Since the Arcata-Ferndale Race back in May, we had been continuing to make improvements. Perhaps the most significant were the road wheels. Melisa Boyd of Free Wheelie gave me their old ATV wheels when they upgraded to custom built wheels. These became our off road wheels. I took the rims from the old ATV wheels and drilled spoke holes in them. I bought spokes and high strength rims and made two new wheels out of the parts. When I showed one of these off at the Peak Sports, where I bought all the bike parts this year, the wheels got lots of attention.

That was before the 4th of July parade here in Corvallis.

The supplier of watch faces, that we were making badges and bribes out of, didn't come thru. We gave them almost six months, but they seem to operate on a different calendar. We had to find another solution. So we made a mold and cast about 40 badges out of Sculpie. It was on sale half price. And after painting, they looked rather nice.

Somebody lost one of our helmet covers, so Julianna made another. We repaired the graviton reflectors and the temporal wake disrupters. I improved the new water drive so it could be drag lifted out of the water without damage. I also got rid of some of the weight by shortening the lift cables considerably. I cleaned and adjusted all the chains.

This preparation was pretty minimal, but it was all we managed.

daVinci Days was the weekend of Friday the 19th thru Sunday the 21st. The weather was a bit warm at over 80F, but otherwise excellent. For Friday and part of Saturday, we hung a good sized car battery from Rex to power its special effects. This was so the main (expensive) batteries would last longer. Friday was the art judging and much of the engineering judging. We were given two minutes to "impress the art judges". The whole team approached the stage with Rex. As we got close I called out "deploy graviton reflectors" and out they popped. A moment later I called out to "fire up the temporal wake disrupters" and all eleven started spinning. I then explained to the audience that we were about to demonstrate a time jump and that they should stand back. I fiddled with the dash board and then looked around worried. Brian and I got out and fiddled with the graversion containment vessel. I then called out: "Is there a particle physicist in the crowd? Our fusion power generator is acting up." No response. So I announced a change in plans. "We will now sing a song." Brian had put together the song the past couple of nights.

• It's a scientific marvel from a distant future time.
• It's a wonderful invention from a crazy genius mind.
• It has changed the face of history and politics and crime.
• And it's lots of fun to own.

• We called on Cleopatra and her pyramids so fine.
• The royal courts of Europe offered food and song and wine.
• In Rome we looked up Nero for a hot and wild time.
• And TimeRex parties on!

• As we journeyed past the century our fusion engine stalled.
• So we opened up our history book to see who we should call.
• It told us that daVinci Days were lots of fun for all.
• Now Corvallis hears our song.

• For the glory, a Kinetic race to run.
• For the glory, what a heck-of-a-lot of fun.
• daVinci Days are known through time as great for everyone.
• So TimeRex came along.

Saturday was the first day of the race. But first came the parade. We have a tradition of having the pit crew drive in the parade in Corvallis. This has two advantages. It better shares the glory among the team. And it keeps the race pilots cooler on a very hot day. This year I had arranged so that any two of the three pit eligible crew could take this honor. Unfortunately not one of the pit crew showed up. So TimeRex was not in the parade. I don't know if the judges docked us points for that, but I'm sure it didn't help us with the spectators.

But it did have one advantage. We were placed second in the lineup. First was Rob Hitchcock, the speed deamon. So there was no way we would be caught behind a slow poke. We had the new road wheels, so we were faster than before. But there were still several faster road vehicles. Still, we traveled a long distance without hardly getting passed. This seemed odd. But then Philip reported that the Pt Townsend team had brought their Kinetic Kops who were deliberately stopping and misdirecting the racers behind us. We only missed it because we were well ahead when this started.

I had to chuckle. But I probably would not have chuckled if I was in that holdup. It really was cheating beyond the pale. It looks like something that deserves a new rule.

This first day of the race was mostly a road race. In years past, this included the climb up to bald hill park on a rutty dirt path. But the city had paved the path this year, removing the challenge. So the Wizard added another leg to the race and also added a sand pile.

In the grand old tradition of Kinetic Sculpture, the sand pile was not tested before the race. It had a couple of unexpected features. First of all it was a little too narrow to be safely traveled by the really big vehicles. They tended to straddle the sand part, leaving their left and right wheels on the opposite sides of the peak. Since having a vehicle fall over on its side while slipping down a hill would be dangerous, this was made optional for large vehicles.

The second feature was simply that it was more difficult than expected. Too few of the Kinstic Sculptures made it thru the sand pit. Unfortunately Rex was among the ones who failed this test. It was rather a downer to be eliminated from the Leo awards so early in the race. But we decided to run the rest of the race as tho we still had a chance. Much of the reason for this decision was curiosity about how well our new wheels would perform.

The second day is the Mud Bog and River Race. We got into line for the Mud Bog earlier than we usually manage. We were third.

Approaching the mud bog.

The first two vehicles got stuck in the mud. The second of these two was Rob Hitchcock, who almost always gets Best Speed. I thought we were gonners for sure. We started making contingency plans for when we got stuck. But when our time came we were suprised to learn that all that preparation putting on newer, larger, ATV wheels had been a good choice. We just kept chugging thru the mud.

Mind you, we were moving pretty slow. Its hard to rotate those wheels when they are about a foot deep in peanut butter. But we were able to maintain a consistent speed. And the crowd went wild! We were showing them that "yes, this mud can be beaten".

This was the big advantage to being early in line. The crowd was fresh and really rooting for the first team to make it. We just had the good luck to be that first team.

I took it easy after that and missed all the other mud crossings. But I heard some good stories.

If you remember Killer Tomato from last year, the mud was his nemesis. Killer Tomato has the pilot hanging from the axle between two enormous wheels. The pilot made some changes from last year. He added the capability to shift his body weight way out on the pedal structure, greatly increasing the torque he could apply to the wheels. That seemed to do it. He wasn't fast thru the mud, but he made it.

A down side to this years mud is that I heard a vehicle with nothing more than mountain bike wheels was successful. That suggests to me that perhaps the mud was too thin. But I'm really not sure. Its possible that this was possible all along. Sometimes we just assume the obvious won't work.

While the other vehicles were slogging thru the mud, Scientists On Sabatical (SOS) decided to give their vehicle a quick float test. Their "quick test" wasn't. They got caught by the river current and started the river leg of the race ahead of schedule. SOS was one of those last minute, thow together what you have, vehicles. Evidently they had some trouble with their floatation. When we passed them in the river they looked more like flotsam than like a vehicle. The pilots were in the water up to their necks. But they were still cheerful, warning us about some snags. Evidently they had found out the hard way that the Willamette has lots of snags.

But I'm getting ahead of myself...

At the Arcata-Ferndale race earlier this year we had used the new prop based water drive for the first time. But at the time the structure was unprotected so that we had to use the oars until I felt safe lowering the prop. Since that race I had added protection to the prop so that it could be dragged below the vehicle during water entry and exit. This meant we could do the water leg without using the oars. But of course this had not been tested. Fortunately the concept worked.

In past races we had sometimes not gotten deep enough into the water on entry. This meant that our pontoons would drag. This would be more a problem with the new style water entry because we wouldn't have the oars handy to push off with. Evidently Brian was very concerned by that because when we rolled into the water he didn't hit the brakes until my pant bottoms were wet. (That was not in the script.) But entering deep worked. We made a smooth water transition.

Once in the River Rex made reasonably good time. I did notice that River eddies are so strong that Rex's steering was stretched to the limit. So an improvement I want to make before next year is to increase the rudder size.

The river exit took longer than it should have. But once we realized that Rex wanted to exit almost parallel to the shore, we had no trouble.

	Exiting the Willamette.
	Made it!

The road trip back to the Finish Line was fairly smooth. We stopped a block before the line to set up the equipment for a dramatic finish. Then as we crossed the finish line we deployed the Graviton Reflectors and turned on the Temporal Wake Disruptors. Unfortunately there were only about three people at the Finish Line. But at least they got our show.

• Best Overall - Hammer Dog by June Moxon
• Best Local - Free Wheelie by Melissa Boyd, Don Reid, and team
• Best Speed - Meet the Beetles by Ken Beidleman
• Best Art - Late Knights and Crescent Wenches by Dwayne Flatmo
• Best Engineering - Killer Tomato
• Teddy Bear - Panther Pride

At the ceremony the Kinetic Wizard, Raan Young, announced that they were not counting the Sand Hill toward the Leo. (You will recall that the Leo indicates that you finished the race without pushing your vehicle.) But since there were a few vehicles that did all of the race including the sand, they created a new category "Super Leo".

But because they had eliminated the Sand requirement, TimeRex got a Leo. Its a good thing we decided to continue the race as tho we still had a shot at the Leo. There is a lesson here.

The weekend after the race, we took TimeRex back out to the fairgrounds to challenge the Sand Hill again. After the race we had thought of several things that we could have and should have done. It turns out that the most important of these (in my opinion) was lowering the tire pressure. I completely spaced this one out during the race. What a pity. TimeRex showed it was capable of handling the Sand with the right tire pressure. But we also created some new and rather creative ways to run TimeRex. We should have no problem in the future (assuming we remember to do what is needed). If the Super Leo awards still exist next year, we should be able to get one.

On the drive back from the fairgrounds, a bike tire blew out. On close inspection it was clear that it was due to die. This was not a new tire. The rubber was mostly rotted away, leaving a few threads. Clearly both tires must be replaced.

The next race is Port Townsend WA on October 4 and 5. I hope to see you there!