Tornado_Racing

iTrader: (2)

NEXUS..............

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Nexus

iTrader: (42)

Tony,

Thanks for all the assistance. PRS customer service has been open awesome..

Rob Phillips

iTrader: (6)

Guy your car looked pretty fast this past weekend. I couldn't tell if the inconsistancies came from you or the setup I would like to wheel it some time. I ran a one way with my SD at HT and I was faster with it. I don't use brakes, so thats not the problem, but the inherent push that comes on power with an oneway is what keeps me away from it. Good luck this weekend, and don't beat up on Rumple too bad.

teamgp

Definitely me. At first it was the nerves while thinking about all the big names in attendance. Then it became the pride as I over-drove the car too much before settling down during each run. The push problem was solved with gobs of caster, in-board toe-out, and very little front droop though. It doesn't push even with a low downforce body like the G6. However, I prefer the Mazda 6 because it inspires more confidence and feels like your fingers are actually connected to the steering rods.

AJ Goin

where do you find most of your set up information?

sitting duck

http://home.tiscali.be/be067749/58/

This is where i get my setup info.

tonyv

iTrader: (1)

Well, well, I finally get a chance to have a look at this forum again and...

Frankly I think those of you that discard Teamgp's "project" so easily are losing out on some very interesting findings. But then that's off course up to you. I have found his info very usefull. Moreover I would like to point out that if you want to be better than the rest it is sometimes a good idea to "think out of the box". If you simply do what everyone else is doing you will do ok, sure. But then the only way to win is to be the best driver there. However it is also possible to win by having the best car on the track. And how do you do that? Exactly, by running a better and therefore different setup.

During testing Jilles and I allways try different things. We don't just take a "good" setup and refine it, we also make major changes and start from there. Those of you that have some knowledge of mathematical optimization problems will know that many problems are non-linear and as a result have many localized optimums. To find the global optimum you have to start your search from many different starting points, find the best refinement for each and then find the best in that set of optimal refinements. Frankly I am glad that Teamgp does this for us as this is the type of project many of us would never even consider. Also don't forget, if something does NOT work it is also usefull info.

Finally, it has been implied (reading between the lines) that Teamgp (Guy) does not have sufficient experience to be acknowledged as a setup expert. Well, if he's not a setup expert then I don't know who is. The reason he is a moderator on the XRay forum is because he knows what he is talking about. Some would say that I AM a setup expert (most would argue ) and I for one DO acknowledge Teamgp as one. It is why I endorsed his signing. More importantly Juraj and Mario also see Teamgp as an asset or they would not have signed him. I am sure most of you will agree that Juraj knows more about RC cars and RC car setup than each one of us...

teamgp

Here are a few of my sources. However, you still have to use the ol noggin to put it all together when understanding how to design a base setup to start with and the chassis dynamics once you're underway and dialing it in.

1. Books

* Hudy Setup Book
* XXX Main
* Engineer to win by Carroll Smith (formula one ideas) - You won't use half the book as it deals with scale parts (brakes, etc.) & materials, but the second half is great for setup.
* Chassis Engineering by Herb Adams (NASCAR/TRANSAM ideas) - The entire book is great, including a section on how to design a base setup from scratch and how to design your own chassis

2. People - I'm always asking questions and observing, even when others think I'm not

3. Last but not least, the track - The owners of our LHS might as well have put me on the payroll. I'm testing or practicing every week and you can learn a lot with a simple short practice session or two at lunch every week.

teamgp

Edited...

Thanks for the compliment big T.

Excuse my original response, as I normally don't take compliments very well.

BigDogRacing

iTrader: (12)

Tony, I appreciate your POV on the subject. There's obviously no point in arguing since you and Mario feel that way. It surprises me that you say you have read many books and done a lot of testing with Jilles, yet there are a number of things Guy writes that are incorrect. It's not worth my time to go back and read all 500 pages that he's written, but if I remember correctly, a lot of it made me think "he'll find out that isn't right" or "it doesn't work that way about 90% of the time". No matter...

So anyway, since you are here I'm curious- how is Jilles testing with the nitro foams working? What about the nitro foams with a oneway and the Mazda 6 body? Has he worn the paint off of his 38 lb springs yet? Oh wait, surely Jilles isn't running his car 4 spring rates harder than everyone else, wasn't he the one helping tune the Xray team cars in Florida by putting the softest springs they had, pulling bulkhead screws out and dremelling the chassis' to give more flex? There's no doubt in my mind that an awesome racer and tuner like Jilles tests "out of the box", but I would venture to guess that when he makes 2 spring rate changes and his car gets slower each time, he doesn't keep going that direction. That would be not only "out of the box", but "out of the whole damn warehouse".

Your paragraph about linear and non-linear optimization was very eloquently written. I'm sure you lost a few people there- although I don't see the point in using 50 cent phrases to describe a nickel's worth of information. Fact is, you basically rewrote what I said earlier- that tuning changes may have more or less effect on the performance under different variables and most importantly that tuning is not just a matter of a bunch of indiviual changes, but a combination of them all where each parameter compliments the others. A tuning "zen" if you will- where a car and it's components are working together so well that it usually doesn't even look very fast ont he track, and doesn't feel all that fast to the driver, but the laptimes tell it all... ahhhhh

Well, if the professionals say dump the double pinks and diff, I guess I better get to digging out my nitro boxes.... gotta go!! LOL

BTW- I hope you guys can take some ribbing like men- if not, there's no point in having a forum.

tonyv

iTrader: (1)

Yes, you got the Zen right and then missed the whole point of that Zen. If moving to harder springs makes the car slower, is it then the harder springs, OR would it be possible to build a faster setup by starting to change other parameters taking harder springs as the base? That's what I meant by taking different starting points and trying to find an optimal setup from there.

As to Jilles, no he doesn't test with harder springs very often, but every now and then he does, just to confirm that he cannot find a better setup that way. Sofar he has not. That does not mean there is no way to do that, what it means is that we did not find it. Maybe Teamgp will (or has). That's not what interest me in his posts. It is the information on what each change did to the car under what circumstances. And his thoughts on why the car behaved that way, sometimes completely differently from what you had expected .

It wasn't too long ago that in rubber tyre racing all the top drivers were convinced you had to run a front one-way possibly in combination with a one-way pulley to be fast. First people started to remove the one-way pulley, and nowadays more often then not we run a spool. Since there are obviously some basic truths that allways work I assume the top drivers are on the wrong road here? If one-ways were fastest before, they must be fastest now right? Well, apparantly not. Not in the least because the cars have changed. What worked on an FK'04 will not necessarily work well on an FK'05.

Don't get me wrong, I do see your point and agree with it to some extent. The problem with books however is allways that they focus on the basics that hold true under most circumstances. In many cases these basics are not sufficient to find a good setup. Do we help less experienced drivers more by telling them the basics, or helping them think through what the car is doing, what the effect of a certain change was and why it had this effect? True, a more ambitious proposition, but one that I personally feel has much more value as it explains the "dark art" of setting up a car. For the basics, read the books...

BTW, no harm in having some good discussions and taking differing points of view. That's where progress starts

dawgmeat

iTrader: (9)

To make a long story short TeamGP help you with showing you whay doesn't work

tonyv

iTrader: (1)

No, what works, what doesn't, under what circumstances and why.

kerry

iTrader: (1)

come on guys, move on. all information helps one way or another, tonyv is right, teamgp enjoys what he does and puts the time in to help others thats what xray finds valuable in him. i like to think we are adults, lets try not to sling mud at each other. if you dont agree with whats being said, step up and contribute, dont slander. its guys like tony, mario, teamgp and others that make this and other xray threads part of a great racing package. you guys get my vote keep up the good work

Pyramid

They guys seen things from different point of view, expert and novice but not necesserely they are expert and novice respectively. So both are right and assets to Xray! just dont get along which they dont have to as once (correct me if I`m wrong) got their car for free while the other paid for themselves. The bad thing is: if once they feel not like belong to the team, they will walk out from the brand they have been loyal to. I`ve seen this (too many times) from reseller point of view which mean only the manufacturer/distributor that will lose at the end.