TC3Racer

I am faily new to onroad racing and I was wondering what techniques you guys use to get around the corners fast. For instance coming in real hot and slamin on the brakes and then punching it through the turn, or coming in fast and let it coast throught the turn and when you straiten out accelerate. Also include how you steer, for instance if you come in wide and exit real tight or vise versa or staying tight throughout the turn, or the traditional wat for the 90 degree turns, coming in wide goin as straight as possible at the middle of the turn and ending up wide on the exit.

Speedo

Try and keep a nice ark going, a wider, more open ark carries mores speed through the turn than the short tight one. Say you have a 180 turn around a pipe, you'll want to come in wide, cut across and come close to the pipe, and exit wide. That is ideal, but it depends alot on the corner. If there is another corner after it, taking this approach may not set you up right for the next corner, so you might want to take a tighter line exiting the corner. I never use brakes, that depends alot on the track though. Try and find the tightest line that carries to most speed. It depends ALOT on the corner, though. Best thing to do, is pick a corner, and watch the fast guys take it. There is a 10 mb mod race on the internet that is worth downloading and watching. Its the Cleveland Warm Up 2000, Grand Rapids
Sedan Mod "Foam" A Main and the URL is http://rcvehicles.about.com/library/...vid_sedans.htm you need real player too.

Speedo

TSR6

iTrader: (5)

There was an article written by Stephen Bess that apeared in RCNitro Magazine not to long ago.

It is availible online here http://www.rcnitro.com/articles/driving_techs.asp

Trips

iTrader: (16)

I find that how and when you transfer weight makes a big difference to your corner speed. One thing that seems to help me is to slightly load the outside tires before the actual turn in. Approacing the turn, I'm not right at the outside edge, more near the middle. A few yards before the turn in point I'll drift out toward the outside edge then as i straighten out the weight gets onto the outside tires. I then want to start the turn in before the car settles. By already having the weight settled on the outside tires you don't have to wait for the weight to transfer when you start turning in.

Another thing to try to do is when you have two consecutive corners with a short straight between them, it's very helpful to try to make one big curve out of it rather than straighten out. You'll probably travel a little extra distance on the short straight by curving it, but you'll improve your corner speed this way and the lap times will show it.

Trips

TC3Racer

My local track has a big section of switch backs. I'll show you.

Darkseid

iTrader: (9)

I have seen both the "drive in slam breaks and nail the throttle"method and the smooth "flow through the turn method" work well for people. I think if the track is truely challenging, you will most likely end up using both methods on every lap. Some turns just beg to be taken smoothly, and some can be taken quicker if you slowdown more with the breaks then power out.

TurnNBurn

I generally use the smooth approach, mainly because I've had a lot of experience running Mod in the 10th scale pan class. Ten years ago, I used to gear around 5:1 running 9 and 10 turn motors with Panasonic P-170's.

In my experience, I found that it really helps the batteries when you "roll" through the corners. To make passes, I concentrate more on setting up my apexes for the turns in order to complete the pass coming out of the turn. If I'm not able to make the pass coming out of the turn with a late-apex manuever, then I'll try to out brake them going into the next turn if I'm at least able to pull along side of them.

I just recently got back into the hobby after an eight year layoff. The one thing that I see that may be an advantage with today's batteries and the popularity of Touring Cars is that if you have a smooth throttle finger and good batteries, you can use the advantage of 4WD to "drive" the car out of the turns. I think that your speed mid-way through and exiting the turn are more important than your entry speed into the turn. If you have to compromise on your car setup, make sure that you can exit the corner faster than you can enter it.

That's my $.02 on the subject.

Matt M.

iTrader: (26)

man that is a cool track....

TC3Racer

that it its. BK and other factory racers go there every week.

Rog

TC3Racer - So you race at SoCal huh? Hated that layout. Well, at SoCal you'll have to do a little of both. In general, stock racing is gonna require you to maintain speed. Stop and go racing is easier with mod and nitro because power isn't an issue.

TC3Racer

hopefuly I will be racing there. Just have to convince my dad to take me. My esc just fried so I will be out of commision for a couple of weeks, till I can get it fixed from novak.

I was thinking of getting a center one-way from gpm to help maintain speed through the corners without putting on throttle. I have noticed in while doing a figure 8 pattern that if I hold the throttle throughout the turn that it powerslides, but this is on dustty asphalt (parking lot) and dusty tires. It will hopefully be better on the track.

imataquito

hm ... tc3racer i think it depends ...
if u love the car to be stable and easy to drive use full time 4 wheel drive and brake hard going in to turns .. and do setup ur car with a slight push ...(understeer)

approach the coner with full trottle then brake hard till it slows down to a acceptable speed on that turn thn turn in and once u reach the apex full trottle again .. u should be fast that way
-(u gota experiment to find the acceptable speed on the turn 4 ur car- no slides and fully on the edge of traction on the fastest drive line - trust me it aint easy )

OR

setup the car with lots of push - not too much though
then stary turning in far from the turn SLIGHTLY ... then when u reach the turn hit the brakes hard and turn in hard once its after the apex and the car is pointing QUITE stright punch the trottle...

BUT if u can handle twichiness on your front end and u have a very smooth stearing finger use one ways and it will be faster
just let off trottle b4 the turn and once u get quite close to the turn slowly turn in and ONCE ur car is pointed the direction u want (sometimes even b4 the apex) punch the trottle ...

dont worry if its a tight turn or u r entering the turn too fast...
because if u have the one ways on the car will naturally FOLLOW the line u have set - like i said above ' once u getthe car pointed the direction u want'

its hard to explain ... just try it out i am sure u will understand what i mean
if u use one ways JUST MAKE SURE U HAVE GOOD REAR TRACTION
or else u will be spinning out on every turn
and if u curently dont ahve one ways in and u pop in a one way unit u have to change the setup quite a bit to find the ideal balance

and if u dont have enuff rear traction u will have to control ur trottle finger while exiting and this increases ur lap time

it might be hard with one ways at first but once u get a hang of it u will never want to go back to full time 4WD
it just gives u soo much conering speed compared to full time 4WD

btw ... i think ur local track is more suited for one way cars due to the amount of switchbacks

just my 0.002 cents

TC3Racer

I think I will be getting one soon. I noticed that the AE one locks up the front end so that the diff is eliminated. This desing breaks cvds all the time in nitro cars (serpent impulse), but I found the GPM one way and it is built into the input shaft of the front end.

Another thing I have been pondering what would happen if u used the GPM one way in the front and using the AE one way/diff locker in the rear. I bet it would fly through the corners but it would go completely out of control when exiting the corner.

TPhalen

iTrader: (2)

Well, first off, there is no way to put the oneway in the rear, unless, of course, you have connections at AE that can install the oneway bearing backwards...oh, ya, tried that....and it SUCKED ASS!!!! heh heh....

The center oneway on the shaft and the oneway diff are 2 totally different animals on the TC3. We've tried the oneway, then the oneway and the shaft oneway, and then just the shaft oneway. Personally, I think the oneway diff is by far the fastest. I wouldn't spend the money, nor recommend, the oneway shaft, but, again, that's my personal opinion. It didn't make the car that much different for the $30 or whatever it costs. It did, however seem to mellow out the oneway diff, but took away some of the aggressiveness of the car. I didn't like that.

Oneway diff - Plusses - more cornerspeed (in most instances), slightly higher top speed, NEVER HAVE TO REBUILD IT.

Oneway diff - minuses - no brakes, requires you to change you driving style to something a little more smooth, a bit harder to 'battle' with it.

I've always been a big believer in 2 diffs and massive brakes. I always figured if you could outbrake someone into a corner, you can make the pass, and, with 2 diffs, that is easy to do against a oneway car. He has to back off a bit sooner to make a corner.

BUT...

Since I've switched to the oneway and learned to drive it, I'll never go back. It's just faster....

imataquito

TPhalen-'Since I've switched to the oneway and learned to drive it, I'll never go back. It's just faster....'

lol i too have the same belive as u but not anymore ..
one ways is JUST FASTER way faster