Ok, had a good run this weekend. Both on moderate / high speed track (Saturday) as well as on small technical track (Sunday). My setup for both tracks were the same. I actually did not do major changes on the basic setup since the last races just to keep some of the setup variables constant for my testing. For those interested, they are as below;
Suspension geometry Front:
Downstops: +0mm
Set-up ride height: 8.5 mm
Camber Left: -2.5 degree
Camber Right: -2.5 degree
Track-width: 200mm
Toe-in: -2.0 degree (toe-out)
Caster setting (mm in front): 6mm
Steering block type: FC (new)
Suspension geometry Rear:
Downstops: 5 mm
Set-up ride height: 7.5 mm
Camber Left: -4 degree
Camber Right: -4 degree
Track-width: 199mm
Spacer on upright: 2.5mm
Toe-in: 2 degree (toe-in)
Shockabsorbers Front:
Springs: red
Oil: 60W (Trinity Shock Oil)
Holes: 1
Cilinder type: aluminum
Shock bladder: stock (black) with foam inserts
Shock-tower position: on bearingblock
Shockabsorbers Rear:
Springs: red (Veteq)
Oil: 60W (Trinity Shock Oil)
Holes: 4
Cilinder type: aluminum
Shock bladder: red (soft) with foam inserts
Shock-tower position: on bearingblock
Anti-roll bar front:
Thickness: std.
Position: 45 degree (medium)
Anti-roll bar rear:
Thickness: adjustable with front male blades
Position: 0 degree (flat - softest)
Tires Front:
Make: Speedmind
Hardness Left: 37
Hardness Right: 37
Diameter: 60.5 mm
Tires rear:
Make: Speedmind
Hardness Left: 37
Hardness Right: 37
Diameter: 65 mm
Transmission:
Pinion 1st: 15
Pinion 2nd: 18
Gear 1st: 50
Gear 2nd: 46
Pulley rear axle: 47
Pulley layshaft middle: 16
Pulley layshaft side: 18
Pulley middle shaft side: 24
Front axle:
Type: One way
Rear axle:
Type: ball differential
Diff. setting: hard
I have not played on our local track for some time and I decided to go with 37 shore front and rear Speedmind tires. I liked it a lot. I was still using the 4.5 mm split in the front and rear tires. At the end of playing 5 to 6 tanks, I ended with a split of 3.5 mm between the front and rear.
I was actually too lazy to go back and mount the the upper front arms back to stock positions. I left it where it is and decided to test the car again with the same Lola shell that I thought gave me handling problems earlier. This time, I used the guerney strip (170102) in the tail of the Lola shell. I think about 3 or 4 mm exposed and the car now handles very nicely. Enough rear traction but at the same time, the car transitions very fast and corners very sharply. Besides that, I rebuilt my rear shocks and installed the softer red shock bladders (909446). I noticed that this time, the rebound was very fast on the shocks. Anyway, I also narrowed the rear end a little using the 950 upper rear adjustable arms. I did not use the smaller hex wheel adapters because with the 0 offset Speedmind rear wheels, I could use the stock 11mm aluminum hex spacers and still be at 199mm.
I'm please to note that the car has lots of on power and off power steering. I think too much such that the rear wheels spun a little mid corner turning into the apex. Well, I actually solved that by turning down the steering EPA by about 15% and the car rolled in and out of corners nicely.
Initially, I tightened the rear FPS diff a little to balance out the off power oversteer and I found that I got a surge or power out of the corners. I thought I would loose off power steering a lot because I made the rear diff quite stiff. It didn't change the amount of off power steering much but what I noticed is that at moderate speed sweepers, the car's rear end "floats" around controllably. Seemingly, wherever I pointed my steering off power, the rear end will "float" the same direction. On power in the middle of the sweeper, the car cuts in very nicely and out to into the straights. I needed to be careful with the throttle coming out of the sweeper as there was a lot of on pwoer steering. I believe this is what is meant by 1/8th scale style driving.
Brakes? Yes, the Mugen teflon brake pads does slow down the car nicely after the high speed straight before the apex. The rear ends did not lock and braking line was straight. I'm wondering what kind of performance would the new Serpent brake pads would give...
So my guess now is that the front upper arm mod together with the smaller front tires is a keeper contrary to my conclusion the previous week that the two mods will make the car's front roll center too high. It could be the difference that the guerney strip made to the rear end of the car or the new shock bladders that are giving me better rear end grip. Or perhaps my idea of using softer front than rear tires to get same wear rate backfired and did not provide the car handling I wanted. In any case, I have a sneaky suspicion that it could be the rear shocks.
Next week, I'll try the Protoform Stratus 2.1 TC shell and report any differences.
My apologies for the long winded report. It's just that there are still lots of things to discover with the car.
