I started the year at Curborough and this was my last event of the year at this purpose made sprint track near Lichfield. Details of the sprint track including track plan and aerial photographs can be found HERE
Curborough Sprint Track (from www.curborough.co.uk
)
Going Around Molehill.
My inner wheels are on the curb which is good as it shows I am using all the road.
Exiting The Hairpin.
This picture confirms my thought that I need more roll stiffness in the car. I can not increase the front bar
as this will upset the balance and I do not want to fit a rear bar. So I will have to increase the spring rate
all round.
Car Set Up: I do not have any notes on the car set up in my note book but presume it is my standard setup.
Springs: (Front 200 LB/inch, Rear 250 LB/inch)
ARB: Drop link on the rocker in the middle hole and the neutral
position on the bar.
Dampers: Front Bump 6, Rebound 6. Rear Bump 4, Rebound 3.
Differential : 3.91 LSD (7")
The suspension was not changed all day.
Practice 1
64ft......2.51 sec's
Time.....37.86 sec's
Notes: Tramp off the line and the bottom hairpin double apexed. Other people reported that the track was slippery. I did not notice this.
Practice 2
64ft......2.43 sec's
Time.....36.76 sec's
Notes: I did a few burnouts before the start and the start felt very good. This is reflected in the time, 2.43 sec's is my fastest 64ft time. I had slight oversteer in the faster bends.
Practice 3
64ft......2.71 sec's
Time.....37.99 sec's
Notes: Lots of tramp off the line and changed from 1st to 4th.
Run 1 Dry and sunny
64ft......2.46 sec's
Time.....36.69 sec's
Run 2
64ft......2.56 sec's
Time.....36.64 sec's
Notes: Could not go much quicker without feeling very scared!
Summary: A good year of competing. The car feels well balanced and is a joy to drive. At my first meeting here at the start of the year I ran 38.43 seconds, so over the year I have improved 1.79 seconds or 4.65%.
I would like to try stiffer springs on the car say 20% stiffer. However to do this I will have to get clever with the springs. The current springs do not rattle on full droop and the car sits at the designed ride height. Stiffer springs that keep the car at ride height will rattle on droop. Fortunately Eibach do springs that will solve this problem but they are not cheap!
More power would also be useful and I would like to cure the wheel tramp. This could be the paddle clutch so I may try an organic plate. The other problem could be my method of attaching the wishbones to the chassis. The plates are strong in tension and compression but not as strong in rotation.
