Ian You should feel pleased about that against Guido, he is a very good driver I don't doubt your straight line speed Ian, I just question your speed actually through the corner, as I said the slightest of marginal lifts before entry, which you say is at the first brake marker (150-200m before turn in) probably results in a wash off of speed of up to 60ks, as I said my SR8 drops 40ks in an instant & your car would be the same with floor venturis etc, I just don't think you are going through turn 1 at anything like 290ks, I think it is very easy to think one is faster into that corner than one actually is. I generally have a little look at my speed well before my throttle lift but have no time after that, I'm seriously looking & trying to hit my turn in point accurately with no time to look elsewhere, I suspect you are doing the same, which could be up to 200m before turn giving a long time for speed to wash off & on exit when one reapplies throttle the revs jump again quickly. We have broken down my data at every corner to entry, mid & exit corner speeds & I was originally loosing 0.7 sec time through turn 1 compared to my Pro's data overlay, it has taken me many, many laps to get even up to 250ks & now .4 sec lost on that corner to him. I kept thinking I was lifting minuscule amounts but was in fact loosing 30-40ks, my butt wasn't telling me the truth of it, but the data was. I don't doubt it feels like 290ks but IMO that sort of speed through turn 1 requires a very special car & huge skill level that I don't think any of us on here quite have, maybe as I said the likes of Mark, Dan or Marc or maybe another Pro yes cheers Pete
Pete, I bow to your greater experience and will be watching my tacho all the way through in future! One thing I have learned to do is practice going through there off line, because the approach is such a good overtaking spot, as many drivers back off too much and too early. I have sometimes got past 3 cars at once - the closest thing to out braking anyone that I get! I used to be too cautious putting the power down on the exit and the Formula Atlantics would be on my tail again for an easy out-brake at turn 2. In the last race at Retro Speedfest I was buried at the apex and stayed that way till the braking point, which kept them behind me - huge fun! (but don't think about the throttle jamming open...) Ian
I agree turn 1 & turn 2 are favourite spots of mine for overtaking, if you can get into the slipstream of your competitor down the straight & jump out about that first brake marker, get beside them on the inside & take the inside line into the turn & hold your nerve, mostly everyone on the outside will back out of it in my experience. I also agree it is always especially satisfying when you make a pass on someone running similar lap times.
See how much smarter he is than me? The sum of my data logging is how sore my right hip is at the end of the day! I know I've done good if I can't stand up when I get out of the car. I had a really good instructor a couple of years back who would bash the Golf's dashboard if I slowed down too early or too much. I was so worried he'd break something, I did what I was told, in one day I was exiting every turn 20kmh faster.
Visible progress day at the workshop. Because of my repeated oil fires, the heat shielding for the wastegate hoses on the rear right side was literally toasted, so I changed to new black silicone heat shielding, which I think looks much neater. Here's the before and after pics. I also reset the rear camber from -3/4 to -1/2 degrees, which will hopefully help with my rear grip issue. My new clutch ships from AP in the UK on Monday, so I'm on the home run now. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
What a great drive by Whincup. On the same day that Channel 7 decides to try and set a World Record for the number and length of advertisements in a telecast.
Wendy just asked me if it's ok to get out of your car and push it out of the sand. I said, "sure, if your name is Clark Kent."
ooopppssss [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o88lti71yH4]Porsche Carrera Cup Sandown 2014 Race2 Start Huge Crash - YouTube[/ame]
I'd be checking with my mechanic re the last engine out service ..... and if he wanted to come and do the bolts up this time
My new clutch arrived from the UK yesterday, so I can finally start assembling the rest of the car. Quite a different casing design to the original clutch and noticeably less weight. After the usual painstaking attachment of the transmission/rear end, with only a thou or two clearance for the pilot bearing and the clutch spline, I had it working. Pedal is much lighter, almost like an old Ferrari road clutch, compared to before when it was super heavy. Hope it can cope with 900hp Image Unavailable, Please Login
So I jumped on the AP site and checked the part number against their specs. 290 ft lb. That's about 1/3rd the torque that a DFX makes. Email to VDS in Indianapolis, sure enough the f-wit poms have supplied the wrong pressure plate. A typical experience dealing with the UK, they ALWAYS fuick up, they ALWAYS treat the customer like an idiot and they never give a toss.
For 2 weeks I've been keeping my cool dealing with the UK end of this, who insisted on me organising the freight from this end and twice cocked it up without telling me. Then to spend a solid day yesterday assembling, to discover it was all wasted effort. I've bought 3 clutches from the USA, never a problem. This one required a custom spline, hence the UK.
True enough, thought it was too good to be true, having a road car clutch effort. It's the first challenge you have to overcome learning to drive these things, controlling such a heavy pedal. It's why 1st time drivers stall so often.
Did discover something useful today. I've had oil fires with this car every event I've run. Have chased down multiple oil leaks but knew there was one on the back of the right bank cyl head, that needed a tear down to fix. As I started to dismantle again today, I had a good look at the clamp that joins the headers to the turbo inlet. There is only one position for this clamp and, due to a slightly incorrect bend in the header collector, an exhaust leak that just happens to line up with a gap in the clamp and blasts hot gas at the silicone sealant on the rear head cover. So run the engine hard for a race or two = silicone burnt out = oil leaking onto red hot exhaust. I've made up a heat shield to fit between the exhaust and the head, hopefully a permanent fix. Image Unavailable, Please Login
Good thing you sussed the clutch - The Poms are no worse than the Italians; I've plenty of horror stories of buying race parts for Alfas & Lancias. Once (not for me fortunately) they swapped a complete engine from the one on the dyno to something else - still with the same #. Is it going to be together for November 29/30 EC?
That's what I'm trying to achieve, was hoping to run the rebuilt engine in at the next test day 7th Nov but no chance now. Will probably take 2 weeks to get the correct clutch here. So I'll have to run it in at Friday practice and hope there are no major problems.
Have they got 355 clutches ? Mine was slipping in 2nd gear at EC yet seemed ok in all other gears .... weird
