Well a rather lengthy delay in writing up the Brands race weekend. Nothing to do with it being a rather disappointing event points wise and more to do with concentrating on other activities. I actually had a really good time at Brands despite the dramas. In the last week I and a number of others have been trying to organise a team of RGB drivers to take part in the end of season Birkett relay race. The race takes part on Saturday 28th October at Silverstone, so after the final round on the championship. The race lasts for 6 hours and each team runs a relay of drivers in their own cars. We have submitted an entry for a team called "Posh 'n BECs" with 6 drivers, each running our own RGB cars, The 'Posh' part will be for Neil as he has a double barreled surname and not because he looks like Victoria Beckham and the BEC part is of course because we are running 'B'ike 'E'ngined 'C'ars !
Hopefully we have our application submitted in time as the event is normally well oversubscribed.
I have always liked the idea of endurance racing and this should be a really blast. We have a great team of drivers from a social point of view and as the results are based upon consistency handicaps around each driver/car combinations fastest lap of Silverstone you don't need to be the fastest drivers to do really well. If we can all run consistently and maybe improve upon our previous times at the circuit we could come out very well. Anyway its an opportunity to have some fun at the end of the season.
More later when we have confirmation and of course the details on the 2 races at Brands when I get a chance to write them up!
Monday, June 26, 2006
Thursday, June 22, 2006
Brands Hatch June 10th - Qualify Report
Well for once this year the forecast was looking really good for a race weekend. Whilst the F1 boys were baking at Silverstone we were contemplating the effect of 40+deg of track temperature at Brands.
Tony, James and I arrived at Brands some time after 8pm the night before, I unloaded the car whilst Tony and James put up the tent. It was to be our first camping adventure at a race circuit. Just as the light was going, we all went for a very revealing walk around the circuit. There are some curbs which are much more severe than they look from within the car and others where the painted curbs overlap onto just bog standard tarmac. In the later case that’s a simple extension of the circuit which I would never have used if I had not seen it in person.
Signon was at an early 7:30am in preparation for a 7:45 scrutineering session and then almost straight away out to the assembly area for a 9am race. I guessed with a joint A, B and C class qualify that there would be problems with space on the track but there was the added fun of trying to guess what tyre pressure to start with and whether a 15min session would put the tyres over the top.
So out in the first pack in qualify and people were messing about with speeding up and then dropping back to get some space when we would have been much better off just all going for it and making space with subtle changes in pack rather than completely messing up each others laps all the time. The first 5 or so laps were completely written off with other cars well of the pace and running inconsistent lines which makes it really hard to get past. After that the car was not feeling to good, initially I put it down to the temperature but then it felt inconsistent which did not help the confidence to really push. As the time went on the steering was get progressively stiffer which was very worrying. On one run through the chicane I got it a little out of shape, in fact this lap ended up being my quickest. On the next lap I did roughly the same but entered the corner even quicker because of a better run out of Graham Hill bend. So more of a slide to catch and increasingly stiff steering meant that I went off, well that’s my excuse anyway. Interesting trip over the grass though! After that I decided to call it a day for the qualify session and pulled into the pits. In the pits it was obvious that the bearing that supports the steering column had run out of grease and started to seize up. Fairly simple to fix, with excellent support from Neil C-B for his supply of grease, cheers mate. Looking back at the on-board video the track in front of me when I chose to pull in was looking much clearer. Oh well first time for a mechanical problem during qualify and I had at least set times for both races.
I was in fact hoping to run at the front of the grid for the weekend, I think my expectations have grown a little since the last time!
5th on the grid for race 1 and a dismal 12th on the grid for the second race. Should be interesting.
Post qualify I also realized that the car was still setup at the front for the wet race we did at Thruxton. Dampers rather soft then for a dry hot race! Now that would make a bit of difference wouldn’t it.
Thursday, June 08, 2006
Prep for Brands
So the car is now prep'ed for Brands to the point that I could strap it up, load the car and go if everything gets manic between now and Friday evening. I have a few other items to do like fuel up the car and refill the Jerry cans, check tyre temp but I could do those at the track if I need to.
Last night, I moved the mounting points for the oil cooler so that it is almost touching the radiator in an attempt to aid air flow through and therefore increase the oil cooling effect. I can't quite get the top as close as I would like as the bottom mounts are on the bonnet hinge bar and that's not horizontal. Anyway its much better than before and I have added a horizontal splitter that runs from underneath the oil cooler both backwards to the radiator and forwards about 4 inches which hopefully will help direct the air through.
I guess Saturday will be the real test for this - forecast is for 25deg so that's 10deg higher than I have run the Fury at before. Dry ice anyone?
Last night, I moved the mounting points for the oil cooler so that it is almost touching the radiator in an attempt to aid air flow through and therefore increase the oil cooling effect. I can't quite get the top as close as I would like as the bottom mounts are on the bonnet hinge bar and that's not horizontal. Anyway its much better than before and I have added a horizontal splitter that runs from underneath the oil cooler both backwards to the radiator and forwards about 4 inches which hopefully will help direct the air through.
I guess Saturday will be the real test for this - forecast is for 25deg so that's 10deg higher than I have run the Fury at before. Dry ice anyone?
Wednesday, June 07, 2006
Thruxton Telemetry - Qualify Laps Compared
Comparing dry qualify fastest and second fastest laps
Lap 6 – 1:25.82
Lap 7 – 1:25.66
Lap 7 was slower from the start all the way through to Goodwood (had traffic to pass in the complex). My lap 7 line through Noble was neater, missing the bumps on the exit and giving me a better transition into the entry of Goodwood. This is represented by the first green line (showing an improved sector) on the trackmap. I managed a better run out of Goodwood, probably due to a better line and that makes quite a difference down to church (first part of the medium thickness green line on the trackmap). Then I get a better run through Church itself and that makes the difference all the way through to the end of the lap (thickest green line shown on the trackmap). The improvements in the last part of the lap can be seen from the top speeds. On my fastest lap I maxed out at 132mph compared with 127mph on the second best lap. If I am able to combine the first half of lap 6 with the second half of lap 7 that lap would have been a 1:25 dead. .
Lap 6 – 1:25.82
Lap 7 – 1:25.66
Lap 7 was slower from the start all the way through to Goodwood (had traffic to pass in the complex). My lap 7 line through Noble was neater, missing the bumps on the exit and giving me a better transition into the entry of Goodwood. This is represented by the first green line (showing an improved sector) on the trackmap. I managed a better run out of Goodwood, probably due to a better line and that makes quite a difference down to church (first part of the medium thickness green line on the trackmap). Then I get a better run through Church itself and that makes the difference all the way through to the end of the lap (thickest green line shown on the trackmap). The improvements in the last part of the lap can be seen from the top speeds. On my fastest lap I maxed out at 132mph compared with 127mph on the second best lap. If I am able to combine the first half of lap 6 with the second half of lap 7 that lap would have been a 1:25 dead. .
Thruxton Telemetry - Comparing wet and dry
Had a chance to run through some of the telemetry from Thruxton. I wanted to review the main differences between wet and dry and also look at if there was potential to improve on my qualify dry lap time as well.
g-force circle
The G-force circle comparison of wet and dry shows a reduction in grip of around 0.7g in lateral cornering force and 0.5g less in braking ability
Track overlay
You can see from the following track overlay that the main differences in the wet are through the slow complex section and the fast run that follows on from Church corner which is obviously heavily effected by the lack of grip in that corner and the effect is seen all the way on the run to the end of the lap.
g-force circle
The G-force circle comparison of wet and dry shows a reduction in grip of around 0.7g in lateral cornering force and 0.5g less in braking ability
Track overlay
You can see from the following track overlay that the main differences in the wet are through the slow complex section and the fast run that follows on from Church corner which is obviously heavily effected by the lack of grip in that corner and the effect is seen all the way on the run to the end of the lap.
Monday, June 05, 2006
Post Thruxton - Pre Brands Hatch
As I didn't have any problems with the car, other then it being too stiff at the rear in the wet race, I don't have any major tasks before Brands Hatch this coming Saturday. I have cleaned it up and re-connected the anti-rollba, started a general spanner check which I will complete this evening along with setting the dampers back to dry settings in the hope that the nice weather continues. I was not too impressed with reading Jenson Button was hoping for a wet British GP weekend to help his chances of points - gee thanks Jenson!
I was a little concerned that I might be getting to the end of life for the brakes but I checked and the rears have some good life in them and the fronts are not even down to 50% worn yet. Must try harder in the upcoming races.
Winners Cup!
Thought I had better include a picture of my Trophy collection so far :)
Weight
The post race scrutineering at Thruxton was a weigh in. I came in about spot on my estimate which is just over the min weight and when I checked the fuel left I had 6 litres. So that 3 litres over the minimum I need to have for any scrutineering and would account for the difference of a wet race I guess. So my fuel estimation is getting a lot better.
Goodbye Novice Cross, Hello P place
So now that I have completed my first 6 races, in fact 7 now if you include the all comers non championship race at thruxton, I can now remove my novice cross. For a laugh I thought I would replace it temporarily with a 'P' place, normally used on the roads to denote a driver who has just passed their driving license.
Before:
After: 
Back to Brands
So Saturday is a double header back at Brands. A return to a circuit for the first time. I don't think I am know it completely having only completed a test day and the first race back in April during in which it rained but it will be nice to go back and see how much I can improve. Back in April I managed 3rd in class C for qualifying and came in 3rd in the race after regaining he places I lost on the start line! During the final laps of the wet race I was down to the same lap times if not faster than Chris and Tim at the front. So I will try and get to the front again and with my much improved starts get off to a better start. The Double header will also run as separate class races so there will be no Class A cars getting in the way. Better for the race, little less defense against other Class C runners at the start I guess. It does however mean that I get to watch Pauls race which will be good. For both of use it will be a good indication of how much we have improved over the last 2 months.
I was a little concerned that I might be getting to the end of life for the brakes but I checked and the rears have some good life in them and the fronts are not even down to 50% worn yet. Must try harder in the upcoming races.
Winners Cup!
Thought I had better include a picture of my Trophy collection so far :)
Weight
The post race scrutineering at Thruxton was a weigh in. I came in about spot on my estimate which is just over the min weight and when I checked the fuel left I had 6 litres. So that 3 litres over the minimum I need to have for any scrutineering and would account for the difference of a wet race I guess. So my fuel estimation is getting a lot better.
Goodbye Novice Cross, Hello P place
So now that I have completed my first 6 races, in fact 7 now if you include the all comers non championship race at thruxton, I can now remove my novice cross. For a laugh I thought I would replace it temporarily with a 'P' place, normally used on the roads to denote a driver who has just passed their driving license.
Before:
After: 
Back to Brands
So Saturday is a double header back at Brands. A return to a circuit for the first time. I don't think I am know it completely having only completed a test day and the first race back in April during in which it rained but it will be nice to go back and see how much I can improve. Back in April I managed 3rd in class C for qualifying and came in 3rd in the race after regaining he places I lost on the start line! During the final laps of the wet race I was down to the same lap times if not faster than Chris and Tim at the front. So I will try and get to the front again and with my much improved starts get off to a better start. The Double header will also run as separate class races so there will be no Class A cars getting in the way. Better for the race, little less defense against other Class C runners at the start I guess. It does however mean that I get to watch Pauls race which will be good. For both of use it will be a good indication of how much we have improved over the last 2 months.
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