2019 Can-Am Proxy Round 7 Calgary AB

[Giddyup]

[AndGoliath]

Alan received the cars this afternoon. The following is the current plan (please see first post for the latest info):
+ Tuesday (1st): Alan and I are inspecting the cars and performing any necessary maintenance. We are also selecting the lanes we are using for the race and qualifying. Tom, if you have some input into this, please provide it via PM or email.
+ Wednesday (2nd): we are qualifying the cars. We have a driver (me) and three marshals lined up. I previously qualified the Group 5 cars that we hosted this past winter and am a careful, but reasonably quick driver. This is going to be about getting the best result for each car, not my ego. We are not going to be streaming as we do not want to rush and so we can provide useful feedback on the cars. We are also recently retired and like to take breaks (i.e., snacks and naps). We may record the session, edit it, and post it, if possible.
+ Sunday (6th): we are racing the cars. We have three drivers and three marshals lined up. Our top driver is not available, but all three available drivers have been on the podium for previous club seasons. We are used to driving cleanly together. Again, no egos.

Qualifying and racing are going to be starting around 1000h MST each day. I will post if I am going to provide incremental or single updates.

[AndGoliath]

Here are the cars in no particular order:



Alan and I checked out the cars and this is the report:



Body: I listed anything that appeared to be missing or damaged. Most damage was previously repaired. Alan glued an engine intake back onto one car.
Braids: I checked whether the braids were clean or dirty. I cleaned the brushes with a clean toothbrush with a ruler backing them up so they would not get flattened.
Front tires: I spun them to check for wobble and resistance. I will recheck the highlighted ones tomorrow to determine whether it is side-to-side (S2S) or vibration inducing. All of the axles turned (no dragging). One of them stopped immediately (#52) and a couple (#77 and #66) would spin a little more.
Rear tires: I spun them to check for side-to-side wobble and resistance. Any resistance noted appears to be motor feel, not binding. I did not have enough light to see any out-of-round wobble. The vibration check should cover that.
Vibration: I ran each car on a roller stand (at 10V) with a toothpick on top to determine the subjective amount of vibration. This needs to be taken with a grain of salt since the flat fronted cars did much better.

While doing the vibration check for the #9 car it slowed as I was adjusting the voltage indicating it was increasing its current draw (my train supply operates more as a constant current than constant voltage supply). We stopped the run and removed it. It had a bit of a smell as if it was overheating. There was no binding. We checked it again at the end of the checks and it was fine. It was also fine during the low speed lane checks. We will check it again before, during, and after qualification.

We did not open any of the cars up. The cars that have "open" rear ends did not appear to have any significant build-up inside.

Alan and I ran each of the cars slowly around the track in each lane to ensure there was no binding. Thanks to one illegal guide (it sticks out beyond the front of the body) we found a couple of paint drops in the slots that were removed.

I will provide more feedback on the cars after qualification tomorrow.

[Audi1]

The #52 had free-spinning front wheels when it was sent out, so I suspect that this is deslot/crash-related. I'd appreciate it if you'd have a look and see if the set screw(s) have slipped, causing the front wheels to bind against the front axle carriers. If they have, then just either re-set the screws or insert a small flathead screwdriver and pry up some space. Solid fronts are definitely not fast...……….

This is a minor adjustment and we routinely do them at our track pre-qualy. Thanks.

Allan

[AndGoliath]

[Audi1]

There is no front wheel roll rule for this proxy. If a racer wants a 3-point car (guide and rear wheels touching), then that's OK. But, the vast majority of racers choose a 4-point car (all 4 wheels touching) for routed wood tracks. Sometimes, repeated offs or crashes can turn a 4-point car into a 3-point car over the course of the proxy series; particularly if the front tires are close to the limits of the front fenders.

Allan

[AndGoliath]

[Audi1]

Opening a car for repairs is fine. If the repair is major, then there is a 3 lap penalty applied for the race. If it’s minor, then there is no penalty. In either case, the car can be both qualified and raced after the repair is completed.

When you put the body back on just follow the body mount screw back-off instructions - which should be on the underside of the car. If there are none, then set the body screws to give the car a medium amount of body roll.

Thanks - have fun with the qualy!

Allan

[AndGoliath]

I am first sharing some pictures to tell the qualification story. The first two indicate the qualifying podium and order:





And here are our qualifying volunteers: Alan (host), Thomas (marshal), and Kevin (marshal). Alan's lights are so bright no Shadow (driver) is visible.



Alan had tested a camera for streaming or even recording and posting later, but the track lights washed out the image and nothing significant was visible.

I will post the chart of the results with driver feedback after I have entered the data. That may take an hour or so. Sorry for the delay.

[AndGoliath]

Allan requested me to take a look at a couple of cars that had minor issues:

#52
I barely backed off the set screws from underneath until the axle spun freely. I did not open up the car.

#7
I left the car alone as no adjustment was visible underneath and the instructions on the underside of the car said to not open the car unless absolutely necessary.

#66
I barely backed off the set screws from inside (the bottom screws are glued) until the axle spun better (not totally free). As I backed off the set screws I found there was a point where the axle did not seem to get freer so I stopped at that point. I returned the body screws to the original snugness.

#9
I opened up the car and found no issues. I ran it for a minute or so on my roller stand and it ran consistently with no heat buildup. I returned the body screws to the original snugness.

I forgot to check the front tires on the cars on which I noticed wobble. I'll check on Sunday.

[AndGoliath]

Here are the qualification results:




Notes:
1) The cars were qualified in reverse order of their position in the standings (left-most column).
2) Each car was run for one minute in the blue lane (second from outside in the long sweeper) and its best lap recorded.
3) There were relatively few offs (5 or so) when I braked too late after the sweeper and only one car gently bumped the newly padded barrier (#70, I'm sorry about that).
4) All cars were able to take the sweeper at full throttle.

More information is to be provided in the driver feedback.

[AndGoliath]

Here is the inspection / driver feedback from qualifying:




Legend:
Sound: This is the nature of the sound the car makes when it is driven. "Drag" means it sounds like it is dragging (it is not necessarily doing so). These sounds are probably related to how the bodies are attached. My RevoSlot is the only car I have that makes a lot of noise so I do not have a lot with which to compare.

Braking: This is how strong the braking action. This type of circuit needs brakes since there are alternate high-speed / low-speed sections. Also, if the car did handle well in low-speed corners and the car had poor brakes, then it was necessary to go off-throttle earlier to compensate.

Low-speed Cornering: This is the degree of oversteer in the 180* corners and the S section. "Tight" means the car was on rails. "Loose" meant it was oversteering more so than the easier to handle cars. The ability to recover indicated less oscillation and the ability to get on the throttle quickly to go into the sweeper (the track has a slight jiggle exiting the 180* corner before the sweeper and being able to recover quickly helps get the power down sooner). The #70 car was the only one that tended to break loose and stay out the whole corner and accelerate in a controllable manner.

High-speed Cornering: I wanted to provide an indication of this, but I did not have a good view of the cars from my driving position due to the overpass. As the cars came into view I was more concerned with braking points. Some drifted a bit, but there was no oscillation that I could see.

Speed: This is a subjective measurement of the relative speed of each car. The label "more capable" indicates it felt as though the car could have handled more speed around the sweeper if it had the speed. All cars were driven at full throttle around the sweeper. All cars except one seemed to accelerate well. I noticed #5 did not pick up speed as quickly. Obviously, the final speeds differed.

If there is something that does not make sense, please ask for clarification.

[wanabgts]

Looks like the short track did me well with my little motor! Thanks for the updates, this is a high quality thread!

Zack

[AndGoliath]

I updated the first status/schedule post with the latest events and a piece of race news. We are expecting a fourth driver for the race and will be able to run on all four lanes. He is not at the same level as the rest of us, but he should do OK as he is our top driver.

[Courtney s]

Thanks so much for the notes and all your effort. Seventh is the best my car has done i'm excited to race, I do have a request can you store my car next to BRUMOS maybe some of the speed will rub off!

Congrats to the Big 3!