Interests:Cars, Beer, Diving, not necessarily in that order....
Posted 20 April 2017 - 10:44 AM
Great to see the car back together, it certainly was a big smash.
With regards to the bare ally I can confirm it is a nightmare to keep clean, my Superlight Twenty, as pictured below, above has recently gone in exchange for an Orange Roadsport race car with an eye to compete over the next few seasons. Cant help thinking that a wrap is probably the best way to go, in terms of resistance to grazel damage etc. Ian Payne at PT Sportcars showed me a recent wrap they had done and it really was excellent.
Good luck with everything, I look forward to seeing your progress!
It adds weight but while it's cars not racing it helps passengers to climb in and out and would give some much needed protection if the worst happened.
ETA - If you do remove it you might need to buy a shorter bolt to go through the A frame point as the thread would be very deep (possibly too deep for a deep socket). When I fitted mine I had to buy a long bolt to make it fit.
Pembrey went well, the car ran (mostly) perfectly and has come back in one piece and I have 2 signatures on my race license - RESULT!
In the graduates series each meeting has 2 races. For Pembrey, the club managed to organise a race on both the old and new layouts, which meant we got 2 qualifying sessions as well!
Write up of the races to follow... all timing and results here for those that are interested: http://www.tsl-timin...7/171621cmg.pdf . The 2nd qualifying was probably my highlight (page 16) where I was only 0.860 off of pole, but 1st to 14th was separated by under 1.5 seconds. Caterham racing is very close!!
EDIT: for those that don't know, my actual name isn't Captain Vimes (really!!). I'm driver 117...
Edited by Captain Vimes, 23 April 2017 - 08:30 PM.
Background to classes - Skip to qualifying if you're not interested
The grads cars are of various specifications. The older K-Series cars are starting to shrink in numbers a little so they now run the Super Grads and Mega Grads in the same qualy session and race. The supers are slightly slower than the grads BUT the difference is only 0.5-1 second per lap. They can make this up by slip streaming a mega so they're pretty even overall especially at a track like Pembrey where there's no long straights to make use of the extra power from the Mega.
Anyway, the key info is that I'll get results overall and per class. We're not really racing across the classes but we are fighting for position!
Qualifying 1
To qualify you first have to complete a minimum of 3 laps. I'm the only driver on the Mega/Super grid who has never raced before although there is one other driver who had his first race at Oulton park.
My approach was to complete the 3 laps and stay out of peoples way so as not to annoy the fast guys.
I was therefore pleasantly surprised to hear that I qualified 10th of 20 overall and 7th of 15 in my class. Pretty much in the middle of the pack. Not bad for a first go and considering that most others had swapped to a much fresher set of 'race tyres', while I left my pretty worn set on I'd used in testing (and had also completed an endurance race with the previous owner). Well the cost of the rebuild had to have an impact somewhere!
BUT i was then worried that I had 10 people behind me on the grid so I had to make a good start to avoid a crash!
Excellent. The whole competitive element makes every move count which ratchets up the pressure and makes a good move mean so much and the heartache of a mistake unbearable. Overtaking at speed - love it!
Race reports to follow but I went from 10th to last and back to 10th in race one. Lots of wheel to wheel racing!!
I’ll let the video do the talking as I’ve added captions but briefly..
When I lined up on the starting grid the guy in pole started waving his arms. I assumed he had a mechanical failure but left the car in 1st gear. Then the 5 minute board came out so I dropped it out of gear and waited…then everyone went!
I thought I must have made a mistake but a couple of other drivers confirmed they HAD used the wrong board (should have been 5 seconds).
Anyway, I panicked, got it in gear and bonfired the rear wheels but then couldn’t find 2nd gear (driver error, it was where it has always been,, just behind 1st..). No one hit me from behind but I entered turn 1 in last place (20th). So then the fun began trying to make up places!
The video shows what happened from there. I managed to get back up to 9th before dropping back to 10th. The guy I was battling with for 9th (car 105) has been racing his Caterham for over 10 years (the same car) in various classes. The other racers are similar so I was pleased to be able to share the same track space with these guys and start learning what racing a Caterham is about.
I was hoping to be somewhere mid-pack if possible and that's exactly what I achieved. Most importantly, I brought it home in one piece and had great fun. I don’t think the final position would have been much different with a better start as I didn’t have the race pace - I did in race 2 but that’s a different story…
looked like you turned them on quite quick but they started to get away from you later in the race
I was over driving the car later in the race so it was a bit scruffier bit but my last laps were some of the quickest (although still slower than qualifying).
Having said that (#racingdriverexcuse) most drivers run 2-3 sets of tyres:
- testing set (old and knackered)
- racing set (previous wet/qualifying tyres)
- qualifying / wet set (new as possible)
I only had an old set and a very old set so I tested, qualified and raced all on the same tyres, which are now scrap. Unfortunately as I've raced on them, that's one of my 3 sets of tyres allowed for the season gone
Be warned for the national - Pembrey is a tyre killer! I had barely any wear from Donington, Brands and Oulton and now this is how my outside front looks:
The new section was only just completed this week so the track was very, very green. Between qualifying and the race my lap times dropped by over half a second (as did everyone else's) as the track rubbered in. I'm amazed at how the grip level changed. It's not something I've experienced before.
Anyway, with everyone learning the new section it put me on a more level playing field. The result was qualifying in 6th overall and 5th in class:
The pressure was then on to get a much better start than in race 1!!
Edited by Captain Vimes, 24 April 2017 - 08:43 PM.
I think that's only the second one I've ever seen 
