SpeedPassion SP-1 asphalt setup
Most of what I did to the car was to try to get maximum traction on both ends of the car. The link toe in was something that I wanted to try and it seemed to be pretty good for the car. When the traction was up on the track in the main I was able to drive most of the track on power.
I also added to the steering rack spacers for a total of 3mm to add some angle to the steering rods. This made the steering a little more aggressive, but the car was making enough traction to handle it. I did also mount the shock as far forward as possible, which added to the steering. That may need to be backed off for lower traction tracks, so it might be a good idea to start in the middle hole depending on your track.
Rear droop was pretty minimal, about 1.5mm. This usually helps keep the car a little more stable off power.
I did also try CRC White side springs and about 2* camber, which was very good when traction was up, but as traction went down after the mains, this was a bit too much.
Overall, I was very happy with the car right off of the bench. While I was testing some changes out on my usual car, and the track changes during the day, ultimately the SP car was .2 second per lap faster on this day. That is a pretty good result. If nothing else, the car is at least as fast what I have been running.
Tuesday, July 16, 2013
SpeedPassion SP-1
I am now in the possession of the new SpeedPassion car, the SP-1. Like most of the new cars out there it is a link style car. The front end is a little different than most, using an upper pivot ball similar to a 1/12 car like the CRC line. It also utilizes a steering rack as well, instead of the traditional direct steering set up.
The build up is a little different than most to get an 190mm legal car with Pit Shimizu tires, so we'll dive in with some photos.
I decided to add another hole for the links in between the two available. I have noticed some of the cars out there have some angle to the links. I had Howard Lo of Speed Passion do this to his car and I wanted to be able to try different settings as well. I drove Howard's car before I built this and I felt like it had a lot of rear grip compared to the typical straight link. The photo shows a line scribed in the CF with the point of my calipers. I used the calipers to find the difference of the holes on center, and then I scribed the line by centering the point of the calipers on the edge of the existing holes. I did the same with the pod plate.
Once drilled I finished the holes with a dremel stone bit that happens to be just about perfect as a countersink.
Now I can select multiple angles for the links to get the amount of "link toe" that I want. The link toe seems to help the car be more planted. UF1 MIDWEST inaugural champion Rick Vessel says this is due to controlling the roll steer inherent in link cars. Remember that changing the link positions will probably require resetting the "football" pivot.
Note difference in angle in the links !! Also Tamiya F104V2/RM01 links fit perfectly if you need them in a pinch, or if you want to try their hard carbon version.
While we're at it, you may also want to address the 3mm nuts used on the football pivot. I am a Dremelin' fool, so I knocked the flanges off 2 serrated 3mm nuts and used those to secure the pivot without rounding out the plastic on the pivot. Another suggestion is to use a 3mm tap on the nyloc nuts that come with the car so they will hold your setting but not round out the pivot when you need to make adjustments.
Another nice adjustment is the ability to move the shock forward and back on the top deck. There are 3 holes, though one seems to be designated for the antenna tube. I don't use an antenna tube, so it's open for shock attachment. Moving the shock forward will put more weight on the nose end of the car for more steering. I did have to use a Tamiya long shock end to reach the longest setting however
As far as the front end, you should look at Howard Lo's RCTECH post on the 190mm front end modification. It has all the changes you need to make to get the front end where it should be on Pit tires. Be aware that the screws should be through the INSIDE holes on the graphite plate, and the OUTSIDE holes on the aluminum cams on the arms!
There are a couple other things as well:
I drilled out the front half of the tension adjustment hole for the lower suspension ball. This allows a little finer adjustment on the tension by having one side of the arm free. The lower suspension ball is plastic and it is my one gripe with the car. I had to do some hand finishing and sanding to get the ball free in the arm, and I still was not really pleased with the result. A little teflon powder helped to free it up but the ball either needs to be metal or the plastic needs to be improved. An aluminum ball would be perfect here.
.Here you can see I dremeled a slot in the ball retainer to make it easier to thread in and adjust with a flat blade screwdriver.
In lieu of using shims under the steering knuckle, I used a 3mm screw as a droop screw for on the fly adjustment at the track. Note that you should set the length of the lower kingpins the same on both sides before setting the droop screws. The easiest way to do this is with a caliper measuring the length of the kingpin past the lower ball. Mine is at 5.5mm between ball and the lip of the kingpin.
That's most of the car. I'll elaborate on inital setup in my next post on performance. Please do note that the spur gear that comes with the car is actually really important. It has 18 balls, and I think helps contribute to a very smooth but slip free diff. The extra balls help with a good lock up without too much tension, which is huge on rubber tires.....
The build up is a little different than most to get an 190mm legal car with Pit Shimizu tires, so we'll dive in with some photos.
Now I can select multiple angles for the links to get the amount of "link toe" that I want. The link toe seems to help the car be more planted. UF1 MIDWEST inaugural champion Rick Vessel says this is due to controlling the roll steer inherent in link cars. Remember that changing the link positions will probably require resetting the "football" pivot.
While we're at it, you may also want to address the 3mm nuts used on the football pivot. I am a Dremelin' fool, so I knocked the flanges off 2 serrated 3mm nuts and used those to secure the pivot without rounding out the plastic on the pivot. Another suggestion is to use a 3mm tap on the nyloc nuts that come with the car so they will hold your setting but not round out the pivot when you need to make adjustments.
Another nice adjustment is the ability to move the shock forward and back on the top deck. There are 3 holes, though one seems to be designated for the antenna tube. I don't use an antenna tube, so it's open for shock attachment. Moving the shock forward will put more weight on the nose end of the car for more steering. I did have to use a Tamiya long shock end to reach the longest setting however
As far as the front end, you should look at Howard Lo's RCTECH post on the 190mm front end modification. It has all the changes you need to make to get the front end where it should be on Pit tires. Be aware that the screws should be through the INSIDE holes on the graphite plate, and the OUTSIDE holes on the aluminum cams on the arms!
There are a couple other things as well:
.Here you can see I dremeled a slot in the ball retainer to make it easier to thread in and adjust with a flat blade screwdriver.
That's most of the car. I'll elaborate on inital setup in my next post on performance. Please do note that the spur gear that comes with the car is actually really important. It has 18 balls, and I think helps contribute to a very smooth but slip free diff. The extra balls help with a good lock up without too much tension, which is huge on rubber tires.....
Monday, July 1, 2013
Fred Medel of Tamiya USA on the TRF101
Fred posted on Rctech on the new TRF101 and what it does differently on the track:
"Hello All,
I decided to take the TRF101 for a spin. I built one off the shelf to see how I can best share the differences between both platforms.
As most of you may know I have A LOT of time on the V2. About 6 weeks ago I was in Japan talking to the designer of the car. In case anyone wondered it's Kiyo Suzuki. He's the same fellow that travels the world with Marc Rheinard developing the TRF touring cars. The man knows his stuff when designing cars in case you wondered.
In short Kiyo and Satoshi Maezumi told me the new front end changes the way the front end responds to your steering input. Basically, you'll notice it feels more neutral compared to the standard front end. Having driven a million laps with my V2 around the Tamiya track I can confirm that is indeed the case. The V2 is a stable car. However, the 180 hairpin turn after the sweeper has always frustrated me as the V2 wants to continue to turn. You have to be careful after the 180 to keep the car straight to make the inner sweeper. In the past I've tried to fix this with dual rate on the radio and with tire choice and sauce application tricks. With the TRF101 the car enters the turn with immense stability and there is no sign of the car wanting to continue to turn after applying throttle after the 180. It's just that stable. I believe this is the case because you now have a solid front end like the F103 on top of having the side links further apart. With the F104 link front end you have more movement going on with the front end, which makes for some unwanted movement. I didn't think this was an issue before, but it seems like the solid front end cures sensitivity and over-steering. Also, loosening the front screws on the carbon mellows the car out even more. If you think the front carbon piece doesn't move if you loosen it think again. There's a ton of movement. It's a great tuning option. I would suggest making sure the whole is big enough so the screw moves freely with the carbon top piece. Also, Kiyo informed me that I should experiment with using O-rings instead of the steel washers in the middle of the front end. This will make for a softer and dampened front end.
In short...I put two packs throw the car with my V2 starting point set up. It can only get better once I begin to play with more things. For one, the stock instructions have the TRF shock built with too much droop. Surprisingly, the car remained stable at the Tamiya "Kink" even with that much pod droop. Typically, you have to set the V2 with little pod droop to keep the car stable though the kink. Not so with the 101 so it seems, but more testing is needed.
Anyway, I hope everyone is enjoying their new toy. I am. I'll post some pics soon to show how easy it was to get to 4.2mm ride height on the front without having to use shims on the upper arm. At the Tamiya Track lowering the car below 4.2 is not recommended.
Stay tuned..."
"Hello All,
I decided to take the TRF101 for a spin. I built one off the shelf to see how I can best share the differences between both platforms.
As most of you may know I have A LOT of time on the V2. About 6 weeks ago I was in Japan talking to the designer of the car. In case anyone wondered it's Kiyo Suzuki. He's the same fellow that travels the world with Marc Rheinard developing the TRF touring cars. The man knows his stuff when designing cars in case you wondered.
In short Kiyo and Satoshi Maezumi told me the new front end changes the way the front end responds to your steering input. Basically, you'll notice it feels more neutral compared to the standard front end. Having driven a million laps with my V2 around the Tamiya track I can confirm that is indeed the case. The V2 is a stable car. However, the 180 hairpin turn after the sweeper has always frustrated me as the V2 wants to continue to turn. You have to be careful after the 180 to keep the car straight to make the inner sweeper. In the past I've tried to fix this with dual rate on the radio and with tire choice and sauce application tricks. With the TRF101 the car enters the turn with immense stability and there is no sign of the car wanting to continue to turn after applying throttle after the 180. It's just that stable. I believe this is the case because you now have a solid front end like the F103 on top of having the side links further apart. With the F104 link front end you have more movement going on with the front end, which makes for some unwanted movement. I didn't think this was an issue before, but it seems like the solid front end cures sensitivity and over-steering. Also, loosening the front screws on the carbon mellows the car out even more. If you think the front carbon piece doesn't move if you loosen it think again. There's a ton of movement. It's a great tuning option. I would suggest making sure the whole is big enough so the screw moves freely with the carbon top piece. Also, Kiyo informed me that I should experiment with using O-rings instead of the steel washers in the middle of the front end. This will make for a softer and dampened front end.
In short...I put two packs throw the car with my V2 starting point set up. It can only get better once I begin to play with more things. For one, the stock instructions have the TRF shock built with too much droop. Surprisingly, the car remained stable at the Tamiya "Kink" even with that much pod droop. Typically, you have to set the V2 with little pod droop to keep the car stable though the kink. Not so with the 101 so it seems, but more testing is needed.
Anyway, I hope everyone is enjoying their new toy. I am. I'll post some pics soon to show how easy it was to get to 4.2mm ride height on the front without having to use shims on the upper arm. At the Tamiya Track lowering the car below 4.2 is not recommended.
Stay tuned..."
Monday, June 24, 2013
Friday, June 21, 2013
TRF101-may not be TCS legal for 2013
"Because the TRF101 is so new and has an unknown differential in performance to the F104, its legality in the TCS series is on hold for the remaining 2013 regional events including the Finals and will be reviewed for 2014 season. We will have a better understanding of how the chassis performs in relation to the F104 line and can proceed appropriately."
David Jun of Tamiya USA
http://www.rctech.net/forum/12277937-post18060.html
Buyer beware!! It appears that you may want to hold off the TRF101 if you are planning on using it for Tamiya TCS events in the USA.
David Jun of Tamiya USA
http://www.rctech.net/forum/12277937-post18060.html
Buyer beware!! It appears that you may want to hold off the TRF101 if you are planning on using it for Tamiya TCS events in the USA.
Thursday, June 20, 2013
Wednesday, June 19, 2013
Yeah Racing Transformula TransThingula
So I saw a Yeah Racing Transformula kit on ebay with no reserve. The car was kind of intriguing in that it was a bit of a precursor to all the link cars out there and one of the first aftermarket set ups since the resurgence of F1 racing. I also saw some things I liked about the kit that I though I could use. Anyway, I got the kit for about $85, which was good as the other ones I saw on ebay are going for about $160.
The car showed up and it was actually completely built.
The thing about the chassis is that it is F103 length. That is quite a bit shorter than an F104, and makes the car do strange stuff if you attempt to run it to the narrower F104 width (180-190mm). Unfortunately, this rules out using the link setup. However, the T bar setup, which the car comes built with, is able to be modified to a wheelbase closer to the F104. Moving the support posts for the upper deck and t bar connections to the extreme rear of the chassis plate will give a wheelbase about 4mm shorter than an F104, which is acceptable.
I used the upper deck as a template to re drill the holes in the chassis plate. Luckily, everything lined up almost perfectly without interfering with any holes already in the chassis. I also had to drill new holes to move the body mounts to the correct position for a modern body.
After setting up the rear end of the car to length, I wanted to put on the F104 front end with Exotek parts. I didn't really anticipate there being any problems with this, but the Yeah racing servo mounts are meant for an F103 front end. Normally this just means the mounts have to be replaced with F104 style servo mounts to work with the F104 front end parts. What's weird is that the Yeah racing parts are about 2mm shorter, requiring the chassis to be re drilled again to work with standard F104 parts. It's really weird since the F103 and F104 parts from Tamiya are totally interchangeable....
Once I was done drilling, here is the closer to finished product:
I did want to show the dual damper setup I was able to build. The motor pod parts support this for the link setup, but I was able to adapt it for the t bar configuration using the old body mount holes, and the plastic tubes from the F104V2 parts tree. I used the plastic damper tubes since I needed to cut them to fit, and I would not be making a mistake on the more expensive option roll damper tubes. Eventually I will replace the plastic tubes as the idea has proven itself on the track. The only reason I would replace the plastic tubes is that there will be more surface area on the option damper tubes once they are cut down.
Another small problem is the motor pod. It is like the F103 pod, set up for the smaller F103 tire. Ride height becomes excessive when F104 diameter tires are used. This was not a big deal as I was able to take a used F103 t bar and cut it down so only the pod area remained to make a spacer. This brought the ride height to about 4mm with the #2 axle cam.
To work with the modern bodies, a shorty pack fits perfectly. To secure the pack, I put two holes in the upper deck slightly wider than the pack to retain the battery. Tape is very hard to work with in this case, but the screws keep the pack from moving. The fit is pretty snug otherwise, so only the screws are really needed.
Those are the major changes needed to get the car running. I added a Tamiya axle and diff, along with a sedan shock. To mount the body using the separate side pods, a small slice needs to be made near the rear to clear the end of the upper deck where the tubes attach. If you use the body in one piece form, this probably is not necessary. I have not fitted it yet, but I think that the F104Pro body might be a nice choice in that the winglets on the side would hide the protruding parts.
As far as testing goes, once I finished the car, I turned it over to my buddy Kevin for testing. He brought it out to the carpet track on practice day. I wasn't able to drop by until later in the day, but he told me over the phone "You're not getting this car back unless you can find another one". It was pretty good out of the box. Initially it was set up with 2 o rings on the t bar and the tubes with 2000 wt diff oil. Kevin tried 30,000 wt oil in the tubes at the end of the day, but that was a bit much and the car wanted to traction roll from being too stiff.
The next week I took the car out and tried a few things as well. Kevin wanted to try the car with the F103 damper pucks just to see if it was any better. I ran it most of the day with the pucks and it was pretty good, but in the last couple runs I went back to the tubes, and for me anyway, the car seemed to drive better. I wound up with 7000 wt oil, and that was pretty good. I also changed the t bar setup to a .5mm spacer on the front screw and a stiff black Tamiya o ring on the back. We wanted to try to get the car a little flatter, and this worked well.
Overall, and with only a little time on the car, it is very good. You are limited on battery placement in the t bar configuration, but so far it has not been a big hindrance. On the plus side, the F103 style t bars are dirt cheap and offer a lot of options in setup (tilting the t bar, different types of o rings and spacers to control roll characteristics). I'm going to continue to work with the car as I think we have only scratched the surface.
The car showed up and it was actually completely built.
The thing about the chassis is that it is F103 length. That is quite a bit shorter than an F104, and makes the car do strange stuff if you attempt to run it to the narrower F104 width (180-190mm). Unfortunately, this rules out using the link setup. However, the T bar setup, which the car comes built with, is able to be modified to a wheelbase closer to the F104. Moving the support posts for the upper deck and t bar connections to the extreme rear of the chassis plate will give a wheelbase about 4mm shorter than an F104, which is acceptable.
I used the upper deck as a template to re drill the holes in the chassis plate. Luckily, everything lined up almost perfectly without interfering with any holes already in the chassis. I also had to drill new holes to move the body mounts to the correct position for a modern body.
After setting up the rear end of the car to length, I wanted to put on the F104 front end with Exotek parts. I didn't really anticipate there being any problems with this, but the Yeah racing servo mounts are meant for an F103 front end. Normally this just means the mounts have to be replaced with F104 style servo mounts to work with the F104 front end parts. What's weird is that the Yeah racing parts are about 2mm shorter, requiring the chassis to be re drilled again to work with standard F104 parts. It's really weird since the F103 and F104 parts from Tamiya are totally interchangeable....
Once I was done drilling, here is the closer to finished product:
I did want to show the dual damper setup I was able to build. The motor pod parts support this for the link setup, but I was able to adapt it for the t bar configuration using the old body mount holes, and the plastic tubes from the F104V2 parts tree. I used the plastic damper tubes since I needed to cut them to fit, and I would not be making a mistake on the more expensive option roll damper tubes. Eventually I will replace the plastic tubes as the idea has proven itself on the track. The only reason I would replace the plastic tubes is that there will be more surface area on the option damper tubes once they are cut down.
Another small problem is the motor pod. It is like the F103 pod, set up for the smaller F103 tire. Ride height becomes excessive when F104 diameter tires are used. This was not a big deal as I was able to take a used F103 t bar and cut it down so only the pod area remained to make a spacer. This brought the ride height to about 4mm with the #2 axle cam.
To work with the modern bodies, a shorty pack fits perfectly. To secure the pack, I put two holes in the upper deck slightly wider than the pack to retain the battery. Tape is very hard to work with in this case, but the screws keep the pack from moving. The fit is pretty snug otherwise, so only the screws are really needed.
Those are the major changes needed to get the car running. I added a Tamiya axle and diff, along with a sedan shock. To mount the body using the separate side pods, a small slice needs to be made near the rear to clear the end of the upper deck where the tubes attach. If you use the body in one piece form, this probably is not necessary. I have not fitted it yet, but I think that the F104Pro body might be a nice choice in that the winglets on the side would hide the protruding parts.
As far as testing goes, once I finished the car, I turned it over to my buddy Kevin for testing. He brought it out to the carpet track on practice day. I wasn't able to drop by until later in the day, but he told me over the phone "You're not getting this car back unless you can find another one". It was pretty good out of the box. Initially it was set up with 2 o rings on the t bar and the tubes with 2000 wt diff oil. Kevin tried 30,000 wt oil in the tubes at the end of the day, but that was a bit much and the car wanted to traction roll from being too stiff.
The next week I took the car out and tried a few things as well. Kevin wanted to try the car with the F103 damper pucks just to see if it was any better. I ran it most of the day with the pucks and it was pretty good, but in the last couple runs I went back to the tubes, and for me anyway, the car seemed to drive better. I wound up with 7000 wt oil, and that was pretty good. I also changed the t bar setup to a .5mm spacer on the front screw and a stiff black Tamiya o ring on the back. We wanted to try to get the car a little flatter, and this worked well.
Overall, and with only a little time on the car, it is very good. You are limited on battery placement in the t bar configuration, but so far it has not been a big hindrance. On the plus side, the F103 style t bars are dirt cheap and offer a lot of options in setup (tilting the t bar, different types of o rings and spacers to control roll characteristics). I'm going to continue to work with the car as I think we have only scratched the surface.
Friday, June 7, 2013
UF1 MIDWEST First Season Thoughts
I suppose it's taken long enough to get to this. I really haven't posted too much here, and there is really no reason for that. Anyway, I just wanted to post on some of my thoughts about the first UF1 series in the Midwest.
There were 4 races, 2 at Harbor Hobbies, and at Hobby Stop West in Toledo OH and Hot Slots of Champaign IL. That's a lot more driving and geography than the guys in Southern California have to deal with, but F1 is still getting off the ground here. To help with the attendance, there were 2 separate days of racing each weekend, with 3 drops so 8 total race days. This way even if you could only attend one day, you could still race and score good points. UF1 MIDWEST Facebook page
Rules were basically the same as the original UF1 series, but the Pardus tire was used as a spec tire as opposed to the open tire rules of the original UF1. It's a bit of a change from the Pit Shimizu tire that is more popular, a little taller sidewall and only available in one compound. We found that to get the best result, the front tire had to be glued up on both inside and outside sidewalls. Otherwise, the cars got tippy in a high traction environment. The tires were nice in that the tire, insert, and wheels were under $30 for the set.
As far as the tracks, there were very different in terms of the traction characteristics. Harbor has quite a bit of traction, but can have a bit of a slippery feeling when there are a lot of cars on the track. Hobby Stop had outrageous traction, the cars were bolted down, and in fact a lot of the cars were chattering in the turns. Hot Slots was more medium traction, and despite building a black groove, didn't get to overwhelming traction. Hot Slots was also the smallest track, our "Monaco".
I ran the TOP racing F1 car to start the series. When I initially put the car together, I realized the TOP car had a lot of steering, more than the Tamiya F104V2 car I had been running. The car comes with a pan car style front end, so I replaced it with the F104 front end with the Exotek upper link system for adjustable camber and caster. Otherwise, I pretty much ran the car stock from the box. I also used the Speed Passion body with the wings from the Tamiya F60 Ferrari.
Typically, I had been running a short battery moved to the back of the car, and most of the time, the side springs backed off of the chassis. What is significant about this is that as the races went along, I began to develop a setup theory based on the battery placement. A lot of what I was doing, such as backing the springs off the chassis, was to allow the chassis to roll farther to keep the car from traction rolling. The problem with this is that the short battery needed to be moved forward as the traction came up. The key is that the more weight that is over the pivot point where the chassis meets the rear pod, the more the car will want to traction roll. This is somewhat counter intuitive, but most of the suspension action occurs at the rear of the car. Moving the battery forward also will make the steering feel less sensitive. The battery back tends to make the car rotate middle corner and be a little more sensitive on center.
So if the battery is forward, you can also run the springs touching the chassis or even with some preload. The problem with running the springs off the chassis is that the car is not as stable feeling. It does tend to rotate a little more, but feels like it has less corner speed. I think part of the reason I liked the battery back was that the car seemed to have more forward traction when the bite was lower. I race at Harbor Hobby all the time, and I think that it's characteristic is that you are looking more for forward bite than side bite until traction gets high.
Leading up to the first race, I had only run the car to it's stock width, around 180mm. The rules allow up to 190mm, but my car was actually pretty good, and I didn't change anything. The thing about the TOP car is that the axle is 1/4" vs. the metric axle on Tamiya and most other cars. This means that you can't use something like the RSector widening kit. IF you want to stretch the rear end, you have to space it.
So when the weekend of the first race came, one of the guys from Toledo, Lon, showed up with a F104V2 with a widening kit on it. He was .2 a lap faster than what I could do. So I figured out that I would need to get the car closer to 190mm. The front end was fine as I could use the RSector axles and knuckles, but the rear end had to be spaced with shims, a lot of them. Luckily, I got close to 190 this way, but the clamping hub on the left side turned out not to be quite as tight as it could be. On the first day, it cost me my qualifying run when it came off the car. Of course, there was no problem at all during practice, but once it counted problems ensued... :/ I opened the slot in the clamp hub to try to let it have more movement to grab the axle, but it came apart again on Sunday. I finally had to drill and tap a hole for a set screw which solved the problem. The problems with the axle were somewhat unfortunate because the car was really good that weekend. Lon Burling from Toledo was TQ for both days. His car was very good, the best I think I had seen an F1 car up to that point. My car was really good too, and I think a little better over longer runs like the 15 minute final. Lon definitely had the advantage on the short qualifying run.
The first day I was in the lowest main due to blowing out in qualifying. I scored pretty good points but it was hard to see how my car was compared to the A main guys. The second day I was able to qualify second to Lon. The interesting thing was that in the mains I could see that my car ran better over the 15 minutes. Lon's car was not as good on this track over the long runs, but I later found out why.
When the second round started at the Hobby Stop West in Toledo, I realized that Lon's car was set up for the ultra high bite at the Toledo track. The bite there was almost sticky. Quite a few cars were traction rolling, and also hopping due to the bite. In this environment, Lon's car was unstoppable. Both days I was able to qualify second, but over the longer runs my car just could not compete. OF course, nobody else really could either. My car was decently fast, but picked up tires in a lot of corners, which was costing me time. The other problem as that I really didn't seem to be able to get my diff right. A big problem with rubber tires is that they put a lot of stress on the diff, and as the bite goes up, this increases. It's hard to keep the diff action smooth and not have the diff slip on every corner. This is compounded with the Pardus tire compared to the Pit as it is a heavier tire. Anyway, I had actually broken the thread on my axle while tightening it, but I was able to unthread enough material from the graphite of the axle to make it work again. It held, but it was a little scary.
I did get to see the VBC F1 car at the Toledo round on Sunday. Dave Johnson, a CRC driver raced it on Sunday, and while it was his first day with it, he was able to stay right at the front with the car. You could see that the car could be even faster with some more time on it.
For the third round at Hot Slots, I came to an impasse with the TOP car. This track was the most different from the others. As it turned out, the track was so tight, the 180mm setup was the way to go to get the car to turn. I had made a visit to the track before the race, and the 190mm setup just made the cars too slow in the corner. Part of this was the tightness, and I think part of this was also the fact that the track didn't build a huge amount of traction. Traction was good, but not like you would expect after seeing the black groove on the track.
My problem was that the TOP car did not want to turn. It felt "long", which I have felt before with an Exotek F104 with a short top deck. In retrospect, this seems like it is a function of too much chassis flex, but fore and aft flex vs. twist. The Exotek car has a 2.25 lower chassis and an upper deck that stretches the full length of the car, but I made a custom short upper deck. With this short deck, I noticed that the car would feel "long" compared to my other cars. I got this same feeling from my TOP car at this track. The TOP car has a 2.5mm lower deck. The Tamiya cars all have a 3mm chassis, which at times seems like bit much, but look at a V2. There is not really an upper deck to speak of, so this works. As far as why I think the front to back flex is the most important, on the older F104 models and even an F103, the full length upper decks make the cars steer more. Often, I would use o rings to promote twist flex in the cars and let the car move side to side. Changing to a short upper deck will dull the steering of the car. Considering that the TOP car is really designed for foam tire racing on a 200mm setup, it makes sense the designers would want more flex to keep the car from being completely bananas. This also tends to work in your favor when the bite is really high, since again, you need to dull the steering. Of course, this is all retrospect as I tried about everything I could setup wise at the track, but the car was just not on pace.
I did have my F104V2 with me so I asked Eric "Snowy" from Wisconsin what he was doing with his car. He was right at the front, and his car looked great. He was nice enough to help me get the V2 setup for the mains and share his setup. The amazing thing was that with Eric's help, I was able to be instantly on the race pace as soon as I put the car on the track. It was just the car. Every car in the A main was either a Tamiya or an Exotek Tamiya. In fact, I have to mention Ted Hammer's car. Ted is a gas car guy from Toledo, and he was racing an F104X1. His car was FANTASTIC. Honestly, my mind was blown at how good his car was. He had the fastest car at the track hands down. At the same time, Rick Vessel's Exotek car wound up being the class of the field in the mains. He was able to keep his car out front when everybody else got into the "action" further back.
In the final round at Harbor Hobby once again, I stuck with the F104V2. It was working ok, and I wasn't able to find a new axle for the TOP car, so I decided stick with the safe option so I could make it through the weekend. Rick Vessel again was fast. I never really got my car the way I wanted for more than one run. I'm not sure if it was a tire or tire prep issue or the way the track changed. I was able to be close to the pace, but it seemed like at times my car faded as the races went on. The TOP car was definitely more consistent than this, but I would have been afraid to run it with the axle issues I had. In the end I did ok, but I wish I had been able to get a little more from the car.
Despite all the trials and tribulations, I was able to finish second in the series, mostly based on having some consistent finishes. Rick Vessel came on strong in the last two weekends, and was able to take the overall championship with his Exotek F1R F104.
This was probably one of the most fun things I have done in rc racing. It was extremely challenging, and I can only imagining it getting harder the next time around.
There were 4 races, 2 at Harbor Hobbies, and at Hobby Stop West in Toledo OH and Hot Slots of Champaign IL. That's a lot more driving and geography than the guys in Southern California have to deal with, but F1 is still getting off the ground here. To help with the attendance, there were 2 separate days of racing each weekend, with 3 drops so 8 total race days. This way even if you could only attend one day, you could still race and score good points. UF1 MIDWEST Facebook page
Rules were basically the same as the original UF1 series, but the Pardus tire was used as a spec tire as opposed to the open tire rules of the original UF1. It's a bit of a change from the Pit Shimizu tire that is more popular, a little taller sidewall and only available in one compound. We found that to get the best result, the front tire had to be glued up on both inside and outside sidewalls. Otherwise, the cars got tippy in a high traction environment. The tires were nice in that the tire, insert, and wheels were under $30 for the set.
As far as the tracks, there were very different in terms of the traction characteristics. Harbor has quite a bit of traction, but can have a bit of a slippery feeling when there are a lot of cars on the track. Hobby Stop had outrageous traction, the cars were bolted down, and in fact a lot of the cars were chattering in the turns. Hot Slots was more medium traction, and despite building a black groove, didn't get to overwhelming traction. Hot Slots was also the smallest track, our "Monaco".
I ran the TOP racing F1 car to start the series. When I initially put the car together, I realized the TOP car had a lot of steering, more than the Tamiya F104V2 car I had been running. The car comes with a pan car style front end, so I replaced it with the F104 front end with the Exotek upper link system for adjustable camber and caster. Otherwise, I pretty much ran the car stock from the box. I also used the Speed Passion body with the wings from the Tamiya F60 Ferrari.
Typically, I had been running a short battery moved to the back of the car, and most of the time, the side springs backed off of the chassis. What is significant about this is that as the races went along, I began to develop a setup theory based on the battery placement. A lot of what I was doing, such as backing the springs off the chassis, was to allow the chassis to roll farther to keep the car from traction rolling. The problem with this is that the short battery needed to be moved forward as the traction came up. The key is that the more weight that is over the pivot point where the chassis meets the rear pod, the more the car will want to traction roll. This is somewhat counter intuitive, but most of the suspension action occurs at the rear of the car. Moving the battery forward also will make the steering feel less sensitive. The battery back tends to make the car rotate middle corner and be a little more sensitive on center.
So if the battery is forward, you can also run the springs touching the chassis or even with some preload. The problem with running the springs off the chassis is that the car is not as stable feeling. It does tend to rotate a little more, but feels like it has less corner speed. I think part of the reason I liked the battery back was that the car seemed to have more forward traction when the bite was lower. I race at Harbor Hobby all the time, and I think that it's characteristic is that you are looking more for forward bite than side bite until traction gets high.
Leading up to the first race, I had only run the car to it's stock width, around 180mm. The rules allow up to 190mm, but my car was actually pretty good, and I didn't change anything. The thing about the TOP car is that the axle is 1/4" vs. the metric axle on Tamiya and most other cars. This means that you can't use something like the RSector widening kit. IF you want to stretch the rear end, you have to space it.
So when the weekend of the first race came, one of the guys from Toledo, Lon, showed up with a F104V2 with a widening kit on it. He was .2 a lap faster than what I could do. So I figured out that I would need to get the car closer to 190mm. The front end was fine as I could use the RSector axles and knuckles, but the rear end had to be spaced with shims, a lot of them. Luckily, I got close to 190 this way, but the clamping hub on the left side turned out not to be quite as tight as it could be. On the first day, it cost me my qualifying run when it came off the car. Of course, there was no problem at all during practice, but once it counted problems ensued... :/ I opened the slot in the clamp hub to try to let it have more movement to grab the axle, but it came apart again on Sunday. I finally had to drill and tap a hole for a set screw which solved the problem. The problems with the axle were somewhat unfortunate because the car was really good that weekend. Lon Burling from Toledo was TQ for both days. His car was very good, the best I think I had seen an F1 car up to that point. My car was really good too, and I think a little better over longer runs like the 15 minute final. Lon definitely had the advantage on the short qualifying run.
The first day I was in the lowest main due to blowing out in qualifying. I scored pretty good points but it was hard to see how my car was compared to the A main guys. The second day I was able to qualify second to Lon. The interesting thing was that in the mains I could see that my car ran better over the 15 minutes. Lon's car was not as good on this track over the long runs, but I later found out why.
When the second round started at the Hobby Stop West in Toledo, I realized that Lon's car was set up for the ultra high bite at the Toledo track. The bite there was almost sticky. Quite a few cars were traction rolling, and also hopping due to the bite. In this environment, Lon's car was unstoppable. Both days I was able to qualify second, but over the longer runs my car just could not compete. OF course, nobody else really could either. My car was decently fast, but picked up tires in a lot of corners, which was costing me time. The other problem as that I really didn't seem to be able to get my diff right. A big problem with rubber tires is that they put a lot of stress on the diff, and as the bite goes up, this increases. It's hard to keep the diff action smooth and not have the diff slip on every corner. This is compounded with the Pardus tire compared to the Pit as it is a heavier tire. Anyway, I had actually broken the thread on my axle while tightening it, but I was able to unthread enough material from the graphite of the axle to make it work again. It held, but it was a little scary.
I did get to see the VBC F1 car at the Toledo round on Sunday. Dave Johnson, a CRC driver raced it on Sunday, and while it was his first day with it, he was able to stay right at the front with the car. You could see that the car could be even faster with some more time on it.
For the third round at Hot Slots, I came to an impasse with the TOP car. This track was the most different from the others. As it turned out, the track was so tight, the 180mm setup was the way to go to get the car to turn. I had made a visit to the track before the race, and the 190mm setup just made the cars too slow in the corner. Part of this was the tightness, and I think part of this was also the fact that the track didn't build a huge amount of traction. Traction was good, but not like you would expect after seeing the black groove on the track.
My problem was that the TOP car did not want to turn. It felt "long", which I have felt before with an Exotek F104 with a short top deck. In retrospect, this seems like it is a function of too much chassis flex, but fore and aft flex vs. twist. The Exotek car has a 2.25 lower chassis and an upper deck that stretches the full length of the car, but I made a custom short upper deck. With this short deck, I noticed that the car would feel "long" compared to my other cars. I got this same feeling from my TOP car at this track. The TOP car has a 2.5mm lower deck. The Tamiya cars all have a 3mm chassis, which at times seems like bit much, but look at a V2. There is not really an upper deck to speak of, so this works. As far as why I think the front to back flex is the most important, on the older F104 models and even an F103, the full length upper decks make the cars steer more. Often, I would use o rings to promote twist flex in the cars and let the car move side to side. Changing to a short upper deck will dull the steering of the car. Considering that the TOP car is really designed for foam tire racing on a 200mm setup, it makes sense the designers would want more flex to keep the car from being completely bananas. This also tends to work in your favor when the bite is really high, since again, you need to dull the steering. Of course, this is all retrospect as I tried about everything I could setup wise at the track, but the car was just not on pace.
I did have my F104V2 with me so I asked Eric "Snowy" from Wisconsin what he was doing with his car. He was right at the front, and his car looked great. He was nice enough to help me get the V2 setup for the mains and share his setup. The amazing thing was that with Eric's help, I was able to be instantly on the race pace as soon as I put the car on the track. It was just the car. Every car in the A main was either a Tamiya or an Exotek Tamiya. In fact, I have to mention Ted Hammer's car. Ted is a gas car guy from Toledo, and he was racing an F104X1. His car was FANTASTIC. Honestly, my mind was blown at how good his car was. He had the fastest car at the track hands down. At the same time, Rick Vessel's Exotek car wound up being the class of the field in the mains. He was able to keep his car out front when everybody else got into the "action" further back.
In the final round at Harbor Hobby once again, I stuck with the F104V2. It was working ok, and I wasn't able to find a new axle for the TOP car, so I decided stick with the safe option so I could make it through the weekend. Rick Vessel again was fast. I never really got my car the way I wanted for more than one run. I'm not sure if it was a tire or tire prep issue or the way the track changed. I was able to be close to the pace, but it seemed like at times my car faded as the races went on. The TOP car was definitely more consistent than this, but I would have been afraid to run it with the axle issues I had. In the end I did ok, but I wish I had been able to get a little more from the car.
Despite all the trials and tribulations, I was able to finish second in the series, mostly based on having some consistent finishes. Rick Vessel came on strong in the last two weekends, and was able to take the overall championship with his Exotek F1R F104.
This was probably one of the most fun things I have done in rc racing. It was extremely challenging, and I can only imagining it getting harder the next time around.
Wednesday, May 15, 2013
First Ever Vintage F1 Video
Video of the first Vintage F1 race at the Tamiya USA track....by Charles Lightfoot...Incredible Work!!!
Monday, May 13, 2013
RCFIA Returns
http://www.rcfia.com/schedule/
"For it’s second season, the RCFIA Formula 1 series travels to 6 tracks across Northern California. With the addition of 2 new races and tracks, the RCFIA Formula 1 series will be even more interesting to watch and participate in!
"For it’s second season, the RCFIA Formula 1 series travels to 6 tracks across Northern California. With the addition of 2 new races and tracks, the RCFIA Formula 1 series will be even more interesting to watch and participate in!
The 2013 RCFIA Gran Primo D’Sonoma June 2nd 2013
The 2013 RCFIA Grand Prix of Ripon June 29th 2013
The 2013 RCFIA Grand Prix of Union City July 7th 2013
The 2013 RCFIA Grand Prix of Roseville July 27th 2013
The 2013 RCFIA Grand Prix of Antioch August 10th 2013
The 2013 RCFIA Grand Prix of Ukiah August 24th 2013
The 2013 RCFIA Grand Prix of Ripon June 29th 2013
The 2013 RCFIA Grand Prix of Union City July 7th 2013
The 2013 RCFIA Grand Prix of Roseville July 27th 2013
The 2013 RCFIA Grand Prix of Antioch August 10th 2013
The 2013 RCFIA Grand Prix of Ukiah August 24th 2013
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