Have you fixed the miss firing? I'm curious of what was causing it?
Edit: Watched the vid now. Amazing, almost had the win there! Excellent driving! At first I was like.. "Put your foot down!" then I saw how slippery it was >_>
Pleasant to watch such a clear pic, must say. Looks like it was quite intense, though I found myself thinking "Powerrrr!!" in a rather Clarksonian style waiting for the revs to go up
edit: quite interesting how your confidence on the limit really grew during the race, very cautious early on but after 11 mins or so being much more aggressive. Was it just conditions getting better or something else?
Correct. Slow corners in the wet are not the ideal territory for a stiff single seater!
I suppose the safety car might have been out for the whole race, but I didn't catch it up
We add wing, soften the roll stiffness, reduce the damping, move the brake balance to the rear and cross our fingers. In future we'll also adjust camber, but we didn't want to do too much on our first proper wet outing and confuse ourselves.
We didn't blank off the brake or cooling ducts, but we should have in hindsight. The cooler brakes and engine weren't a problem though, as the brakes were fine, and the reduced engine power with cooler coolant was probably a good thing with such little grip!!!
The aquaplaning was more do with the sheer amount of water. Some people were on brand new wets, and ours aren't measurably worn either. The ground clearence isn't a problem 99.9% of the time in the wet, and it wasn't this time. But there is only so much water a wet tyre holding up a 560kg car with less than F1 levels of downforce can cope with before the tyre just sits on top...
I'd rather be in an open top car than have a greasy, smeary windscreen that I can't wipe. The worst bit is sitting on the grid whilst 50 gallons of water runs down your neck!
Yes. We tried different gaskets, needle jets, float heights etc etc, but it turned out to be fuel pressure. Initially we had 2.5psi, which caused a slight misfire. We then tried 3.0psi which made it worse (as at Mallory in practice). Then back to 2.5psi (for the first Mallory race), then down to 2.0psi for the next day (matched the existing lap record).
Sometimes the solution is the simple one. But only when you try everything else first!!!
Dosen't Luffield have a patch of resurfaced tarmac on the indside right at the apex that is extra slippery in the wet from what I remember? (then again the outside line is usually the best in the wet)
And then theres the huge kerbs which look so inviting to drive over, but are like ice.
And that's why I'd rather have a roof, as you know t'is not nice going out onto the grid while sitting in what has turned into a bath on wheels.
Ok, thanks again for the details. One more question...what was the strange "fap-fap-fapping" noise that was most noticeable in the slow right handers? Some kind of shunting in the transmission or were you, erm... 'otherwise engaged'?
I think it's just the drivetrain being unloaded. I was usually at that throttle position that is neither over-run nor on the power. There certainly doesn't appear to be anything wrong with the drivetrain... At least not that I can find :S
My guess would be his freinds or relatives which may have been watching, to which there thinking "WTF? Why is he so far back?", which is why he puts his hand up saying "i know! im a newb!" then claws back to a very good position.
Yes i know, that was a stupid way to put it.
@ Tristan. I have a question about races in the wet. 5haz was talking about Single seaters becoming a "bath on wheels" when at the grid. What do you do incase you do get a few CM of water in the floor of the car, by the pedal box for example. Are there any small drain holes in the floor of the car, as i imagine there must be a fair ammount of water in there after a race?
Also, what kind of transmission are in these kind of single seaters? Im guessing from the sound, the fast shifting, and the car, that this is a sequential transmission right? Im only asking because about a lap after your spin, just as your coming onto the start/finish, something happened with your shifting. You seemed to shift down a gear, which put the car high in the revrange, which you then shifted up two gears. Was this intentional, or was it to save a potential spin? Sorry for the silly question, but im just curious and its a little hard to tell from your video.
E: Just watched it again. Its at around 1:55. Looking at it again, it seems you shifted up to save a potential spin, so that with the engine being highed in the revs, its producing less torque than lower down, thus stopping the spin? Either that or im chatting total rubbish.
Most open top racers I have seen have had draining holes in the lowest part of the floor, we had a few on the Ginetta but even these werent enough to stop a few centimetres of water collecting.
Its amazing how much water a car will throw up in your face, its actually like being hit with a jet washer above 90mph.
You mean the in-lap or the green-flag lap? On the green-flag lap before the start I was signalling (or trying to) to the car in 5th that passed me. During the race, in the first couple of laps, I was waving to get the race red flagged, as it was too dangerous - I wasn't afraid of making a mistake myself, but I was concerned that someone on track would end up having an accident or being collected by someone elses. And on the slowing down lap I wave, clap and thumbs up to the marshals - volunteers without which nobody would be able to race.
I like your thinking though!
Nope, I blocked up all the spare holes (for alternative pedal positions for short people) with silicone sealant. But very little water actually gets in there when I'm moving, and what does gets soaked up by my shoes, gloves, suit, helmet lining etc etc.
It's an h-gate non-syncro non-sequential Hewland gearbox. The fast shifts are because the gear change is very quick once you unload the transmission with a lift of the throttle.
*goes to watch 1m55*
Yes, in the gear I was in (probably 3rd gear) it was spinning up the wheels to easily due to excess torque. Popping it into 4th made it much easier to manage (but probably a bit slower ultimately). It's not a great change though - a bit crunchy. There's a really bad one into Copse on one lap. Makes me wince every time I do it or watch me doing it... But that's the cost of being an amateur; you make mistakes periodically!!
Normally I wouldn't want the revs to drop below 4000rpm, but in those conditions it was better to use a higher gear and lower revs coming out of a corner. Being an untuned engine it's happy to pull from 'low' revs.
Ginettas are probably even less waterproof with a roof than my car is without!!!!
Tell me about it - now try cars with downforce, diffusers and exposed 8"/10" wheels. But at least I don't have a greasy windscreen to cope with
Another couple of questions about wet weather. Did you do anything to your visor to combat the conditions (e.g. Rain-X on the outside, anti misting agent on the inside) and do you change your breathing to try and direct your exhaled breath away from the visor?
I put some Rain-X on the visor on Friday, but to be honest it's not as good as spit rubbed in with a tissue. So I did that for the race. No misting up issues, and no changes in breathing that I'm aware of. I did give it the occasional wipe with a finger though
Great stuff Tristan, like I said to get back to 2nd after that spin is brilliant, those conditions looked horrible.
When I was there a couple of months back, qualifying was almost as wet as that and it was amazing just how slippery it was on the normal racing line. Whereas at Brands last year in the rain you could take the normal dry line.
(Please accept a most humble apology for my somewhat childish behaviour. That line would have resulted in pure "Kev gold" had it been written six months ago, but, owing to his continued absence, and my obvious lack of intelligent witticism, that's the best reply i could come up with, and i'm not even sure if it's spelled correctly. Feel free to ignore...thank you)
Thanks Alex! Means a lot when someone of your talent compliments little old me! Rockingham is the same - the racing line remains the grippy line even in the wet, mostly. I didn't get to race at Donington, but I gather that's the worst, because of the Airport.
Brilliant!!! You can be honourary Kev
Next race end of this month at Snetterton. We're doing a guest entry with BRSCC F3, which is a championship for full F3 spec cars - F3 engines, high octane fuels, low ride heights, spec tyres. So we're going to see what low ride heights (~20mm) and spec tyres are like. But we'll be about 10 - 20hp down on their engines, so not expecting too much magic. Having said that I would have been in the top 6 or 7 from my pace earlier in the year (at higher ride heights, but softer tyres).
Then we're off to Croft at the end of September, and back to Snetterton in October for the last 4 races (2 meetings) of the year. I have to win everything and hope my rivals DNF a couple of times at least to win the championship - effectively it's not going to happen, but until it's mathematically impossible I'll keep trying. You never know...
, the track was like mirror on the back straight!
