DemonDriverDan's Rallye Race Car

[RetroPug]

Would this be suitable? http://www.demon-tweeks.co.uk/motorsport...attery-box

There's a bigger one for the next size up of battery as well.

[DemonDriverDan]

I'm not running the loom in to the car, far to much work

[DemonDriverDan]

Since the last update I've done another Snet session which revealed a new oil leak which was easily sortable. We've also been back to Snet for the first race of the year over the Easter weekend.

As you may remember Storm Katie was lingering around over that weekend which meant the weather played a dominant role. In the run up to the weekend the forecast was heavy rain on pretty much the entire Sunday with it potentially drying up late in the afternoon. Our qualifying was in the morning and the race the afternoon so it was looking likely to be a wet quali and dry race. That wouldn't have been too bad as everyone is a bit race rusty and with a 40 car grid the last thing you want is a pile-up at the first corner of a wet race! As it turns out the weather was completely the opposite.

Quali looked to be damp but ended up being dry and so we made the decision to not run the rear wing and just the splitter. The drag it creates would have cost us too much straight line speed and lap time. I hadn't had much chance to test this configuration and found that the car was really unstable at the rear, wanting to step sideways at pretty much every opportunity. I couldn't get used to it in the 3 laps I had in qualifying so was quite off the pace. Ben went out for his laps and was much more comfortable in the car and put us 10th on the grid, 2nd in class with a 2:16.643, only 0.04s away from the class leader in 8th. Pretty annoying considering class pole is worth a championship point. As we weren't sure how damp the track would be we ran a soft setup so the car was pretty grim to drive, wallowing all over the place, which didn't help the lap time either.











Unfortunately we hadn't noticed there was a sharp piece of metal on one of the inner arches which, as the setup was so soft, was hitting the tyre and ruined it. Balls.



In the run up to the race the rain came, and it came hard. Luckily we had the gazebo up or I've been soaked just standing outside for a few seconds! Obviously at this point we had decided to fit the wets as the track was soaking and started to take the wheels off when I decided to check the forecast one more time. It said that rain was coming but was due to arrive after our race. With the high winds and strong sun I thought the track would dry out to the point that running the dry tyres would be a better option. Not completely convinced by this I left the setup soft and put the rear wing on to stabilise the car in the opening few laps when I thought it would be most wet. How wrong I was!

While sitting in the assembly area waiting to go to the grid it started to lightly rain. During the warm up laps the rain started to get a bit heavier but nothing major. Then, at the end of the first lap of the race, it came down hard again. Going in to turn 1 it looked like a lake rather than a track! The rain stayed for pretty much the entire race and, with most cars running dry tyres, made for an interesting race. I'll post the summary I wrote on Facebook on the way home:

"3rd in class after a pretty crazy race! Heavy rain arrived at the end of the second lap and we were on dry tyres which made for quite a lack of grip. Others around us were struggling more though and we managed to make a few places up to be sitting second in class at the pitstops. We had to be careful of the hard charging Mini of Amery and Gibbs who were catching at a serious rate. After our near perfect pitstop (not luck, honestly!) we came out still second in class although were soon after overtaken by Denslow in his Fiesta. In the second stint Ben was having issues with heating the front tyres up meaning lap times were not ideal and allowing Denslow past. This was compounded when a safety car bunched the field up. There was just 1 lap left at the end of the safety car period to keep Gary Burstow behind and keep 3rd in class. Ben somehow managed it and the final podium spot was ours!"

Putting the wing on was a very good choice as it made the car so much more stable and driveable in those conditions with the wrong tyres on. I enjoyed my stint and was putting in some reasonable lap times. The diff was having a nightmare when putting the power down, it juddered horrendously out of most corners meaning traction wasn't great.

Very pleased with the result. It's all about points this year and we need to get more next time but it's a good start.














Rather than doing a full race video I've made a highlights video cutting out all of the boring bits where we're just driving round

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJk8ER63fEQ

Roll on the next race at Silverstone!