Race 5 Thunder Road

[charlesx]

Hear hear Munter.

 

The idea of having the one driver drive all cars on one lane hopefully helps even things out.

 

A major challenge with any proxy is to make your car as easy to drive as possible. Always a bit of a compromise I suppose.

 

Chas Le Breton

[slotmadmac]

On race night the drivers will be Me, Pieguy SlotsNZ and The Great Munter. So, respectively, that's 2 x Third Eyes, a Slot It and a Difalco. We're a talented, handsome bunch - apart from PieGuy who is thick and ugly.

 

As a slot guy I hardly ever run Slot it / HRS or NSR cars. Nothing against them but in our local group I try and build up non podded stock chassis cars to compete against the guys who go down the Slot It / NSR path. So big ups to the guys who share the non podded love. There's only a few of us left.

Edited May 6, 2014 by slotmadmac

[charlesx]

Hi Mac.

 

I am with you on the un-podded. It is a great pity the Canam Proxy is now predominately NSR/Slot-it as to my mind it takes somethiong away from the event.

 

I have have about 11 cars entered in events across the world over the last year. Only one is a podded car. Five are scratch built metal chassis cars with the rest Carrera, Ninco, Scalextric, SCX, MRRC or Revell.

 

Regards

 

Chas Le Breton

Edited May 7, 2014 by charlesx

[neil]

With the coming G5 I'm needing To build or purchase my chassis.......to me the thought of the scratch build process is daunting.... & its the motor cradle that I'm sought of fearing.... this is where a purchased pod makes it all that easier..... just like the cars I've entered in this Championship..... was easy to cut & shut( sought of)..........still I've not yet made a move on the G5 chasiss & am still thinking .....lots of thinking... not doing ....just thinking.

[drw21]

Hi Guys, I wasn't having a dig at any one or anything and I do apologise if that's how it came across. Just a bit curious as so far it's been quite stable.

 

I also know that the Hawkes Bay racers will always be the guys to beat with RTR type cars and our cars are in great hands for the 2 Races they are hosting for us.

 

(Chas, I borrowed Mike's truer to sort Pauls Alfa tires just before last years race)

 

All the best for Race 5 tomorrow night guys, it's getting close.

[charlesx]

Hi Neil. Group 5 cars I have seen (SIdeways) come out with a podded chassis so different circumstances. Mind you there may be FLY or CARRERA cars out there for example that comply so they are probably non-podded.

 

By comparison Canam was originally at least 50% non-podded but with prevalence of NSR and Slot-it now scales have turned. There have always been some podded Chappy, Alfa and resin bodied cars fitted with NSR or Slot-it chassis.

 

That said it is still a great event which I hope will survive into the future. It makes a nice change from National classes.

 

Regards

 

Chas Le Breton

[slotmadmac]

All good Dave - no drama at all with your comments Mate. Your car is super stable but on my track it suddenly deslotted in parts of the track where I typically never deslot - coming out of some of the faster corners and on the sweeper. I think this was simply my inexperience with higher RPM motors.

 

I pushed the cars quite hard in qualifying but your car also deslotted a few times under acceleration in a straight line. The nose lifted causing the deslot - so I guess it's getting plenty of power onto the track. I think, given more track time, I could drop your 917's lap times on my track considerably. The same goes for a number of the faster cars.

 

Tomorrow night the guys will all adjust to these higher RPM set ups. We'll get the best out of them without pushing too hard and it will be interesting to see how the fastest race laps compare to the qualifying times.

[drw21]

Cool Mac, sounds like your track has awesome grip levels that some of us just ain't used to.

 

All the best for Thursday Night Mate.

 

There should be an address sheet with Wazza's addy in ChCh in the case, if it's not there let me know - Dave.

[SlotsNZ]

Yeah, typically my track has "good" levels, - high compared to most ozzie tracks and Christchurch tracks - and I get the odd car which will lift the nose out of the slot, mainly at the startline, or on the 2 inside lanes after my hairpin which is tight and slow.

 

But Macs track, Viv's to some extent, and Chris' track, all have higher grip levels again, and I am usually running some combo of a bit of weight/taller gearing/some "anti-spin" on my Slot.it controller to prevent higher powered cars lifting off on a number of corner exits.

 

Looking forward to getting a 2nd run on these cars tonight, - and my last time with controller in hand for several weeks.

[Drew Vessey]

Good luck to all for this evenings race.. and to those driving this evening i hope you all have fun running such a cool collection of cars.. i'm looking forward to seeing the results..

[munter]

I enjoyed the drive on blue lane, thanks to all entrants for the cars and to Mac for the invitation to take a lane.

 

Results .....will be coming through sometime soon.

[SlotsNZ]

Okay folks, here are the results for round 5 of the CanAm Proxy series.

 

 

Some very fast cars, but we all found that this years cars were on the whole, harder to drive consistently than previous years.

Apart from Tony Cook's car, which could really do with one more notch of motor, we felt most of them were are constant risk of deslot due to being powered pretty much to the limits of the chassis.

It showed up more on Macs big fast track than my smaller track, simply because the terminal speeds WERE so high.

I recall one heat where all 4 cars were sub 7 seconds. But deslots were higher than we're used to, even with a focus on distance not trying to beat the other cars/drivers per se.

[slotmadmac]

Thanks to the boys who turned up to marshal and to JK for doing such a good job with the spreadsheet.

 

There were a couple of issues - Nitro's car ended up on the floor and broke off a rear wing strut and the aerofoil. We re-ran that heat. A repair has been made and it lives to race again.

 

Aquakiwi's car lost a rear wheel - twice! It was a plastic wheel and was superglued back on. From memory we restarted a fresh heat the first time it happened, the second time we used a track call. The car has a lot of axle slop in it. The sidewinder gear needs to be moved closer to the bushing but it has been super glued to the wheel hub (not by me - it was like that when the car arrived here - and the other wheel fell off tonight.)

 

I guess we found it a fairly frustrating night. Sorry to say that the boys didn't enjoy the cars as much as other years and, as Mark says, we thought a number of them were over-powered - fast but not enjoyable, if that makes sense.

 

It's hard to be critical when none of the Bay boys has a car entered this year but I thought it was best that we tell it like we saw it. Please be assured that we are very grateful for the opportunity to run your cars tonight - so thanks for that and congrats to all involved.

 

My favourite cars of the night were Tony Cooks 917 and Dr Speeds wee McLaren, with Bunyip and Stubbo tied for third.

 

Mac

[aquakiwi]

Thanks for running and repairs, the wheels are all alloys but I think the grub screw on one is stripped hence the glueing on. Dave had to do it at the first round I think from memory.

[nitro0440]

Well done to the top 3 in the round , Big thanks to Mac and his team for the running of round five .... Thanks also for the repairs to the M20 , i wasn't expecting to much from the M20 , it was a last minute change of car for the proxy ... Am interested to see how the cars will run on my track after all the coments from previous rounds ... Round 6 .. controller fingers are poised and ready , bring it on ...

[Drew Vessey]

Congrats to the top 3 ..And thanks to the host and marshalls and drivers etc for putting on the round..I personally am looking forward to the next couple of rounds down south to see if my two entries have got the legs this year for the longer straights.. time will tell i set them up this year with the longer straights in mind and took the comments that i received last year in to the equation,so fingers crossed.. Good luck to all for the next rounds

[alexis in greece]

Thanks to everyone involved in running this round and congratulations to the top 3.Finishing 13th was quite a surprise given the previous results,its either the repair or the tires found more grip on this track.

Edited May 9, 2014 by alexis in greece

[munter]

Hello Alexis, your car seemed smoother and more predictable when cornering.....it must be the tires coming right.

[neil]

Ditto... to the guys running the round... interesting track.. surprised all & took no hostages with some entrants ..... even I'm bewildered by the upset between my 2 entries..... was it because one performed better,,, or the other performed worse.... than their average expectations... I wonder if others like me.. cant wait to get their car back,, to work on them more & do it again

[slotmadmac]

even I'm bewildered by the upset between my 2 entries..... was it because one performed better,,, or the other performed worse....

 

Both your cars rode hard on the track (to the point were we thought they were bottoming out) and were quite noisy even when circulating slowly. They both had a number of deslots. I'd look at the front tyres and check for roundness and possibly look at a softer tire.

[charlesx]

Thanks for great round at Thunder Road.

 

On behalf of Taranaki contingent Paul will be very pleased with 2nd. Well driven by all involved. Mike and Trent also did fairly well at 7th and 10th. Less said about my little McLaren M6a the better. Clearly my very shallow guide continues to be a problem.

 

Special thanks to Mac the track owner, organsiers, drivers, marshals and other helpers plus congrats to the podiumites.

 

Regards

 

Chas Le Breton

Edited May 9, 2014 by charlesx

[Orakei Racer]

Thanks Johnny Mac and team for hosting this round.

 

Interesting round. It certainly highlighted the better balanced and handling cars.

 

Surprising the higher powered cars struggled as Thunder road has some nice long straights and flowing corners.

 

The points table will change a bit after this round.

 

Working on that tonight.

[drw21]

A BIG Thank You to Mac and his team of drivers, marshalls and the ‘timer guy’ for completing Race 5.

 

Hope you guys enjoyed the Race and thanks for sorting the results so quickly too. Well done guys!!

 

Tony Cook’s 917K still has the stock NSR motor in it, interesting to see how competitive a NSR car would go with original motor and gears.

 

I was waiting to see when Paul’s Alfa was going to hit top gear, well done Paul.

 

The gap between DrSpeed and CharlesX is getting bigger, c'mon Chas, "you can do it".

 

Here are the updated points total so far=>

 

 

 

 

You will see that HGPanel has dropped his worst round and with this points system it hasn't really hurt his position in the scheme of things.

Dropping the worst round gives us all a breather if we need one.

 

Nittro440 has the most consistent out there!!!! Go Wazza!!

Edited May 9, 2014 by drw21

[charlesx]

Hi Dave.

 

Good to see your car put two good ones together but Mi, Mi, Mi is it close.

 

My M6a is clearly only a qualifying car this year. Last year one of the front tyres got something on it early on and virtually fell apart - went soft and mushy.

 

I replaced both tyres this year but clearly my selection leaves something to be desired. Appears to have lifted front by at least 2mm as Slot-it guide only appears to have about 3-4mm penetration into slot. I think its very good grip has also contributed to problem.

 

Not to worry there is always next year. The longer Chch track may be a chance for it to shine. One lives in hope. Still like the concept of smaller cars but with only 2 this year a separate class is hardly justified.

 

Regards

 

Chas Le Breton

[Stubbo]

I'm a bit slow responding here but thanks to Mac and the gang for running the round and well done to Dave, Paul and Bunyip on the podium.

 

Cheers Guys.