Lane times?

Feb 12, 2014
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What would be a good starting point to figure out a way to get my times more consistent in all lanes? With that being said I only have a tuning board. Or is there to many factors to pinpoint one thing?

Thanks shane
 
I agree with JBD (Benji). No matter what you attempt to do in setting up the track, there are always some small things that will make the times unequal from lane to lane. Also, it is almost impossible to make the staging absolutely the same for each run. That is why our racing system takes an average of all four lanes for each car. E.g. go to the table that shows the time for each of your cars in all four lanes. Then do the same for any of your competitors. In general, you will find the same changes. In regards to Staging, I have a single lane test track. When I am testing, I have to make 4 passes to get a true idea of the car's speed/times. This is simply due to tiny changes in staging. Being off on the DFW by even 1/128th of an inch, as well as assuring that the car is otherwise absolutely parallel to the track can cause a big change in the resulting times.
 
CCR, your car Blew By You looks like it was more consistent than Dirty Deeds. Assuming that they weren't set up identical, I would examine both the differences between those setups AND the speeds of the cars that raced adjacent to yours since your consistency in a race is affected by the cars next to you. On your cars I would look mainly at the amount of drift and the amount of weight on the DFW. Just my $.02.
 
Can I assume if you are slower on the side where traffic is pushing you DFW away from the rail you may need more steer? If you are slower when the DFW is pushed into the rail you may have too much steer?
 
ngyoung said:
Can I assume if you are slower on the side where traffic is pushing you DFW away from the rail you may need more steer? If you are slower when the DFW is pushed into the rail you may have too much steer?

Not necessarily. I try to tune for the fastest times possible and what you see in the lane differences is the happy medium.

I build and tune my car for the fastest times period. If I can maintain that fast time with more steer, I do. Sometimes it's a minimal barely noticeable adjustment because exact steer is hard to measure even on the tuning board.
 
ngyoung said:
Can I assume if you are slower on the side where traffic is pushing you DFW away from the rail you may need more steer? If you are slower when the DFW is pushed into the rail you may have too much steer?

Well my fastest run was in the red and I'm Left DFW but maybe I got the bounce but I still think you have something. But I think it also depends how much steer you put in it. If you crank the steer makes them stable as heck but you'll loose a little time. There is probably a happy medium for your steer, maybe if you add a tad more steer then when it runs its fastest to pick up speed in the slower lanes??

The Bounce, I think we've all seen it. You might once in awhile get the perfect bounce and pull a great time.

Your Gaps, I think the looser your gaps are possibly the more the cars next to you will affect you.

Gaps, So Gaps are very temperamental (I wiggled in almost 1/2 my runs, (I ran out of time to set them properly) research on here and you should come up with the standard gap. I finally have my Johns Gapper tool on order.

My thoughts:
Red= outer- used most when they are testing possibly = fastest
white= inside- two cars each side slower
Black= inside - two cars each side slower
Blue= outer- faster
 
Thanks for the info. I have a new car that I plan to send to the finals if I make it. And it needs new wheels. Should I get the prep option to see where I'm at with my prep? I know john knows what he is doing..
 
For me the outsides lanes were faster than the inside two lanes. Also, my car had a slower drop coming down the hill on the inside lanes. I would like to see a chart which would show the number of wins each had and the average time for each lane. I'm thing the outside were faster do to only having a car on one side, but I'm not sure why the drop would be so different on the inside lanes if the staging was the same.
 
Chump Change Racing said:
Thanks for the info. I have a new car that I plan to send to the finals if I make it. And it needs new wheels. Should I get the prep option to see where I'm at with my prep? I know john knows what he is doing..

If you have been prepping your own and haven't reached your goals with it, it may be time to use that option when buying a new set of wheels. This way you can find out if it's your prep or your set up. This can get you a good baseline with your current prep.
 
Thanks GX.. I have been giving this a lot of thought.. You have helped me make my mind up../images/boards/smilies/smile.gif/images/boards/smilies/wink.gif/images/boards/smilies/wink.gif
 
Must be because your BASX car was faster than my fastest SS.. Haha!! That car would be scary with some fenders on it../images/boards/smilies/wink.gif/images/boards/smilies/wink.gif/images/boards/smilies/wink.gif I'll just clean the wheels and let them roll for next month..
 
Maybe make some dummy cars to fill in the other lanes during testing to get even break in. Make them really stable and slow to minimize chances of effecting the real car.
 
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ngyoung said:
Maybe make some dummy cars to fill in the other lanes during testing to get even break in. Make them really stable and slow to minimize chances of effecting the real car.

Would that be real world though?

A lot of guys run right on the edge. I got to run in the red lane last race (my fastest lane) in SS and the car in the white lane was all over the place and killed my time for that lane. Sometimes it's luck of the draw. We're never going to be able to account for everything.
 
I was referring to the speculation that the red lane may be faster because it is used the most for testing and tuning making it broken in more then the others.