Rear wheel weight distribution

[Darkside]

I'm sure this information is on the forum somewhere, but I haven't found it, and we need to get my son's car done. He's got a car with 3 wheels touching. The car is weighted with 15 g on the DFW. What should the distribution be on the rears? As close to equal as possible, or should the weight be distributed more to one side or the other?

Thanks in advance for any advise.

 

[HurriCrane Racing]

Buhler?.....Buhler?....Buhler?

You won't get a straight or consistent answer to that question. Everyone has their own opinion on how to best position the weight in the body. Each car is a little different for me. If you have a track you can experiment with different weight positions.

 

[Darkside]

Thanks HurriCrane. I've been trying to get the distribution on the rears as close to even as possible. But then I recently saw a post in the "3 am thoughts" thread that made me question that logic and got me to thinking that we were on the wrong track ( pardon the pun ). My boy and I have built three cars for this years race. He'll race the fastest of the three. Each one varies somewhat on weight distribution. We'll be running them for the first time on the test track tonight, so we'll see if there s a significant difference.

Thanks again. I appreciate the feedback.

 

[Reecedad]

Although I'm no expert, I like a 20% split on the rears. Start with 14g on the DFW , 57 behind it and 70 on the other. I think you'll find this combination keeps the weight close to center on your body. It's helped me keep my wiggles down.

 

[Darkside]

Okay so I have some results. Of the three cars we built, two had the weight distributed more to the rear wheel opposite of the DFW side by a few grams. Both of those cars were more stable and ran significantly faster times. I understand many factors contribute to the performance of a car and this by no means confirms that more weight to the opposite side is better, but it definitely didn't seem to hurt...

In fact the times were so much worse for the evenly distributed car that I'm certain some other gremlin is at play. I would do some experimentation, but right now we have two really good cars for his race on Saturday and we're both a little brain fried after two weeks of building.

Looking forward to getting back to building cars for fun without a deadline.

 

[HurriCrane Racing]

Looks like you answered your own question. Track testing really is the only way to be certain.

If you're looking for a little more building pressure, try your hand at league racing.

Good luck this weekend!

 

[Darkside]

Thanks HurriCrane and Reecedad...

League may be the next step... I'm not sure my boy has that level of interest, but I've definitely reached that level of obsession. I'm a little burned out at the moment, but I'm sure that in a couple of weeks I'll be itching to build and race again.