Car appreciation... the aesthetics, the engineering, etc

Yes, in reality would be running smaller. (This would also allow travel)

Side view of front says XJ220 to me. I like it.

Ta muchly NH, will prob amount to zero.

Still.

He's definitely putting on a show for the audience, I'd hope he raced with a bit more of a progressive throttle than that.

Any time I drive past a petrol station when it's really raining, my car is like that. Stamp the throttle and the wet diesel spilt all over the road means you can light up the rear tyres at any speed. 1/2 lock at top of 3rd is 'interesting'.

Think the race ended up being dry. In any case he won! Guy has serious skills. Also had a massssssssssive crash in Indycar 10 years ago.
IndyCar Series - Kenny Brack crash Texas 2003 - High Quality - YouTube

I'm not doubting his skills at all! From my purely amateur observer seat, it just looks like if maybe he was a little smoother putting down the power he wouldn't need to be flapping around with so much oppo lock. It makes for a very entertaining video anyway.

Also, fuck, that crash!! He's clearly crazy.

Sounds like Doc maybe had some archaeological experience, which helps. :o$

it was wet with tyres from the 60's and 500hp
in the dry that car would be a handful

The man is clearly insane.

Makes me want a cav gt40 even more.

Comments welcome. :o)

https://forge.localmotors.com/mobile/?cg=12245

Wouldn't mind seeing this without all the flares over the render. Masks the shape of the car too much, also would like to see with realistic sized wheels to get a sense of proportion. Looks like a good project though. I imagine it'd be ace to try and sculpt a half scale clay model.

Also, out of interest, do you start with plain old sketches or go straight into the modelling? (just curious, would love to study automotive/product design)

I'm not doubting his skills at all! From my purely amateur observer seat, it just looks like if maybe he was a little smoother putting down the power he wouldn't need to be flapping around with so much oppo lock. It makes for a very entertaining video anyway.
.

From my (very limited) experience the sudden steering swings are simply the result of a high PWR, little or no downforce and lots of water. In the dry, tyres tend to slide reasonably progressively, whereas in the wet the tyres grip up to a certain point and then suddenly let go, requiring a sudden requirement for 'a dab of oppo'.

F'example, here's me at Cadwell - skip the beginning and go to 4:30 - you can see the car suddenly slides and needs immediate correction in a way it doesn't in the dry, in the absence of real provocation.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3RXMAdV-Xuc

I'm the first to admit I'm no Kenny Brack, but driving hard in the wet really does make life interesting.

Dan: have you any good footage of donnington ?

From my (very limited) experience the sudden steering swings are simply the result of a high PWR, little or no downforce and lots of water. In the dry, tyres tend to slide reasonably progressively, whereas in the wet the tyres grip up to a certain point and then suddenly let go, requiring a sudden requirement for 'a dab of oppo'.

F'example, here's me at Cadwell - skip the beginning and go to 4:30 - you can see the car suddenly slides and needs immediate correction in a way it doesn't in the dry, in the absence of real provocation.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3RXMAdV-Xuc

I'm the first to admit I'm no Kenny Brack, but driving hard in the wet really does make life interesting.

Nice driving!

I'm obviously not experienced enough with high powered cars in the wet.

Dan: have you any good footage of donnington ?

Got this footage of me making a total horlicks of an overtake round the Craner Curves.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ciJl-PEGx_M

haha!

"footage"

Was that filmed on a potato?

Matt purple was a bold choice.

It's actually gloss purple - although you can't tell from the video due to the camera shake. I really must get my GoPro installation finished and ditch that useless bullet cam.

The purple car was one of the Stuart Taylor Motorsport 'Team Lavender' cars, and won the championship a couple of years ago, albeit driven by a different driver. They got plenty of stick for the colour choice at first, but I think people have got used to it by now.

If they're winning championships then I don't think anyone can stick it to them about the colour!

What series is that, and what car are you driving?

It looks like a Westfield series with Megablades/busas?

Do you still compete now?

It's the 750MC RGB championship. RGB stands for 'Road Going Bike-engined' as it's for cars which are capable of passing an MOT powered by bike engines of up to 1 litre. I've got a Fisher Fury with a Yamaha R1 in it. This is mine:

I'm still competing, yes. I'm back to Donington for a double-header this weekend, in fact. Then Cadwell, and then the end-of-season non-championship Birkett 6 hour relay race at Silverstone.

I've never heard of a Fisher Fury but it looks awesome.

This would explain your awesome machining workshop in your house from your Brompton thread.

Do you get Z-Cars Minis competing in this series?

It seems almost affordable too, how many tyres do you go through in a 14 meet season?

No, never had any Minis competing. I think they'd struggle to get anywhere close to the minimum weight limit (530kg for front engined, 560kg for rear engined, both with driver) and they'd get clobbered aerodynamically.

It's a pity, in a way, as I like Z-Cars stuff. A friend of mine used to have this Tiger Z-100. 2 ZX9R engines. Bonkers.

Tyre use varies. The cars are quite light on the regulation rubber (Yokohama AO48Rs) and they tend to go hard before they get worn out. I usually start the season on a new set of tyres, and buy another set halfway through, so two sets a year. Although this year I'm still on the same tyres I started the season with at the moment. A new set of boots for my car (13", 185/60 front, 205/50 rear) costs about 280 quid IIRC.

Ooof that looks mental.

I can't imagine how quick your car and the others competing are then, as having had passenger laps in a Z Cars Mini, I was overwhelmed by how quick it was.

By my calculations, you could do a season in £5-6k? It's not that cheap in the grand scheme of things, but it would be fucking fun.

Almost worth stopping learning to fly to scratch the itch to race.

I've never actually added up how much I spend on racing, but 5-6k a year sounds about right, excluding the car, trailer and safety gear. Some people spend a lot more - lots of testing, new tyres every meeting, engine rebuilds etc. but with a more modest racing programme with a few days testing a year and 2 sets of tyres I'd say 5-6k would be doable. Fuel to get you to and from the race meetings takes up a surprisingly large amount of that, although there are much more economical ways of doing it than mine (Scooby WRX Sportwagon towing a large trailer).

The Z-100 was great fun. I think the best 0-60 Simon ever got was 2.7 seconds on Hoosier slicks. It was also quite fun at Le Mans when people in expensive sports cars decided to race from the lights, when Simon was just pootling along using only one engine, so he'd nonchalantly fire up the second engine.

Right well I need a new job that pays more money so I can go racing.

those tigers used to hold the 0-60 record

the one 900cc engine for the front wheels and 1 900cc engine for the rear wheels

nice