Just as I said we would, Clint and myself went to an SCDA track event at NHIS this past Tuesday. As per usual, the SCDA ran an excellent event. Everything was very punctual, the flaggers were on the ball, and the instructors were very knowledgeable and friendly. I drove my Miata, and Clint broke his Protege’s cherry (among other items) and tracked it for the first time:

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I told you there is a Moose Fetish running through the Boston underground:

I don’t understand wings like this. They don’t even look like they could be aerodynamic or make the car faster.

Failure.

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I just put in my brand new front set of Hawk Blue racing brake pads in preparation for an SCDA track day at NHIS tomorrow (be on the lookout for an upcoming review when I get back). Look at them sparkle:

What a lovely shade of blue. I think even my mother could take a liking to these brake pads. Too bad these pads dust like the desert in a windstorm. I’ll give them 1/4 mile before they are completely black and look like hell.

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Everyone gets their seatbelt caught in the door from time to time. It happens, and there isn’t much we can do about it. But there is absolutely no excuse for this Prius which pulled up at the gas station:

Now remember, it pulled up like this, meaning it had been driving around all day dragging the seatbelt along the ground. Too bad it didn’t snag on anything. That would have made an interesting noise.

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I am not much of a fan of off-roading. I prefer smooth, high speed tracks to low speed, obstacle courses. But that doesn’t mean I don’t respect serious off-road vehicles. Quite the contrary. Anything that can get itself out of a hole like this definitely wins my respect:

I don’t think I could get myself out of that hole, at least not without a lot of aggravation. Yet here is the Jeep eating up that wall like it’s nothing:

As reported by Autoblog, this particular Wrangler has been modified slightly, but I am extremely impressed nonetheless.

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I was trying to buy groceries this afternoon when I was accosted by this disgusting abortion of a Nissan Altima in the parking lot:

I understand that people want to rice their cars, though I myself have no desire whatsoever. But, I cannot understand why anyone would want to rice their car in a stupid way. The whole point of ricing a car is to make a car look better. The primary (and most obvious) failure is the wing on the trunk. I don’t know why, but lately I have been seeing more and more wings of this style. They don’t look “hot,” “tight,” or “badass,” they look like antlers, and this car looks like a moose.

The sorry attempt at air damming is also appalling. The side skirts are ornate, but do nothing to keep any air under the car as there is a good 5 inches of open space underneath them. The rear diffuser is laudable at best. That such a car could get anywhere near the speed where a rear diffuser would be of any use is, in itself, a good laugh, but not as good a laugh as actually thinking that this skirt would do a damn thing to manage any air flow.

But the best part is his rims. They are steelies. Even my beater has alloys for the summer. If the owner had not riced his car, and instead put the money towards a nice set of wheels and vicious tires, his car would at least have something going for it, instead of countless things against it.

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Up until now, we have been talking about relatively short corners of about 90 degrees or less. For such corners, the tradtional track in, apex, and track out approach will yield the fastest times and highest exit speed. In longer corners, in particular those that involve 180 degree direction changes, this tradiational approach is not always best. Many such corners benefit from the double apex.

What is a double apex?
A double apex is exactly what it sounds like: 2 apexes in 1 corner. If that concept sounds odd, you’re right. It is a counterintuitive way of approaching a corner. But, as you will see, it can be the best option in some situations. Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve spent more time in a car over the last month than is healthy. At the end of April I drove from Boston to northern Virginia, then rode shotgun to and from the odd no-man’s land that is the corner of West Virginia that borders Maryland, then drove back to Boston. A week later I drove from Boston to Syracuse to Watkins Glen to Ithaca to Boston. And just this past Saturday I was passenger in a day trip from Boston to Lime Rock Park and back. All told, I think I put in just under 40 hours of seat time. Just over a day and a half. A day and a half in cars either boring or inhospitable, on interstates and roads that once were, by myself and with friends. A long drive is a bizarre thing: It is a cross between looking at a long unending mural and living an episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000.

There is the destination of course, but we all know that the destination is often a mirage, a dream, a thing you can only imagine as you pass signs for places like Old Weathersfield and Weedsport—and signs that say “NEXT EXIT 35mi”. The mind focuses on act of driving and on the monotonous scar of highways like I-90 in western Mass and I-95 north of Baltimore.

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Yesterday, Clint and I attended an SCCA race at Lime Rock Park. Qualification was in the morning, and then there were about a dozen different races throughout the afternoon.

Each race had several different classes running at the same time, so there was often an interesting and bizarre mix of cars on the track at any given time. In general, a given class and its subdivisions would all race at the same time. In the IT class for example, there is ITA (most vicious) down to ITC (least vicious). 2nd gen RX-7s were running in ITA, right alongside older Volkswagen Rabbits running in ITC. Read the rest of this entry »

All of our discussion to this point has involved a corner with a constant camber, or banking. Under constant camber, grip will be the same at all points through a corner. But, if banking changes part way through a corner, grip will vary significantly.

The effect of banking
In short, the more banking a corner has, the more grip your tires, and thus your car, will have through a corner. If two corners are exactly the same, only one of the corners is flat and the other has 10 degrees of banking, you will have more grip and thus be able to go much faster around the corner with 10 degrees of banking. Read the rest of this entry »