BIWS Round 4

My day started/continued when my mate Andy Murray and I returned from a pool session at Rileys. Andy promptly began sorting out his gear ready for later that morning and the diff rebuild was in full swing by about 1am. My gear was already packed ready to go, so all that was left was for me to spectate and interject with moral support throughout the ordeal. We finally made it to bed around 2am - 5:50am was our planned departure time. Travel to Don Valley went without a hitch despite the unexpected snow storm which had struck under the cover of darkness.

The venue and track were kind of what I was expecting, except that the racing surface was surprisingly abrasive, but the layout and facilities looked good.





We got all set up and popped warmers on ready for a practice run...





After a couple of practice runs and a round of qualifying it was apparent to all that the lack of grip was a serious issue and setup alterations began to resolve the issues. Stefan Chodzynski opted for superglue as his additive of choice, the logic was sound - it is the stickiest stuff known to man - but he was foiled by the quick drying time and had to unleash the file of fury on his tire to rescue the day.



Another fellow pit member, Andy Cottom, went for an interesting choice of additive. One which adhered to the rules that the only additives allowed are ones you would be happy to drink. Codenamed "OJ Extreme Traction Sauce" it often masquerades under the brand name Tropicana...



After a fairly light application, Andy was convinced of its magical grip-giving properties, for the first minute of the race at least, so continued with somewhat heavier applications throughout the remainder of the day.



My car went OK in the low grip conditions, in hindsight I should have experimented with setup options more, but the track conditions were constantly changing complicating matters and confusing any setup changes. I qualified 7th in the B final for 10.5 - a result which I was pleased for my first trip to the venue with but at the same time felt the car and I were capable of a little better.

The first round of finals went well I finished 2nd after starting at the back end of the grid. Unfortunately the same could not be said for my second round of finals, I was having a messy run due to a combination of poor driver input and a loss of grip in the dying rounds of the meeting. After making a mistake going round the central sweeper I side swiped the track marking pretty hard and sheared off a plastic outdrive cup in my spool. A disappointing finish to the day to be honest. But, there is always next weekend at the Carpet Masters to redeem myself.



I managed to get some footage of the first round of the 13.5 A final with Luke Hobson on pole - check out my "Recent Racing Videos" section the right to see that. Until next time...

Weekly Club Night @ RVRCCC

Last night I was in attendance at the usual Friday night club meeting at Ribble Valley RC Car Club. The track layout was the same as last time I was there for their NICS event. It's a nice flowing layout and although I had some reservations when I first saw it, it has really grown on me.

Car setup remained the same as last time out except for two fairly big changes... the first being the installation of my new Speed Passion GT Pro 2.0, in blue, naturally. The second was the fitment of some Sweep 32s as I am running these for the first time tomorrow at BIWS so I wanted to see what they were like having heard mixed reviews.

I'd also found time to cover some, oh okay most, of my pit gear in carbon fibre vinyl and blue screws. That combined with the recent acquisition of some MuchMore blue accessories and obviously my new Tamiya means there is a definite carbon fibre/TRF/Tamiya blue theme going on on my pit table now. Good times.



The car was running well as before and there was definitely a marked improvement in both performance and efficiency with the SpeedPassion 2.0 speedo over the older 1.0 model I had in previously. With the same settings plugged in via the handy program card the car felt like it had quite a bit more punch and a slightly higher top speed to boot. As another plus point I noticed I was taking quite a bit less out my lipo; about 500mah less actually and all done with the added bonus of it being blue and matching the car! If it's this quick already I'm intrigued to see what it's like with the stock profiles installed on it - I'm just awaiting delivery of the 'Pro' LCD program card.



The Sweep tires however were a different matter. I was expecting something akin to Sorex 32s not much grip but still very drivable. I was bitterly disappointed. Anything other than silky smooth throttle and steering inputs resulted in the rear end breaking loose and the car seemed to suffer from slow speed understeer coupled with fairly vicious high speed oversteer. I instantly missed my Sorex 28 JBs. A friend did back to back runs with the 28s and the 32s and we concluded that the 28s were worth somewhere between 1-2 laps over the five minute run. Not sure what to expect on the apparently low grip surface of BIWS really, but when I didn't push the car actually didn't feel too bad. Must have been the Tamiya light shining through the darkness of the Sweep 32 abyss.



All in all a reasonable evening. I didn't do anywhere near as well as I should have but the experience from running the Sweeps before the racing tomorrow should stand me in good stead. Not sure what to do about setup for tomorrow really, I've heard of people going softer, people going harder and some just running carpet setups... Guess I'll have to make that call after practice. I will let you know how it goes!

A Look Back at My Racing from the Past Week

I haven't had an opportunity to let you all know about my racing from last week until now, so here we are...

Week began with racing on Sunday at the Northern Indoor Carpet Series (NICS) held at one of my local clubs Ribble Valley RC Car Club (RVRCCC). It's usually a slightly bigger meeting than a usual Friday club night and is nice and relaxed. Just another excuse to go racing really! There are a couple of rounds left in the series - for more details, including entry details, check out the club links on the right side of the page. The meeting was basically my new Tamiya's maiden voyage and in summary, all went extremely well. I was fastest in timed practice, fastest and improving with every round of qualifying and I went on to TQ and win the meeting. Couldn't ask for a much better debut!

Quick plug for the club as it's a pretty new venue for them, with permanent track, carpet and pitting space (all with mains power). There's a bar which serves food downstairs and the track is plenty big to boot. Check out pictures below to see more. Sorry about quality again - I was still getting to grips with this blogging malarkey and had forgotten my proper camera.



Next race came the following day at my other local club, Monday nights at Morecambe Model Car Club (MMCC). Morecambe is very different to Ribble, it's one of the smallest tracks I've ever raced on, but it makes for insanely close racing with tight twisty tracks usually. As a result everyone there is of a pretty high standard. The Tamiya's second outing certainly didn't disappoint. I usually either end up pole in the B Final or bottom end of the A at Morecambe, however I had always felt that the Xray just wasn't working for me here no matter what I tried.

The Tamiya proved this by helping me FTQ every round (except Round 1, as grip tends to be ridiculously low unless you are in the top qualifying heat) and end up pole in the A final! This was my first ever FTQ and pole and I was delighted with it. The car was going fantastically and I literally couldn't fault it.

I led the A final for the entire race with a pretty comfortable lead, until I made slight mistake which put second a little closer but still not in a position to challenge. Coming onto the straight on my final lap... I turn right round the hairpin, and it just keeps turning into the barrier! I get marshalled and straightened up but second place is all over me now... I try to turn slightly round the sweeper before powering home to victory down the straight but the car seems to have a mind of its own and careers into the barrier with second place piling into the back of me and getting past me. I limp home to second place, still two laps up on 3rd and 4th. When I pick up the car to see what happened, the ball stud in the steering has come free causing one of my wheels to no longer be connected. That will be the LAST time I don't threadlock that assembly together!

End of the week now, and as you can probably tell from all the results I posted, I was present at the 12th National in Plymouth. Trip down on Friday night was a bit of a mare. We'd been on the road for over two hours from Preston and we hadn't made it past Birmingham... despite leaving just after lunchtime. Once we were there though we got all set up then headed back to the Travelodge. Went out into town on the Friday night which was cool, made a nice change from sitting in a Travelodge room listening to the motorway traffic passing by.

Saturday came around and car felt great, hadn't felt this good since Crewe - I just hadn't been getting on with the non-GT carpet. Everything went well in qualifying; I just didn't get enough clean runs in to significantly improve, so ended up 5th in the D final. I had wanted to make the C, so it wasn't a great result but could have been worse. I then proceeded to clip the sweeper at the end of the straight early on in the final, which launched me into the wall and popped a link off my 12R5. The marshal decided it was too much like hard work to pop it back on, so I spent the remaining 7 minutes watching my Saturday final.

After another night out on the tiles, Sunday morning rolls around far too quickly if you ask me, nevertheless we make it to the track and practice begins for open mod. I've been having trouble with my GM speed control in mod ever since I took it out the case and cut the capacitors off. Everyone else had done it fine so I thought why would I be any different? Sod's law I was different and my speedo just hasn't worked on Sundays with a mod motor despite my best efforts to identify and rectify the problem. It works fine on Saturdays with 10.5, but put a hotter motor in and all hell breaks loose. It won't run sensorless (which is how everyone runs the GM on Sundays) and although it works a little better with a sensor it's still not usable. Epic cogging plagues my runs - inconsistently working then not working, meaning sometimes I get power and overshoot a corner, other times I get nothing and turn into the corner. The last ditch attempt was to change the caps for some new, better ones for this weekend. It didn't work, so I pulled out after practice and just supported my team mates for the rest of the day. I'm now entered for 10.5 for both days for the rest of the season and I guess a new speedo is on the wishlist for when I can afford one. Probably start of next 12th season now. I was also entered in the 12th Euros for Mod, but I have now regrettably backed out now as I decided I'll save my money for the TC Nationals this summer instead. There will always be other opportunities.

Next race is this Friday at the club meeting for RVRCCC. Then on Sunday I will be at the BIWS round in Sheffield. Stay posted for updates and pictures on both of these meetings in due course.

12th National Rd4 @ Plymouth - Results

Okay, so the style of results posting (which some of you may have seen before I edited all the posts into this one simpler post) was basically a round-by-round update of this weekend at Plymouth via pictures of printouts.

I did it this way because it was pretty quick and easy for me to take a picture of the printout for each round/final listings/finals on the iPhone and upload them via an app. Admittedly the quality wasn't great (which was in part due to the dark corridor) but it was about as real-time as you can get - which I know a lot of people have been asking for in terms of coverage of National meetings.

Now, I have created a list of links to all the original photos below. This takes up a lot less space on the blog and should be easier to navigate for everyone.

My plan as it currently stands will be to continue doing it in this fashion for future National meetings unless anyone has any serious issues with it. Please leave comments via the link beneath this post and let me know your thoughts.

I’ve also uploaded a very short video of the track layout, see ‘My Video Channel’ or ‘Recent RC Videos’ sections. Unfortunately, I was bit of a dozy idiot this time round and plain forgot to video the finals, but I plan to do this for future meetings. I also only managed to record the A and B Finals for each class on the Sunday, sorry about that, it won't happen again.

Anyway, I hope everyone likes the coverage and welcome to my relatively new blog! The content is set to only increase as time goes on and I have some big plans for it all. Stay tuned.

Saturday Standings after Round 1

Saturday Standings after Round 2

Saturday Standings after Round 3

Saturday Final Listings (1)

Saturday Final Listings (2)

Saturday A Final Results

Saturday B Final Results

Saturday C Final Results

Saturday D Final Results

Saturday E Final Results

Saturday F Final Results

Saturday G Final Results

Sunday Sport Mod Standings after Round 1

Sunday Open Mod Standings after Round 1

Sunday Sport Mod Standings after Round 2

Sunday Open Mod Standings after Round 2

Sunday Sport Mod Standings after Round 3

Sunday Open Mod Standings after Round 3

Sunday Final Listings (1)

Sunday Final Listings (2)

Sunday Sport Mod A Final Results

Sunday Sport Mod B Final Results

Sunday Open Mod A Final Results

Sunday Open Mod B Final Results

12th National Rd4 @ Plymouth - Saturday AM

We arrived just after 8pm last night to set up and see the track. Much better idea than rushing down Saturday morning, might have to make it a regular thing this Friday lark.

Track and pits are great - see the album pictures below. Practice has finished now and my car felt really good, so I'm looking forward to the weekend. We are halfway through Heat 2 Round 1 right now and I'm in Heat 4, I'll keep you posted as the day progresses.

Tamiya TRF416X Build Review

So the 12R5 was built before this blog was even a twinkle in the corner of my eye, but when I get a chance to strip it down I’ll do a little build review on that just for kicks. But for the moment here’s my build review of the latest addition to my ‘garage’ - the Tamiya TRF416X.

I'm assuming a fair bit of RC knowledge and common sense throughout this guide so I might skip little building steps if I consider them self explanatory and/or covered in the manual. However, if you have specific questions leave me a comment and I'll do my best to answer them asap. I’d like to thank Ed Clark for his tips and help on his forum (THard.co.uk - TRF416: Things to Know) and also a certain Mr. Groskamp who did some videos on building the Tamiya with RedRC (YouTube - Red RC Pro Tips with Jilles Groskamp).

First things first, let's begin with the prep work. Sanding and gluing carbon fibre edges is hardly anyone’s favourite task (if it's yours please leave me contact details so I can send you my next chassis) but it needs to be done in my opinion and makes the whole thing look a lot nicer. Here's some before and after shots of mine, I spent a little time on this but have found in the past the longer spent on the sanding part the better the results.

You might also need to sand the top and bottom ‘tips’ of the top deck - if you don’t it could bind on the bulkheads and badly tweak the chassis. I found I had to take about 0.5mm off each end of mine.

While we’ve got the emery paper out, attack the diff plates. As you can see below it greatly improves the surface for the balls to run across. I used 600grit paper to flatten out both sides of the plates and scuff them slightly giving the balls something to grip. This new flat surface and scuffing results in a slip-free diff that is not overly tight.

I assembled my diff with an assortment of non-standard parts including TRF Ceramic Diff Balls, Jaad Racing Ceramic Thrust Race, Schumacher Diff Grease, Associated Black Grease and Jaad Racing Diff Covers. I also used Tamiya Hard Grease to stick the diff plates to the outdrives. I have just superglued them on in the past which works really well but I’m never comfortable doing, so if the hard grease is good enough for Jillies... I might experiment between the two methods in the future though. Don’t forget to put threadlock on the diff screw/diff nut connection... unlike someone else...

Layshaft and Spool go together without a hitch and look mighty fine with the white and blue colour combo!

For the installation of the wishbones follow Jillies’ video to the letter. It’s a great explanation and all the shimming is spot on I found. I even managed to find some of that illusive Hybrid Blue Grease so I could see what it was like. I did find I had to ream the wishbones with a 3mm arm reamer to free them up, I’m sure they would have freed up with some use, but I’m impatient.

Next up, put all the drivetrain assembly into the bulkheads. I found, like Jilles, that the bulkhead clamps did squash the bearing holders slightly so I put some 0.1mm shims on like he recommended. Bonus point if you can spot them in the picture below. It’s like a “Where’s Wally?” picture, but for RC geeks, and cooler obviously...

Steering assembly now. If you get this far and haven’t used any threadlock yet, your steering will fall apart coming onto the final straight when you’re winning your first ever A final at your local club at the first meeting with the car AND cost you the race. Tried, tested and guaranteed. Don’t ask.

I decided to put the servo in now. Thought the way the servo mounted over and around the belt was pretty cool so I took a picture of it as well.

Roll bar mounts were next on my to do list. Simple enough, you just need to follow the instructions in the manual and be fairly deft and accurate with a scalpel for trimming various bits off the ball cups. Yet more of the Tamiya ‘hobby’ experience I had genuinely missed since my Mad Bull – you have to do little bits of the finishing process yourself. Gives a greater sense of achievement I think.

Break out the pin drill for the next step, the front c-hubs and the rear uprights need holes drilling for the grub screw which holds the outer hingepin in place in the wishbone. I also assembled my car with the plastic hubs after hearing the graphite ones had a tendency to break indoors, but I’ll put them back on for outdoors and maybe test indoors with them in the future. The graphite and plastic look pretty similar in this picture, but the plastic ones are a lot blacker (and softer) in reality.

Driveshafts next on the menu, assemble as per manual. I used Xenon blue grease on the joints. Make sure you put some threadlock on the grub screws and try to avoid getting any grease on that tiny bit of thread. The manual doesn’t mention threadlock anywhere, I should have known better for the steering, but the driveshafts were pretty obvious even to me.

A few moments later and they’re on the car...

The bit I’ve been waiting for, the world famous Tamiya shocks. I can confirm - they are simply a joy to build and end up working flawlessly with the same amount of rebound every time. Makes you wonder why all the other manufacturers haven’t just given up making shocks really. I built mine with TRF Competition O-rings which look suspiciously like the popular MuchMore items, I’ve got some MuchMore ones to try later as well. Don’t forget Jillies excellent tip about the 0.1mm shim under the piston to remove any play. And whatever you do, don’t hurt those gorgeous gold shock shafts with nasty pliers when you’re putting the ball ends on – side cutters on the tip of the threads are the order of the day.

The Tamiya shock pump I’ve had for a while now is finally given the honour to remove air from some genuine Tamiya shocks. It didn’t say anything but I could tell it was happy with its new found purpose in life.

Shocks and roll bars on the car and we’re looking nearly ready to roll...

After some turnbuckles, solder, servo tape, setup gauges...

And a can of white spray paint later...

SORTED!

The Dreaded First Post

Well, where to start? Welcome one and all to my new RC blog! I suspect you are few and far between at the moment but hopefully with a bit of effort on my part we can change that over the following months.

I feel obliged to start this blog as many others do, with the "who am I, why am I here and what happened to get me to this point? etc etc" post. So, as someone once sang in an old film; let's start at the very beginning, it's a very good place to start...

Cast your mind's eye back to somewhere around the beginning of summer 2003, I'm standing on the drive watching my Tamiya Mad Bull 1/10th off-road buggy 'thing' round and round in circles, wondering if this is as good as it gets. I've got to be honest, I was sincerely hoping it wasn't - the novelty of driving a Mad Bull round and round and round the drive is wearing thinner by the second. Cue a good friend taking me to my local indoor touring car club. Having seen him and his Yokomo MR4-TC Custom going round the track I instantly decide two things:
1. I really like the look of this racing malarkey, think I'll give it a go!
2. I want anything but a Yokomo MR4-TC Custom



So, with an August birthday looming and parents primed to lighten their pockets and upset the bank manager I began doing some research. I quickly came to the conclusion that a Team Associated TC3 was my best bet as it was a popular car at the club and had solid support from a local model shop. When my birthday rolls around a few weeks later am I the very proud owner of an AE TC3 RTR. I begin racing it and I am immediately hooked, soon spending all my pocket money and savings on better radio gear, speedos, batteries and numerous other 'hop-ups'.



Fast forward through the next few years where I move onto owning two XRAY T2s and start racing outdoors with one of them. First just at a nearby club and then I try my hand at some regional race meetings in the summer before I leave home for uni. I continue racing indoors during my first year at uni, but the lack of an outdoor club means outdoor racing stops and the outdoor car gets used for spares and backup. My second year of uni I spent in the States and unfortunately the RC gear gets left behind so it ends up being a break from racing... I missed it.



When I return to the UK for my final year of uni the T2s feel somewhat outdated and the brushless revolution has arrived in my absence so I sell the stuff I had (foolishly) left in storage for that year abroad and find myself in ownership of an Xray T2'009 complete with a SpeedPassion brushless combo. This serves me well at club level for the next few months but when I and some mates from our club decide to do the 2009 TC Nationals brushless technology has advanced so far I opt for GM power in the T2'009. A CentralBooking and travelodge.co.uk visit later and we pack the cars up with tables, chairs and gazebo and head off to what is (for most of us) our first National series! Nothing of particular note here, I might do a reminiscent post sometime, but in summary – it was great fun, learned a lot and finished up 26th overall in prostock. Oh and about halfway through the season I got bored of switching setups and stuff for indoor club racing in between National rounds so procured another T2'009.



Now we find ourselves very near the present, the indoor season is in full swing and I have decided to get involved in 12th for the first time and so I’m currently racing in the 12th Nationals series with my Team Associated 12R5. It’s going ok, but issues with my speed control have stopped me doing well on Sundays so far. Plus getting used to 12th setup and driving has stopped me doing particularly well in general!



I also treated myself over Christmas, selling the Xray pair and buying the new Tamiya TRF416X. After seeing how well the ‘old’ model went at the Nationals last season I was convinced that was what I wanted to run during the indoor season, the next National season and far beyond. So funnily enough I find myself coming full circle, from my first two cars being a Tamiya and an Associated... to my last/current two cars being an Associated and a Tamiya. I guess blue really must be better!



There we have it, a brief history of my RC life. Well, it wasn’t as brief as I intended, but what can you do – it’s over now. So, where do I see this blog in the future of it all? I’ve decided it’s going to play an integral role in my RC life from now on. I intend to keep it topped to the brim with witty banter (well I’ll try), pictures, race reports, new product reviews, and thoughts on club nights and bigger meetings, and I’m even planning twitter-style posts during big race meetings via my iPhone. That’s right, how’s that for dedication huh? I even purchased a little blogging app to make sure I have no excuse! So, as they say, on with the show...