SimRacing.org.uk

Grid/server capacity: 22

RACE ONE

Practice/car change: ~19:20 (60 mins)
Qualifying: 20:20 (10 mins)
Race: 20:30 (18 laps)

Track: Thruxton Download this (https://www.simracing.org.uk/smf/index.php?topic=3358.msg187122#post_thruxton)

Cars allowed: KAD Mini Cooper S Download this (https://www.simracing.org.uk/smf/index.php?topic=3358.msg54520#post_mini_cooper_s_kad_works) Excluding Car #'s 6, 9, 40, 58 & 80
                       Additional skins Download this (http://www.mediafire.com/file/5ni1u5jjrf0b1la/Additional_KAD_Mini_skins.zip/file)
            
Time of Day Setting: 14:00
Start: STANDING
Tyre wear: Normal
Fuel consumption: Normal
Pit stops: Not required

Server: simracing.org WEDNESDAY
Password: see above (#post_event_password)

Notes:
(1) It's best if all drivers can make sure they are connected before the Qualifying session as drivers on track during qualifying will not see cars that join after they are on track until they go back to the garage.
(2) Please make sure you are fully aware of the SimRacing.org.uk Rules.
(3) The AI control should be turned off so that you have control of the car at all times, including pitting. Your player file should therefore read
Autopit="0"
Force Autopit Off="1" // Forces autopit always off
No AI Control="1" // AI never has control over car
If you still finding pitting problematic, experience tells us that its less to do with positioning and more to do with approach speed. A slow approach to pit crew chief has proved most reliable.

Special Notes: None.

Amuse Bouche  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zo1g3WaK7w0

OK, so it is no big secret that I find Minis, of any description, a challenge to drive in GTL. 

So, after getting disco'd from a GPL race last night I thought that as I was already sat at my PC, I would test the Thruxton/KAD Mini server in preparation for Wed's race.
The first 10 attempts at a lap barely passed T3 without swapping ends, clipping kerbs and rolling over or exploring the countryside. Various changes to my approach and tweaks to the setup to try and get control of the little beast gradually improved things, to the point where I was beginning to feel that maybe I was on the right wavelength for the majority of the lap.

Except....... At the end of the long straight as I approach the chicane section over the crest of that small incline and the first semi right hander ( at what I consider to be racing speeds ) the car becomes uncontrollable as I apply the brakes ????? with 75% front bias on brake setup.

If I apply the brakes early and whilst still "on the straight" it feels like either the wheels are octagonal, or the road surface is like a washboard, and the car hops about becoming uncontrollable. If I manage to wrestle with the thing and avoid diving off the track, I will miss the first apex by a mile and then I am travelling too fast to allow the car to transition through the right-left-right of the chicane.
 If I try and brake a little later ( keeping some 25%~ power on to avoid locking wheels ) I might make the first semi right hander and just about get the nose of the car around the first element of the R-L-R, but 90% of the time the rear end refuses to stay where it is supposed to be and the car tries to take a shortcut into the pits by missing out the chicane entirely ??!!!! It is as if the rear tyres are on ice and simply pendulum around.

The only way that I can find to get through this section is to be really ( and I mean REALLY ) slow and in tonight's race I would be a definite hazard to anyone who might be behind me.....not that I expect many cars to be slower than me!!. But if I am being lapped the speed difference might be a serious problem for the faster guys.

I have tried various changes to brake balance 65%-90%, altered the rear roll bar settings, changed front and rear dampers but nothing seems to have any noticeable effect  :-\
 I cannot believe that this section needs to be driven as slowly as my attempts appear to show, and I am convinced that although my driving might require some changes, it has to be a setup related issue as regards the "washboard" effect??? If I could get the car to retard smoothly on the straight section, then I could probably attack the chicane with some confidence.
Is anyone inclined to offer any advice???

I find that really smooth braking on the far left of the straight, before beginning an easy turn in to the chicane, works best.

You are not alone in having problems on the approach to the chicane Clive, that confounded big bump is just where you need to be braking & completely upsets the car just when you need it to be settled. As you say the only semi reliable way is to take it slower & I have to brake far earlier than seems necessary to reliably make the first apex without the car going out of control. Don't know why the track maker decided to put a big bump there, I'm sure the real track does not have such an extreme bump there.

The other place which can catch you out is Church, where it is easy to take too much kerb & roll the car. Could be a lot of carnage tonight methinks. :o

Thanks for the feed back guys.

It is of some comfort to know that others are finding it tricky at the chicane, but when Geoffers says that he is braking "early" that is probably still 100 mtrs after I throw out the anchors in an attempt to join the last of the late brakers club:-\.  

Tony's advice about taking the far left hand side is something that I also tried, hoping to find a smooth piece of tarmac that would not upset the car. I sort of worked out that would be a good plan during qualifying, but at Thruxton the approach to the chicane is just about the only real passing place, so odds are that if ( big IF! ) I am at all competitive and hope to make a pass, then that nice piece of track will be occupied by another car lol......unless of course I am the intended victim  ::)
Either way, I foresee my Mini severly testing all of the barriers around the chicane over the course of the 2 races.  ;D

Now I am going to walk the dog in the afternoon sunshine...........and contemplate.  ;)

BTW plans are afoot for a visit to Thruxton and a drive in their single seaters as part of Andy Livingston and myself doing our Grand Tour of UK race tracks. So maybe I will find out if there really is a big bump on the approach to the chicane.........and if there is, perhaps Thruxton will be minus one single seater???

I should be around, so there will be at least one car slower than you  ;D
and I am also a bit worried about being lapped.
For that last point Tony's video made me realize that depending where on the track it happens it can be quite tricky... We'll see.
With its bumpiness this track makes me happy that I do not own a motion simulator rig !  ;D

A tricky track indeed - not one of my favorites  :P

I'd like to join you if possible?

Wish I could help you guys but I'm rather struggling with the two fast crested right handers and the only advice for the chicane approach I have so far is: Don't sneeze just there....
Also: power surge protector issue permanently solved: Yay.

Results and replay now posted.

What a racing evening!  :eek:  :D
As I struggled with the car and the track when preparing for the races I did not expect much (apart from being lapped).  :-[

So I was really surprised to be on P4 in race 1.
My start was not too bad (even if I am more used to end of grid start) until my screen froze and turned black right after T1 !  :cursing:
I tried then to move to the grass to avoid creating chaos (not sure how successful I was).
After that I tried my best at keeping a decent pace, knowing that there would probably be some "events" on track. And I must admit that I was lucky enough to take advantage of a few incidents and the final result was more than satisfactory.
Not sure what happened when I saw Clive literally take-off on the S/F line at the end of the race, nice aerial acrobatics anyway.

Race 2 went even better.
P2 on the grid (thanks to the non-qualifiers  ;) ) and no freeze at the start.
Of course I was no match for Fulvio, Clive & Geoffers, but I managed to come back to this group when they were fighting against each other. This fight was quite entertaining at some point.
Then I managed to pass Fulvio and a moment later I had a hard time keeping it on the tarmac, which caused Fulvio to spin (and relieved some pressure). Again I benefited from the fight between Geoffers & Clive, to finish a surprising (and surprised!) second.  :D

Now all this does not come from nowhere: actually I carefully selected my car livery: it states "RAPID" on its license plate... and it is !  :punk: (I probably also had a decent setup)
Anyway I'd have to get the one that reads something like "Rocket Powered" to be remotely competitive with Geoffers... What a show once again! Bravo Monsieur !  :thumbup2:

Grats to the podium finishers in both races, I had suspected that Geoffers would be the class of the field and so it proved.

My comments and questions, pre race helped my problems with the chicane section, but did not entirely solve my issues in that area. I think that maybe that I got that sequence szomewhere near right for about 25% of all laps  :-\
I have to confess that the two races in the KAD Mini were approaching, but not quite, enjoyment. For some reason my brain and muscle memory simply does not gel with these front wheel drive boxes and as a result each race is extremely hard work. I can never get the handling quite as I would like it, so I am fighting the car for the whole race, especially trying to hit the correct lines which tends to be a little random and inaccurate.
I think Geoffers had an up close and personal view of my erratic progress in race 2 when he was trying to stay ahead of him.
 I honestly was not trying to block your progress Geoff, I was simply at ( and often beyond ) my ability, which was why my yellow peril was all over the track at times ( other reasons excuses are explained below   ;) ). The slightly unpredicatble handling and steering caused a couple of spectacular rolls when I got too close to kerbs and flipped the car. The incident at the start of the final lap in race 2 was particularly annoying as I might have made the podium  :-\

I'm glad that someone else noticed my acrobatic finishes in both races..... ( currently under review by the stewards  ::))

Early enquiries appear to show that Mable and Arnold may have had some input.
Without asking for my opinion, Mabel had suggested that we have our own champagne celebration regardless of finishing position and Arnold took it one step further by engineering an automatic uncorker for two Jereboams that he secretly mounted in the boot.
That extra weight is quite obviously the reason why my car handled so badly and I failed to win either race. What the stupid pair failed to appreciate
( twice!!!) was that two Jereboams of bubbly mounted in the boot of a Mini for 18 laps, riding over kerbs ( rolling over )  and multiple bumps and lumps on the road does nothing for the stability of the contents.

When Arnolds ingenious uncorker, which utilised elastic and metal clips from one Mabel's old bras, removed the corks as I crossed the S/F line the thrust generated from the pair of bottles could have produced one of two possible results. Either, my yellow Mini would have accelerated to a rocket powered Mach 2 and soared over Stonehenge (just a mile or two away) like a UFO, or as did happen at the end of both races, the downward thrust sent the car into a series of flips and twists more akin to a gymnastic floor exercise.
My head is still spinning from the experience and until I feel better further enquiries are on hold. But fear not, someone will pay for this!!!.... and that wasted champagne!!

Still wasn't too happy with the car when I joined the server & a few practice laps showed it to still be very difficult to get into the chicane. So I tweaked the setup some more, increased rear toe-in to 1° and put the brake bias fully to the front to try to stop the rear overtaking the front. It seemed to work & I went nearly a second quicker in qually than I had achieved before.

1st race, not much to say really other than where were you all.  :laugh:

Race 2 was much more like it, start wasn't too good this time & nearly got sandwiched by Bob & Kurt (I think) in T1, luckily they didn't close the door & I squeezed between them. Rest of lap 1 was a case of being in the right place at the right time & approaching the chicane I was already up to 3rd place :o. Lap 2 I ran wide onto the grass at Village & lost a place to SC, took a couple of laps to find a way back past & set off after Fulvio & Clive. Caught them after a couple more laps & when Clive found an opening to get past Fulvio I more or less followed him through. However getting past the evil one was much more tricky, got alongside a couple of times but I'm sure he had Arnold fit extra wide wheels to the Mini as there always seemed to be not enough room to complete the pass. Eventually Clive was a bit slow through the Chicane & I had to jump the kerb on the last part to avoid rear-ending him which also had the added benefit  of getting me into Allard in the lead. Clive then had a tumble at the Chicane next lap leaving me with a comfortable lead over SC.

Congrats to Matt & Erling & SCargo & Fulvio on their podiums.  :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap:

Result_Race 1 (https://www.avonrise.co.uk/srou/kurts/Thruxton_22052019_R1) - created with Autosimanalyzer V1.69

 8)

Not much to say about both races. Simply not my track.
After the start of R1 I could not avoid S_Cargo and damaged my suspension which eventually led to my early exit.

R2 was a little bit better but also a very short one. All in all the slowest driver in the field.

I would like to point out that for the second time in a row I found differences between both versions of Autosimanalyzer available to me,
which I'm not able to explain  ??? :

R1_Comparison (https://gtl-gtr2-racing.lima-city.de/Thruxton R1 Comparison.jpg)

R2_Comparison (https://gtl-gtr2-racing.lima-city.de/Thruxton R2 Comparison.jpg)

Differences are highlighted:

So I decided to post result of R1 created with Autosimanalyzer V1.69 as I don't know the real course.
R2 result created with Autosimanalyzer V1.69 is definitely wrong as I never was in first place after lap one, so I decided to switch to
Autosimanalyzer V1.65 for this one.

This just for your information.

Really would like to know who the creator of that software was way back in order to contact him.

It would appear that in both races v1.65 gives the correct race order, so maybe some bug crept into v1.69.

In one of the races you did briefly appear in 1st place, then back down again.