A new RX-8… office chair

I took the delivery of my new RX-8 office chair. How cool is that? Stephen & Eric from UPanel Ringwood made this for me.

The seat is nearly fully functional. The back rest can move up and down and the seat can go limited forward, backward, up and down. Only the lumber adjustment is not wired. I will be game to hot up the remaining wires to see if the lumber support can be adjusted. But I will be risking an explosion to the air bag. .

 

The power is from a 12V battery from Jaycar. They seems to last forever but they are easily rechargeable.

I am very happy indeed. A seat for GT5 on PlayStation.

He is about to flood the engine

This is not my car, but being a Victorian I should know this dude do I???? He is probably not on the rx8club but I would like to find out.

I do have a question… what is wrong with the remote and besides GPS tracking. What is so good about the application?

Turning engine on remotely has been around for decades… why do people still want it?

This will remain in not ‘my cup of tea’ gadgets category.

RaceChrono's data video maker (RaceChrono2AVI) takes shape

This is more interesting news for the RaceChrono fan and video maker likewise. This program (RaceChrono2AVI) has taken shape and promise to rival the top race data video premier (TrackVision). It is true that TrackVision have video rendering function for the average Joe for video editing. But most people into digital video will have the software (in my case Sony Vegas Movie Studio Platinum 9) to edit the picture. Most video editing software allows picture in picture function, and the rendering flexibility and quality is professional, and far more superior than TrackVision. You can make a video track blog like mine below with race data for instance. Very useful indeed. More in the RaceChrono2AVI forum.

The latest beta utilise data export from RaceChrono beta v1.02.

Here is the final product. Most of the thing can be changed. The background (the RX-8 dash), the rpm gauge, the speedometer configuration, all the lap times and gauges there, track map etc have choices and all are drag and drop. Finally the movie is made by video capturing in real time, so no more touching the screen and let it run.

Picture in picture the video data, result in this!

Latest beta can be download HERE (beta v0.3.22).

RaceChrono2AVI program - TrackVision for free

If you have played RaceChrono enough, you will love this program. This is the TrackVision for the RaceChrono, and for developer to call it RaceChrono2AVI (download HERE). This program uses the .csv files export from RaceChrono and use it to generate a moving AVI file. All you have to do is to use a movie maker to combine a picture in picture video. I use Sony Vegas Platinum 7.

A few bugs at this stage:

1) I cannot use single lap files. All lap files are used at this stage.
2) The capture does not work in all Windows Themes. I use the Classic theme to reduce the top of the bar and it works perfectly.

*******both the above has been solved and a new beta V0.1.15 has come out (8/10/2008)*********

The end result:

TrackVision demo review

I have eventually downloaded the demo version of the TrackVision and now RaceChrono (beta v1.01 or better) can be used to render and integrate the data into the video file. The demo version allows you to view the files in action but the video cannot be exported or saved. At the moment (RaceChrono beta v1.02), the data that can be used in TrackVision includes speed, rpm, map and position, throttle position, and G meters. This is a screen shot of that. The dashboard is custom made and I have emailed to Antti at RaceChrono for review.

It does give immense versatility to set it up probably, but that means it can only work with one particular model of cars, since there are so many variable to set up. This is the screenshot of the demo, and it is poor quality. The real thing is also subpar as the rendering program is not up to professional standard.

   A forum member, on the other hand, offers to write another program which render an avi format video from the data. The only thing you have to do is to PIP the clip in the main clip. Just like the best motoring mode. Sweet if it is free!

My Q-steer RX-8

It is small and fun, and I can make a F1 course for that and set some record haha. The other is a phone strap.

In action: