2009 Victorian Track Sprint Schedule

Here is the schedule this year. It will be continue updated until the end of 2009 and highlight my potential starters and DNS.

19/01/09 - MCA - Phillip Island Practice
26/01/09 - CC (NSW) - Wakefield Park
01/02/09 - MX5 Club Vic - Winton (form)
14/02/09 - WRX - Haunted Hills Hillclimb
14/02/09 - Driver Dynamics Sandown
15/02/09 - PIARC - Phillip Island Sprint
15/02/09 - MCA - Haunted Hills Hillclimb
01/03/09 - AROCA - Winton Sprint (short track)
08/03/09 - HSCCV/FFCC - Haunted Hills Hillclimb
12/03/09 - Events O'Neill Sandown
|22/3/09 - RENEW Wakefield (form)
28/03/09 - Driver Dynamics Sandown
04/04/09 - WRX - Phillip Island Sprints
19/04/09 - MCA - Sandown GP
23/04/09 - Events O'Neill Sandown
25/04/09 - WRX - Sandown Sprints
27/04/09 - CC (NSW) - Wakefield Park
02/05/09 - Driver Dynamics Sandown 
10/05/09 - HSCCV/FFCC - Sandown Sprint
28/05/09 - Events O'Neill Sandown
31/05/09 - AROCA - Sandown Sprint
31/05/09 - PIARC - Phillip Island Sprint
06/06/09 - Driver Dynamics Sandown
13/06/09 - CC (NSW) - Wakefield Park
21/06/09 - MCA - Winton Sprints
25/06/09 - Event O'Neill Sandown
28/06/09 - WRX - Sandown Sprint
04/07/09 - AROCA - Phillip Island Sprint
04/07/09 - Driver Dynamics Sandown
12/07/09 - HSCCV/FFCC - Sandown Sprint
18/07/09 - WRX - Winton Sprint
25/07/09 - CC (NSW) - Wakefield Park
26/07/09 - NCCA - Sandown John Mott Sprint

08/08/09 - OzRenesis/RX-8 Club RX-8 Nationals Wakefield

09/08/09 - AROCA - Winton Sprint and Regularity (long track)
16/08/09 - PIARC - Phillip Island Sprint
16/08/09 - MCA - Sandown Trident Day
05/09/09 - CC (NSW) - Wakefield Park
??/09/09 - AROCA - Sandown Sprint (tba)
27/09/09 - HSCCV/FFCC - Haunted Hills Hillclimb
05/10/09 - CC (NSW) - Wakefield Park
10/10/09 - WRX - Winton Sprints
17/10/09 - AROCA - Winton AROCA 6 hr Relay
18/10/09 - AROCA - Winton AROCA 6 hr Relay
25/10/09 - MCA - Sandown Annual
03/11/09 - HSCCV/FFCC - Sandown Cup Day Sprint
15/11/09 - PIARC - Phillip Island Sprint
28/11/09 - CC (NSW) - Oran Park GP
13/12/09 - AROCA - Phillip Island Sprint
19/12/09 - CC (NSW) - Wakefield Park CC Festival
20/12/09 - CC (NSW) - Wakefield Park CC Festival

A wet Winton track day = hard work, but I have got POWER!

This should be the last track day of the year and proven to be interesting. The unusual severe rain cloud gathered over Benalla and provide an interesting experience on a race track that has the reputation of the lack of grip.

 

Today I was going through the data, comparing the run from Tampermotorsport days which is a dry track to this time in a wet track. Seriously, look at the acceleration of my car. Left graph is the little straight coming from turn 10, and the speed is 10 kph slower coming out of it and seriously, I am sure the throttle will be slower to get in on a very wet track, but still speed before I braked in the wet is only 2kph differnet from dry. Same goes to the main back straight. 13 kph to start and by the end of straight, 2.3 kph only!!!

The sleep of the acceleration increase so much. The only mod you can see is change of spark plug and my butt dyno told me the power is back. It is back!

Rear endlink, lower arm bushings, and battery relocations.

I at least check my car 4 times a year at my mechanics. So change of from spring to summer, it is time to do another check. I only did 2000km since last change and 3 short cool spring track days since last oil change. I don't see the difference in terms of colour from the dip stick. So it is topped up to full mark and left for another day. Will change after new year or before the next track day.

 
I eventually get the rear Autoexe endlink installed. This is much adjustable but the require length is much shorter than stock. Stock is very high for the height of the car. I also get the member metal washer installed.

Then the major job to relocate the battery from the front or in front of steering axle to on top and slightly rearward to the axle. And the battery used now, although is much weaker in terms of crank amps (380 vs 750 CCA), is much lighter (7.8kg vs 17kg).

The empty space left after the battery case is removed is interesting. The idea is also to increase airflow though the engine bay. You can see the left side of space created shows the silver bracket of the Defi coolant sensor (that bracket is made from Fujita eng). So it is near radiator and hopefully air will partly go through there. I was told about this from a friend in Japan (thx Tom).

This kit is made by RE Amemiya, Please read my previous post about this. We found out the problem when we cannot match all.... the instructions in the installation menu. Firstly the stock washer is different shape in Australia, thanks to the stupid rule that all the HID lights sold has to have a washer. I wonder this is still current. Anyway we have to remove this motor and the washer tank, with the sensor attached. Lucky the low washer level light did not lid on the dash after removal of it. Otherwise it will drive me mad.

But the wiring of my RX-8 at the battery (+) point is different from the installation menu. Particularly, there is a big big big positive from the radiator side that seems to be missing in the Japanese models. Well we cannot risk a major error since you see that square box is the EPS (electronic power steering) fuse. Loosing power steering is not fun on the road at speed or no no on the track. No power steering is very heavy, you cannot even steer to get out of a car spot. (Addition: Now we have put all the cable back together like stock mode. Instead of the RE Amemiya's suggestion to bring the EPS unit by an extension cord to the new battery location. We feel that the extra wires and stuff deserves a proper connection so we just get a long connecter to connect from the stock location to the new location. Hope that will last long)

  This is the bonus oil catch can. The supplied tube runs from the top of oil inlet to the can before going to the MAF tube.

  The washer is now this tinny wee can size haha. The original motor can be used on the side (not shown in the picture). The odyssey battery sits very prettily in the bracket.

I also change the spark plugs. The old plugs are covered with carbon deposits after a year of track days plus very limited daily drive. But it is not fouled at all. However, even the difference from this good looking covered plugs to clean ones are amazing. I think I will clean those plug quite frequently now. I have asked Nelson to clean the plugs and save them for about autumn/winter time. We have also tested the spark plug cords/leads (after 2 years changing to the Fujita ones). They are ok. Resistance is about 380mOhm on leading, which is longer than the trailing ones at about 270mOhms. We decided if any one is under 200, we will change the whole set before burning the current set of coils.

It is now set for next Saturday's Winton day. Forecast is some rain/shower 3 days leading to Saturday's track day. The chance is low but we will see. Finger crossed .

RaceChrono2AVI rivals the legendary TrackVision

This is the new beta version 0.3.27.

The updates include:
- Speed Smoothing
- new interface for customization of digital display and gauges.
- Digital displays can change foreground and background colors and can been bring to front.
- Program window got top caption again and can be moved by clicking only on the caption
- A new digital display for the "best lap so far", it will show the best lap only when it will reach and will blink for 10 seconds.
- Track gauge will not clear any more the original background before drawing the gps track, look at the Winton track gauge for an example.
- Avoiding absolute path in cfg files.
- "ON AIR" icon shown when avi recording is active.

This beta version alone is already better than TrackVision. Comparing RaceChrono2AVI to TrackVision:

1. RaceChrono2AVI is free. TrackVision costs $200 to buy, and they have to authorise the payment as per server so there won't be cracks or even potential sign in/installation problems.

2. RaceChrono2AVI's gauges can be arranged by drag and drop the gauges to the place you want. TrackVision can be customised only by doing the codes.

3. RaceChrono2AVI renders a movie of the data in any format you choose. Then you use that video to overlay your track in car camera's video. You need a video editor such as Sony Vegas or similar to do that. It is an extra program but who has DV video does not have a video editing software, and you can do DV widescreen for your video. TrackVision includes a video render program that does not allow to insert other video (so you still need a video editor to make a story or a track blog) and rendering video is in 4:3 aspect ratio only.

4. RaceChrono2AVI is easier to make your own dash. I try to do that in TrackVision. Although the code (language) use to generate the dials are similar, it is still pretty hard to adjust the exact position and also the calibration of rpm gauge and speedometer (refer again to point 2).

The followings are the screen shots of my 2 custom dashes (the cfg files can be download here). Unzip and install the files to the RaceChrono2AVI/cfg/ folder

 
 

The result is this:

 

Also the RaceChrono program can be used to measure a course. So you want to show how fast you move from Point A to Point B. A touge run hehe!