Shoot!

Imagine that!! me in a McLaren Suit. Pic been taken beside
a McLaren car. COOL!
This is almost the next best thing that can happen.
The best thing?
That is to have a go in a F1 car, of course!

All thanks to M1 and Vodafone for bring the car in and having
the suit and helmet for people like me to take some pics.

However, I was really there for the Pit Stop Challenge, which is
to change the tyre of the car. Sound easy?
It is not so. After I tried it with my colleague, I reckon I
appreciate all how well trained and organised the pit crews are.


This is indeed a good memento.

What a .... !

This is interesting............ the race is quite interesting, yes.
The drivers are indeed interesting

But what caught my eyes are the kart!
Is it really a car?
Kart, I mean?

Interesting........ !
---------------------------
As many as five of Felipe Massa's Formula One race rivals could join the Ferrari star at his annual kart race in Brazil at the end of the 2008 season.

The 27-year-old championship contender's former team-mate Michael Schumacher, who won the event in the southern city of Florianopolis last November, has already confirmed he will defend the title.


"To be honest, I didn't even have to invite him back. He told me at Hockenheim that he wished to race again," Massa said at a press conference in Brazil last week for the forthcoming 'International Challenge of Go-Kart Champs'.

2008 Toro Rosso racers Sebastian Vettel and Sebastien Bourdais are also likely to race, Massa revealed, as are Rubens Barrichello and Nelson Piquet Jr.
Robert Kubica, meanwhile, wants to attend on November 30th to make up for his absence last year.

"Almost everything was set for Kubica to race in 2007 but a last minute commitment prevented it," Massa explained.

NASCAR champion Jeff Gordon has also been invited, and Renault test driver Lucas di Grassi is also likely to race, the Ferrari driver said.

pics and text from en.f1-live.com

Pressures!

We heard it many times that we should always pay attention
to our tyres, as it is the only contacts we have with the road
while we're driving.
So, it's a safety aspect.
However, if we are speaking in motorsports terms it is
Performance. It is Handling.

There are many different brands of tyres, with each brand
there are either Hard, Medium and Soft compound.
That's not including the wet tyres on the shelves.
Whatever brand, compound, type of tyre you had chosen
to run with there's a common denominator to it.

Tyre Pressure.

How much to pump? How to make adjustments so that
the handling is sweeter?

I reckon this is true for kart or car or bike, so I hope this
useful to more than to only karters


Lets now take a look at some examples of settings to meet changing conditions.

• Change in atmospheric temperature: The general rule is to raise inflation pressure slightly as the temperature falls and lower it as the temperature rises. If there is a distinct difference between morning and afternoon temperatures, raise the inflation pressure a little in the morning for a better grip by increasing the load to generate heat. Lower it in the afternoon to reduce generation of heat by the tire. This rule applies for summer and winter also.
• Understeering / Oversteering: Raise rear tire pressure about 3 psi to correct understeering and lower inflation pressure in the rear tires by the same amount to counteract oversteering. The opposite is also true for front tire inflation pressure. This should not be changed, however, because tire stiffness caused by the proper inflation pressure is needed on the front wheels.
• Compounds: Tire pressure can be raised when using the hard compound SL tires. With the high grip compound, it can be lowered.
• Variations in road surface: Lots of rubber residue on the road surface causes greater resistance and on such a surface it is good to lower air pressure to reduce heat generation by the tire. This holds especially true in summer.
• Wet tire: Use the same inflation pressure as for dry conditions or raise the pressure 1-6 psi. When the track dries out, however, a heavy load is imposed on the pattern blocks on the corners and the tires are subject to coarse abrasion. The best remedy is to change to the slicks as soon as possible but it’s also possible to use wet tires, with reduced inflation pressure, for driving with a good grip. Coarse abrasion also affects slick tires if m of the road surface is very high, when drifting or putting a heavy load on the tires. Use the same remedies to this as explained above for wet tires.

Determining if the chassis is twisted ( tweaked ).

Run enough laps to get the tyres up to operating temperature before checking the temps. Remember that the temperatures from one side to the other probably won't be the same because race tracks generally have more turns in one direction than the other. For example, if the track has more right-hand turns than left-hand turns, the left side tyres will run hotter.

Put the probe into each of the three reference points on both front tyres and read the temps. If you are running on a typical track with an unequal number of left and right hand turns and the front tyre temperatures read the same , this is an indication of a tweak. Further proof of a tweak will be that the left rear tyre temp will read much hotter than the right rear tyre temp (see diagram below ).

To cure this problem, adjust the left front wheel downward. This will transfer additional load to the right rear tyre. By doing this, you will also take some of the load off the left rear tyre. This adjustment will raise the temp on the left front tyre when the kart is run again.

Make enough laps to get the tyres up to temp and take another reading of all four tyres. Note the difference between the two front tyre temps. Now, note the difference between the two rear tyre temps. If you make enough adjustment on the left front spindle ( king pin ) the two figures should be the same.

Front to rear weight distribution.

Although most drivers have enough feel for how the kart is handling to be able to diagnose understeer ( pushing ) and oversteer ( loose ), it's impossible to feel the small amounts of front-rear imbalance that can slow you down slightly.

If both front tyres run hotter than the rears, there is too much weight on the front of the kart. There are two ways of curing this problem -- 1) move any ballast lead bolted onto the kart to the rear, and/or 2) relocate the seat toward the rear.

Once the problem is resolved, the front tyres should read cooler and the rear tyres should read hotter than before.

And of course, reverse the procedure if both rear tyres read hotter than the fronts.

How hot is too hot ?

According to the tyre manufacturers, most karting tyres are designed to operate in the 74C (165F) to 85C(185F) degrees range. Bear in mind that the tyres cool very quickly upon coming off the track. No matter how quickly you read the tyre temps with the gauge, the numbers will be less than when driving.

Almost any kart tyre will self destruct it it's operating temp exceeds 100C (210F) A kart tyre getting close to the upper edge of it's optimum temperature range will take on a shiny, wet look when on the track.

Intro : ME

text from russellkarting.com/settings.htm

text and illustration from www.kartpedia.com (it uses probe to measure the temperature, we mainly use guages to read pressure locally. )

Speeding Once more!

3 Aug 08, 5 more days to the Olympics, I finally visited the new track
at Plentong.

Where the previous track is located just by the side of a main road,
this new track is hidden away.
It's like if you want to get to something good, you have to seek it.
You will have to venture. You will have to drive through about 4Km
of dirt track


And mind you, it took us about 15 mins to complete this dirt track.
There are stones, and humps, and pot holes to deal with.
So do not think you're driving in some stages of WRC Rally... because
if you do, I am quite sure there are no Service Parks at the end of the
'stage' to repair damaged suspensions or radiator been hit by stones.

Upon reaching the track, it's all buzz again! Buzzing with flies!

Because this area was a fruit farm, the flies still lingers on.
There was no one there as yet at about 10.15am.
We were suspecting that if anyone will come in at all!


But before we got started, there was one group of 4-5 persons
who arrived and ready for fun karting.
Then steadily throughout the afternoon, there are groups who
came in and karted. Interestingly, I believed now I am not the only
crazy ones along with my friends!

I did not take any picture of the track itself, as it has been posted
in few forums, and one of those is located at:
http://kartingedge.com/forum/index.php?topic=260.0

The tarmac is smooth. The track wide. So we are ready to go out
once again! Today, the boss had put forth this configuration of the
track for us to try (path is marked with red dots)


The distance of this particular configuration is about 1.1Km.
Once you exit from the pit, it's something of a hairpin which I
marked as Turn 1. If you are not from the pit, Turn 1 is wide 180 degree
right turn. At this turn, I will need to carry as much speed as possible for
the long straight.

The straight is slightly upslope, and the speed will built up to its max
about half way or 3/4 way through it. From there, you have to be ready
for Turn 2, a very high speed right hander which is still uphill.
Here, after my 1st session I had to tweak my rear end as it fish-tail
a bit no matter how I turn delicately. Session 2 was much better.

Turn 3 come quick and fast. Another fast right hander down slope.
If you have balls of steel, a very good brake and good set up for Turn 4,
right hander hairpin, one can full throttle and brake at the last possible
moment and turn! COOL...! But, last I checked it was not made of steel!

Anyway, if you brake too late for this corner you will more often than not
find you and your kart in the ditch. Don't believe, ask my friend, Desmond.

After Turn 4, you will gently climb uphill again for Turn 5.
Look at the track layout, and you will see it's something a 300 degree
left hander that will bring you back downhill. Here, it will crucial to find
the correct speed and line to take. Which after trying and looking at over
again, it's about 3/4 away from the most inside line. This is the most
challenging section of the whole track. My neck hurts now I had
never do round about so fast ever before!

Finishing Turn 5, the section before Turn 6 is quite tricky as there is a
quick Left then Right before the very wide right turn. Which is Turn 6,
I reckon you will have to use all the available track so that you can carry
much speed into the pit section of the track and the straight before
Turn 7.
Turn 7 is deceiving. It seems wide. As a mater of fact, it is. But because
you think it is SO Wide, you tend to bring too much speed into it forcing
you to go too wide. I know, because I'm guilty and nearly paid for it!


Oh, I did nearly went off as well at a very high speed at Turn 2. I was
already feeling hot and tired when we went for the 3rd session at 1.30pm.
A blink of my eyes, and I was steering a second too late for the corner....
Luckily for the wide track I managed to recover to be on
my way back to the pits and called it a day.

The track is fun. But well, karting is always fun, isn't it?

In a nutshell, this track is hidden because it will be a gem in time
to come when the rubber is laid down from more karts.
Since it's a relatively high speed track, one will get tired more easily
without feeling too much torque from the kart. Fatigue will come from full
concentration and the G force from Istanbul like Turn 5.

So you think you can go fast.... try this @ Plentong!