The Nürburgring Diaries - Volume XVl

[vitg]

So after a few laps to get in the groove managed to pull consistent 7 ’39 to 7 ’41 sec laps depending on how many mistakes I made. Car stock @ 350 HP , 1060 kg.

Next I started adding the cheaper go fast bits ( it seemed like a logical way to do things ).
Therefore setup No.1 :
Oil change, Weight redux 2, Chip, Sports Exhaust , Racing Fly , Sports Suspension.

Best lap (finally got a fairly clean one) - 7 ’ 31 . 957
Weight – 964 kg
HP – 383
Cost – Cr. 14,100
Credits / HP – 427
Credits / sec – 1753
Tuning the suspension and moving the weight around helped with understeer, still tricky to drive at the limit though.



Okay, I thought, what next? What may give me more bang for my buck ?
Setup No. 2 :
Upgrade to Semi Racing Exhaust and Sports Soft tyres.

Best lap – 7 ’25. 963
HP – 390
Cost – 22,200
Credits / HP – 555
Credits / sec – 1581
Grippier tyres and more fiddling with suspension helped.
Main problem was Tranny running out of puff too soon.

Aha ! Thinks I, maybe an FC tranny might be money well spent ?
Also upgrading suspension and a tad more power may be useful.

Setup No. 3 :
Upgrade to Racing Exhaust, Racing Brakes, Semi Racing Suspension, FC Tranny.

Best Lap – 7 ’ 18 . 850
HP – 394
Cost – 43,400
Credits / HP – 986
Credits / sec – 2052
Not a huge increase in HP, but getting more of it to the ground and making better use of it. Tamora drove pretty nicely.



Although having an unlimited budget, obviously spending vast amounts of cash, for not a lot of improvement (The Law of Diminishing Returns kicking in hard !). So I thought I would try the poor mans performance tuning method – stick a wing on, to sort out the grip, and spend money on some power upgrades only.

Setup No. 4 :
Stock weight, Oil change, Chip, Stage 1 NA Tune, Semi Racing exhaust, Wing.

Best Lap – 7 ’ 18. 017
HP – 413
Weight - 1060
Cost – 10550
Credits / HP – 199
Credits / sec – 482
Pretty good, probably also just driving better due to familiarity.
Handled good but missed the Brakes and FC Tranny.






I agree with Oldguy, the wing does not suit the Car very well ( have seen worse though ), but it is a cheap fix

[oldguy1957]

Since Mr. Inthegrass posted his results, I decided to go ahead and post mine, too. I went about things a little differently, but there are some comparisons to be made. i.e. I only documented the ET, as opposed to the HP, as HP doesn't mean crap unless it actually improves your lap-time.

My first step was to try to do as much good with as little money as possible (I'm going to refer to credits as $$$, just because that's how I think of it). Due to the bargain pricing, I just went with a oil change and wing (which made it very ugly, but oh well, it's results that matter). This gave me my best results based on $$ spent:ET gain.

Improvement: Wing and oil
Lap time: 7'28.710
Improvement over benchmark: 11.29 seconds
Cost: $1250
$/1 second ET gain: $110.72

Improvement: Racing Chip
Lap time: 7'26.347
IOB: 13.653
Cost: $1500
Total cost: $2750
total $/ 1 second ET gain: $201.42

Improvement: R1 tires
Lap time: 7'11.156
IOB: 28.884
Cost: 8400
total cost: $11,150
total $/ 1 second ET gain: $386.03

Improvement: Stage 2 NA tuning
Lap time: 7'04.412
IOB: 35.588
Cost: $12,500
Total cost: $23,650
total $/1 second ET gain: $704.412

At this point, I was getting pretty tired and my notes got a little sloppy, so I don't have all the details, but I know I added an FC tranny and eventually got down just under 7 minutes. Also, at one point I had the Stage 2 NA tuning and S2 tires, which was by far the most fun, as throttle control became very necessary on corner exits. I bought R5 tires, but to the best of my recollection, I never actually used them.

[nightmare75]

Ok, I got some time today and my results are in. I only did one set of prices and stuff, seeing as I'm a little strapped for time, but I'm pretty happy with my time. I decided to take a little different approach to the challenge by not upgrading the power at all. Other than the oil change, nothing I did affected the power made by the engine in any way. Here's what I did:

Oil Change: 50 cr
GT Auto Wing: 1200 cr
Racing Hard tires: 10500 cr
Weight Reduction Stage 1: 1200
Weight Reduction Stage 2: 5500
Racing Flywheel: 1050
Semi-racing Suspension: 7400
Total Spent Credits: 26,900 cr

Final Time: 6'55.039
Total Improvement: 45 sec

Cr/sec ratio: 597.77 cr/sec




(pics taken before modifications were made)

The car handled quite well with less weight and a little suspension tuning. I didn't really have to fight either over or understeer throughout my runs. The car was easy to take to the edge, as is usually the case with lighter cars that don't have too much power. Cr/sec could have been better with R1 tires, I think, but it doesn't really matter. I think adding power at this point would only make the ratio go up.

[oldguy1957]

^^Interesting results. I couldn't resist the lure of adding hp. Did you do the mods incrementally, or all at the same time? I'd be interested to know how much the semi-racing suspension improved it by itself, as I didn't opt to use that at all.

[nightmare75]

I did it all at the same time. I have to say though, I think the suspension did some good to my results. The main tune I did with that was to drop the ride height all the way down and bump the springs all the way up, as well as lowering the shocks a little. The springs didn't have enough tunability to get all the way as stiff as I normally set it, but I think it worked out well enough as the car handled quite well. That might be more due to the R2 tires and wing than the suspension, but I'd like to think the suspension made a positive difference. It may not have been worth all the credits spent on it, but I think the semi-racing was more worth it per dollar than the sports one.

[amemyarz]

I haven't been around in a while.

BUt, I'm up to some Ring Diaries racin'
be back tommorrow with some times.

[vitg]

Feb 27, 2008 21:01:11 GMT -5 amemyarz said:

I haven't been around in a while.

BUt, I'm up to some Ring Diaries racin'
be back tommorrow with some times.

Excellent, welcome back.
As there seems to be a bit more participation lately , how about I set up a Weekend Rider™ for next week ?
I can rustle up a suitable Car, design some clues and be ready to go early next week.

Yea or Nay ?

[oldguy1957]

I'm game. But easy on the difficulty rating on the hints! Yours are always too good!

[vitg]

Feb 28, 2008 21:48:06 GMT -5 oldguy1957 said:

I'm game. But easy on the difficulty rating on the hints! Yours are always too good!

Of course I will go easy on you.








Probably.

[amemyarz]

Sorry I didn't get my times in sooner but I was beat from track practice.

Here's what I got so far:
TVR Tamora stock Time:7'35.044
Wing 1200
oil 50
new Time: 7'18.097
time gained:17sec
Cr/sec ratio: 73.5 cr/sec

edit: I'm in for a WR

[vitg]

Weekend Rider™ - Hint Number 1


"The Doctor is in"

[amemyarz]

hmm... .... ..no idea.

[vitg]

Weekend Rider™ - Hint Number 2


"Have you tried some Sandpaper " ?[/i][/b]

[oldguy1957]

Is it too rough?

[vitg]

Most definitely

Weekend Rider™ - Hint Number 3


"1337+1337+726 = " ?