180° turns at Duryea & Weatherly

JekylandHyde · Post by **JekylandHyde** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 5:21 pm

Why aren't more people taking them like THIS?

I notice a lot of those are downhill, but there are still a bunch uphill.

Post by **Matt Rowe** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 9:04 pm

A couple of times during rally coverage this year the announcers mentioned drivers have started to take more of classic approach to turns over the past season. Meaning less wheelspin and sliding and more of a roll in, drive out approach. I can't remember the specific driver they refered to, but it seems the trend was started by one driver that was cleaning everyone's clock and doing so without all of the wild looking sliding.

Keep this in mind, dynamic friction is lower than static friction so a spinning tire should provide less acceleration that a tire rolling across a surface. So how can wheelspin make you faster?

Oh, and one last thought. Balancing a car on the edge like that takes a lot of skill, a lot faith in your safety gear and a decent amount of money to fix everything when the inevitable happens. Is there a pro rally driver that has never crashed a car?

dlascoskie · Post by **dlascoskie** » Thu Dec 22, 2005 12:43 am

I thought i did take the turns like that

JekylandHyde · Post by **JekylandHyde** » Thu Dec 22, 2005 9:38 am

It is "exciting" driving, but it would be interesting if someone took
the scientific approach to measure which method is truly fastest.

Matt Rowe wrote:Keep this in mind, dynamic friction is lower than static friction so a spinning tire should provide less acceleration that a tire rolling across a surface. So how can wheelspin make you faster?

I guess the question is:
Is the momentum maintained > traction lost

I did note in a couple of those clips that the wheels came to a compelte stop a few times - if only briefly. There were also one or two where you could see the momentum of the car start to take it backward after it swung around ... I don't imagine that is "fast" when you are trying to go forward.]

Matt Rowe wrote:Oh, and one last thought. Balancing a car on the edge like that takes a lot of skill, a lot faith in your safety gear and a decent amount of money to fix everything when the inevitable happens.

Understatement of the year.

dlascoskie wrote:I thought i did take the turns like that

ROFL!

Steve Tumolo · Post by **Steve Tumolo** » Thu Dec 22, 2005 9:40 am

Matt I agree with you 100% But then again I have seen Kerry Hitt slide his Vette through turns like a Rally car. And that was with no wussy hand brake just raw power and Elephant Balls. I was working on the outside of turn 5 (years ago that was where the worker station was) and every time Kerry would come through there he was in a full 4 wheel slide. Merlin is another fast guy who slides through turns as well.

Post by **Matt Rowe** » Thu Dec 22, 2005 9:54 am

But Steve are you sure they are faster by doing it? Not doubt those guys have a ton of skill and put down fast times but would they be faster or slower if they kept the car planted? Hard to say without taking splits at major turns. Oh and I didn't think Merlin and Kerry were that bad, but then I've never gotten to see them anywhere but at the start line.

One last thing, remember that momentum has a direction as well as a value and it takes a force to change that direction. So "preserving" momentum is harder to do when the tires are providing less force as they are spinning. Really, there are few black and white areas in racng and we measure improvements in .001 of second where a thousand factors make a difference. So depending on the situation it might be faster, finding that out is what makes this so much.

rallynutdon · Post by **rallynutdon** » Thu Dec 22, 2005 2:03 pm

I would think that the sooner you get the back end around, the sooner you could get on the FULL power in a straight line. Of course you need gobs of power (torque) for it to work.

dspgti · Post by **dspgti** » Thu Dec 22, 2005 9:12 pm

By my recollection, Sammy (Ron Jr) Moreck has most of the hill records. I never saw that car slide one bit (except on the launch).

Steve Tumolo · Post by **Steve Tumolo** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 9:43 am

Another great point Dave. But would that not be because of the massive amount of grip/downforce along with the power to weight ratio that car has? I think that in the case of Merlin and Kerry it is the fact that you will not get all the power you need to the road anyway so it is better to get the car rotated with the gas pedal to steer you through to the track out. Not to mention getting some much needed heat in the tires.

Matt, I have video here somewhere taken from the outside of turn 7 looking down to 6 at Duryea. You see Kerry come through 6 wide open brake for 7 and half way through 7 he goes into a 4 wheel drift through the rest of the turn. It is AMAZING how smooth it all looks.

JekylandHyde · Post by **JekylandHyde** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 10:17 am

Steve, if you send me the video, I can host it on my Site for everyone to see.

GT1-hillclimber · Post by **GT1-hillclimber** » Sat Dec 24, 2005 10:49 am

One point concerning GT1/2 cars and hillclimbs. In the really tight hairpins, throttle steer is almost a necessity. Our car did not have much of a turning radius (zero scrub front end stuff), so I would have to blip the throttle 1/2 way thru/coming out to get the car to turn. Then wait for the slide to stop before throttling up. The camaro was not an ideal hillclimb car (except for maybe Giants and Snowshoe) because of the turning radius.

Working on that!!

Merry Christmas to my hillclimbing friends up North. By the way, Rich Shafer (raced at Giants with us 2 years ago), owner of Cool Shirt, had major back surgery this week. He is going home today. Iffy wether or not he will get to race this year. Also, Tommy Richardson is facing surgeries again on his feet. His return to racing this year is in jeorparday as well. Please keep these hillclimbers in your prayers.

Mash

dspgti · Post by **dspgti** » Sun Dec 25, 2005 12:43 pm

I'll concede that some cars aren't set up to do 180's, but short wheel based all wheel drive rally cars should be. Case in point for the fast line: Dan Ruttan (that's a V6 all wheel drive I think?) beat Merlin Miller for FTD at Duryea. I didn't get to watch Dan too much but what I saw was very little sliding on Dan's part.

GT1-hillclimber · Post by **GT1-hillclimber** » Mon Dec 26, 2005 11:34 am

Dave, it does appear as all wheel drive is the hot ticket for hillclimbs. Amazing what is being done with these audi AWD chassis (with chevy V8 conversions etc). Never seen Rutans AWD, but saw the results from Duryea last year. Wow. I know Merlin left nothing on the table. Not in his nature!

mash

Champ · Post by **Champ** » Wed Dec 28, 2005 11:25 am

Well, I would, but I don't have a hand brake.