BRCA Round2 – Halifax
Well, in a typical Lazy styley, I’ve left it a bit before putting this up….I’ll also keep it a bit shorter this time!
Anyway, second weekend of July was time for round two of the TC nationas up at Halifax.
For those who don’t know, Halifax is, well…. LARGE! It’s predominantly a gas track, and was recently resurfaced, so the grip is pretty mega, thanks to a combination of the new tarmac, and the foam/oil residue on the surface (although if it’s damp… well, I’ll come back to this). To say it makes pro-stocks seem a little slow is an understatement 
To go well, you need two things… Power (preferably lots), and corner speed..
So onto the action…
In pro-stock qualifying, a bit of rain played havoc in the first round, with the track going from dry-damp and greasy-dry in the space of five minutes in heat 7! Unfortuantly for thoose racers, neither slicks or wets worked… the previously mentioned surface combo litterally had no grip… they could have been on drift tyres for all the good it did.
Thankfully, the track stayed dry for the rest of the weekend, and in the end Jonny Bowden was TQ, taking two rounds, and finishing second in another. Lee Price was second on the grid from Byron Humprhries, the Schumacher drivers now all running the Mi4’s, and looking quick to boot.
Modified was all about the usual suspects, with Chris Grainger taking three rounds to end up TQ with a round to spare. Elliot Harper and Andy Moore were showing the potential of the 6.5t/LiPo combintations to line up 2nd and 3rd. Interestingly, the A final was split 50:50 in runners using LiPo vs 5cell… seemingly nothing in it, despite the weight difference (1500g vs 1425g).
In the Finals, Jonny Bowden showed a clean pair of heals to everyone, taking all three legs. Lee Price held station behind, taking three 2nds. Luke Thompson had an excellent first two legs, taking third in each from sixth on the grid, and ending up third as a result.
The top three in modified made a clean break in each final, managing to pull out a large gap on the chasing pack each time. Chris took the first and third legs to take the Mi4’s first modified national win, with Andy ending up second, and Elliot third.
As for Gossip?
Well, there were a few Photon’s in the pits, Stew Noble managing to get his into the modified B… although Luke Hobson had huge interference issues on the sat, traced to the aerial mount causing the
Motors and speedo’s were a hot topic in Pro-Stock. The final was pretty evenly split, with 5 Novaks, 4 Nosram/LRP’s, and just one GM. Speedo’s was more interesting, with a few old TC specs thrown into the mix against the now de-rigure SPX style. One GM was evident, along with two SXX’s… so maybe the speedo wars are nto as clear cut as we’d like to think
As previously mentioned, 50% of the modified boys took the opportunity to run LiPo, the main reason being that whilst slightly slower, they could be as fast all the way through the run, without a risk of dumping… motor temp now being the killer, plenty of big fans in evidence.
As for your authour… to say I’ve had better weekends was a bit of a understatement. Never really clicked with the track (put that down to a lack of practise), and ended up resorting to my old folly of making too many changes. Made the D (AGAIN, will I ever crack the top 30 at a national?), and eneded up 36th in the o/a, so could have been worse (given I finished 31st at WL, and that was a better weekend). Still the car/speedo/motor/cells combo was working fine… just the muppet behind the sticks at the end of the day.
Roll on Cotswolds (and most deffiently after a good practise this past weekend at the BTCC 
)
Written by ed.
rcLazy LiPo Weight ™
rcLazy LiPo Weight (tm)
Using LiPos in a touring car has one big downside: they’re too light.
So you have to add masses of weight to them. Usually the shortcut is to stick weights all over the cells.
But, if you then want to use the cells in a different car, that needs different, or no weights at all, then you’re stuck.
Until I came up with my amazingly simple rcLazy LiPo Weight ™!
Underneath, simples.
How to make one:
- Get a lump of thin lead sheet, cut it a bit shorter than your lipo, then cut it to width by weight, I needed about 150g.
- Then, just fold it over the top of your lipo, perhaps with an extra fold on the outside edge to make it fit.
- Cover it with your favourite Fablon. (I do have a roll of very choice Smarties fablon, but I decided carbon look would be more acceptable by the Touring Car fraternity.)
Negatives
It’s not perfect, the weight it pretty high up in the car, and a bit towards the centre perhaps, but, it’s easy, you just clip it on, tape it down and race.
And, if you’re running a fat lipo, it might be a tight squeeze under your top deck.
Oh, and remember, it’s very bendy, so don’t squash it.
Written by simon.
SLCC Round 3 – Yateley
rcLazy.com Team Including Tiny Mascot!
The whole rcLazy team was out in force at Yateley Model Car Club. at the weekend for round 3 of the Southern League Challenge Cup. We had fun, laughed at blue bits, fed chips to small children and went reasonably quickly.
The track is very similar in size to Bashley, a longer straight, and a KILLER downhill chicane. They’ve lowered the kerbs in this chicane for ‘09 thankfully, and it’s a lot safer, you get it wrong and you just end up out of shape, on the wrong line, slow, or on the grass. But you don’t end up in the air, or with a broken car.
New Shell Showing Battle Scars Already
Saturday was setup day, my 416 worlds was almost perfect on kit setup, I just changed springs. The rest of the Tamiya guys spent hundreds of laps trying to find the perfect setup, and ended up near mine! I added a bit of anti-dive on Sunday morning following their advice, thanks for all the hard work guys!
We did okay in the end, scattered around the A and B finals in all classes. I qualified 3rd in Stock, and had a nice second final, getting up into the lead, before throwing it away, falling into the grass and letting Scott Hauser through for the win!
Rob 'Sandbagger' Howett Posing Like A Pro
Some of us even got some trophies, Rob Howett resorted to sandbagging the pro-stock B final to show us all how to smile at a camera, hold a trophy, hold a car, ensure team logos are clear, all at the same time. Ol’ dog Howett gets it right every time! His B final winning performance would have been good in the A-final, too late in the day mate!
Ed Clark and Mark Townsend made the A final, and Mark had a nice battle in the second leg for position two. Sam ended the race in front of Mark though. We doubt Mark would have been up there if he hadn’t rebuilt his diff minutes before the final. Ed suggested he did it about 28 hours before, but of course that would have been far too sensible!
A great weekend, not perfect by any means, but being rcLazy isn’t about being perfect, it’s about not trying too hard!
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- rcLazy.com Team Including Tiny Mascot!
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- New Shell Showing Battle Scars Already
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- Mark Townsend Trying To Pass Sam Martin
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- Ed Clark Hand Painted rcLazy Sticker
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- Ashley Finch Sits It Out…
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- Jason Findlay Shows Bottom of Car
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- Reuben Manning Loses Feeling in Right Hand
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- Matt Sedgley Gets Newtonated In Sponsor Shirts
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- Rob ‘Sandbagger’ Howett Posing Like A Pro
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- SHMCC Team – Naughty Ed!
Group photos courtesy of Jason Moggridge.
All other photos thanks to Dan Pitter of Blink Studio.
More event photos at: YMCC
How was your SLCC Yateley? Comment below and tell us all about it!
Written by simon.
BRCA 1/10th Off-Road National Oswestry
Last weekend Oswestry hosted the 1/10th off-road national.
There is, as always, an awesome Oople report. So just go read that for all the news and pics. It’s worth reading just for the mattress not fitting the tent photo
I really miss 1/10th off-roading, there needs to be more of it in the Southern half of the UK! Are you in the South and wanting some buggy action too? Comment below!
Written by simon.
Building a Tamiya TRF416 Worlds Edition
After a year or so of running used Tamiya’s, I decided it was time I splashed out and got myself a new car. There was only one choice really, the Tamiya TRF416 Worlds Edition.
It’s clearly a very quick chassis and it comes with pretty much all the bits to be very competitive right out of the box.
Finding one in stock was a very different matter. Tamiya stopped production for a while, but it transpired they did another batch, so I found one of the new batch online. Ordered and it was with me a few days later.
It went together like a dream. Being a man, and very familiar with Tamiya builds I didn’t really follow the manual, well, I did, but not the exact order of the manual.
I added JAAD ceramic balls and thrust to the diff, Tamiya don’t seem to do a ceramic option, and I wouldn’t run steel balls since experiencing ceramic, and they’re not that expensive.
I also added low friction ‘V’ parts top and bottom on the dampers, with fluorine shock shafts. Mainly because I had them in the spares box, so it made sense to add them from the beginning.
The only awkward bit was the rear wishbones, they seemed a bit fat, I realise now I should have trimmed them a little, but instead I removed a 0.5mm spacer, and shimmed the gap back up. I’m sure after some use the 0.5mm will go back in there happily.
All the standard screws were used, they’re steel, but we’re underweight these days anyway, so no worries there. And some blue Tamiya threadlock was used with all screws that go into alloy, that’s pretty much all of them as there’s sooo much blue on this car. The weak threadlock prevents the screws loosening, but enables them to be easily removed, it just fills the gaps in the threads a bit.
Some photos are below of the build. I forgot to take photos as I was nearing the end, but some photos is better than none I figure!
First time out I ran it with electronics from my old car, for a direct comparison ‘chassis only’ upgrade. And I knocked 3 seconds off my personal best at Bashley, including a roll that cost me another 3 seconds. It really is quick then!
I was staggered how much more corner speed it carried, I built it pretty much with kit setup (a few very slight changes), and the grip was amazing, it turned in, carried the speed, and you could get back on the throtttlw very early. ’Glorious’ was how I described it on the night, whilst grinning like a Cheshire cat.
If I gave up racing now, I would still say it was worth every penny [cent]!
The final pictures show it with the Team Wave RB50 that was chosen to go in this car, a ‘generation 3′ speedo, with timing advance and ‘full-throttle turbo’ functionality at a bargain price. I look forward to fiddling with all the settings.
I think it’s an ideal speedo to squeeze more power out of the stock motors I like to race, whilst still being able to run 10.5 and mod motors should I desire.
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- Shiny Shrinkwrap
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- Lovely Label
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- Bags o’ Fun
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- Picture Book
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- Hang the Superglue
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- Blue is Best
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- One Down…
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- Motoring On
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- Note the Lengths
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- Spool Included
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- Added Ceramics
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- Not Difficult
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- Driven by Belts
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- Note Missing Screws
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- Rear View
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- Front View
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- Electrics Fitted
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- Race Ready
