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Mid America Results and Fun

Posted: Mon Apr 27, 2015 8:29 am
by birddog
Well, we got lucky with one of our MA cars this year.

As we were watching the prelims of the open scout graphite division, we were wondering if we'd even make the finals or not. Turns out we were in 6th place out of 114 cars after the prelims. We were running times between 2.960 and 2.971. About what I saw on our test track.

So, going into the finals we expected maybe around 6th place. But to our amazement, my Sons car actually got FASTER in the finals. Part of it may have been the staging as Greg was staging the final round (and he did a very good job of it), but I also think I may not have worked the graphite in well enough and after 6 runs it finally got worked in properly. We started running 2.94x and 2.95x times. We were actually competing with the top cars!

We ended up getting 3rd (which we are thrilled about as we got 4th last year). We were VERY close to getting 2nd (only off by about 1 thousandth of a second per race). What a dramatic finish and it was fun to watch the trophy presentation online as well (they treated the proxy winners very nicely).

Our oil car was faster, but not fast enough. Didn't make the finals there.

While my adult car was faster than Cody's car on our test track, it didn't do as well at MA. Maybe something got bumped in shipping.

We had a great time watching and are thrilled with the 3rd place finish in open scout graphite.

Thank you Greg for all you do to put on a fantastic event!

birddog

Re: Mid America Results and Fun

Posted: Mon Apr 27, 2015 8:47 pm
by knotthed
You did get a re-graphite by dawes I believe. I was there with my son during the process. All of the proxy finals cars got it.

I guess I need to learn a little about reapplying as we lost time and not sure why.

Our fastest car at home was Linda's and it was not the fastest there. I would not conclude shipping unless it was drastically different. I also believe the traffic can play a big role in your times. Get a bad draw it's gonna hurt and vice versa.

See if you can go back and watch the feed and see if your bad runs were next to some twerking cars.

Great Job!

Better bring you A game, that is for sure. We were short on time and knew our daughters car was the slowest. I wish we would have went back to the tuning board and track for 15 more minutes.

Re: Mid America Results and Fun

Posted: Mon May 11, 2015 9:04 pm
by knotthed
Birddog,

I hope you don't mind me tacking onto your thread.

I wanted to share our build info with everyone, as racing at an event like this is a great way to benchmark against the best of the best. There were several league racers and their kids participating in the event - don't let that be a deterrent to getting a great benchmark.

Logan Open Scout Oil; Derby Evolution (Mid America Wheels and 94SRG axles), 1 cube shy of 4oz, Blue Fenders
Qualified 8th Overall, Fourth Place Webelos, Seventh Overall Finals

Logan Open Scout Graphite; Derby Evolution (Mid America Wheels and 93 Velocity Pro axles), 1 cube shy of 4oz, Red Fenders
Qualified 2nd Overall, First Place Webelos, Sixth Overall Finals

Layla Open Kids Graphite; Derby Evolution (Mid America Wheels and 91SRG axles), 1 cube shy of 4oz, Toothless
Qualified 17th Overall, (We knew this was our slowest car and didn't have time to tune it anymore)

Linda Open Adult Graphite; Derby Evolution (Mid America Wheels and 91SRG axles), 1 cube shy of 4oz, Hummingbird
Qualified 12th Overall, 5th Overall Finals

Don Open Adult Graphite; Derby Evolution (Mid America Wheels and 93 Velocity Pro axles), 1 cube shy of 4oz, Harley Davidson
Qualified 5th Overall, Seventh Overall Finals

All cars were briefly tuned on a 32' MicroWizard Aluminum Freedom Track, and glass tuning board.

Here are the pictures of the cars and us with trophies in front of an old CLAAS Combine.

Image

Image

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Re: Mid America Results and Fun

Posted: Tue May 12, 2015 3:37 am
by Vitamin K
Thanks for sharing your info with us, Knotthead! You better believe I'm taking notes. ;)

If I could request a few more bits of information, feel free to share at your own discretion:

- What kind of angle do you put on the DFW of your cars?
- Any specifics for the graphite application process?

Re: Mid America Results and Fun

Posted: Tue May 12, 2015 10:29 am
by Topspin.D
If you don't mind... one additional question:

How do you drill (bullet / block / other)?

Re: Mid America Results and Fun

Posted: Tue May 12, 2015 12:02 pm
by knotthed
Wheel Prep:
Novus2 and Walgreens Qtips, your Favorite wax, burnished with Hodges with polishing rods by hand, topped with Hob E Lube

Hodges info: http://www.winderby.com/m20_040829.html

For what it's worth, I am not convinced there is a huge difference in graphites or I cannot tell the differences. We had good success last year with Max V graphite. Caution; applying graphite to a freshly prepped wheel may induce :cry: ........

DFW Angle? I have no idea - I would guess a little more than 3 degrees - I added a picture above - the cars are not that skinny the panoramic feature could not decipher the background properly to keep the cars full width.

Drilling; marked with Pro Body Jig(PBJ) and drilled with Block/Bullet usinig a 1/8" diameter long drill bit, so close to 3 degrees on the rears.

Re: Mid America Results and Fun

Posted: Tue May 12, 2015 12:42 pm
by Brian Clark
Congrats to both of your families. Looking forward to next years race.

Re: Mid America Results and Fun

Posted: Tue May 12, 2015 3:13 pm
by Topspin.D
Thank you for sharing

Re: Mid America Results and Fun

Posted: Tue May 12, 2015 5:08 pm
by knotthed
Topspin.D wrote:Thank you for sharing

You're welcome.

I would love to see the top 12 cars for each class showcased like this.

There are a lot of good pictures on the Mid America site - Great Job Greg!

Re: Mid America Results and Fun

Posted: Wed May 13, 2015 2:46 pm
by birddog
knotthed wrote:
Topspin.D wrote:Thank you for sharing

You're welcome.

I would love to see the top 12 cars for each class showcased like this.

There are a lot of good pictures on the Mid America site - Great Job Greg!
knotthed wrote:Wheel Prep:
Novus2 and Walgreens Qtips, your Favorite wax, burnished with Hodges with polishing rods by hand, topped with Hob E Lube

Hodges info: http://www.winderby.com/m20_040829.html

For what it's worth, I am not convinced there is a huge difference in graphites or I cannot tell the differences. We had good success last year with Max V graphite. Caution; applying graphite to a freshly prepped wheel may induce :cry: ........

DFW Angle? I have no idea - I would guess a little more than 3 degrees - I added a picture above - the cars are not that skinny the panoramic feature could not decipher the background properly to keep the cars full width.

Drilling; marked with Pro Body Jig(PBJ) and drilled with Block/Bullet usinig a 1/8" diameter long drill bit, so close to 3 degrees on the rears.
OK. For our 3rd place graphite car, our process is basically the same. We use Max V graphite. For drilling, we use a silver bullet, but we mark holes by hand (do not use a PBJ). We also used nail polish on the sides of the cars where the axles go in and we used Pledge on the axles themselves. Then, tune on a test track with various positions of DFW and trim weight until we get the fastest times.

birddog

Re: Mid America Results and Fun

Posted: Wed May 13, 2015 6:29 pm
by sporty
What weight / gram wheels. Did you run in adult graphite. ?

I ran 1.4 grams. Some were 1.6.

While I had some. 2.95. Something runs. I seen some wiggle. Issues in some of the runs. Hurting a bit.

I think it was 8th ? Final. 12th overall. ?

I skipped a lot of finer work I usually do.

I
you mostly know. Racerx. Was same car from two years ago.

The Nellie. I had no idea. How they would run or perform.

I used in some of them. The derbyworx. Titanium axles. All axles. AND wheels. Derby worx.

For the cars.

One had the puma weights.

It was fun. To just send in. Not focusing on speed. And was happy just with that.

No wax was used.

Re: Mid America Results and Fun

Posted: Wed May 13, 2015 7:16 pm
by knotthed
Ours were all the same this year, I believe they were 1.2 grams.

Let me know if you want me to weigh them.

Re: Mid America Results and Fun

Posted: Fri May 15, 2015 5:02 pm
by birddog
We used 1.4 gram wheels.

birddog