Bull Shit!

One man's trash, is an other's treasure as they say...

I came across a bundle of unused donated bodies at the track, I'll be taking a few there myself soon So this gallardo was unused.

So I picked it up. It's painted in lame flake so I thought it would be good for some liberty walk attention

I'm a huge liberty walk fan, so a simple sticker replacement and body enhancement is all that's needed. I'll be adding more camber this week too.

FC V S 14. 39!

39 = "San Kyu" in Japanese which is well known as "Thank you" even in Japan. This blog post is a bit of a thank you dedication.

While I have about 10 different bodies, This S14 has filled the mirrors of every one.

I've learned more from this machine and it's driver than anyone else. 

Recently, I've been running a lot together and I have been building my skill set greatly. Whether it's line, setting or technique. I'm truly grateful for the opportunities.

With about -15 deg front on the S14 chassis, it makes my chassis under the FC look not so aggressive at -10 deg. we both run +10 offset front and +12 offset on the rear. I don't know why, but stance and steering dictate these things.

I'm maxed out on my Yokomo camber setting gauge, but my friend had modified his years ago to go further to about -20. I also think it took a bit longer for the damage to occur on the S14 than my FC.

39-39 desu!

Click HERE for a desktop image.

MAX Drift

Today was like this... A LOT! a bit of a story in this post.

 These guys are two of the guys I love running with. Both with a little different style, but equally helping your skill set.

Whether you are leading and working on line to allow the follower space and adjust speed to bring them closer, OR behind, trying to transition withing mm of each other and get as close as possible but not hit each other. It takes concentration, driving skills and setup.

Adjusting to a high speed Kawabatta style entry from a slightly high speed entry, or trying to catch the pack in a high speed line from your own mistake, it's all skill building. recently I'm loving this.

I stay all day from 10 til 10 if I can. 

Unfortunately though, when I'm driving too, I can't take pics, of course, so there are no pics of the awesome fun the four of us had today including Max One owner, Yamada-san. Quad door-to-door drift sessions are awesome.

At one point after about 30 minutes of continuous and countless laps of insane sandwich action, we all just stopped and had to stretch and put our controllers down for a minute. Concentration was insane. It was incredible. Yamada-san's ball diff 1.5x TA-06 is a completely different style and gets sandwiched between two 1.8x and over machines with maxed out camber, it takes some adjustment. Then with the Keyence Aria boost noise and monster power to deal with also it's tough, but rewarding.

I've been going to Max One in Tokyo now for about 6 months. Starting with my Drift Package converted to RE-R and then the DRB, TA-06 and now settling on two Yokomo DRBs.  Every two weeks but recently its turned into every week or maybe twice a week.

Unfortunately or fortunately due to work commitments, I have to go on a Wednesday, so there's no competition, but I'd trade a one lap contest for the 8 hours of fun I had today for anything. The guys here are a very, very high level so I feel that I don't even need a competition to be satisfied.

My benchmark is still a little way off, but I'm getting there.

The scars on my FC tell a story. I've crashed this body soooooo many times its unbelievable, but it's the one that works best.

I really tried to run the ZX today, but two laps was enough. Unless I'm drifting with another ZX It won't be used. I may even sell it. It's too big and needs too much of an adjustment to line and other drivers.

So I also installed the dash in the FC and went for it. Matching your friends in similar set up machines is the key here.  You can really get it on with similar machines and it looks cool when bodies are similar sizes.

I'm so glad I have been trying new setups recently after doing a bunch of research. It's really changed the way I look at RC drift. Today, here's a list on changes I made.

TAO Setting,

Reduction in Neutral brake, just aggressive enough to lock the rears in a straight line. 14% was the final adjustment.

MT4 Setting,
Throttle End Point Adjust.  depending on challenger. This is vital to match speeds and transitions. now I switch between 75% and 79% on a 7.5T. I may buy a 10.5 T in the near future.
Steering curve. 20% faster at position 20 for a faster initial correction.

DRB HT Chassis.
Rear Toe now at ZERO. transposed from the test chassis but I'll move the 0.5 hubs over also.
Oil 300. rear springs: RC926 ultrasoft/ultrasoft. front: RC926 ultrasoft/soft

Basic lubrication maintenance.

This stuff took a little time but after I could enjoy about 6 hours of constant drift.

Ultimately MAX DRIFT!

.
.
.
.
ps.

 There's a lot of images of the Prodrive GC-05K wheels in these shots, but I didn't actually use them so much today.

If only they were +12... +9+5mmspacer is not enough. HAHA!

Damper Test Set 2

I finally got around to updating the second set of shocks from an unknown to a known quantity.

Upon disassembly I noticed a few things that were a little different. Being used items, I had no idea what kind of oil was inside. I only know it was softish.  The rears were setup with a 1mm longer ball end... for more ride height?

The fronts were setup with sponge inside and the rear without. The fronts on the DRB were needing to be a little harder anyway. I guess thats a simple way to handle a small adjustment, but I removed it for testing.
I'm trying to get a feel for subtle shock changes. I'll probably rebuild these again next week.

So anyway. These also had the harder black rubber seal instead of the silicone one.

So Set one is here. http://rextremerc.blogspot.jp/2012/05/yokomo-damper-maintenance.html

Oil 200
No Sponge
Silicone rubber Seal
ABC rebound piston
Steel Shaft
Blue O ring
Black O ring Guide
Yokomo HSS Suzuki Springs on the black chassis

Set 2 is. as pictured

Oil 300
No Sponge
Black rubber Seal
Normal 3 Piston
Steel Shaft
Blue O ring
Black O ring Guide
RC 926 Springs. To be tested. on the HT chassis.

 I also have a labeling system on the shocks themselves too so I can track them.

Time for a spread sheet.

Tsunami Time Attack - Drift 7 - Concept

The RE-Xtreme TA-D7 (Time Attack Drift 7) will be the second drift spec machine based on the Tamiya ORC bodyshell.

Some of you may remember the Tsunami Graphics prototype graphics I produced before.

Well this one will be a more focussed livery to lay tribute to RE-Amemiya's Time Attack Hurricane 7 and the Drift Success.

We may have all hoped that the Hurricane7's 20b Turbo with 700 odd hp may haveended up in the drift scene. but alas, it has remained a Time Attack chassis.

So the base colour may become RE-Amemiya Blue, but the top graphics will have a Tsunami Theme rather than the Hurricane but I'll use the same colours.

See how it progresses.

Shall the masking begin.... gonna be a nightmare.... GRRRRRR.

RC 926 Twin Spring Set

These are RC926 (RC kyu ni roku)  twin spring sets.

I really want a slight variation between in soft. I am using mainly Yokomo HSS soft springs with thin oils. so these will allow a little more control.

Usually, I have to pre-load normal springs a lot and they seem wasted. 28 mm becomes 23 or so. To me this seems a bit useless. so these are 31mm with the 1mm separator and are already giving me good ride height without preload. FANTASTIC! also a nice long range of movement at what feels like a more progressive rate.

Right side is RC926 ultra-soft and left side is RC926 Ultrasoft twin 1.3mm.

I am just test installing in this picture. but I got 3 different tensions in the soft range.

Ultra Soft , Super Soft & Soft. But I can combine to make.

ultra-soft
ultra-soft/super-soft 
ultra-soft/soft

super-soft/super-soft
super-soft/soft
soft-soft

6 combos over two chassis

It will give me more control in how I set up the car.
Rather than winding up the pre-load, simply choose the correct tension.

Next weeks testing session shall be a bit intense... the proof is in the performance.

AVS 5 vs Prodrive GC-05

 Curves... I was in the hobby store for a totally different reason. But I had to have these.

These are Prodrive GC-05K --- Watch the movie here.

Daigo Saito probably made them famous just like Kazama did with the GC-06.

However.

they could easily be replica of Advan AVS Model T5.

The real wheels are so similar you can't really tell the difference until you get really close and examine the details.

But neither brand had the dish and curve of these replica's

My 280ZX is a car that carries them quite well. The ZX is of a period between classic and modern. 

The RWB red is also a good match but, I simply don't like chrome on RED.

The FC is another potential user but they may end up becomming gold one day. or I simply buy another set to paint.

at 700Yen per set of 4. they easily come in at the cheaper end of the scale. These Chinese produced wheels are getting popular.

MAX TWO

MAX ONE  ほんとに楽しみです！　今日は二回に行きました！　なぜ？

Today, I went to MAX one as usual, but I had something to do in the afternoon. For a weekday, there were a lot of people and I really didn't want to bail, so after my errands I returned to complete my setup of the DRBs... kind of.

So here is the deal... I changed the setup of the DRBs drastically after last weeks eye opening adventures with one of my friends. I did some research and now I have the DRB's ass swinging a LOT!!!!

definitely an eye opener.

So now I'm really working hard to get even more out of the chassis. It's an adjustment to chassis and driving style. I am confident I could enter a competition and not be embarrassed. I didn't think 1.8FCD with 10 degree camber could be this good. Recently with the two chassis setup, I am applying changes really quickly and using what works and remembering what doesn't to good effect.

The guys starting out are having fun too, it's really good. Today, I had some great FC battles but I forgot to some pictures of the BLACK and RED and ORANGE machines. 

They probably wouldn't have been very good... the blurry shots above are a result of the fact that today my mind was crazy...

Wheel Size

I's forgotten how big these HPI wheels are. I may have to go do some asphalt drift!

These are my display wheels only. But they do look good. Some people run these with a normal size rim and mount the tyre on the inside.

Maybe... But I like to keep them for display.

In contrast these street Jam Wheels are 17" style and offer a totally different look.