Discussion
Just wondering if all seven owners adopt the same driving style to get the best out of the car. On, my first track day I am treating the car like other cars with everything smooth and progressive. I went for a passenger ride with a chap called Paul in a yellow R400 (you there Paul?) who was much more aggressive with the car, especially on the way into corners. Not sure if it was a faster technique but it seemed like a lot more fun.
How do you drive yours?
How do you drive yours?
Smooth is best, but not the most fun!
Depends on the setup of your car & driving style to be honest. The predominant handling characteristic with a Caterham tends towards understeer, one of the best ways to counter that tendency is to brake later & to carry the brakes into the corner, keeping the front tyres nicely weighted up to help make it to the apex properly.
Depends on the setup of your car & driving style to be honest. The predominant handling characteristic with a Caterham tends towards understeer, one of the best ways to counter that tendency is to brake later & to carry the brakes into the corner, keeping the front tyres nicely weighted up to help make it to the apex properly.
Unless you have a lot of power or are just talking about relatively low speed corners, power oversteer is pretty hard to do & may look & feel good but is certainly not the fastest way round, but I like myself!
When going for a time, you do have to minimize the oversteer as its essentially a loss of drive on the next section of the track that will effect your speed down the whole of that section, looks good though!
When going for a time, you do have to minimize the oversteer as its essentially a loss of drive on the next section of the track that will effect your speed down the whole of that section, looks good though!
The R400 will have had more than plenty of poke for power-oversteer
I see from your other post that you have just taken the plunge into Caterham ownership with an R400 - nice one!
Regarding driving style we all have our own, smooth is fast but doesn't mean you cant leave big, black number 11's out of all the corners (not just the slowish ones)and with over 400 bhp per ton to play with you will have much fun. The car should be set up well if it's been owned by CC so you shouldn't have any issues there.
Get it on track and if it's your first Caterham, get some tuition first rather than messing with the car.
Basicaly just have lots of fun - nice and smooth or otherwise.
I see from your other post that you have just taken the plunge into Caterham ownership with an R400 - nice one! Regarding driving style we all have our own, smooth is fast but doesn't mean you cant leave big, black number 11's out of all the corners (not just the slowish ones)and with over 400 bhp per ton to play with you will have much fun. The car should be set up well if it's been owned by CC so you shouldn't have any issues there.
Get it on track and if it's your first Caterham, get some tuition first rather than messing with the car.
Basicaly just have lots of fun - nice and smooth or otherwise.
My overpowered SLR rewarded a bit of trail-braking as you entered a tight-ish corner (as DSL indicated above) to tie the front end to the track. Worked well on tight corners where you need good turn-in. The rest of the corner required a conventional approach as you exited it.
On more open corners, there was enough power to drive it on the throttle to a point. When I got the ACB10s truly hot, I could feel the front washout suddenly turn to sticky turn-in as I hit the power hard. I wasn't unsticking the rear at this point, but I could actually feel the rear tyres leaning under the weight. I was this >|< close to actually sliding. It is one of those eureka moments.
That was on a trackday at Combe. It was dry and cool. A day where I really learned a lot about my car.
On more open corners, there was enough power to drive it on the throttle to a point. When I got the ACB10s truly hot, I could feel the front washout suddenly turn to sticky turn-in as I hit the power hard. I wasn't unsticking the rear at this point, but I could actually feel the rear tyres leaning under the weight. I was this >|< close to actually sliding. It is one of those eureka moments.
That was on a trackday at Combe. It was dry and cool. A day where I really learned a lot about my car.
Vlad, you would be surprised that unless you do some sharp lifting off the throttle to get the front to bite, followed by nailing the gas pedal, that Caterhams with R400 levels of power will still tend to understeer rather than oversteer when above third gear, unless its wet!!
As for being well set up direct from Caterham, mmmmm not in my or most Car mags experience, they usually err on the side of understeer as that's much easier to deal with & less likely to have you in the hedgerow!
Its quite surprising what a difference a proper set up on your car makes, but like most things in life its not without its costs, the better you make the car for the track, the worse it generally gets on the road.
Also worth setting the car up to suit how you tend to use on track, ie corner weight it for just the drivers weight or if usually carrying passengers guess an average weight & have it set up to suit, accepting that it will be less than optimal with just you on board.
As for being well set up direct from Caterham, mmmmm not in my or most Car mags experience, they usually err on the side of understeer as that's much easier to deal with & less likely to have you in the hedgerow!
Its quite surprising what a difference a proper set up on your car makes, but like most things in life its not without its costs, the better you make the car for the track, the worse it generally gets on the road.
Also worth setting the car up to suit how you tend to use on track, ie corner weight it for just the drivers weight or if usually carrying passengers guess an average weight & have it set up to suit, accepting that it will be less than optimal with just you on board.
It very much depends on the model of Caterham your driving. I can think of some very successfull Caterham racers in the slower class cars (Academy and Roadsports) who are far from smooth. HOWEVER the ones that are fast in all models are definately the most "unrushed/smooth" drivers.
As mentioned Caterhams inherently understeer so you have to be very patient with them to be consistantly fast. Power oversteer in a Caterham (when conditions or model allow) is actually p**s easy but also as mentioned its very, VERY slow.... but cares when its soooo much fun.
Ultimately the only judge you've got that the driving you were "treated to" was any good is by whether or not the chap has raced and won quite a bit in Caterhams, if not your working off heresay and guess work, which may or may not be right
As mentioned Caterhams inherently understeer so you have to be very patient with them to be consistantly fast. Power oversteer in a Caterham (when conditions or model allow) is actually p**s easy but also as mentioned its very, VERY slow.... but cares when its soooo much fun.
Ultimately the only judge you've got that the driving you were "treated to" was any good is by whether or not the chap has raced and won quite a bit in Caterhams, if not your working off heresay and guess work, which may or may not be right
My experience as a Megas and C400's racer
Slow car with grippy tyres (i.e. the mega with 140bhp and Yoko A048R's) - Being fast is about carrying speed. If you're style is to be agressive then it wont hurt you
Powerful car with less grippy tyres (i.e. the Superlight with 230bhp, LSD and CR500's) - Being fast is about deploying the power. Hanging the back end out doesn't feel slow but it is. Being agressive with the car will unsettle it and limit your ability to deploy the power. However, going too slowly into the corners will make you get on the throttle too early and unsettle the car
My style in the Mega is to get the car standing on its nose on the brakes and lob it at the corner at as high a speed as possible. In the slower corners i'm gentle with the throttle to avoid wheelspin. I tend to be fairly aggressive with this
My style in the Superlight (which doesn't come naturally to me) is to turn in as i'm easing off the brakes, still carry some speed into the corner and GENTLY at first apply the power to balance the car, applying full power when i'm sure the back end is planted and its going to bite. Generally all this is as smooth as possible.
Slow car with grippy tyres (i.e. the mega with 140bhp and Yoko A048R's) - Being fast is about carrying speed. If you're style is to be agressive then it wont hurt you
Powerful car with less grippy tyres (i.e. the Superlight with 230bhp, LSD and CR500's) - Being fast is about deploying the power. Hanging the back end out doesn't feel slow but it is. Being agressive with the car will unsettle it and limit your ability to deploy the power. However, going too slowly into the corners will make you get on the throttle too early and unsettle the car
My style in the Mega is to get the car standing on its nose on the brakes and lob it at the corner at as high a speed as possible. In the slower corners i'm gentle with the throttle to avoid wheelspin. I tend to be fairly aggressive with this
My style in the Superlight (which doesn't come naturally to me) is to turn in as i'm easing off the brakes, still carry some speed into the corner and GENTLY at first apply the power to balance the car, applying full power when i'm sure the back end is planted and its going to bite. Generally all this is as smooth as possible.
Modena Scotland said:
Sideways
May be slower but FUN and most popular with the pax. More skill invloved as well.
Mass
Rubbish.........while i enjoy sideways alot, there really isn't a lot to consider, there is much more demands made on the driver pedalling the the car round a circuit in the least amount of time. May be slower but FUN and most popular with the pax. More skill invloved as well.
Mass
James.S said:
Modena Scotland said:
Sideways
May be slower but FUN and most popular with the pax. More skill invloved as well.
Mass
Rubbish.........while i enjoy sideways alot, there really isn't a lot to consider, there is much more demands made on the driver pedalling the the car round a circuit in the least amount of time. May be slower but FUN and most popular with the pax. More skill invloved as well.
Mass
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