Phone mount while racing....

[Stevemcmaster]

Hi all,

I was interested in trying out my phone as a gps lap timer in the car while racing, with the advantage of running a video overlay at the same time.

Has anyone had experience of this and, if so, how did you go about mounting it?

I am in a Caterham Classic, so have a cage that could be used for a clamp mount, or I could knock something up to go on the dash top....

I know that the real answer is a vbox, but at £3.99 for the app and a 40 quid Bluetooth GPS receiver, I thought I would give it a whirl....

Cheers

Steve

[tapkaJohnD]

Steve,
Most series' regs forbid car to pits radio contact, or the possibility thereof.
So the scrutes might object!

When I used to manage a Holly Birkett Six Hour Relay Team, my secret weapon was for all drivers to carry a mobile phone,and ring me up if and when they stopped on the circuit. This could save many lost laps while we guessed if they had stopped or only delayed. Then one year in the managers briefing, a newbie manager stood up and asked the Clerk of the Course if he could do this. GROAN! Everyone was doing it, and the CoC knew full well, but could turn a blind eye until some fool actually asked. And rightly, he gave his decison, according to the regs that drivers may not carry a mobile.

So check with your series!
John

[nky_84]

Stevemcmaster said:

Hi all,

I was interested in trying out my phone as a gps lap timer in the car while racing, with the advantage of running a video overlay at the same time.

Has anyone had experience of this and, if so, how did you go about mounting it?

I am in a Caterham Classic, so have a cage that could be used for a clamp mount, or I could knock something up to go on the dash top....

I know that the real answer is a vbox, but at £3.99 for the app and a 40 quid Bluetooth GPS receiver, I thought I would give it a whirl....

Cheers

Steve

It works, but the speed doesnt refresh quick enough, so it looks like you are doing 90mph in the corners and 50 up the straight. It works ok for lap timing though.

[Stevemcmaster]

Thanks gents...

Will check with the series - thanks John...

I am most interested in the lap time function to be honest, the video etc is just a nice to have - the app I have does lap time delta to previous/fastest which is a nice feature.

So, any ideas for actually mounting it?

Thanks again....

Steve

[frodo_monkey]

Probably better to buy a T100 if you ask me, but if you are dead set on using your phone (presume its an iPhone) - I suggest a bit of sticky back Velcro on the back of the phone, a 4" x3" bit of ally with the other side of Velcro in the middle, four holes at the corners and one cable tie across the top, another across the bottom. Make the ally slight bigger than the phone in order to bolt it to something suitable - exhaust clamp to go around a cage etc...

[Count Johnny]

The Blue sayeth:

8.1.10.

(a) Cars will be Permitted to carry radio transmitters
or receivers, for which Ofcom licences will be
checked at scrutineering, in the following races
only:

(i) International non-Historic status races

(ii) Those taking place on a high speed oval
circuit where regulations Permit the use of
spotters

(iii) Races which involve a Driver change

[IanUAE]

We ran a iPhone connected to a power supply as a lap timer at the Barcelona 24hr race last year. On average it recorded a lap time ~2 seconds quicker than the official lap times. Still it gave the driver an idication of his pace.

[Stevemcmaster]

Thanks everyone for your responses...

I have found a fully enclosed case, which also has a tripod mount built into it - theory here being that, if the regular rollbar clamp mounts for cameras work using the tripod mount on the camera, this will be acceptable.

I'm in touch with the series cheif scruit to get his views and will ultimately get it looked over at the pre-season test @ Silverstone on the 23rd on March....

I have a T100 already fitted, so I will be able to run a compare for accuracy on the day as well. The big deal on the app is that it runs all of the GPS based logging information that a VBox does, along with the video capture and overlay and the ability to take its GPS feed via bluetooth from an external GPS receiver.

The most concerning part is the Bluey reference to radio transmitters...

Will post the outcome...

Ta
Steve

[Fishy Dave]

Do you have a link to the mount you have found?

[Stevemcmaster]

Hey..

The mount will be a standard roll bar clamp with a tripod thread.

The big deal is the phone case which is:

http://www.tridentcase.com/shop-products/kraken-am...

This has the option of taking the flip stand out and adding in a tripod adapter, also from the same company.

Its all available off eBay as well..

Ta
Steve

[themanalive]

If your phone is on the android system, then I would recommend using racechrono as the app for doing the timing. I was using Harrys Laptimer on an ipod touch with a bluetooth gps at 5hz, but compared to the actual track timing system the laptimes were + or - quarter of a second and the speeds were all over the place.

I then downloaded racechrono for my android tablet and again using a 5hz gps bluetooth and the laptimes are accurate to less about 0.05 seconds. The speedoverlay is bang on accurate and when you look at the data afterwards the traces are very detailed. Finally there is a little programme that lets you make an overlay of all the data to then put on a movie. Overall its a great setup that is very cheap.

[Stevemcmaster]

Great - thanks.

I have a couple to try out - Racechrono and Trackmaster to see how they compare.

Cheers.

Steve

[andylaurence]

There's also WifiLapper, which allows you to connect an IOIO for hooking up sensors like steering angle, brake pedal pressure, throttle position, etc. As a bonus, it transmits the data back to a laptop in the pits via Wifi when you go past the pits or via 3G in real time. Quite handy in longer races when you want to monitor car health and driver performance to make decisions about pit strategy...

[McSam]

andylaurence said:

There's also WifiLapper, which allows you to connect an IOIO for hooking up sensors like steering angle, brake pedal pressure, throttle position, etc. As a bonus, it transmits the data back to a laptop in the pits via Wifi when you go past the pits or via 3G in real time. Quite handy in longer races when you want to monitor car health and driver performance to make decisions about pit strategy...

That's quite awesome and I'm gonna suggest its use for testing - great cheeky way to get live data. But I would bet it's forbidden in the vast majority of races, telemetry usually is, no?


Interesting to see what the Blue Book says on radio comms. For my own plans, I was thinking of having a two-way radio in the car, no hands-free or any of that crap, just the walkie-talkie style transmitter stored somewhere so I can radio back to my pit if I bin it. I guess it's little different to carrying a mobile, just quicker and easier to work with.

Edited by McSam on Tuesday 19th March 10:20

[spyderman8]

Fascinating app but it could certainly fall foul of the rules - you'd have to look at particular series regulations as well as the Blue Book.

[Stevemcmaster]

Terrific use of tech, but just a bit too much for me at the moment...

Once I am down to the final tenths real data logging will be helpful, till then, just a lap by lap overlay of +/- against the fastest / optimum lap will be sufficient and, if I can see this during the lap - it will be perfect.

I am expecting the kit to arrive this week, so I will pop a picture up once its installed.

Ta
Steve

[Count Johnny]

spyderman8 said:

Fascinating app but it could certainly fall foul of the rules - you'd have to look at particular series regulations as well as the Blue Book.

(At risk of beng an old stick in the mud) It certainly does:

[Blue Book - Section Q - 8.1.10]

'(b) No signal of any kind may pass between a
moving car and anyone connected with the car’s
Entrant, Team or Driver save for the following:
(i) Legible messages on a Pit Board
(ii) Body movement by the Driver
(iii) Verbal communication between a Driver and
his Team by means of radio using an
approved frequency subject to 8.1.10(a)
(iv) Lap trigger signals from the Pits to the car.
Lap marker transmitters shall be battery
powered and once operating must be free
standing (not attached to any other pit
equipment by means of wires or optical
fibres) and incapable of receiving external
information. Such lap triggers shall use a
transmitter operating with a carrier frequency
above 10Ghz (radio or optical) and a beam
half angle of no more than 36° when
measured at the 3dB point, and shall not be
used for the transmission of any data from the
pit to the car other than the lap mark. Lap
mark data must be transmitted repeatedly
and must be demonstrably consistent
(v) A single burst of timing data from the car to
the Pits as the car passes the receiver. All
timing beacons and receivers must be a
minimum of 10m from any official timing
beam.'

Fascinating stuff, though.

[spyderman8]

"shall not be used for the transmission of any data from the pit to the car other than the lap mark" pretty much rules it out - good spot.

[Count Johnny]

spyderman8 said:

"shall not be used for the transmission of any data from the pit to the car other than the lap mark" pretty much rules it out - good spot.

Well, that section deals specifically with transmitting data from the PIT to the CAR (like changing an engine map remotely, for example).

Really the bit that spoils it all is the beginning of the reg which states 'No signal of any kind may pass between a moving car and anyone connected with the car’s Entrant, Team or Driver save for the following:' and then goes on to list things which basically mean you can time the car; hang out a pit-board; wave at each other; and even talk to each other (if you're in a race involving driver changes) but can NOT stream data from the car to the pits.

No doubt this is an age old attempt to keep motor racing affordable - which has (like many things in The Grey Book) been superceded by extremely affordable technology - and it's a great shame as I would just lurve to see some streamed data from our car.

Mind you, as I think about it, you could actually use it for testing which would make loads and loads of sense.

Hmmm...interesting...

[McSam]

Count Johnny said:

<Knowledge from Blue Book which I might definitely also start calling Grey..>
Mind you, as I think about it, you could actually use it for testing which would make loads and loads of sense.

Hmmm...interesting...

This is what I'm thinking. No reason why you can't have it on test days or even open track days, something that works by 3G would be brilliant as you'd need practically no trackside setup at all. Particularly if you were playing with aero setup it would be great.