Karting. Tips needed.
Discussion
Cotty said:
Alfanatic said:
I had a partially wet race at Buckmore. I found terminal understeer if I tried to turn on the brakes or even just on a trailing throttle. Even smoothly rolling on to the throttle gave unbelievable amounts of understeer at practically crawling pace. Only cure I could come up with was great big dollops of throttle, applied with as little finesse as possible
Yep that works for me. Lots of throttle in the wet and drive though it. It seems that karts want to go where you want it with more throttle than you think safe. Took me a while to get the hang of it, but more throttle = more grip, it sounds wrong but it works (for me). The only exception was Clay Pigeon, they resurfaced some parts of the track and hitting the new surface on full throttle span the wheels. I found a lift and coast over it then reapply the throttle worked and was quicker than the people driving round the new bits of track.
I have heard that, on a dry circuit, karts get around this by picking up the inside rear wheel but I don't know if that's true or even how you'd engineer it to happen around left and right hand bends without any suspension. Maybe low pressure in the front tyres or a funny camber / castor combination on the front wheel alignment or something?
But you are right, it takes a lot of commitment because you find yourself spearing off towards the tyre wall face first, and the solution is to accelerate as hard as you can, and if you're a bit too cautious with the accelerator you just end up spearing face first towards the barrier even faster. That goes against everything that 20 years of driving has instilled in me
I'll admit that even after I'd sussed that I didn't manage to find enough faith to apply it all the time and ended up creeping around a corner fairly often at a pace that I could have been faster by getting out and pushing the kart around. Also, after reading this thread, I realise that I also stuck to the traditional racing line, which can't have helped.
Edited by Alfanatic on Thursday 6th October 09:17
The axle is one bar basically and no diff. So, by getting your weight on the outside wheel, the kart will turn more, with less steering lock, keeping up your momentum.
This will also knacker you out. If you are going to do this, do this towards the end of your session, once your ironed out your driving.
Simple stuff works better (as per your 750MC); smooth steering; sliding slows you down, always look where you want to go- even when your sliding, listen to the tyres- slight squeals are ok, screeching means you've over done it, the same for the engine (bog down); and understand when you can and can not attack kerbs. On some circuits your have to attack certain kerbs to be quick which takes a lot out of the kart and you.
O and enjoy!
This will also knacker you out. If you are going to do this, do this towards the end of your session, once your ironed out your driving.
Simple stuff works better (as per your 750MC); smooth steering; sliding slows you down, always look where you want to go- even when your sliding, listen to the tyres- slight squeals are ok, screeching means you've over done it, the same for the engine (bog down); and understand when you can and can not attack kerbs. On some circuits your have to attack certain kerbs to be quick which takes a lot out of the kart and you.
O and enjoy!
Gruffy said:
doogz said:
Hmm. I'd be inclined to keep my weight away from overloading the outside wheels. Especially as there's no suspension.
You'd be travelling slower then. Think of it more as unloading the inside wheel than loading the outside wheel.doogz said:
Hmm. I'd be inclined to keep my weight away from overloading the outside wheels. Especially as there's no suspension.
There's no diff, so loading the inside rear wheel would promote understeer as both rear wheels will be wanting to drive the kart forward at the same speed, so you want the inside rear wheel to be light enough to scrub / spin away with little resistance. At least that's how I understand it.doogz said:
I guess it depends on what sort of karts you're driving. The more powerful ones, you'll find with only one rear wheel on the ground, you'll get some spin.
No that's wrong as well. I race 2 strokes, and they are set up to cock the inside wheel.Just trust us on this one!
But like a lot of us said, not worth doing all the time.
I did 45mins at Bayford meadows, and the next day my kneck was in pain!
Alfanatic said:
I have heard that, on a dry circuit, karts get around this by picking up the inside rear wheel but I don't know if that's true or even how you'd engineer it to happen around left and right hand bends without any suspension. Maybe low pressure in the front tyres or a funny camber / castor combination on the front wheel alignment or something?
Dont have a carting background but i would say that its probably something to do with the large scrab radius of the steering (centre of the tyre contact patch to the point where the king pin axis intersects the ground) This combined with the Caster angle of the king pin axis when viewed from the side of the cart is going to force the inside front wheel down and lift the outside front wheel.Edited by Alfanatic on Thursday 6th October 09:17
when you sitting in the car stationary and turn the steering you can feel the cart rock from side to side.
Ryan
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