Maverick Proxy Race #6 is in the books!

[SRQSloter]

[TuscoTodd]

Next up - ListerStormGT's car!

Comments from our driver's / track owner / fellow racers who helped marshal and watch the action...

Chassis: This is the second car in the field with a Slot.it chassis. However, instead of being set up as an inline - this one is insted set up as a side winder. Definitely shows off how versatile and adaptable the design is to fitting cars in this series!

Body: The silver with the satin black hood and racing stripes looked fast just sitting still! Mix that with the black spoke inserts with the polished wheels behind (kind of simulating the look of disk brakes) and it made for a tough looking package!
Also - the pics don't really show it - but the metallic silver used on this really jumps out under the lights! :D

Driving: The side winder set up used with this slot.it chassis seemed to help it be a little more predictable in the corners while still maintaining the light / nimble feel of what was the second lightest car in the group. The car could be driven deep and powered out fairly quickly so long as you rolled into the power verses snapping it on - similar to the other slot.it chassised car - again more of a "driver's car" - but a little "tamer". :)

Pictures:

[TuscoTodd]

Next up - my (TuscoTodd) car!

I will just share pics of mine... :)

Pictures:

[TuscoTodd]

Next up - DixonJohn's car!

Comments from our driver's / track owner / fellow racers who helped marshal and watch the action...

Chassis: Very clean straight forward approach! The rectangular main rails make for a nice rigid, light weight platform putting it in amongst some of the lightest cars fielded. We weren't sure if there were supposed to be four screws holding the body on, but after seeing how fast it was - we didn't want to "mess with success"!

Body: The very glossy "Arrest Me Red", contrasted by the flat black treatment definitely fit this cars performance and was set off nicely by the addition of the side pipes and details like the "tape" across the head lights. :)

Driving: The nose up attitude of the body made it look like this car was pulling a "hole shot" even when sitting still! The chassis really worked with this set up making for a very easy to drive car. The front end did seem a bit "light" as it liked to pop out of the slot on tight corners if you got into the throttle too early/quickly - but that aside, it was very easy to drive this car quick!

Pictures:

[TuscoTodd]

Next up - ShotgunDave's car!

Comments from our driver's / track owner / fellow racers who helped marshal and watch the action...

Chassis: A very clean looking design that has a very slick set up for the rear bushings! As has been noted, this car tips the scales as the heaviest in the field - but is due to added tuning weight verses the chassis itself.

Body: The front air-damn had EVERYONE's attention! Not just because it was fluorescent orange - but it's track scuffing clearance! WOW!!! They don't get closer to the racing surface than that! :D
The glass smooth light green metallic paint and aluminum slotted mags really fit the '70's look and with the white painted side pipes and white letter tires, looked ready to tear it up at the drop of a hat!

Driving: Smooth, but heavy feeling was the general consensus (which based on the weigh in - was spot on). However, believe it or not, even with being the heaviest of the cars, it acted light in the nose in tight corners. This may be more of a balance issue though? as the rear of this car was P L A N T E D !!! :D
In long sweeping corners, it was a rocket ship - but in tight corners, the rear grip and weight seemed to work against it.

Pictures:

[TuscoTodd]

Next up - Austin's car!

Comments from our driver's / track owner / fellow racers who helped marshal and watch the action...

Chassis: This chassis definitely fit into the high tech end of things! It was all light weight aluminum and was lovingly dubbed the NASA chassis by our racers! VERY slick looking design! (If this is a regular manfacturer's offering - can you share who that is?)

Body: This car definitely looked track ready wearing the Ford Motorcraft decals and 8 slot wheels! It had a low/wide looking stance and just looked ready to send the rubber bits flying! VERY cool! :banana-dance:

Driving: This car took a lot of us by surprise! With no body float, there was a concern that it would tend to be a bit "chattery" in the corners - but that was FAR from the case! The car had a nice smooth drift to it - so long as you didn't push too far. :oops: If you did, then it tended to want to bite in a bit and pop the front end out of the slot. With that, it took a lot more diligence to drive it well on the tighter corners at the end of the long straights in the second race - but in the first race were there were big sweepers at the end of the long straights, this light weight ride zipped right along! :D

Pictures:

[TuscoTodd]

Next up - RMS/dreinecke's car!

Comments from our driver's / track owner / fellow racers who helped marshal and watch the action...

Chassis: Having worked on the RSR Porsche, I now recognize this chassis! :) (before getting the Porsche kit I hadn't seen one of these in the flesh) The chassis looks to be a good fit for this body as well, being easily adapted for various wheel bases/needs. :)

Body: WOW! The pictures really don't do this car justice as the level of detail / care put into this entry is truly impressive! From the more notable items like the chrome foil window trim, addition of mirrors, driving light, rear wing, etc to the subtle things that just make you go WOW! - like the chrome foil trimmed rear tail light assemblies and the axles that have been trimmed to have the front axle protrude just flush with the face of the insert, looking like what would be the wheel bearing dust caps on a 1 to 1 car - AND trimming and blacking out the rear axle end to simulate the same void that would be seen on a 1 to 1 rear wheel when installed! Truly impressive!!!!
:text-bravo:

Driving: The general consensus was that the car felt "heavy" - but was tippy. (which it was second heaviest) One of the observations made in trying to determine why this was, post racing - is that the front axle is free to float up and down pretty much unrestricted. This seems to have a very negative impact on the stability in the corners when the driving starts to turn "spirited".

Pictures:

[TuscoTodd]

Next up - APalmer's car!

Since Aronn was involved in the racing I will just be sharing the pics - enjoy! :D

Pictures:

[dreinecke]

Thanks for that report! Glad I can paint since I couldn't make it run any better lol!

[SRQSloter]

Excellent report there Todd!! One of the best I've seen. :text-bravo:

I'll do the front to rear weight ratio when I have them here. And get some rpm readings at the rear tires for everyone too.

:handgestures-thumbup:

[ListerStormGT]

Thanks for the report Todd, nice to see the opinions on each car. Looking forward to getting them and driving them all. :auto-driving:

[turbokev]

Really enjoyed reading all that Todd. Thanks for taking the time to evaluate each car!


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[TuscoTodd]

Glad to hear that you guys enjoyed the feedback - I know how much I appreciated the feedback from the previous hosts and without us being able to do the uStream broadcast (yet!), I hoped that these summaries might help convey some of what wasn't able to be seen. :)

Our goal was to capture/relay as much info as possible, while still participating in driving and keeping the rotations/times/lap counts/etc. straight, while at the same time not holding up the action and/or going past our "time window" into the track's regularly scheduled racing for the evening.
It was definitely a whirl wind, but with everyone's help we pulled it off and had a blast in the process! :banana-dance:

All those involved in driving/marshaling/watching really enjoyed the proxy. Being able to check out the cars in a "hands on" type atmosphere both during and after the race spurred a LOT of talk about the possibilities of initiating something similar at our track as a possible new class and also about maybe acting as a jumping off point for initiating a proxy!

It is definitely cool to see the level of excitement it has bred both on race day and since! Also as an added plus, it resulted in at least one racer signing up as a new member here and a couple more visiting as guests! :)

And for those that haven't had the pleasure, I have to say it again - these cars are a LOT of fun to drive and they all have notably different personalities and preferred driving styles. It is interesting to note, that even with all the different approaches to the builds, the competition between the cars turned out to be extremely tight. Many of the cars finished within a lap or so of each other and there was even one tie that had to be decided by fastest lap time!
Truly impressive!
My hats off to all the builders and I look forward to having an opportunity to host again! :D

[TuscoTodd]

Rusty - definitely look forward to hearing what your findings are on weight balance and rpms - should make for an interesting data to compare!

Jeremy - on the rear gear - it may be, without a gusset in corners that between the forces of the rear axle and the lever effect from the rear mount that there is some distortion of the rear bushing/gear assembly during heavy cornering?
I if you do find an "ah-ha" with what might be going on, I would love to hear about it as I didn't see anything "obvious" that should be causing the "coffee grinder" to keep resurfacing. :)

[SRQSloter]