WHEN FRONT WHEELS TOUCH

[OL Mike]

[ElSecundo]

[dreinecke]

First off, I've personally helped roll 3 Gen 1 GTI's over from flips while auto-crossing...

Second - Simmer down. There is no PERFECT answer to anything and EVERYONE's mileage may vary. These are toy cars, not lasers used in brain surgery. Have fun, share tips, don't get frustrated.

On a personal note, my cars don't look like blobs and since I value aesthetics more than speed I prefer my wheels in the front turning. I too follow the adage of keeping the weight off the front though.

[goosenapper]

[sirslotsalot]

Many ways to deal with front wheels. Some glaze them with CA to reduce friction, others go independent front wheels which yes, are more expensive. It's all good. Just all food for thought and grounds for experimentation.

Kihm

[ElSecundo]

[OL Mike]

[img]http://www.slotcarillustrated.com/portal/forums/pictu[BBvideo%20425,350]re.php?albumid=2082&pictureid=42173[/img] FOUR WHEEL DRIVE HERE'S A MOVE OF THIS CHASSIS[

[masmojo]

An inportant thing to consider when referencing experience with 1/32 and 1/24 Commercial/pan type cars is that typically the ones I have seen don't touch the track, But if we assume for the sake of argument that they do need to touch the track I think the over-riding reason they don't use solid axles is because those cars are overly wide and a solid axle connecting them regardless of whether it was effiecient or not would be MUCH heavier, which probably goes further to explaining why they don't use them.

I have build several cars with independent fronts and my main gripe with it was that as the scale goes down sometimes the hardware to get then to work is troublesome, may not actually save any weight and they tend to be more fragile. Along with sometimes they don't run straight. Yes, if set up perfectly there could be a slight advantage, but I mostly build for laughs and a solid axle is easy, reliabel and durable!

[ElSecundo]

I apologize, Roalnd, when I go into 'analytical mode', the warm-fuzziness of normal conversation seems to disappear, and I come across like a jerk. Not intended, definitely nothing personal, I just look at the problem at hand and try to draw the right conclusions, without also drawing conclusions that shouldn't be drawn from the given facts. I'd wear the warm-fuzzy suit more often, but it just makes me look like an Ewok, and it itches like a mofo. :)

If we wanted to look at the theoretical best possible setup in the front, we'd want to get rid of all possible 'scrubbing' of the front tires. The best way to completely eliminate scrubbing with either a tripod/outrigger setup or a setup with the front tires always touching, is with a steering system with independent fronts. Somehow, no matter how many times it's been tried, there just isn't any benefit speed-wise, though it does look really cool.

So why doesn't the 'theoretical best' setup create any gains? Possibly because other setups have effectively eliminated all the front end losses, and there is nothing else to be gained up front.

There is one place where a tripod setup might be better than a 4-point setup, and that's on a track with rough joints, especially in curves. A sliding car with a solid axle setup with the fronts planted can be affected by scrubbing the edge of a front tire over a rough track joint. This is why Ninco cars have so much articulation at the front, because Ninco track is bumpy that way. The best setup there is to prevent the fronts from interacting with the track, with just a slight outrigger effect. That same car loses out at commercial tracks, because the engineering trade-off is bad -- the benefit gained from the floppy front axle is non-existent, and there is more benefit to be gained from eliminating the sliding friction of the guide, and gaining more outrigger effect at the front, ie, rolling front axle. And since the Ackermann front end doesn't yield any gains, is it safe to assume that a properly set up front end doesn't have front tire scrubbing issues?

[Wolseley Hornet]

[Cjent]

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