League Race Tonight

Hi Folks,
It's league race night tonight, and in keeping with the season's style of 'work it through the numbers' we're starting this season with the slowest, but but by no means boring, HRC460 class.

The Cars
We know them well by now - 1990 or before, 460pp and racing hard tyres.
They've transferred well into GT6, even Evan's RUF it seems after last week's lashing we all got from it.

In this class a light car is king it seems, the last few seasons Callum's RX7 made our lives hard work to say the least - though my NSX once tweaked seemed to give it a run.
One topic for discussion though, do we allow the Lamborghini's to race? They're a class apart from any of the other cars, I have one, and whilst I am a clutz behind the wheel (see any online time trial scores) even I can muster a fast lap in it. It's almost too fast... But then perhaps I need the help.

The tracks
First up will be Brands Hatch F1 - this is fast becoming my favourite go to short circuit, albeit the long one (eh?). What's more it really suits these cars it seams, and for some reason seems to be in the same place in terms of nostalgia too. Certainly we've practised it a fair bit, it should be a great race.

Second up is Grand Valley East Reverse - a short track an no mistake, but really well suited to these cars. Turn one at the end of the start-finish straight is always a tiptoe the car around moment, wondering if the weight of the car will send it to the outside, round, or just straight on. Races are won and lost on that corner...
There's a couple of extra laps in this race, in recognition of it's short stature...

Official Details

Championship Race #1.
Track: Brands Hatch F1
Start time: 9:15 PM
Laps Per Race: 6
Cars: HRC460
Tyres: Race Hard
Boost: Low/Off

Championship Race #2.
Track: Grand Valley East Reverse
Laps Per Race: 8
Cars: HRC460
Tyres: Race Hard
Boost: Low/Off

Race Day Comments
I'm not sure if we should have compulsory pit-stops. The decision here will stand for the rest of the season, as I don't want an inconsistant set of races. I'm leaning towards yes, but Callum's comfort soft episode (that doesn't sound right does it) isn't racing either and I want it to be a fair race - though I may have commented that the rest of us on racing medium and his car being on comfort soft is in fact pretty much an even race... ;o)
Anyway. We'll try it again tonight, and see if it works - and if so make it a rule.

Season changes
The "Euro Super Special' race has pp set way too low @ 550pp. I'm thinking we'll got to 600pp, which will rule out older supercars, but will allow some proper money missiles to be launched...

League Business

So here it is folks, the season starts this next week...

Season Details

It's open for discussion of course, but it's not an easy thing getting an eclectic mix of cars for us to enjoy across the whole spectrum.

Note the "no point' races. This is so that we can race stuff outside of our regular classes, which as you'll know from the charter are:

Of note here is that we're not going to use the GB500 cars, they being a subset of the TC500 cars in any case. Exotique is our original league racers, road going 587pp, no plans to run those this year in any official capacity though happy to race in after races etc. of course.

The charter is up to date on the right hand link, I have yet to upload the season calendar, soon folks.

Also; I'll endeavour to do the pre-race post I always used to, time seems to be slipping away a bit more these days!!!

Pics

If you're still confused, here's a bit of an encyclopaedia...

GT590 - They don't all have to be green hornets though.

HRC460 - Well the Dino is, the other one is way over powered, but nice though!

More HRC460 - Though luck being competitive in them.

TC500 - This is the closest thing to a V8 Supercar I reckon.

650Open - If you can afford this...

European Supercars - nice innit.

Even more.... still eye candy.

Action replay
I finally got round to uploading a video of our racing the other night too - and figured out how to get GT6 vids to frame up properly too (GT5 was fine). Sill, a top race, I've got a few more for some time in the future too, enjoy:



See you online next week folks!

E30 Update - big one at that.

So it's been the weekend for my E30.
As pre-arranged Evan came up for a day pulling cars apart to help me move some big steps forwards...

As you'll know from a previous post, I needed to unlock my diff. Not a small job and the plan was to unbolt the rear subframe and move the lot over, solving a small issue of trashed hub on my car (two snapped bolts for the rear wheel, not good).

But, given the underside of the Ron looked a bit like this:

Unbolting all sorts and shifting across didn't seem such a smart move. What's more, without a solid beam rear axle there's quite a lot going on under there. So shuffle the diff it was.

And so we did: 

That there is a 4.45:1, Auto, open diff for an E30 circa 1989.

That there is something similar, on my 'good' car. Except somewhere in there it's welded.

And so we got to taking off the open one from the donor car.

Sit rep, T+2mins. I do not like oil on my hands...

The recipient, waiting patiently to be able to go around a corner.

We left the diff here for an hour in the hope that it would magically make it's way into place.

It most certainly did not.

Happy campers, job done.

And we got used to the oil. 

Overall a grand job for the day, removed two diffs and fitted one. Things we learnt?

• Fitting is much easier than removal.
• BMW diffs aren't too bad to remove, just the bolts holding them in place.
• It's a two person job for sure. No way I could have done this by myself.
• Sway bars are easy to remove (I 'found' one on the Ron).
• Sway bars should be fitted before the diff (now waiting on the floor of the garage, doh!).

Sunday..

No pics for today, but today I removed the hub from the Ron too. A complete nightmare to do really, not least as (and if you're in the know you'll know what I mean) the little retaining clip that you can't really get to and pulled out on the white car, wasn't the same on the Ron, so I spent an hour trying to pull a washer past a very tight nut indeed. Where's the BMW efficiency eh, eh...

What this does mean is that tomorrow I may well have a rolling car. Exciting times!

Final word.

And finally, a huge debt of thanks to Evan, fair to say that without him it would have been a. impossible and b. a lot less fun (as today was). So thanks mate, same time next week? There's plenty to do... ;o)

Racing tonight...

We'll have some league racing - promise! Last week of my holidays this week so I'll be back in a depressive work mood from next week, and looking for excuses to do other non-work related computery things. Like a season mix.

Here's some more racing of Mount Panorama, Brock in an M3...

Very nice footage I think you'll agree.

Tonight, you'll need an HRC460 and TC500 car - we'll do Bathurst for a bit too. Great track.

E30 News
Not much, this weekend Evan and I are playing at breaking cars. Hopefully transplanting an axle along the way...

And I've refitted the air filter, it runs better with this mass air sensor.

Update...

Late, sorry.
Tonight, or last night as you read this, we'll focus on the GT590-4 cars, so that's Japan made race cars including 4wd cars, at 590pp. Tyres are Racing Medium.

Something like these in fact.

But what's been consuming me? Euro old sports that's what, these sorts of things:

They keep my busy, and allow pics like these:

That's enough eye candy.

E30 update
Not much has happened. I've ordered a gear shift knob, the last one never arrived. And I'm thinking this will be my benchmark:

Season update

Errr, yes, watch this space. Umm, still doing research. Yeah, that's what it's called.

My new wish list...

1. Large areas covered in trees - Check.
2. A desire to drive like a loon - Check
3. Ability to do so - err wait.
4. Snow - haha, funny.
5. $$$$$$ - Oh well.

It was all going well until Trevor the squirrel ran across the road.

TC500 Race Prep Night Thursday

Hi Folks.
Race prep night on Thursday.
Specifically we'll be doing TC500 races on the night - we've all had time to rebuild our garage now.

Of the league - please do take the time to come and race, you've all got GT6 now, and it would be great to get some serious racing under way.

I've also updated the charter (linked on the right somewhere) to be in line with GT6, not much has changed, other than the preposition that we'll be doing some DTM racing at some point (Fatherland cars etc).

In terms of finding rooms, make sure you tick the 'Friends rooms only' then update the list. If it's past 8:30pm I'll have a room up and running.

Hope to see you online folks, I'm looking forward to the racing this season!

Cheers
Andrew

Welcome

Top HRC460 racing last night folks. And welcome to a couple of new racers that we may see about a bit going forwards - certainly it made for some excellent races, see below...


Anyway, I'm thinking we'll have a more open league for this next season, not least as we do seem to all be busy at the moment, we'll see how we go. Thoughts so far are:

• HRC460, TC500, GT590 and 650Open will remain as 'class cars' 
• I was worried that the new GT6 pp system would render them not so nice to drive, but with a few exceptions (Evan's RUF continued to be a challenge - stick in there chap) we're all good. And there's some nice new cars in there too - just not the Trans-Am mmmkay.
• I'll run mini 2-3 evening racing seasons for various classes.
• In this I'll also bring in DTM and other class cars as we get more in-game cash.
• Plan is to have drop in and race races rather than contend with a whole season.
• Points will add up to an overall champion though - if only so we can reuse my points system!

Overall, a great night and I'm inspired for a great season's racing going forwards.

E30 Sit Rep...

Sit Rep - well, we'll find out as I now have this:

Not overly exciting to most I wager. But this collection of cables etc is in fact the business end of a diagnostic kit for my car. With this I can at least check all sensors and make sure all is working.
But also, I can reset the service interval on the car (it has one that monitors engine hours, very clever), so my car will have a little green led telling me all is well too - the dirty liar!

Jobs upcoming include the back axle/sub assembly replacement - anyone know how to install outdoor air-conditioning as it's a tad warm at the moment....

End of the holiday...

Hi Folks.

Last night of the disorganised racing tonight - I'll get the season events etc sorted for next week and we'll start some points racing around mid to late January, basically a fortnight from now.

Of course, I've been remiss in my blog updates, I blame these two:

They do take up a lot of my time it seems! (err, yeah, and the kids, those two also used up a bit of my holiday I suppose).

We'll do some in class racing tonight, so that's the HRC460, TC500, GT590 and if we've got anything fast enough 650Open. Those forgetting, the league rules are linked down on the right hand side.

And on that note, expect a major update of those rules to bring them into line with GT6.

Finally, I'll run an open room tonight for a bit too - this to see if we can drum up business. And indeed last night I had some most excellent races with some Aussie chaps last night. I even managed a win at Motegi East. The rest of the racing I was sort of in the mix but generally outclassed... about usual then.

If you three get the friend request and visit this blog, welcome, we're an easy going bunch that just enjoys organised racing.

That's all folks, let's see if we can muster up some good racing tonight.

Cheers
Andrew