Link for you RSS peeps.

Now as for the competitiveness of the 2010 Mustang, there is no actual data supporting any claims. Utecht races a 1988 Mustang in the Central Group 5 series. He is a very good driver and has been winning events (and championships in the past) and is currently in 2nd for the Central Group 5 title. Unfortunately this says nothing for the 2010 Mustang as they have completely different frames, engines, suspensions, etc…

As for Hurst, while he does work for Rally America, I have been unable to find any info on him. I still prefer the Fiesta to the Mustang in terms of a Rally platform.

Ken Block clipped the inside of a corner in practice and rolled it. His crew managed to get his car in working order for the race against Brian Deegan.

Foust is using an electro-somethingmotive sequential transmission in his Ford Fiesta rally car (hmmm, hopefully rally america starts letting this happen).

ACP succesfully landed his second jump of compeition vs Pastrana, but sadly spun at the end. Pastrana won his first race of the event. After the race there was a quick shot of Pastrana and his car being weighed on four scales (random scrutineering?).

Ken Block raced against Deegan. Ken Block tapped the rear right corner of his car against a jersey barrier and did not have enough speed to hit the jump, so he skipped it. Block DQ’d himself by skipping the jump, luckily for Deegan, who had a turbo hose pop off, essentially making his car naturally aspirated (read low power/torque).

Tanner Foust raced Kenny Brack (who beat Dave Mirra). Both fords jumped astonishingly well. Foust either pushed too hard, or was late with turning coming off of the second hairpin and overshot. This mistake cost Foust the race and Brack advanced to the Final.

Travis Pastrana lined up to race Brian Deegan. Deegan’s turbo hose couldn’t get fixed in time. Deegan’s car could not clear the jump with 1/3rd of the power, so he skipped it and was DQ’d. Deegan was shown in car so frustrated and angry to the point of crying. This is understandable considering something so simple as a turbo hose ruining your shot at an X-Games medal.

Travis Pastrana raced Kenny Brack (former Indy Racer) for the gold. Kenny Brack lost his bumper (mostly) on the first jump. Sadly, Travis Pastrana wedged himself into the trickiest corner of the race. Brack won, and this is Travis’ first loss in Rally at the XGAMES.

Kenny Brack: GOLD
Travis Pastrana: SILVER
Tanner Foust: BRONZE

Some notes: Everyone seemed to be using a sequential transmission (hooray new Rally America rules), but I’m pretty sure the Fiestas were using Electro-something sequentials, which would be hopeful for rule changes in Rally America.
These cars are much more powerful than during the normal season. The restrictor preturbo is larger in diameter, and these cars are at least doubling their power just for this event.

Link for you RSS Peeps.

It was done by the folks at Fifth Gear. While I think most of Fifth Gear is worse than Top Gear, this has got to be one of their better stunts.

Now I may have joked about backflips being done by Travis Pastrana in Rally Cars on April 1st (some of you didn’t get that it was an April Fools joke), but this could actually happen. Speed Racer here we come.

The footage from the race and the results lead me to believe it would’ve been awesome to spectate. Loeb CRASHED! Although, it was not a race ending crash, just a bad off. Still kept him off the podium but he ended up with 2 points. This lack of points dropped him into 2nd place in the overall championship standings. Loeb is right on the tails of Mikkkkkkkkko Hirvonen (only 1 point separating them).

So, some results: MIKKKKKKKKKOOOOOOO grabbed the 1st spot and earned himself 10 points. Sordo, Loeb’s teammate, stole second (and it’s 8 points) from Henning Solberg. Henning’s earning totaled 6 points  which pushed himself ahead of YANNI MATTIE (Jani Mati Latvala) for 4th place in the series. Petter Solberg, one of my favorite drivers to watch, drove his privateered Citroen Xsara to 4th place. The points for Petter tied him with YANNI MATTIE. It’s the Solbergs v Latvala for the 4th place in the Championship. Side Note: I’m biased but I’m also pretty sure Petter is the fastest driver of a Xsara ever.

With 160 points left up for grab in the last 4 races (40 max), this could shape up to be an exciting end of season. I cannot wait for Rally Finland, which is coming right at the end of this month (July 31st, 2009).

Link for you RSS Peeps.

Mark was actually a huge help through out this project. He was especially helpful with machining and cannon implementation.

For more info and video on the project visit its website:  http://www.ce.rit.edu/research/projects/2009_spring/Beirut_Bot/

Also, hell yeaaaa, 10 days to graduation. WOO.

Link for you RSS peeps.

Link for you RSS peeps. It was even Latvala’s birthday! Speaking of birthdays, today is TwoGuysRally’s first birthday! We’re one year old today (April 6th, 2009).

Travis Pastrana really is amazing when it comes to things with wheels and motors. I hope to see him start using this move in his rallies!

Uh oh, I just realized this could also spell doom for rally in America. Just like with Motocross he could be switching to the Freestyle variety. Freestyle Rally, X-Games 09 is looking like it has yet another sport to add.

Gear Change: The use of an unassisted manual sequential gear change mechanism is allowed.

Neat! You can use a sequential given that you have direct access to the mechanical selector. That is only one step away from an electro-whathaveyou sequential with paddle controls. Although you cannot control many parts electronically (yet), as seen on page 89 section 6b:

Electronic Controls: No type or form of electronic control is permitted for the following components:
i. Suspension, steering, braking, gear change/clutch, front and rear differentials.
ii. Simple engine cut operating during a mechanically activated gear change is permitted.

So you cannot control the clutch/transmission electronically yet. But you can flat shift, which means you keep your foot planted on the gas pedal during shifts and electronically cut the engine’s power. Either way, there is hope for Rally America to become the premiere rally league in the future. Not for a while though.

This is just the introduction to engines, I’ll cover the common terminology and give everyone a good starting point for understanding the finer design choices that I will cover later on.

Most automotive racing is powered by internal combustion engines. There are some variations within there to make things interesting. There are usually either two stroke or four stroke engines. I’m gonna focus on the latter, because two stroke engines are basically non-existent in rally. In four stroke engines, there are… wait for it… four strokes!

• Intake: The piston is moving downward, away from Top Dead Center (TDC) with the intake valve(s) open and the exhaust valve(s) closed. This draws in fresh air/fuel mixture to burn later.
• Compression: Intake valve closes, usually just after Bottom Dead Center (BDC), and the piston moves up to compress the air/fuel mix. Just before TDC (usually 10º-40º of crankshaft rotation), the combustion begins, either by igniting the fuel with a spark (gasoline) or injecting the fuel into the compressed air (diesel)
• Expansion: This is the stroke where the power comes from, the burning air/fuel mix generates a lot of heat and pressure that pushes the piston down, generating torque.
• Exhaust: Just before BDC, the exhaust valve opens up, and the piston moves back up to push all of the burnt gasses out of the engine. Once it reaches TDC, things start over again with the intake stroke.

The next choice is the type of fuel. Diesel engines run by compressing air a lot to generate very high temperatures, then inject the fuel, which combusts to generate pressure and heat that drives the engine. Spark ignition engines run a bunch of different fuels, usually gasoline, but can also include mixes of gasoline, ethanol, methanol, propane, compressed natural gas, and a few others. The air fuel mixture is ignited with a spark instead of relying on the sheer amount of heat in the diesel cycle.

There are also variations of the typical reciprocating piston engine, the most common being a rotary, or Wankel engine. The piston is replaced by a rotor with three faces housed inside of an oval-like housing that is technically known as an epitrochoid. Rotary engines have a very high power/displacement ratio because there are three power strokes for every revolution of the rotor, compared to the one power stroke every two revolutions of the crankshaft of a normal four stroke piston engine. However, sealing and lubricating the piston is a significant issue that hampers the reliability of this design

So now that this is out of the way, it’s time to get into the common terms used when describing or talking about engines. Let’s start at the macro level, things that everyone should be familiar with and move our way in.

Displacement: The amount of volume that all of the pistons displace in one stoke. This is dependent upon the number of cylinders, the bore and stroke.

Bore: The diameter of the cylinder when viewed from the top. The piston diameter is a small amount less than this, with rings to provide a good seal

Stroke: The distance the piston moves from TDC to BDC. This is dependent upon the crankshaft dimensions.

Compression Ratio: The ratio between the displaced volume (Vd) and the volume in the top of the cylinder (Vc) when the piston is at TDC. To calculate, CR = (Vd + Vc) / Vc.

Air/Fuel Ratio: Also known as AFR, or it’s reciprocal, FAR. Gasoline likes to burn within a specific range of ratios between the mass of air present and the mass of fuel present, typically between 8:1 to 20:1. the combustion can be considered the most “complete” when the AFR is stoichiometric (the wiki article does a better job explaining the chemistry than I ever could), 14.7:1 for pure gasoline, or ~14.2:1 for the 10% ethanol blend that almost all pump gas is now. This means that for every 14.7 kilograms of air that flows through the engine, the engine will try to supply 1 kg of gasoline. Ratios that are lower than stoich are called “rich”, and higher is “lean”. Given a constant set of parameters and optimized ignition advance, AFRs around 12.5-13 for gasoline give the most torque, because the fuel burns the fastest then.

Ignition Advance: Measured in the number of crankshaft degrees before the piston reaches TDC. Typically spark will be tuned to create maximum cylinder pressure around 14º after TDC. More advance is needed when the engine spins faster, because the burn speed of gasoline does not increase with the engine speed. However, the burn speed does increase with air density, and with AFR, with a maximum burn speed for gasoline being around 12.5-13. As such, timing is typically less advanced with more open throttle or higher boost pressure, but more advanced at higher engine speeds. Many design factors play a role in optimal ignition timing.

Volumetric Efficiency: This is essentially a measure of the amount of air that goes into a cylinder compared to how much a piston displaces. Since air is compressible, meaning the density changes with pressure, it makes more sense to think of it in terms of mass. A volumetric efficiency of 100% would imply that the mass of air that is in a piston is the same as the mass of whatever the displacement would weigh in the surrounding air. So taking the 100% efficiency example further, if it was a 4 cylinder 2.0L engine running at 100% efficiency at STP, the mass of air inside one cylinder would be equal to the density of air (1.184 kg/m³) multiplied by the volume (0.5L), the result is 0.592 grams of air. Doesn’t sound like a lot, but air is pretty light, and when you’re turning the engine at 6000 rpm, the engine is moving about 7 kg/min of air.

Mean Piston Speed: The average speed of the piston as it moves through a cycle. This is dependent upon the RPM (referred to as N in calculations) that the engine is running at and the stroke. To calculate, Sp = 2 * N * Stroke. Due to material strength and fatigue limitations, it is uncommon to see the mean piston speed exceed 25m/s or so, except in extremely high performance racing engines, like F1.

Brake Mean Effective Pressure: Commonly BMEP (or MEP when not measured at peak torque or power), this a way to measure how effective an engine is at making power in relation to it’s displacement and rpm. As a general rule of thumb, the more power you make per amount of displacement and the less rotational speed at that power level, the higher the BMEP is. Alternately, for those of you who know how torque, power and rpm relate to each other, the peak BMEP of the engine is at the peak torque of the engine. To calculate MEP, you need to know either the power and RPM, or torque, displacement, and number of strokes (2 or 4)

Calculating with power and rpm:

MEP = (P * Nr * C) / (Vd * N)

P is power, in HP or kW
Nr is the number of revolutions per power stroke, 1 for 2-stroke, or 2 for 4-stroke
C is a constant, use 396,000 for imperial (hp & ft-lbs) or 10³ for SI (kW & N-m)
Vd is displacement, cubic inches for imperial or liters for SI (61.02 CI per L if you need to convert)
N is the engine speed in RPM

Or with torque:

MEP = (T * C) / (Vd)

T is torque, ft-lbs or N-M
C is a constant, 75.4 for imperial, 6.28 for SI

Well, that’s it for the intro. I’m sure some of you have specific things that you would like me to go into detail on in this series, feel free to ask, and I’ll try my best to cover it!

Last fall, when I put the snow tires on, I tried to scrub down the inside of the wheel, and got a bunch of stuff off, but it still looked horrible:

So I made a quick run to a Pepboys down the road and picked up some Meguiar’s Hot Rim cleaning spray. It says to just spray on and rinse off. That’s a blatant lie. I effectively destroyed a sponge scrubbing all the crap off the surface. The spray really did help break down the baked on brake dust, and after rinsing everything off, that wheel now looks like this:

Much better! Not bad for about 10 minutes worth of scrubbing… hahaha. However, not perfect because quite a few of those black spots aren’t dirt, but damage to the surface of the wheel.

So why do this? Well, obviously it look nicer now. More practically, cleaning stuff off the surface prevents oxidation from occuring, and if there is too much dirt and grime, the balance of the wheel can be thrown off, requiring the wheel to be rebalanced to reduce vibration at high speeds.

In usual fashion Sebastien Loeb finished first. I don’t know how he keeps that up. Many people would lose focus after winning as much as he has. He keeps getting faster too. It really is quite amazing.

Mikko Hirvonen, Ford’s favorite for the WRC pulled out a 2nd place finish. He’s now only 8 points behind Loeb in the championship standings and with 75% of the season’s points still up for grabs he has plenty of hope to be the World Rally Champion. 

The next WRC race is April 2nd, 2009 and it is Rally Portugal. 

Picking the right angle(s) makes any footage that much better. The viewer will start to pick up on the feel of speed (matters in racing videos) and they will keep their attention focused on your video (rather than your YouTube comments).  

If you are filming racing events you are going to be limited to angles by how versatile they are. You can only put so many cameras on a car (or on a track) and editing in footage from non-race events would confuse people. If you are filming to cut pieces together for a highlight-esque reel you can get a lot more creative with your angles. First lets cover some basic effects of angles:

Basic Effects
The inside and outside of the car require different placements for the same effect, they’re essentially opposites. The higher inside the car you are, the faster it will seem, while being on top of the car will make it seem painstakingly slow. This is because you need a reference to feel speed. Inside the car, if the camera is in your lap you might have clouds or reflections off of the windows as a reference. Clouds are far from the car, making it seem slower. While if the camera (or even your eyes) were higher up and looking down onto the ground close to the car, the perceived speed increases because the speed reference is moving that much more.

Getting the camera too high outside the car results in cutting off the close speed references and again makes the viewer focus on the ones that are far away (horizon). Unless you angle the camera down and can include closer ground. 

I think of it this way: including mostly ground is like an extreme close-up, it increases the energy of the frame. Including mostly sky/non-moving parts is like a wide shot, it reduces the energy of the frame. 

Now lets cover your bread and butter angles:

Behind the Driver(s)
This is one of the more common, especially in Rally, shots to see. It includes both drivers from behind. But height placement and angle from vertical are the most important aspects of this shot. You will hardly ever see a non flat setup of this shot as it will confuse the viewer and make them feel like the car is rolling (even when it is not).

Most of the action comes from the windscreen and whatever is on the other side of it. However, the drivers do provide an acceleration reference with their heads, but that is besides the point. So getting the camera up high enough in the rear of the car is the best idea as you want to see some of the road and at least the horizon. A low shot with no horizon/ground is one of the more boring shots available. Not only can we barely see the human aspect of the racing, but there is hardly any perceivable speed.

Good example of this shot.
A great example incliding Colin McRae’s wild driving.

Cop Car Shot
The POV view, the driver/passenger view, whatever you call it, includes almost none of the interior and at least some of the car for reference. This angle is great because it lets the viewer think they are driving or a passenger. It includes a good amount of ground for speed and some of the car to remind the viewer that this was filmed in a car and not on Superman flying super-low.

This angle is subject to some problems. In bad weather much of the view can be obstructed by rain/mud/snow on the windscreen. The more centered this is in the windshield the less likely that problem is.

Example of this shot. I included too much of the interior and not enough of the outside in this shot, but it’s acceptable. The setup was largely due to the limitations of camera and camera mount. Now that I use a lipstick style camera much better shots can be setup.
Better framing of the same shot in the same car.

Facing the Driver(s)
One shot many people like to see is of the driver’s face. This even applies to full face helmets. Seeing the helmet, or the face connects the viewer with the driver. This shot is even more effective for open face helmets. It really highlights the driver’s concentration and sometimes hilarious facial responses. It can even show off the wheel work (which is plenty in most racing).

When framing people, the two thirds rule really helps. Keep their eyes about 2/3rd up in the frame. If the shot is from the side, give them what’s called lookspace. Lookspace means there is space in the frame in front of their face (to where they’re looking). It may seem obvious to put the back of their head at one end, but I’ve seen some awkward framings. A tip: don’t zoom in too much, get the bottom of the frame to include at least their shoulders or chest.

Looking up from below the people also makes people look better, to an extent. An extreme up shot would be awkward but a camera placement at around neck level or a little below aimed upwards could add some depth and perceived good feelings about the driver(s) to the shot. 

Example with lots of lookspace. It gave me enough room to fit in the pedal shot, but this is more of a “I need to talk to the viewer” shot.
Great example with some tilt. Notice the walls for a speed reference. Because of how close they get to those walls, they can use them as a speed reference. 

Creative Inside Shots
There are so many interesting shots available to you, but most of them will involve either the moving components of the car (wheels, suspension, guages, etc…) or the people and the outside world. This is where your imagination as a producer comes into play. Some ideas for some more shots inside the car are:

• Pedal Shots - get that footwork on camera.
• Out Rear Window - if you’re kicking up a lot of dust, or leading the pack this shot can be really nice.
• Guages-to-Driver - look through the steering wheel at the driver’s face. 
• Helmet Camera - Strap the camera to the driver’s helmet. It shows you exactly where the driver is looking and how their head moves. You start to notice how far through the corners the driver is looking (quite far if they’re good).

So get at it and be creative. Just go out and play! Next time we’ll cover putting the camera outside of the car, but still attached to it.

Petter Solberg had an outstanding performance for his first competition in a Citroen. He placed 6th grabbing 3 points for himself. He was squeaked out of fifth by Daniel Sordo (Citroen). Ford had a strong presence in the top eight(5 out of 8), but then again there are only two manufacturers in the competition so they should be split pretty evenly. 

 

Link for you RSS peeps.

If you haven’t seen it yet, check it out. Check out MTV or MTV2 one of these days. It is a documentary worth watching, granted most of it doesn’t have to do with his Rally career.

If you want the DVD buy it on amazon (affiliate link).

Travis Pastrana took first place in his 2009 Subaru, but worried about deer strikes through out the competition (it ended his 2008 Sno*Drift lead). ACP rallied his Mitsubishi Evo into 3rd place, although I think he should’ve done better…he’s Canadian. They get a lot of snow up there, eh (har har har I can make canned jokes about Canada. WOAH! Puns too ).

These results make me happy. They give me hope for Rally’s future. Some diversity is present in the field, unlike the Citroen v Ford WRC. I’m eager to see how this season shapes up. Next up for RA is 100 Acre Wood in Missouri. Woo!

What the hell? I know the global economy is in shambles but only two manufacturers in the premiere Rally racing league? It is good to see that Chris Atkinson tranistioned into a Citroen succesfully (and Solberg will be showing up in a Xsara in Norway), but it is sad to see such homogeneity in what used to be one of the most diverse racing leagues ever.

Maybe the P-WRC will be the league to watch for diversity’s sake. Subaru hinted that it might stick around for some P-WRC action. Redbull just confirmed a Skoda for their 2009 P-WRC team. I imagine you’ll see some Puegeot S2000s kicking around too. 

Or better yet, 2009 could be the year the US Rally viewership approaches that of Europe (we can hope).

Citroen Xsaras were fast a few years ago, and I wonder if Petter will be able to claw out a decent position in a non-factory supported car. However, for all we know he could be factory supported by Citroen, but I doubt it if he is running a Xsara. 

I’m real excited to see Petter back for another year.

The GT-R has an interesting transmission, a computer controlled dual clutch sequential. So this means that Nissan has intentionally included a feature in their car that would void the warranty when used for anything other than getting the car unstuck from mud or snow. While this can be interpreted in a lot of different ways, it brings up an interesting, although blindingly obvious point to me.

Cars break.

The real question then is why do they break? For the average person, it’s likely due to improper maintainance, or simply normal wear and tear that takes out a component that may or may not be critical to the operation of the vehicle.

However, for people like Charles and I, and most likely you as well, we drive our cars hard. We expect the engineers who designed it to allow the car to be driven at full power and aggressively by including headroom in the strength and durability of critical components. But of course, even with that, there are things that you do that wear down parts, and will eventually break them.

Luckily, things are designed so that cheaper parts that are easy to replace take the brunt of the damage, protecting the more expensive components.

Aggressive turning will wear down suspension bushings, and tires a bunch. Hard shifting is hard on the clutch and engine mounts. Rough roads are also tough on the suspension bushings, and the dampers, and sometimes rattles the interior apart.

However, it’s not too hard to exceed the limits of some of these safety components and break something more important. For example, launching the car by dumping the clutch with the engine at a high rpm is very hard on the transmission, driveshafts, differentials, axles, and related bushings. It’s not uncommon for someone to break a differential gear or axle spindle when doing hard launches like so.

Something else transmission related that is hard to avoid is synchro wear. Synchros allow you to change between gears easily, and without rev-matching. In most modern manual gearboxes, the gears are always meshed together, but spin freely on a shaft. The gear is selected by engaging a ring, which then prevents the gear from rotating, and transfers the torque into the shaft. When engaging this ring, it needs to be spinning close to the same speed as the gear, or else there will be an awesome grinding noise and you won’t be able to select the gear. It is the synchro’s job to make sure everything is spinning at the right speed. However, the synchros wear out with use. Each gear shift puts a little more wear and heat into it. If you’re using the synchros a lot to make shifts that involve large RPM changes, they overheat and warp, creating a spot that rubs more than the rest, getting hotter and wearing faster, etc. So when downshifting, try to double-clutch whenever possible to reduce wear on those synchros! I know that was an awkward and cumbersome explaination, so I’m sorry, I’ll make a dedicated transmission post someday to explain it in more detail. However, we have made a video a while back on how to double-clutch if you’re not familiar with it:

In addition to that, there are plenty of other things. Keep the interior and exterior clean to avoid rust and damage to the finish. Don’t run into stationary solid objects. All those things that you generally can’t avoid when rallying, hahaha.

Camera Settings
When I refer to the camera I’m talking about a video camera, whether it is a camcorder, helmet camera, point and shoot digital camera in video mode or even a high end film camera. Our videos have been shot with a Canon Elura100 (camcorder) and a VIO POV.1 (helmet camera). We have used point and shoot cameras for pedal shots before we had the helmet camera but we were always disappointed with the quality.

Most cameras will have options either buried in software menus or are controlled by physical things (buttons, dials, rings). The most important one for driving is focus, specifically auto-focus. Turn off auto-focus. Since most of the shots you setup in a car are going to be static shots (the camera stays still in relation to the car) you just have to setup the focus of the camera once before you drive. With auto-focus on you can get all sorts of annoying focal length changes that may distract/annoy viewers. This gives you a chance to learn how to set focus on your camera too, which you must do if you turn auto-focus off.

Zoom out as far as you can. Zooming in multiplies the visual effect vibration of the camera has on the video.  Couple that with any camera that has digital zoom, in effect, lowers the quality/resolution of the video and you end up with some terrible looking video. You can always digitally zoom in later during editing.

Some cameras also have vibration compensation. Some do this really well, but most don’t. This is now in the realm of getting to know your camera, and the only way to know it is to use it. So here it is up to you, but try out both on and off and see which you prefer visually. For securely fastened cameras on stable mounts, vibration reduction usually does not help.

Mounting the Camera
Mounting the camera inside a car is a bit tricky. Most decent solutions will cost money. I forked over some dough for a Sticky Pod mounting system back when I bought the Elura. I am glad I did too, it has been more used than I thought it would be. I use the extra suction cup it came with to mount my helmet camera to the car. The full mounting system is still used for the Elura and has been used to make every single non-helmet cam video we’ve made (barring how to install vinyl stickers).  There is a downside to the suction cup style mounts: you have to have smooth surfaces like glass in and around the car.

However there are DIY mounting solutions far from the simplicity of duct tape. Threads all over the internet have talked about how to make a DIY headrest mount (fits on your head rest poles and is secured by the headrest). These provide 1 or 2 shooting positions but provide a “Driver’s View” for your video. These are also usually more secure than a suction cup mount.

If you’re filming with a full on race car I’ll assume you can make a mount that fits on your rollcage. Tube frames provide great mounting points using zip ties/clamps. Helmet cameras (lipstick cams) work great for tube frame mounts. This will let you get great shots of everything in the car including pedals, driver+dash, inside looking out shots, faces of the driver(s), etc… 

Sound Considerations 
On camcorders or any tape based camera there are spring loaded heads in there. Cars have a tendency to vibrate and those vibrations are passed through the mount to the camera. The big problem happens when your microphone is in the same area as the heads (such as with the Elura). The microphone picks up the vibration of the heads and any loose items in the camera, so consider picking up an external mic (example at amazon). I have, but before I did driving videos sounded terrible. Here is an example of the rattling:

Placing the microphone in different spots also gets you different sounds. With an external mic you can put it inside engine bays, near exhausts, near a window crack (so you get a wind buffeting sound for “speed”), etc… I’ve done it as an experiment inside the WRX’s intake and it ended up sounding pretty sweet. Here is that example:

So go grab your video camera and start playing! Make sure to focus on driving while driving and not the camera. You dont want to record a silly accident (but if you’re in one hope you’re recording).

That’s it for this entry into How To Film Your Driving. Next time we’ll talk about angles and and their effects. 

A few days ago I decided to spray my rear right wheel well with PAM (the oh so famous spray on oil). So far that wheel well has been accumulating much less snow than the other wheel wells (I also didn’t spray that well), so the initial trial seems promising. So over the next few weeks as it snows and I go and play in said snow I’ll be testing out various chemicals to prevent buildup. 

Before I get started officially, I was wondering if you had any ideas as to what else would work? I’m looking for cheap/elegant solutions.

So far:

• PAM/Spray on cooking oil
• Rain-X (usually for your windshields) 

I know many of you guys realize my love for all things Volvo at this point, but this is something pretty interesting to me, and is proof that you can turn almost anything into a race car if you want to. I happened to find out that a team, K-PAX/3R Racing, is entering into the SCCA World Championship with two Volvo S60s.

This news is pretty contrary to me, with major teams pulling out of racing left and right. For a while, the future of automotive racing was looking pretty bleak to me. But this reminded me of something that we said a while ago: Smaller teams stand a chance of doing really well, since it seems that many of the top competing teams are taking a leave of absense. This announcement is proof of that. Who would think the epitome of safety and (maybe undeserved from my perspective) sluggishness would find it’s way to the track in racing form?

So to all of you smaller teams out there: Pull through! The future of rally racing may rest on your shoulders at this point, and it is your time to show everyone what you are capable of.

Drive like a grandma - Full throttle isn’t a great idea for a few a reaons. First it should be avoided until the car’s oil and water is up to normal operating temperatures (it will get there) as wear is increased. Second, the colder the weather the worse the traction. Rubber gets brittle(r) and grips thing worse, not to mention ice and snow. That means stopping distances are increased and turns cannot be taken as fast. Bonus for driving like a grandma: better gas mileage. Because of my shenanigans in the snow my gas mileage for that week was about 13mpg (well below my 30mpg highway and 22 or so city).

Expect the worst - in traction at least. Just the other day I was turning left from a stop and WEEEEEEEEEEE, the car suddenly loses the back end. Ice was in the middle of an intersection. Sometimes you cannot see ice/sand/marbles/oil slicks from james bond/etc… so expect the worst for traction. 

Remove Ice and Snow buildup - I cringe everytime i see people with huge sheets of snow on the roof of their car driving around. Not only have I been hit by chunks of snowice when driving behind someone (they suddenly go air born at 40-50mph), but if they slam on their brakes what is to stop all that from coming right down onto their windshield. My rule of thumb is just that, more than a thumb width on the top and I remove it. Brooms are really useful for the removal process, especially on a miniva… *ahem* tow vehicle.

So driving like a grandmother really does sum it up. Be nicer to your car while it warms up, it’ll repay you with many many more miles of like-new driving. Also be careful out there, statistically speaking if you’re between age 15 and 24 cars and other motor vehicles are the biggest risk of death. 

Side note: if you’re between 25-44 AIDS, cancer and heart disease beat out car accidents (1996). 
Side note2: watch out for your ‘friends’ and window strength. 

The first of those is about something called “Trim”. I have seen this used time and time again as a size descriptor for a certain turbo. It is not! A single turbo has two trims, one for the compressor wheel and one for the turbine wheel. Usually it is used in reference to the compressor.

So what is trim? Well, if you have read part two, you may recall that it is a ratio between the inducer diameter and the exducer diameter, Inducer²/Exducer² to be specific. Now, take note of that. It is just a ratio, nothing more. Yes, it does change the flow characteristics of the turbo a bit, but it has no bearing on the overall flow capabilities of the turbo, nor it’s size.

With that off of my chest, there is one other insane issue that I see crop up from time to time. Compressor wheel upgrades. It is often viewed as a cost effective upgarde to rebuild an engine’s stock turbo with a larger compressor wheel, without changing the turbine side at all. In some cases, this is actually a good idea.

However, in the vast majority, the stock turbo has a smallish turbine side to produce boost lower in the RPM band. When an even larger compressor is hooked up to that turbine, some not so good things can happen. First and foremost is compressor surge. The turbine has the potential to spin the compressor too fast and generate more boost than the compressor is capable of handling at that airflow, which leads to surge, which is extremely bad for the turbine.

The second is something that I mentioned in part four: Exhaust backpressure. A smaller turbine will result in higher backpressure, reducing the overall efficiency of the engine, and increasing exhaust gas temperatures. In other words, the engine’s power is reduced somewhat because it has more trouble flowing air, and is more susceptible to damage due to the higher temperatures.

Moral of the story: Before upgrading a turbo, make sure that both sides complement each other well. Flow capabilities should be similar on both sides.

In contrast with Subaru leaving the WRC, American leagues (NASA and RA) will still feature Subarus as their most common race car (and possibly still their winningest).  With DIRT’s possible new entries into the sport such as their ProjectRS you’ll have plenty of new Subarus in NASA. 

Fans of Petter Solberg will hopefully be able to watch his driving, albeit in most-likely a non Subaru as he is now a free agent. Rally Norway has even extended its entry deadline for Petter until January 13th.  

Rally America is still expected to have its big names return: Travis Pastrana, Ken Block, Andrew Comrie-Picard and the not so well known Kyle Sarasin. So there will be plenty of competition to watch. Infact, with such big names dropping out of the WRC, Rally America could gain in popularity (world wide even).

2009 is set to be an exciting year. Do any of you have big rally plans this year?

To fix this, I got a solid polyurethane upper mount from iPd to replace the hard rubber OEM piece:

As you can see, the Volvo part looks somewhat abused… it was originally a one piece design! Installation was pretty simple, I only needed 13mm and 15mm wrenches, along with a hacksaw and screwdriver to cut out the retaining ring on the old mount (the alternative was a bushing press to push it out of the mount, something I don’t have).

Before and after shots of the engine mount in question:

After installation, I took the car out for a test drive. One thing that I found a lot of complaints about was the increase in cabin noise and vibration. Granted, I am hard of hearing, but I honestly can’t see why someone would complain about the nice growl that is added upon acceleration.

However, the noise was the second most noticable difference, right after the feel when shifting. The actual shift engagement feel did not change, but rather the way the power is transferred to the ground when the clutch is released. In comparison to before, it feels much more solid, and throttle response is slightly better.

Those are really the only two things I noticed. No changes in handling through turns, which makes sense because that mount is designed to not support any load from the sides.

The moral of this story would be to make sure you stay on top of any bushings, especially on car that is exposed to racing conditions. The higher road speed, bumps, acceleration, braking, hard shifts, etc, all wear down the bushings that much faster, and introduce slop into components that usually do best without any.

Hopefully you’re enjoying your new year! We all at TwoGuysRally are. It is going to be a good year. I know it because I just got a Helmet camera and that will enable some new camera angles for TwoGuysRally videos. Expect good things for the future.

I hope you all are making the best of your new years like I am: hot tub, champagne and fun!

I had the unfortunate experience of witnessing the effect of a drunk driver on a stop light post right by my home. At first I heard what reminded me of clanging I-beams, then I drove around the corner and saw an econoline style van in a ditch (with significant dent/hole in its front) with a stop light attached to the side of it. So I did what any good Samaritan would do: I stopped and got out to see if everyone was okay.

Everyone was a man who stumbled up the hill/ditch on the driver’s side of the van. He was an older male with a moustache, some balding and lots of slurring (and not of the head injury variety). He said he was okay and no one else was in the car. He also asked me for a ride home (which I refused, of course). Boy was he drunk, or at least seemed it, because he fell away from my car when i locked the doors and dialed 911. Apparently he though it was a good idea to run up the street away from the accident while I was on the phone with the cops. They caught him just up the street after I gave a description to them (by the way eye witness reports suck, I claimed he had a Tan Jacket, but it was blue, however his pants were tan/khaki so that must be where I got confused)

At first I felt bad for the dude on what a shitstorm he got himself into, but then I realized: his van travelled across the point where I yield for traffic on that road and I would have yielded to that very van because of the direction he was travelling (and he only got there a minute or so before me). That would have ruined my night and car (and possibly life), so I didn’t feel bad at all about IDing the guy after they arrested him.

One interesting tidbit I learned that night: cop cars have TERRIBLE traction in the rain. Terrible. When I was in the cop car to drive by to where they arrested him in order to ID him, the officer lost traction right away and slid a bit. But it wasn’t only that cop that lost traction, every single cop that went around that corner did. I could totally out accelerate the cop car in the rain in my stock WRX. NEAT! (Observation: the cops may just be doing that for fun, since I bet they get bored just driving around all night.)

Anyway, what this reminded me of was how stupid it is to get behind the wheel of a car drunk. You already are in the, statistically speaking, most dangerous common situation. Adding alcohol will only make it even more so. So be safe out there when driving, especially around last call.

Last Minute Gift Ideas: RainX/IceX washer fluid. It’s good until 0 Farenheit. I could have used that on my drive back home as my washer fluid froze for the two hours the trip was below 10 degrees. Plus the rainx solution has some sort of lipid in it (wax) that makes water bead up on the windsheild.

Another idea is a Seat Belt Cutter / Window Breaker. Sometimes seat belt buckles get stuck and doors won’t open. It’s cheap and easy and may come in handy (hopefully not necessary).

Happy Holidays! Have a great time, I know I am.

Brakes are nice but if your car is oversteering hitting the brakes will most likely bring your car into a full spin (weight transfers to front wheels). Keeping on the gas will cause your car to straighten, as the weight transfers from the front to the back wheels. This of course assumes your front wheels are pointed where you want to go.

I’ve seen a few people in the past week slide unexpectedly and continue going in a straight line, only to hit the brakes (instinctual, I empathize) and go off the road. If only they calmly pressed on the gas a bit and steered where they wanted to go.

There is an exception: really powerful cars that are RWD/AWD. Really powerful cars have the tendency to lose traction in the loose stuff because of the right most pedal. However, coming off of the gas completely will cause more harm than good stability-wise, so you should learn to left foot brake. But that’s for another post. Good luck out there and keep safe.

But Subaru isn’t the only casualty, Suzuki withdrew from WRC also. Although for them it may have just been too big of an expense for too little of a return. However other leagues aren’t immune from this economic recession. Honda recently announced their withdrawal from Formula 1 AND the AMA(motorcylce racing). Porsche and Audi both widthrew from the American Le Mans Series.

While all this is sad and upsetting to the world of motorsports, there is a silver lining: it gives the amateurs a chance. While it may seem like amateurs and privateers get struck even harder by the recession, but their income is a little more stable than the advertising budgets of the factory teams. So there is hope for us all yet! It may just be a big enough shake up to make your way into the sport.

Do you know of any other teams/pillars of the sport that have been eaten by this economic recession?

The Prize? To compete in a NASA Rally Race with a fully prepped car and team, plus free instruction. That’s pretty appealing and makes me want to go.

Unfortunately the $350 + fare totals about $800+ for round 1.  Since round 2 is at a different date I would expect to plunk down another $800+. To get to the finals is about $400-500 for each round (even though they are free). That total is, conservatively, $2800. Sadly that is cost prohibitive for me (also it interferes with something more money is spent on: University). So maybe I’ll hear about you winning the competition, or at least participating. Either way it is a great deal if you make it to round 4.

Remember be safe and keep warm! I’m so excited for the upcoming winter (it’s still technically fall!).

I saw it with Mark when it came to select theaters for one day only. It just happened to come to the theater nearest us, so that was convenient. However I was sick and popping Pseudoephedrine like there was no tomorrow, so I ought to see it again. But from what I remember it was really fun to watch, regardless of sinus pain.

If you really have no idea what 199 Lives is or who Travis Pastrana is here is a trailer:

Link for you RSS Peeps.

Thanks to Patrick for the heads up on the release date! Oh and it really did take forever for it to come out on DVD didn’t it? (~6 Months).

Now why do I bring up something that has to do with F1? The FIA is also the governing body of the most watched Rally series: the WRC. This concerns me a bit, as the FIA is considering a very similar thing for Rally (super 2000 ruleset). Sure it makes it cheaper and all that, but the WRC and F1 are the premiere competition platforms for their styles of racing. They’re going to be hugely expensive, but think about the trickle-down (technology wise) that occurs. While I may be preaching to the choir, the WRX would be no where near what it is now or not even exist (STI especially). The Ferrari Enzo would not exist if it were not for F1 trickle down. Infact, Quattro would not exist if it weren’t for Rally (nor would most of the awesome AWD systems out there).

Barring supercars and budget ‘performance’ cars, F1 has advanced the software world! The driver’s practice on “almost” perfect simulators developed by their respective teams, that contain track surface data within +/-2mm of actual. Hell, they even use the internet to reduce the massive number of people they have to ship around the world. Check out some more technology trickle down that gets pushed by F1.

Either way, the FIA is maybe messing with a decent working formula and I hope they don’t push standard engines/transmissions too much in both F1 and the WRC. Technology freezes remind me too much of NASCAR (while sure they have some advacement, Carbs are a thing of the past and are sharing less and less in common with most street cars daily), and I really do not want Rally to be like NASCAR. Let’s hope for the best.

The “big” news regarding Rally GB is that Loeb finally won the Rally. While Loeb winning may not be that surprising, he has never won Rally GB before. I guess congrats are in order for Loeb. All of his winning makes me wonder: How does Loeb perceive a win? Is it as exciting/relieving as it used to be? Or does he just have to win in order to be happy with his performance? Hrmm…

Anyhoo, Valentino Rossi made it through the rally but didn’t score any points. Oh well! There’s always next season for the Doctor.

I Love YouTube:

Link for you RSS Peeps. Unfortunately the sound sucks on this video. Oh well.

Link for you RSS peeps.

What I really like about a BMW as a rally car is that it is different. I like to see cars other than the standard WRX/EVO/Focus/etc… I dont particularly like Saabs, but it is neat to see them out in a Rally. The 911 Rally car was also another neat sight. So that brings up the question, what is the weirdest/most unusual car you have seen compete in a rally?

Oh and to anyone who thinks BMWs only raced on tarmac, here is a link proving otherwise, although it is a different team and slower. Still, its an E30 in dirt/gravel/snow. Mmmmm.

Really? Loeb drives a Mitsubishi as a recce car? That seems weird considering a factory team could probably afford their own car as a recce car. I wonder why they do that. If you know why please enlighten me in comments or an email.

Anyhoo, regardless of troubles for the recce, the weather could be treacherous as temperatures are hovering around freezing (1 to 2 celcius lows predicted). Friday it is supposed to rain, which if the weather takes a turn for the worse it could be snow. Although Weather.com predicts that by Sunday everything will be clear and, at least, warmer than freezing. I don’t recall when it has snowed during Rally GB and that would sure be a neat sight (fingers crossed).

I’m quite excited to see the highlights from this rally, even though Loeb has secured the championship. The fight for the podium is still on, but most likely Sordo will secure 3rd (if he gets 2+ points). Latvala or Atkinson could prove to upset Sordo (especially if Sordo has an off or three) and steal the podium iff they steal the event’s first spot.

On one hand snow tires offer a perception of safety in the snow (I’m told it snows a lot here in Rochester but I do not agree with that statement). On the other, I’ve gotten along just fine without snow tires (All seasons) and had a ton of fun doing it. 

I do not need them for accelerating (AWD helps a lot in that regard) but I could benefit a ton in terms of Braking and steering. So should I stick with my all seasons (that worked wonderfully last winter) and experience with them or should I invest a few hundred dollars for snow tires (and probably wheels as snow tires for my wheels are a bit pricy)? What do you do?

Do you turn tricks? Do you develop software? Do you work at Starbucks? Are you a trustfund baby? Do you harvest organs from orphans and sell them on the black market?

If you’re curious about what I do: I am not completely independent as school is quite pricy. But I am trying to break free(and pay for a race car) by writing software for primarily the iPhone/iPod Touch (but contracts for other systems happen too). 

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!! Drive safe and eat yourself stupid.

Link to the video for you RSS peeps.

One reason he was so awesome, he drove mostly one handed for the beginning of his career. Tell me some more reasons in the comments below.

Now, having spent some time on this quaint little planet, I feel as though I must inform you of what you lot have and mostly do not have with regards to this fascination you possess with “cars.” First, I pity you all, for your underpowered engines and heavy curb weights. To convert the power generated by my almost mythologically charged engine in your meek “horsepower,” I would have to append the prefix Giga to it. Oh, you say, awed but misunderstanding the fantastic power of my machine, how can you get all that to the ground? “To the ground?” I respond, chortling. “To the ground?” No, my throbbing, humming automotive marvel literally rips THROUGH the ground, destroying both track and competitors in the process of rocketing forward to victory and the adulation of the entire citizenry of my much larger, better planet.

Now, one thing you have going for you is this method of racing called “rally racing.” I see the redneck gleam of unrecognition in your eye, and I know that this is probably a good thing because you would sully the automotive racing spirit with your drunken antics. No, citizens of this infant civilization, rally racing brings to my multitudinal eyes the recognition of the true sportsman’s spirit that I, in my status as racing Godhead, long since ceased to feel. Yes, for little renown and much danger to themselves, your human racers push forward focusing on skill as much as speed and the excitement of doing something just so in that reach for the quintessence of the race. And, while yes, while my titanic skill dwarfs those of your petty heroes, I feel a kinship towards those that fight the racing fight.

So, you, who read this on your machines that laughably are not implanted into your heads at birth, go forth and proselytize for this sport! And revel and enjoy this sport as seems so necessary, for until your primitive racing gets closer to that of my home planet, this is the best you will do. And beware, humans who live between Chicago and San Francisco: Please get out of the way, because I need to get my machine up to speed in order to get back home to my larger, better planet.

About the Author: Dan Summers is a Mechanical Engineering student at RIT. He doesn’t take any drugs…as far as I know. He has guest posted here before with the Layman’s Guide to Rally Racing and he will probably continue with the guest posts in the future.

I would advise everyone who goes to view the video on youtube to take note of the comment, while the experiments are unbiased, the interpretation of results are quite the opposite. Even so, it is fascinating to see how different manufacturers’ implementation of putting power down to all four wheels compares in a synthetic and repeatable test like this.

AWD has always been a tricky situation to deal with. When all four wheels have similar levels of traction, things are easy, and open differentials will handle the job fine and split the torque evenly between all the wheels. But what happens when one or more wheels breaks loose? In an open differential system, all four wheels receive the same amount of torque, which will be equal to the amount of torque the spinning wheel can put to the ground (aka: not much).

The simplest way around this is to just lock the differentials when slippage is detected. This will provide the maximum amount of traction because all the wheels will be forced to spin at the same speed, but this reduces drivability a bunch if you’re trying to turn at all, since the inner tires spin slower than the outer tires in a turn, and the rear spin slightly slower ontop of that.

There are many (enough that I’d rather not take the time to list them all, since I’m sure I’d miss a few) limited slip differential technologies that bias the torque away from the spinning wheel(s) to put the power down to wheels that have traction. This is usually done with some sort of fancy gearing or internal clutches in the differetial. Most AWD systems use limited slip differentials with varying levels of success. As you can see from the video, Subaru has one of the better limited slip systems out there. I really would have liked to see how an Audi with Quattro performed in the same test, but oh well.

There is also what I consider a “lazy-man’s” limited slip system that applies brake pressure to the spinning wheels to increase the amount of torque at that wheel, thus the other wheels too. This is the method of “traction control” my S70 has. I put quotes around traction control because it requires a very responsive system for it to really be of any benefit outside of driving slowly slippery surfaces, something Volvo didn’t quite account for in the design.

Or you can just forgo driving the car with the wheels and use a giant turbine or something, but I don’t think many rally organizations allow propulsion in such a manner.