HINTS, TRICKS AND COMMON SENSE FOR THE NEW F500 RACER

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HINTS, TRICKS AND COMMON SENSE FOR THE NEW F500 RACER
by Richard Schmidt

The number one rule is NEVER start your engine with the rear wheels on the ground unless there is someone in the drivers seat to control the car.

If you paddock on grass or gravel, put down a tarp or plastic cover over the grass in the area where you will park your car to work on. If you don't, just dropping that special size nut or bolt down into the grass could ruin your day as you look for hours just to find it. Also the plastic will keep any fluids from killing the grass.

I used a sheet of black plastic cut to about 8 ft wide and 12 ft long. Get some long nails and large fender washers that have the center hole small enough so that the nail head will not go through it. I used about 10 nails. Before putting the plastic down, do a little clean up of the area that will be under the plastic. Get out any larger rocks or tree branches that will be hard on your knees later.

Fold the plastic under itself about 3 inches along the edges. Place the nail/washers around the perimeter of the plastic to keep it in place and also to hold the plastic down so you and your crew members/family will not be tripping on the edge of the plastic.

I always brought along some old small rugs that I used to kneel down on when working on the car. I never had one of those car lifts. They can be a back saver. If you can afford it and have room in your trailer, then get one.

One word of caution, as the race weekend approaches, and your group is later on Sunday afternoon, DO NOT drive around in the paddock area in places that there used to be other racers. Always stick to the access roads that were used when the paddock was full. Not all racers clean up their space before they leave. I found this out the hard way as I drove just haphazardly across the vacant paddock spaces, back to my paddock space, I picked up a puncture on one of my tires from a discarded safety wire. As I did not have spare tires at this time and I did not have a tire plug tool, I had to go home early and miss the last race. Get a tire plug tool, it can save your weekend.

I made my own quick lift to get the car up about 6 inches so we could place a block under the engine and front end. I got a two wheel dolly from the local Home Depot and just use that to lift the car.

NEVER just finger tighten a nut or bolt. If you do and later forget to tighten it, it could be the cause of your shortened session. If you do not want to tighten it at the time, then just leave it off. When you do a walk around the car when you think you're ready for the track, you will see the missing bolt or nut. If you are lucky enough to have crew, explain this rule to them, very important.

Now I know a lot of guys will want to use some sort of colored marking on their nuts and bolts so that they can do a quick check visually to see if anything has worked loose. Personally, I have never seen a nylock nut come loose so I never practiced that routine.

CHECK LIST
Create a check list for packing up for your trip to the race track. Put everything on the list that you could possibly ever need while at the track and that you have space for and your trailer can handle the weight. I'm talking about things that seem insignificant at the time, but may become very important at the track. Like that big socket for getting the clutch off of the engine, or the tire pressure gauge. I always had my number one crew chief and companion Sharon help me with this. I would categorize each major item and then have the individual items in that major item listed and as she called out the items, I would verify that the item was indeed there.

Here is an example, Major item, SPARE PARTS TOOL BOX, items in box, fuel pump, check, spare fuel lines, check, clutch weights - 50 grams, check, etc.

I never had a check list for going onto the track. Just did a visual, tire lug nuts tight, tires set to pressure, filled with fuel, body panels secure, etc.

YOUR TRAILER
If you have an open trailer, there are somethings you want to secure in a locked space. Souvenir seekers will take stuff that are important to you, like the steering wheel and the master shut off red lever.

SPARE PARTS THAT YOU SHOULD ALWAYS HAVE
Spare engine, extra set of tires, rain tires
Some will say that they cannot afford a spare engine. Well one weekend ending early on Saturday morning because your engine went south, saved by having a spare engine ready to drop in will save you more than what the engine cost, when you consider travel time/money, hotel room and food cost, and entry fee spent for nothing.

DRIVER AND CREW COMFORT
Don't underestimate the affect of sun and heat on you and your crew. An uncomfortable crew is an unhappy crew. An exhausted driver is a slow driver. Get a canopy. Something that is large enough to cover the entire car and then some. I had a 12 X 20 canopy. It is a great provider of shade. If you keep your crew members happy, they will want to come with you to the next race.

TIRE PRESSURE
This topic is filled with opinions. That's OK, I'm just going to point out some things that can affect the pressure you see on your gauge. Get a tire pressure gauge that has a low pressure scale. You don't need a 60 lb tire pressure gauge to measure a 12 lb tire pressure.

One - In order to accurately set your tire pressure from race to race and track to track you need to have the tires under the same condition each time you set the pressure. As you cannot control the sky, for example, sunny or cloudy, you must do what you can to control, and that is whether the sun is shining on your tires before you set your pressure. You should always strive to keep your tires out of the direct sun. If you have a canopy, move the car so that all the tires are in the shade. If you don't have a canopy, cover the tires with a white or light colored cloth. Direct sun on the tire will cause the tire to increase in temp and thus change the pressure inside. I have measured the temp of the tire exposed to direct sunlight at 120 degs. Almost as hot as your tire will see under racing conditions.

Two - Always use the same tire pressure gauge. Tire pressure gauges are notoriously inaccurate, but that is not that important, what is important is that you use the same gauge and you will soon find the pressure that works for you. Another thing to consider in a pressure gauge is it's ability to repeat the reading. Take your pressure gauge and take several readings from the same tire. If the gauge does not repeat within one pound, get a different gauge.

TIRE SURFACE TEMP
Get a tire temp probe. You cannot understand what your adjustments to the suspension and tire pressure without one. There is a lot of misinformation about taking tire temps out there. You CAN NOT take your tire temp measurements after you get back to your paddock space. You MUST do that in the pit area after a hot lap. It is best to have two people do this, one to take the readings and the other to write down the numbers. There are tire temp probes that have memory, so that can take the place of the second person. I was never able to find a good description of how to take the measurements, but this is what I have learned. Always start on the same edge of the tire, just to be consistent. I always started on the outside edge and then worked in toward the inside edge. DO NOT stick the probe straight into the tire, you could cause a leak. Push the probe into the tire surface at a 45 deg angle. At first, as the probe is cold, you must not take the first reading. Pull out the probe and then do it again. Then note the highest reading you get, then move to the middle of the tire and take a measurement. You should not have to repeat the multiple probes like you did at first. Just note the highest temp and then move on to the inside temp.

Keep in mind that the last turn before entering the pit will affect the temp of the tires. If the last turn before the pit is a right turn, then expect to see higher temps on the left side tires.

One thing I have noticed about the temps on the rear tires, the temp is always, well almost always, hotter on the inside edge. I do not have an explanation for this. Some people say that it is because of the brake heating that tire up on the inside, but that does not explain the other side that does not have a brake heating up the tire. At the time I was racing, we were using smaller diameter axles. It could be that the axles were bending and thus giving us more negative camber on the rear wheels ?

RACE FUEL
ALWAYS buy your race fuel at the track. Make sure that you are buying the correct fuel. If you are unsure of what fuel to buy, ask the race steward for help. I almost had a race victory taken away from me because, while I did buy the fuel at the track, I bought the wrong fuel for our class. Don't make that mistake. Typically the SCCA will not test your fuel at regional races, however, if you buy off-track pump gas, you just don't know what you are getting and it may affect your jetting.

If your race is on a hot day, in the 90's, here is a trick that is not new, but not talked about much. Get a large plastic trash bag, put your 5 gallon gas can in it and then put ice all around the can. Cold fuel has two advantages, One - it's denser and thus you can get a little more fuel in your cars fuel tank. Some fuel tanks are marginal in capacity for a 40 minute race. Two - cold race fuel gives you better engine performance. You should put the fuel can on ice for at least an hour before your race time. Then shortly before you are scheduled to go on track, put the cold fuel in your cars fuel tank.


FUEL LOADS AND QUALIFYING AND RACING
If you are at a track that you have little or no experience on, then you should take advantage of all the track time that you can. This means that you will want to fill the fuel tank on your car to the top so that you don't run out of fuel while practicing. However during your qualifying session, DO NOT fill the fuel tank full. Gas weighs about 6 lbs per gallon. If you fill your 6 gallon tank for the qualifying session, you are carrying around 36 extra pounds that will slow you down.

The 494 Rotax engine that I ran burned about 1 gallon for every 10 miles, your mileage may very ! Laps completed per gallon of fuel will depend on the track length. Road America (RA) is 4 miles per lap. Unless you are doing something wrong, you should not need to do more than 4 laps for qualifying. So at RA, that will be 16 miles, using 10miles/gallon, two gallons would be sufficient. Obviously you will want a little safety amount for you session, so 3 gallons will do just fine.

Keep in mind that you are suppose to be having fun. If you can have your significant other and family come to the track with you, your race weekend will seem like a camp out with lots of noisy cars. Sometimes finding crew help can be a problem. I found several people from my work who were interested in engines and racing, so that was a big help. Offer to pay for their entrance to the track and let them know if on-track camping is OK.

YOUR PADDOCK LOCATION
Your paddock location is important. Why you might ask, read on. I just recently saw a video of a F600 racer drive his race car from his paddock location to the false grid. He must have been a half mile away from the false grid. In the video, you can see him driving towards the grid over some parts of the road that are not paved. By the time he got to the grid, his tires were full of small rocks and covered with sand and dirt. To top off this poor situation, the driver, once entering the track did NOT understand the reason for the other drivers to be swerving back and forth on the track.

I strongly recommend finding a paddock location that is close to the grid area and preferably on paved or concrete surface. This will go a long way in helping the driver clear off the crap from the paddock area once he or she gets onto the track

And yes, swerving back and forth during the warm up lap will help clear off the crap form your tires and even get some heat into them. Just don’t get carried away with it. One day while I was crewing for a FF driver, he was doing the swerving on the strait and spun out, yes spun out on the warm up lap. Talk about embarrassed!


WARM UP AND COOL DOWN LAP
When I first started racing, I thought nothing of driving all over the track on my warm up and cool down laps. However, I did notice that there was always a lot of old rubber on the tires the next time I went out on the track. It would take 2 to 3 laps before I could get any grip out of the tires. Then one day, I finally realized that driving haphazardly around the track during the warm up/cool down laps was the problem. I was picking up old rubber from the track and putting it on my tires.

On your warm up/cool down laps, NEVER drive off the normal racing line, especially in the corners. As you may have noticed, the scrubbed off rubber from the tires accumulates on the outside of the turns, don’t drive there. On the straits between the corners, yes you can drive from side to side if you want.

Now if you are going to never use these tires again for racing, then it doesn’t matter.


For beginning racers, I recommend this book, Winning by George Anderson. It is a little dated and does not have much on the F440/F500 cars, but a lot of it is still valid for everyone.