I rode in a friend’s Ferrari (1978 308) recently and while I love how it sounds… I often can not get enough of the turbocharged sound. So if you love the sound of turbochargers doing work here you go:
Link for you RSS peeps.
It may be an older video of ours, but I love it and cannot get enough.
Update: Apparently I decided to post this exactly two years after uploading it to YouTube. Odd.
Either I was horrible at finding awesome Rally blogs before we started TwoGuysRally or I am finding more solely because people now tell me about Rally blogs. Either way it is a good thing for all of us:
Last Ditch Racing - While I knew about their YouTube channel, I must have missed their blog. Either way these guys are doing exactly what Mark and I want to do: Rally and tell people interesting things about it. Check that blog out. Thanks for the heads up on this one Aaron.
Alba Rallysport - These guys are regulars on DirtyImpreza and that is how I found out about them. They provide some good articles but it is more related to news and how they are doing/what they are going to be doing. Interesting stuff anyway, although I wish they would update more often (but I get it, posting regularly is tough, just see my last Friday’s post).
321 Go Video - While not really a blog, they do provide some good coverage for Rally Stuff and apparently they have their own team. Although I do not know a ton about them as I am somewhat lazy and they do not publicly write about themselves. However, they do provide some well produced videos in high quality.
Anyway those are the ones that I’ve found/been brought to my attention recently. If you know of any more please please let me know. Either in the comments below or shoot us an email.
Watch this and look at how thin the tires/wheels are. Link for RSS.
In most cases the wider the tire the more traction is achievable. However in really snowy enviroments (ie Rally Sweden) thin tires can get more traction than wide ones. How? This works because the thin tire is putting a much higher pressure (PSI) onto the snow surface compared to the wide tire. This makes the snow compress and the tire/wheel sink down into the snow. Wouldn’t this just slow you down? Going straight…sure, but the problem in snow is stopping and turning, not going fast in a straight line. Snow builds up around the outside of the wheel and infront of it, so when the car needs to corner/stop it pushes against the snow. This increases the possible traction. This is the same concept as using ruts in motocross or with your car in mud. You can apply much greater cornering forces without losing traction.
There is yet another reason they use thin snow tires. The snowy rallies in the WRC are in areas that also develop a nice layer of ice under the snow. They use this ice to increase traction, mostly for straight line acceleration, and when I use acceleration that means in both directions (hint braking and throttle+). They use the ice by putting metal studs into the tire. The studs work just like cleats for grass sports. They dig into the ice (again because there is a ton of pressure applied to them thanks to the mass of the car) and allow force to be transmitted through them. But in order for the studs to get close to the ice the tire has to dig through the snow, and so that’s yet another reason thin snow tires are used in the WRC.
Yes.
You may have noticed that the co-driver can barely see above the dashboard. No… co-drivers are not like horse racing jockeys, they are average when it comes to height. What makes them look like children is the seat height.
Co-driver seats (to an extent Driver seats too) are much lower in the car than your standard seat. That is because the engineers are trying to bring the center of gravity(CG) closer to the wheel hub height for more predictable handling. Higher centers of gravity accentuate ‘weight transfer’ in the car and that can make a car way more dangerous than it should be.
This is why all the components that are high up, like the steering wheel, tend to be made of materials like carbon fiber. While the cars have a minimum weight (in the WRC) the engineers try and place the weight as low as possible in the car. In fact, Subaru’s “boxer” engine is an attempt to keep the engine as low as possible and further bring the CG down.
So stop making fun of how a co-driver might look in the car, for all you know they could be bigger faster and stronger than you… looks can be deceiving.
One thing that I’ve noticed a lot is that rally cars seem to use turbochargers almost exclusively over their supercharger counterparts.
I have gone into detail on turbochargers in the past on how they work, and why they’re used to increase the amount of power an engine puts out. What is different about a supercharger? Well, both compress the intake air to increase power, but the supercharger’s compressor is driven mechanically (usually a belt off the crankshaft) instead of by the energy in the exhuast gas. So instead of reducing the efficiency of the engine by increasing exhaust pressure, energy is taken directly from the engine to increase power.
There are some plus sides to this, mainly no lag in waiting for the compressor to spin up. The compressor speed is directly related to the engine speed. This predictability makes design simpler, and the engine’s power response much more consistent.
However, ultimately a turbocharger setup can make more power with a similar amount of weight added to the car. The pressure increases non-linearly with engine speed, and can hit a high pressure before the supercharger would.
Each setup has it’s pros and cons, but to me, it seems like turbochargers are winning in popularity by a long shot. I know Charles and I both prefer turbochargers, and own turbocharged cars, mainly for the power efficiency and fun torque curve. Which do you prefer, turbochargers, superchargers, or even normally aspirated, and why?
While I would guess that most of you favor Rally Racing I bet there are a few of you who prefer other racing. So what is your favorite type of racing?
I’m also curious about why that’s your favorite type of racing. So go crazy in the comments or email us ( twoguysrally (ATTTTTTT) gmail ).
While I’m asking you questions I might as well ask: What do you think would help TwoGuysRally?
Helmets are so varied in design and cost, so how do we know what helmets are good and what are not? A lot goes into that assessment but I hope I can shed some light on the topic.
Why Wear a Helmet?
Helmets are easy to use items that can save your life in a crash (seatbelts are more important though!) so you might as well get one for spirited driving. It does not take much force (ie, acceleration) to damage your brain. We perceive the world through that wonderous organ, so damaging it will affect how we live in most every way. It could affect your life so much as to end it! So keeping your head safe is a good idea. Side note: I wear helmets in pretty much every sport I do…lacrosse, snowboarding, auto racing, cycling to name a few. I’ve worn helmets often enough that I feel naked without them when doing those activities.
How Should It Fit?
Helmets should be snug, especially at first as they will only get looser. The helmet should not rotate/move freely on your head. However, it should not squeeze you so tight that it will cause pain and eventually headaches (I’ve had that happen before I knew better!).
For an autoracing helmet moving the helmet should move your head if you’re not resisting the movement. So if you leave it in a certain position on your head it should stay there. Other sports have other requirements for helmets, for example Lacrosse helmets are strapped to your head quite snugly as they are expected to be struck…often.
Ratings?
There are various certifications for helmets, the most famous of which are the ratings produced by Snell. Snell is a not for profit organization that tests all sorts of helmets. If you’re curious about how they test helmets YouTube does not fail in that regard! There can be various ratings so check your sanctioning body for acceptable ratings.
But why does it matter? For a few reasons: 1) you will never be allowed to race in any respectable sanctioning body without a certified helmet and 2) the certification guarantees a certain level of protection.
Weight?
Weight, believe it or not, affects the safety of the helmet. Weight added to your head means more momentum above your neck. That means a larger force applied to your neck in the event of a crash (this is also why the HANS device was invented). So a really massive helmet will injure you in a crash where no helmet would not.
Fatigue matters, especially in Rally! Extra weight that your neck has to carry will speed up how fast you fatigue. So the lightest helmet possible, with the same protection level, is preferred. However in order to keep it as safe at the same weight, special materials need to be used. Unfortunately for all of us this drives the cost up, but I think it is something worth spending money on.
Full Face vs Open Face
Rally is a motorsport which commonly uses open face helmets, while most of the other motorsports use full face helmets. If you’re curious to the difference visually, here is me wearing a full face helmet and mark wearing an open face helmet (facebook links do NOT require login). There are pros and cons to each of them:
Full face helmets provide a lot more protection to your face (teeth and nose) but come with the downside of trapping more heat and adding weight. While open face helmets provide less protection to the front of your head but cut down on weight and heat. But there is one unique thing in Rally that makes open face helmets dominant: Co-Drivers.
Rarely will a Rally co-driver wear a full face helmet. Why? Because they need to scream at the driver and a piece infront of the mouth muffles the critical sounds that much more. So it almost makes more sense for the driver to be wearing a full face (Sebastian Loeb) while the co-driver dons the open face.
Do you have a favorite helmet brand/style/color?
I promised videos and I know I’ve been slow about them but here is the first of a few (rest are not up yet). I’m still finishing up a highlights video for you guys.
Link for you RSS folks.
Unfortunately, it was raining over the weekend, so I had to delay the suspension work I had planned for the car. It was a really nice day yesterday, so I took the day off to have a full day in case something went horribly awry and I needed to go get more parts (I did, hahaha).
Unfortunately Charles had class for most of the day, so he wasn’t able to help me. No worries, as my tool selection really only allows one person to be working at a time, he would have just been sitting there and watching me and taking pictures.
One piece of advice, make sure you have all of the tools you need before you start. I thought I did, but it turns out that the jack stands were with Charles, and the spring compressors I was using for the struts required a 15/16th inch wrench, which I didn’t have, and required an emergency trip to Sears to get it.
Everything went more or less smoothly. I wasted some time on a few silly mishaps, like forgetting to put the dust boot on the first strut until I had decompressed the spring and had the strut assembly all together. This required taking the whole thing apart and getting the whole strut assembly into pieces so that I could get the spring seat out again to put the dust cap underneath it. Not a big deal, but annoying.
Before and after shots, since the springs I used lower the car about an inch to an inch and a half.
(click for larger)
And some pictures my lovely assistant, Sarah, took when she stopped by to see how things were coming along.
So now I get to play around with the shocks, since the rebound damping is adjustable, meaning the amount of resistance to the expansion of the shocks. This should have some interesting implications on the way the car handles, but I want to get used to how it feels now, since the difference is huge compared to the wallowy stock setup. I’m sure I’ll collect some data in true engineering fashion and post my findings from changing the suspension settings.
Rallycross is tough on your car, and right after the racing you should check some things to make sure your car wont die on the way home. Here they are:
What do you do after a rallycross? Making checklists and bringing them with you will help you if you get nervous at races (I do to begin with). They allow you to focus on something other than whats racing through your mind. So keep your car well kept, it will repay you by not breaking as often.
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