hrd-hr30

they're called formula libre cars. they're pretty much purpose built hillclimb cars, but some are converted F2 or Formula Ford chassis. Many run motorbike engines, some run old F2 engines and some are even ex-F1 engines, many are turb or supercharged, and one even runs a turbo rotary. And they're incredible to watch - awesome accelleration! Peter Gumley won outright in his SCV, with Andrew Howell only a tenth or so behind in his Gould. Until the last run of the weekend they were seperated by only 1 hundreth of a second!

here's a link to a pic of my car from last weekend's Australian Hillclimb Championship http://www.rpmphotography.com.au/v/Browsin...7/ACT_11939.jpg 230rwkw CA18DET in a ~900kg Datsun 1200. Still not quite as fast as my damn-near-stock R32 GTR was around Mt Cotton.

impossible to give you driving advice on an internet forum. the best (and safest) way to get a feel for the handling of your car on the limit is on a skidpan at low speed with low grip levels. And you'll have a lot of fun at the same time. or an advanced driver training course with one of the motorsport oriented schools.

are they staggered widths? you don't really want that on a GTR. if they're not staggered, then there's really no reason for different offsets on a GTR.

Work Emotion CR Kai. exactly what I wanted for my GTR

Nissan sell the TPS for about $145

penrite make a 600deg fluid (same as Motul RBF600) that's about $16 per 500ml bottle. Worked fantastic in my GT-R on QR which is reknowned for being hard on brakes. On normal fluid the pedal would be n the floor after 2 laps. With the Penrite Sin it stayed rock hard for the complete 7 laps.

awesome clip. only from a standing start in a straight line! at 1700kgs vs the 460 Scuderia's 1250kg I can tell you right now the GTR won't match it around a dry racetrack.

The Federal 595SS are not a bad tyre. I've beaten a few high place Dutton competitors in a road rally using 595SS on a relatively standard R32 GTR (only mods were coilovers, exhaust, pods, and Mines ECU) while they were on semi slicks. Don't get me wrong - they're nowhere near semi slick performance, nor are they the best street tyre out there, but they are a long way from being rubbish! I've had 2 sets of them and wouldn't hesitate to buy them again.

if your car is already understeering, I wouldn't go with harder front springs or bars. that will only make the understeer worse. You might be better off looking at front roll couple to reduce front body roll without altering spring rates. And roll axis inclination which could be causing the excessive yaw which leads to the inside rear lifting.

I hate you all! There better be some in car vids posted up for all of us who can't make it there ourselves! how often do they have these sprint weekends at PI? I might have to make the trip down for one next year. Oran Park GP is on my list for next year too before its gone for good...

welcome aboard Andy! btw do you reckon this 4.375 diff be OK for the Supersprint, or should I be looking at getting that other 4.1 in the car? I picked up a front spoiler a couple of weeks ago too - should help front end grip a little into the chase...

I bought an R32 GTR mainly for track use. Had it for a couple of years and did a few hillclimbs, sprints, an autocross and a tarmac rally. It was stock apart from HKS exhaust, Mines chipped ECU and Buddy Club coilovers. I only ran 225/50*16 RE55S on the standard GTR wheels - you can fit much larger tyres under there - 255 or 265 are common. Even so, I only ever got beaten by 1 WRX on bitumen - Michael Collins at Mt Cotton - if you know some of the WRXs in motorsport up here you'll more than likely have heard of him I'd say. From my experience, a well driven relatively standard GTR will leave all but the most highly developed WRXs for dead at any race track. I wouldn't pay too much attention to times from QR though. without trying to offend anyone, alot of the people who go there aren't very experienced and probably aren't getting the best out of their cars. Brakes - The standard brakes are OK (for standard power levels) with 600deg fluid and decent pads at QR (btw, you're right - that's QLD Raceway) which is reknowned for being very hard on brakes. If you start making more power than standard, you'll need to look at upgrading the fronts. Reliability - I never had to do anything to the car except change the oil. but you always hear stories about how expensive they are to own from people who don't own them... just take your time and find a good one. I paid $22K for mine just over 2 years ago. You could get the same car now for about $20K. I sold it because I wanted to get back into another race car - I previously had an U2L IPRA Datsun 1200 coupe. And like you I wanted something lighter. I now have a 230rwkw Datsun 1200 coupe racecar that weighs about 950kg, but I do regret selling the GTR. I haven't gone as fast as the GTR at Mt Cotton yet. Light and rwd is good on fast open tracks, but in slower speed tracks lightweight rwd cars = ordinary traction and very difficult to match the heavier GTR. From this experience, if I could go back, I would not have sold the GTR for the lighter race car. HTH Harry

no, I sold the GTR. I'll be bringing my CA18DET Datsun 1200 coupe race car this time. But I still love GTR's and will definitely come and say hi and check out your GTRs

I'm making the trip down from Brisbane again for this year's Speed Weekend. Its always the first weekend of December. It will the Mountain Straight Hillclimb on Sunday, which is just awesome! Far better than the Esses Hillclimb. I ran in 2003 in my 2000cc IPRA Datsun 1200 coupe, 2005 in my R32 GTR where I managed to get 3rd outright on the Mountain Straight Hillclimb, and this year will be in my CA18DET Datsun 1200 coupe - IPRA spec minus the turbo restictor... with 230rwkw's and somewhere around 950kg's it should be interesting to see how it goes against some GTR's!

congrats on the win! I went out there on the Sunday to watch, saw all 4 IPRA races on Sunday and had a bit of a sticky beak at the GTRs in the pits - very nice. Also got to catch up with a few mates who were either competing or crewing for other cars, plus I picked up a front spoiler and some race fuel for my Datto. Dave and the BSM GTR were definitely the class of the field, although Justin Keys (a local QLD RX3 runner) threw everything he had at him after the safety car in the middle of the 24 lap final. Dave drove really well to hold him off and then re-establish his lead. I was wondering how the tyres would hold up for 24 laps on the GTR compared to the much lighter rotaries... And the under 2L guys put on a good show too - there were some crazy fast fwd U2L cars from interstate, even as far away as WA. And Kevin Ledger's WRX from WA was running very competitively too until problems struck. Well done to all who made the effort to come up here for the IPRA Nationals - I really enjoyed the racing you guys put on!

more superlap madness - Saurus R32 GTR at Tsukuba. probably a bit more like what Giant's car will be like than the all carbon fibre HKS Evo - that was pretty extreme! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lOJjBrh6-qg

it would be great to finally get back onto Lakeside! Hopefully it can all start to happen now without any more delays. It must be almost a year since PRSC announced that QR/Tetly was the successful tender... my side pipe will have to go too, but I'm more than happy to do that for another chance to run there. Finally QLD will have a racetrack to get excited about again! QR is a bore. Morgan Park is OK, but not a patch on Lakeside's fast and challenging layout.

haven't been in here in a while. quite a few pages to catch up on. Tacker's machine looks awesome! and good to see Giant's getting there despite the tight schedule. should be an absolute weapon in the new format - and it was impressive enough before! couple of things - stiffening the rear bar should make the car more tailly??? traction rods should be set on an aligner (or with the goog old string-line) with the spring/shock out of the car and the length set to minimise bump steer through suspension travel, particularly around the working range of motion a couple of inches either side of static ride height. But really, that would be putting the upright back towards vertical anyway. I found this out the hard way by trying to scrimp on the rear camber correction and just doing the main arm. SK pointed me in the right direction when I had terrible oversteer as a result.

totally agree, it was most likely he didn't close the bonnet properly. but if you have a tie down strap hanging there it might help remind you to close the bonnet! then again, it is a suba driver we're talking about...

this is the program from the IPRA Nationals Further Regs: SATURDAY , SEPTEMBER 29, 2007 SCRUTINY from 0700 hrs in the Scrutiny Bay. QUALIFYING 0830 Improved Production Cars – Odd Competition Nos. 0850 Improved Production Cars – Even Competition Nos. 0910 Historic Formula Vees Group V – Regularity Practice 0930 Yokohama V8 Rides 0950 Improved Production Cars – Fastest 50% 1010 Improved Production Cars – Slowest 50% 1030 Formula Vees – 1600cc 1050 Formula Vees – 1200cc 1110 Yokohama V8 Rides 1130 Historic Group V Formula Vees 1150 Formula Vees – 1600cc 1210 Formula Vees – 1200cc 1235 Compulsory Drivers’ Briefing in Scrutiny Bay (Attendance recorded) 1300 RACING EVENT 1 Historic Group V Formula Vee Srcatch Race 8 Laps 2 Improved Production Car Scratch Race Heat 1 Groups A-B 10 Laps 3 Improved Production Car Scratch Race Heat 2 Groups C-D 10 Laps 4 Formula Vee Scratch Race - 1600cc 8 Laps 5 Formula Vee Scratch Race - 1200cc 8 Laps Yokohama V8 Rides 6 Formula Vee Regularity Trial 8 Laps 7 Improved Production Car Under 2.0 Litre Shootout 8 Improved Production Car Over 2.0 Litre Top 10 Shootout Yokohama V8 Rides SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2007 0815 Warm up Session – Improved Production Cars Groups A/B 0825 Warm up Session – Formula Vees - 1600cc 0835 Warm up Session – Improved Production Cars Group C/D 0845 Warm up Session – Formula Vees - 1200cc Yokohama V8 Rides EVENT 9 Historic Group V Scratch Race 8 Laps 10 Improved Production Car Scratch Race Groups A-C 10 Laps 11 Improved Production Car Scratch Race Groups B-D 10 Laps 12 Formula Vee Scratch Race - 1600cc 8 Laps 13 Formula Vee Scratch Race - 1200cc 8 Laps Yokohama V8 Rides Formula Vee Regularity Trial 8 Laps 14 Improved Production Car Scratch Race Groups A-D 10 Laps 15 Improved Production Car Scratch Race Groups B-C 10 Laps 16 Formula Vee Scratch Race - 1600cc 8 Laps 17 Formula Vee Scratch Race - 1200cc 8 Laps Yokohama V8 Rides 18 Historic Group V Formula Vee Scratch Race 8 Laps 19 Improved Production Repechage 15 Laps 20 Formula Vee 1200cc Final 12 Laps Yokohama V8 Rides 21 Formula Vee 1600cc Final 15 Laps 22 Improved Production Car Final 24 Laps 21 Formula Vee Regularity 8 Laps

that's right, but they're still worth having. A bonnet flew up on a WRX at Mt Cotton Hillclimb on Sunday - luckily it was on one of the short straights - massive damage to bonnet and roof, smashed windscreen and 4 flat spotted semi slicks. not exactly a cheap day out! alot of guys up here use a tie down strap. thread part of it throught he supports under the bonnet and find something down low to tie it off to, like a shipping hook or loop it round the bumper. its cheap insurance.

the only thing wrong with that drawing is the rear stays not attaching to the main hoop - so effectively you can't have that second roof section. it really doesn't do anything except add weight anyway. you don't need to triangulate the A pillar, and the X bracing can be in the main hoop or the rear stays. although if you're making it in cromemoly, you can have any design you want as long as it passes the engineer's tests/calculations. the drawings in the CAMS manual for cage members only applies to CDW or CDS tube cages.

link didn't work for me, but its probably the OS Giken head.

what's with the attitude? I just pointed out that the "quicker cars" in your comparison were on full racing slicks against Giant on semis. There's nothing to argue about.