Tiny Terror Shootout: C-class challenge! CLOSED

[fndrbndr]

By the way, today's the last day of the challenge, so if you have times, post 'em up.  I'll leave it open til either midnight or first thing tomorrow morning, whenever I get around to closing it and putting up the final leaderboard.

[feuerdog]

I'll be back in about an hour or two with some times......

[fndrbndr]

OK.  It's draft day, and I'm by the computer anyway, so I'll hold off on the final.

[feuerdog]

Easier than expected, sorry I missed out on this one guys, it's been a rough past month for me,......but this was a nice little stress relief.

Porsche 914/6
180hp
1833lbs
Pre-existing tune and build, no tweaks for this challenge, I just ran it as it was.  I suspect a modified early v5 version.

Seb: 80.683
Tsu: 60.831
Atl: 61.263  (A new PB)

I hate Road Atl. but the car was light and sticky here, and more importantly the gearing didn't hinder the uphill pulls.  It was easy to stay on the throttle, brake late and light, and not lose time or acceleration on the hills.  A definate C-class short track keeper.  On the other two tracks my Seat Leon just could not be beat, but the Porsche did keep up for the most part.

Thanks for letting me squeeze in at the last second. 

[fndrbndr]

Challenge closed.  Closing thoughts forthcoming.

[fndrbndr]

Thanks to everyone for running this.  I was sort of surprised to see the 914/6 become the car of choice.  It was stronger than most when I ran it, but it's hard to tell what your results will be in a project like that, because the wheel nut is always tightening.  I've just begun using the QR technique to evaluate my care, so the wheel nut was certainly an issue.  Some other thoughts:

1.  There seemed to be some desire for the Solstice.  I threw it in as a twist, and no one ran one, or even had any discussion of one.  I think I'll save it for another time and re-twist it.

2.  The Dino didn't get as much love as I expected.  It looked in danger of running away in my QR.  I'm wondering whether the low PI was an issue.  Then again, once Drift and Serial declare a car "the fastest," I guess that car becomes the car of choice.  I know Bimmer liked the Dino.  I certainly did as well.

3.  While I'm not surprised that there ended up being a favorite, I really didn't see the porsche coming.  I've mentioned this before, but Detrick actually built the one I ran.  it's fast, and I've run it online with good results.  I didn't think it was far and away the best of the class, though.  Then again, I put in a LOT of seat time in a couple of the cars (2000GT, miata) in another class, and the tunes were similar enough that this may have muddied the waters for me a bit.  That's part of the fun of these challenges, seeing whether different results come about.

4.  Participation was strong.  It started off a little slow, but participation came up pretty quickly.  Thanks for that.  You've made my first challenge a joy to run, except for the whole RROD thing, which I still need to do something about, coincidentally. 

5.  Thanks for your patience as I've played with the leaderboard, especially Blooze for giving me a macro-enabled spreadsheet.  That was a HUGE help, and it made the process more fun and less work than it would have been otherwise.

6.  The story was a bit lackluster this time around.  Sorry for that.  I'll try to do something more spectacular next time around.

[feuerdog]

I had two determining factors for the use of the Porsche; firstly, I had one already tuned and ready to go, because....secondly, I don't like the way any of the other cars look.

Alot of the cars I choose for challenges are based one of two or three things:
1.  Do I have one of those cars already, and is it tuned.
2.  Is it considered and underdog/outcast.
3.  Do I like the way it looks.

A yes to these questions will quickly determine a choice for my driving/tuning attention. 

For example, I have a ZR-1 tuned for evaluation purposes, but I rarely race with it,....why?  because I know it's not an underdog, I don't really like the way it looks(although I do appreciate its heritage and capabilities), and for those two reasons I only have one of them in my garage.

The 914/6 is a double bacon cheeseburger among assorted vegetables in this salad bar line-up as far as i'm concerned. 

[fndrbndr]

I think #2 led to the early popularity of the Z.

Personally, I love ALL of these cars.  Then again, I'm looking forward to the day when I have the extra cash for my very own spec miata car.  lol  Diff'rent strokes.

[Serial]

Here's my take on it; a few weeks back over at Exodus we ran a C499 914/6 with slicks on our ladder.  It turned out to be an awesome car.  An all out grip monster, competitive with C550's on certain tracks.  After we were done with it, I had planned to upgrade one to C550 for online use, but hadn't got around to it.  The Tiny Terror Shootout was a great reason to build one.  It was the only car I tried so I can't speak for it's dominance within my garage at all.  Maybe next time we run these I'll try out a different ride.  Don't forget that Ske's Fairlady was only a total of .3 behind over three tracks.  A definite contender as well.

And I want to give a special congrats to Drift, as I think this was his strongest showing yet.  When I first started running laps, I couldn't even see how those times were possibly in the 914/6 - very nice runs man !

[Spiny Anteater]

Like Serial, I only ran the one car on this, so can't really make much of a comparison. However, in a perverse sort of way I was glad that the Elan wasn't the fastest car out there (not that I would have caught the top 3 anyway). After the initial PI problems when the car came out it's good to see that it's back to 'normal' and can be used without the leaderboard stigma. I was also surprised at how poorly the 2000GT fared considering how many you see online.

Having built 2 Elans, I expected the more powerful version to be better at Sebring and the grippier version to be better at the other 2 tracks. Instead, it was Road Atlanta where the 170bhp version was best. I can only assume that at this low a power level the RA hill has more of an impact on times than the turns.

[fndrbndr]

The thing with Sebring is, you can gain SO MUCH time in a couple of corners that if you give those up, you won't gain it back on the long back straight.  My miata is right up there with my M-inc C-class Charger.  I forget which one's faster, and it's close enough that they're essentially sporting the same time.  Oh, and I'm very close to stock power on my build, around 160 hp, I think.

[Blooze]

Good job on this challenge, everybody!!

$

[Drift2XL]

I like pure grip cars like these alot. Its very easy to set quick times on these short tracks.

I appreciate the kudos there Serial, but to get those super low times took me a ton of laps. Almost a law of averages type of thinking. If you do more and more laps, you're bound to hit one really close to perfect. While I did try to work on my consistancy, I really didn't get much better. One fast, one off course lap, and so on.... Still not the dead on times I would have liked to have seen. I doubt I could get within three tenths in a ten lap window right now.

These cars demand perfection in the turns. If not, you don't have the power to catch back up to the ghost. The Muscle Inc C Class run just before, I could semi-fudge up a turn and still get back to the gas quickly and catch the ghost. It was almost like there was two or three equal lines through one turn. One line with these momentum cars.

The 914/6 did have an acceleration advantage over the rest. That really helped pulling the hill at RAS. But being a MR it took some serious self-control not to give full stick on some of the turns. Oversteering an MR may start the tail to slide on exit.

[Placard Rat]

I missed the last few challenges thanks to a busy months and a bit so was just reading through what I had missed.
I was particularly surprised with the attention the 914/6 was getting. I had tried running one in C with DOTs and a minor weight reduction and was underwhelmed by its capabilities. Slicks and a Full WR really woke her up for me and I finally have a C-Class car that I'm somewhat happy with.
I'm looking forward to the next TT Challenge, it looks like a fun group of cars to work with.

[fndrbndr]

Glad everyone had a good time with these.  I love small, grippy cars.  If I could drive one comfortably, I'd probably be driving one of these small roadsters IRL, but I digress.  Maybe when I get the box back and get settled into a routine again, we can run these again.  Thanks for everyone's participation; I'd consider this challenge a huge success!