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Australia, race report (27/05/2009)

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Reporter

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Serpent 720 -09 1/10th scale 200mm


SA IC State titles, May 16-17th

After flying in from Perth on the Wednesday, I arrived to later have a very late night indeed. Going through all the gear that had been sent to where I was staying, and fitting the 966 upgrade kit to my 960-08. After a few hours sleep, we woke to some light rain, and clearing skies.




So we headed off to the indoor track to run in the Nova engine, and make sure everything was working right. After an hour or 2, it cleared up enough to head to the Little Hampton track, and we had about 1.5 hours of track time before it rained again, and ended anymore track time to get setups, after running in the engines.
Friday, again woke up to Rain, so after a couple of changes, we headed to the indoor track again. Sorted out some small issues with the 8th and the Tourer.

Saturday saw the start of the Qualifiers and woke up to rain again. After waiting an hour or so, it was decided to run 5 min Qualifiers due to rain. So we had a 10 min warm up in heats, to make sure all transponders were working. Due to the track being damp in places, Qualifying started, so I got on a set of 35’s early to try and get where I needed to be from the start. The 720, I was running a Mega MF and the soft 35’s from Capricorn. Didn’t get a clean run , but still managed to get a low 15 lapper in ,  the 8th saw major clutch problems, and 2 speed issues. And it didn’t get any better all day. As time was cut short, I just really didn’t have that much time to try to sort things out. I concentrated on the tourer from then on, and I put the 720 in 2nd spot after round 2.
The track was getting better towards the end of the day.  The move to 37’s proved to be a bit premature, and they started working towards the end of the round. I slipped down to 3rd, and at the end of round 4 for the day, I was sitting 4th in 200mm tourer, and 9th in 8th scale. It was a shame to not sort out the 8th that day, as I felt the change to the 966 I found a more stable rear end, with out loosing any steering in the car. So to head home, change some engines, and work on the cars, another late night.


Sunday, I woke to a constant light drizzle , and we headed to the track. To my belief, the track was dry, and we proceeded to get straight into the qualifiers. The 353 tuned in the 720, was the trick, and it was so much better than the previous day. I had a tire let go, and at one point I thought I was traction rolling, but a badly chunked tire, saw the car roll 2 times in different places, so I ended the session early, which was a shame, because I was 0.3- 0.4 seconds a lap quicker just with the engine change. The 8th scale was going much better, and was again going faster than the previous day, and then it rained. Just a light shower saw the cars un-drivable in seconds. Unfortunately, it did not stop, and the event was called on the previous days results.

So I finished 4th in tourer with my 720-08 and 9th in 8th scale with the 966.
So back to Perth and prep for the WA state titles in 2 weeks time.

Id Like to Thank Adam at Serpent Radio Control Cars for all the help with getting the parts and upgrades I needed for these 2 events and Aaron at OZ Spec Hobbies for the Novarossi engines.  

Regards. P. Pattison