Listers,
You can buy indexing gaskets, basically tapered (cone shaped) washers of
slightly varying thickness, from speed shops. Not that I've ever looked for
them, but I've heard of them. I would guess that Accel might be a source for
this kind of thing (tried to download their catalog but it crashed and burned).
Actually, one percent is a pretty huge difference. Let's say you remove one
percent of weight from your car - 25 lbs or so. Now you have improved your
acceleration and cornering (by reducing the weight) by up to one percent, and
that will get you down the track quicker. I know that you won't see one percent
gain in track time for every percent that you reduce the weight or increase the
power (for power increases it's way worse, since top speed increases
approximately with the cube root of the power increase), but on a one minute
autocross course, one percent is 0.6 seconds, and I've been beaten and beaten
others by less than that countless times. On a roadcourse, a one second per lap
difference (at let's say 60 mph average speed) translates to 880 feet after ten
laps - quite a margin of victory. Anytime I can improve anything on my car by
one percent for free/cheap I'll do it.
Theo Smit
tsmit@novatel.ca
B382002705
[] <snip>
> regarding brand, orientation, etc. are on the order of 1% effects, so
> probably aren't something most casual drivers would worry about. However,
> when lot's of bucks are involved based on differences of inches after 500
> miles of racing, then 1% starts to sound real important. Also, since a lot
> of manufacturers are installing 100k mi plugs in new cars, a 1% effect
> might be worth the effort in this case too.
>
> I can say that from now on, with the Tiger, I am going to start "indexing"
> my plugs; especially if I decide to spend over $50 for a set of those
> super-bitchin NASCAR NGK's that Bill Martin is using.
>
> Well Allan, TTFN,
>
> Bob
>
[] <snip>
> Bob Palmer
> UCSD, AMES Dept.
> rpalmer@ames.ucsd.edu
|