Nurburgring Race Series - Week 9 - Mercedes Benz SL55 AMG

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Dave_George

Dave_George

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davegeorge78
Hello and welcome to week 9 of the NRS!​

*EDIT* VOTING OVER​
This week will cover cars in the 410-500BHP category. Some big hitters were available for testing however there are surprisingly few cars within this powerband, so for this week the amount of choices has been dropped to 4 cars 👍

Before i announce the choices I would ask that you do try and drive these cars this week before voting, try not to vote on spec or looks or anything else other than how they drive and which one YOU want to drive. All of these cars are more than worthy of a week 9 drive, tuning is going to be slightly reined in this week so we can concentrate on suspension set up so please make your choices carefully.
I can tell you that there is at least one car here which set a sensational laptime all things considered and it may not be the "obvious" choice......

NRS WEEK 9 CARS:​

The Aston Martin Vanquish
The Spyker C8 Laviolette
The Mercedes Benz SL55 AMG
The Ruf CTR "Yellowbird"
​

As in previous weeks please PM me your top three choices by monday 9pm GMT 12/12/2005 :)

Please dont discuss your votes on this thread 👍

Enjoy your testing/voting these cars really shine on the ring and im looking forward to week 9 already!

cheers :cheers:

Dave

*EDIT * VOTING RESULTS!!​
Thanks for the votes everyone, some very interesting results im sure you will agree and not what i was expecting, however the car i mentioned that produced a stunning test lap did indeed win! So well done im sure a good week is ahead! 👍

In 4th place with 8 points - The Ruf CTR Yellowbird

In 3rd place with 10 points - The Aston Martin Vanquish

In 2nd place with 14 points -The Spyker C8

But in 1st place with 16 points - The Mercedes SL55 AMG!

week9merc5ia.jpg

This car was mighty impressive during testing and only a few seconds off the Rufs pace which considering its weight is some feat....There is even after our weight reduction a lot of bulk to move around so the trick this week is to get that weight controlled well in the braking and cornering :)

WEEK 9 - SL55 AMG - SPECIFIC TUNING

STAGE 2 WEIGHT REDUCTION
S3 TYRES
BRAKE BALANCE CONTROLLER (Thanks Scaff)
TWIN PLATE CLUTCH
CARBON DRIVESHAFT
SEMI-RACE FLYWHEEL
SEMI-RACING SUSPENSION
RIGIDITY INCREASE - DRIVER OPTION

SPORTS EXHAUST SYSTEM
OIL CHANGE
RACING CHIP

POWER IN YOUR TUNING SCREEN = 546 HP
WEIGHT IN YOUR GARAGE SCREEN = 1661KGS

POWER TO WEIGHT THIS WEEK OF 328.7 BHP/TON

This week the car is plenty powerfull enough with just an oil and exhaust/chip upgrade, the other changes should help get the power down a bit quicker, Ive added the brake controller on Scaffs advice from last week and i think the standard brakes are strong enough to not need upgrading so NO racing brakes this week.

S3 tyres are provided this week, i personally have felt not much difference in the S1/S2 variety but these should in theory offer slightly better grip than the harder compounds we have been using.

Rules are as normal, im sure i dont have to repeat them, needless to say no cheating, everyone is invited to join and welcome to ask questions etc, just get the car and start racing 👍

Good luck everyone,

cheers

Dave
 
Results in post 1 everyone, I cant wait to get started on this one, great V8 soundtrack this week also!

regards

Dave
 
Whoops, I forgot to vote!!!

Thank god you guys stayed away from the RUF ... that would have been HELLISH.
 
I'm kinda dissappointed :indiff: . I really, really, really wanted the RUF. I wanted the RUF the last time one was up for voting too. I'm not sure why...the Yellowbird is such a handful...even more so that the Elise.

It's probably better off that the majority chose differently. The aggravation would have likely caused me to destroy something (like the DFP) and then the family probably would have gone hungry so that I could replace it.
 
Breathes a big sigh of relief :cool: , I thought the Yellowbird was going to be picked, this
would've been ok but after last weeks restart fest I was hoping for something very
heavy with a large lump of motor in the front end. :D The Merc fits the bill nicely.

Thanks Folks 👍


Steve
 
Bah, you're all a bunch of girls! :) (Sorry Nat)

In that case, we'll have to have an optional race at the end of the series for the Yellowbird. That car has such an iconic link to the Nordschleife it must be included at some point.

But I'm happy with this week's choice, I had a feeling that was the car Dave was talking about. Good luck everyone. 👍
 
hmm this was my 3rd choice... interesting. Hopefully this car behaves better then the CLS.. ;)
 
RedOak
hmm this was my 3rd choice... interesting. Hopefully this car behaves better then the CLS.. ;)
Click to expand...

Er, RedOak....

I've noticed you've been saying CLS when you mean CSL. To clarify,

Mercedes CLS:


And BMW M3 CSL:


Sorry to be a pedant, but CLS refers to a Mercedes while CSL refers to a BMW.
 
VTRacing
Bah, you're all a bunch of girls! :)
Click to expand...


Perhaps I should change my name to TVRacing this week then :sly:.
This race suit doesn't make my bum look big, does it ? :D

Steve
 
VTRacing
In that case, we'll have to have an optional race at the end of the series for the Yellowbird.
Click to expand...
I agree with VTRacing. I think the car should have stock HP (with an oil change) and I suppose we should be given all the adjustable parts.
 
Perhaps we should have a RUF week? All the RUFs are fun cars to drive with huge amounts of power (3400S aside)

p.s. I wanted the Vanquish to win. sigh..
 
goixoye
I agree with VTRacing. I think the car should have stock HP (with an oil change) and I suppose we should be given all the adjustable parts.
Click to expand...


If enough interest is raised i may look at this as a "Series Finale"

Maybe on N2's completely stock as the suspension is adjustable as standard anyway.

Let me know your thoughts everyone!

thanks

Dave
 
My thoughts are Ruf's as a christmas "2-weeker", so u have enough time to concentrate on getting christmas, kissing girls, receiving presents, smelling relatives and being drunk out of the way before you have to deal with our results thread and the like.

Just a thought....

:irked:👍
 
vexd
My thoughts are Ruf's as a christmas "2-weeker", so u have enough time to concentrate on getting christmas, kissing girls, receiving presents, smelling relatives and being drunk out of the way before you have to deal with our results thread and the like.

Just a thought....

:irked:👍
Click to expand...

Hmmm. I kinda like that idea 👍 It would be very difficult to get a clean lap with the Ruff, but in a 2 week period it should be doable.
 
the Ruf idea is good, i like it ;)
But i was kind of wondering if the series final would be with a F1 car... *glup*

Overall this car is quite exciting... something came to mind tho... does driving with the roof down add drag? (slower in straights)
 
I was hoping for the Yellowbird to win...then again, even if I had voted, it would have been in vain! :-)


As a series ending selection...Now that would be AWESOME in my book!
Though, I'd opt for at least S-Tires, as this would provide better driveability as opposed to most realistic 'lap times'...which everyone seems to haggle about on these forums....Even though in my opinion, it's not how true to life the lap times are, but rather how a car would handle/react in RL and sometimes, N-tires don't provide true to life handling charactersitics! But hey...this is just my simple opinion.. :D
 
The ruf handles like a beast wereas the merc is like an elephant on a ford ka although it has the power it just dosen't cut it for turns.

Well done me, i forgot to vote again :(
 
I like the idea of driving the RUF whenever with whatever tires. I would vote to make it as true to life as possible (so whatever that means relative to tires & TCS/ASM).

I was also hoping we'd get to drive the Caterham too. That thing is like trying to contol a feather in a tornado on the Nurb.

EDIT:
An early split.
T10: 6'29.783
105.6 miles including testing at Deep Forest.

I really couldn't see a definite improvement over the defaults at Deep Forest. The set-up did feel good at the Nurb. I need to try the defaults at the Nurb to see how they feel.

Next time I'm in the car I'll write down my settings and post them.
 
Man, this thing is quick. But I think most of it comes down to the tyres.

I'm having a bit of trouble with these tyres, they're not very progressive in the way they let go and then grip again. This makes the car harder than the Elise to catch when it's sliding, though it may also have something to do with the extra 1000kgs the Merc has to cart around over the Lotus.

Anyhoo, first split from me:

T10: 6'16.452

Setup (this hasn't been well-thought-out folks):

5.7/5.1
100/104
7/8
3.0/0.5
 
Nevermind my settings. I was better with the defaults with about the same amount of time on the Nurb.

T10: 6'26.266 (-3.517), 166.0 miles
But not a good final sector. In the brake zone after T11 the car kept wanting to come around under hard braking on the first couple of laps with the default. So I was a little cautious to keep the lap clean and crossed the line at -3.003. So I gave up about 0.5. I might tweak the brakes but leave the other settings on the defaults.

This is one-handed so I think on the next session I'll try two-handed to see what I come up with.
 
I think the S3's make a significant difference. I am not having to fight the car at all. I have done only minimum tuning. (no brakes, haven't touched dampers or camber) and I managed a 6'23 early on.
 
i think i wanna try it
 
Cool, appie! Kom er gezellig bij! Do join us! The more, the merrier (hope I spelled that last word correctly :p)
 
Hi all,

Had a couple or exploratory laps yesterday and settled down for a more serious run this afternoon, I found the SL to suffer big understeer everywhere, although there was some body roll it wasnt bad and grip was good.

I changed my settings for the springs to 4.5/5.3, just softening the front helped with kerbs and understeer. My Ride heights i changed to 105/110 (same as the elise) again the rake helping to reduce understeer. Damping i set to 4/5 down from default a bit and camber 2.2/1.5.

I now have a car which turns in, understeers but of the safe push on variety 👍 and generally grips and doesnt cause me too many problems. I love the way this car fires you out of corners!

Im setting Brake balance at 6/2, any higher on the front seemed to get the ABS triggering and higher on the rear was causing oversteer under braking, feels quite stable on the brakes now :)

My times for my first clean lap : (* indicates a "time losing" error in that section)

T1 44.960
T2 1'19.203 *
T3 1'47.278
T4 2'38.152 *
T5 3'16.085
T6 3'42.528 * Big opposite lock slide thru left hander on back twisty section :banghead:
T7 4'32.730 *
T8 MISSED IT!
T9 5'37.226
T10 6'19.998

V max on back straight = 198 (Anyone seen the magic 200??)

And its a lot quicker than the CSL :)

Thats not to say it doesnt cause potential controller chuck moments.....get the braking slightly wrong and you can kiss goodbyee to that sector

Appie 17 and Qwerts 1 please do join in 👍

Enjoying this 👍

cheers all

Dave
 
Who else voted the SL55 #1?

1. Mercedes Benz SL55 AMG
2. Spyker C8 Laviolette
3. Ruf CTR "Yellowbird"
 
#2 I think.

That's a nice time Dave. 👍

Like I said before, I'm not a fan of the S3 tyres. After what we have been running on they seem to have too much grip. I prefer to feel the car moving under me all the time, not to have massive grip suddenly transfer to nothing.

Having said that, I guess the behaviour of S3s is probably more accurately modelling a real-world tyre compared to the N series tyres.
 
I decided to take the night off from the NRS...sort of. I thought I'd play with a Beetle at the Nurb so I totally tricked out a normal one and chased my SL55 ghost. Not real close. So then I totally tricked out an RSi and kicked my SL55's ghost's a$$.

Then I thought about Mission 34. So I gave it a go. 6th place, 35 seconds back. Then 16 seconds back (think that was 1s better than my previous best effort). Then 7 seconds back. Then I thought about a video I saw about how somebody took some short cuts at a couple of places, rode the wall at he Karussell, etc. So I tried that. 1.7 seconds back. And then finally after a dozen or so attempts I beat that confounded gull-wing thing by 0.216s.

I thought I would never beat this Mission. I might not ever beat it clean. I will probably never try it again as it seems a bit stupid to have to sit in the starting blocks for 2 minutes. I'm almost certain I would not have beat it had it not been for this series. So thanks Dave.

I'm sure most of you beat this thing long ago and did it clean so in your eyes I've not accomplished anything. So why am I even writing this? That's a good question. Everybody here's asleep except me. And even if they were awake they wouldn't care...they just don't understand. Maybe after this series wraps up I'll try again to see how close I can get with a clean lap.

But even so beating Mission 34 this way is better than not ever beating it at all or better than using some cheat code to fill out a completion percentage. The prize car is pretty cool too (Nissan R89C).

Now I just have a few of those *fill in explitive here* Special Conditions events to get 100% completion. I HATE those rally events.

Sorry to put so much nonsense in your thread Dave...it's kinda related though since it's the Nurb and all. I'll shut up now. I definitely need some sleep.

BTW used AT and two-handed driving technique.
 
VTRacing
#2 I think.

That's a nice time Dave. 👍

Like I said before, I'm not a fan of the S3 tyres. After what we have been running on they seem to have too much grip. I prefer to feel the car moving under me all the time, not to have massive grip suddenly transfer to nothing.

Having said that, I guess the behaviour of S3s is probably more accurately modelling a real-world tyre compared to the N series tyres.
Click to expand...


Scaff has done some tyre tests that proved the N2 and N3 were closest to real world results, he used an M3 and did a variety of tests and then compared the results, quite scary how close they were!!

Feel free to try the S2s if your prefer, i cant see any reason for not allowing the tyres to be changed as long as the grip level doesnt go up 👍

@ Ronny, No worries about posting your M34 write up here i quite enjoyed hearing that this series may have helped you achieve one of your goals 👍
I remember taking a couple of attempts to do that one, cant remember where i took the Gullwing now but i didnt have much room for error! Well done :)

cheers

Dave
 
Goixoye... well done on getting M34 done!!!!
Hooray!
👍

As for the special conditions, its all about car choice, often you need to not go soooo fast, but have a car that will stop and turn quicker, to beat the confounded AI. The other thing to say is, you had better learn your trax inside out.

As for this race, i had 2 laps yesterday, the car understeers, and i think i'll need time on the setup, which i may get later, but the first lap was a dirty, the second yielded a T10 of:

T10: 6'16.227

I didnt save the lap, because there were mistakes everywhere.... off i go to improve the handling.....

:irked:👍

Good luck everyone.
 
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