July 21. Laguna Seca eRoadRacing + MotoGP!

[protomech]

Okay. It's not TTXGP any more. I'm sure I'll get used to the new name .. eventually.

Probably the premiere electric race event of the year .. who's going?!

I'll try and keep tabs on the race from afar, though I will be moving that weekend. We haven't had much interest with the Google Hangout in the past; are the races at bad times for people to duck in and out, is Google Hangout a poor venue for organizing group remote viewing / discussion, or is there little interest in following the races in real time?

Race Schedule is up. Events get started thursday evening.
Friday July 19, Practice
1:25pm 1:55pm Free Practice e-Roadracing World Cup

Saturday July 20, Qualifying
5:00pm 5:30pm Qualifying Practice e-Roadracing World Cup

Sunday July 21, RACE!
9:40am 10:10am RACE e-Roadracing World Cup

[protomech]

Brammo's been pretty busy on facebook.



1st: The major prototype competitors are out. Lightning is out. MotoCzysz is out. Mission is out (expected, but I had a bit of hope that Mission Motorcycles might show up). Münch is out, as is every european competitor.

I wrote a bit about this here:
http://protomech.wordpress.com/2013/07/19/2013-eroadracing-laguna-seca-observations-from-practice/

It's a Brammo and Zero show this weekend.


2nd: there's a couple of tiers of competition starting to develop. And there's a wide range of experience on-track.

Tier 1 is EBoz and Shane Turpin. Shane has done a practice session with Brammo and he's wearing Brammo gear now. Where's Steve? I think Brammo said Steve had pressing engagements elsewhere during the last AFM race.. Also, Turpin is fast. Really fast if he's pipping EBoz.

I think we'll see during the race that these two are more than a little competitive .. should make for some excellent racing. 1:34 in practice is still a bit off Mission's qualifying pace in 2011 (1:31), but this is just free practice. I wonder if we'll see an attempt to draft for part of a lap to boost one rider's laptime and try to take the record down.

Shane talks here about dropping the lap record down to 1:30 before the first FP session:


Tier 2 is Ted Rich and Shelina Moreda, with Kenyon Kluge a bit behind. Ted is riding a 2013 Zero S; I would bet that he's packing a Size 6 controller (stock Zero is Size 4, Empulse R/TTX is Size 6) to be that close to Shelina. He also has a little bikini screen on the bike, which should boost his top-end speed and acceleration.

You can also see ducting forcing air into the motor cooling fins. Hardly elegant, but more sustained power = more better.



I believe all 4 Zeros racing this weekend have Size 6 controllers. These are not stock bikes like the Zeros from last year .. and (probably excepting Kenyon Kluge's bike) I believe they're all personally owned.

Tier 3 is Jeremiah Johnson (Zero S) and Arthur Kowitz (Empulse TTX). Brandon Miller is well behind .. I know Jeremiah Johnson is pretty experienced. I don't know if Brandon is having setup/hardware issues with his bike or if it's just a software (brain experience) thing.

Btw, here's a good profile on Arthur. He and Brandon are no slouches when it comes to racing. But it definitely seems like there's a gap between fast guys on a bike and professional racers.

Qualifying today (Saturday), Race tomorrow (Sunday)!

[Gavin]

Have fun Proto...I wish I was there. 

Too bad you weren't out last year...could have ridden 17 mile drive.

G

[protomech]

I'm in the process of transitioning to a new job that should make travel a little easier. I'd love to make it out next year.

[protomech]

Here's practice Friday:

Brammo's been pretty busy on facebook.

Saturday Qualifying Practice is underway. @eRoadRacing is providing a live tweet stream of times as they come in.

Brandon Miller is flying vs yesterday. He will race Sunday, unless the cutoff time is radically different. Very happy for him.

The fastest Zeros - which have beefed up controllers and additional motor cooling - appear to be passing Shelina. More motor > transmission? May be a hint for street bike performance in 2014..

Here's QP2 rankings:

Turpin 1.32.516 RR - very very close to Rapp's qualifying time in 2011.
EBoz 1.33.087 RR
Kluge 1.48.068 S
Rich 1.49.061 S
Moreda 1.51.019 TTX
Johnson 1.52.046 S
Kowitz 1.54.417 TTX
Miller 1.55.625 S

Big gains vs Friday. Turpin is 1.1s away from Rapp's QP time and the electric course record, and faster than Rapp's fastest race time. Can the RRs maintain that pace for an entire race length?

[protomech]

QP complete. Will update the above once final times are available. Turpin, EBoz, and Kluge will be on the front row to grid.

[protomech]

With QP over, I think we have a preliminary answer to some questions:

What's better, more motor or a multi-gear transmission?

More power = more better. Assuming Shelina is riding the TTX as hard as Ted Rich and Kenyon Kluge are riding their bikes - I think a reasonable assumption - then the 40 kW Empulse is falling behind the probably 50+ kW Size 6 Zeros.

Except for that little bit about heat..

How's that air cooling working out on the racetrack?



"Team SBK in pits, putting ice on motor. — at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca." from Brammo's facebook.

Ice on the motor will help for QP, but won't help much in the actual race. The Zeros - except maybe Miller's? - are running air ducts to the motor for additional forced-air cooling. And even then, the motors benefit from ice cooling?

Big liquid-cooled motors with direct drive seem like the winning combination for race performance.

Curiously, this is the combination that Brammo, Lightning, Mission, MotoCzysz, Munch, and pretty much everyone else are running in their prototype bikes.

Also the same combination that Tesla runs in their production cars.

We know now whether air-cooled direct-drive vs liquid-cooled multi-gear qualifies faster. Who takes the checkered flag tomorrow? More power or better heat dissipation?

[Shinysideup]

Maybe Zero should fill their air ducts with crushed ice?

[protomech]

I believe ice cooling was not allowed under the old TTXGP rules. Not sure if that was just for race or if that applies to QP too?

[protomech]

Official times are up.
http://www.eroadracing.com/?p=747

[protomech]

Gas2 has some coverage:
http://gas2.org/2013/07/20/eroadracing-qualifying-practice-laguna-seca-2013/

They also have some information about the TTX, and better links to the QP results. Go check out the article!

Friday:


Saturday:


Brammo has continued to update their facebook. They have the best on-site photos and videos.
"There is much to do and the race team will be working into the night getting ready for tomorrow, race day."



Varying reports of race start time. Gas 2 says 9 AM sharp. Race schedule says 9:40 AM. Pacific time, of course.

I don't know of any live video or audiostream. @eRoadRacing on twitter seems to have the best race coverage I've found. Has anyone found anything better?

[Jeff]

Holy crap.  That was insane.  (I am here, typing on the stupid phone)

Turpin's brake fluid caught fire.  (!!!!)  He was getting faster and faster every lap until something happened with the bike, he started to pull off the track, and apparently the rear brake lines were slightly too close to the hot batteries or something.

Totally nutty.  Also Shelina lost traction in the corkscrew but is here and is thankfully fine.  The TTX lost most of its bits on the right side but otherwise also appears to be fine.

[Gavin]

Both RR bikes got to over 140 mph.

Gavin

[protomech]

Susanna Schick got an interview with Brammo talking about the components in the Empulse:
http://gas2.org/2013/07/21/eroadracing-usa-round-1-an-unexpected-podium/

David Herron has his usually excellent race report up now:
http://www.electricracenews.com/2013/07/in-surprising-finish-bostrom-kluge-and.html

David claims Turpin's RR ran out of battery capacity before the end of the race.

[flar]

Racing results are odd.  Shane Turpin finished as many laps as everyone else in the entire race except for Bostrom, yet he gets a DNF whereas the rest of the field gets a placement...?

I suppose I can gleam a rule out of this (something along the lines of you have to still finish whatever lap you're on when the winner passes the checkered flag), but it seems kind of odd that he did enough of the race to have done everything they did and faster than they did it, but doesn't get a place on the podium because he ran into a mechanical/electrical problem at a distance greater than any of the rest completed.  Well, they probably did complete their cool down laps and made it to the pits, but if one of them had crossed the finish line and immediately lost power and screeched to a halt, they would have had a place even though they didn't make it as far as Turpin or as fast.

I suppose, if he had pushed his bike around the last lap - or in another scenario, coasted slowly over the finish line if pushing isn't allowed - his 9 lap time would have been horrendous, but by virtue of having finished a 9th lap - would he have come in 2nd?

And, I guess this brings up a potential new strategy mechanism.  If the bike senses it does not have enough energy to finish a lap, it goes into creep mode so that at least it completes whatever lap it was on rather than DNFs well ahead of the lapped traffic...