Another Subaru wagon rally car

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cmm7v3
Leaving service a group of around 10 cars misread the route book and caused us to be 5-11 min late into stage 5.

Where at on the road?

It's that delta that you take a slight right onto the low water bridge. Lauren and I sat there for a few seconds debating if this was it or not too. At night it is hard to see there is a low water bridge. I have been tricked by that spot before, and it doesn't suprise me that a lot of noobs got caught out on it too. It's an unassuming corner that doesn't quite look like the tulip at night (even though it is exactly like the tulip).

That would be the one, we thought it was a driveway since Dylan zeroed the odo in the wrong spot. So we just followed tail lights hoping they knew the way.

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MConte05
It's that delta that you take a slight right onto the low water bridge. Lauren and I sat there for a few seconds debating if this was it or not too. At night it is hard to see there is a low water bridge. I have been tricked by that spot before, and it doesn't suprise me that a lot of noobs got caught out on it too. It's an unassuming corner that doesn't quite look like the tulip at night (even though it is exactly like the tulip).

Yeah, it was also a follow the lead idiot kind of issue. TAG was in front of us and they made the mistake, and James was like "Go that way?" and while I was unsure I gave him a "Hmm, I guess so, they did". Then Haas followed us, and once you have a group, you kind of stop second guessing.

Then the worst part was, the next 3 tulips over the next like 2.5-3 miles actually MATCHED the wrong road. Since none of the roads actually have signs, or if they do you can't read them at night, everything actually lined up within .1 mi, so we thought it was OK for about 3 miles out.

Then we finally turned back, and crossed Chris and his party train of about 6 more cars. Those Georgian guys were *PISSED* and started barreling through the transit at like 55-60, which wasn't cool - we had to pull over and let them past cause they were driving up our arse with their driving lamps on.

Ok Got it now.

So, for future reference, can you suggest a different tulip or wording? I'm a bit confused as to what the codrivers thought as they were looking at their odo.

Maybe having the comment as "Bear Right; over LWB"

Here is the area:

Honestly what got me was "straight". "Straight" to me means stay on the road you are on, and the road we were on turned left. If I see "turn" I know I should be leaving the road I am presently on to another road. "Bear right" or "Keep right" I suppose would also work.

I also managed to screw this up on us on the Recce route, there were like 4 "straight; <indicator>" in a row, and then one that just had "Highway Right" but the tulip indicated straight, and I of course made us turn like a fool.

After doing it of course I realize my mistake of it, not the notes, but that's part of the challenge right?



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 02/27/2014 11:03AM by si.

Maybe I should remove the word "Straight" and just have the codriver rely on the tulip?

In the daytime the road does go straight maybe at night it just looks more like the curve left is the main road.

Kinda related to this discussion of the routebook (although we are getting off topic from Chris's car) make sure your odo is spot on and trust the mileage. Some rallies you will have to turn off of a highway onto a goat path and think to yourself "this is the way?, it can't be" but the mileage is on or close enough.

I missed a turn (during recce thank god and remembered during the rally) at Mexico where you turn off of a divided highway onto nothing more than a foot path, which leads down to a dry creek bed, and then you drive under the highway through a concrete drainage culvert. Ahhh, fun times.

For the life of me I could not get the Alfa calibrated well enough to be "on" for 100AW. It was fine for Perryville using the auto factor calculation with the odo check route. It seems to be perfect. For 100AW no matter what I did including manual factor calibration it kept drifting.

Without "straight" I think I would have been fine - but then again when the team in front of you goes the wrong way, you immediately start second guessing yourself. Especially if it's a team who has done 100AW multiple times before. When Haas went with us we were certain it was right, he knows the area, right? Lesson learned.

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si
For the life of me I could not get the Alfa calibrated well enough to be "on" for 100AW. It was fine for Perryville using the auto factor calculation with the odo check route. It seems to be perfect. For 100AW no matter what I did including manual factor calibration it kept drifting.

What kind of pickup? For 100AW in 2011 we had the sensor mounted picking up a bolt head on the inner CV stub where it goes into the transmission (OL Subaru). I worked fine, except on decel. I spent all weekend trying to figure out why calibration was off only to finally be watching it on a big downhill and realizing it didn't move if we were coasting. Not enough for huge errors, but enough to keep me moving it up and down.
This year our crew used a Terratrip 202 (not plus) that I bought from the Zedril's for $50 like 5 years ago. Thing has to be at least 15-20 years old I'd guess. Still works for transits though!

---

Grant Hughes

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NoCoast

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si
For the life of me I could not get the Alfa calibrated well enough to be "on" for 100AW. It was fine for Perryville using the auto factor calculation with the odo check route. It seems to be perfect. For 100AW no matter what I did including manual factor calibration it kept drifting.

What kind of pickup? For 100AW in 2011 we had the sensor mounted picking up a bolt head on the inner CV stub where it goes into the transmission (OL Subaru). I worked fine, except on decel. I spent all weekend trying to figure out why calibration was off only to finally be watching it on a big downhill and realizing it didn't move if we were coasting. Not enough for huge errors, but enough to keep me moving it up and down.
This year our crew used a Terratrip 202 (not plus) that I bought from the Zedril's for $50 like 5 years ago. Thing has to be at least 15-20 years old I'd guess. Still works for transits though!

Maybe in our case there was too much wheel slippin'? I pull direct from a hall sensor in the transmission (where the OEM speedo drive would go) on the T5. When I get the car back together - might try to see WTF is wrong heh

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si
When Haas went with us we were certain it was right, he knows the area, right? Lesson learned.

This is Haas we are talking about, ya know?

On my bug I have the sensor pick up the back of the front rotor. Works great. Almost no drift on transits. Over a 10 mile stage it might drift 0.1.

You might also try an app on your phone. There is one for the iphone called "RallyOdo" and it works pretty good.

We run ASE rally monitor on android with an external GPS receiver. When we remember to calibrate it, it works great.

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johnhuebbe
Maybe I should remove the word "Straight" and just have the codriver rely on the tulip?

In the daytime the road does go straight maybe at night it just looks more like the curve left is the main road.

I'd put the "bear right" for sure. At night with the lights the LWB is hidden in the shadows, so all you see is what looks like a driveway and a gentle curve to the left. While the tulip seems to indicate a sharper left turn. Like I said, I've been caught out by this tulip in the past, I now know exactly what to do just because of the fact it's happened fairly often. But even Lauren was doubting me until I just drove onto the bridge and pointed out the tulip said over LWB.

Maybe worst case scenario just put one of those caution arrows? Gotta go that way anyways to get to the start/finish of the stage, so could just one more thing for the crews to pick up when they close out the stage.

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johnhuebbe

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si
When Haas went with us we were certain it was right, he knows the area, right? Lesson learned.

This is Haas we are talking about, ya know?

On my bug I have the sensor pick up the back of the front rotor. Works great. Almost no drift on transits. Over a 10 mile stage it might drift 0.1.

You might also try an app on your phone. There is one for the iphone called "RallyOdo" and it works pretty good.

John coming from organising 135 mile motorcycle enduro background---130 miles down little 35" wide trails which we had to staple a million arrown, I always though a few arrows in junctions where there were recorded difficulties might not just be smart but might save lives.

There used to be a junction we used a lot that was like a misshapen 5 point star...all the old crusty guys like Gene Mc never got it wrong.....but LOTS of noobs did take one wrong turn...

And then when they hit a highway 4 miles down the road they turned around and floored it back..
Driving Sweep once I missed a headon by about 1.5 seconds with a noob who was going back wrong way (he'd gone wrong, hit the highway 4 mi away, turned around , slotted right and was almost to the clear cut where he could have seen the cars off on a spur...but he stopped 25 years from the clearcut and turned around and was going against the flow for the transit---around 75 mph)

We used that service area and junction for years and it was ALWAYS somebody going wrong then panic--and started speeding. There were near misses. too many..
One of 2 stapled arrows would have solved the problem..

---

John Vanlandingham
Sleezattle, WA, USA

Vive le Prole-le-ralliat

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Figured I would post a quick update on the car. Was too busy to get any pictures or anything while doing anything, but I have put a new to me recently rebuild 4.11 RS trans and rear LSD in along with a new clutch and flywheel. I took it to the first SCCA rallyx to see how it would do, and the new trans is a much needed improvement over the old one. By the time we got to run in the afternoon, the sky opened up and rained all through out session. I had 2 clean runs and 2 god awful runs, but due to less penalties compared to everyone else in my class I was able to take the M4 class win. Here is the only shot from the weekend, and then a few links from 100AW since I finally got the videos uploaded. All videos show atleast one of our cock ups so enjoy.



Stage 1




Stage 6




Stage 13




Stage 14