Palm Desert Raceway in Palm Desert CA! Very high grip, and high tyrewear when dry, after the dust clears, medium grip with low tyrewear when run wet. Normally they always run it wet I hear.
On our way to Phoenix for the Nitro Challenge 2014 warm up race, Peter Martin and I stopped at Chris Marrale’s home track for some testing. The conditions were tough, and perfect for testing. The track had high grip sections, but due to dust, also low grip sections, and there were some rocks poking through the surface. We ran it dry in order to find a good setup in this challenging condition.
When getting to the track, the car felt edgy, and the rear would just lose traction suddenly due to the dust. I made a few setup changes which really improved the car. I ran AKA soft Impacts which were good.
I moved the front shock out on the arm, which helped with calming down the steering. Another option would have been to increase the front swaybar thickness to 2.5, from 2.3. Sometimes the car doesnt jump as well, or handle bumps as well when moving the shock out, that is when the swaybar change would be a better option. One thing that I did not try, but that could have been good, was to lengthen the front link on the C-hub, in order to smooth out the steering response.
I also moved the rear shock one hole out on the shock tower. This really helped to increase the stability of the car. The rear did not squat as much, and it didn’t get as unsettled going from low grip to high grip or vice versa. Another thing to try on the rear would be one step harder spring, or shortening the link to the middle column on the tower. I didn’t shorten the link, because of the low grip sections of the track.
Below you can see the setup I ran, larger version, and more setups HERE.
THEQuagraine 