Source: http://www.metrof1.com/blogs/metrof1/2011/11/kimis-back.html
Thursday 31 May 2012
Fiat Drag car
This is one that i wasnt quite happy with so i dug through my parts box and found a nice blower and hat, some chrome wheels, and a moon tank. I pulled her apart and dug in! It doesnt have much detail but im happy with how it came out. Enjoy
Source: http://cs.scaleautomag.com/SCACS/forums/thread/1017493.aspx
62 Custom Vette......It's Finished.............5/30
Going to build a custom Vette..........................................................
More coming soon..........................
Source: http://cs.scaleautomag.com/SCACS/forums/thread/1014489.aspx
Coffee and the newspapers…
Perusing the international press this morning over coffee, I was struck by two stories that are unrelated to Formula 1 but interesting in their implications. The first was from Hong Kong where London-based jeweller Graff Diamonds has announced that it is delaying its $1 billion share sale in Hong Kong, citing adverse market conditions. The [...]
Source: http://joesaward.wordpress.com/2012/05/31/coffee-and-the-newspapers/
FIA’s Technical Working Group to discuss RBR controversy on Monday
Protests against the controversial hole in the Red Bull floor failed to materialise after the Monaco GP, despite rival teams indicating that they are not happy with it. However sources have told this writer that the matter will be discussed … Continue reading 
Alonso the new favourite
 Fernando Alonso is the new favourite for the title |
“He is the man with the momentum and, on the same basis that I backed Mark Webber to win the title before Korea, is now my favourite to claim the world title in Abu Dhabi on Nov 14. “When the cars are so evenly-matched you have to back the man in possession. Especially when that man is a two-time world champion and arguably the finest driver of his generation.”The Mirror’s Byron Young drew comparisons between Alonso and seven-time world champion Michael Schumacher as the Spaniard bids to become the sport’s youngest ever triple world champion.
“Like Schumacher, Alonso accepts no opposition within his team. Ultimately he fell out with McLaren over their refusal in 2007 to bring Lewis Hamilton to heel. “He returned to Renault on condition he was No.1, only to be at the centre of the Singapore cheat scandal - engineered to hand him victory. “The Spaniard has always denied involvement but at the German GP in July he was brazen enough to radio Ferrari to rein in team-mate Felipe Massa so he could start the winning streak that has taken him to the brink of history.”
Source: http://blogs.espnf1.com/paperroundf1/archives/2010/10/alonso_the_new_favourite_1.php
post all your 4x4 trucks
Wanting to build a Mudbogger or mud dragger. need some ideas
Source: http://cs.scaleautomag.com/SCACS/forums/thread/864908.aspx
Vettel collision: A champion under pressure?
Sebastian Vettel's behaviour during and after the Malaysian Grand Prix has been causing a bit of a fuss in Germany over the past few days.
The media have lapped up his response to his collision with backmarker Narain Karthikeyan, in much the same way as their British counterparts would have done with a similar incident involving Lewis Hamilton, and Vettel has come in for a fair bit of criticism.
On the BBC after the race, Vettel called Karthikeyan an "idiot" for his role in the collision that cost the world champion fourth place.
Speaking in German, the word he chose was "cucumber" - a common insult in that country for bad drivers on the road.
Vettel faces increased competition from outside and inside his Red Bull Team. Photo: Getty/AFP
It has also been pointed out that shots from Vettel's onboard camera appear to show the 24-year-old Red Bull driver giving Karthikeyan a middle-finger salute as he drives past. This has led some to call for him to be punished by governing body the FIA, which so far is keeping a low profile on the matter.
Comparisons have been drawn with McLaren's Jenson Button - who also failed to score any points in Malaysia, but who reacted with his usual calm.
Vettel, some in Germany have said, doesn't know how to lose.
They point out that last year he won 11 races on his way to one of the most dominant championship victories in Formula 1 history. Failing to win four races in a row in that context, the critics say, should not elicit this kind of reaction.
Vettel has not spoken in public since leaving Malaysia, and Red Bull are shrugging it off.
After the race on Sunday, team principal Christian Horner defended Vettel's driving in the collision with Karthikeyan, saying that it was the Indian's "responsibility to get out of the way of the leaders as he is a lapped car".
Although the stewards penalised Karthikeyan for the incident, others are not sure it's quite so clear-cut.
One leading F1 figure told me: "It was completely Vettel's fault - he needed to give Karthikeyan more space. He only had to clear the last inch and he cut across the front of him. He was showing a bit of frustration and it bit him."
Certainly Vettel has found himself at the start of 2012 in a situation with which he is not familiar.
Vettel has had the fastest car in F1 since at least the middle of 2009, and he has used it to good effect.
But now things are different. Red Bull's new car is not a match for the McLaren, and it has also been behind one Mercedes and one Lotus on the grid in each of the first two races.
For a man who is as driven to win - to dominate even - as Vettel is, that will not be a comfortable situation.
Nor will it have escaped his attention that team-mate Mark Webber has so far out-qualified him in both races this year - again, quite a turnaround from 2011, when the Australian managed it only three times in 19 grands prix.
It is early days, but so far the comparison between the two Red Bull drivers looks much more like it was in the first part of 2010 - before the team started fully exploiting the exhaust-blown diffusers that dominated the last 18 months and which have been banned for this season.
Webber was never that comfortable in last season's Red Bull - and while he came to match Vettel on race pace in the second half of last season, he never really got on terms with him in qualifying.
Much of that was to do with the behaviour of the car on corner entry, where the exhaust-blown diffusers were so powerful in increasing performance.
Red Bull's decline has also coincided with the stiffening of the front-wing load test, an attempt to stop teams allowing the ends of the wing to droop towards the track at speed to increase downforce. Red Bull were noticeably better at doing this than the other teams.
It may be an unrelated coincidence, but this year's Red Bull suffers from understeer, a lack of front-end grip - a handling characteristic Webber is comfortable with, while Vettel prefers oversteer.
This is not the first time Vettel has been criticised for letting his emotion get the better of him when things are not going his way.
There was the infamous 'nutter' sign he directed at Webber following their collision in the 2010 Turkish Grand Prix.
There were also mistakes in Britain, Belgium and Singapore that year as he very nearly gifted the world title to Ferrari and Fernando Alonso, who lost it only after a strategic error in the final race.
Such was Vettel's domination in 2011 that it never arose- leading some to say he had reached a new level of maturity both in and out of the car.
The truth of that claim looks set to be tested this year, as Red Bull and Vettel struggle to regain a position that the driver at least seems to consider is rightfully his.
Meanwhile, his rivals will have been watching with interest.
Webber, Alonso, Button and Hamilton remember Vettel's behaviour in 2010 all too well.
Betraying his emotions in such an obvious way will be seen by them as a weakness - they will look at it and think he is rattled.
So it is true to say on the one hand that Vettel's reaction proves he is a winner.
But it is also the case that learning how to lose gracefully - as Button and Alonso, particularly, have learnt in recent years - has its benefits as well.
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/andrewbenson/2012/03/vettel_collision_a_champion_un.html
Wednesday 30 May 2012
The right race in the wrong place?
Sebastian Vettel gave this already fascinating Formula 1 world championship another huge twist at the Bahrain Grand Prix with his first victory of the season.
What looked for a while like it might turn into a carbon-copy of so many of the Red Bull driver's wins on his way to the title last year - pole, blitz the start, consolidate lead - turned into a fascinating battle with the Lotus of Kimi Raikkonen.
The Finn showed all his old skill and consistency as he climbed from 11th place on the grid to take second place. In so doing, Raikkonen finally delivered on the potential of a car that has looked capable of this sort of result since the start of the season and proved he has lost nothing in his two years away in rallying.
The result, and a nightmare race for McLaren, leaves the championship finely poised going into a three-week break before the Spanish Grand Prix, with Vettel leapfrogging from fifth overall to first and only a handful of points covering all the top five.
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All of this, though, has been completely overshadowed by the situation outside the track, and the controversy over F1's decision to return to Bahrain despite ongoing civil unrest in the Gulf state.
The race has dominated the news agenda over the weekend and, for those involved in the sport, it has not been pretty.
Most people could see the situation F1 has found itself in this weekend coming from miles away, but if the sport's bosses did, they are doing a good job of hiding it.
Last year's Bahrain Grand Prix was cancelled following the violent suppression of protests which were part of the Arab Spring that swept across much of the Middle East.
Troubles have continued, despite promises by the ruling royal family to instigate reform following a critical independent report last November, which detailed human rights abuses, including wrongful arrests and torture. Amnesty International says the situation in Bahrain is "not much different" from a year ago.
Yet F1 chose to return, FIA president Jean Todt and commercial boss Bernie Ecclestone believing the claims of the authorities that the situation was much improved and that they could guarantee security.
It did not take long for that last claim to be exposed. Returning from the track on Wednesday evening, down the main highway into the capital Manama, four Force India mechanics were caught between protestors on one side of the road and riot police on the other.
The protestors were throwing petrol bombs at the police, who were responding with tear gas. Petrol bombs flew over the car, and one landed worryingly close.
The whole incident lasted no more than two or three minutes, but it clearly spooked those involved - and the rest of their team, who subsequently chose to skip second practice on Friday so they could return to their hotels before dark. A decision made despite an intervention by Ecclestone.
Most F1 personnel encountered no trouble. But the unrest continued throughout the weekend, and on Friday night a protestor was killed.
Vettel, who had described the controversy over the race as "hype" when he arrived on Thursday, was forced to think again. "It's always dreadful when someone dies," he said after qualifying on pole position.
For all the protestations from Todt and Ecclestone about sport staying apart from politics, the grand prix has become part of the argument in Bahrain.
The protests are not specifically directed at the race, but it is seen as a legitimate target because it is so closely identified with the ruling Sunni royal family, who set it up as a global promotional tool for the country and by extension their regime.
The race organisers - effectively the royal family themselves - have overtly politicised the event by promoting it with posters using the F1 logo in the middle of the slogan "UniF1ed", in a country that is clearly anything but.
Protests have targeted Formula 1 both inside Bahrain and across the world. Photo: Getty
Ecclestone's and Todt's responses to this - that they cannot control how people promote their races (Ecclestone) or that the slogan can be interpreted in lots of ways (Todt) - are debatable at best. Some have called it sophistry.
If F1's bosses thought they could go to Bahrain, pick up the huge pay cheque for the race, and get out without any damage to their or the sport's reputation, they have been disabused of that notion in the starkest terms.
On Saturday, Mercedes team boss Ross Brawn - who, behind the scenes, has been one of the senior figures most opposed to holding the Bahrain race - said F1 "with proper judgement of what happened and what we saw needed to come to a conclusion".
I am told by senior insiders that the many of the sport's bosses have been staggered by the extent to which the sport's name has been dragged through the mud this weekend, as well as the focus on it by major global news organisations.
Quite apart from the obvious moral and personal safety issues involved, this is clearly a commercial concern. F1 is selling a dream and an aspiration. But the dream has this weekend become a nightmare - and there has been nothing aspirational about the image the sport has presented to the world.
F1 being what it is, if anything will make them wake up to the potential consequences of racing in Bahrain, that will be it.
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/andrewbenson/2012/04/the_right_race_in_the_wrong_pl.html
Massa: The truth will emerge in Melbourne
Ferrari’s Felipe Massa has been speaking about his team’s preparations for the 2012 Formula 1 season. Check out our Ferrari review for 2011! The Brazilian – who will take part in testing this week – believes that he will try many new ideas as they look to find a winning formula for the season ahead. [...]
'87 Buick Regal convertable
Here's a Grand National i converted into a Regal. I bought the kit from someone who had already chromed the bumpers and grill. The body is resin, I just cut the top off, the resin hood was warped, so I cut the bulge out of the kit hood and smoothed it. The continental kit was given to me by a friend, the boot was made by me and cast in resin. I lowered the suspension and color matched the wheels from Pegasus. 
Source: http://cs.scaleautomag.com/SCACS/forums/thread/1012552.aspx
American Muscle Car Parking
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American Muscle Car Parking originally appeared on topspeed.com on Wednesday, 30 May 2012 09:59 EST.
Source: http://www.topspeed.com/car-games/car-games/american-muscle-car-parking-ar130284.html
Become an F1 Fanatic Supporter: Annual subscriptions now available | F1 Fanatic
Become an F1 Fanatic Supporter: Annual subscriptions now available is an original article from F1 Fanatic. If this article has been published anywhere other than F1 Fanatic it is an infringement of copyright.
You can now pearly yearly for ad-free subscriptions to F1 Fanatic. Become an F1 Fanatic Supporter now.
Become an F1 Fanatic Supporter: Annual subscriptions now available is an original article from F1 Fanatic. If this article has been published anywhere other than F1 Fanatic it is an infringement of copyright.
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/f1fanatic/~3/RsB0q9fEkxA/
Robert Kubica Hospitalised Following Rally Accident
UPDATE ON KUBICA’s CONDITION: http://wp.me/p3uiu-11K Renault Lotus F1 driver Robert Kubica has been airlifted to hospital following a car accident while competing on a rally. The incident, described as a high speed accident, left the Pole injured and he had to be airlifted to hospital. His co-driver Jakub Gerber was uninjured in the incident. While [...]
Source: http://f1fanatics.wordpress.com/2011/02/06/robert-kubica-hospitalised-following-rally-accident/
Nissan Dummies Down Tire Pressure
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Remember when TPMS was just a cool feature on BMW, GM, and Mercedes vehicles? In 2006, the NHTSA and DOT came together to make it a law for all incoming 2007 vehicles to have direct TPMS standard. When this happened, the tire industry released a collective “Oh man, are you serious?” Well, now another company is taking the simplifying of tire pressure an extra step beyond a flashing indicator saying “Hey, put some air in the tires, please!”
That’s right; starting with the 2013 model year, Nissan will include a system that actually activates the horn when the tires have reached their correct pressure on all of its cars. This all comes on the heels of a successful test of the system on the 2013 Altima. No more “confusing” tire pressure gauges to fumble around with. In all seriousness though, this is actually an ingenious idea. When I was in the tire business, you have no idea how many times a customer would roll up asking us to put 44 psi in his 1995 Cavalier’s tires because that’s what the sidewall of the tire says is the max pressure, or his grandfather once told him that more air increases gas mileage.
So now when you are whipping down the road in your 2013 370Z and that pesky “Low Pressure” light starts flashing, you can just fill `er up `till it beeps. Why not take it a step further and just install a small compressor that fires up and adds air to the tire as you drive via a vein that runs through the casting of the rim?
We’re kidding Mr. and Mrs. Automotive Engineer, if that happens we all had better just stay off of the road, because if you can’t inflate your tires due to lack of knowledge, you shouldn’t be driving in the first place. Let’s all hope that never happens.
Click past the jump to read Nissan’s press release.
Nissan Dummies Down Tire Pressure originally appeared on topspeed.com on Wednesday, 30 May 2012 02:00 EST.
Source: http://www.topspeed.com/cars/car-news/nissan-dummies-down-tire-pressure-ar130066.html
Tuesday 29 May 2012
Hellmund hits back in COTA legal dispute
The ongoing battle between Tavo Hellmund and COTA is continuing to boost the coffers of Austin legal firms. Yesterday COTA said that Hellmund had committed in writing to arbitration to settle any dispute, but Hellmund quickly struck back by insisting … Continue reading 
Source: http://adamcooperf1.com/2012/05/25/hellmund-hits-back-in-cota-legal-dispute/
Massa threatened with jail over team orders
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“A public raised on a diet of Emerson Fittipaldi, Nelson Piquet and Ayrton Senna were simply appalled and saddened in equal measure by Massa’s apparent lack of ambition.”
Source: http://blogs.espnf1.com/paperroundf1/archives/2010/11/massa_threatened_with_jail_ove.php
The two Kimi Raikkonens
There are, it turns out, two Kimi Raikkonens.
The public face of the 2007 world champion, who has returned to Formula 1 this season after two years in rallying, is of a monosyllabic, monotone, unsmiling figure, energised only the moment he steps into a racing car.
The one who emerges in private is very different - a talkative, jocular man, who can happily sit and shoot the breeze like anyone else.
As Lotus trackside operations director, Alan Permane has worked closely with Raikkonen since he joined the team last November.
Kimi Raikkonen has been perceived as cold and uncommunicative. Photo: Getty
The 32-year-old Finn, Permane says, "is happy to sit and talk, not only about technical stuff, but laughing and joking and talking rubbish with his engineers about all sorts of stuff".
He is just not interested in any of his dealings with the media and, unlike his rivals, doesn't bother to hide it.
Permane worked with Michael Schumacher and Fernando Alonso through the title-winning years with the team formerly known as both Benetton and Renault. He has been impressed with Raikkonen from the start.
Raikkonen first drove one of the team's cars at the Ricardo Tormo circuit in Valencia in late January. Straightaway the team knew they had something special.
He had not driven an F1 car since the 2009 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, and had no experience of the Pirelli tyres he was using. Yet, after a single installation lap to check the car's systems were working, his first flying lap was within a few 10ths of a second of the fastest lap he would do over the next two days.
The good impressions did not go away.
Permane said, "He has never driven a car with a full load of fuel in it.
"We went from 30-160kg [of fuel load in Valencia] to show him that's the sort of difference you can expect - certainly from qualifying to race it's even bigger than that.
"We calculate the lap time difference the fuel load will make and his first lap was absolutely spot on that difference. That is impressive."
After that, Raikkonen did another 20 laps, each one exactly 0.1secs slower than the last - the lap time lost by tyre degradation.
There is a widespread belief that Raikkonen is as unforthcoming in his technical debriefs as he is in public, but that, too, appears to be a fallacy.
Lotus have found his comments in debriefs to be not only lengthy but very perceptive, too.
He was slightly quicker than new team-mate Romain Grosjean throughout pre-season testing, so it was a surprise that he was about 0.2secs slower than the Franco-Swiss semi-novice in the practice sessions in Melbourne.
Equally, the errors Raikkonen made on his qualifying laps that left him down in 18th on the grid betrayed a certain ring-rustiness, as well as perhaps the pressure he was feeling from Grosjean's pace.
In the race, though, something of the old Raikkonen returned as he fought back up from his low starting position to take seventh place by the end.
Clearly, though, there is more to come.
Raikkonen is not entirely happy with the feel he is getting from the Lotus's steering, but Permane plays down the significance of the problem.
"He's very particular," Permane says. "He knows what he wants and it's not quite to his liking. It's not a million miles away, but we'll get it there."
Raikkonen can drive perfectly well with the steering as it is, but the problem probably does mean that he is driving a little below his maximum.
The question now is, at what level is his maximum?
The reason Raikkonen left F1 in the first place was because he performed for Ferrari for much of 2008 and 2009 way below the level expected of him.
Ferrari, in fact, terminated Raikkonen's contract a year early and paid him not to drive in 2010 so they could bring in Alonso.
The Spaniard has since out-performed Felipe Massa, the man who generally had the better of Raikkonen from the start of 2008 until fracturing his skull in an accident in Hungary in July 2009.
Does this mean Alonso is that much better than Raikkonen? Or that Raikkonen in 2008-9 was a long way below his best? Or that Massa is not the driver he was?
No one knows for sure, but for Raikkonen's comeback to be considered an unqualified success he will have to be able to match his new team-mate's pace.
The fact Lotus have regrouped over the winter and produced one of the year's fastest cars only increases the pressure - it's not so bad to be beaten by a team-mate when you're battling to get into the top 10; but a very different matter when you're fighting for the podium.
That, it appears, is what Lotus are in a position to do.
"We screwed up with the car last year," Permane says, "and we know we've done a lovely car this year, not only aerodynamically, but we've done a nice package mechanically."
So pleased are Lotus with the new E20 that Permane says he "dared to compare it with 2005", when Alonso won the first of his two titles.
That is not so much a measure of Lotus's realistic hopes as a reflection of how much the drivers like the car, and how well it responds to changes.
Nevertheless, the team are confident they can keep up with the break-neck development pace of the likes of McLaren and Red Bull and hold on to their position.
For Raikkonen, the requirement now is prove that he can go with them. So far, the signs are positive.
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/andrewbenson/2012/03/the_two_kimi_raikkonens.html
Alfa Romeo C12 GTS Concept by Ugur Sahin Design
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If you’re trying to rack your brains trying to figure out where you’ve heard the name ’Ugur Sahin’ before, we’ll save you the trouble and tell you that this dude is the same guy behind the design of the Soleil Anadi.
Recently, Sahin’s design house unveiled a new design project, this time based on the Alfa Romeo 8C Competizione, called the C12 GTS Concept.
We don’t need to remind anyone about the design skills of Ugur Sahin Design because their works already do that for them. With the C12 GTS Concept, the objective was to build a project car that not only pays tribute to Alfa Romeo’s famous design characteristics, but do so with a fresh perspective and a sharp eye towards building on the Italian automaker’s appeal.
In terms of its design, the C12 GTS Concept carries Alfa Romeo’s distinctive ’inverted triangle’ grille, a characteristic that underscores the design heritage of the car. The addition of swooping lines, tactically-placed curves, and balanced proportions further enhances the car’s aggressive and sporty appeal. All told, the C12 GTS Concept is being pegged as a bigger 8C Competizione that comes with the looks of a real, head-turning Italian masterpiece.
Similar to the Anadi, Ugur Sahin Design needs an investor to get the C12 GTS Concept off the ground. It took them a few years to do so with the Anadi, but knowing how these guys operate, we’d be very surprised if it takes them the same amount of time to get somebody to build a production model of this stunning concept vehicle.
Lord knows if we had that kind of money to make it happen, we’d be on this project like white on rice.
Alfa Romeo C12 GTS Concept by Ugur Sahin Design originally appeared on topspeed.com on Monday, 28 May 2012 17:00 EST.
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