Chassis – Serpent 4X
Motor – Speed Passion Competition V4
ESC – Speed Passion GT2
Batteries – MaxTime 6500 mAh
Tires – Volante (handout)
Radio/Servo – Sanwa
Bodyshell – Protoform LTC-R
Remarks – Carrying on the development of Serpent’s “Project 4X”, Swedish ace Viktor Wilck is running a pre-production version of the car with a prototype chassis that features more cuts. Updated since Viktor’s latest ETS outing, the car now features front and rear bulkhead stiffeners and a new motor mount with different links to prevent any tweak.

Thursday practice

I prepared 2 different Project 4-X cars, both with the flex type chassi ( with more cut outs). As we still need to learn more with the new car, we prepare 2 cars, so we can test things even faster. I work intensively together with designer – racer David Ehrbar and every test and race we learn to make use of the new Project 4-X car better.

4-X car 1 we made with harder roll damper oil and harder spring. The other car was the 4-X EC car we ran at the same track for the EC. Car 1 was a little faster but not yet perfect. As next step we made the front more narrow and made a softer diff and now the 4-X car was better again and we could do fast laptimes to give it 5th or 6th position speedwise.

Qualifying

I chose to run the EC car, but with same changes as on car 1. Set-up still very similar tot he Ec set-up but with a ittle harder rear roll-damper spring (7.6), front (6.4). I decided to skip 1st round to save the tires for new in round 2 and 4. This is optimal strategy as most people use new tires in round 1 and 3. I could not make best use of the strategy , so I had to settle for 9th overall for final ! I had expected to qualify around 5th or 6th in the final as the speed was pretty good.

Finals

For the finals we decided to change setup as we needed even better pace, sof or the 1st final l I changed to little softer rear oil 1500->1200, and harder front 2000->3000. The pace remained about same as qualifying. Position 9.

2nd final changed to more droop front and rear for more roll and steering, also more rrs shims to get more toe-in change in rear! This was little better and pace was similar to the others. Car was more difficult to drive. Position 5.

Last final changed to little less droop in front 0.5->2mm, this was again a step back as I lost a lot of steering! Position 7.

I ended the ETS ranking overall for this season in 11th. We are making good progress with the completely new concept of the Project 4-X car. To be in the a-mains with such a new type of car shows the potential is there.

The Wc in China will be the next major race and we still have a good test program ahead to preparet in the best way. High grip and very high temperatures will make it a very challenging WC.

Viktor Wilck