Ed Clark Comments

Three words....

OH MY GOD!

So, I'm impressed

Had the first run this evening... and although I'm sure some of it is down to NCS, the car felt very good. Very well balanced, but with a nice and sharp front end. The rear just follows the front happily, and making adjustments to how the car turns mid corner is very easy with the throttle. In some ways, it's too sharp for me at the moment, as I've had my 415's always set up a little, well, safe... and always been looking for a little more steering.

Now the 416 just feels planted, even on the cold and un rubbered carpet I was running on this evening. Just seems happy to rotate about itself, although the rear can was a little loose on occasion (though that might be more track conditions than otherwise). Can't wait to see what happens when the grip is up tomorrow

Had about 5-6 runs this evening, and running 10.5/LiPo ment the runs were quite long. Started out with kit setup, bar short LWT arms. Suprised at how good the car felt, especially considering how far removed the kit setup seemed from what I ran on the 415 (I know, different cars, but the setup principles are the same).

Anyway, worked through some alterations. Moved the rear link to the inner most hole, which helped take a little snappyness out of the rear. And also dropped to 4mm under the front link, which improved even more the front end response.
Next run, I tried the old faithful 415 setup. Tamiya White/Blue springs, and no roll bars... opps. Front end just felt way to soft, like it was falling over itself. Didn't grip very well, and very slopy response. So quickly pulled the car in to have a look what extra springs I had in my pit box. Ended up going with Xray Light blues (~18lb, Tam White are ~15lb, Tam Grey ~20lb), which improved the front end, got it pretty well back to where it was before.
I did feel that the stiffer front was hurting front traction a little, so dropped back to Tamiya whites, but this time put a soft roll bar on the front. Now thats was more like it. Certainly in my eyes, the car likes a stiffer front end than the 415, I guess that can be put down to the improved flex characteristics of the car.

Final run of the night, I simply moved back to Coreys setup (except still in hole 3 in the arms for the shocks), with the kit shock/roll bar settings. Still felt good... but I've moved back to 4mm under the camber link on the front, as I seemed to be a bit more consistent with that. I'm still having a slight issue on some laps with the rear snapping out in one particular corner, when the rear is quite highly loaded. I'm going to try 1mm under the rear inner link tomorrow in an aid to solve that (lower the rear RC a smidge, but also flattens the link reducing camber change).
Other things I'm going to fiddle with tomorrow are rear shock positions (see if I can a difference between std position and one in), Spring/roll bar setup (might try the white/blue soft front bar option again), and lower shock position (if I get time, I'd like to move them out one hole on the arm, to see the difference).

So, plenty to try, but all good so far... believe the hype.

Ed