The 24 Hours of Lemons Forums → Our Crappy Race → Lamest Day Guess The Effluency Laps contest: Lada versus '61 Cadillac!
We drove 4 sets of tires off the front of our eldo in Reno...what fun would racing be if your not trying. I say they'll finish no more than 90 laps of the leaders...good luck speedycop...keep the caddy legacy alive! not sure on the lada, but the caddy will own it.
Umm. Just to be different, The Lada will do 750, and the Caddy will do 450.
The Lada will try to punt the Caddy off the track and lose.....badly!!!!
So what's the score?
Here's a clue - a Lemons lap of Nelson's will be in the 1:50 to 2:00 minutes / lap range. Fast cars will be in the 1:40's.
Actual times will be depend on traffic and we are going to have PLENTY of traffic, At least at the start.
Don't forget to account for PLENTY of laps under yellow.
Now guess away.
I know the race is over but an official time posted at 11:00 am Sunday had Snoopy's Dog House @ 1:40
Yah... waiting for the score myself.. but both cars did so incredibly well!!!!!!! Lada took the IoE but the Caddy took SOMETHING... I could barely hear Jay at the end.. but both cars basically got recognized and while one got the nickels... Jay ponied up a CHECK for the other!! bonus!
I think we ran a couple of 1:2x:xx but most of our drivers were in the 1:30:00 range on fast laps..
Truth be told the Lada seemed to just keep going, granted slowly, but going and the Caddy, God Bless it!, kept gettin punted. Almost did our favorite bridge, sideways.
Either case, both deserved standing O's for entertainment.
(Beware the repaired Fiesta!! May the FART be with you!)
ciao, ted
Lada: 528 laps
Cadillac: 183 laps
Crud. I was off by 80 laps.
I know the race is over but an official time posted at 11:00 am Sunday had Snoopy's Dog House @ 1:40
Whaaa??? You guys turned a 1:40 in the van?! That's around what we were turning in the Quad4 CRX, which probably weighs about 2,000 pounds less and has about the same horsepower. Jesus.
hey, i was only off by 28 laps on the lada....waaaay too optimistic on the caddy though i did say it would make it to the end. can i haz a cookie?
I personally think you can win this event if you ran 1:40s like clock-work and minimized your pit time. I'm not saying do totally insane stints in the hot-seat or F1-style pressurized fueling but staying on the track and out of trouble will easily get you top 30.
I personally think you can win this event if you ran 1:40s like clock-work and minimized your pit time. I'm not saying do totally insane stints in the hot-seat or F1-style pressurized fueling but staying on the track and out of trouble will easily get you top 30.
Agreed.
It wouldn't hurt to actually drive the car on the public roads before the race, too. There's a lot that could be said for registering a car and using it as a daily driver for a few months, to iron out all the issues. Replace all the brake and other components that don't count toward the total price while you are at it. Heck, if you really want to cheat, you could replace the timing belt, water pump, and head gasket - it's not like the judges check for those things.
At this point, I'm firmly convinced that it's not a matter of speed, but of reliability.
Our best lap in the Lada was 1:46 or something like that. It was hard to carry speed in corners while trying to stay out of everyone's way. I was shocked at the reliability of the car though. Our mechanical failures were as follows.
1. Forgot to torque rear wheel, fell off in the first parade lap... 10 minutes off track
2. Burned points, added ballast resistor, 30 minutes off track
3. Clutch went out of adjustment, 20 minuted off track
The Lada has earned our teams respect and admiration. We didn't have to replace a single part, used the original brakes all around and the car could run again tomorrow with no changes. It ran incredibly cool throughout the race and the oil still looks brand new.
Right after the race, we talked about a hairy engine swap, but after it dragged us around the course for 24 hours without missing a beat, we feel some obligation to it. It would be very sad to see it sitting in the corner of my garage.
Right after the race, we talked about a hairy engine swap, but after it dragged us around the course for 24 hours without missing a beat, we feel some obligation to it. It would be very sad to see it sitting in the corner of my garage.
A Fiat Twin Cam out of a $100 wrecked 124 Spider would probably bolt right in... but, yeah, the car works pretty well as it sits.
At this point, I'm firmly convinced that it's not a matter of speed, but of reliability.
The only thing I can think to say here is "duh". Please don't take offense. 
The Lada... put wider and stickier tires on it. Get the suspension and alignment up to par. Pull as much weight as possible out of it (if you haven't) Drive it like it's a CRX or Miata. No reason that car couldn't at least be a healthy mid-pack car as far as lap times. And no reason it couldn't win a race if it stays reliable, is driven cleanly, and driver changes are kept to a minimum.
The Caddy... well, it's delightfully hopeless!
The only thing I can think to say here is "duh". Please don't take offense.
None taken.
It'll be curious to see what happens once a majority of the drivers actually try to build and drive for reliability....
The Caddy... well, it's delightfully hopeless!
True that. It's also incredibly cool by all accounts, and for sale.
It'll be curious to see what happens once a majority of the drivers actually try to build and drive for reliability....
Ah, but the majority never will! The dark side is strong.
My guess was exactly the opposite of the result. Lada pwned the F out of caddy. Kudos to the Lada guys for keeping it rolling. I thought for sure that crapcan would permanently break. But I know nothing about Ladas and blindly assumed it's a fragile piece of soviet crap. Apparently not....
Agreed that if people do a good check of their cars for potential failure points (like bad ball joints, wheel bearings, water pumps, etc. etc.,) the whole field can be quite reliable. But that's contrary to the Lemons model- pieces of crap that will likely break and let's see who can hold theirs together for 24 hrs.. It's very true that the key to win is to be quick, but more importantly and stay out on the track as long as possible. Plus you have to pit wisely. Pitting under green kills you. Pit under yellow at all costs.
We probably averaged just under 1:40/lap and finished 29th. That clearly wasn't fast enough. Our car ran like shit (strong fuel injector short/hesitation from idle to 3K rpm) so we only had decent power from 3K to 4.5K rev limiter. We only had 3 signficant delays- two offs that required no repair (but had to pit) which included our only black flag (10 min penalty), and a refueling f-up sent us to our off-track pit area on account of spilling too much gas.
All told, our significant delays and other minor ones probably cost us no less than 40 min. and might be close to 1 hr. That's ALOT of time. If the leader is turning 1:30 on average, that's a loss of between 27 and 40 laps to the leader. Then our foolish driver change strategy cost us more time- nobody drove more than 1.5 hrs and we have 5 drivers.
Still, we were just moving right along turning lap after lap. A fast track like that is going to reward the high power:weight cars (that corner well too) as long as they can keep their noses clean and not overdrive the car. Some cars like the pink mustang had some serious GO at their disposal. But our slow ass E30 still beat that car.
The 24 Hours of Lemons Forums → Our Crappy Race → Lamest Day Guess The Effluency Laps contest: Lada versus '61 Cadillac!