S.O. Life: Testing times

On Wednesday we took the Uni's global light race car testing at Mallory park as part of our data logging module. The Aim was to try out the rebuilt car, now running on FI instead of carbs and gain some data in order to write a technical report on all aspects of data logging and data analysis. The global light is an awesome little car, running lap times of around 48 sec it is easy to upset bigger and better cars, and with our fearless driver who loves nothing more than showing up a bigger car it gets driven hard.

The cockpit of the beasty, very spartan but has the essentials: a rev counter, sequential shifter, brake bias valve and temp gauge.

Powered by a Yamaha R1 engine, modified to run on throttle bodies and megasquirt rather than carbs, the car is a really light and powerful package. With high end brakes and Ktech tuned Ohlins suspension, which cost around £500 a corner before modification, the car has awesome handling and awesome stopping power and that's before you factor in the real aero devices on the car.

Sadly the car only made it out for two sessions. The driver complained of "excess camber" on one rear wheel. On inspection it turned out the split pin which holds stops the hub nut from coming loose had sheered, allowing the hub assembly to become loose and allow the wheel to move around. After a speedy repair the car went back out but after the next session a drive shaft UJ was found to be unserviceable and the car was put retired.

All in all a mixed day but the car ran well and put in decent lap times and we were able to gather enough data for the report. Win, win!