As mentioned in another thread, when YOU say something, David, I am more likely to believe it. However....... this time YOU are wrong!
The reason WHY lateral weight distribution matters less in a kart than on many other types of vehicles is simple: we are VASTLY smaller and the driver-weight is a MUCH larger percentage of the total weight in a kart than in ANY other class of 4-wheel-motor-racing!
Just TRY it for yourself:
1) Set a kart up on 4 scales, and JUST move your head and see the diferences in the weights.
2) Set up a (for example) a Formula Ford in the same way and THEN move your head. Now copmpare the percentage of the changes!
What you will see is that the change in the FF is barely noticeable but the change in the kart if VERY (and surprisingly so) noticeable!
On top of that, just TRY moving your weight around in the seat in an FF when you are strapped in securely, Errrrrr..... precisely WHERE are the belts in a kart preventing body movement....?
So, as you will have seen, the effect in a kart is VASTLY increased compared to cars and the AMOUNT of involuntary movement in a kart seat is GREATER than in most cars. Thus the weight distribution is VASTLY more 'dynamic' in a kart than in a car!
Seccondly, there is a HUGE difference between front-rear weight distributiuon effects compared to lateral effects; why? Because we do NOT race on many figure-of-eight circuits! You already know (or SHOULD know!) that, on all NON-f-o-8 circuits, there are 360 degrees more 'Lefts' than 'Rights' (or vice versa depending on clock or anti-clock). Taken to extreme, an Oval track (e.g., Rockingham Banked Circuit) there are ONLY left-hand corners and precisely 360 degrees of them. However, the old version of Kimbolton used to have precisely ONE Left corner of 30 degrees and 390 degrees of RIGHT hand corners. This was SO extreme that, on cold days, you would arrive, once per lap, at the ONLY left corner and discover your right front tyre had cooled in the previous lap to ICE cold and your turn-in ability had VANISHED! We used to get round the problem by 'STAGGERING' (I know that's not the precise meaning of the word 'stagger' but it will DO, here) the tyre pressures, weighting and other less-legal methods.
Similarly, tracks like the old-Buckmore had some SUPER critical right hand corners but only had two (UN-important) Lefts, we thus used to 'stagger' the karts (e.g., mis-match the rear-tyre sizes) so that the losses on the bad-handling-lefts were VASTLY outweighed on the improved-handling-rights.
You also know that many circuit cars are 'staggered' in this way.
My Point?.....:-
While NON-f-o-8 tracks can benefit from running 'staggered' handling, then there is NO reason to ASSUME that MATCHED left and right weighting is ANY sort of benefit!
The MOST perfect example of this can be see in THIS car:-
http://www.thememorabiliaexperience.com/vintage-f1-artwork/tributetoford.jpg
The Lotus 38.
For those who don't know, YES, the left hand suspension is VASTLY Longer than the right.... because it was used on ovals!
So.... until you can show WHY you should maintain IDENTICAL weight distribution on a kart when they NEVER (bar old-Thruxton) experience the SAME number of degrees of left and right corners, then your argument remains un-proven!
You COULD anwser that '50:50 is a good STARTING point' and we MIGHT agree on that becasue it is EXACTLY that...... a STARTING point..... from which you intend to deviate with experience!
So.... why do I care about the front-rear distribution.... and NOT the left-right? The answer is simple..... The number of left and right cornbers have NO effect on the front'-rear distibution! Secondly, we ALREADY agree that we 'STAGGER' the front-rear weighting to give a rear-bias! We do this becasue the front and rar do different JOBS on a kart........ and if you think THAT through, you'll see that leads BACK to the previous point..... BECAUSE the left and right sides of the kart do different jobs on 99% of kart circuits, it would be BONKERS to assume that the two sides would NEED to be IDENTICAL!
It's not that we do not need to KNOW the lateral distribution.... it's your implied assumption that they need to be IDENTICAL..... when they do NOT!
Have you NEVER set the tyre pressures differently on the left compared to the right...........? If you have, you have gone part-way to accepting my point!
Ian
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