bernmc
|
 posted on 29/5/08 at 05:15 PM |
|
|
Millbrook Proving Ground: Driver training
I spent Saturday at Millbrook with a company called CAT Driver Training. Fantastic day.
I'm new around here, so don't want to step on any toes, but I wrote a (somewhat long-winded) review of the day for another forum. If
anyone's interested, I'll copy and paste it here.
We spend such a lot of time and money messing with our cars - must be worth spending a bit on the numpty holding the wheel as well  !!!
Excercises included - high speed braking (my fastest stop was from 160ish  !); rapid lane changes; high speed bowl; Millbrook's handling and
Alpine circuits; understeer/oversteer; Caterham Gymkhana.
|
|
|
|
|
nib1980
|
| posted on 29/5/08 at 05:31 PM |
|
|
I'll be interested to read your review.
I spend a lot off time at milbrook with my work, so seeing if peoples opinions is the same as mine is always interesting!
Nib
|
|
|
l0c0st
|
| posted on 29/5/08 at 05:36 PM |
|
|
I'd be interested in reading your review. I'm planning on doing something like this when I get my Indy on the road.
Do you have to use thier cars or do you use your own? How much does it cost?
Cheers Dom
|
|
|
cloudy
|
| posted on 29/5/08 at 05:42 PM |
|
|
Live nearby - let us hear it!
|
|
|
Simon
|
| posted on 29/5/08 at 07:01 PM |
|
|
quote:
Originally posted by bernmc
I'm new around here, so don't want to step on any toes,
I wouldn't worry about that, you can always apologise if you upset someone
Get the review up!
ATB
Simon
|
|
|
JoelP
|
| posted on 29/5/08 at 07:26 PM |
|
|
ditto
|
|
|
bernmc
|
| posted on 29/5/08 at 07:27 PM |
|
|
quote:
Originally posted by l0c0st
I'd be interested in reading your review. I'm planning on doing something like this when I get my Indy on the road.
Do you have to use thier cars or do you use your own? How much does it cost?
You can do either. This day was £340ish based on 8 people sharing two instructors, and in our own cars. I went as part of the GTR Owners CLub. CAT
have a race-prepped Subaru Impreza and an Elise that can be used. They also have a caterham but only use this on the skidpan.
Full (verbose) review coming up...
|
|
|
bernmc
|
| posted on 29/5/08 at 07:31 PM |
|
|
As a starter...
Here's the video of Colin Hoad, Head Honcho doing some of the activities of the day:
CLick
I babble on about them all below...
Starts off with the Alpine circuit. Watch the steering wheel as he enters the course, and you'll see what I mean by 'single input
steering' - he won't move the wheel all through dip and hill until he has to turn right.
There's a boring bit on the high speed bowl in the middle, but if you FF to 5:20, you'll see the hands-free manoeuvre!
5:40 on is the handling circuit. Knowing how narrow and tricky this is, the speed he goes around it is incredible. Have a look at how the passenger is
being thrown about to get an idea of how fast he's going. Also listen for comments along the lines of 'two corners, one input'.
Must have been taken with a minder in the car as you're not allowed to video.
[Edited on 29/5/08 by bernmc]
|
|
|
bernmc
|
| posted on 29/5/08 at 07:32 PM |
|
|
100 ton limit over bridge...
Fortunately, there’s no such limit beneath it, where I'm doing exactly a ton... and the lunatic next to me has just told me to take both hands
off the steering wheel! Welcome to Millbrook, and CAT Advanced Driver Training.
***
I’m at Millbrook with 8 other members of the GTR club for a day with CAT Driver Training. It’s essentially a day of ‘tasters’ of what CAT has to
offer, and an opportunity to do things with your car that you would never dare on the public road, all within the bounds of a purpose built vehicle
test facility... ‘a 750 acre playground’ as one of the instructors puts it .
Millbrook is owned and run by General Motors. Security is tight, and there are no cameras allowed. Try taking a sneaky snap of one of the prototypes
or test vehicles you’ll come across during the course of the day, and expect to face a charge of industrial espionage. As it’s a vehicle test facility
rather than a recreation area, there aren’t any spectator areas, little or no runoff , and sections of fresh barrier bare testament to recent driver
indiscretions.... Good thing that no-one has had an accident on a CAT course then!
The day starts off in some of the best hospitality facilities that I’ve ever experienced on a driving day. Hot and cold drinks are on tap, enough
chocolate and biscuits to double your waistline, and an excellent lunch will appear throughout the day. Even the portable toilets are good enough for
a hotel!
Head Honcho Colin runs through a safety briefing, and then gets down to the business of vehicle dynamics. He comes from a background of motor racing
and vehicle evaluation, so has an intimate knowledge of what makes a car tick. This is one of the things that impressed me most about the day –
there’s a huge amount of technical information, with emphasis on why what we do makes the car react the way it does. The focus is on smoothness,
balance, and achieving what you set out to achieve with minimal input.
While we’re being lectured, CAT’s own engineer is busy going through each of our cars with a fine toothed comb, checking tyre tread, pressures, fluids
and so on. He’s around for the day to help if anything falls off, and will recheck all the cars again when the fun is over, so you can drive home in
safety. It’s this level of customer care and attention to detail that sets CAT apart from any other ‘driving day’ I’ve experienced. They really do go
to extraordinary lengths to make the day a success.
Talking over, and its game on! There are two instructors for the day, so the group of 8 splits into two groups of four, and we’re off to probably the
most famous strip of tarmac in the UK – Millbrook’s Mile Straight. Get excited about the acceleration figures that your favourite car mag churns out
every month? Chances are they were done here. It’s the site of the day’s first event: Threshold braking.
As with all the events, we start off with a demo by our instructor, so we all pile into the Ford repmobile for a few eyeball-popping high speed stops.
Then it’s time to go one-to-one with the instructor in your own car. The idea here is firstly to learn to stop with the help of ABS. ‘Once you hit
70mph, hit the pedal like you hate it’ says Nick, my guru for the day. ‘You obviously don’t hate it much’ he quips after my first feeble attempt. Once
you realise you’ve probably never braked as hard as you could have ever before, you go on to learn to threshold brake – that is braking with the
maximum pedal pressure that just keeps from triggering the ABS. Get it right, and you’ll stop quicker than you can with ABS. And 70mph is the slowest
stop of the exercise – you soon move on to 80, then 90, and then 100. Braking has to be smooth and consistent, and in a straight line. I found that I
tensed my arms when hitting the brake pedal, which made the car squirm. As I learned to relax, the car stopped in a straight line. It’s not something
I would have picked up on my own.
Translate this to the track, and if you can brake consistently and to the car’s maximum potential, you can do the same thing at every corner, every
lap.
Of course, while all this is going on, your instructor is learning how well you and your car stop, so that when the time comes for the finale and he
says ‘you’re just going to have to trust me on this one...’ he knows exactly what he’s doing.
The final run is absolutely flat out down the mile straight with a stop at the end. ‘This is your car – you do it how you want to’ says Nick. Want to
launch at 6000 rpm and blast away? Prefer to do a gentler rolling start? Entirely up to you. I haven’t had the courage or opportunity to do a full
launch in safety in the GTR, so this was my chance, and I wasn’t going to pass it up. Somewhere around 6000 rpm, I discover that all that money spent
on the twin-plate carbon clutch is worthwhile as the Skyline leaps forward with a banshee howl and chirp of the rear tyres. ‘That was pretty near
perfect’ says Nick as I concentrate on getting my gear changes in before the 8000rpm redline comes up. 100mph flies by and we’re nudging 160 when the
end of the straight starts to look awfully close and I’m wondering if Nick has lost his voice, had a stroke from all the excitement, or is just plain
crazy! There’s no moaning or snoring from the passenger seat, so I’m just settling on option three when he says ‘BRAKE!’ and I slam on the anchors.
The car pulls up without drama and with at least 50m to spare. 15 minutes in the car, and Nick already knows the GTR (and me) better than I do.
I’ve heard a lot about how bad the standard Brembo setup is on the R33-GTR, but after my time with CAT, I can only conclude that it’s operator of the
pedal that must be at fault. I’m running Motul RBF600 brake fluid, Ferodo DS2500 pads, and standard disks. The car performed faultlessly stop after
high speed stop. No smoke, no fade. Apart from the blue discs and enough radiant heat to sunbathe in, you’d never have known what we’d been up to.
Next on the program was the High Speed Bowl, where we’d practice rapid lane changes, and then learn to lose our licence hands free! As with all the
activities, it starts with a familiarisation jaunt in the CAT repmobiles, and then it’s back into your own car for the real thing.
The first exercise involves travelling at 30mph in a lane, and then having to swerve into the adjacent lane as quickly as possible. You’d be surprised
at how violent this manoeuvre feels. And at how well the car handles it. Again, I’m sure that if I’d have had to do it for the first time in an
emergency on the road, I’d never have turned the wheel enough – either to turn out of the lane, or more importantly to turn back into the next lane.
Once you’re happy at 30, you do the same thing at 40. Interestingly, the Skyline felt better at 40 than it did 30 – we suspected this was due to the
rear wheel steering coming into play.
Intestine shaking shenanigans over, we move over to the high speed lanes of the bowl. Again, it’s up to the individual driver to go as fast as they’re
comfortable - there’s no pressure to go at a certain speed. One of CAT’s mantras for the day is ‘look where you want to go, not where you’re going’.
This is especially important on the high speed bowl – at 150mph in the banked outside lane, you’re practically looking out of the side window, and you
feel like you’re almost vertical! Look at the barrier, and surprise surprise, that’s where you start heading! Once again, the GTR is impressive at
speed. It is completely stable and unruffled.
The bowl is designed so that in each lane, at a certain speed, you should be able to take your hands off the steering wheel and the car will continue
to travel in that lane without any steering inputs. Accelerate slightly, and the car will move further up the bank. Decelerate and it moves down. It
just so happens that this speed is 100mph in the outer lane. It’s still a huge leap of faith to gently lift your hands away from the wheel while
travelling at a speed that would get you an instant ban from PC Plod. But the adrenaline rush leaves you with the biggest grin afterwards...!
And once again, your instructor has been learning how you and your car handle turning and travelling at high speed. All the better to guide you when
you get to the next two events. Cunning devils!
|
|
|
bernmc
|
| posted on 29/5/08 at 07:33 PM |
|
|
Sadly, we have had our first car casualty of the day. One of the R33’s, barely 1500 miles after an engine rebuild, sounds like it’s spun a big-end
bearing. Once again we see CAT customer service in action. Their own Subaru Impreza is already burbling quietly to itself as it warms up, and the CAT
staff are busy on the telephone trying to find a recovery vehicle that can lug the Skyline several hundred miles back to the engine builder. The
distances involved mean that the car’s owner will have to leave at around 2pm, but Bossman Colin practices his dieting technique, cuts his lunch
short, and heads out with him in the Impreza for some extra tuition before he has to leave.
For the rest of us, it’s on to the Handling circuit. Like all of Millbrook’s circuits, every piece of road and every corner has a purpose. Each is
designed to test a different aspect of the car. It’s one of the things that makes the facility so good for driver training.
So for example, one of the corners on the handling circuit is specifically designed to induce understeer. The surface is less grippy, and the road is
banked to promote agricultural expeditions. There are slow transitional bends (left-right) and fast transitional bends. Blind crests, decreasing
radii... drive Millbrook’s circuits and you should encounter every kind of corner that road and track can throw at you.
As always, we start off slowly following our familiarisation drive. The circuit feels tiny and very intimidating. There’s no run off. But all that
morning messing about means that my instructor now knows me and my car so well that it isn’t long before we’re flying around the track. (Well, it
feels like I’m flying – Nick’s granny could probably do it quicker!). There’s a constant stream of advice from the passenger seat – ‘Brake here in a
straight line’, ‘turn as soon as you see the corner’, ‘look at where you want to go, not where you’re going’. I’m amazed at how well the CAT staff
manage us after such a short time in the car with us. They generate huge self confidence. And if they feel things are getting a bit ragged, they
simply slow you down, go back to the basics, and build up again.
Nick is enthusing about how well my car is set up – it’s one of the things that makes the biggest impression on me on the day. Hearing that your car
is behaving well from a pro is wonderful! Now, if only we can sort out the nut holding the steering wheel...!
I never managed to get the whole course right – I’m too much of a slow learner to pick things up in a few laps - but the feeling when you manage to
get a couple of corners in a row just right is simply amazing! The car just feels sublime, and you realise you’re beginning to feel the weight and
balance shift around as you get it right or wrong, whatever the case may be. It makes you want to go back and have another go. Again and again!
Unfortunately, there’s not much opportunity to do that on a group day. With three other people waiting for their turn with Yoda, time is strictly
limited.
And the Alpine Route awaits. The Handling Circuit is pretty flat, with some short stretches of gradient. The Alpine route is a rollercoaster. Hills,
valleys, blind crests, trees, barriers... my heart is in my mouth as we plunge down the first valley and up the hill on the other side. It’s an
opportunity to practice ‘single input steering’. ‘Look ahead, and turn once’ says Nick as we enter the course. And throughout that long dip and rise
up the other side (it feels like miles!), the road curves gently and the steering wheel stays still in my hands. It’s another one of those ‘Wow! This
really works’ moments that seem to occur throughout the day. Once again, Nicks gentle instruction is confidence inspiring: ‘Aim for the third post,
brake in a straight line’, ‘turn now’, ‘power, power, power’... once again I never manage to get the whole route right, but I get most corners right
at least once. There’s a perfect lap in there somewhere.
Nick mentions that we were hitting 90 through some bits, which given the narrow, twisty nature of the course amazes me. When the car is balanced
properly, it just feels natural.
The day finishes off with some oversteer/understeer training on a big chunk of concrete pad, followed by a round of hooliganism in CAT’s Caterham.
This all takes place next to CAT’s catering facilities, so we finally get to watch the other members of the group performing – something that you
can’t do on the handling/hill circuits.
We spend some time going around in circles at silly speeds, learning just how good the Skyline is at not letting go. You have to be pretty violent
with the car to get it to oversteer, and even then it sets about sorting things out pretty smartly. I’d have liked a bit of time to play around with
the Torque Split Controller, but again, it’s a group day and we have to move on.
I’m first up to make a fool of myself in the Caterham Gymkhana! Cones mark out a wacky circuit which includes a slalom (don’t look at the cones, look
at the gaps !) and a dainty little pirouette around a cone (not!). You get a practice run (two if you’re first up) and two timed runs. Penalties for
going astray or hitting cones (and it’s surprisingly easy to go astray)! If you’re too tall or have eaten too many pies to fit in the Caterham, you
get to do the course in the Impreza instead.
4000rpm off the line with a squeal of tyres, and I impress myself by managing to remember where to go! The unservo’d brakes catch me out a bit, but I
don’t hit any cones, and I don’t spin. Again, I never get the whole course right, and seem to fluff the entry into the slalom every time. I need
another go! My time improves by around 9 seconds between the sighting and final run so I’m pleased that I’m progressing.
It’s great fun to watch the rest of the group have a go. From the careful, measured approach to the bull-in-a-china-shop technique, there’s plenty to
laugh about!
All-in-all, a great day out. Well worth it. I’ve already booked a return !
|
|
|
JoelP
|
| posted on 29/5/08 at 07:55 PM |
|
|
sounds fun!
|
|
|
|
