Im in a crew racing The Sodi World Series and we’ve been using a rubber insert to keep from flogging around in the gigantic hire kart seat. This moves the driver up and forward by over an inch relative to where he / she would sit without it. Can someone tell me please ewhat the change in COG does to the handling?
It’s effect is surely microscopic - but a microscopic change multiplied by a couple of hundred laps is probably worth thinking about.
We’ve discussed buying our own seat insert and cutting the bottom out of it in order to bring the COG down to where Sodi designed it to be, even if we’re still forward of what’s ideal.
Seat position is a big factor in how a kart will handle.
Basically on a setup like you’ve got, moving the driver forward will increase front grip, moving back will increase rear grip.
If a driver needs to be moved forward because they aren’t as tall, having them sit up higher will help too, so I’m not sure you really need to cut the bottom out of your insert.
Are you able to scale the kart with the driver and insert? Can you move ballast around to compensate? A smaller driver will typically sit higher to get a better weight transfer effect to free up the kart to rotate, like you said when you referenced levering the inside rear tire.
Interesting idea Chris. I in fact do have a set of corner weight scales. If the track owner is willing to let me use them I’ll get back to you with the result.
Col? did a very cool video a few years back that talks about this in a roundabout way. Moving weight around. There was an odd conclusion that he arrived at that was somewhat counter intuitive. I’ll see if I can find it.
