Anyone going?

I'm able to get in today as 'trade' today as i'm doing a motorsport course at college

Should be a bit more quite, and hope to get some good pics.

Cheers,
Matt

can u get me a ticket?

Just got back from the NEC, and it was quite good - got some good stuff, like a datalogger, and arranged a few things with a few people. But there wasn't much there worth photographing really, so we didn't take a single picture.

Quote from tristancliffe :

there wasn't much there worth photographing really, so we didn't take a single picture.

hmmm....i heard different (the women) and why didn't you photograph the new VXR Vectra!? i wanted to see that! luckily theres a pic on Crash.net this week

Yeah, I got some quite decent pictures from today. Few nice cars about, oh and got a go on a G25 on one of the sims

Oh and the girls... Eddie Stobart have certainly changed thier image

Was a good day overall, got myself some mechanics gloves for £9.99!

Matt

Flying down tomorrow

I'm getting my dad to drive me down tomorrow.

Granted there were women, but most weren't actually photogenic :P A vectra, vxr'd or not, can never be photoworthy. The Stobart stand was most interesting - talking about how they apply the decals to the cabs The man the HKS stand couldn't understand normally aspirated cars, on another stand someone tried to tell us a car turbo was in fact a gas turbine.

Lots of G25's around, mostly on PS2 F1 sims. Did see netKar running briefly, but resisted the urge to cannon on in and take the mickey

I suppose the nicest cars ranged from the Ascari GT show car thingy, a collection of LeMans cars from the past, the Coys auction arena (which had a Reynard 893 in it that we looked at in great detail), and a few Radical/Caterham/Westfield type cars, some of which looked nicely engineered, some massively overstyled, and some just plain rubbish.

I also took great pleasure in seeing Brunel Universities stand (where I went) had the most appallingly prepared car in the whole show, and was right next to lots of other unis with pristine cars. How I laughed (inwardsly).

At least your uni made an attempt to actually go to the show, my college had no intention at all of going this year...although there was a guy wondering around wearing a National College for Motosport shirt

The Le Mans thing was just awsome, and i loved seeing some of the older cars, like the rally escorts and such.

Matt

Hopefully I'll be going tomorrow, though I've been bed bound with a stomach upset all morning it seems to be clearing.

Quote from tristancliffe :

Did see netKar running briefly, but resisted the urge to cannon on in and take the mickey

Is it a have a drive type of thing? If it is where abouts is it? I'd love to see nK actually working and try out the G25 at the same time.

OT - are G25s really worth that much more than a DFP, IIRC they're about £150 which seems a lot if it's just a DFP with a clutch pedal (already made) and a shifter (tried to make but it's made out of a piece of card, a clothes peg and an ice cream tub to say the least what I'm really concerned about is the quality of the hardware, I'd rather save for a £400 wheel than go for something that'll fall apart like my first Logitech wheel did (bearing disintegrated) and my DFP has started to show some signs of (throttle pedal corner broken off, power lead female (on wheel) iffy.

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I suppose the nicest cars ranged from the Ascari GT show car thingy

I've seen the Ascari tubs destined for the semi-works British GT cars at a local garage (being fitted with rollcages) and they looked absolutely stunningly engineered, if I was going to go for any modern supercar I think they would be near the top of my list, your assured something that isn't going to fall apart, will keep up with any averagely driven super-dupercar and won't make you look like a tw*t like an Enzo. I'd still go for the Radical plus historic racer package if I could afford one not that there's much chance of that

Quote :

I also took great pleasure in seeing Brunel Universities stand (where I went) had the most appallingly prepared car in the whole show, and was right next to lots of other unis with pristine cars. How I laughed (inwardsly).

What course did you do? I know someone, James Downs, who was doing a motorsport engineering course, be a couple of years bellow you though I think.

I just did Mechanical Engineering (BEng). Thought about doing a Masters, but couldn't see any real benefit for me.

The nK stand was, if I remember correctly, on a stand around the edge near the Oval Racing section. I didn't venture into the Oval Racing section, as the thought of mixing with neanderthals with a left turn fixation scared me.

Have they sold any Ascaris yet? As far as I can tell they make a new show car every 6 months, bump the price up, and change the headlights (The Ascari GT thingy seems to have an Ecosse triple headlight conversion to try and cover up the cheap-as-chips Peugeot headlight look).

Quote from tristancliffe :

Have they sold any Ascaris yet? As far as I can tell they make a new show car every 6 months, bump the price up, and change the headlights (The Ascari GT thingy seems to have an Ecosse triple headlight conversion to try and cover up the cheap-as-chips Peugeot headlight look).

No idea but don't forget selling cars/making money is not important to Ascari, it's the play thing of a ridiculously rich (Dutch?) business man.

Quote :

The nK stand was, if I remember correctly, on a stand around the edge near the Oval Racing section. I didn't venture into the Oval Racing section, as the thought of mixing with neanderthals with a left turn fixation scared me.

lol yeah, seen Nascars before, nothing really terribly interesting about them, although I would be interested in looking at dirt track or BRISCA stock cars if they have any. AFAIK they have some BRISCA cars in the live action arena thing which I've got booked for 12pm, is it any good? Never bothered with the shows and things before.

The show was very good, there's nothing like 64 cylinders of stock cars thundering into the first turn. The Aston was awesome too, a V12 bouncing off its rev limiter for a good few seconds. The only disappointing bit was the start, but you'll see that tomorrow.

There's tons of stalls there giving out free stuff (keyrings, posters, pens, etc). Oh, and the Tesco 99 Octane stand giving out free beer. If there isn't someone giving out beer then wait around for a bit, they'll come out soon enough

Quite a few unis there (I don't remember even seeing a car at the Brunel stand, btw) who were giving out lots of info. A very nice Le Mans feature, tons of historic cars, some newer cars and the supercar paddock.

I didn't convince my parents to buy me a Ginetta but they're gonna let me hire one for a test day, I suppose it's good enough

EDIT: I don't think Ascari were there today, at least I didn't see them. Also in the oval racing section is a small drag racing section including a top fuel dragster, funny car, jet car and a junior dragster.

Quote from ajp71 :

(Dutch?) business man.

Yep, a Mr Klass Zwart if I remeber the name correctly.

Commonly found running old (90's) F1 cars in Euroboss, driving himself and running some others IIRC.

Went today spent some worthwhile time gathering info on courses. Live Action show was far better than I expected, stock cars indoors were quite a sight (and noise). Good to see that it was mostly racing rather than just doing donuts and so on as you usually see at these events although I would hate to see the damage bill after 4 days of Palmer Audis, Historic saloons and Jedis racing on a slippy indoor track Twin engined autograss cars were particularly impressive. Only really dull bit of the action thingy was the drifting and Louise Goodman.

Didn't see nK on show or a G25 hooked up to anything that may remotely resemble a simulation. The show has expanded enormously since I last went which can only be a good thing. They've added quite a bit in the way of ricing areas to draw crowds but thankfully they are separate to the main halls. Funniest thing was the flashing LED wheel lights they'd added to the single seaters to please neanderthals.