ALFAGTV6.COM

[MD]

You might find this site really interesting;

http://users.telenet.be/worldstandards/ ... tm#history

[Duk]

I suppose I don't really know any different, but to me, the steering duties require more coordination that the gear changing duties. Being a righty it makes more sense to me to drive on the right hand side of the car.

Maybe driving on the left side of the car promotes ambidexterity in righties?

[MD]

Hi Duk,

I see we use the same logic. Here's part of an article that I am preparing for the OZ forum about the Cab which has not been posted as yet but it makes reference to this subject.

Here's part of what it will say and guaranteed to put the cat amongst the pigeons:-

A sideline story. ( A plug for right hand driving)

Have you ever considered the differences in the muscles we use when we are changing gears in RHD cars vs the LHD cars ? No? Well, in RHD cars when we are selecting for forward motion, we use 1 push muscle for 1st gear and 4 pull muscles for the rest. For forward motion in the RHD cars one would pull to 1st, pull to second, push to 3rd, pull to fourth, and a push to 5th.
Now it is common knowledge that a muscle is stronger when it is pulling as opposed to pushing. It is also a known fact that most people are right handed. Putting these two facts together, you can see that when the right hand is controlling the direction of the car (particularly with no power steering), the arm that has the most power and familiarity is in charge of it. The second thing is that “lesser” favoured arm is delegated to do the duties of shifting which is less important than where the vehicle is going but fortunately it is also able to use the better muscles deployment configuration when selecting all those gears.

..and the final nail in the coffin for LHD?

The majority of tracks in Oz run clockwise. This places the driver’s weight in the best position for effects of centrifugal forces. Furthermore, in the case of the typical Alfa 4 cylinder engine, all the hydraulics can be placed on the drivers side preventing the fluids from boiling from the exhaust manifold’s radiant heat. Having the steering box on the RHS, means you can feed the engine pipe between the firewall and the front crossmember unlike how the factory does it for better flow. Bonus !!

So what has LHD got going for it? Bugger all !! hahhaa

[kevin]

No wonder I cant drive the new kyalami . Its the only anti clockwise track we race on . Trust corporates to screw up the old kyalami my dad designed in the 60's which was clockwise. ( ok it would probably be a bit dangerous now with that very long main straight)
Md I think I must relook at my current driver set up , as I do struggle with the long front wheel drifts through turn 2 and 3 at kyalami compared to fast right sweeps on other tracks. Last time i drove a left hand drive race car I pulled the door handle in panic when searching for the gearlever . The chap behind thought i was trying to bail from the car .

[Duk]

The majority of tracks in Oz run clockwise. This places the driver’s weight in the best position for effects of centrifugal forces.

'cept Bathurst .
Seriously, when my Old Man use to race go-karts, at the major race meets they'd do a few races in the opposite direction (clockwise) instead of the normal track direction (anticlockwise). It adds variety as you effectively have 2 different tracks. I think they could do something similar with the V8 Supercars. Bathurst 'backwards' would be real interesting to watch

So what has LHD got going for it? Bugger all !! hahhaa

ROFL!!!

[MD]

You might well reflect on all this and go yeah, so what! Well pretty much if all the guys have the same impediments then it's a level playing field anyway and so at the end of the day, I don't see it as a being a be all end all and I see nobody is too uptight about it which is just how is should be.

The close scrutiny about shifting mechanics came from doing all the gear shifter modifications to analyze which motion would produce the best gains and then figuring out the geometry.

To replicate the shifting pattern of LHD cars WHILST driving a RHD car (that is to say, 1st and 2nd gear being closest to the driver as opposed to 5th and reverse being closest to the RHD driver) I configured an Alfetta shifter to see how the muscles would react. It took some thinking whilst shifting to do it but it worked ok with the functionality not being as fluent as in the conventional make up.This was as much to do with muscle memory as it was of muscle function.

Any bonus? Well a big one. No bastard could drive my car other than me cause they couldn't figure out the shift pattern. They all tried to take off in 5th !! hahhaa. Good anti theft device !!

Duk, irrespective of which direction Bathurst runs, for me its been going backwards for years and hopefully runs up its own arse one day and then we will see some GENUINE racing like it's meant o be.

Kevin,for the Kayalami track, you may need to revise the suspension settings possibly for toe and left and right tyre pressures compared to what you usually have?

[Duk]

A while ago I saw this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ox2wgHqrNy0 (and damn if the Mazda 787b doesn't sound awesome! I recon it sounds more Ferrari V12 than a Ferrari V12 does . Shame about the commentator flapping his lips mid music).

What I thought was odd, is that despite being a right hand drive, the H pattern gear change is on the driver's right . Perhaps done to accommodate European drivers

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nx55chQW ... re=related shows it a lot better.

[MD]

Perhaps done to accommodate European drivers

You could have a good point there or alternatively, there are mechanical issues down the central tunnel for the shifter and so it's fitted on the RHS.

I seem to remember an early Nissan pulsar hatch coming out with that shift pattern for road use !! What a pain !