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Showing results for tags 'Proposing an OAPR ......'.
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Hi guys, From an earlier post you will have noticed that we launched a new concept for 1/24th racing here in our part of the world. It has been named the OAPR (Open Australian Proptotype Racing). It has it's origin in the very successfull OEPS (Open European Prototype Series) as started, organised and inspired by 5 times World Model Car Champion - Nick De Wachter and his team of helpers. This in itself grew from the World Premiere Event held in Toronto, Canada in 2009 where Simon Wakelin and myself campaigned a Porsche RS Spyder (developed by Mr. Kudo in Japan)to an overall 5th position amongst a reduced but formidable world presence: From this first venture onto the world endurance racing scene, ausFORCE went to Germany in 2010 to take on the best of the best in their own backyard: Tim, Werner and I came away with a solid eighth place and made our mark in this class with these wonderful cars: Finally (and hopefully not the last time) ausFORCE again went to the World Endurance Championships in 2011 and this time managed to place an even better 6th place: ....this time amongst teams that have been racing this concept for more than 3 years on a regular basis: Drivers being Tim, Noel and myself: So with all this behind us we decided it was time to bring the concept home and to get something going. Therefore the cars and chassis that you will be introduced to are new and exciting, although a little differrent to make it somewhat simpler for everyone. The idea was to draw on the very succesfull formula of the OEPS, but to start it off by also running the concept cars in sprint racing with a slightly longer duration. So instead of 3 minute sprints, rather 5 or 10 minutes. This way it is hoped that eventually clubs will race these cars on club nights, eventually growing into inter club, inter state and national endurance racing of longer formats. Basically, the car rules are simple and to this end a complete rule set has been drawn up (again taking it's cue from the OEPS rules and is available from me). The main principals being that the cars must be replicas of 1:1 LMP and ALMS cars. Bodies made from 15thou clear plastic, such as PET, PETG, PVC or lexan. At the moment we have 7 such bodies available from Andrew Bartholomew up in Qld - with an 8th to be released soon. The liveries are quite generous but must represent a race car - again, all explained in the ruleset. The biggest difference from the usual model car rule is that the chassis is also "open" and provided it complies with the basics of model car chassis construction (bolted together - not soldered or glued - with vertical movement and suspension) one can buy a commercial version, build your own or modify and or mix different chassis parts to create your own winner. This concept is carried all the way through to even include being able to make your own wheel rims, should you want to. Again, all the specifications are in the rules. However, as this very 'open' ruleset may be daunting for some we also decided to get the ball rolling by introducing the Red Roo Chassis, developed in conjunction with Garry J and Nick De Wachter and finally produced by Nick De Wachter in Europe. This is only one option but currently the best locally available alternative to suit our rules as the motor specified is the NSR 25King (Same as for Scale Auto Racing). Being a long can motor some of the available comercial chassis may not accommodate it properly: As a seperate post on this forum I will do a detailed build of this chassis , which is currently available from me and which should give everyone a good idea of where we are going with this. Cheers, JanR