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How do you even start with Mychron 5 data?
We have a Mychron 5 on the kart and I keep putting off looking at the files because by the time we load up I just want it charged for the next run. Lap times on the dash are fine, that's not what I'm stuck on.
Is it even worth opening the software on a weeknight or should I just watch water temp and rpm so we don't grenade a motor. Anyone start with those two and ignore the rest until there's a free hour, or am I wasting the unit treating it like a stopwatch?
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A fella can keep an eye on water temp and rpm while he's driving and that is what actually saves the motor. the downloaded stuff is after the fact.
I reckon a lot of people mix those two jobs up, they think they wasted the MyChron if they don't open the software every night. You can just pull the temp trace and see if it climbed in one corner you were too busy to notice and that takes a couple minutes not a free hour.
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Water temperature and RPM on the dash are the correct items for engine survival, but they do not tell you where lap time is created or destroyed. Lap time is the integral of 1/v along the path, so the logger is wasted as a stopwatch, and you also do not need a free hour: overlay GPS speed and RPM versus distance on two warm laps with similar times.
A time-based overlay desynchronizes after the first difference, while distance keeps the same track station aligned, so a lower speed at a given point is a real local deficit. Skip the first laps of a session; cold tires have less available grip at the contact patch and are not a valid baseline. On the speed trace, the start of the drop is brake application, the slope is how hard and how constant the deceleration was (a wavy drop is varying deceleration, usually inconsistent pedal force or a correction), and the length of the drop is how long you stayed off throttle. RPM then shows when the engine actually started climbing again and whether it is sitting on the limiter or falling too far, which is a gearing or driving issue rather than something water temperature will explain. A speed deficit that does not line up with a brake or throttle change is often traffic or a draft, not a technique error.
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Dash water temp and rpm are plenty for not grenadin a motor long as somebody's actually glancin at em between heats and not just the lap time. Ain't gonna hurt nothin to leave the laptop shut on a weeknight.
Where it starts to pay on dirt is a slick groove. If rpm is climbin and ground speed ain't, you're usually spinnin instead of hookin up, and the dash time won't tell you that. On a rough chopped-up oval that GPS speed can bounce though, so don't treat a little mismatch like gospel. One decent lap against a junk one is enough.
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