Toast
8th October 2007, 11:53
XT Ultra Lap Timer
Ordered my XT Ultra with beacon pack from Tim 39 last week. Received it from the courier from deep South the day after I paid for it! Awesome service!
I wanted to buy one of these because I've found that at trackdays I tend to piss around and don't try as hard or try as many new things as compared to when I'm being timed at a race day.
I got a chance to try it out at Puke on the Sunday just been, so here are my impressions.
-Pulling it out of the box, the receiver and display unit are both wrapped in nice, solid billet aluminium cases. Good to know that they'll be able to hold their own in the 'unlikely' event of a crash. The pieces that sit on the bike are actually a lot smaller than I was expecting, which is cool 'cos it's pretty tight up front on most modern sports bikes.
-Mounting: It's a pinch to set up on the bike, except that you may want to employ a 5 year old to insert the joining cable between the receiver and display unit (ok I've just got gumby office hands). The velcro supplied is super strong, so there's no worry about it all flying off while you're in motion. I ordered the 'long' cable with mine, and at 20 feet or so I think that this is a bit overkill for any bike application. No drama at all though, as it just gets bundled up and stuffed behind my instrument cluster.
I mounted the device on my dash, covering the speedo, which I don't mind since I previously used a piece of tape for that anyway.
-Setup: The menu system is super-easy to use. I was actually a bit worried about this 'cos it's a 4-button thing and I usually find things like this a bit lacking, but this one took 1 minute to understand and then I was away.
-One the track: Perfect! It does what it says on the box. Everytime you nail past the IR beacon (at this particular spot at Puke, comfortably over 200kmh), it sets off the timer and logs that lap in. Worked everytime in spite of me just using AA batteries in the signal output device instead of hooking it up to a 12V battery (this is said to give a stronger signal). The display is large and very clear.
One of the first settings I familiarised myself with was the length of time that the last lap is displayed for. I changed this from the default 10 to 30 seconds, as I found it wasn't the practical to look down at the speedo at 230kmh while being ejected out of the seat from the bumps approaching the Jennian Homes sweeper.
The device has a other useful features such as a minimum lap time setting to stop it being triggered twice if there are multiple beacons along the pit wall, unique session identifiers (which it figures out by itself, and includes a summary page with the track name, the best, worst and average laps along with the temperature and time and date), memory for heaps of laps and support for split timing if more than one person at the track has an XT beacon (I've read on US forums that the XT timers also work off other brands' beacons too). There's probably more, but to me the fact that it times my laps and stores them in an easy to recall format are the most important factors.
At $382 + $10 shipping very promptly within NZ, there's really no point in importing one yourself from overseas (based on the prices I've seen on the XT website and eBay). I'm stoked with the purchase and will always use one at any trackday in future. If you want to add an objective judgement to your riding improvements (or not), then I suggest that you do too :niceone:
Ordered my XT Ultra with beacon pack from Tim 39 last week. Received it from the courier from deep South the day after I paid for it! Awesome service!
I wanted to buy one of these because I've found that at trackdays I tend to piss around and don't try as hard or try as many new things as compared to when I'm being timed at a race day.
I got a chance to try it out at Puke on the Sunday just been, so here are my impressions.
-Pulling it out of the box, the receiver and display unit are both wrapped in nice, solid billet aluminium cases. Good to know that they'll be able to hold their own in the 'unlikely' event of a crash. The pieces that sit on the bike are actually a lot smaller than I was expecting, which is cool 'cos it's pretty tight up front on most modern sports bikes.
-Mounting: It's a pinch to set up on the bike, except that you may want to employ a 5 year old to insert the joining cable between the receiver and display unit (ok I've just got gumby office hands). The velcro supplied is super strong, so there's no worry about it all flying off while you're in motion. I ordered the 'long' cable with mine, and at 20 feet or so I think that this is a bit overkill for any bike application. No drama at all though, as it just gets bundled up and stuffed behind my instrument cluster.
I mounted the device on my dash, covering the speedo, which I don't mind since I previously used a piece of tape for that anyway.
-Setup: The menu system is super-easy to use. I was actually a bit worried about this 'cos it's a 4-button thing and I usually find things like this a bit lacking, but this one took 1 minute to understand and then I was away.
-One the track: Perfect! It does what it says on the box. Everytime you nail past the IR beacon (at this particular spot at Puke, comfortably over 200kmh), it sets off the timer and logs that lap in. Worked everytime in spite of me just using AA batteries in the signal output device instead of hooking it up to a 12V battery (this is said to give a stronger signal). The display is large and very clear.
One of the first settings I familiarised myself with was the length of time that the last lap is displayed for. I changed this from the default 10 to 30 seconds, as I found it wasn't the practical to look down at the speedo at 230kmh while being ejected out of the seat from the bumps approaching the Jennian Homes sweeper.
The device has a other useful features such as a minimum lap time setting to stop it being triggered twice if there are multiple beacons along the pit wall, unique session identifiers (which it figures out by itself, and includes a summary page with the track name, the best, worst and average laps along with the temperature and time and date), memory for heaps of laps and support for split timing if more than one person at the track has an XT beacon (I've read on US forums that the XT timers also work off other brands' beacons too). There's probably more, but to me the fact that it times my laps and stores them in an easy to recall format are the most important factors.
At $382 + $10 shipping very promptly within NZ, there's really no point in importing one yourself from overseas (based on the prices I've seen on the XT website and eBay). I'm stoked with the purchase and will always use one at any trackday in future. If you want to add an objective judgement to your riding improvements (or not), then I suggest that you do too :niceone: