Well, it's been two track days since my last post, one at Heartland Park Topeka and one here at Gateway International Raceway in St. Louis.
When last I posted, I was still fighting some pretty good understeer, so I made the following changes:
- Lowered front ride height 1/4" - Using the washer trick on the lower strut bolts, managed to increase the camber up front from -2.2 to -3.1 - The new rear bar did NOT go on, as it didn't fit. - Replaced destroyed 3.73 Clutch-pack LSD with a 3.46 Torsen unit from an 01 3.0 Z3 (40k miles).
Heartland Park (10/2/2010) results (sorry, no video GoPro case broke). - Man, a Torsen diff is a very very different beast than the clutch pack. The tail just sticks and sticks and sticks under throttle, until it doesn't and then it goes quick! Not the gradual break-away of the clutch pack, but it seems to stick better. Definitely takes some getting used to!
- Even with staggered tires (had to run my streets as I corded my slicks), the new setup was rather twitchy. Following dahamler's advice, I disconnected the rear swaybar. It seemed to settle the car a bit, but I think I'm going to put it back on at Putnam next Friday to see if some of my other changes have dialed that out.
- Worked tire pressures to help improve balance, but sadly it wasn't good data for me as the slicks are a whole different game.
Final result: The car was getting to be pretty darn quick even on its streets, starting to catch some M3s and other decent hardware even though they were running R-Compounds. Pretty good result given that this was the Instructors/Advanced only day.
Gateway International Raceway (10/13/2010) results - On slicks this time, working on tire pressures. Everything else was left alone.
- Car did a pretty good job, driver was having a hard time hooking up. It was faster than EVERYTHING in the Advanced/Intermediate group, even lapping a couple of cars twice. Apparently not many of the cars were heavily prepped. On the last session I was running 1:14s, but the car was definitely capable of running 1:12s. Needed a couple more sessions to get back in the GIR groove as it had been 2+ years since I ran at Gateway. Sadly, I won't get another chance as it's very likely that they're closing the track this year.
Still, it was a fun day, and it's nice to be getting all the point bys and not having to give any. It's not a competitive event, and it's all about learning, you shouldn't care what the other guys are doing, but it's nice to see you've done a decent job with car prep.
Video comp from Gateway showing every pass of the day:
Changes since Gateway: Added a 1.25" trailer hitch to pull a tire trailer (or mount bike rack). Will have to fix a newly developed power steering fluid leak.
Next track day: 10/29 at Putnam Park Changes to try: - Re-connect rear sway and evaluate. - Work with tire pressures and wear, hopefully collect some tire temp data. - MAYBE collect some actual telemetry using a proper data-logger.
So my little ti swap has survived its first summer and track season. It's been fun to have it as a sports/track car, but now it needs to go back into utilitarian mode.
Living in St. Louis and having the ti as my only car means that it has to be able to handle some reasonable snow from time to time. With the track-abused General UHPs I was running, my choices were to find some winter-friendly tires, or pick up a beater car.
I was still on the fence about it when I saw an ad on Craigslist: Brand new Yokohama IceGuard G10s - 255x40R17 - $250
That made the decision pretty easy. The only trick was seeing if they'd fit. I picked them up, and comparing them to my stock front 225s was not exactly encouraging in terms of fitment, and a little scary given that I'd already been through one snow/ice episode on the UHPs. No wonder I had no grip!
The fronts required 12mm spacers to clear my coil-overs, and were rubbing ever so slightly on the fender under compression. I thought I was in the clear! Surely the front would be where the problem would be, the rear should be able to accomodate wider rubber.
Sadly, the rears were actually much worse, rubbing the center of the fender arch pretty badly. *Crap* I thought to myself, now what?
Right about then I remembered I had this lovely -adjustable- coil-over kit provided by AutoWerks of America for this build. I raised the car as high as the rear perches would go (about 1/2") and adjusted the front about 3/4" to help push my weight balance rearward. I figured there wasn't much point in having a slammed car in the middle of winter; I don't need my front clip to double as a snow plow.
After the adjustments, the fronts did fine and the rears are only rubbing a tiny bit. A little more time spent fender-rolling and there shouldn't be any problems.
They don't look that monsterous on the car, but they're beefy suckers. The only way I'm getting stuck in the snow this year is if I drive into a snow-bank!
Rally anyone?
Ti: They're closing Gateway because it has huge tax liens that were supposed to be paid off by them getting some Nascar Cup series races. They never got the cup races, kept deferring, and *boom* no longer profitable to operate.
that's really disappointing to hear about gateway. and those are some monstrous tires.
i need to get rid of my salvage ti. but i feel like it would be weird to get another exact copy of the car i currently have. because i really love schawrz ti's and my title is what upsets me about my car
you do really want to run a less wide tires for the winter like cooljess suggested.. the wider the tires less pressure/weight each thread on tires get thus more spinning... so thinner/ less wide tire have alot more weight on each thread so it digs in to the snow better so you get better traction... Be carefull with the fronts especially you just might not stop cuz you have no traction..
Throw some sandbags on the trunk if u you see that you get less traction.. I personally have extra cases of bottle water that i throw on my trunk for extra weight.. good luck be careful.
__________________ Intake, Sony mp3/cd player, remus cat-back exhaust,
Chris: I considered a diff oil cooler as a potential upgrade down the road, but now that I've moved to a torsen-style diff, I suspect there will be significantly less heat build-up than with a clutch-pack. We'll have to see how it does on hotter track days next year.
Barische: I more than get the physics of the narrower tire vs wide, but as was mentioned, it was a deal I couldn't pass up. In any event, it's significantly better than what I had been working with: 225/245 balding UHPs.
Chris: I considered a diff oil cooler as a potential upgrade down the road, but now that I've moved to a torsen-style diff, I suspect there will be significantly less heat build-up than with a clutch-pack. We'll have to see how it does on hotter track days next year.
Barische: I more than get the physics of the narrower tire vs wide, but as was mentioned, it was a deal I couldn't pass up. In any event, it's significantly better than what I had been working with: 225/245 balding UHPs.
haha, my bad.. I really did not try to imply that you are stupid or nothing.. I just put it out there as if other members are reading and didnt know what we were talking about... I currently went from 205/65/15 to 225/50/16 and my snow grip is **** even though the new tires have alot more thread.... So i put **** ton of weight on the trunk which helps...
__________________ Intake, Sony mp3/cd player, remus cat-back exhaust,
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