Monday, April 29, 2013

Just a quick update

     Not a ton to report at this point.  The car is currently sitting at DynoTech getting the passenger side front axle replaced due to the tiny tear in the boot.  Other than that...

     - Got the car up and running on Tephra V7 finally.  Pretty much went without a hitch, had an EGR cel pop up but it it turned out that I hadn't perfectly matched the periphery settings from ROM to ROM.  This brings up an interesting point due to the fact that as far as I knew, the car should not need any EGR systems shut off through the ROM...

     - I need to decide what to do about the brake shudder.  I either need to skim the RB rotors, or pick up some blanks so I don't have to deal with the terrible shudder again.  The trouble is finding some place to skim the rotors.

     -  I've become a little well, disenchanted I guess you could call it with EMRA.  I deal with enough politic-ing and bullshit at work to not want to see it going on when I'm at the track where I should be having good pure fun.  This is not to say I will not do any more events with them, but I think I need to change up my schedule a bit.  I had planned on going to the NYS safety track with them in June, but there has been a severe lack of updates on basic events let alone for an event at a brand new track...the track has even announced they are totally open yet.  I think I'm going to target a TrackDaze event in it's place at NJMP.

     Here's an an awesome picture taken by JDS photography at Lime Rock last event.  He has some more I will probably purchase since they are wall hanging quality for my condo/garage, just haven't had the spare cash yet.





Tuesday, April 16, 2013

Some espresso and two red bulls later...

     And the first event is in the books.  Another good day at Lime Rock.  Keep in mind that I went into this event on new suspension, alignment and brakes.

     I headed out for the first session having no idea what to expect.  I had spent the week contemplating how to set up the rear suspension as well as what I was going to be facing with my brake cooling.  The weather was challenging, as it was in the low 50's with the sun going in and out of cloud cover so track temp was staying quite low.  Since the first session is a short warm up one, i decided to just run the brake ducts full open and go easy.  Upon returning to the pits and checking the rotors with my handy dandy laser temp gun, I saw somewhere in the range of 300 degrees...waaaaaay to cold, I knew i needed to be in the 700+ degree range.  The suspension was down right impressive.  The new lateral grip is intense and a challenge, as I am now having a VERY difficult time staying situated in the seat even with the CG lock.  
     This was also my first competitive day on a familiar track since I started with iRacing.  Do I think it helped?  Absolutely.  I already know the track well at LRP, but there was a new mental feeling, almost more focused.  I knew exactly where to point the car and had some new turn in points that felt much better than last year, as well as rolling the corners better and overall just feeling like i was maximizing the setup a decent amount better than I was last year...pretty neat if you ask me.

     The next session, I added some tape and blocked off about 50% of the duct inlet which resulted in much better brake temps at the rotor of about 500-600 degrees.  Unfortunately I developed HORRIBLE brake shudder.  After some discussion, it is possible i made some bad deposits on the rotors running the DTC 60's in the rain in February.  Further more I had 4th and 5th gear grinding both up and down shifting.

    
 After all was said and done, I came home with a 1st place trophy and a new personal best lap of 1:05.8x.  Although I will admit that it was first place because my only competition got protested and bumped up a class for running R-comps (not by me though).  That being said, my time would have landed me in about 4th place in the next class up.

     My GoPro didn't want to cooperate, so I have very little useable footage from the day.


     I didn't even remember to mess with the rear rebound all day, as I was distracted by the brake issues.  As always, my work is never done, and the car has more in it even just as it sits.  BUt of course I am now left with a decent checklist of things to do.

-I need rear diff bushings ASAP
- Probably need to have my rotors turned
- New pass front axle/boot, as I discovered grease flung everywhere, and a small tear in the outer boot
- Need to adjust the clutch a little and see if I can get it shifting better before i wind up with a large repair bill
- Could probably use to check the tune and start working on ECU boost/Tephra v7 finally.

OVERALL:  car was great, tire wear and temps looked very good and now i just need to prep for the next event, my first with NASA in May.