For whatever reason it has been difficult for me to get stuff written this season. So lets play a little catch up... Back in August I went to Thompson with NASA for a single day event. It was the only event I could make in that time frame due to work, so I just went to get some driving in. Much to my surprise the track had been repaved again since my last visit. That coupled with never running there with aero made for a weird day. I was really light on sleep (surprised?), and after about 1 session it became apparent it was a throw away day. There was very little grip in the track. I upped the wing angle a little and it helped, but I was still well off my old pace so I just kind of phoned it in for the day. Even managed to tear my oil temp gauge wire somehow... Never bothered pulling the data or video Didn't have any events lined up in September so I did some autocross in the S2000 to hold me over until the NASA season finale in October. Also spent the time to put some more power in the car thanks to the gift of E85. The car is a whole different beast now. The E85 makes it feel peppier everywhere in the power band and really really works great with the stock turbo. I was very interested to see how it would work out on track.
Got denied a vacation day so I had to work all day Friday and then start the long haul down to NJMP. We wound up arriving around midnight, got unloaded and tried to sleep...yeah right. Saturday was a nice day, got reacquainted with the car and Thunder and everything seemed to be going as planned. Just got to drive which was nice. Sunday proved to be a decent bit colder to the point of requiring some tire pressure changes. Had a nice Sunday drive, car handles, performed etc...until I looked at the data and found out I was 2.5 seconds slower than when I was there in June. This was obviously not the way I wanted to end the season. The car felt so comfortable and controlled that it was one of those "I feel slow so I must be fast" moments. In trying to figure out what happened, I can only guess that I either didn't set the wing back to the proper angle since the car had some under steer in a specific high speed right hander on the track. The only other potential is that the front spring change I made over the summer didn't show the small upset in balance it made at Lightning due to the style of track. Here's the video:
[url=https://flic.kr/p/AK6k1Y][img]https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5822/22803778972_b1a8a97c68_b.jpg[/img][/url][url=https://flic.kr/p/AK6k1Y]WSPS-NASAFALFIN2015-HPDE Groups-0694-(ZF-2373-52076-1-001)[/url] by [url=https://www.flickr.com/photos/natebookbinder/]Nathan Bookbinder[/url], on Flickr
[url=https://flic.kr/p/ALhxhg][img]https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5816/22817282955_1b4347af1e_b.jpg[/img][/url][url=https://flic.kr/p/ALhxhg]WSPS-NASAFALFIN2015-HPDE Groups-0740-(ZF-2373-52076-1-002)[/url] by [url=https://www.flickr.com/photos/natebookbinder/]Nathan Bookbinder[/url], on Flickr
My winter upgrade list wasn't to extensive for this year. Some cooling upragdes and minor suspension tweaks. Now they've gone and reworked the TT3 rules so I'm going to have to rethink a few things... I'll update as we get a little deeper into the offseason. I think I'm most upset tat I didn't reach my goal of getting a TT license by the end of 2015...sigh.
For whatever reason it's been difficult for me to write anything lately...work, life, whatever....brains in other places almost constantly. I've fallen behind and I now need to catch up on the last two events. At the end of July I was at NJMP lightning with NASA. It was HOT...I don't just mean warm, I mean f*cking hot, asphalt was 120-130 degrees. With an all paved paddock that sucked. The only change to the car since being at the same track the month before was finally putting in my 10k front springs. Oil temps were an issue as usual, managing to run in the 240 to 250 degree range all day both days. It didn't help that on Saturday I mowed some grass. In an effort to find some time on track I was backing up my turn in point for turn 3 and eventually backed it up too far leading to short cutting turn 4 because I immediately realized I would never keep it fully on track, and the 2-3-4 complex is the WORST place to go off on this track due to wall proximity. No harm no foul, but the oil cooler ate some debris and dinged up a few more fins. Other wise the car felt good, but still had a slight push in some turns which may have been me slightly over driving the street tires in the heat. Midway through Saturday I started hearing a weird ticking/tapping noise at full speed down the front stretch which was odd, but sounded like a slight rub or something. Few laps later...tick, tick, BOOM there goes my left front fender liner flying 30 feet up in the air down the front stretch. After the session all looked fine but I decided to swap over to my BFG R1's just as a precaution since the bottom edge of the fender liner contains a metal bar that could have damaged the tire. I have little experience on the R1's but the car seemed to handle them well and I was able to match my street tire best but not go faster as I am still learning the limit of those tires. The final session on Sunday was one of the best I have ever had. Was still on the R1's which were great with heat tolerance, and got to play around with some very high end cars/drivers...until I overcooked it in 7.
Overall, managed a new street tire best of of 1:17.3, which was 1.5 seconds faster than the month before with the front springs being the only change.
Unfortunately my traqmate memory was full so I don't have an actual data file for the 17.3 lap, only a 17.6. I've since sold my traqmate and upgraded to an Aim Solo. More to come...
Like Atmosphere says it "trying to find a balance, trying to build a balance". In this case its an aero/suspension balance. After running my small original splitter with the kognition wing it was quickly obvious that it was not enough. So I used that splitter as a template and built a nice 5 inch one with some endplates that in my head actually do something. Loaded up on the trailer and headed for a 2 day event at NJMP during which I'd be on both tracks. Day 1 was Thunder (no chicane) and it rained the night before/most of the morning. This didn't bother me because 1)rain is fun 2) it helps you visualize aero. Spent the morning tooling around and playing in the rain while backing down the wing angle each session as it dried out. On street tires, the car felt great finally! Made a couple click adjustment on the rear shocks and was lapping very comfortably and going faster in some sections of the track than I ever have. The car actually had some front end grip, although still felt like there was a weird mid corner wash out. Ended the day with a 1:33 on street tires with the TT3 record being 1:26...that looks like progress to me. Day 2 was Lightning, and it was going to he hot and dry all day.
Started the morning on street tires and quickly noticed the balance was
again pretty good. Turn 5 up over the crest really tests the setup, and
that is where i discovered a serious mid corner washout with the front
end (more on that in a minute). The last session before lunch a very
"smart" bmw driver lost his coolant in turn 3, spun off the track,
started reversing back onto the track as I came through and caused a
black flag all. It then took 20 minuted to get him towed because he
didn't drag the brake which led to the cable winding itself around one
of his wheels and ripping off his front bumper. For the
afternoon I bolted on the new set of wheels I bought that were shod with
BFG R1's (not the R1s). Not gonna lie, I was nervous about trying out a
tire that has next to no communication of letting go. First session
out I made sure to get them warm over 3 or so laps and then started
getting progressively faster. Was quite interesting and luckily
uneventful but I was able to set a new PB on lightning of 1:17.98, which
is slightly faster than on street tires.
So remember that mid corner push? I was running too soft a front spring for both the aero and the new tires. I ordered a set of swift springs a month prior to the event and was lucky enough to have the box show up missing a spring. 3 weeks of fighting with the place I ordered from as well as swift and calling my credit card company, the second spring showed up the day I got back from the track. The other issue was oil temp. In 85 degree ambient temps with some humidity I was seeing temps in the pan of 235F+. Increasing cooling is now a major priority. I will be back at Lightning at the end of July with NASA. I'm slightly getting bored with the same track all the time, but it is invaluable for testing purposes and improving the car. The ride to and from the track was MUCH more enjoyable this time with my new trailer....until i ripped my brand new splitter getting loaded up to go home... I will try and get some more video edited and some more pics from my dad.
Holy hell was it a long winter. It feels like I did absolutely nothing but worked (as usual right) and bombed around in the Subaru through mountains of snow. I guess I have to confess at the time I wrote this I've already done 3 track days this year... You call it lazy I call it writers block so whatever...March rolled around and it was time to start prepping the car as April was looking pretty fun. Basically just did fluids, injectors and a retune around them (which still isn't 100% complete) and mounted the splitter. "well you can't run a splitter without a wing" says everyone...well let's get right down to that saga. I ordered a Kognition wing the weekend after Thanksgiving (That means November you turkey's...haha get it?). After countless messages, excuses and generally terrible customer service Mike@Kognition finally got my wing to me in the middle of April...FUCKING APRIL. Oh and he forgot to send me end plates. So after missing his promised delivery date I completed two track days without aero and then put all the aero on for my first ever trip to the Glen, complete with Walmart cutting boards I made into wing end plates.
So 3 track days on back to back to back weekends...lets see what I remember: Lime Rock 4/11 - This was the first event out using DTC60's on the rear of the car. Between sim work over the winter, and just experience at Lime Rock at this point I was pretty much up to speed first session matching my old personal best. Thanks to my new traqmate system I was able to quickly see i was losing 1-2 seconds. Temps were cold and windy, but the car was flawless as usual and i drove it to a new PB of 1:03.1.
Lighting 4/17-18 - It was an uneventful but fun weekend. Bailed early on Saturday because they wound up combining group 1 and 2 which never works for me. It was obvious I needed to ask for a check ride since I was lapping at the front of group 2 consistently. Got my opportunity on Sunday and was finally bumped up to group 3! Last session of the weekend I got to run around in a combined 3 and 4 session...and hot damn was it fun. I learned more in that 1 session being around faster cars than I did all last season. Didn't achieve my goal of a sub 1:20 lap but it' coming... Between traqmate issues and forgetting to start the camera a few times I don't have any great video to edit...may post the full last session at some point. Watkins Glen 4/28-29 - This was bucket list level shit. I have dreamed of running this track and it finally happened...and damn did it turn out to be EVERYTHING I had hoped. I stupidly threw on the wing and splitter for this event having never been on the track. Cool and damp the first day so used to to find my bearings etc, and again thanks to the sim work over the winter I was right up to a decent pace. Next day brought 60 degrees and sun, which allowed some extra pushing and a 2:18 lap time.
I removed the OEM oil cooler duct to make installing my brake ducting easier with the splitter. This taught me an interesting lesson...pressure=cooling. Even in 60 degree ambient temps I was easily seeing 220+ oil temps. At the time it wasn't an issue, but when we hit 80-90 ambient at NJMP in July I think I'm in trouble. Planned work is below: - Rebuild front calipers (dust boots causing piston to stick = bad vibration) - All driveline fluids are due for change - Increase front spring rate (multiple pictures show way too much roll) - Build bigger splitter - CSF radiator + dual puller fans + front mounted oil cooler so I can start playing with more aero. Next event will be autocross with the s2000 in two weeks which should be pretty interesting. After that Evo should be back on track end of June at NJMP...may wind up on r comps...
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