Well after thrashing on the car from 8pm until 5:15am straight the night before the race to finish things up I was on my way to the track (towing it there). I installed an H20 temp sending unit in the water pump for my VD0 guage, swapped in new Ferodo DS3000 front pads (costly... but worth it... track only), made a battery hold down box, cleaning up some wiring, swapped my '99 rear rotors around as they were facing the wrong way
, my new 13" Alcon rotors were the wrong hat bolt pattern (wasted 1 hour there), put in 7 quarts (race track only) of fresh Redline Oil, installed my CCW 18x10.5's with 285/30/18 Michelin Pilot Sport Cups, and put distilled water in the rad/Redline water wetter.
The day started out by making the mandatory driver's meeting by 2 minutes (really late start towing up there), a broken battery hold down bracket while in tech which I welded at 4:30am without a mask made me miss the 1st 2 sessions (local track guy arc welded it back together), cooling issues in the first session (I had a gutted Tstat) which cleared up when I replaced it while sitting out the next session (had to run into town to get a new one). I had a hell of a time bleeding out the air in the pits thru the cap, so bleeding it out thru my sending unit in the water pump was the only way. My fan relays took a dump after I grounded out the power wire after pinching them between my battery and the box I made (which popped the 60A fuse and killed the relays) so I hot wired them. Made some cardboard ducting between the radiator and the front bumper cover also. Cooling problems essentially solved.
Modified engine/brake/Rcompound tire'd Sti/Evo's I walked away from and even in the corners I would slowly gain distance on them easily. The only real car I had a tough time reeling in was the new Lotus Elise. I would get closer and closer slowly but surely over the 4-5 laps and get to within 30 yards... but then I would start to get too hot 240*+ before I had to back off and cool down to 210* for 1/3 lap and then beat on it again. H20 temps were in the 220-235* range in 102* weather (140* track surface temp) most of the day. I short shifted at about 6,000rpm to keep engine temps down. The Michelin Pilot Sport Cup tires I ran kicked butt once up to temp and are incredibly sticky.
I had a local racer ride with me and he said the car had gobs of power, handled great too! I let him drive it for a session also. He also mentioned I checked my mirrors too much, was too courteous (waved everyone by when I was having cooling problems), and need to concentrate more on the track (I would check the temp guage that was near the shifter temporarily often). Since this car has about 350hp more than my previous track car it was a learning experience with the 1st session. The 2nd session I was much better and the 3rd session I was hauling some serious *ss and inducing slight oversteer and a little trail braking with pretty good control.
I did 5400rpm in 5th down the long straightaway. 3:90's, .75 ratio in 5th, 285/30/18's. Can someone calculate this?
This car rips... it was worth the build time. I'll post some pics tonight.
Can anyone host some short video clips from the track taken with my Canon Elph? Decent quality.....
I ran GAB Super R shocks and initially had them on 4 front 5 rear... and thought I was stiffening them up and put them on 1 front 2 rear for the last session. Live an learn... I was actually softening them up... but the car still handled great! Live and learn.... they didn't come with directions so I'm not to blame.... No understeer or bumpsteer that I can tell...
-Mark
05-27-2005, 01:27 PM
Went to Thunderhill Road Race Park yesterday (Willows, CA0 
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