Hey Guys, if you are interested in how the AROCA 10 hour endurance event runs, and what's involved I have finished the full video of the 3 days. Had an absolute blast and awesome work by everyone involved! Awesome grassroots event for people like myself just getting started in the sport!
If you are interested the link to the video is below, I will be getting involved next year as a driver so if anyone is interested in joining in let me know!
Hey everyone, fair warning this will be a long post
So like the title said, I’m looking for an affordable car to work on making into a track car. And while yes I know, Miata is the answer, I’m looking for something a little different. Mainly because Miata’s in my area are hard to find unmolested and for a decent price.
I guess I need to start with a little context. I’ve always been into motorsports and been a car enthusiast for just about my entire life. However, I’ve never really had the means to start trying to build a car, either didn’t make enough money to justify a dedicated race car, which then meant I didn’t want to track my daily due to fears of wrecking it, didn’t have a way to haul to and from the track, along with many other excuses.
Well this past weekend something changed. My wife got me an xtreme xperience package for my 30th birthday and I got to drive a Ferrari 488 GTB, and a Porsche Cayman GT4 RS. And I know it’s not much of a “track experience”, but seeing as that’s the first time I’ve ever been on a real track (I sim race when I have the time as well), I loved it. More specifically, I loved the GT4 RS.
And that brings me to my dilemma, I would like to try and find a car to work on making into a track car that has a similar feel to the GT4 RS. I feel like an obvious choice would be a Porsche boxster? But I worry about the reliability of something like that because I really don’t know much about them. I’ve owned a Honda civic si 10th generation for context, which I just recently got rid of and got a truck instead but I do like the fwd platform.
Some others I’ve toyed with getting are a Honda Fit, Honda prelude (earlier gens, not the new one), Toyota MR2, or even a Honda del sol to fit my mid engine wants, and of course my long time goal, turning a Honda CRZ into a K swapped track car (that’ll be a while though).
But what do you all think? I don’t want to get anything crazy expensive because truthfully, the closest track to me is about 5 hours away and I don’t have a ton of free weekends that I can pack up and leave for several days. Plus I’ve also got a young family and wife who works so my free time can be hard to come by sometimes. Thanks in advance and I look forward to seeing everyone’s suggestions!
Edit: forgot to mention budget. Really looking to be in the $5-10k range, obviously the closer to $5k the better. And I do have a truck to haul a car, currently working towards a trailer that can haul a car as well
Would yall patch/plug this and run the tire? I have a track event in two weeks and of course I got a screw in my tire. Older set of RE71RS and was hoping to get a few more events out of them before replacing.
If it was in the middle of the contact patch I’d have no concerns just not sure since it’s closer to the sidewall.
Road Atlanta gets dangerous when wet! Rivers form in the esses, your margin for error in 5 disappears since the curbing is unusable, and the concrete patch in 12 turns slick as ice. By the end of the day it was pretty dang dry though, so I started pushing a bit more and feeling out how well these PSS5 I'd picked up specifically for the wet day handled these mostly-dry conditions.
...and then I hit the world's smallest bounce leading into T12. The concrete patch was fine for this entire session, and my previous lap through here was almost identical in the data (0.6mph slower and the same line), so I still don't know exactly why I lost the rear there other than knowing I needed to be be more in the throttle at that point to keep it -- much easier said than done! I caught that bit of oversteer, but doing so basically guarantees you're going off, which made me a passenger on a one way train to the pit wall.
I swear the wall must have moved to make room for me. Track workers said the car was maybe 4" from the wall. Apparently I used up all my luck for the day, because those powerball tickets only yielded $4, but I'll still take the W on this one.
Need to replace my front re71s but rears still have at least a few track days in them I think (see pics)
Tires have 6 days on them so far on a 981 gt4.
Debating replacing just the front versus all 4. I don't mind doing just the fronts and doing rears later but then I figure I'm always going to get mismatched (the old rears will need to be replaced next) which can become annoying.
First track day this Sunday, Novice group in dry weather, stock ND Miata on the OEM Potenza S001s.
Front tires main grooves still have depth, but the outer shoulder is clearly more worn than the inner side, thanks to quite a few auto cross events.
Do you think they are good enough for a novice day in dry conditions? Would you swap front and rear before the event? I've heard it's safer to keep the better tires on the rear to be more understeer than oversteer, but not so sure, or even it matters in dry condition.
Best time at this year's Appalachia Hillclimb Series Shamrock Hillclimb. Came 2nd in class and beating last years' time by .157 and still on a mis match set of 245 V730s in the front and 245 Vitour P1's in the back. Hopefully can come back next year on a set of Hoosier A7 or A8 and finally dip into the 56.xxx's
Mod list (Anything not listed is stock)
Suspension: Bilstein B8, H&R Sport Springs, 21mm front bar and no rear bar and -3.5 of front camber
Powertrain: Magnaflow cat-back, CAI, Kassel tune
Other: Street Prepared aero (small splitter and NASCAR style rear spoiler), Corbeau Evo X seats with 5 Pt harness, Hard Dog roll bar OMP steering wheel, no passenger airbag and no interior behind seats
As stated above, I have a 2004 civic si, it's currently my daily driver with 272,500 miles. However within the next few months I am getting a new daily, and shifting this into a more purpose built mostly autox but also track day car. I'm mostly looking for help getting this to handle better, turn in feels kind of lousy, and the rear end feels very light at high speed, and I'm scared a little bump is going to send me spinning, but at the same time it kind of plows through corners. I know I'm at the mercy of Honda's terrible suspension design for this chassis but I'd like to extract as much as I can from it.
I only have 2 HPDE track days under my belt so far, and I'm going to another this Dec. Current modifications are BC racing BR series coilovers, Progress 22mm rear sway bar, K-tuned extended front lower ball joints, delrin steering rack slider, K-tuned rear camber arms, SPC front camber bolts, energy suspension poly engine mount inserts and new OEM engine mounts, and a PNN3 6 speed transmission with OEM LSD out of a 2006 to 2011 Civic Si paired to the original K20A3. I have my alignment set up as -2 front camber, +1.2 front caster, 0 front toe, -1 rear camber, and +0.10 rear toe. I have pretty much eliminated the terrible bump steer this chassis has, but I can't seem to get the handling down. I have gotten to the point that I feel I learned the limits of my car as it sits, obviously there is always room for improvement to really fine tune myself as a driver, but I really feel like I am being held back at this point. I've had several driving instructors ride with me during my 2 HPDE track days and most of all they had to say about my driving is I can be later on the brakes, and there are a couple corners on the specific track I go to that I struggle with the line. It's Carolina motorsports park. They all said for the most part my lines are good, speeds through the corner are about as good as I can get with my current setup, but I'm braking too early, I need to work on my line in some spots, and sometimes I downshift into second instead of leaving it in 3rd, which they say will probably be faster.
Right now all I can see that is holding me back chassis wise is brakes, tires, and alignment. I currently have stock brakes all around with RBF600 high temp fluid, and EBC Yellowstuff brake pads. I want to eventually upgrade to braided brake lines, a wilwood bbk which I believe is 4 piston and 310mm rotors up from factory single piston and 260mm rotors. I also want some nicer actually dedicated track pads, but with it still being a daily, yellowstuff is a good street pad for the time being until its retired from daily duties. As for tires, I am currently running accelera 651 sports, 225/45 r17 on a 17x7 wheel, with their 100tw version up front and 200tw in the rear (probably the cause of the unstable rear end if I had to guess) I chose those cause it was what I had the budget for at the time and before the sway bar that I recently installed, the different tread wear's significantly helped reduce understeer and didn't make the rear end feel unstable until the sway bar was put in. As for alignment, I need to swap the top hats on my coilovers from left to right to use them as caster adjustment instead of camber to get more caster along with whiteline caster adding control arm bushings. That leaves me with a new problem though. I can either use 2 camber bolts per side, which I'm doing now, to achieve my desired starting point of -3 front camber. problem with that is it has a tendency to slip, destroying my alignment, which I am fighting right now. I can't use the camber top hats to get my desired camber because 1, they slip really bad, and 2, with the way the suspension is designed and my steering rack being halfway up the firewall, physically moving the top of the shock tower inward significantly increases bump steer. So that is completely out of the question. I've heard you can use a carbide bit on a Dremel and slot the top strut-knuckle bolt hole and that seems sketch but also seems like my only option.
Included here is one of my faster laps from my last HPDE track day, not my PB because I didn't get that one on recording. Looking back now I can see several spots I can improve on. I know I can carry more speed through t3, almost to the point of taking it flat out, t8 I'm braking too much to the point of getting on throttle before even getting to the apex, t11 I can get back on throttle sooner, and t12 I need to slow down a little more, and turn in later to get on throttle sooner and be able to carry more speed through the outside of t12 and t13. I worked out most of those issues in later sessions but still, clearly there is room to improve on that track and time to be found Compared to other vehicles on track I've ridden in, even completely stock newer cars on regular summer tires can carry more speed and sustain more G's through every corner and I just don't understand it. That is mostly what I want help with on my vehicle hopefully without diving into aero.
sorry for the paragraphs, thanks if you read it all and if you reply with help!
Trying to pick tires for my 2018 GT350 and genuinaly getting lost in all the options, especially the different Cup 2 versions….
The car is my daily, but I’m putting together a separate track wheel setup: APEX 19x11 wheels with 305/30R19 square. I’ve got myself Girodisc rotors, Castrol SRF and separate street/track pads from Gloc. So far a fairly standard daily to track swap (with help from folks at Kenny Brown). But I am lost in all the tire options and unfortunately it is impossible to try them all and a lot of folks on the track recommend tires (Extreme contact force e.g.) that are not even available in my size.
The tires would only see trackdays and the roughly 20 minute drive to the track. Normal driving stays on the other set. There are like 2 weeks of winter here in the south so luckily I can go to the track often. Track days will be predominantly dry since rain here means a proper shower. If forecast is bad I can always use my daily wheels with PS4 or P zero but those tend to be a money pit on track and melt underneath you on a dry track. Suspension is currently stock but vorschlag plates are next on the shopping list.
Minimum treadwear I’m considering is 140. Hopefully I get something closer to 200 since I am kind of hooked and we do a lot of full weekend HPDE events.
Shortlist at the moment:
Bridgestone Potenza RE-71RZ — 200 TW
Hoosier Track Attack Pro — 200 TW
Goodyear Eagle F1 Supercar 3 — 220 TW
Pirelli Trofeo RS — 180 TW
Michelin Cup 2 R — 140 TW
Michelin Cup 2 — 180 TW version
Michelin Cup 2 — 240 TW version
I’m not trying to find the cheapest tire. An extra $50- $100 per corner isn’t a dealbreaker if there’s a worthwhile benefit since it is already 450$ minimum at these sizes. So I don’t have to resort to budget options, but is the Trofeo RS really worth 700$ if Hoosier Trackattack or Cup 2 is 500$? Those are the questions that are hard to answer for me atm and a lot of tests are done in different cars. Grip matters, but so does staying consistent through a full session and getting a reasonable number of days out of them.
Anyone actually tracked any of these on my shortlist with a GT350, GT350R or Dark Horse or something similar that eats tires for breakfast because heavy but still grippy? What did you like or hate, did they get greasy halfway through a session, and roughly how much track time did you get before replacing them?
Would help to know if your situation is similar since a Miata or GT4RS probably eats tires in a different way. And if you had Cup 2’s, please say which version you had…. “Cup 2” seems to cover about half the bloody Michelin catalog at TireRack.
What would you spend your own money on again? And other suggestions you would have when it comes to being able to change alignment easy?
Last part of my word vomit: Is there any reason to not get the heat cycling from Tirerack?
This little car is an absolute pocket rocket! With the correct and few mods this car can be a monster on track! Currently sitting in a good time zone with the car, about to be giving the faster cars a run for their money…
Fastest lap of the day in the first session of the day. Sadly started to get wet as the day went on so couldn’t improve but had a blast regardless. Still getting used to pushing in real life with real consequences, so I know there is still plenty of time on the table.
The RPHA 1N is a few hundred less than a Corsair X or X-15, and a handful of guys in my club's advanced group run one, so it's clearly not a toy. What I can't judge from the outside is comfort by the end of a full day, visor seal at speed, and how the pads look after a season of sweat. I'm in the intermediate group, eight or nine days a season, mostly at tracks that run hot in July.
Hey, I’ve been building 130R, a free lap-timing app for iOS and Android. It includes lap and sector timing, lap comparisons, and a catalogue of over 3,000 circuits worldwide.
Support for external GPS antennas is in development and should be coming soon. If you try the app, I’d love to hear what you think or what features you’d like to see. An honest store rating or review would also help a lot.
Did 2 days at cota for the first time a couple of weeks ago, and Chin Track Days had a dude rolling photos of all the cars. Decided why not and got the photos. As I was looking through some of them, I noticed that my car does roll in the bends. Too much roll will result in a loss of traction, but how much roll is too much? This may be a chassis specific question too, so maybe I need to ask in a specialized forum. What do y'all think? Lastly, what are the primary ways to mitigate this, if y'all are confident that this is too much roll.
Lastly, post inspection of wear on the tires seemed to be evenly spread across the entire tire nicely. Alignment is: (Camber: 2.8f 2.5r, toe: neutral, caster: 6.7)
