2012 Season Thread - 929 Evo

[boomn29]

Putnam Park - Saturday 5-12-2012.




After running the Enduro on Friday afternoon, I awoke at 6:45am Saturday tired and sore. I was sore in different area than I usually am on track weekends. Being I turned probably 4x the amount of laps in a single session that I ever had before, my whole body ached some. But especially a knot in the middle of my back from a seat that wasn't holding me in very well laterally and my triceps as the Miata's don't have power steering. I still had to unload and unpack the car, and do some prep but that was about it. I will say when I slid over the cage to drop into the driver's seat of the Evo - it felt plush! I really do like my seat, it's got a lot of cushion and sits low (took forever to get it where I like it) and has a ton of lateral support both for my legs and my back.

Our warmup wasn't until after 10am so it was relaxed. For the warmup I lined up around grip spot #3 I think and after waiting 1 lap for things to come up to temp I put down an easy 1:17.9 to earn #2 in grid. I then went to tech and got weighed since I still had no solid idea of what the car weighed post-cage. It came in at 3198 lbs; which was about 50 lbs over what I was claiming for the day so I was pretty happy with that given the current fuel load.

Session 2 was at noon and I made no changes and fired a 1:17.0 which slotted me first in class and first overall. I hit traffic very quickly as there were 44 cars in TT on Putnam's 1.7 mile course. Also someone nailed the hay bails in the final turn so we had a few sitting on the exit of T10 which was right in the line - and after 2 laps of that I seen the double yellow. I was probably going 130mph when I seen it, closing in on 2 lower classed car probably going 95-100mph but I made the passes safely before the flagstand and tucked in behind the traffic. Oddly though that traffic was another car giving pointby's that was off pace. By the time I realized it I'd been re-passed by a few cars - I think this confused some cars as other passing from other cars ensued and only 1 was called in for passing under double-yellow.

For S3 I made a few small tweaks and ran a best of 1:17.2 but the car was really starting to slide at this point. Wasn't sure if it was the heat - sunny and around 85 - or the tires giving up. I figured a bit of both. I know I was starting to drop 1-2 tires into the dirt in multiple corners on exit as the car just wouldn't hold and would slide. It made 'catching' the slides a bit interesting and fun but I knew this wasn't going to be faster. I was also given the pleasure of the 'meatball' flag and when I came in was told my exhaust was rubbing and throwing sparks. This shocked me as there was no audible difference. When I got back to my paddock spot I seen the brace by the rear axle had broken and it was hanging low and would need a bandaid! I recently had another bracket re-welded and perhaps with that being tighter, me dropped tires and that rear brace being rewelded back in 2009 - the extra pressure caused it to break again. Either way I had 2 hours to fix it, and with my idea and some help from Hoops (thx man) it was pretty simple.



For S4 I adjusted the suspension a touch to try and aid rotation/grip assuming things would be worse if the tires were the problem. I had my answer in the first lap; it was the tires! I ran 3 hard laps right around 1:18.3 until I hit traffic, then I played for another 1-2 and drifted. I actually had a few people ask who left the drift marks in certain turns as I was at least having fun! At this point I new the tires were shot, having 12-16 Heatcyles each. Also good news was that our exhaust fixed had held up just fine. My time from S2 would hold to land me 1st place in TTA - but 1.3 seconds off my record from 2011 when I was on wider stickier rubber.

Vid from Sat; A lap each from Sessions 2 & 3 from different angles:

[fixem2@ATK]

Just goes to show bailing wire and zip ties still work!! (Sorry duct tape is not as cool as zip ties!!)

[boomn29]

Saturday evening I rotated the tires; X'ing the front backwards. I figured the LF would be nearly bald - and it was. But the RF was worse! Sunday was going to be interesting with no grip in the rear, but I was thinking since the fronts looked ok that I'd at least be able to turn like I could early Sat.

Left side tires from Sat evening. Front on the left; rear on the right. I rotating the bald ones to the rear....



RF:


I made more suspension tweaks, rolling back the changes I made late Sat in hopes it would help the car grip more. I had some pulsing in the front end under braking on the out lap. I figured something was stuck to the rotor and/or the tires were flatspotted from sitting all night as I had reset my pressures to my normal morning starting pressures. It seemed to go away with some really hard jabs so I put it out of my mind and hit it hard. I ran 6 laps with a best of 1:18.2 which the car was no longer sliding, but rather drifting today! Jeff's Evo was behind me this session and got some good vid; check it out below.

For S2 I bettered my time to a 1:18.1 but that's all I could get. The rear was drifting around so much that I had to do more than countersteer, I had to get out of the gas some which is a killer for times. This is the session I put the camera on the rear and had a Mustang 302 behind me. My overall times were better than his, but in this session I just couldn't get the power down and after drifting through T4 and getting out of the gas I simply pointed him around.
When done, I looked over my tires carefully to see how bald the rears were now and to verify nothing was corded. The tires passed inspection, but the LF rotor did not. Check it out:



While I had a spare, it was 12:30pm at this point and very hot. With basically 0 chance to improve my times and only to play around more, I decided to forgo the fix and just pack things in and go surprise visit my Mom with it being Mother's day and all. It'd only add about 45min to my overall trip. With all the crazy turmoil with my wife's family recently; I've been trying to take the extra effort with regards to visits and calls and whatnot. I was actually going to cancel this event but the wife told me to go and enjoy the distractions. So I watched the start of my friend's race after packing up and took off.

Overall the car did great. No mechanical issues, just the broken exhaust bracket which was no biggie, the broken rotor which is a wear item and my boost gauge is still broke (so no, I've no idea what boost I was running). Oh, and my time easily held up Sunday for first in TTA once again.

After looking deeper at all my GPS data, everything is pretty cut and dry.
An 8/10's lap from 2011 on wider A6's yielded a nearly identical laptime to this year's lap at nearly 10/10's on skinnier R6's. Nuff said.
Braking force with R6's is crap compared to an A6; I had data confirming this already. Cornering G's were about the same but that's the 8/10's vs the 10/10's thing to allow that. I was able to push my brakezones a bit which is good and the car rotated great w/o hardly any understeer given what front grip I had at least.

The 2012 setup vs the 2011 setup to me feels better with regards to power and rotation. I'm really happy with how smooth the car idles, and I don't even notice the Synapse BOV thx to Buschur's tune (he assured me it'd be smooth; he's right). The differences being a Buschur tune on the engine this year and an ACD-tuning update in the ACD unit. Also different on this track were taller tires and a taller 4th gear as compared to May/2011 - both of which hurt my laptimes as the car was previously geared incredibly well for Putnam. With less speed on corner entry from the ****tier tires and the gearing changes I was actually forced to downshift twice more per lap to keep the turbo spinning. So factor in all those changes and running 1.3 seconds behind my blitzing 2011 time of 1:15.7 and I'm feeling pretty good about the car.

Sunday S1 (rubber & drifting vid):

[boomn29]

Video from session #2 on sunday:

Sunday S2 - backwards:

[boomn29]

More pics from the weekend:

[boomn29]

Pulled the tires off the car last week after Putnam.... damn.

These tires spent 4 sessions Sat in the front (pic above). Then 2 sessions on Sunday pretty much doing the drift thing. While there's still tread left, they had nothing for grip. I'm happy about the even wear at least... and no cording (damn 255's cord constantly).

Anyways check them out:

[boomn29]

It's currently up on the blog, but I wanted to share a recent review I wrote up about ACD tuning. I didn't include the videos here as I've posted them previously in this thread. Enjoy....

One of the hardest things to get rid of in an Evo is understeer - or push. Like most cars from the factory, the car is front heavy and is setup to understeer once you turn up the wick. You have to drive the car pretty hard to find this barrier, but once you do it will drive you crazy!

I started tracking my 2006 Evo in... 2006! After ahile I had upgraded the tires to wider & stickier 255 RA1's and was having a lot of fun and getting faster. But the car was starting to push in a few turns. I implemented some of the well-known 'tricks' like increasing my camber and adding a bigger & stiffer rear swaybar. This helped some, but all the RSB was doing was reducing the rear grip instead of fixing the issue.

I continued to gain speed and by 2009 I was running Hoosier R6's. By this time I had a full set of coilovers on the car, ligtened it some (3300 lbs w/ driver), and upgraded the brakes. The car pushed now more than ever. Because of class regulations with NASA, I chose not to upgrade and stay in the class I wanted - thus I was forced to adapt my driving style to the push. This meant either throwing the car in a turn hot and sliding it until the traction caught and power out, or over-braking early to reduce corner entry speed and late-apexing everything. Neither option was ideal.

In mid 2010 I was so fed up I decided to jump classes and upgrade the rear diff. I chose Shep's version which is a 1.5 way 12-plate. Oh my god; the car freakin rotated now! I was now able to better control the car, and hold a 4-wheel slip angle. Instead forcing the rear to come around with tricks, I could get rotation with just the gas pedal.
Especially in the wet, the car was so much more fun and controllable. At my first event, I could carry a small drift ~80mph for over 100ft w/o drama! The car now rotated through the turns and I could pick up the gas soooo much quicker. Times dropped and no side-affects. I did a lot of refining the car and really liked where I had it sitting at this point.

After awhile though, as I put on wider and stickier tires, my speeds continued to increase and some of the push came back. I had heard about ACD updates a few years ago but never really believed anything about them. This was one of the reasons I got the Shep unit originally and not some fancy software that did not have a lot of feedback out there, at least not from many people I knew.
But I heard something about a newer company - ACD-Tuning - and I started researching them in late 2011. I talked awhile over email with Matthew and I explained how the car has progressed and what would make it better. We decided to team up and I quickly received an updated ACD unit for testing. I have to say it came quickly and was packaged very tightly - A+!

Now I've received a lot of offers to test products in the past. Some are new, some are proven, some have been offered at a discount and some even free. A majority of the time I do my homework and end up going a different direction. Meaning just because it's free, I'm not slapping it on the car. The same goes for stickers/decals. I keep the car pretty clean and prefer it that way. But this ACD-Tuning I really wanted to see if it could help so I pulled the trigger.


Test weekend #1 - Road Atlanta
In March 2012 I made my first trek to Road Atlanta. I ran Day #1 with my normal setup using 245 Hoosier R6's and had a good time of 1:32.8 I think. For day #2 there I swapped in the updated ACD unit and ran it in map #1, which had the smallest change as compared to the factory Tarmac mode. Overall I did not notice much of a difference. I only ran a few sessions that day given the 11hr drive but I did better my time to a low 1:32x. The good news is that the updated ACD unit did not cause me any problems or issues at all. There was no bind-up, no loss of grip, no crazy understeer or oversteer, no wheel spin or wheel hop or anything negative. Now being a new track I only ran about 8/10's so I didn't push the car incredibly hard or drive 'on the edge', so the ultimate decision on the ACD-Tuning software would need more testing.
I talked with Matthew about the event and Map #1 and he assured me it was the smallest change and said everything was good. He recommended to start with Map #2 next time, especially since I'm running Hoosiers and all. So that was the plan!

Test weekend #2 - Autobahn.
Although a small facility, a lot of people know this place as Redline and GTA and One Lap have all been here. It's actually one of my closest tracks and a great facility. The track is pretty wide and mostly smooth with some difficult corners and a few oddly placed bumps - and is known to be hard on brakes. I ran the first day with Map #2 on the same tires and the car rotated well but felt a little 'skaty'. In retrospect, I attribute this to some other factors including the new 6pt cage I had installed, and the fact I was pushing hard on a familiar track with skinnier tires than my last trip (245 vs 255's). The car still rotated well.
With day #2, I switched classes and bolted up my wider 255 A6's from the previous year. In my first hotlap I ran a new personal best of 1:31.9 (vs 1:32.1 in April/2011) in Map #2. The car felt great. It was so much more stable and sure-footed on the wider stickier tires and it again felt like my 2011 setup - the rotation felt good and I even played around with Map#3 which Matthew put on there for insane drifto! Even that map wouldn't turn the car into a drift-machine which is actually good. I didn't want to sacrifice grip in the front in order to gain it in the rear. I wanted the whole system to work together... just better - and it was.

Test weekend #3 - Putnam.
Back to another track I know well - running those same 245 R6's which was nearing the end of their useful life! I ran the car in my favorite Map #2 and tossed down some low 1:17's. Despite a gearing change from 2011 the altered my shiftpoints for the worse, everything felt great. Putnam has 2 long L-hand sweepers that can be torture to run - especially T4. They used to be torture with understeer frankly, and I've seen many a RWD car have trouble getting the power down here consistently.
Leaving the car in Map #2 all weekend - as the grip from the tires got worse, the car dynamically changed in T4. Keep in mind, that because of the reduced grip I was pushing really hard, close to 10/10's and the car was a handful with lots of steering inputs and corrections needed to keep it literally on-course. As the weekend progressed, the rear was beginning to rotate more and more in T4 specifically and it was great! I never adjusted my line, I just kept my foot down and adjusted the steering angle by opening up the wheel earlier as the rear rotated more and more. If you want the full writeup on the weekend go here: http://forums.evolutionm.net/10168766-post197.html There you'll find the same 2 video's I'm going to post below. And you can read all about the 2012 changes to the car in that parent thread - including my cliff's notes about the ACD-Tuning.

Synopsis:
Now I wouldn't really call my car overly developed or refined. It's running a ton of factory OEM parts still and some off-the-shelf items. There's no trickery and nothing really custom on it. I'm saying this so anyone reading this can put themselves in my shoes with regards to how the ACD-Tuning has helped further refine and aid the rotation in my car. My full setup can be found here: http://boomn29.blogspot.com/p/2012-car-setup.html
Now what I can't tell you, is how much the ACD-Tuning will help a car on the stock rear diff. I can only guess, and that guess would be enormously! With my car already having an upgraded rear-diff, coilovers, an aggressive alignment and setup to rotate well - it only made it better, more controllable and more predictable.

Customer Service:
Matthew has been very easy to work with. We exchange a lot of emails as I send him my thoughts on the car along with turn specific information and video. He takes all that in, and I believe they are continually refining their tuning solutions to help the entire market get an even better product. They even offer an exhange program, but no worries as our Evo's work w/o the ACD unit in them anyways if you're in a pinch for time.

[boomn29]

Nothing too exciting this week... Been busy with other projects like the yard and such.

I was able to get the oil changed on the truck. And last night I got the oil changed on the 929 Evo. AMSOIL goes in both. I also have the ACD and Trans fluid draining currently. I'm switching brands in the driveline this year - once I use up the last of my Redline stock I'm going to put in AMSOIL. I figure AMSOIL has been great to me so far, so why not run it throughout the car.
I'm debating whether to drain/change the rear diff fluid. I probably will, just never look forward to that since it's messy to refill to be sure.

A few pics; just to liven things up...

[fixem2@ATK]

AMSOIL FTW!!!

[boomn29]

Fluids time for the Evo too!

Engine Oil, Tranmission Oil and ACD oil all being drained currently...

[boomn29]

Got a little time to spend on the car last night. I was able to refill the Trans and ACD - so that's all taken car of. No time for anything else though besides a little interior work (touch of spray paint to match the cage color; this will be ongoing!).

I need to swap out the cracked rotor and work on the new brake ducts. Also need to troubleshoot my boost gauge. Hopefully get to some of that tonight.

Snapped a quick pic this morning:

[boomn29]

Brake ducting ingenuity attempt at work here. Key word is attempt! I've been running 2" ducting hose in the bumper holes which is extremely tight on a IX with an aftermarket intercooler setup. I bought some NACA ducts and 2.5" ducting and need to find a way to effectively position these in order to get increased airflow to cool the brakes for an entire 30-40 minute race.
I've had a few ideas, but nothing definite that'll work yet. I think I have room to run one on the driver side in the mesh of the bumper; so minimal hacking! The passenger side is the worst; always has been with the oil cooler needing as much air as it can get. I've pulled off the headlights to see if there's room, but there's not much with a pulley just to the right. I really don't want to cut into the bottom of the bumper, but that might be my only choice.

I'm wanting to keep the car TTA/PTA legal, which means I have to use the OEM bumper and cannot add any additional aero right now.

I also bolted the front crash beam back on. It's the only spot I have a front tow hook currently which is needed for the racegroups; and I'm underweight as it is. I know need a different tow hook setup so I can try to reduce weight on the frontend - just not a priority right now.

[boomn29]

We're booked this weekend for Gingerman Raceway in Michigan!

I actually signed up late last night after finding out that I have the weekend open. It's not my favorite track but like usual the event fits my schedule. So I'm about 80% sure I'm going - and I'll be in the racegroup only (No TT).

So now to the list of needs so I can make this a definite event. I need to route my new brake ducts to keep the car cool for an entire race. That's really the only necessity here assuming I'm running PTA with no aero. After that, the goals are quite simple really, survive for an entire 30-40min race and how the car works a set of tires and how the brakes hold up over the course of an entire race and Gingerman is a pretty decent track for that. I heard that it's the newer long config on Sat; open for vote on Sunday. I've got some Hoosier R6's yet that will be great for PTA.

I could run ST2 one of the days - and use up my old larger 255 A6's from last year. And that's probably a good idea, just to burn them up and they'll be faster than my other R6's anyway. That'll help clear they way for some new tread; namely some BFG's that I want to mount up.

[boomn29]

A pre-requisite for racing the Evo again is better brake cooling. That'll be achieved by running new, larger, and more direct air cooling ducts form the front bumper. Welcome to my nightmare...

I've had a few ideas; pretty much everything has failed. The failing reason has been constant; there's just not enough room in the front of the car to run adequate ducting on the OEM IX bumper. My larger upgraded FMIC blocks the middle, the piping blocks the little 'faux' holes.
I have an old pic from I think an 03 Evo where they ran NACA ducts in the front bumper of the car for what I assume is air cooling. I'm not sure if the oil cooler is in the same spot, but I know this car did NOT have the ACD pump on the driver's side to deal with. Here, check this out - follow my green arrows:


As I mentioned with the above idea, the ACD pump clogs up the right side. Besides the duct routing issue, I think there's room to put the inlet duct in the mesh actually and not have to cut into the bumper at all. The ACD pump is an issue either way, but I think there's room to route behind and around it. You just get a quick downward bend unfortunately. (see first pic below).

On the passenger side, I dunno if the oil cooler is in a different spot on that 03? I really don't see a good spot to jam the duct in really. The front bumper crash beam is a bit in the way, but you can probably still find room and/or remove it. You'd probably have to cut into or push the top rear corner of the oil cooler ducting a bit to find room to route the ducting. Or another option (like I show it below) is behind the oil cooler; this probably isn't as good an option but was easier to route quickly for a picture. Again, this side is doable I think but you get another quick downward bend unfortunately. (see second pic below).





Yes, I'm going crazy...
What this all means - besides failures - is that I'm at least eliminating bad options.

[boomn29]

What's left is the lower portion of the bumper. imo, the only real option is down low in the front bumper. Having the inlet down low would really help you run a direct duct straight back to the caliper and minimize the bends. It'll be a bit tight routing around the ACD pump and the oil cooler ducting but I think there's enough room to make it work.
Install would be like the custom epoxy setup that my buddy Jim did (pic #1 below) as well as pic #2 below from a shop out in CA that apparently does not have the setup available for sale as of yet. Now trying to create or source something this week is MY problem.





I was hoping that CA shop would be able to overnight me some parts, but I'm still waiting on an eta as the setup is not yet being sold. That sucks. At this point, there's really no way I can get it in time for the weekend even if it was all ready to package up and ship.

I think I could order a different set of NACA ducts for a much crappier (aka less clean) install. I'd need a duct that would allow me to attach my hose straight to it w/o a bend. I have a pair of 2.5" NACA ducts I got for this specific job, but they are the angled outlet ones. If I did get a NACA duct, there's going to be quick a big hole in the bumper! I'm not sure if it'll affect the overall rigidity of it or not?

Lastly, I'm not sure if the local hardware stores might have an option that could salvage my weekend or not...

[boomn29]

Ok, I've got a setup that I feel descent about now. It's not a finished product, but it's something I can finish up at the track and get through this weekend. I don't have a good set of tires to use this weekend, plus the turnout is pretty low so my goal is just to get the car through 2 races and finish. Then take all that information and modify. I plan to install the larger hoses with the new custom inlets and I think stepping up a brake pad too.

Here's some quick pics including the routing I took care of last night. I ended up cutting up my stock LICP and using that for now.

• On one passenger side, it's the same size as the ducting hose I was using before; but it eliminates 2 of the sharp bends and part that was pinched behind the existing LICP - so better. I eliminated about 8" of hose too. Then I thought it needed more, so I modified a NACA duct I had to try and funnel in more air. It needs a bit more TLC but it's definitely an upgrade.
• On the driver's side, the inlet is about 2.5" which is larger than I had before. Then my hose connects to it and runs nearly straight back. I'm not sure if I'll whip up another NACA duct on this side, but I've got the supplies to piece that together that I'll take with me. Again, I eliminated about 8" of hose.

[boomn29]

Happy to say the brake updates worked just fine this weekend. I'm going to build on that idea to make an even better product even.

Car did great this weekend, finished it's first ever Sprint Race on Saturday. Then #2 on Sunday! Flag-to-flag with zero issues. There's a batch of changes we can do to speed it up, with several minor things planned. Stay tuned for recaps and plans...

[Smevans]

Car looked good sir. Sorry I didnt say hi but I was only there for about 15 minutes to pick up a friend. Way to hot for me to stand around anyways haha.

[fixem2@ATK]

Looks like you are diving in for the kill and the black car is fighting to stay straight!!

[boomn29]

Looks like you are diving in for the kill and the black car is fighting to stay straight!!

That's exactly right. That was about 13 laps into the 15 lap race, and nobody had ANY grip at that point including me. It's also multi-class racing and being a rookie I'm trying to play nice. The cornering speeds of those CMC cars on Toyo's are painfully slow compared to what I could do, but they have tons of low torque with the GM V8's.

Long-story short, I played nice and took him the next lap. Really neat to see that explained out in pictures!

[boomn29]

Car looked good sir. Sorry I didnt say hi but I was only there for about 15 minutes to pick up a friend. Way to hot for me to stand around anyways haha.

Hey, pics from the Sunday race - awesome! I'd love to have those emailed to me if you could.

Sunday's race was a lot less worrisome for me after surviving on Saturday. I pushed a lot harder and slid around on crappier tires a lot more. Other cars on fire, some off in the sand and stuck; all kinds of interesting stuff out there! Super thx for posting the pics.

[Smevans]

Hey, pics from the Sunday race - awesome! I'd love to have those emailed to me if you could.

Sunday's race was a lot less worrisome for me after surviving on Saturday. I pushed a lot harder and slid around on crappier tires a lot more. Other cars on fire, some off in the sand and stuck; all kinds of interesting stuff out there! Super thx for posting the pics.

Will email them off when I get home from work.

Did you get pushed off the track (corner 4 or 5 I think) on Sunday? Hard to see from where I was standing at the time but it looked like you in the dust cloud.

[boomn29]

Will email them off when I get home from work.

Did you get pushed off the track (corner 4 or 5 I think) on Sunday? Hard to see from where I was standing at the time but it looked like you in the dust cloud.

I got pinched a little, and with the reduced grip from the high temps and marbles off-line I couldn't hold the outside of the track in the 2 lefts there and I went wide. Knowing 2 cars were beside/behind me I didn't try to overcorrect it so I carried it slowly around the corner with 2 tires off most of the way! lol.

I'm thinking I probably could have slowed down and 'given up' the corner to the passing car a little earlier but you learn. Or I could have pinched him off first - but that's not smart for a guy with 'Rookie' marks all over his car. And I'm sure the old-timers look for those marks and/or recognize the new cars out there.

[boomn29]

929 Evo - 1st Sprint Race - Gingerman 6-9-12

After some last minute updates to the brake ducting last week, we made it to Gingerman around 10pm and setup camp in the pitch dark and proceeded to drink until about 2:30am for some reason.

Race Day:
Morning came quick and I made the registration switch from PTA over to ST2 already. I knew I didn't have a chance in ST2 w/o at least good tires but I wanted to be in the faster rungroup and get used to the traffic. My goal was simply get the car through the weekend successfully and see how everything felt and reacted over the course of an entire race.

I prepped the car briefly and went out for practice on street tires to feel out the brake updates. Everything felt solid, although the car pushed hard on the street tires - which it has all year since the cage went in - I ran a 1:47 or so which was used to set the grid for Quals later that morning. I had a car spin in front of me and 2 of us had to split to miss it in the track which was fun. I was weighed afterwards and started doing to the math for the ballast I'd need.

I switched rims to the last of my leftover 2011 255 Hoosiers and stuffed the car full of fuel until it ran back out! I only ran a few laps and qualified with a 1:41 trying to save the tires as they were pretty beat up from running hard TT sessions last year. Last year pushing hard on the tire setup I ran a 1:38.8 (current TTA record) so I was in the ballpark. I made weight, but not by much, so we definitely would need to add ballast. Another issue was the oil temps. In my effort to fix the brake cooling issue I admittedly borrowed from the oil cooler flow as well as fixing the hole in the rubbed fenderwell by adding a chunk of plastic. I think the latter made things worse so I removed it and then worked up a special duct from the 'faux hole' around to the oil cooler. I was fairly confident this would make things at least manageable.

With a 3hr gap before the race I had some prep time. I had a tire that was starting to cord, so I replaced it with an another used 255 I had. I also was able to secure the ballast I needed, with the help of Jason from GP Racing we secured 25 lbs in the passenger side and another 30 lbs in the trunk. I'd already topped off every fluid container in the car (oil, radiator, drink bottle, windshield fluid, fuel, etc). Not knowing how much fuel the car would burn I errored on the heavy side as I didn't want a DQ.

The race went pretty well overall. All of the ST cars lined up in the 1st of 3 waves; I was 9th of 12 in that group and started on the inside of a very tight T1. I got a good jump, but all the big V8 N/A cars in front of me pulled harded off the line. I also realized from my vid I should have been up closer to the car in front; so I'll learn. I took T1 pretty slow trying to stay clean and dropped below boost in 3rd so I lost some momentum there. After that I had a Speeds car right on me and tried to leave room for him to come around as I knew he was faster and not in my class. I ran a few 1:42's and after that settled into a pace around 1:45-46 carefully eyeballing my oil temps the entire time around the 280-285 range. I babied the car, avoiding the high rpms when I could by shifting early and pushing the clutch in to coast into braking zones - all tricks that I know help the oil temps. Brakes felt good throughout and the tires stayed underneath fairly well since I wasn't pushing hard. I picked up a few spots from lap traffic with the older CMC cars and navigated some faster GTS traffic. I picked up the pace on the final few laps just to see and the tires were giving up for sure. Turn-in was horrid and the rear wouldn't rotate because of the lack of front grip and the extra ballast didn't help. In all the race lasted 17 laps and I covered about 43 miles.
I was very happy just to complete the race in the Evo. I was ever so paranoid about the brakes and the oil temps before the race started. I didn't use quite as much fuel as I thought so that was good and the car performed well with the Buschur tune. Officially I'd finish 4th in class and 12th of 36 in total.

As for the fuel, after the race I had exactly 1/2 tank but was not weighed.

fwiw on the weight, I ran 4 laps in Quals the next morning with 0 changes and came in at 3266 (claiming 3244) so I was fine.

[boomn29]

Busy ordering parts - lots of parts! Tires, brakes, etc...

If anybody has a line on some kind of headlight deletes, please let me know.

[fixem2@ATK]

Sounds like someone got bitten by the ST2 bug!!

[boomn29]

Sounds like someone got bitten by the ST2 bug!!

I'd like to, but that's not the plan for 2012. I want to keep the car TTA/PTA legal, so I can at least run Nationals in TTA this year. But I was completely out of tires, and also switched some compounds thx to Hoosier (with me paying shipping both ways).

[boomn29]

Dunno if you can make it out, but here's pics of the ballast we put together Sat:

[boomn29]

929 Evo - Race #2 of weekend - Gingerman 6-10-12

After a long 35min timed race on Sat - I was happy but insanely hot and exhausted. It was pushing 90 with 0 clouds all day and all that sun/heat was taking the toll on my energy level to be sure. Sat evening I went over the tires and tried to strategically rotate to get the best tread in the right spots - but everything moved very very slow! The brake pads looked to be around 50%, wearing less than I feared they would in the race. I knew they'd be good for the day but might start to get low and run warmer.

Sunday morning started very early due to a mandatory quite time of 10-12pm at this track. So the first cars were out at 8am with our race group scheduled for 8:20. This session would be qualifying, with the grid based on yesterday's best race lap. I was making some other updates including switching out my ACD unit and last track of time. I made it to grid in time, and the session was hot! I quickly discovered I missed a few things:
1) There was something rolling around in the car (later found a 10mm socket)
2) I didn't torque my wheels - only as tight as my rechargeable drill got them
3) I neglected to plug in my ACD after the switch
4) I neglected to put up my driver's side window net!

Apart from all the above, I just ran like 2 laps quickly and safely and came in. I managed a 1:41.5 which was slightly better than my qual time from Sat while still taking it pretty easy. I weighed 3266 I believe; having made 0 changes to weight since yesterday's race when I was claiming 3244. Meaning I was probably 4-5 laps to the good after Sat's race but I was also coasting into the corners to work with the higher than normal oil temps.
I checked over the car and realized my passenger rear that was previously showing some spots of cord decided to let go and wasn't really safe to run for a race. Maybe I could have flipped it and run it for a short session but that's not the safest to do. So it was time to switch to my other set of even more HC'd 245 Hoosier R6's and change forms. With a huge gap, there was plenty of time to take care of that and pull all the ballast I had put in the previous day.


The forecast for Sunday's race would be about the same. Right around 90 and solid sun. After happy to literally survive and finish on Sat, I was determined to push everything today and see how it turned out. I started in the same spot; 9th out of 12 in the first wave. After watching my vid, I was again not aggressive enough getting in line for the start. I held with all the leaders for 2-3 laps this time and settled into a pace of 1:42x (compared to 1:45-46 Saturday). The car slided a lot more but also rotated better, probably due to the combination of having less tire and less weight. Around lap 10 the brake pedal started getting longer, so I backed my pace down and did some LFB prior to the bigger braking zones just to make sure everything would be there. This slowed my pace enough that the CMC cars were difficult to get around (see pics above) as I didn't trust the brakes nearly enough to stick my nose down to the inside. And I definitely learned the CMC guys cornering speeds sucks on those Toyo's! Next time I'll know that my car can stick much better in the turns and make the pass more aggressively, so all good information.

This race was scheduled for 25min, so I knew it'd be less than the 17 laps from yesterday. There were a few local yellows again, but nothing to slow us down. There was more attrition than Sat with a few cars pulling off full of smoke; 1 catching the ground on fire nicely. I believe 14 laps was the total. The Evo pulled through with flying colors in this race; just the pads wearing down about 3/4 of the way through but that wasn't unexpected given the width I started with and only having 2" ducting still.

I was called in for weight as I finished 3rd of 4th and made weight easily. So I got my first podium in a Sprint race. But there's work to do and it's time to get serious!

I pulled off the passenger side from tire to do a little TLC to the fenderwell and found an issue:



Although this was a double raceday, with me being very hot and the brakes going downward, the cords showing was enough of a sign to pack it in for the weekend. Now if I were going for pts in ST2 or had 4 good tires, I would have at least went out for a few laps in the 3rd race but that's not my plan for this year.
At that point I was done for the weekend and worked to pack things up.

Overall my mind was racing with data. While I had oil temps on Sat just over 280 and I babied the rpm's, I pushed it hard on Sun and it never really went higher. I was also able to run 4 seconds faster consistently on even worse tires which was also a good sign. With the old saying that new tires are worth 2 seconds; I'd been knocking out 1:40's on better tread which is what most of the class had listed for their fastest lap actually. Keep in mind; I'm running 1 class higher that my setup too! So there's a lot of positives and a lot of small changes I can take away from the weekend. Which honestly was the entire plan from the beginning.
I've gotta thx Buschur Racing for a quality tune that was put through it's paces all weekend. It's been great this year so far! Also thanks to AMSOIL, KNS Brakes & ACD Tuning.

[boomn29]

So now that the #929Evo has a full race weekend under it's belt, it's time to charge forward with an updated plan! While the plan last weekend at Gingerman was just to survive, learn, and burn up the rest of the 2011 leftover tires, it's time to take all that knowledge and make the appropriate updates to charge forward.

Thanks to a new partnership with GP Racing Products, the #929Evo is going to get some much needed updates. If you've recall the name, when I ran the Enduro at Putnam I rented from Jason & Ryan of GP Racing. They're pretty much a 3-person shop that currently support 3 top running Spec Miata's with another that's currently for sale that they rent out. In addition Jason used to be an Evo owner so there's some additional familiarity right there. All in all, there's just some things you can't do without a 'proper' race preparation shop - and that's where the partnership with GP Racing came from. In addition, GP Racing offered to take my Evo home with them directly from the track and we'd work out a timeframe for me to retrieve it; with an option of delivering it back to an upcoming track event! This option made a world of difference being they're located just outside of Milwaukee, WI which is a solid 5 hr drive.

Most notably is the fact that since the 140 lb cage install, we've yet to put the car back on the scales for a corner balance! We've also been w/o a working boost gauge since the cage install, which is been annoying if nothing else. Also since the Putnam event in May when the rear exhaust hanger weld broke, we've been using wire and supporting zip ties to hold everything in place (which has worked great actually). Add some tire mounting, a host of other small items and phase II of the brake cooling upgrade project and GP Racing is really going to fine tune some issues on the car.

We're also striving to pull as much weight off the front end as possible prior to the corner-balance. I think I've got nearly 31 lbs coming off the front. In all, for our PTA legal post-race weight of 3263 lbs, we could be adding around 85 lbs of ballast to the car - definitely not in the front!