GVR4 mods quantified

[skivittlerjimb]

Though I'm still just getting started in the pastime of attempting to hustle a 15 year-old car around a race track, I'm at a bit of a unique point in this evolution. Having done just four track events, at the same track, and with successive suspension and tire modifications between each event, I figured I might be able to add to the GVR4 knowledge store by posting my findings and improvements. Here goes:

The Track - 3/4 mile go-kart track in upstate NY with three hairpins, two straights, two sweepers, and two chicances. Spec. Miatas with good drivers do ~:58 laps here. Fastest street car I've seen was a moderately modified Evo 8 that got in the high :55 range. Fastest street car record ever (AFAIK) was a heavily modified Lotus Europa with a mid :52 lap.

June 2005- 85-90 degree temps- driver with no experience- mods. limited to 2.5" turbo back exhaust and KYB AGXs. Tires were relatively fresh Yoko ES-100s, 205/55, on stock wheels.
Avg. lap time- 1:05.39 Best lap time- 1:03.32
Won the novice class, but stock brakes overheated badly. After two laps the pedal would go long. Tons of body roll , tires rolling over mightily until I bumped front pressures up to 42-44 psi. Car also was at indicated 2/3rds on the temp. gauge after a three lap session.

Sept 2005- Cooler ambient temps. New mods. included Porterfield R4S pads, ATE Super Blue fluid, WL 22mm front and 26mm rear bars, and a few Whiteline poly bushings. Same tires.
Avg. lap time- 1:02.37 Best lap time- 1:01.76 Won Class 1 for the weekend.
Brake fade issues were pretty much gone. Transitions were so much better with the WL bars that I was taking the chicanes much faster. Added Water Wetter to the coolant but the temp. gauge still was well over halfway after three-lap sessions.

Here's a nice picture from that weekend that shows the need for camber plates!

June 2006- Day One- WET. First day it rained the day entire day. GVR4 did well posting one of the better times of the wet Saturday.
New mods- GC coilovers with 250lb. springs in the front, 200lb. in the rear. Ride height close to stock. Additional caster tightened up the steering courtesy of a WL caster bushings. Got a fresh alignment but still just half a degree of neg. camber up front and 1.5 degrees of rear neg. camber (too much) in the rear due to frozen adjusters back there.
Avg. lap time on wet day- 1:06.17 Best wet time- 1:04.61 result was 4th out of 18 cars.
Wet Day In-Car Video

Day Two- Drier, still some rain and standing water on the track. Chunked Yokos were on their way out. 5th in class and 8th overall. Avg. Lap time- 1:02.93 Best time- 1:01.64
Happy to have beat my best lap time so far, but not by much. On the plus side, running an 80% water plus Water Wetter coolant mix meant temps were just a shade below halfway on the gauge the entire time. Tires were toast. Here's a nice shot of what was meant by "dry" that weekend:





July 2006- Both days were in the low-mid 80s. New mods. included MBC set to 12 psi, 1G MAS moved to colder air location, Odyssey 680 battery on bling-bling tray. Biggest addition though, was the 225/45 Falken Azenis RT-215s on 17x7.5 Rota Sub-seros courtesy of Bob in Chicago. Car had a lot more grip of course, but the balance was more understeer until I bumped front tire pressure to 39 psi cold. Stayed with 39 at all four corners and had no tire rollover. Best time of Day One- 59.97 Avg. time- 1:01.04
Best time Day Two- 1:00.25 Avg. Time - 1:00.62
Nice video showing the whole track
Only cars faster than 1432 that day were a heavily worked STi, a C6, a 2005 M3 (just by a bit), and Charlie North's '93 Colt with 16g 4g63t power and AWD (great car, BTW). Won Class 3 and was fifth out of 19 cars.



It's been great fun but I want more. It's tough to travel too far and spend too many weekends away from home, but I need to at least make it to NHIS and Lime Rock this year if at all possible to see what turns in 4th gear are like!

After the mods I've done I simply love to drive my old GVR4. The car has tons of grip, very little body roll, no real bad handling manners other than understeer at the limit, and will even respond decently to trail braking.

Next up will be (hopefully) front camber plates. Long term I need to decide if I should find a less rusty chassis to work with, but if I stick with this one I'll want a rear subframe assembly from a TEL with an LSD to go along with it, complete AWS delete (it's just blocked off now) and non-ABS brake line conversion (it's just unplugged now). While more power is always great, I'm staying focused on handling and braking improvements. Just got a helmet, and would love to get grippier, lighter seats too, that would accommodate a proper harness. Maybe that Mofugas short shifter will finally make it off the shelf and into the car, too, who knows? All I know is that this sort of thing is lots of fun, and I'm glad I lucked in to the GVR4 community a few years ago.

Who wants to go to the next SLMP event? Labor Day weekend, just $100. PM for details.
Cheers!

-Jim B.
1432/2000
166k rusty racer

 

[rez]

Nice driving! That little track looks like a lot of fun.

 

Jim: that's a fantastic drop in time on such a short "handling" track. I see your average time is very close to your best time. That means your set-up is now much more predictable and stable. You'll really fly with camber plates and more neg. camber in front. Those 15yr-old rubber strut top mounts mess up the front goemetry under heavy cornering. I don't think 1.5 degree rear neg. camber is too much.

 

[speedyvr4]

man thats great. Thats what I want to do with my dsm. I have my suspension almost ready, I got agx's on sprint springs, just did the oem big brake upgrade with hawks pads. Just gotta install camber kits front and back, fatter sway bar and suspension should be done till the coilover bug bites. I was saving up to do my first HPDE event at thunderhill, But the galant kicked my ass, and robbed me of all my uncle sam return money. Maybe next year. Till then, I'll keep working on getting my car ready. I loved to see how your times became more consistent and you grew along with the car. Keep it goin man!

 

[4Grim]

Great progress man...it seemed you and the car grew and improved together. I myself am getting #1948 for some track time like you are doing. Great progress man...keep it going!! /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/applause.gif

 

[turboflanagan]

I have a Schroth harness in mine and absolutely love it. With it on, it doesn't even matter that I have leather seats. I don't move at all. I would highly suggest trying that with the stock seats before shelling out money for others unless your stock ones are beat.

 

External oil cooler will substantially help in controlling your engine temp.

 

[atc250r]

As usual, Bob is right. More negative in the front is "more gooder". /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif I run -2.0* front and -1.5* rear and although its hard on tires it really helped the car corner better. If you don't have enough room in the front to run that much negative camber with the plates due to spring clearance, then get some Ingalls Camber Bolts for the front. Dial in as much negative as you can with them (arrow and tab point away from tire and towards body), then add some positive with the strut mounts. I have Tein uppers in my car and that's how its set. My buddy who owns a Z06 'Vette was impressed with the handling when he drove my car. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/worthy.gif Also, a rear swaybar is key to making these understeering cars corner properly. Mine was the best $150 I spent on my suspension.

John

 

[skivittlerjimb]

Thanks for the encouragement, guys. I intend to drive this car until it falls apart, so look for more track day reports in the future.

I do have camber bolts (Whiteline) in the front, but the alignment shop down in Norwood (near DSG) was still only able to get .5 degrees per side. I'm still waiting for Alex to get those E39 Tein tops in from intergalatic backorder, unless I find another set somewhere else first. I'm relatively lucky the rear is frozen where it is, near 1.5 degrees negative per side, although I did see premature inner treadwear on the rear with the last set of tires.

I do have an '90 external oil cooler set up on the shelf, but the pipe that runs to the cooler is a bit tweaked, and I'm not sure my mechanical abilities are up to installing the filter base just yet. If/when I pull the front bumper to do an FMIC, I'll see if I want to tackle that job at the same time. I'm sure I'll delete the A/C at that point, but I doubt I'll have the parts lined up to do the ABS delete job.

As for swaybars, I'm toying with the idea of disconnecting the front bar for a few "fun runs" the next time out. With a 26mm rear bar and no front bar, it should be quite entertaining and educational. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif If I had to do it again, I might have just stuck with the stock front bar and the WL rear bar to get a touch of oversteer, but I'm not sure the car would ultimately be faster that way. It's seems to me that making the front end stick better rather than making the rear end stick less is the best route for faster lap times at this point.

For seats, recently someone on the board installed these, which I like quite a bit. For $350 or so a set, I may take the plunge if they're still available:



Here's another, and smaller file size, video of the front chicane. My entry point should be wider, but some cones blocking off a collapsed and then repaired section of pavement right at the start/finish line forces you to go in closer to the first cone/curb on the right.

-Jim B.
1432/2000
166k

 

[rheckert]

/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/rofl.gifI read the stiching to fsat the first time and read, "RallyMart"
I like them. Good looking seats. Have you sat in them?

 

[CP]

Same mod route that I've taken...brakes and suspension first.

Raise your boost to 14psi. Get a better MAS and a logger if you don't already have one. Increase your rear tire pressures a few pounds, which essentially increases your spring rate back there and will help with the push (I try to keep mine at 39-40 psi hot all around). I'm running -1.5* rear camber, and -2.5* in front with no uneven tire wear with 235s. Wire both your fans to a switch, so you can manually turn them on during lapping. Get an external oil cooler. Ditch the 4WS and everything associated with it. Harnesses are great. Smaller diameter steering wheel helps too.

 

I might have #78 up and running cherry by then. Its about 400 miles from here in rhode island but that track looks like itd be fun. Is it all weekend long? Im sure you guys have some good logging roads up in VT also /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif

 

[skivittlerjimb]

Hey Chris,

The event officially starts on Saturday morning, Sept. 2nd, and goes until Sunday afternoon at about 3:00 p.m. The track owner opens up the track for "fun runs" on Friday afternoon as well at about 3:00 p.m. I've never gotten there that early but it's a great way to learn the track, and usually he only asks for $20. The rest of the event is $100. It's capped at 20 cars so you get plenty of track time. Last time out I had 20+ timed laps and a dozen or so untimed hot laps.

There is plenty of cheap lodging nearby, but the majority of folks just bring their tents and camp next to the track. There are flush toilets and a clean water source, but no electrical power at the track. You'll find all the info. at www.sccv.org in the Forums/SCCV Events/Track section.

As for VT logging roads, they're around, but NH and Maine have better ones, IMHO. Except for the northeast corner of VT, most of the dirt roads in VT are pretty well traveled and have lots of folks living on them, so you can't exactly take them at full tilt, not that you'd want to. Often times VT's dirt roads are in better shape than the asphalt ones, though!

-Jim B.
1432/2000
166k- car's a native Vermonter, I'm not

 

Thanks jim, ill deffently look into going to some of those events when she gets back on the road. I really would love to do a hill climb up okemo, maybe next year for sure.

 

[skivittlerjimb]

For hillclimbs in the VT and NH, you pretty much need a roll cage unless your car is "Unprepared" and you drive under the "breakout time." Make sure you read the tech section of the www.hillclimb.org site carefully before you register for such an event.

Or you could just take a (careful) blast up the Bolton Valley access road, or App. Gap, or Brandon Gap, or Middlebury Gap, or .

-Jim B.
1432/2000
166k and was not seen doing 75mph on such a road last night

 

ya ill check it out so this way next year ill be ready to rock! ha ha

 

[CP]

Join the BMWCCA and get to some of their events at NHIS, LRP or WG. Personally I like their format and general event feel better than COM (too competitive, with an emphasis on going faster). I also do events with the ACNA (Audi Club) but they only do one event at NHIS, which is the closest for all of us. The BMWCCA does a bunch of events at Loudon, and you can do one day only at a two day event with them if you want to. PM me if you've got any questions. I'm hoping to have a set of Stoptechs in time for the Glen at the end of August with the ACNA. Saving now...

 

[CP]

Hmmm...funny (off-topic, sort of). My father just called on his way to California for a wedding. His plane is fuxored, so they're pulling it back to the gate in Atlanta. But he's sitting next to Shane Lewis right now and is talking racing with the guy.

 

[skivittlerjimb]

Hot Bits camber plates and 2.0 degress of neg. camber plus a Whiteline front strut bar certainly did help, to the tune of over .5 seconds off my best lap time at this track. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/cool.gif

Sept. 2, ambient temps in the high 60s, dry until the end of the day:
Best Time: 59.43 Avg. Time (Dry): 59.81
1st in class and 5th out of 20 cars (beat by a 400hp STi, 2004 M3, C6, and well-driven and boosted Mini S)

Sept. 3, temps in the 60s, but rainy and breezy pretty much all day thanks to the remnants of Ernesto passing through. The track never had standing water but never dried out either. Most noticeable in getting traction out of the track's 3 slowest corners.
Best Time: 1:01.74 Avg. Time (wet conditions, both days): 1:02.71
1st in class again, but 6th overall. Beat the C6 this time (was driven a bit timidly by it's owner) but a very well-driven and prepped hillclimb Golf 1.8T and an "enthusiastically" driven 80s Firebird with a healthy V8 got a bit better the 2nd day.

Still hoping for a day at Lime Rock or NHIS before the season is out, but the fuel tank replacment must get done first. Here's a few pics and couple videos from the weekend:










Quick Dry Lap

Wet Day Video

Any and all comments on line, technique, etc. that you road course folks notice are very appreciated! My GVR4 in it's current format is a great car to learn with: good, predictable handling manners, not too much power, and doesn't seem to mind being abused for short periods of time.

-Jim B.
1432/2000
167k

 

[CP]

Interesting small track. This is in South Burlington? Can you mount your camera any higher?