[FT@SGP]

Today we went to our first autocross of the season, the "Test and Tune" day. It is one of those days that give competitors a warm up and does not count towards points. There were many Evos and suprising number of STis; just a wonderful sight to see

Since our STi is not out of the shop yet, a customer of ours (wojo from these boards) asked us to drive his Evo to help him tune the suspension. His car has a turboback exhaust and I believe that is about it for power upgrades, and we had put in his JIC FLTA2-RS coilovers and did corner balancing as well.

The event was at FedEx field and was a beautiful day. The lot's asphalt was nice as usual and the course was a great mixture of handling and power. The start favored power and a good lunch could truly make 05. -0.7 sec difference. The a right-hand sweeper, then a series of single-cone and gate slaloms with 90-deg turns and shift and 180-deg turns and so forth.

Wojo has set the JIC's bump settings to 12 front and 12 rear out of 15. Tire pressures were 36/36 if I remember correctly without my notes. And we started running...

During my first run, the car was not pushing too much, it was relatively balanced and I took it quite easy and had a passenger (another Evo owner who was not running today and first in auto-x ). There was a portion of the lot that was relatively bumpy and we noticed that we were skipping a little too much and was not able to put the power down in that section where it would have been nice. However, the slaloms and overall turn-in response was quite nice. My best time was a 67.xxx and Wojo did a 66.xxx

In the second run, we adjusted tire pressures, and the car responded quite well to transitions with the RA1s, but we were still having problem putting power down in that one bumpy section. But our times went down to 65s.

Before the 3rd run we adjusted the rear bump to 8 and left the fronts at 12. And now we could really put the power down in that bumpy section, but we compromised our turn-in during the slaloms, slowing our transitions with less stiffness in the rear. But overall my time went down to 64.7xx, so focusing on that side of the course was the right objective. But we had to keep the power down but also get good turn-in during the slaloms. So, we wanted to try lower bump in the front and we set it to 10.

Unfortunately, that compromised front turn-in too much and I hit a cone during the first slalom and since we hadn't readjusted the tire pressures, they were a little too high in pressures due to heat and it became more difficult to control the front-end. Ended up with a 65.xxx in the fourth run.

My third run was the best and was enough to get 3rd place in ESP behind a mustang (0.2secs) and a camaro (~2secs). So, overall I would have throphied, but being roughly 2 seconds behind first place finisher is never too good.

However, we truly gathered invaluable data for shock setup on the Evo, which will also be applicable for the STi with slightly different settings.

STis and Evos dominated the AS class, and RS WRC from these boards took first place with a 62.xxx. It is truly a pleasure to see him drive, any car, but especially the STi

We certainly got the results I was looking for: adjustable shocks played a significant role in putting our available power to the ground and modifying handling characteristics as they are supposed to and Wojo was particularly pleased to be able to have that capability as he drives on the street, autocrosses, and track events with nearly equal focus.

So, hopefully we'll do even better with our STi

[ingrahamm]

I ran second in AS w/ a 63.9. RS WRC drove well, though I'm sure the much less than required 5 minute stretch between co-driver runs helped heat his Hoosiers pretty well.

Sorry I didn't get to meet you.

matt

[FT@SGP]

Matt,

I am sorry we did not get to meet as well, I was looking forward to it, but got so busy with two customers at the same time, I could not even watch most of the time.

You are right about the tires. He had the R compound of Hoosiers, and he always have some difficulty getting them to temp and usually they are quite greasy until 4th run.

Your time is a very good one as well, 2nd place in AS I assume?

How did you like the FedEx field?

[ingrahamm]

fedex is all right. I don't think it's any better than Virginia Motorsports Park in Dinwiddie (Petersburg), though.

yep, 2d in AS as noted previously. Not great, not embarrassing.

perhaps we can meet at the Nat Tour, assuming I make it up there.

matt

[FT@SGP]

For sure, I'll see you at the Nat's

[HeyDan]

I'm new to AutoX as my first school/outing will be this weekend. At this point, my priority is to learn and and fun. But it seems that to be competitive, upgrades in tires and suspension is a must do?

FT, I know even as a vendor, your answers will be objective

Ingrahamm, what are your mods?

Thanks,

Noob

[FT@SGP]

Hello Agent.STi,

To be competitive, you absolutely do not need any modifications with the exception of tires possibly. Matt and Burak (RS WRC) both did better than our modded Evo in raw times. So, you can definetly be competitive in stock class.

However, if you make a simple mod that puts you into Street Prepared or Street Modified classes, then you better exploit class rules to maximum possible allowed by your budget to be competitive

Stock classes are some of the most fun. Part of the competition in modified classes is that you not only compete on the basis of your driving, but also your engine and chassis setup To me that's just another level of fun and competition, lol.

One thing I'd like to note however: many people say you should learn in stock car then start your modifications. I am quite against that. If you learn to be competitive in a stock car and for one reason to another you make modifications later on, engine or chassis, you have to re-learn an entirely new driving style. Believe me I know this, many won't agree with me, but I know this. We are going through with this with one of our Evos. Great driver at national and local level, but over the winter he upgraded to 310 whp and 320 wtrq and now JICs; and yesterday he was below his last year's performance and not happy.

He is re-learning for sure, and he'll come up to speed fast, but he will loose points first two events, which might cost him class championship at the end of the season But, there is always 2005

[FT@SGP]

Here are the Pre-elim. results:

http://solo.wdcr-scca.org/results/20...e-3-28-04.html

AS class is dominated by STis LOL.

[HeyDan]

FT,

Thanks for your usual sage-like advice and insight. My only mod (pinks) will put me in street prepared. I was going to upgrade my suspension regardless of AutoX. But now the upgardes will actually be used

[FT@SGP]

It is my pleasure Agent.STi, any time.

Yes, I have to agree with you regarding suspension; another reason I don't like spring-only upgrades. But if you do upgarde to coilovers, thankfully there are a lot of people ready to buy Pinks

[ingrahamm]

FT--I respectfully disagree about modding the car early in one's AX career. I think novices should run in Stock and remove as many variables from the equation as possible. Heck, I myself have been doing this for a while and still always begin in Stock.

Agent--my car is 100% OEM stock except for OEM size SSR GT7s with Stock class legal R compound tires.

In any event, Agent, no matter what choices you make, you will have fun, get faster, and enjoy a great car in a safe environment. Can't beat that!

matt

[FT@SGP]

Matt,

I know many disagree with me on this stock vs. moded novice issue I truly don't get offended about it, and hope I don't offend others either. I understand your view point, which is common, and I personally went through half of my first year with a stock BMW 330Ci, I hated it. I learned driving cars in stiff chassis and always had some sort of modifications on my cars, hence I feel a lot more comfortable with modified cars rather than stock.

That why I have my opinion, may be it is too personal of a view, but I also see similar performance degradation in cars that we sponsor and setup; so, I don't have any data to conclude otherwise

Burak for example, feels similar to you, he knows how to maximize the performance of a stock car; and most likely I don't. I need a calculator to get a square-root of a complex number, my wife does it in her head Similarly, I need suspension to go fast, Burak needs stock

[ingrahamm]

no no, everything's cool. I have run cars in AS, DS, FS, GS, STS, DSP and A mod though. suspension tuning is fun but IMO a distraction, to a novice, from learning the fundamentals.

I like tuning spring rates and all the rest, and have a pretty good understanding of how to do it. But AX is hard enough to learn w/o adding all the other stuff nec. to learn to really tune a car properly. I think learning to maximize the perf of a stock car is a good way to get in a position to max the perf of a modded car.

again--different strokes, and all that.

matt

[FT@SGP]

rgr that

[HeyDan]

Guys, thanks for all your input. Lots of great food for thought.

Dan