When I bashed the berm and broke my OEM wheel, it seems there were a couple parts on the passenger side suspension that got bent/out of wack. Under heavy braking (like at the track), the car pulls pretty hard to the left. Unfortunately, the parts are again not in stock, so I have to wait for them to come in from across the pond.

 

Ouch!

Sorry to hear that...

 

How do you like that size wheel so far? I've just started the search for a set of autocross wheels.

 

First Post! Welcome to NAM and the wonderful world of MINIs.

 

Thanks. It's a heck of a step up from my Focus ST.

 

Those wheels look fantastic on that GP... nice choice.

 

So, did my track day on the 225/35/18 A052's.. It was...interesting. The morning was cold, as were the tires, so I wasn't trying to set any lap times for my first session. Just kinda trying to get a feel for how the tires acted and all that. One other thing I did different on that first session was to use the flappy paddles to shift, rather than let the car do it (GP mode on, transmission in sport mode). For not even really pushing, I set an almost 2second PB. WTF. And not just one lap. *Every* lap was consistently faster than my previous best time!! Tire pressure going out was around 31F 30R. Hot they were about 40F/38R.

Second session, no flappy paddles, just to have something to compare with. My lap times were slower by about 2 seconds. Hmm. Tire pressures were about 35F/32R cold. 42F/40R hot.

Last session, used the flappy paddles. Didn't check the tire pressures cause I was lazy. Set another PB by almost 3 seconds (total, not in addition to the 2 second PB from the first session). GODDAMN!!! Video of that lap:
Now for the bad news. The driver front tire. Remember, these were brand new a couple weeks ago. This was their first track outing. *Maybe* 200 miles total on them. From what I can gather (remember, I'm not an expert here, so I asked around):

- Overdriving: Quite possble. I have a tendency to really push the corners.
- Lack of front camber: Definitely. Stock we don't get much
- Bad tire pressures: Possibly. I've never tracked these so I was playing with pressures...kinda

I won't be buying these tires again until I can address at least 2 of those issues above. I think I'll try some Federal RS-PRO's in 225/40/18 next, see how the lap times are with the flappy paddles

 

Wow! That’s not good

I never seen a tire roll over on the sidewall like that and then cord the thing. I have ~1.5 deg of camber and run at Lime Rock Park, which is brutal on the outside of the left front tire and have never seen that, and I have run a number of different tires and sizes. And I have a lot of friends that I run with there; nothing like that...

Here is my 2 cents...
Switch tires... My new favorite... Falken 660 (corrected link)
This tire sticks like crazy and seem to be very tolerant of a setup that may not be ideal.

Tire pressure - On most of the tires I have used (Dunlop ZI, ZII; Toyo R888, Bridgestone RE71Rs) the max hot pressure was 40 psi. Above that and the performance really dropped off. Min hot pressure was 37 psi. Below that they felt squirrelly. Now the Falkens were different. They tolerated pressures above 40 psi, but I have only had them out twice and have not had a chance to play with pressures.

Does anyone know what the factory camber is for the GP3? For the GP2 it was -1.5 deg. I would think the GP3 would be at least that, if not more. While camber will aways help with tire wear, I am surprised with the wear that you got.

Driving - Some observations from 2,000 miles away and never having been on that track, but here goes... You miss getting down to the curb of the apex on a lot of the turns and you should use all of the track for track out. This means that your arc is tighter than it needs to be. With track out, this is a general observation and there may be reason to not track all of the way out for setup into the next turn, but this will be a compromise. Also, with the first 2 turns shown in the video, the turn-in is more abrupt than what seems to be necessary. Try rolling the steering wheel into the turn more; make it more progressive and smooth. For both of these initiating your turn-in a little earlier should help. This may help with not over driving the tires. (I edited the following) However, I didn’t see anything in what you are doing that should have resulted in the wear you got.

Oh, if I remember correctly you had work done on the front end... Check your toe in. If you have too much, that would mean you have to turn the steering wheel more to make a turn and that will cause excess tire wear. I would set it to the low end of the spec, but not zero.

Hope this helps...

 

Another observation, which doesn’t bode well for those A052s.... The tread wear across the tire is pretty even. In fact it is really good wear, at least from what I can see in the pictures. This says to me that your camber is good/fine. My experience at Lime Rock Park is that the outboard edge of the left front tire wears excessively, but the inboard part of the tire has almost no wear and the wear profile across the face of the tire is a pretty even tapper. That is what I get with -1.5 deg camber and is what I would expect to see with your tire if the MINI needed more negative camber.

My guess - 1st...too much toe in... 2nd... the tire.

I think the camber is acceptable (I wouldn’t go off at this point to add more), and I think my comments to your driving are more nits than anything being to the point of being the major cause of this tire wear...

 

My GP3 has been put away for the winter. But, I pulled my alignment printouts from when I had Crown MINI in Richmond VA perform a 'race' alignment on my GP3 the day I bought the car and before my first track day a couple weeks later.

I worked with the Lead Service Tech at the dealer to align the car to my specifications while I sat in the driver's seat while the car was on the alignment rack. He is a racer and I have been working with him for over 15 years. He understands the need of a proper 'track' alignment.

We got nearly 1.5 degrees negative camber in the front on each side. The max negative camber in the front was -1.35 degrees LF and -1.45 degrees RF with me sitting in the car. We set Total Front Toe to 1/16 Total Toe OUT. 1/32 inch toe out per side.

The rear of the car the Camber was set to -1.90 LR and -1.85 RR with Total Rear Toe set to ZERO. Set to 0 each side.

I have run two track days at Pocono with the GP3 last fall. Tire pressures started 35 PSI cold and they got to about 40-42 PSI on track. I monitor the tire pressure in the car while on track by displaying them on the center info screen. I set Tire Pressure screen to "Preset 4" and Engine Power Graphic screen set to "preset 5" I toggle between the two.

Tire wear is not quite even across the front tires. (Hankook OEM tires) Pocono is mostly right turns. Left front showed most wear (but no cord) After first track event, I rotated the tires front to back and back to front. No Criss Cross.

I will be ordering an extra pair of OEM wheels soon to have with me at the track. I will probably mount the Hankook OEM tires on them. I was disappointed to see that David corded the Yokohama A052s after one event.

I expect my first 2021 track event will be in April. I will need to replace the front brake pads before that track day. I bought a set of the Brembo brand P06097N replacement pads. I don't like the 'look' of them. The Brembo brand don't look as abrasive as the OEM MINI Part # 34 10 6 889 266 front pads

Has anyone tried the Brembo Front pads?


Mark Chiles
Hershey, PA
2021 MINI JCW GP #999
2019 MINI JCW Orange International Edition (manual)
2013 MINI Cooper (Manual - Winter Car)
2009 Pontiac G8 GXP (6.2L - Manual)

 

I would not run those on a low camber car, when they came out people were cording them really fast at autocross events. It's not a HPDE tire it's made to be a hot lap time trial / autocross tire, go out and do a warm up, a hot lap or two and come in if you stay out they over heat and will do what you had happen.

I would not try them personally without at least -3 up front

 

Mark - Thanks for the input and info.

As for camber, I remembered after I posted my thoughts above that I had talked to a guy this past summer who ran amateur endurance race events with the Yoko A052s and wondered how he did that if Dave is cording his so quickly. My guess is what Mr. Blah said: -3 deg of camber or more. And he ran a rear wheel drive car.

The A052 and RE71R tires are both “autocross” tires and, as a result, are sticky when cold or warm. But this doesn’t make for a great track tire. With the RE71Rs I found they heat soak after a while on the track and they lose performance. However, I will say that they are very tolerant of a low camber car, which mine is. The A052 has a very square edge tread, unlike the more rounded edge tread of the RE71Rs and many other tires. I wonder if this also played into the wear Dave saw?

 

Finding good information on tires is such a pita, mainly because review's and reviewers don't always specify if they're doing AutoX or actual HPDE/track days. So frustrating :angry_face:

Either way, it was worth the attempt, if only to have more info for future purchases. Which I just just did. Federal RS-Pro's in 225/40/18. They were next on my list to test, followed by the Fallen 660's. The Federals are cheap, too. Hopefully they perform and don't get destroyed like the A052, lol!

@mchiles I haven't tried any aftermarket pads yet. Until my suspension is fixed, at lest . I attached my alignment printout from when I got it aligned at the beginning of Dec. A couple things to note: The front is off because of the bent suspension bits on the passenger side. He got my rear camber to approx -1.96 -1.99. Would there be any negatives to just copying your specs and telling them "Give me this"?

@Eddie07S Thanks for the input on the tires. I've never had a tires crap out on me like this and getting feedback from non-Mini drivers sometimes isn't as helpful as I'd like . Hopefully the Federals wear better...

 

Below are screen shots of my GP3 alignment. I am "Old School". I prefer alignments displayed with Camber in Degrees and Toe in Fractions of Inches. It is usually a setting on the alignment computer.

The alignment rack at the dealer did not have GP3 OEM alignment specs loaded into the computer when my alignment was performed.

I prefer a little bit of TOE OUT on front axle to reduce understeer. I prefer little or no toe out in the rear to avoid unexpected high speed oversteer. Car has very neutral handling with this set up.

If I was setting up for autocross. I would probably increase Front Toe Out to about 1/4 inch total toe out and some toe out in the rear too. This increases steering response at the expense of straight line top speed on the track and causes the car to wander on the street and wear out the tires fast.


Mark Chiles
Hershey, PA
2021 MINI JCW GP #999
2019 MINI JCW Orange International Edition (manual)
2013 MINI Cooper (Manual - Winter Car)
2009 Pontiac G8 GXP (6.2L - Manual)

 

Thanks guys for all this useful information. The GP is a garage queen along with the other seasonal speedsters with summer performance tires.

Great Thread!

 

"Hot they were about 40F/38R. ?"
Optimum Pressure hot 2.5 Bar / 90 Deg.

 

Or about 36psi
And would that be 90 deg C? Or about 200 deg F?

On my R56, with the 7”x17” wheels but the same camber as the GP3, I found 36 psi to be a little low. The car became sloppy. I may be the odd one out here as I know most people run their tires lower than I do. My cousin runs his M2 with the tires at about 36 psi, hot, as do many others. Some are running down in the low 30s (psi). I will note that the higher pressures tend to be from autocross experience, as opposed to track experience. If the thought is that the tire pressure was too high, I was told to drop the pressure in about 2 psi increments until handling was adversely affected.

 

Not temperature, pressure. 40F = 40psi in the front and 38 psi in the rear

 

Again for 225/45/17 Cup 2 Michelin recommendation not over 2.5 bar optimum grip level 90° that around 200 F ?

 

2.5 bar is equal to 36 pounds U.S.

 

This is the tire that my cousin uses on his M2 and I believe that is pressure he uses. I have not used Michelins, so I can’t speak to them. But the tires I have used on my R56 were best at 38-39 up front and 37 - 39 in the rear. Typically I would run 1 psi lower in the rear than the front. All except the Falkens were not good over 40 psi. The Falkens were very tolerant of being above 40 psi, but were better being below 40. I didn’t get much of a chance to play with the pressure on those, so I may not have gotten down to an optimal pressure.

 

What is your tyre temperature ?
You talking here about 1 or to 2 Psi 40F/38F ?
and don`t monitor the temperature ?

https://www.facebook.com/f56.shiva/photos/a.1569909749893124/1703412729876158/
Thats wheel might have seen well over 2ooF

 

Not considering temperature make no sense as performance tire develop their glue activity at temperature you never reach in normal life, which makes them for 98% complete useless.

The CUP 2 have been initially developed for Porsche GT3 and should be for all F56 owners the choice !
Looking 7 years back at the newly launched F56 JCW we had to overcome MINI`s long-life-approach.

We contacted Michelin told them the type of car and weight, they gave us the datas.

JCW 2015
205/45-17 7J x 17 ET:54 11 kg
225/45-17 8J x 17 ET:40 9 kg Michelin Cup 2

GP3 2020
225/35-18 8J x18 ET:39 9 kg
235/40-18 8J x18 ET:39 9 kg Touring Michelin
235/40-17 8J x 17 ET:35 X Track TBA
245/40-17 9J x 17 ET:xx X TÜV Racer TBA

 

Clutch -
I will note that this is only my experience, with my car setup. It is one data point I put out there for others to consider. Not saying it is right or wrong. I also believe that posts from others, such as yourself, are important to this discussion. Thanks for posting and sharing your knowledge.

Yes, tire temperature is important. It seems that the temperature you are showing is an internal tire temperature, which I was not aware that I could get on my JCW. This is something I may look into.

However, as I noted in my post above, on my R56 with a tire pressure below 37 psi, hot, the tire/car handling was unacceptable. Corner turn in was sloppy and the car was less stable through the turns. So, I am not sure how tire temperature helps me if the car’s performance is unacceptable at a lower pressure. I would think that finding an acceptable pressure range is where I would start and then would adjust pressure within that range in order to get close to an optimal temperature. For reference, I believe I did this min pressure check when I was using Dunlop ZII 215-45x17 tires on 7” wide wheels. I will admit that I have not experiment with a lower end pressure on the other tires I have used (Toyo R888, Bridgestone RE71Rs). I also have not yet had a chance to experiment with the tire pressures on the JCW.

As for tire size, I don’t know how people are running 225/45x17s on 8” wide wheels on their F56 JCW. I tried that size tire on 7.5” wide, ET40 wheels and didn’t make it out of the driveway because they were rubbing so badly. I downsized to a 215/45x17 on the same wheels and this was the rubbing I had from 3 days on the track...


Getting close to the metal lip

You can see the metal lip in the picture and the wear on the plastic is getting close to that. I would think that, with a 225 wide tire on 8” wide wheels, the tire would have likely been rubbing on the metal, which again would have been unacceptable.

Again, this is just me and my experience with my F56 JCW. Not sure if it means anything for the GP3, except that it is something to look for when changing from the factory design.

 

Finally, some backspacing info. That'll be useful.