I have a stock 2013 roadster s without sports suspension or other performance options. What can I legally put on my car in stock class? Can I upgrade to sport springs? Can I legally put JCW springs on the car?

What is hot stock sway bar setup for this car?

Can I do anything to engine

What is a good wheel and tire setup for stock roadster S? Assuming a6 is tire but what size wheel and tire are people running in national level cars?

 

Stock class is no more. As of the first of January we have Street, which is much the same thing. Street must run on street tires, 200tw+, so no A6 tires. There is Street-R which will allow A6 tires, but the class is going away at the end of 2014 for MINIs. The hot street tires are either BFG Rivals (225/45-15 on 15x6.5 is a good choice for Coopers, not sure about Ss) or Dunlop ZII (225/45-16 on 16x7 is a common choice).

The main things you can do to Street class cars are one bar, shocks, wheels +/-1", and exhaust downstream of the cat. SR doesn't allow the +/-1" wheels.

For Street (as for the old Stock class), you could perform package conversions. If it were an option from the factory you could change to it, but it has to be the complete package. That means you could upgrade to the sport suspension. The JCW suspension (I assume you mean JCW, not Jew) was also ruled legal.

As one sway bar is free and shocks are free, that means you have to install all the same springs and one bar from the package. A larger rear bar is the usual setup, so you have to change the front bar to the package one.

Not a lot you can do to the engine. Air filter, spark plugs and exhaust are free.

 

Great feedback thanks! So if JCW has different tune isn't it possible to put the JCW tune on the car?

Thanks for heads up on street I have always driven prepared classes and hadn't realized SCCA finally made this change. Great news!

So I'm thinking JCW springs and front bar with big rear bar. Wow I can go + 1 on wheel width! Is 16 best size or17 for tire availability? 16x8 with 225 ...wonder that will fit?

 

The +/-1" allowance is on wheel diameter, not width. But as MINI wheels get wider as they get bigger (15x5.5, 16x6.5, 17x7), it effectively means you can run wider wheels. Now legal would be 15x6.5, 16x7 but still only 17x7 (or 18x7).

I think the JCW dealer tune was also ruled legal (as port installed), so you can run that. I don't run in D Stock/Street (where the turbo MINIs are), so I couldn't say for sure. (We run in H Stock/Street with the JustaCoopers).

 

Just buy some good tires (either Dunlop Z2s or BFG Rivals) for your stock wheels and run the car as is. A roadster isn't going to be competitive outside of your region (and maybe not even that) so you may want to consider that before sinking a ton of money into it. Focus on the driver mod and consider doing a novice school (if you're new) or an evo school (if you've done some track days or similar).

You can put the JCW springs on with any damper, but you must also run at least 1 of the JCW sway bars as well. A common setup is the stock front bar (either sport or JCW, depending on the springs), and a Hotchkiss (or similar) rear bar. The JCW ECU flash is also legal.

 

It is my understanding that MINI never produced a JCW suspension for the roadster.

 

Ok so here is what I'm thinking so far

16x7 Enkei rpf1 wheels
225/45/16 Direzza II tires
JCW springs
JCW front bar
Hotchkis competition rear bar
JCW tune
What kind of shocks do they make for this car? Seems like slim pickings? Would like bilsteins.

Here are a couple of my past/current cars. ....don't worry about me spending too much money. Building street class car will be cheap! Lol!

 

Shocks...

Bilsteins are available along with Koni yellows and 2800s and Moton clubsports (iirc). It common to save a little money by just getting double adjustable rears and tuning handling with the rear compression. I have DA converted Koni yellows in the rear and regular yellows up front.

Rest of your setup looks pretty standard. FWIW Jack Burns had some success in Lincoln on the 215/40/17 Z2, so if money isn't a concern it might be worth testing.

Sorry for the noobish comment, a roadster just seemed like an odd car to build and its definitely going to be a uphill fight with it in DS.

 

2800s aren't too hard to fit but there is some custom fab required. You just need to figure out the measurements that you need (compression/droop/etc) and order the right shocks. Fronts are a strut application. The rears might require more work. If I was going for high dollar shocks at the moment I would go straight to Motion Control and not look back.

Although honestly I'm not sure you really need more than a set of Koni sports to be competitive

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Check with Charlie Davis or your local dealer regarding the availability of JCW springs or bars for a Roadster. The JCW suspension is no longer listed as an accessory, and I have only seen reports of dealers not being able to get them for people who originally ordered them.

 

No sweat I don't buy my cars to be nationally competitive. I work with what I have and just try to extract as much potential as I can. I'm an average ax driver so no hopes of being top national ax driver but I do like to have a car that is maximized to given class rules. My Z was sort of a lost cause in Ax as a prepared car and now is turning into a track and hillclimb car but I have the mini roadster in my stable and thought it would be a fun ax car. Seemed like stock/street mods would be perfect fit for car that is my daily driver. Stock suspension is rather sloppy but it's been a fun drive. Forces me to be real smooth. With slightly stiffer springs and more rear bar should sharpen it up

 

Does Charlie work at a mini dealer. If so which one?

 

Charlie worked in the MINI San Francisco parts department before moving to a BMW dealership on the peninsula. He used to order the specific JCW parts for autocrossers. The correct springs depend on your installed options. He's also, as you probably know, a virtual walking rule book.

 

Thanks talking with him now!

On tire /Wheel front I ordered set of 16x7.5 Kosei K4R and Im going to start with 205/50/16 dunlop dizzy II. That should be decent tire and wheel setup to start with.

 

I thought you were going to be in Street class. The x7.5 wouldn't be legal in Street.

 

^YUP!!! The wheels you just bought bump you to STX.

If you're not worried about being the top car in the class but want to go fast...PM me

 

Yep already going to somewhere else as the options for this car aren't ideal for stock class and real compromise for what I want. I have H&R springs coming, set of Hotchkis bars, Koni sports.

So can the roadster run in a ST class? Will be looking at OS Giken LSD or perhaps a Quaife torsion dif, aftermarket ECU tune, intake, etc. STX? Oh boy running little mini against EVOs sounds like a blast!

I just don't think I could ever drive a stock car in ax after running prepared cars for so long. Just want something that I can have as daily driver that will be ok at regional level.

 

The roadster isn't explicitly classed in the street touring classes but I'm guessing it would fall under STX with the rest of the S/JCW Minis. You could write in to request your car be classed in STX however at the regional level I would just run in STX and not worry about it. The Evo/STI runs in STU so you're not classed with them. Your competition is going to be RX-8/FRS/BRZ/ITR/WRX/325/328.

A tune won't be legal for STX unless it's a custom tune because you can't change the factory boost tables which all (as far as I know) aftermarket tunes do. Your biggest gain is going to be suspension and a set of springs/bars aren't really going to cut it at anything more than a regional level. Then you need wheels and tires and then a diff is probably the next step.

Just read the rules and decide what you want to do. Remember if it doesn't say you can then you can't. If you have any questions just ask.
http://www.scca.com/solo/content.cfm?cid=44517

 

Thanks ...I charted this territory in past with SP and Prepared with cars that hadn't been classed before . Ok so STX sounds like decent class. Will read up on rules. But man as I started to research options on Roadster with Charlie I just couldn't live with restrictions in street class. Hey wait a minute Charlie drives a STX BMW. I get it now!

I have an extra lightweight battery from my race car I can throw in mini. So on tune guess JCW tune is only real option. Then just do legal intake and exhuast mods. That should be enough power.

I'm probably going Quaife just to save money and since car is m daily driver and not a nationals car suspect that will do the job.


Guess camber plates and adjustable suspension arms will help too. Is it like SP no spherical bushings in suspension? I hate that rule as it limits suspension to crappy stuff.

I'm not a good at building cars to SCCA rules. I usually build what I want and then end up in some crazy class with SCCA that's why I tend to go with NASA and Hillclimb associations as rules tend to be more fair with those clubs. I like the classing systems that take power to weight tire size etc into account.

Exhibit b: My other project in addition to the mini. My unlimited class 370Z wide body race car for time attacks and hill climbs.

 

A quaife will do just fine for your purposes. I'm sure the OS Giken is a bit faster but it'll also require time to setup/tune and I just didn't want to deal with that. The Quaife is much better than the e-diff that mini tries to pass off as a real LSD.

No sphericals allowed unless the joint already had a spherical in it from the factory. So you can't change the "type". An example of this is the forward inner connection from the front control arm to the body. There is already a ball joint there. However the rear connection is a bushing so you have to stick with poly there. It's not really a bad thing. I wouldn't want sphericals on my street car anyways and the "vision" of ST was really supposed to be dual-purpose cars.