Hey guys, thought I'd throw up a thread on my experiences tracking my R56 as just kind of a fun thread to put together some info and maybe get some tips here and there. I just wrapped up my second HPDE day, nothing competitive just out there for fun right now. Might move into Time Trials eventually but that would be sometime down the road.

Being where I am in Cali I'm right around several tracks ranging from an hour or so drive to 5+. So far I've only been to ButtonWillow but aim to hit some of these other ones soon.

• Laguna Seca - ~2 hours
• Willow Springs - ~3 hours
• Thunderhill - ~5.5 hours

My first track day was with NASA starting out in HPDE1 with instruction. Car was mostly stock at this time with a stage 2 tune and intercooler upgrade and some EBC Red pads and some fantastic 500 treadwear all seasons. A lot was learned, mostly about the corners on the track which was good. My memory isn't fantastic so I thought I might have some trouble remembering the names and apex points but once you're driving out there they stick pretty good.

I wasn't really pushing my car mostly just trying to have fun so I was extremely surprised when I came back down the main straight in my first session on the 3rd lap and the brakes did nothing. Managed to cook them extremely well and by the end of the 3rd session I had to call it quits due to how bad they'd gotten. Missed my last session for the day but still had a blast. I unfortunately had 3 different instructors so I kept getting different advice for each corner which made it interesting trying to determine the best lines, regardless they signed off on my going into HPDE2 by the end of the day so I must have been doing something right.

This of course gave me the bug and now the mods really start, I've now added a set of Ohlins R&T with Vorshlag camber plates, NM Eng Rear Sway Bar, NM Eng Catback (been hunting for an exhaust for sometime, just wanted a bit more sound), Wilwood 13" FSL BBK in the front, Aquamist WM kit and Schroth QC harness for safety, Enkei RPF1's with some RE71R's for grip.

Second day was with Speed District, these guys were a completely different setup than NASA. NASA runs races in between the HPDE sessions so you get 4 sessions for the day, Speed District gets you essentially 2 days in one with 8 sessions per group which was awesome. I was back out on track every 40 mins for 20 mins, by the end of the day I was beat. I only did 7 sessions but the 7th and 8th were open track and I was on track for 40 mins my last session.

Unfortunately NASA didn't provide transponders for HPDE1 free and considering it was my first day I didn't want to pay for one as I was trying to focus on learning rather than pushing for times. Speed District on the other hand includes them with your day. I managed to improve quite a bit going from my slowest time of the day at a 2:22.735 to a 2:15.158.

From there I was struggling to improve but also noticed that my traction control was interfering in some corners. I was confused here as everything I found said that pressing and holding the DTC/DSC button for 5-10 seconds so the light comes on then goes back off should turn everything off but that's not what I was experiencing. So for my next session I decided to try it with the button pressed and warning light on, man did that transform the car. Now the car is doing 4 wheel slides around corners and I'm not having to deal with the computers interfering. Immediately picked up a nice chunk of time bringing me to my best time of the day at a 2:12.398. Only 3 seconds behind a Cayman so not too bad I think.

I was running -1.9 degrees of camber front to back and 0 toe in the front with 1/4" toe in for the rear. I found 30psi front and 28psi rear cold to be the best for this setup according to tire temps. I could have used a bit more camber but didn't find out till too late in the day. Tire temps with DTC/DSC on were pretty good but with them turned off it was clear I needed way more camber, which is evident by my tire wear. Unfortunately I think I killed my DF tire, which was probably at 50% when I started the day, I may be able to rotate it to the passenger side and get a bit more out of it but the shoulder is pretty toasted.

I ran the Ohlins at 2 clicks from full stiff in the front and 3 in the rear and it handled everything amazingly well. May have gone up on 2 wheels for a bit on Cotton Corners by clipping too much berm at the crest on a lap...didn't do that again.

The Wilwoods held up great, didn't get any fade at all running a set of Poly B's that a member on here sent my way that he had laying around. Very thankful for these as I realize the Poly H's I ordered with the brakes would have been overkill and probably would have killed my rotors. Really surprised everything ran as well as it did considering it was 100 degrees, always hot at this track.

The shop that does my alignments only trusts one of their guys to do them with the camber plates etc so that locks me into doing them on Saturdays only, tough to set a track specific alignment before a day on a Saturday then so I ordered up some equipment to do them myself. Judging by my tire wear I'm thinking I'm going to need 3 degrees in the front and 2.5 in the rear. Also planning to drop rear toe in to 1/16"

The tires are dirty as I drive the car to/from the track, I only put 2 tires off the track on my first lap of the day....may have overcooked the last turn a bit but after that was good. Anyways that's about it for this post, probably won't have another session for a couple months as I need to sort out a few other things but will update this with my future events as well.

 

Happy to hear the brakes are holding up well. Save the H pads for when you make the move to dedicated track tires.

 

What kind of methanol set up are you using. Just heard that running meth at the track is the way to go with keeping your engine cool and track times consistent.

 

I’m running an Aquamist HFS-4 with a 50/50 water meth mix. I don’t have a datalogger so I can’t say for sure but when i was checking intake temps on some sessions I never saw them go above 160 and it was a 100 degrees out.

 

did you get the plates installed? that will help a lot with the tire wear unfortunately no fix for the rears picking up OPR

 

I did have the camber plates installed, I was only running -2 degrees front and rear though. At the time I was having my alignments done by a shop that could only get my in on Saturdays so rather than run extensive camber for 800+ miles plus a track day I ran moderate camber and hoped that would be enough. It kept up well enough until I turned off the stability control and then I started cooking the driver side tire shoulders.

I now have the necessary equipment to set my own alignments trackside so I'll be able to make adjustments for track direction and tire temps while out there, should help extend the life of the next set of tires pretty well.

 

Whare did you get your aquamist setup from? ive been wanying to buy the same setup you have but want to buy from a good source. I believe the site i found was aquamistdirect but could find any reviews on the site and did not recieve any answers to my email wen i tried to contact them. So ive been kinda nervous about ordering. Any advice would be very appreciated thanks!!

 

I ordered from AquamistDirect. That's Richard's site, odd that he didn't get back to you though. I emailed him originally before purchasing with questions about the kit and he was very helpful. I'd recommend shooting him another email if you have any questions, but I had no problems with my purchase.

 

Sweet thanks!!! And stuff happens mabey it was a busy day or something it was a few months ago. I appreciate the info i plan on it being the next upgrade before the turbo. Did you do the install yourself? If so was it difficult?