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My first spin

I was taught to try to spin my car early on in order to know my car's limits. An NSX with track suspension setup like yours is tough to spin, so kudos for pushing your car to its limits!
 
I learned two things this weekend.

1. The Goodyear F1GS3s are great street tires - but lousy track tires. The Falken 615s are FAR, FAR superior on the track. In fact when I wear my Toyo R888s out I am going back to the Falkens. I have to drive to the track and the Toyos are loud, twice as much $, wear quicker and my laptimes are only 2 sec faster. But then again, the new Blugegrass Motorsports opens next spring and it's 16 miles from my driveway. So maybe I can get away with driving back and forth with Hoosier R6s. :biggrin:

2. My rear Dali Track bar is now for sale. Even running the front bar stiff and rear bar soft, it's way too much rear bar (at least for my setup) - I had TONS of oversteer. I think I am going to stick my OEM bar back on the rear and/or switch the rear to the smaller street/track bar.
 
Oh, for those of you who were wondering how I recorded with no wind noise (both windows down). Opened the video camera and soldered in an external mic jack and then got a lavalier mic (lapel mic) with 20' cord and ran it to the trunk. :biggrin: Camera has CRAPPY audio so it clips a bit under full throttle, but $150 + $20 for the mic will have to do until I can find a used Canon HF100 on ebay. :cool:
 
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But I heard GSD3s were the best tires ever made :wink:

It's nice to actually see some in-car footage of someone actually driving a car on GSD3s at the limit. From the video, I would agree with your findings. Would you say the 615s have more grip and less tread squirm than the GSD3s? I'm not a huge fan of the 615s but they are a great bang/buck and if the grip levels and time improvement aren't enough to warrent the extra cost of the 888s, then the 615s are a great option.

What were your tire sizes and pressures of your GSD3s that weekend?

Your first spin appeared to be caused by a higher entry speed than you did before, trailbraking, keeping weight/grip on the front of the car and causing the rear to get a little light and rotate on you. You started to catch the slide immediately but stopped briefly while the car started to get ahead of you and then you quickly found the rack stops a bit too late. Not bad though.

As the track got wetter, the dry line becomes really slick from the rubber build-up. At that time, start searching for grip by staying off the dry line.

Overall, I thought you drove the car very well. You had the tires near the limit the whole time with tire noise and everything looked pretty good! :biggrin:
 
My first spin awarded me a black flag- which I explained as an off-road excursion due to poor track conditions:wink: I'm sure there'll be plenty more...
 
But I heard GSD3s were the best tires ever made :wink:

Would you say the 615s have more grip and less tread squirm than the GSD3s?

What were your tire sizes and pressures of your GSD3s that weekend?

The GSD3s have LOTs of squirm. They squirm and then set. After they set the grip is pretty good and fine for a street tire. However, on the track they suck and make the car feel sloppy. Sizes were 205/45/16 255/40/17 (only sizes available to fit the NSX 16/17) FYI: The tire squeal you hear in the video are the rears (mic was in the trunk). The fronts were howling like crazy.

I started at 35/40 and then moved to 33/40 to try and tame some of the oversteer. Tire temps (avg) 128F / 146R. In the rain I bumped them all up 3 lbs.

Billy, to be honest with you I think the Falkens will give you 90% of the performance of a R compound at 1/2 the price. The Falkens feel like an R on the track as there is no squirm and they really have a tremedous amount of grip. Moving from the GSD3s to the Falken was night and day. Moving from the Falken to the Toyo R888s was more like "what's the big deal? These aren't that great". Going back to the GSD3 was "never going run another set of these on the track (maybe in the rain) - but thank God they stopped making the 205/45/16 so I won't be tempted to buy another set." I would not hesitate to recommend the 615 for a track tire to anyone - novice or advanced. The bang for the buck really makes it a no brainer, especially if you buy 2-3 sets a year ( I HPDE a dozen or so weekends a year).

In the 16 size the choices aren't really great. With my 17/17 track wheels there are a few more options. I would like to try the Dunlop Direzza Sport Z1 Star Spec 215/40/17 & 255/40/17 (about the same $ as the 615s) or Bridgestone Potenza RE-01R (twice the $ and at this price I could go 888, Nito01 or R6).
 
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I chose to use the OEM rear bar and the Dali track bar up front as well since the NSX does not seem like stiff rear bars.

I have even heard of removing the rear bar completely from multiple sources. I am yet to try that. Maybe next track day I'll try it on and off same day. Last couple times had other mods I was tring out so I did not want to try have multiple variables, next will be removing rear bar. But need two consecutive days with same tire set up to compare to.

I want to set up a video camera and a ipod 3-axis g-meter within view to be able to watch/ record g-force during turns, deceleration, acceleration and so on. that would really show actual results rather than the butt accelerometer.
 
I want to set up a video camera and a ipod 3-axis g-meter within view to be able to watch/ record g-force during turns, deceleration, acceleration and so on. that would really show actual results rather than the butt accelerometer.

I recommend the Racelogic Vbox. $500.

- GPS & Accelerometer for dataloging
- lap timing & 6 split times
- live lat g / accel g / dec g + peak
- max speed
- software to download to pc and then see and overlay laps
- you can also display lat g, etc on the graph below.

You can also overlay the data on the video like traqmate.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0kjaom8WW3U

For $500 it REALLY is a great tool.

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2 comments:

1. I think your tire pressures were to high to begin with.

2. The tires were squeeling with good grip in the beginning. However near the end of the session I see them getting greasy. I suspect that you just needed to back off till the end of session and let them cool down for the next session. I have done that too but with Bridgestone So3's.
 
2 comments:

1. I think your tire pressures were to high to begin with.

2. The tires were squeeling with good grip in the beginning. However near the end of the session I see them getting greasy. I suspect that you just needed to back off till the end of session and let them cool down for the next session. I have done that too but with Bridgestone So3's.

Or I can just bring my Toyo R888s next time. :cool:

It was suppose to rain all day, but actually cleared up and what was left of Ike went North. However, we got the winds in Cincy - gusting to 80 mph all afternoon. Had a friend tell me that they had a 68 kt ground speed most of the way down final when landing CVG and our normal Vref speed is around 140 kts +/-. The winds at 6000 were our of the South at 120 kts.
 
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2. My rear Dali Track bar is now for sale. Even running the front bar stiff and rear bar soft, it's way too much rear bar (at least for my setup) - I had TONS of oversteer. I think I am going to stick my OEM bar back on the rear and/or switch the rear to the smaller street/track bar.

You are catching on :wink:
 
I think the reason for the 615s feeling like a big jump over other street tires is due to the lack of squirm and handling characteristics closer to an R-compound than other street tires. From this standpoint, the 615 has handling characteristics of an R-compound while grip levels closer to a street tire. IMO their is a bigger performance jump between 615 and 888 than street tires (excluding R1R/AD07 to 615.

I don't like the 615s break-away characteristic which is pretty abrupt and the tires tend to be much quieter than street tires or most R-compounds. The 615 also dosnt' communicate what its doing very well compared again to street tires or r-comps. But for the price, you get R-comp handling characteristics with slightly more grip than most other street tire options out there. They are a great bang/buck deal and appealing to many.

I was just at the track last weekend with a bunch of S2000s and Toyo R1Rs and Yokohama AD07s have quite a bit more grip than the 615, but also cost much more.

0.02
 
which cam did you use to record!!!
very nice quality! and how did you mount it?

Aiptek HD 1080p. $150 at Best Buy. The big downside to this camera is the audio sucks, but I opened it up and soldered in a jack to run an external mic ($20) to the trunk so there wouldn't be any wind noise and you could hear the exhaust.

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I mounted it by bolting in a bracket to the center speaker (bought a new cover first so I could go back to stock - $25) Bought a mount with a quick release off ebay and bolted it to the bracket. It still shakes a little too much for my taste. In order to get rid of some of the shake you have to have a good solid mount - like a harness bar.

Just PMed tiDave to see if he would make a bar for camera mount similar to 1/2 of the harness bar. Pester him and maybe he will make something for those of us that want a camera mount but don't want to spend $750 for a harness bar.

Jim
 
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Curious - why the change to 800lb springs up front?

I have the same suspension and track bars front and rear and thought it very neutral and compliant.
 
Found last night on post track inspection that I had snapped the right sway bar link. Earlier this year I had snapped the left one and removed the type R chassis bar thinking that maybe the track bar was binding on it. Guess not. Not sure why I keep braking sway links?????

The curbs at Putnam aren't real big and I pretty much stayed off them. My spin off track was on a spot that didn't have a curb. So I have no idea why I keep snapping links. I do know that it was OK when I had set it on the middle hole, but happened at some point after I switch it on day 2 to the front (stiff) hole.

Guess that explains the oversteer this weekend. :rolleyes:
 
I've done the same with my end links. The Dali verision is much more robust but seizes fairly easily (for me). When I get my car back, one of my winter projects is developing an indestructable set of end links.

Actually, I'd be surprised if Titaniumdave hasn't done this already.
 
Your front endlink broke? -That would explain the oversteer.

Can you post a pic of your endlink hooked up to the swaybar and control arm? If its binding or at a bad angle, they can snap...
 
Your front endlink broke? -That would explain the oversteer.

Can you post a pic of your endlink hooked up to the swaybar and control arm? If its binding or at a bad angle, they can snap...

yep, right front. I think it snapped after I moved it from the middle hole to the front hole - so it may have been at about 20 deg angle instead of vertical - but it didn't appear to be off enough to bind or anything like that. Maybe Dali adjustable would be better? What's the point of having adjustable sways if you can't adjust them?

I already pulled it off, but it snapped where the little rod connects to the lower piece (not the one near the sway). Both of them snapped cleanly there.

My temp solution to this problem of snapping them (at $90 a shot) is to take just a little of that putty epoxy and put around that point on both ends (the new one - not going to re-use the broken one) to build up that area a little. Not sure if it will help any, but it couldn't hurt and that stuff dries rock hard.

I'll PM tiDave and see if he has any interest in making something a little more robust than the OEM links. If not, maybe I will just use plastic tie wraps. :biggrin: j/k!
 
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How many track days/miles have you had on the links before they are breaking? We have not had that issue in here ..... after some 70 track events, I now have Comptech's pro suspension, Dali's track bar front at stiffest and rear at middle, Type R braces, and run on Toyo RA1 and don't seem to have oversteer issue. If anything, I have a bit of understeer tracking out and by softening the front dampener setting two clicks compared to the rear may have solved that problem; if I need more, I will loosen the rear suspension one hole - at the edge, fine tuning is track specific and where the real big boys play the game.

But looking at your first video, I suspect your suspension setup is off. Too much steering input which tells me you don't have enough front grip. I too agree that 33/40 cold is WAY too much on street tires. Having no rear sway bar is a totally different ball game and has to match your overall suspension. YMMV.
 
This is interesting as my next track event will be done with f & r track sways (I had the stock one before). I plan to go middle stiff front and soft rear to begin.

Anyway, I do not think it is appropriate to run very stiff sways and/or suspensions on street tires. This will result in slips after slips.
 
How many track days/miles have you had on the links before they are breaking? We have not had that issue in here YMMV.

Bull crap. I have broke several. The underlying problem is the NSX-R bar.
My sway bar would hit the NSX-R bar.
Tried shimming the bar to allow more clearance with NO success.

I broke links with the dali race sway bars and also with the comptech sway bar.
I suspect the only sway bar that may work is the NSX-R sway bar?

I removed the support bar and problem solved.

Hope this helps.

Later
Don
 
Don, how many times do we need to hold your hand ..... :biggrin:

If you install the Type R brace with the proper spacer, you will not have the issue of the sway bar hitting the brace ......... :wink:
 
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