Road Race setup/ Track pics

[KA24DESOneThree]

Originally Posted by WhiteGLX

Oh well i posted my issue with the oil coler about 5 posts back, i have it in the headlight because there is no where else to put an oil cooler that is 4" think, i knw i know, the pics make it look 1" thick like the average oil cooler. As soon as i feel liek switching over to the DOHC bumper that has teh extra vents, ill move the cooler down under the factory battey location, and duct it and everything. And its deff enough, who would ever want to upgrade a 5"H X 6"L x 4"T oilcooler?

You're the one who created the packaging issues by hanging that intercooler out front in a stock bumper. Besides, that oil cooler is made for a PLANE. You know, 70mph stall speed and 120+mph cruising with positive airflow at much lower ambient temps.

Thats where i had the battery located when i was driving the caron the street full interior and with shit rolling around my trunk, and i just havnt had the time to relocate it, a bit of a hassle when i have a few extras that run off of it, cause i dont wanna mess with my wiring again. I have is passenger side to makeup up for when its just me, and i have it rearward to help with traction, because im already having issues with it, as i said in earlier posts.

You're having issues with traction because you upgraded power before suspension and tires. You REALLY, REALLY should've done suspension either first or at the same time.

Alignment is the factory specs, according to the alignment bay at my old place of business. Tire flex is due to a smaller tire being on the rim. NOt streched, but just not wide enough (itll be corrected before my next event with RA1's). I am running about 38psi hot, cold its like 32-34 i think, i adjusted them hot, havnt touched them since the last event, hard to recall the specifics. Rollover problem is not bue to the tires, its because i am running KYB shocks and Tein springs, apparently they dont get as stiff as they need to be for track racing, so those will get upgraded when i have the funds for it. (Buddy-Club Race Spec dampner).

Tire flex is due to your lack of negative camber and lack of pressure. 34 is pretty low on the Azenis Sport. A smaller tire than designated on the rim would have REDUCED flex, not increased flex. You immediately disagree with yourself by saying the flex is not because of the tires, but the suspension. Which is it, according to you?

All questions are welcome, but please read a little everyone before you tell me what you think i need to change, or look at the pictures a little more closely. I dont like repeting myself too often. Almost all the answers these questions are in the pics or already responded to. Keep them commin if i dont have anything on it tho.....

Bold was me.

You made the classic mistake. You went for power and ended up forsaking the chassis. Now you complain that you can't go as fast as you want. Suck it up and realize that it's your own fault. That's my opinion of your setup. The race car guys you talked to didn't say a negative word because they were being polite. I guarantee they looked at each other after you left and said "what the hell was he thinking, doing power first?" There isn't just one way to set up a race car, but undertiring the car is certainly wrong.

By the way, 225s won't cut it. You'll need 245s or bigger. I hope you aren't incredibly fond of stock bodywork.

[WhiteGLX]

Originally Posted by KA24DESOneThree

Bold was me.

You made the classic mistake. You went for power and ended up forsaking the chassis. Now you complain that you can't go as fast as you want. Suck it up and realize that it's your own fault. That's my opinion of your setup. The race car guys you talked to didn't say a negative word because they were being polite. I guarantee they looked at each other after you left and said "what the hell was he thinking, doing power first?" There isn't just one way to set up a race car, but undertiring the car is certainly wrong.

By the way, 225s won't cut it. You'll need 245s or bigger. I hope you aren't incredibly fond of stock bodywork.

wow.......i didnt go for big power, 230whp is hardly big, im not complaining about any of it at all so there is nothign to suck up. I enjoy every second on track with an underpowered wide tired car or an overpower undertired car. And telling me the race guys were talkin shit behind my back, not cool. I ask for advice they give it to me, real advice not the BS your posting. you obviously dont understand tires that well, its not the size of the tire that means everything, teh Falken Azenis Sports that i was runngin are not enough now on teh track, when i was not moving as fast as i am now, they were enough, so now it is time to upgrade to only a slightly larger tire....but a different compound. The Falken Azenis are good track tires for an underpowered car, but th Toyo RA1's are a DOT approved R-Compound tire, MUCH different chacteristics than teh Azenis, MUCh better in every single aspect except wear maybe. a 225 wide r-compound tire with 230 whp will be plenty until i can afford to go with the suspension, wheel and tire setup i have planned for competition.

There is no need to tell me to suck anything up or deal with anything, i didnt critisize you at all when i responded to your post on here, simply explaining the setup. At least do some research on the tires i have on the car and the ones ill be running before you say one wont be enough for a certain setup. Or find out exactly what true race car builders have told me before you tell me they were callin me stupid for the order i did things. There is no eed to be so defensive, its ok, just make sure you know exactly what is expected of a race car and a budget and when you do finally know, deal with it.

[kapower]

I have played around with my alignment for the last 3 years, as of now I only auto cross, but here are my specs...

The car is a 91 hatchback, w JIC flta'2s 7/5kg/mm spring rates. 15x7 + 0 offset w/225/45/15's victoracer's (econo racers!) White line sway's front and rear with custom fabricted spherical endlinks (BTW the endlinks make a huge difference, much much more predictable...). 50% spherical bearings 50% poly... (soon to be all metal)

Front camber) 3.7 negative ___ rear camber) 2.3 negative ... I have never been on a skid pad, but tire temp's are pretty even. I think you will need more or less camber depending upon Tires, and wheel rates. I have heard of other's running 5+ degrees up front and 3+ in the rear, but that effects braking.

Front toe) 1/16-1/8" toe out helps turn in, makes the car much more responsive.
Rear toe) 0 degrees__ I tried a little toe out a couple of times now, and the car is way to unpredictable, I don't recomend it. Toe in will help the car get the power down and help stabalize the car. I tried up to 1/8-3/8 toe in, which definetly stabalize's the car, but I like my car fairly twitchy for auto X'ing.

Well thats my setup, hope that helps -Jason M

P.S improvedtouringforum.com- look in the nissan section... thoose guy's know about the 240...Bob stretch did well with his 240 in ITA. You really need spherical bearings all the way around if you want to be competitive, reducing suspension bind is a big deal with 240's. (we have lots of bushings) Stretch ran on Advanced design double adjustle struts, with I believe GC's. Some (and possibly most) of the ITA guy's run without a rear bar, they say it make's the car more predictable...

[WhiteGLX]

Originally Posted by kapower

I have played around with my alignment for the last 3 years, as of now I only auto cross, but here are my specs...

The car is a 91 hatchback, w JIC flta'2s 7/5kg/mm spring rates. 15x7 + 0 offset w/225/45/15's victoracer's (econo racers!) White line sway's front and rear with custom fabricted spherical endlinks (BTW the endlinks make a huge difference, much much more predictable...). 50% spherical bearings 50% poly... (soon to be all metal)

Front camber) 3.7 negative ___ rear camber) 2.3 negative ... I have never been on a skid pad, but tire temp's are pretty even. I think you will need more or less camber depending upon Tires, and wheel rates. I have heard of other's running 5+ degrees up front and 3+ in the rear, but that effects braking.

Front toe) 1/16-1/8" toe out helps turn in, makes the car much more responsive.
Rear toe) 0 degrees__ I tried a little toe out a couple of times now, and the car is way to unpredictable, I don't recomend it. Toe in will help the car get the power down and help stabalize the car. I tried up to 1/8-3/8 toe in, which definetly stabalize's the car, but I like my car fairly twitchy for auto X'ing.

Well thats my setup, hope that helps -Jason M

P.S improvedtouringforum.com- look in the nissan section... thoose guy's know about the 240...Bob stretch did well with his 240 in ITA. You really need spherical bearings all the way around if you want to be competitive, reducing suspension bind is a big deal with 240's. (we have lots of bushings) Stretch ran on Advanced design double adjustle struts, with I believe GC's. Some (and possibly most) of the ITA guy's run without a rear bar, they say it make's the car more predictable...

I like your setup, only thing is i havnt heard many good things about the JIC coilovers, but thats all i ahev heard, no experience here. I have never autocrossed, but i know the low speeds and sharp turns require a very touchy suspension setup. I plan to go with adjustable links with bushings, i need the bushings to absord some stress from the road (being that some courses are rougher than others). I havnt planned to run as much negative camber as you, maybe -2 deg all around. and for toe in/out, id like them at 0 becasue of the long banking turns i dont need the tires fighting each other at all for the speeds im moving at.

I have talked to a few ITS or ITA guys before at VIR, most of them ran a basically stock setup, with coilovers and pillow ball mounts, but im not sure about all the links, i never had time to sit down, they were busy prepping the car for the races or qualifying track times. They are good to talk to about the ideas of the suspension, but i cant relate to them 100% because i plan to push more than twice their wheel HP once i get to comeptition, which means i need differnet breke, and tire setup then them. But their knowledge of suspension has been and will be helpful. Thanks for your advice and setup of your car, good reference, thanks jason.

[Rennen]

Originally Posted by WhiteGLX

I like your setup, only thing is i havnt heard many good things about the JIC coilovers, but thats all i ahev heard, no experience here. I have never autocrossed, but i know the low speeds and sharp turns require a very touchy suspension setup. I plan to go with adjustable links with bushings, i need the bushings to absord some stress from the road (being that some courses are rougher than others). I havnt planned to run as much negative camber as you, maybe -2 deg all around. and for toe in/out, id like them at 0 becasue of the long banking turns i dont need the tires fighting each other at all for the speeds im moving at.

I have talked to a few ITS or ITA guys before at VIR, most of them ran a basically stock setup, with coilovers and pillow ball mounts, but im not sure about all the links, i never had time to sit down, they were busy prepping the car for the races or qualifying track times. They are good to talk to about the ideas of the suspension, but i cant relate to them 100% because i plan to push more than twice their wheel HP once i get to comeptition, which means i need differnet breke, and tire setup then them. But their knowledge of suspension has been and will be helpful. Thanks for your advice and setup of your car, good reference, thanks jason.

heh, instead of -2º of camber, you should try shooting for more than -5º. the Stretchmobile still holds many track records for an ITA car, and he was running far more than the usual camber... which brings me to the next point.

If you are serious about racing, and/or winning Spend money on a good data acquisition system before you start throwing money elsewhere. The data gathered from one 20 minute session can be worth more than a year's worth of racing without one, and when you add up all the entry fees/lodging/gas it is well worth the money.

I am just learning about racing myself, I have started crewing for an ITA 240SX that also needs to get it's setup ironed out. But from hints I have gotten from real racers, it has opened my eyes to how wrong everyone here is...

[brainfood]

Originally Posted by KA24DESOneThree

Bold was me.

You made the classic mistake. You went for power and ended up forsaking the chassis. Now you complain that you can't go as fast as you want. Suck it up and realize that it's your own fault. That's my opinion of your setup. The race car guys you talked to didn't say a negative word because they were being polite. I guarantee they looked at each other after you left and said "what the hell was he thinking, doing power first?" There isn't just one way to set up a race car, but undertiring the car is certainly wrong.

By the way, 225s won't cut it. You'll need 245s or bigger. I hope you aren't incredibly fond of stock bodywork.

Not sure what you mean by fan of stock bodywork? I put 285/20's on my car the other day with no rubbing just need the correct offsets. I would never run 20's on my car its a long story but 285's will fit under the stock rear fenders. I think 295's will.
I would have to agree with you though on power before setting the car up correctly. I am a much better drifter today than I would have been if I started with a high horsepower car. My car has a completly stock ka and I am doing almost everything before I do my swap and even after I swap the sr it will be almost completely stock with a stronger clutch and some bolt on's I would lots rather carry a lot of speed and be full throttle than have to modulate the clutch and throttle through the entire drift.

edit: go bigger than 225's you will regret it otherwise. With a stock ka I can spin 225/45-17 mich pilot sports all day long especially 2nd or 3rd gear drifts. if you want grip go to 245/45-16's

[WhiteGLX]

Originally Posted by brainfood

Not sure what you mean by fan of stock bodywork? I put 285/20's on my car the other day with no rubbing just need the correct offsets. I would never run 20's on my car its a long story but 285's will fit under the stock rear fenders. I think 295's will.
I would have to agree with you though on power before setting the car up correctly. I am a much better drifter today than I would have been if I started with a high horsepower car. My car has a completly stock ka and I am doing almost everything before I do my swap and even after I swap the sr it will be almost completely stock with a stronger clutch and some bolt on's I would lots rather carry a lot of speed and be full throttle than have to modulate the clutch and throttle through the entire drift.

edit: go bigger than 225's you will regret it otherwise. With a stock ka I can spin 225/45-17 mich pilot sports all day long especially 2nd or 3rd gear drifts. if you want grip go to 245/45-16's

I never plan to go wider than 275 all around, i make my own fender flares that rivet onto the existing fenders and give me an extra 1.75 inches of clearence on each corner to fit the 17x10's with the 275/40 series tries i plan to run for competition.

I used this car as a daily driver for about the past year driving to school work everything, I did the power because my first 240 had a blown motor so i swapped this in, then second 240 i got (this one) had a blown motor and a melted fusebox, so i fixed all that and slowly it got to the point is is today. I did mild suspension with grippy tires for how i have been driving on the track. I moved the tries up form the old ones i was driving on before, everyone seems to think that extreme traction is teh way to go with a track car, but to learn the car you have to actually learn what it can /cant do with or without traction. the small tires i used for the 4 track events this past year worked great, i dont complain, i simply say they werent enough for me to do my best. I am upgrading to the 225/50R16 Toyo RA1's, they are an R-COMPOUND TIRE!! VERY sticky for the track once heated up, i am not ment to go 100% throttle through every corner at every possible second, that not how you road race, so i dont need a relly wide tire yet until i upgrade my power some more. Drifting a a 245 tire is alot different from gripping with an r-compound, as around at race shops about r-compounds, for a car with my setup 225 is fine especially for the rim size i have (16x7.5). At the shop by me, some guy boughta 240 all setup for grip that came with brand new Toyo RA1's 245/40R17's, he traded them for soem used tres with far less traction so he could drift the car beasue the RA1's are way too sticky for drifting, so you need to realize that you 245 pilots are less sticky than my 225 RA1 R-Compounds, so a comparison cant be made between the two.


DRIFTERS PLEASE READ UP ON R-COMPOUND TIRES BEFORE YOU POST ABOUT MY TIRE CHOICES!!!!! SPECIFICALLY "Toyo RA1" TIRES!!!!!

[KA24DESOneThree]

Originally Posted by WhiteGLX

DRIFTERS PLEASE READ UP ON R-COMPOUND TIRES BEFORE YOU POST ABOUT MY TIRE CHOICES!!!!! SPECIFICALLY "Toyo RA1" TIRES!!!!!

I'm giving up on you. Lost cause, because you won't listen worth shit.

Not only do you have no idea how much track time I have, but you don't know what my current profession is.

[brainfood]

Originally Posted by WhiteGLX

I never plan to go wider than 275 all around, i make my own fender flares that rivet onto the existing fenders and give me an extra 1.75 inches of clearence on each corner to fit the 17x10's with the 275/40 series tries i plan to run for competition.

I used this car as a daily driver for about the past year driving to school work everything, I did the power because my first 240 had a blown motor so i swapped this in, then second 240 i got (this one) had a blown motor and a melted fusebox, so i fixed all that and slowly it got to the point is is today. I did mild suspension with grippy tires for how i have been driving on the track. I moved the tries up form the old ones i was driving on before, everyone seems to think that extreme traction is teh way to go with a track car, but to learn the car you have to actually learn what it can /cant do with or without traction. the small tires i used for the 4 track events this past year worked great, i dont complain, i simply say they werent enough for me to do my best. I am upgrading to the 225/50R16 Toyo RA1's, they are an R-COMPOUND TIRE!! VERY sticky for the track once heated up, i am not ment to go 100% throttle through every corner at every possible second, that not how you road race, so i dont need a relly wide tire yet until i upgrade my power some more. Drifting a a 245 tire is alot different from gripping with an r-compound, as around at race shops about r-compounds, for a car with my setup 225 is fine especially for the rim size i have (16x7.5). At the shop by me, some guy boughta 240 all setup for grip that came with brand new Toyo RA1's 245/40R17's, he traded them for soem used tres with far less traction so he could drift the car beasue the RA1's are way too sticky for drifting, so you need to realize that you 245 pilots are less sticky than my 225 RA1 R-Compounds, so a comparison cant be made between the two.


DRIFTERS PLEASE READ UP ON R-COMPOUND TIRES BEFORE YOU POST ABOUT MY TIRE CHOICES!!!!! SPECIFICALLY "Toyo RA1" TIRES!!!!!

Wow you tottally missed all my points and disregarded me as an idiot because I said I drift. I road race also have for about 5 years. I sell tires for a living and fully understand what ra1's are I agree I like a little bit looser car when I drive because I like to rotate the car on the brakes and with a slight high speed dynamic drift. No countersteer so not a real drift just sliding it a tad to rotate it my steering work in a grip situation is very limited its just my style I have never personally run 245's but I know if I had an sr they would be on my car for both drift and grip. I am also the complete opposite when I drift most people run narrow or not so grippy tires when they drift or set the car up very loose. I like a road race setup with lots of grip because my drifts are generally a lot higher speed. Its all opinion and mine is run 245's on the track in reality the extra 20mm of section width is hardly noticable especially on lateral loads but in a straight line and corner exit you will enjoy the extra tire. Also it sounds like you are not trying to go as fast as the car is capable of, dont let the tires hold you back because you are scared of that thing.

[bogert]

All of the tracks were awesome but I think only the best drivers can drive on such roads.