do you guys leave ABS ON or OFF when at the track?

[Vorshlag-Fair]

Are the warnings/lights something the dealer IDS can turn off?

We never found a way to turn these off. According to a Ford engineer I talked with later, they hard coded these into the ABS module specifically to keep people like us from using this on a street driven car.

 

[Mark Aubele]

The Xmas tree on my dash doesn't bother me anymore. You get used to it quickly.

 

[travelers]

As Sky Render said it is more tuned for racing tires. When we moved from "DOT" 315 Hoosier A6 tires to 335F/345R A6 tires the AdvanvceTrac would go into fault mode and turn itself back on. Always.

Right after we switched our NASA TT3 setup to the "BIG" tires, and had all of the issues, we then quickly added the -CA version of the ABS module. All of the traction control system faults went away - because Traction Control was 100% disabled with this new unit. I didn't really see any need for "better" ABS action, and that wasn't why we did this mod.

But.... over the next 2 months months later I ran this car with the new ABS module at two street tire events. First was a Goodguys "All American Sunday" autocross, which I won handily, and the next was an Optima qualifier, which I also won. This was on 335mm BFG Rival tires (not the -S) and they have a LOT less grip than the Hoosier A6. Like a LOT less.

Over those first two weekends the car worked amazingly well on street tires - better than it EVER had before. Especially the Optima event's "speed stop", which is really just a glorified launch + ABS test. The car stopped better and more predictably than it ever had on street tires (we had run Optima events + SCCA STX & STU class autocrosses on 140-200 treadwear tires before in this car).

So while it was probably "designed" for race tires, the M-2353-CA ABS module does work on street tires (and if you ask me, it works damned well). If you can deal with the dash being lit up like Christmas and a loud "bonging" chime warning every 5 minutes or so.

For these reasons (warning lights + chimes - as shown above) I don't suggest using this ABS module for street driven cars. But for a competition car? ALWAYS. Your results may vary. Don't eat any wooden nickels. Some swelling may occur. Call your doctor if an ere.... well, you get what I'm saying. "You were warned".

Thanks for all the good info. I just joined SCCA and have a few things to get done on the car and I'm going to try for a July event.

 

[Norm Peterson]

so it's not the stock ABS that's limiting my deceleration it just crappy tires and less than optimal suspension etc.. thanks! I was hoping that was the case.

The stock GT ABS has to be good to something out past 1.1g. MPSS tires, wide wheels, minimal other mods can get you that much.

Avoiding the flatspotting of $300 tires is all by itself reason enough to keep it when all you're doing is HPDE or local/regional autocross for fun.


Norm