claudermilk
Senior Member
I took the Mustang out to the SCCA Solo II at El Toro yesterday for it’s shakedown run on the new suspension. The phrase “I love it when a plan comes together” is appropriate. I ran in the Classic American Muscle class and brought a friend along in his modified 2007 Mustang GT. Along with us was a ’70 Roadrunner 440 Hemi, a full Pro Touring 1st gen Camaro, and a Cadillac CTS-V. So we had a decent class.
The suspension changes did exactly what I wanted. The car cornered and braked flat, the steering response was very much improved. I still need to dial in settings to try and settle the rear end—but that’s probably going to be tilting at windmills for this car. However, I could stick the back end out & control the drift very easily, so that was a lot of fun—more on that later. I did fiddle with the Koni's settings and ended up full stiff in front and a half-turn from full stiff in back as a base for future events; I am sure I'll still need more fiddling to get a better feel for what the car wants--but that's part of the fun. The Vorshlag CC plates give me a whopping -2.75 deg camber.
I was able to hear the announcer when finishing a run and thought I kept hearing “3rd place.” Turns out I was wrong—he was saying “1st” In the end, after I had finished and the Pro-Touring Camaro had one run left, he had a full second to make up to beat me. I doubt that happened.
I knew I was leading with a good run in the bank heading out to my last run, so I threw the car at the course just to play. It was a really fun layout since they had it pretty open and fast. I actually ran out of revs in one sweeper/straight combination—so I had the breathe the throttle to keep from hitting the limiter and the car falling on its face. I was also able to drift through those big sweepers with pretty good control. I finished with a flourish. The end of the course had a tight right-hander into a 3-cone slalom to the finish, then a hard left to exit the course. I got it through the slalom quickly & gassed it coming past the second cone. The back end started to come out & I went with it, then braked hard to finish. That ended up taking me through the line sideways. I one smooth motion, I was able to slowly motor to the timing slip guy. I doubt I’d be able to repeat that, but it made a nice finish to the day for my victory lap. Seemed to amuse the crowd paying attention, too.
Unfortunately, I flubbed the GoPro start/stops and only got the first run. Bummer--that last run was epic (and shaved an additional half second even with the hooning). I need to practice/streamline getting things ready (2 GoPros & smartphone OBD hookup--I think I'm overcomplicating things...).
My run times were #1: 62.639+1, #2: 64.853+3 (s/b DNF), #3: 61.702, #4: 61.322. I took the class by 1.037--truly a shock to me.
I had heard that there were some questions about my running in CAM. Some thought "oh, isn't that for 1978 or older?" No, CAM is pretty much wide-open as we have discussed around here already. The only mention of model years I have seen is governing what hot rods are allowed to remove body panels. Other than that, it's domestic front-engine, RWD cars & trucks. CalClub does not have any additional regional regs on this that I have seen. I am sure the guy in the Roadrunner wasn't too worried about it--we gridded next to each other, so spent much of our run group chatting about our cars.
EDIT: It appears that 1978 limitation I heard mentioned is a San Diego region supplemental reg--good to know.
The suspension changes did exactly what I wanted. The car cornered and braked flat, the steering response was very much improved. I still need to dial in settings to try and settle the rear end—but that’s probably going to be tilting at windmills for this car. However, I could stick the back end out & control the drift very easily, so that was a lot of fun—more on that later. I did fiddle with the Koni's settings and ended up full stiff in front and a half-turn from full stiff in back as a base for future events; I am sure I'll still need more fiddling to get a better feel for what the car wants--but that's part of the fun. The Vorshlag CC plates give me a whopping -2.75 deg camber.
I was able to hear the announcer when finishing a run and thought I kept hearing “3rd place.” Turns out I was wrong—he was saying “1st” In the end, after I had finished and the Pro-Touring Camaro had one run left, he had a full second to make up to beat me. I doubt that happened.
I knew I was leading with a good run in the bank heading out to my last run, so I threw the car at the course just to play. It was a really fun layout since they had it pretty open and fast. I actually ran out of revs in one sweeper/straight combination—so I had the breathe the throttle to keep from hitting the limiter and the car falling on its face. I was also able to drift through those big sweepers with pretty good control. I finished with a flourish. The end of the course had a tight right-hander into a 3-cone slalom to the finish, then a hard left to exit the course. I got it through the slalom quickly & gassed it coming past the second cone. The back end started to come out & I went with it, then braked hard to finish. That ended up taking me through the line sideways. I one smooth motion, I was able to slowly motor to the timing slip guy. I doubt I’d be able to repeat that, but it made a nice finish to the day for my victory lap. Seemed to amuse the crowd paying attention, too.
Unfortunately, I flubbed the GoPro start/stops and only got the first run. Bummer--that last run was epic (and shaved an additional half second even with the hooning). I need to practice/streamline getting things ready (2 GoPros & smartphone OBD hookup--I think I'm overcomplicating things...).
My run times were #1: 62.639+1, #2: 64.853+3 (s/b DNF), #3: 61.702, #4: 61.322. I took the class by 1.037--truly a shock to me.
I had heard that there were some questions about my running in CAM. Some thought "oh, isn't that for 1978 or older?" No, CAM is pretty much wide-open as we have discussed around here already. The only mention of model years I have seen is governing what hot rods are allowed to remove body panels. Other than that, it's domestic front-engine, RWD cars & trucks. CalClub does not have any additional regional regs on this that I have seen. I am sure the guy in the Roadrunner wasn't too worried about it--we gridded next to each other, so spent much of our run group chatting about our cars.
EDIT: It appears that 1978 limitation I heard mentioned is a San Diego region supplemental reg--good to know.
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