Simraceway driving school, stage 1 -- Sonoma Raceway

[kcbrown]

So as I mentioned elsewhere, I've signed up for a bunch of different events, including a driving school at Simraceway (previously Jim Russell). For me, this is pretty convenient (much more so than the Ford Racing school at Miller Motorsports Park) and quite a lot less expensive than most, as I was driving my own car instead of theirs.

This was phase 1, held on June 27th. It was scheduled to start at 10am, so I decided to drive there in the morning rather than book a hotel for the previous night. That didn't work out so well -- they rescheduled the event for 8am, and gave only one day advanced notice, something I didn't even notice until the morning of the event. Fortunately for me, that worked out well enough -- I wound up being about 45 minutes late, and didn't really miss anything I didn't already know (the first hour or so was class time).

This was a really interesting and fairly broad class, as it happens. We didn't just do laps around the track. We did a slalom and "autocross" course as well (I put the word in quotes because it was really more like a miniature track than anything else, and I drove it as such).

The first thing we did was the slalom. This was one in which the spacing of the cones increased as you went, so you had to increase your speed through the slalom in order to run it properly. As has been the case with my initial expectations of the car at the track, I was expecting the car to be all over the place, a sloppy mess, through the slalom. With soft springs and lots of available suspension movement, how good could it be?

It was wonderful. As with driving on the track, the key to doing the slalom seemed to be making smooth control inputs. The car always went where I told it to go when I told it. When it failed to end up where I wanted it, it was because I didn't time my inputs properly. Because my reaction time isn't the best in the world, I once missed the braking point and went past the cones that marked the end of the slalom. A little more anticipation of what was coming up took care of that problem.

Next up was the "autocross". This had one right-hand turn and five left-hand turns, with one quick left-right "slalom" thrown in for good meausure. We ran three cars on the course at a time, spaced out enough that there would (generally) not be anyone holding anyone else back. Once again, I expected the car to fall all over itself. It didn't. Not even close. It was quick enough that I caught up to the C6 Corvette in front of me (and this was perhaps the third 5-lap run around the course, so it's not like he wasn't familiar with it). I found that the trick here was to treat the car as more of a momentum car, and to concentrate on driving the "line" smoothly and precisely, because the amount of time I would be on the gas or brakes was simply too short for me to precisely control (I did use the gas and the brakes, but wasn't near the limit of either at any point -- I felt control was the key here).

But that's not what made the "autocross" so fun. The fun part was letting it all hang out! I decided for a few laps to (with the approval of the instructors), while rounding the left-hand corner that immediately preceded the first right-hander, play with kicking the tail out to see how the car would behave, what it would take to make it happen, and how easy it was to recover. Recovery wasn't bad at all, but I did manage to spin the car a couple of times while playing around like this, which also put a big grin on my face.

It was awesome! But it felt, too, like the car was fairly easy to recover if I managed to react to what it was doing quickly enough. It didn't take that much throttle to make the rear come around, and this was with the fronts nowhere near the limits of adhesion.


Next was the track. This involved two lead-follow sessions, with two student cars per instructor car.

The first session was somewhat slow and, obviously, well-controlled, but towards the end of that we were still doing pretty decent speeds. Because they kept an eye on you, they tried to gauge your ability to drive the track and adjust their own speed accordingly, and because I'd driven the track for a couple of weekends before, I was pretty familiar with it.

The second session was the fast one. In that session, for most of it, I felt like I was pushing the car about as much as I dared. Yes, the tires were squealing a lot throughout, but I had a lot of variation in my speed around the track despite my relative familiarity with it (familiarity with the track does not equate to consistency of control). Even so, I felt like I was going faster around the track towards the end than I had ever done previously. The other guy with me was the guy in the C6 Corvette, and he commented on how impressed he was with the speed of the Mustang around the track. My average braking was a bit harder this time around than before, but I still left quite a lot on the table, with my maximum braking registering at about 0.8G. Cornering maxed at 1.21G, so I wasn't holding back there.


So at the end, I learned a bit about how the car behaves in fast transitions and smaller corners when attacked at "speed".


Once again, the car was simply astonishing. My driving must suck or something for me to be so impressed with a car with a soft, wallowy suspension as these cars are equipped with. It simply has not disappointed me in any way. I'm really impressed.

And the tires? The tires are wearing evenly left to right. I have proof. The manufacturer left little "fingers" in the tread on each side at what looks like a set height above the bottom of the tread. Substantial wear on one side or the other would eliminate those "fingers" on one side while leaving them intact on the other. That's not the case for my tires: the "fingers" are intact on both sides and, more importantly, the distance from them to the top of the tread at those locations is about the same.

Here, I have pictures. Here's the outside edge of the front right tire after the event was done, before I drove home:

Outside edge front right by n2185x, on Flickr


Here's the inside edge of the front right tire:

Inside edge front right by n2185x, on Flickr


The outside might be wearing slightly more than the inside, but it certainly doesn't look like a whole lot of difference to my eyes.



Anyway, I must be easily impressed or something, because this car has been astonishingly good at handling everything I've thrown at it.

Conclusion: my driving skills must suck!

 

[claudermilk]

Next up was the "autocross". This had one right-hand turn and five left-hand turns, with one quick left-right "slalom" thrown in for good meausure. We ran three cars on the course at a time, spaced out enough that there would (generally) not be anyone holding anyone else back. Once again, I expected the car to fall all over itself. It didn't. Not even close. It was quick enough that I caught up to the C6 Corvette in front of me (and this was perhaps the third 5-lap run around the course, so it's not like he wasn't familiar with it). I found that the trick here was to treat the car as more of a momentum car, and to concentrate on driving the "line" smoothly and precisely, because the amount of time I would be on the gas or brakes was simply too short for me to precisely control (I did use the gas and the brakes, but wasn't near the limit of either at any point -- I felt control was the key here).

But that's not what made the "autocross" so fun. The fun part was letting it all hang out! I decided for a few laps to (with the approval of the instructors), while rounding the left-hand corner that immediately preceded the first right-hander, play with kicking the tail out to see how the car would behave, what it would take to make it happen, and how easy it was to recover. Recovery wasn't bad at all, but I did manage to spin the car a couple of times while playing around like this, which also put a big grin on my face.

It was awesome! But it felt, too, like the car was fairly easy to recover if I managed to react to what it was doing quickly enough. It didn't take that much throttle to make the rear come around, and this was with the fronts nowhere near the limits of adhesion.

This is the perfect time to do that. Toss the car around, get it over the limit, and see what it does. Now your butt is dialed in. These cars with the tires we run are really easy to get the back end out, hold it there, and gather it back up. I actually need to dial some of that back in with the updates I've made.

Sounds like a great event.

 

[dontlifttoshift]

You really don't see a difference in wear between the inside and outside edges?

 

[sheizasosay]

I wonder about the ideal wear too on the RE-11. I see arrows on the side now that I look, but I always tried to get the wear pattern across the tread before it starts to curve down. Don't know if that is right. Just what I have been doing. Maybe verify with Bridgestone? Vorshlag ran these tires at some point. Maybe not competitively (don't know), but they have experience with them.

 

[kcbrown]

You really don't see a difference in wear between the inside and outside edges?

In terms of the tread depth? No. But the wear pattern is certainly more visible on the outside edge.

It's not just the depth I'm looking at either. I'm also looking at the curvature between the two sides, which looks the same.

If the curvature is the same and the depth is the same, then the outside can't possibly be wearing faster than the inside, right?


ETA: it's possible that the tires are just wearing relatively slowly, and that it'll take more abuse to show the uneven wear. They do have a 280 treadwear rating, after all. However, it's now been 5 track days on these tires so far. I would have expected to see much more uneven wear by now if, in fact, they are wearing that unevenly.

So maybe the problem is that I drive like a

 

[sheizasosay]

KC, I just got off the phone with Terry Jones in the Tech service dept. I sent him pic #3 to look at while we talked and basically said that is as far you want to go. He noticed the lighter scrub on the inside and said that was ok. It is obvious it was a lot less abraised than the top.

I think I had my tires at 1.8* or 1.9* this last go. Tire psi somewhere around 41 or 42 hot.

What psi were you running?

 

[kcbrown]

KC, I just got off the phone with Terry Jones in the Tech service dept. I sent him pic #3 to look at while we talked and basically said that is as far you want to go. He noticed the lighter scrub on the inside and said that was ok. It is obvious it was a lot less abraised than the top.

I think I had my tires at 1.8* or 1.9* this last go. Tire psi somewhere around 41 or 42 hot.

What psi were you running?

That last question is more complicated than you might think.

Generally, I've been running 35 PSI (measured cold) all the way around. At the end of a session after I pull into the paddock, the tires would show 39 PSI. That was after a cooldown lap, however, so the actual working pressures were probably somewhat higher.

During this most recent event, however, the Simraceway guys set the tire pressures, and I forgot to ask what they set it to. I had just arrived there, so the tires were still warm. It's possible they set the pressures a little lower than perhaps what they intended, though I suspect that's not the case (it's a driving school -- they should know their stuff).

Today, I just took the car to the Ford dealership for installation of the FRPP Trackcal tune (yay! I already love it

), and they measured the cold tire pressure at 30 PSI all around. So the pictures you see correspond to a most recent pressure of 30 PSI cold.

The bulk of the tire wear probably came from the first two weekends I was at the track, and for those events, the pressures were at the higher 35 PSI. The wear patterns (particularly the bit around the edge) seem quite similar to what I saw during the weekend events. It'll probably take some careful experimentation to determine the best tire pressure to run.

It seems to me that, thanks to the fact that the amount of time between that last hard corner and the time you take the tire pressures is variable, setting pressures precisely is a difficult thing to do, and that the best one can generally hope for is getting it into the right ballpark.

 

[sheizasosay]

Do you have camber plates or plan on getting them? Curious what camber you have dialed in.

The shape of the RE-11 is a more gradual and rounded shoulder than my previous tire. So I wasn't sure how far into that shoulder I should be wearing. I took a look at your tread wear and initially was thinking I left a lot of useable tread on the table. But I also noticed that the available tread depth would follow the taper of the shoulder which is what prompted the phone call.

EDIT- btw, jealous of the good time!

 

[kcbrown]

Do you have camber plates or plan on getting them? Curious what camber you have dialed in.

Nope. The suspension is bone stock save for the 19x10 wheels (thanks Terry!) and 285/35-19 tires.

I'm going to be getting camber plates at the same time I get coilovers. I see no reason to do anything other than go straight to coilovers if I have to even touch the suspension. There's a really good chance I'll just keep the stock ride height (might drop the front 1/2"), and I might not even change the spring rates all that much, depending on what I learn by (hopefully) driving some of these cars that have coilovers (I've learned that I can't really tell a whole lot by simply riding in one), combined with whatever I wind up deciding the deficiencies of this suspension really are.

The nice thing is that I can change the spring rates at will. The problem is that I would need valving that is appropriate for my spring rate choice, and while adjustable dampers help for that (and what I get will be adjustable), some of the valving that is tuned for the chosen spring rate is not adjusted via the rate adjustments and would thus have to be changed by having the dampers revalved. That's likely to be a problem only if I change the spring rates rather significantly, but at the moment, it's not clear exactly how much spring rate I'm actually going to want.

The shape of the RE-11 is a more gradual and rounded shoulder than my previous tire. So I wasn't sure how far into that shoulder I should be wearing. I took a look at your tread wear and initially was thinking I left a lot of useable tread on the table. But I also noticed that the available tread depth would follow the taper of the shoulder which is what prompted the phone call.

EDIT- btw, jealous of the good time!

The "driver mod" seems to be the most fun mod of them all! Hope you're able to get out on the track soon. I'm going at this with this kind of zeal because I know that life is a limited commodity and I want to take advantage of the fact that I can do these things now, while the means, motive, and opportunity are still there.

 

[claudermilk]

Today, I just took the car to the Ford dealership for installation of the FRPP Trackcal tune (yay! I already love it

)

I'm jealous. Let us know what you think of it after driving with it for a while. I know Sky Render has the earlier FP tune and likes it. I am seriously thinking about this one a little down the road.

 

[modernbeat]

...I'm going to be getting camber plates at the same time I get coilovers. I see no reason to do anything other than go straight to coilovers if I have to even touch the suspension...

Actually, if you are going to track the car, camber plates are a good idea even with the stock suspension. The Vorshlag camber plates are modular, so we can build a set for your bone stock suspension (including a lower profile top nut that allows more adjustment range) and when you decide to change to a different suspension, you only have to buy new spring perches and spools.

If you think you will be buying camber plates in the future, I encourage you to do so sooner rather than later. The savings in tire wear will pay for the camber plates sooner than you think and you will have a better handling car that uses the front tires more effectively.

 

[kcbrown]

Actually, if you are going to track the car, camber plates are a good idea even with the stock suspension. The Vorshlag camber plates are modular, so we can build a set for your bone stock suspension (including a lower profile top nut that allows more adjustment range) and when you decide to change to a different suspension, you only have to buy new spring perches and spools.

If you think you will be buying camber plates in the future, I encourage you to do so sooner rather than later. The savings in tire wear will pay for the camber plates sooner than you think and you will have a better handling car that uses the front tires more effectively.

That's true, but if I'm going to pay for the labor to R&R the front struts so I can attach camber plates, then the second part of that "R" may as well be for installation of coilovers.

If I were seeing a really large difference in wear between the inside and outside (and I may later on), then I'd probably go with coilovers with camber plates sooner.

 

[Arustik]

If you consider getting into TT you might want to do some homework before moving forward with tricked out suspension setup.

For example in COM and NASA you are assessed points for 1-way, 2-way, 3-way adjustable suspensions. Also you are separately assessed points for adjustable ride height, and external reservoirs. You aren't assessed points for camber though. If I was to go back I would simply run a camber plate and single adjustables.

From the looks of your tire (and just track/autox in general) you're going to be much better off with a camber plate. It will give you extra grip to allow you to carry more speed in corners and prolong the life of your tires.

 

[dontlifttoshift]

I know you don't think you are seeing wear on the outside edge but (don't read this harshly, that is not the intent) this is a case of logic clouding your common sense.

See how the oustide of the tire looks like the moon, craters and stuff, and the inside looks like you just got back from a Sunday drive? You are using too much outside tire, IMHO you are rolling over on the sidewall too much as well. With the addition of negative camber you should see a wear pattern like you have on the outside across the whole tire.

 

[kcbrown]

I know you don't think you are seeing wear on the outside edge but (don't read this harshly, that is not the intent) this is a case of logic clouding your common sense.

Well, I am certainly seeing some wear on the outside edge, but in terms of the shape and depth of the tread of that versus the inside, I don't see uneven wear as such.

I definitely see more evidence of "action" on the outside edges.

It may be that, over time, the difference in the "action" will manifest itself in greater actual wear on the outside. That remains to be seen.

See how the oustide of the tire looks like the moon, craters and stuff, and the inside looks like you just got back from a Sunday drive? You are using too much outside tire, IMHO you are rolling over on the sidewall too much as well. With the addition of negative camber you should see a wear pattern like you have on the outside across the whole tire.

That is entirely possible. And it's something I'll address at the same time I go to coilovers.

These tires have, so far, been through 5 days worth of driving events, and I have a lot more coming up in this month alone, so I think if the wear is going to get uneven, it'll probably show itself by the end of this month.



I'm not going to get into any competitive driving with this car. No way. I know I am much more likely to stuff it into the wall as a result of chasing times (even my own!) or other cars. And it'll remove the fun. For me, the fun is in the experience of driving, not in competition.

 

[Pentalab]

How much neg camber is... 'too much' for a DD that see's the odd weekend track / autocross use, ESP if a staggered setup is used ? If a fair amount of hwy (straight line) driving is being done, my concern would be premature inside tire wear.

I have no experience with this, so set them initially for -1 deg.

 

[Arustik]

How much neg camber is... 'too much' for a DD that see's the odd weekend track / autocross use, ESP if a staggered setup is used ? If a fair amount of hwy (straight line) driving is being done, my concern would be premature inside tire wear.

I have no experience with this, so set them initially for -1 deg.

I say go minimum 2 degrees. Your inside tire wear will be minimal and the tires will last longer for track/autox.

I used to DD an E46 with 3.5 degrees, granted this was too much (some inner tire wear), it was manageable and didn't create problems for me.

 

[sheizasosay]

How much neg camber is... 'too much' for a DD that see's the odd weekend track / autocross use, ESP if a staggered setup is used ? If a fair amount of hwy (straight line) driving is being done, my concern would be premature inside tire wear.

I have no experience with this, so set them initially for -1 deg.

For the street I would stay at -1* ideally and you can go higher, but it's a gamble. Pricey gamble too. But u want more for the track.

If I had only 3 options for mods to take a stockish car to the track to get started tracking it would be CC plates, a good seat and adj swaybar's, in that order. And I wouldn't blame anyone if they said anything different for their number 2 or 3, but I can't see CC plates not being the first mod for track use....IMO.

Btw KC, I did get some seat time a little over a week ago. It was just cut very short because my lower radiator hose got sawed into by my belt near the power steering pump. Got one 25 minute, fast and smooth run in, leading the pack, before I ended my day early. Love me some maintenance.

 

[dontlifttoshift]

How much neg camber is... 'too much' for a DD that see's the odd weekend track / autocross use, ESP if a staggered setup is used ? If a fair amount of hwy (straight line) driving is being done, my concern would be premature inside tire wear.

I have no experience with this, so set them initially for -1 deg.

Toe wears tires. If you autocross at all, the inside tire wear that you may see will be negated. Mine is set at -2.7*

 

[claudermilk]

Actually, if you are going to track the car, camber plates are a good idea even with the stock suspension. The Vorshlag camber plates are modular, so we can build a set for your bone stock suspension (including a lower profile top nut that allows more adjustment range) and when you decide to change to a different suspension, you only have to buy new spring perches and spools.

If you think you will be buying camber plates in the future, I encourage you to do so sooner rather than later. The savings in tire wear will pay for the camber plates sooner than you think and you will have a better handling car that uses the front tires more effectively.

This is part of why I chose to go with the Vorshlag CC plates. I can reconfigure them for coilovers when I am able to go that route. In the meantime, I have the benefit of them now. And, bot what a difference. I suspect a lot of the improved steering response is due to the plates. No rubber bushings, just those huge, beefy bearings. Zero noise I can attribute to coming from them. Adjustment from street to track is relatively easy & I expect to get easier as I get better at doing it.

I know you don't think you are seeing wear on the outside edge but (don't read this harshly, that is not the intent) this is a case of logic clouding your common sense.

See how the oustide of the tire looks like the moon, craters and stuff, and the inside looks like you just got back from a Sunday drive? You are using too much outside tire, IMHO you are rolling over on the sidewall too much as well. With the addition of negative camber you should see a wear pattern like you have on the outside across the whole tire.

I noted the same. While the tread blocks aren't shorter, they definitely got worked much harder and over time will wear out sooner. I noted the same while I was on stock suspension. I have to watch what the tires are doing now with -2.75 deg camber while racing.