Took the max to the road course for the first time since '04

**Nealoc187** · 07-22-2008, 12:49 PM

I signed up for a two day event at Gingerman Raceway and then had a mad rush to get the max ready for the event. I haven't driven on a road course since 2004 I think, so I needed to get back in the groove. I forgot how fun it is. Saturday was rainy all day and I only went out for one session - wasn't terribly fun running a 3/10ths and still feeling like I was on pins and needles trying to keep the car under control.

Sunday though dried out and I got back at it, and had a blast. The basic setup of the car is:

95 SE 5spd
3.5 swap w/ 4th gen intake manifold (no power above 5300ish) and 4th gen timing
Quaife limited slip diff
PPG 3rd and 4th straight cut gears, shot peened
Shot peened, detailed and deburred 1st through 5th gears
Oscars Radiators 1.5" all aluminum radiator
short ram intake/Ypipe/3" exhaust
K-sport coilovers
generic front strut bar
Cattman rear sway bar
J30 calipers front
z32 rotors front
Goodridge SS brake lines
Carbotech XP8 pads in front
Hawk HPS rear pads
17x7.5" SSR Competitions
Kumho MX tires in front (245-45-17)
Hankook RS2 tires rear (245-45-17)
PLX Devices DM100/SM-AFR/SM-Fluid temp gauges (oil temp and water temp)

I was pretty happy with my performance and that of the car. The Quaife limited slip is pretty awesome - you can get on the power so early coming out of the corner it's incredible. The 3.5 has good grunt and this track can be run in 3rd gear the entire time with the power level I am running. I could have shifted into 4th in the straights and 2nd in the corners but after a session of trying that, I decided to save the wear on the trans and keep the car in 3rd the whole time and just concentrate on running the proper line and hitting my braking points.

This brake setup never missed a beat, pedal feel was consistent and solid the entire time, what it really boils down to is I had way more braking power than traction, so the brakes were not even close to being pushed to their limit.

I started out in Intermediate II (the higher of the intermediate classes) because I hadn't been on a road course in 4 years. I ran a couple sessions in Int II and was running over everyone so I moved up to Advanced I (the lower of the advanced classes) in which the split is about 50-50 cars on R compounds vs cars on street tires. I was middle of the pack in Advanced I.

Handling of the max was interesting - you can tell it doesn't handle or grip as well as the smaller/lighter cars but for the most part I was making up for the handling deficiencies under braking and somewhat under acceleration as well. I'd say braking was my biggest advantage over most cars out there and truthfully, I wasn't really braking at 10/10ths. I picked braking points and pretty much stuck with them even though as the day wore on I sincerely felt I could take it another 50-75 feet into the corners on the ends of the two straights before really getting on the binders.

My coolant temps were rock solid 195 degrees the entire time out there (temps were high 70s low 80s). Oil temp was a little on the high side, 260-270 degrees. Not out of this world high but high enough that I'm going to run an oil cooler before the next time i run out there (next time I'm out there I'll probably be turbocharged anyway, in which case I'll obviously need an oil cooler). Power steering never boiled and neither did the Valvoline SynPower brake fluid.

I've got in car video from each of my sessions that I'll post up eventually, and I've found a few pictures that different people have posted from the event that have my car in them, so I'll post those as well. Should have some external video of my car available pretty soon too.

Credit for these photos goes to Lovefab, briangaudy, cleanblackZ, etc. None of these were taken by me.

**Nealoc187** · 07-22-2008, 01:19 PM

**Nealoc187** · 07-22-2008, 01:21 PM

**Nealoc187** · 07-22-2008, 01:23 PM

khantalha · 07-22-2008, 02:07 PM

offcourse u couldnt take the pics...
always good to hear from you neal... great work

*il99max* · 07-22-2008, 03:30 PM

Hey Neal. Glad to hear you got the car together and got to have some fun on the road coarse. Now get the rest of the engine finished already!!

maxmaxima91 · 07-22-2008, 06:06 PM

Dude.. whats that third gen doing in front of you... ROFL

QNO_A32 · 07-23-2008, 09:35 AM

good job holding it down in adv 1

one_fast_max · 07-23-2008, 04:21 PM

great job neal and jeremy! that must have been a blast! looks awesome!

jeremy.... you got your car finished and up and running already?

*Tatanko* · 07-23-2008, 04:55 PM

Looks like a ton of fun! Way to show 'em how it's done in an A32

G4nismo · 07-23-2008, 06:21 PM

he should stick one of these on the back. newb lol

Drockb418 · 07-23-2008, 09:28 PM

nice pics

maxmaxima91 · 07-23-2008, 09:48 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by one_fast_max

great job neal and jeremy! that must have been a blast! looks awesome!

jeremy.... you got your car finished and up and running already?

O yea.. with 2 days to spare.

one_fast_max · 07-23-2008, 10:27 PM

no wonder you never replied to my emails! ....you were too busy getting the car ready!!

....haha

were you happy with the turbo setup??

maxmaxima91 · 07-24-2008, 08:22 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by one_fast_max

no wonder you never replied to my emails! ....you were too busy getting the car ready!!

....haha

were you happy with the turbo setup??

Ive got a few kinks to work out but overall so far so good. 14 psi on this setup feels similar to what 16-17 psi did on the other setup. o yea,.. sorry about the emails.. ill work on that

Jeremy

*Fr33way™* · 07-24-2008, 08:48 AM

Awesome. Glad to hear the J30 setup standing up to RC duty, should get more interesting (for everyone) when you run some boost through the 3.5.

***gtr_rider*** · 07-24-2008, 09:02 AM

Good to see the cars out of the woodworks again

one_fast_max · 07-24-2008, 10:26 AM

ah its all good jeremy! just messing with ya

great job on the car! i want to make a trip up there sometime to see it. might be a christmas break thing or something...we'll see how it goes. i need a turbo setup possibly

Neal what place did you come in?

MorpheusZero · 07-24-2008, 10:51 PM

NICE.

I have been wanting to run a track day for quite awhile but I was afraid my brakes are inadequate (stock except for HPS up front) and it would wear the hell out of my tires.

Congratulations on the track day man, I hope to see some more from you. One more thing, why'd you go with the USIM instead of the 3.5 IM?

one_fast_max · 07-24-2008, 11:11 PM

the reason neal used the USIM was due to time. he needed to get the car going so he didn't mess with the time consuming job of getting the 3.5 IM on, he was working in a friends place and needed to get it going. he has other plans anyways

**Nealoc187** · 07-27-2008, 10:38 PM

Exactly as kevin said, I just ran out of time to do the swap and doing the USIM was less time consuming. I've got both a DEK and 3.5 IM sitting in the trunk of my beater and I'm going to throw one (or both, and do a dyno comparison maybe) on my car one of these days. Just hasn't been a priority.

Kevin - it wasn't a real race it was just hot lapping which is basically just for fun. There is no official timing.

Morpheus you are right those brakes would not hold up. Back when my other max was stock (except for ground control coilovers) HPS pads and stock rotors were not sufficient. You would need better pads and it'd be wise to run a heavier rotor as well (more mass to absorb heat).

one_fast_max · 07-28-2008, 12:22 AM

ah ok. well that is awesome! i wish there was more of that kind of stuff around here! haha. i would for sure go try that out!

MorpheusZero · 07-28-2008, 02:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nealoc187

Exactly as kevin said, I just ran out of time to do the swap and doing the USIM was less time consuming. I've got both a DEK and 3.5 IM sitting in the trunk of my beater and I'm going to throw one (or both, and do a dyno comparison maybe) on my car one of these days. Just hasn't been a priority.

Haven't we done that already? 3.5IM > 00VI for the 3.5, not only does the 3.5IM flow better but the ports of the 3.5 heads and the 00VI don't match up IIRC.

Quote:

Morpheus you are right those brakes would not hold up. Back when my other max was stock (except for ground control coilovers) HPS pads and stock rotors were not sufficient. You would need better pads and it'd be wise to run a heavier rotor as well (more mass to absorb heat).

Yeah, I was looking at Z32 fronts with milled rotors and some better pads. I flogged the max hard up and down a mountain road recently and I did witness the beginning of fade so I backed off, but I also noticed that HPS were worlds better than stock pads and did hold up to a fair share of abuse. Obviously a 60-20mph mostly second gear mountain road isn't going to compare to consistent threshold braking from 100mph/third gear road course.

How'd your pads look afterwards, notice some taper or were they ok?