General Performance/Trackday/What DV to use discussion thread.

[16Klappe]

Morning boys and girls! I for one think a nice discussion thread to chat about the quirky ideas we all have, motorsport and track days, car preperation and road modifications is well in order. Post up the mods you want to do, the track days or events you want to go to and lets get talking about them!

I would like to get rid of my big leather dinner plate steering wheel and put something with a bit more feel to it on, but how do I stop the air bag light coming up? Or shall I just take the bulb out lol.

 

[warren_S5]

Not sure whether you could just switch air bag warning off in VCDS. Certainly improve things from OEM wheel feel wise.

I'll add another question, do any of you adjust tyre pressures when using road tyres on a track day, and if so by how much on each axle?

And do you have any regimes beyond basic safety checks before going track daying (adjusting map settings / adding octane boosters / using race fuel etc...)

 

[Jason.s]

You can buy OMP wheel and boss kits from ebay that come with the airbag wiring harness that should stop it coming on. Depending on style its £115-160 roughly. Its what i want eventually.

 

[16Klappe]

I'll have a look into those harnesses, I have looked at resistors and all that lark but quite frankly I would rather do it properly.

With track day preps, for my car I checked the oil, brake fluid and PAS levels before and after each session, same for the water and the tire pressures. The car is only run on V Power so I didnt worry about any octane boosters, all I did do was do a fault code reset before going out so it relearnt it was being driven hard as well as a check when I got back.

For tire pressures I can't comment, Prawn has done a fair bit of work with that though.

 

[warren_S5]

I've taken to putting a set of plastic wheel chocks in my boot kit along with a fire extinguisher as after one session I couldn't find anywhere flat to parkother than a grass verge on a steep slope. I felt really uncomfortable leaving the car in gear with the brakes off for any length of time whilst they cooled to ensure they didn't boil the brake fluid so I ended up having to drive back to the hotel and walk back to the track whilst the car cooled down.

I tend to carry a mini tool kit in the car on track days which consists of hose tape, a couple of industrial cable ties (a couple of metal ones and a couple of plastic ones), a couple of mixed jubilee clips, a flexible long shaft Laser driver with socket attachment for hose clamps, some engine oil, set of plugs, a plug spanner, fuses and bulbs.

I don't thrash the car on track as its a daily, so have never taken spare brake pads / associated tools, but do you guys take anything else as part of a 'get out of jail' pack?

 

[S3 Paul]

A rope and my AA card ,
Get a mate to recover you just far enough away to get recovered by the yellow van men
On a serious note, I take a rachet, a row of deep and shallow sockets. Few spanners and odds and sods of wiring/ connecters
I put it all in a small tidy box and leave it in the mrs's car while out on track

 

[Prawn]

I'll have a look into those harnesses, I have looked at resistors and all that lark but quite frankly I would rather do it properly.

hahahahahahahahaha

Quote of the year for me so far!

the 'Harness kit' supplied with a steering wheel boss, IS just a resistor with 2 spade connectors on it.

Personally, I didn't bother, as I've removed the airbag ECU and everything, and the seats, and belts, so I just stripped the clocks down and taped over the air bag light section on the back of the clocks, and the light can't be seen.

As for tyre pressures, go WAAAAAAY softer than you would on the road. I start out at 26psi cold, which will usually rise to 30+ when hot after a session on track. I then lower than to 30 hot all round, and it feels fairly good.

Going out on 32-34 cold will result in 40psi + hot pressures and zero grip at all.

As J said though, all fluids between sessions, including PAS which people often overlook, I take spare front brake pads, but only worn standard ones as a 'get me home' if I do wear the race pads out.

In terms of car setup also, people often over look driving position. You want the steering wheel pulled out as close to you as possible, and the seat very upright. I run a 3'' dished wheel, and I still have it pulled half way out.

 

[Westy]

Tyre pressures are a biggy.

When at Bedford Autodrome 2 weeks ago I was quite happily plodding round all day with 28psi (hot) in my Yoko semi slicks. As soon as I changed to my road wheels for a few laps I didn't bother checking pressures and went for a tank slapper after the tyres had heated up! I'm sure most of you have seen the video

 

[warren_S5]

hahahahahahahahaha

As for tyre pressures, go WAAAAAAY softer than you would on the road. I start out at 26psi cold, which will usually rise to 30+ when hot after a session on track. I then lower than to 30 hot all round, and it feels fairly good.

Going out on 32-34 cold will result in 40psi + hot pressures and zero grip at all.

Interesting you should say this as I was running brand new Toyo Proxes (235/35/19's) - when I say brand new they got run in from Berkshire to Nurburg(!), and with 36PS front and similar in rear from memory (maybe even a touch more as we were road tripping with luggage).

On the second lap (after a sighting lap and a 15 minute car cool off), better Wippermann and Pflanzgarten the car characteristics changed completely and I just appeared to have next to no grip, the car was understeering badly into corners and I really had to back off as my immediate reaction was there was something wrong with the car. I just think on reflection the tyre pressures were so high that the contact patch of the front tyres may have reduced as the air pressure / temp inside the tyres increased (tyre company said they'd used nitrogen to fill - no difference identified!).

Next time I'll try dropping the pressures back 10PSi or so as I have a mini compressor kit which Audi now supply instead of a spare wheel to put pressures back for road use to continue the road trip!

 

[Prawn]

Sounds about right mate, if you're pushing on in a heavy car, it tends to be around wipperman / brunchen that tyres start to go off, I found it most noticable in my daily by the time i got to pflanzgarten I had no grip at all!

Interesting that it happened with nitro fill though, I found nitro fill kept my pressures much more stable, although they did still rise. Now I fill with air and just monitor them more closely.

perhaps the tyres themselves had overheated? rubber just too hot that they'd gone off....

 

[warren_S5]

Sounds about right mate, if you're pushing on in a heavy car, it tends to be around wipperman / brunchen that tyres start to go off, I found it most noticable in my daily by the time i got to pflanzgarten I had no grip at all!

Interesting that it happened with nitro fill though, I found nitro fill kept my pressures much more stable, although they did still rise. Now I fill with air and just monitor them more closely.

perhaps the tyres themselves had overheated? rubber just too hot that they'd gone off....

Car is way over 1400kgs before you add 3 people and a belly full of 100RON Shell (which I'd just filled to the lid!), and some luggage which I hadn't managed to drop off at Hotel Nurburg.

As it was the opening Friday traffic was horrendous so we got there and just queued to get on. To be honest I probably wasn't driving as sympathetically as I could as adrenalin of first laps was high, so I was on a hiding from the offset!

 

[Prawn]

sounds like the fat ******* car just ****** the tyres then mate

i'd love to go for a lap in an 8P to see what it's like, I can imagine it's a weapon in the right hands.

 

[warren_S5]

sounds like the fat ******* car just ****** the tyres then mate

i'd love to go for a lap in an 8P to see what it's like, I can imagine it's a weapon in the right hands.

Is the right answer!

I went on the half day Mercedes Benz SLS instructor led experience a couple of months back, and then got a joy ride at Goodwood FOS in an R8 up the hill climb track with an ex-rally champion and lets say a bit of skill goes a very long way!!! I don't have the finesse or the presence of mind when driving at the limit to dance the car through the corners like these do, so mate a heavy car to too much driver input and its like a jelly on a plate!

In a straight line she goes well, but on the new car I'm getting WALK, uprated rear ARB, uprated rear engine mount and some Eibach Pro springs to help with the handling. The old S3 S2+ was on stock suspension and brakes, and for road use that was fine. Around the ring it proved to be the straw that broke the camels back as the brakes were on borrowed time inside a lap, and the understeer / roll / unpredictability of the OEM car with 350+bhp was ..... well a mistake really. Lesson learned!!!!