dmichaels

Headed out for my last track outing this Friday. Praying that the nor'easter that's supposed to hit over the next couple days clears out... I'm dying to get a couple laps in on the new tires! Now that I have a new 13/16" socket, I'll actually be able to put them on the car too...

Hopefully will have some good experiences Friday on the new tires! It's going to be a mustang festival... 2 Boss 302 LS's, '06 GT, my GT, and another ~2012 GT.

Please rain, stay away...

dmichaels

In love with slicks. What a massive difference...

Knocked over 3 seconds off my previous fastest lap ever in the 50F ambient temp conditions today. The tires just GRIP. I have some learning to do on them. They are more capable than me at the moment. But I love them

5.M0NSTER

Nice work!! I'm glad you had a chance to run with the slicks before the winter.

Wow, looks like the car yawing a lot faster in the corners. As a matter of fact it almost looks like you took one of your other videos from that track and set it on 1.1x speed. Looks fast!

dmichaels

Yeah your right it felt like I was driving at 1.1x speed too. Really fun and now I just have to get some time in to re-learn braking points and cornering forces. It's such a different feel. I might be watching the videos multiple times per day to remind myself how fun these tires are. Haha

5.M0NSTER

I have a question. You're wearing 275/35-18 slicks, right? Those are ~1.45" shorter than the stock Pirellis. I find that with 3.73 and stock wheels tires 3rd and even 4th would be a little too short for some corners. You hit the rev limiter with another 100 yards left to the brake zone.

I would imagine that having tires shorter by this much would amplify this issue. Looks like you'd be losing 5.5% of max speed in each gear. Have you ran into this issue at the tracks you go to? How do you compensate?

dmichaels

Good catch - you are exactly right, roughly 5% more rev's per mile, so I'm losing ground speed in each gear. At Limerock it was not a problem, as I could grab 5th down no-name straight (where I was topping out 4th), and then 5th takes me to 6500 RPM or so on the main straight.

I have two options it seems.
1. Change to 3.55's - I like this option as it would make 3rd gear usable at the track. I hardly touch 3rd even with my previous track wheels at most tracks. But I'm not sure I want to do the gear change (warranty)
2. Tuning and supporting intake modifications to support redline bump
- Friend runs his GT with CobraJet intake up to 7800 RPM. I would like to bump mine up to 7500 or so, but again this voids warranty, and I don't want to take that chance

Otherwise, I can grab 6th on really long straights, but will get no power cause it's such an overdrive. Swapping 6th gears to a more functional one isn't really an option at the moment. I think the gears will only become a real problem at Watkins Glen where I was getting up to 142 mph on the back straight.

I could of course get a taller tire as well, but the ones I'm finding that are cheap scrubs are 275/35/18's... I'm not going to spend big $$ to get a slightly taller tire for little more top end speed.

We'll see... I think I'll be good for the most part, but if I keep the car long term (which is the plan), I'll eventually have to swap gears at a minimum

5.M0NSTER

Thanks for sharing. The 2 options you mentioned are sort of what I expected to hear. One of the instructors at my last event did just what you do. Scrubs of that size (or maybe 285s) but also 18s, and he swapped the pumpkin gear to 3.55

I went the other way, and I'm running 275/40-19 for the extra mph/gear, but there are no slicks/scrubs in that size. It would be nice to run the engine up to ~7400 RPM or so to make up the difference with 285/35-19 slicks, but they are expensive and I really think you need Aluminator like forged connecting rods and pistons to get away with it safety.

Oh well. I still find tires I think will be even better at the track than my S04s, like Bridgestone RE-11s and BFG Rivals. I think I'll go with that size next, and short shift in some corners. So far I've only been to 2 different tracks, but found at least 1 or 2 corners where I run into this issue.

dmichaels

If I wasn't able to get conti scrubs for great deals, I'd be a little more picky about tire size. But for cheap tires ($100/tire or less), I'm happily dealing with the shorter effective final drive.

Know much about swapping the gears? I've never dealt with it before.

5.M0NSTER

Wow, $100 per tire is fan-frikkin-tastic! I'd take that deal too.

I have never done gears before. Looked and a few videos and it looked complicated to me. I'm an electronics/software guy. I lack the mechanical skills to take on that project myself. I would certainly pay a pro to do that job for me.

dmichaels

If you're interested in the tire deals shoot me a PM. I've identified a couple sources. Was particularly pleased with the 8 BFG R1's I landed for a grand total cost of $800. Vastly cheaper than street tires. The conti's I just bought for $50/tire. 1-3 heat cycles on each. Good for several track days at least.

5.M0NSTER

Awesome! I was goning to ask where you score them. I need to wait till I go through my Bridgestone S04s before I buy new tires. At my current pace that will probably happen in 2016. But once I'm ready I'll be very interested in that for sure. Thanks!

Shotokan1509

Looks awesome, how light does your car get on the uphill crest? Everytime I'm there I imagine getting mine out on track

dmichaels

From the drivers seat I felt like I was catching air. Friends watching said I was not but extremely light. You can hear in the video I wait until the car settles to get back on the gas.

Very fun but a little hairy too