SGwick

Just picked up new trackday work horse. My 04 armada engine was showing its age through the hills. Pretty stoked :-)

mustang5o

Full racing slicks typically used by teams who compete in the Pirelli World Challenge series (or so I'm told) the tires are in great shape and have about 3/4 tread left. You can get a set of 4 for about $600 shipped. You don't chew up ultra expensive street tires and you get the advantage of running full slicks. I used come Continental slicks before but they were actually purchased new with only one session on them when I got them. I put about 15 more sessions 15-20 minutes each) before 2 of them started to cord. Not bad I guess but I think the Pirellis are stickier and faster. We'll see how they hold up.

By the way I'm running 305 660R18's in the slicks. Square setup on SVE drift wheels using 1/8" wheel spacers up front.

5.M0NSTER

Nice tow vehicle SGWick!

dmichaels

Nice truck!! That looks fantastic and I'm sure will tow even better than the Nissan

Be ready for "GMC towing Ford" comments. I've received a lot since I got the Tahoe!

SGwick

thanks guys, hahaha lol never thought about gmc/ford comments. I'm ready:-)

mustang5o

I almost got a GMC but I was looking at older trucks and the Chevy's and GMC's didn't seem to have the towing capacity of an F150. Though the older F150's have the cam phaser issues. I ended up finding a really clean low mileage 2003 F250 V10. Gas mileage isn't great but then again, neither was the Jeep it replaced.

dmichaels

A friend of mine tows with the F350 V10 - it does great towing, but mileage is pretty awful. He told me he's at about 8 towing his M3.

I'm very pleased with the capabilities of the Chevy 5.3 in my Tahoe. I would have liked the 6.0, but after towing up to NH and back a couple weeks ago, the 5.3 will happily cruise at 75mph on the highway and I averaged about 13 mpg over 500 miles. It would downshift on the bigger highway hills, but maintaining speed was really no issue. And the intake I fabricated for it sounds fantastic

SGwick

I got the 6.2L 8-speed and it feels preppy :-) but so does the gas :-(

redonblackpony

So I have back to back track days next Saturday and the following Saturday. On the 24th I will be at auto club Speedway. This is a track that incorporates a high banked oval as used by the NASCAR circuit. I figured I would go ahead and add a track decal.
Looking forward to it!

SGwick

Hahaha looking good. I drove that track in a stock car :-) My 1st track experience ever that started a journey :-) Even have the oval version decal :-)

redonblackpony

That's pretty cool!

SGwick

Never realized how good your car looks close up. Awesome track car!

5.M0NSTER

Sounds good! Car looks ready to go. Hope you get a chance to record some video.

I'm off to Gingerman raceway with CGI Motorsports tomorrow, and then closing the season at Grattan on the 24th

redonblackpony

I intend to shoot video. After all, I've never been to the auto club Speedway

redonblackpony

Hey good luck tomorrow at the track

dmichaels

Hope the track days go well! I'm off to Palmer here for a day. Disappointingly I found I only had 3 R1's mounted, so it's R888's only today. But gonna play with the aero! Woohoo!!

SGwick

Good luck guys out on track! Say no to "red mist" :-)

dmichaels

Back from the track day at Palmer today.

I thought I was going to be able to run my set of BFG R1's, but when I went to load them in the car last night, it turned out I only had 3 mounted! Whoops! So I ran the R888's which are very very beat up. Played with the car a bunch, and I have a couple tweaks to make, and I really need to get on good tires to do more testing.

Anyways, very fun day. Here are a couple laps before the tires totally fell off and got really hairy (aka wanting to drift every corner rather than stick... kinda fun in the slower ones, not so good in the high speed ones!!)

Also took out a spectator, Carly, who was there with her brother in his Audi A3. Very cool people and I always enjoy taking out passengers! Closing comments from her were "this car definitely slides the most" in comparison to others she's been out in (E36 race car, 2016 A4, and 2011 R8). So I'll take that as a compliment to my car control skills

Anyways, enjoy

Bert

Was Carly there for Track Night on Friday by any chance; Red Audi? She looks familiar . . .

How about that rough pavement at the Apex on turn 5? That had me sliding too, until I got spooked and just slowed down for that corner. I wonder if it would be faster if you took it wider to avoid that "50% pavement" on the inside?

I thought we were runnig pretty much the same line, but you are a lot tighter on 4 than me, I take it a lot wider at the entry then late apex to be on the right to set up for 5. Anyway, nice laps . . . I have yet to break 2:00

Most importantly -- did the canards stay on?

Also BTW, Harry's makes a nice video . . . Does the app come with the software to produce the final video on your PC; or do you need a different program for that? I am still using Track Addict and haven't sprung for the ODBII reader yet.

5.M0NSTER

Thanks guys! You as well in you upcoming events!

First off, more great videos from Derek. I don't know hoe you do it man, you look fast in your own videos. I guess it helps being good!

My day at Gingerman went really well with 2 minor exceptions:
1) My tires are in the same state as Derek's. I got there with 4mm of thread, and left with 1. It literally fell off in the last 2 sessions. No chunking, but they got super greasy and thread vaporized. This means I have to bail on Sept 24.
2) I'm sooo glad cones are soft, and I nailed one hard. I dropped 2 wheels as a result of (1) and nailed an exit marker. "Nailed that exit!"
Though I guess I now meet the minimum requirements to be called a "cone killer"

Not as cool as above, and I'm sorry about the big bug splat right in front of the gopro, but here is a little video. I was sandwitched between 2 ZL1s at the grid, and walked from both of them.