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I've been thinking about starting this thread for a while now, but never been really sure if anyone would be interested in my car. But the more and more I do to it, and the more extreme it becomes, it has started to get more interesting.
So this is fairly belated as I've been building up the car for about 18 months now, but I'll try and catch up to where we are now. Because of this some of the photos don't quite match up with what I'm writing as they weren't taken at the time.
Car started life (in my possession) as totally stock 2001 in Royal Navy Blue with about 35K kms. Stock that is, apart from the really dodgy Champiro tyres the dealer had put on. These came off pretty much immediately and were replaced by Toyo T1-R's. Having done this and a full alignment (to UK spec) the car took place in its first Superkhana.
I couldn't really drive the car with the roof up and a helmet on (I'm tall), so first mod I had to make was a low position seat rail from Backyard Special. This was really great and gave me the extra room I needed.
The first real mods started with where I always start - chassis bracing. I know people say this is a waste of time on the S2K but old habits die hard. So on went a Spoon Tower Bar and Lower Cross Brace.
After this the front end certainly felt more taught on the road, but that could just be my imagination. Not much happened for a while until I took a really fast bumpy corner trying to keep up with my mates RX7. The rear end felt terrible through the bumps and, after some reading, I purchased the TC Design pillowball rear control arms. The car was still a daily driver so I didn't get the race spec ones.
Another alignment was done and fast bumpy cornering was all good again. Yay!
I had been driving around with the air box cover off for a while, the noise mmmm..., and I got annoyed with it bogging down in traffic. The solution came with the K&N FIPK.
Great noise - no more heat soak!
All the while, I had not been doing so well in the Superkhanas. Most of the others were on r-comps so this had to be the way to go. Wanting to keep my T1-R's for road driving I shelled out for a new set of wheels at the same time. Meet the 5Zigen (what does that mean?) Pro Racer GN+.
Front: 7.5J x 17" +48 offset (7.7 kgs)
Rear: 8.5J x 17" +48 offset (8.2 kgs)
Tyres came in the form of Toyo R888's front 215/45/17, rear 225/45/17 tire. Didn't go up width on the rear because the tyre guy insisted that my rims were not wide enough for anything bigger than a 225! That said, the R888 in 225 is more like a 235 in reality anyway.
This totally transformed the car. Massive cornering grip and a generally very planted feel. Every time I switched back to my road wheels / tyres for daily driving the car felt positively dangerous! It always took a few days to adjust my driving.
One track day up at Barbagallo Raceway had my tyre guy conclude I needed more front camber. I also destroyed the brake pads. I went with some TC Design front control arms and Porterfield R4S pads.
Another alignment saw me with -3d of front camber, and plenty more to come if I needed it.
I needed to start shedding weight, so I ordered up a Mugen hard top in FRP. In the 3 months it took to arrive I also beefed up the front suspension with a Whiteline anti-roll bar. This thing weighs about twice the oem one (very bad) but did provide some benefit.
Roof test fitting;
Roof painted;
At this point I bought another car to be my daily driver (we had a baby on the way, so needed more space). I was then able to go to town on stripping out the interior.
I also ditched the soft-top and saved heaps of weight. Again the car felt transformed in all aspects with less mass to drag around.
Having stripped out the interior, and the car now being a track toy only, I was able to get a bucket seat and harness. Sparco Pro 2000, MemoryFab seat rail and Willans 4-point did the honours.
Just before the last round of the series (last year) I felt the shocks needed replacing with some coilovers. HKS Hypermax Sport III' were installed.
All this helped me to come 2nd in class for the 2008 Sprint Series, and I was very happy with the result. I also competed, with a co-driver, in the Fabcar one day rally in November. We ended up coming 4th in class, and 19th out of 60 overall, even managing to beat 4 of the PRB Birkin' in our class (http://www.prbaustralia.com.au).
Overall some great results and a brilliant end to the year.
This year, to save more weight, I have gone for a single exhaust system. I wanted a 70mm ss system (titanium is too expensive) so I went with the Greddy Ti-C single and an Invidia 70mm de-cat pipe. It' loud! I would definitely not recommend this to anyone who uses their car on the road.
I have yet to compete in the car with the new exhaust but I' hoping for some good improvements.
So that' where I' up to. One last photo to bring us up to date (this morning!);
I have more parts on order right now, so I should have some more updates over the next week!
Hi mcopley, thanks for doing that - it's a great post
I see you mentioned Barbagallo so I assume you're in Perth. Is that right?
From your progression from stock standard to the current state I can see you've put in some thought to each new addition. It will be interesting to hear your reaction after trying the new single exhaust. Let us know how you get on.
RedRover, yes you're right, I am in Perth. The first round of this year's series is on 29th March, so I'll be sure to post back here and let you know how I go.
I have an MCB, and a Mugne roof (hopefully this time it won't get lost in the mail again......) prepainted gloss black, that i'm thinking of leaving black, but out of curiousity sake, I'd like to see a few images of it in blue.
if you don't want to post them up here, feel free to shoot me a PM
wow. looks awesome and inspiring! but i dont think ill ever strip my car like that! ahaha. how are the porterfield r4s pads? do they hold well on track and spirited driving? i was about to get them but got the ferodo ds2500 instead...
Hmmm... the Porterfields. Not that impressed with them to be honest. I need something that bites hard from cold and doesn't fade, because the sprints are from a standing start with no warm up. The R4S pads don't seem to have as much initial bite as the oem pads, and although they do resist fade better, I have had them go on me . I am extremely hard on my brakes so I will be looking for something different next time.
03-07-2009, 03:09 PM
Build Thread (NA Sprint Series Car)
. I am extremely hard on my brakes so I will be looking for something different next time. 
