Friday I had my first trackday in the S2k at Roebling Road. It was a fun, well-run event put on by Seattime. My friend (in the adv. solo group) and I headed up from Jacksonville around 5am to get to Roebling around 7:30. The turnout was low, with only a handful of cars in each of the three groups (adv, solo, drivers ed). We did have 4 S2000’s there, all from SC I believe. My instructor, Nick, was there with his wife and 2 children and his project miata. Nick is a great instructor, super nice guy, lives right outside where I went to college and his son was rocking a gamecocks hat, awesome!

My prior driving experience has been several safety schools, some karting and autocross, iRacing and LFS sims.

My car is mostly stock, 05 with Swift Spec R springs, 225/255 Star Specs, oem front lip and coastal metals splitter. I installed Carbotech XP8 brake pads and DOT4 fluid the day before, as my stock pads were a bit worn and I didn’t want to have to worry about them. I have a hard dog double diagonal that is not installed yet. With this being the first track day and the stock rollover protection, I was conscious to have fun and be aware of the spots that are more prone to trouble (Turn 9 mainly).

The first session was strictly learning line and concentrating on turn-in points, looking for reference points, etc. Nick was skeptical that this was my first track experience which made me a laugh a bit. During the second session I picked up a more speed than I had anticipated, but was driving with a bit too much steering input and corrections. After the session my instructor Nick and I talked about needing to concentrate on smoothness, constant steering inputs and continuing to work on lines without upsetting the balance of the car. Taking the advice I started trying to set up each turn with a smooth turn in and consistent steering. Smoothing out the steering inputs almost immediately led to more speed throughout the track and allowed me to begin picking points consistently.

My instructor was driving his Miata after lunch when he lost power through turn 3. Something inside his engine bay decided to dislocate itself and catch the wiring harness on fire. He was able to get off track to the access road and fire crew before much relative damage occurred. Unfortunately though his day was done and I was really bummed for him. He didn’t let it faze him and he hopped back in my car to instruct as if it never happened. Incredibly cool of him.

I was really enjoying the day, picking up speed throughout the track, but really not pushing turn 8/9 and braking for T1. The s2k was flawless all day. One big slide through turn 3 at around 80mph got Nick’s attention, but gladly we stayed on the track pointing mostly in the right direction all day. Sadly without a camera the good laps at the end of the day went something like this:

Across the start/finish around 115, up to 7800-8000 in 5th gear braking early at the 5 marker board down into 4th. Apex T1, track out and turn in for T2, on the power hard and back into VTEC as the car tracks out.

Into Turn 3 the car is around 100 mph so I would breath off the gas and roll in. The car is very neutral in T3 (by nature and with the splitter/stiffer springs). Because of that and being a beginner, T3 never felt planted as the s2k tended to float through the turn. Apex late in mid/upper VTEC of 4th gear. Straighten the car out and quick heel-toe into 3rd gear for turns 4, 5, and 6. Unfortunately I gained enough speed through the day that I was on the 3rd gear rev-limiter before I got to 5 and going into 7. I’m not sure if the car could take these corners in 4th off the power band.

The turn 7 carousel is slightly off-camber and awesome in the S2000, as the car is free to rotate with the throttle and/or steering. Very neutral, but not as unnerving as the ultra-fast T3. Line it up to apex near the inside tire pile and track out immediately into 4th gear. Turn 8/9 can bite you running wide into the sandy dirt and/or turning you into the wall if you over correct. It’s also extremely fast and neutral so I concentrated on leaving lots of room and building up exit speed, close to redline in 4th as I exited to the front straight.

Based on this: http://www.turnzero.com/technical_re...ear_calculator (with 255/40’s and assuming 8200rpm cutoff) the indicated peak of 125mph was probably pretty close going into T1 and about 100 into T3.

At the end of the day everyone was safe, the miata fire and Erick’s supercharged ap1 (with video in his thread) with an undiagnosed failure were the only ones that needed attention. Nick left me with a nice review, saying the technical skills were there, only more experience is needed progressing to solo. I agreed as having only given a point-by on an outlap, and mainly passing a Yaris ever 4 laps didn’t leave me feeling prepared for a more populated run group. Anyway, had a great time, highly recommend SeatTime and Roebling for beginers and S2k's, sorry no video. I'd be interested to hear what any similar S2k guys do for the corners running into gearing issues. Goals for next trackday are to get the harddog installed, brake a little deeper, and get some footage of the antics.

 

great to see you had a great time. I take my CR out to Roebling all the time with PCA. Great track to learn on since only turn 9 has possible contact with concrete wall Sounds like you picked up on the course line quickly. It is one of the faster tracks in the southeast. Try to take your S out to Road Atlanta if you are looking for something more technical with serious elevation changes.

 

Is your CR Rio? I've never seen it there?

Are you going to be there 6/9-6/10 with CERPCA?

I'd love to check your car out.

 

It tends to get too hot that time of year, I run with PCA Crowne region or NASA, yes mine is yellow. I will try to make it up in September.

 

2005 S2000 / 225/255 Star Spec Tires / Carbotech XP8 / Swift Spec R springs / Coastal Metals Splitter OEM Front Lip / K&N FIPK / Hard Dog double diagonal / Recaro Pole Position

This past weekend I drove up to CMP with two friends in E36 M3’s for the 2 day driver education event. Two fellow S2k owners helped me install the hard dog the weekend before (huge thanks to Justin and Jim). This was my 2nd (and 3rd) track day(s).

The first day was 106 degrees, dry heat with a nice breeze. It was hot, but felt nicer than the average 95 and humid we have in Jacksonville. I ran 4 sessions day 1, learning the line of the track and getting to grips with a track that has some bumpy bits and hard braking. My group was comprised of a wide range of vehicles and experience levels, TAM05’s beautiful GPW AP2, onecleanS2000’s SSM 07, 2 new Camaros, Shelby Mustang, a C5 that reluctantly yielded, an E46 328 sedan, some Subarus, Clubman S, and a new MX-5. Sunday was really uncomfortably hot, and the three of us were pretty weary of the drive back to florida.

The car and modifications handled the weekend and heat beautifully. After the first morning sessions, I was standing on the brakes consistently without any perceived fade. No cracked rotors and no drama scrubbing lots of speed for T1, T8, T11, and T14.

The tires didn’t handle the heat quite as well. The grip was phenomenal for the first 3-4 hot laps, at which point the rears became very greasy. An easy lap would let them regain most of the grip, but it made rear grip/stability an issue.

Balance & Stability:

The rear of the car displayed rear instability at higher speed, from the suspension, tires, track, and aero balance.

The Swift Spec R springs have rates of 420lb/in and 392lb/in Front/Rear respectively, stiffer and more aggressively balanced F/R than AP2 OEM. The stiffer springs makes the car wonderful through the slower sections of the track, but the car was very neutral at turn in and through the 60-95 mph turns.

The tires lost more rear grip through the sessions (42 psi hot before I backed them down first session, ended 36 hot). This led to some unsettling rear twitchiness.

The front splitter I have isn’t designed as a racing piece, but it produces tangible front downforce at speed. I don’t have a rear diffuser/spoiler/wing. This again hurts the high speed stability of the car.

Issues:

Coming out of 6 and 7 on hot tires 3rd gear VTEC resulted in a scary moment as neutral became oversteer and almost ran out off at track out. T3 had a snap oversteer just after apex, not fun, which again pushed us out wide. Not good on the corner with walls. T10, the kink, was kept to around 90mph most of the day. The car just isn’t planted through there as you increase speed, with plenty of front grip and less rear grip it just skates. Turn-in for T8 was difficult as the tires got hot, as it’s fast, uphill and has so much front grip. There just isn’t confidence in the rear.

The instructor was very great, but we both did not like the balance issues we experienced.

The only video i recorded was of the first session of day 2, 95 degrees and humid. I apologize for leaving the garage door opener on the sunvisor and the slowest outlap in history (Fastforward to ~6:30 to get clear track). The session was smooth and fairly sedate I thought, had a couple of clean laps with cool tires, and then tried to cool them before another couple hard laps. Not looking for speed, with a full gas tank and 2x200lb dudes I think I had a couple 2:02s in there. The track is a little intimidating, and by Sunday the heat was getting to me. My right rear wheel weights fell off, lesson learned about taping those down. Also, the gas in our tanks was boiling after the last session saturday, that's insane.
23:05 for the only moment of the session, heat and a bit of loose rear end out of T6&7.

I’d love feedback on my driving and thoughts on gaining a little more rear end stability.

 

Sounds like you had a good time.

I'm looking to do my first track day at the end of this month. I have the same experience as you; iRacing, LFS, and karting. It sounds like you picked up driving pretty quickly. I hope some of that comes from doing a lot of sim racing.

I had also planned to get get the Spec R springs. Are the rates you posted custom? Can you post a picture of your car?

Also, what are your alignment specs?

Looking forward to more updates.

 

It was a blast, heat considered.

The fundamentals of lines and sighting can be built up through the sims. If you have a force-feedback wheel, you may be able pick up the feeling of under/oversteer onset. If you can handle the sensory overload that reality brings with it, they're quite similar One bad habbit racing sims taught me is continuously fine tuning the line via the steering wheel, not really what you want to be doing a lot of the time. Try and look way ahead and find the smooth continuous steering input around the line.

The Spec R's are solid. Great for the medium speed autocrossing i've done, but maybe not the best for tracking? I will try and take a couple pics for you. The alignment i think was ~-1.5 Fr, -2.0 Rear camber, 6*caster(?), 0 front toe, 0.1 rear toe, i'll grab a shot of that too.

Have a great time at the track, stay cool and hydrated if you're in the heat like we were

 

Reid, nice meeting you Sunday. Looks like you picked the track up well. We had a thunderstorm come through after you left which definitely made the track slick. Powering out of corners required very careful throttle application without VSA on. I'm still struggling with maintaining speed through turn 8 myself.

Your alignment looks very similar to mine, but with more front camber. I may have to increase mine, as I'm getting more wear at the outer edges. I used to have extra toe in the rear from the UK alignment, but the rear actually does feel better with less toe.

Drew

 

I ran out there on the short course recently with a 4.44 rear-end ap1 so the gearing is pretty similar to an ap2 and I needed 2nd in the back section still.
I think also you would need 3rd in T8 but probably you can go to 5th b4 the kink

 

.1 rear toe in might be one of your issues with the rear end being twitchy. Is that total toe in for both? If so, you need to add some and it will help the rear end settle down. I have that CR and running star specs 245 square set up, I am running -2.5 front and -1.8 rear with toe in .14 each side total of .28. .2 to .24 total toe would probably be good.