Hey guys, just wondering if anyone has experience with this...

I'm going to put 225 A compound Hoosiers on the S. I'm getting them for free from work off a race Prelude that ran them for a couple laps in qualifying at the Runoffs. Anyone autocross the car with 225's all around? The tires are in pretty good shape so I don't think it'll be too bad.

I have pretty fast hands so a loose car doesn't really scare me at all, just that it might not be that fast.

Any thoughts?

 

Is this your first time on R compound tires? Do you have a big front anti-roll bar?

If you don't have a big bar, and are able to drive to anywhere near the tires limits, you will have massive inside wheel spin coming off of every corner...that is, if you aren't countersteering, chasing the oversteer everywhere.

When I first got my S2000, in 2001, I ran two events on the stock front anti-roll bar. The car would not put down any power on corner exit, and I spun a lot. It was still fun, but uncompetitive.

Steve

 

First time on R compounds in the S, not ever though...

Looks like it's supposed to rain this weekend so I probably won't get a chance to try them out.

I guess I tend to look at the situation a little like this... these tires will have more grip in the rear than the stock tires. I don't get lots of oversteer under steady state cornering, only on corner exit under power. But that situation is not created by extra yaw from the front end grip... just not enough to put power down at the rear.

I'm still learning that when the rear starts to slide, sometimes the best way to get it to stick is to feed in more throttle. Sometimes a little throttle isn't enough and you need a lot to stick the exit.

Anyway, I'll post the results after I've run them.

 

R compounds in the rain may well still be faster than stock tires. It depends on whether the pavement is damp/wet vs. monsoon conditions. If you can, read the comments in the latest SCCS Sports Car magazine about the B Stock race where Jason Saini ended up on S03s for the Thursday monsoon...

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by jguerdat
R compounds in the rain may well still be faster than stock tires.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by jguerdat
R compounds in the rain may well still be faster than stock tires.

 

OOPS! That's SCCA (Sports Car Club of America), not SCCS (Source Code Control System)...

 

Hey guys,

Just wanted to post the results when I ran this setup...

The temperature outside was mid 70's last weekend so the tires had the chance to get warm and I had a co-driver.

I have to say that the car with 225's all around was not unbalanced at all. The oversteer was not unmanagable under transition through slaloms at all and I was pushing pretty hard. I came within 2 tenths of a guy with 245 Hoosiers in the rear on his S. Overall I don't think the balance of the car was bad to be honest, but I'm 24 with good reflexes still so that probably helps the situation. Usually on corner exit I just press the go pedal, steer and don't lift.

The one problem was as some predicted from experience was that the rear tires kept lifting due to the huge amount of front end grip and made it difficult to put power down on tight corner exits. I don't know if a front stabi bar is enough to stop this? Or do I also need 245's in the rear? It seems like the other guy I always run against doesn't get too much wheel spin so maybe 245's are enough?

 

If you're not spinning the car with 225s all around, you're not going fast enough. It may have been enough to win but I'd say you likely need to let a very experienced person drive the car or compete against an S that is driven by a top competitor. I don't have any problem spinning the car with 225 front and 245 rear when trying to probe the last little bit of grip at the limits.

The rear spin is definitely related to the front grip. Body roll is a major factor, partly due to the fact that the chassis is so stiff that dropping the outside front will unload the inside rear. Wider (265) rears can also induce this since they grip more rather than sliding and cause the whole side to lift. Use of a small tree for the front swaybar helps this but you can still get inside wheelspin with the stiffest bars on full stiff. At that point, you either have to live with it or drive around the problem (feather the throttle, try a slightly different line, etc.).

 

I won't hijack this thread.