Having tried this, I disagree. I was 2+ seconds off the pace on a mid-to-high 30 second course. Wider wheels/tires and real suspension get you most of the STX gains. Power is important, but useless if the chassis can't slice through the course like a knife through melted butter.

Completely agree with you on this.

The most important things will be suspension, wheels, and tires. A car with this level of prep can do very well in the hands of a good driver. Power certainly helps, but generally isn't a necessity to be competitive, at a regional level at least.

+1. Less than that if you're willing to cut some corners.

My build last year was about $4500. I got a break on some used parts bought at a discount, but still - I got the Velox LCAs (a bit spendy, and I haven't even changed rear camber, lol) and I spent extra on top hats rather than cannibalize the existing stock ones (to make switching back to stock easier). After getting the car sorted (after nats, more lol) I took top index twice this fall and at all other events at least made a threat for it.

Where STX gets spendy is if you want to go faster than the basic build. The improvements I'm looking at this year are very incremental, but are looking like another $4k to $5k. In some cases I might've saved some money by picking the right parts from the start, but most of these will be new parts. We're talking tenths and hundredths this year though, not whole seconds like last year's build got me. If I was largely sticking to local competition I probably wouldn't change a thing, the car is very good right now.

See my other posts above. I don't think it's possible to spend $20k on an STX twin unless you are buying crate motors and dynoing them to see which makes the most power, or some other absurd shit like that.

What you absolutely need:

- Catless header (leave the rest of the exhaust street class legal)
- Tune (Tactrix 2 is $160 and free OTS tunes are available)
- 17x9 wheels (mine don't even have the right offset, I'm using spacers to get there...mine weigh 19lbs each too)
- 245/40/17 BFGs or 'stones
- Coilovers with 400lbs/in front and rear
- Front camber plates (you can skip the rear LCAs for now)
- Lower the car between 1" to 1.5" from OEM

The car will be amazing like this. A couple years ago Lugod took 2nd place at Spring Nats tour in a twin about as modified as this. Honestly the hardest part about being nationally competitive will be your talent level. The class is extremely deep and cutthroat; I think last year after day 1 all 21 trophy positions were covered by a second. A single chicken lift could cost you a couple spots.

If that's the kind of margin that actually exists than a CS car could never ever PAX even in the same ballpark as an STX car. Scanning through results the PAX isn't too far from reality, if an STX car runs a 40.0 the CS car should be able to manage a 41.0 or better.

Maybe the PAX is too warped by aliens, maybe all the good CS cars are cheating and the STX cars are lazy, maybe sun only shines on CS cars and STX cars all get rain, haven't been around long enough to tell the difference, but ~1s slower on a 30-40s course and <2s slower on ~60s courses is something I've witnessed firsthand. Hell I was rawtimed all last year by CS cars, but that's a comment on my skills more than anything else.




But to the point, doesn't take a fortune to make a quick STX car, and if nothing else this thread saved me $1600 on a diff and I'm shopping for a header this spring instead.
:burnrubber:

:cheers:

It was a single event, tires weren't the best, I'm not a perfect driver, etc. And PAX is not the end all and be all of class comparisons.

Diff is probably the last thing I will touch on the car, and I'm likely to wind up in SP before I touch it. Clutch pack diffs will wear out and require rebuilding, which makes this less than ideal for a daily driven car especially if you put on a lot of miles.

Here are some affordable coilover options with spring rates at or near 400lbs/in:

http://www.ft86speedfactory.com/rs-r...l#.WHQdAlPyuUk

http://www.ft86speedfactory.com/rce-...l#.WHQdBlPyuUk

http://www.ft86speedfactory.com/rce-...l#.WHQdEFPyuUk

http://www.ft86speedfactory.com/mega...l#.WHQdNFPyuUk

http://www.ft86speedfactory.com/kspo...l#.WHQdSVPyuUk

Of these, the RCE T2 is the only one that is delivered as a true DA right off the shelf. IMO it's the best bang for the buck if you just want to plug and play. You need to bring your own top hats to the game but you can reuse the stock rears and find some cheap front plates to get your front camber. My toughest local STX competition has spent roughly double what I have on shocks and isn't faster than me, so you can definitely take the fight to the pimp shock crowd with these.

I thought I saw a KSport that was a true DA somewhere but couldn't find the link. The Megans can be converted to true DA as well for extra $$$. Off the shelf these will have a single knob that adjusts rebound and compression together, which is less than ideal but you can make it work decently enough. The T0 has no adjustment but is still a decent shock.

Come to STX, the water's nice.

Best driver my car has seen put it to 14th on PAX , and that was on hockey-pucks for tires (I think I finally started to wake them up my last run and he got 2 smoking good runs after that). He normally drove a CS prepped twin, and the observation was along the lines of "It just makes everything the car does well, better. Point and it goes, and so much more fun." And that's with what I suspect are some less than right setup decisions, which I'll be addressing for next year (or at least starting). I might be confusing who said the "more fun" part - I know the usual STX competitor with a BMW said that, and also couldn't stop grinning... (that was fun-runs day one, and the grin stayed the whole second day when he co-drove). Guess what BMW just had its setup budget for next year doubled (or tripled). Hah! :)

More than anything else, I think it's the alignment. Higher spring rates and proper damping goes a long way too. And, of course... driver.

C

An upgraded differential was one of my later mods. It isn't cheap after parts and install but it really makes a huge difference on being able to get the power down as often and early as possible.

EDIT: You can upgrade Feal 441 to a true da for $$$ now. They sell them outright for some cars but not listed for the FRS yet

Don't forget about Megan's "high end" stuff!
They can also be revalved nicely for autocross.

True DA monotube for under $2k.
http://www.meganracing.com/product_d...=1830&catid=33

I think these are the ones ProParts USA is playing with. They might need a revalve to be useful at 400lbs/in.

aside from upgrading to BBK, what brake pad/rotor/fluid combination do you guys use?

I'm a noob but I really like the Project Mu HC+800 with stock rotors. Pads have great initial bite, even when cold. Plus they are pretty cheap. They eat away at rotors pretty good though which is why I just use the cheapest blanks I can find basically. Been using it for the last 90k miles basically except for when I tried a couple other pads picking up used sets off friends. Fluid I am currently on ATE Super Blue. Was running Motul RBF600 before but local place stopped carrying it and I was already set to bleed my brakes that day. Been OK on mountain runs (which are probably harder on brakes then autox) but haven't run an autox on it for sure to say if it is fine or sucks. Could probably run OEM fluid without issue even I would think.