1. Spent months testing the car stock in autox, street and track. This was to gather base line data, dyno, temps etc. Before the tracked the stock car we swapped out, Gfour fluid and PMU 800HC pads. Also tried DBA Rotors.
2. Carbotech 1521s are some of the best street pads but they are for the CP8350 AP Calipers, more expensive. But since they were ruined I was not going to buy another set when I had gotten a set of Hawks from Essex for next to nothing. They are the HPS but like I said I have run other street pads that are more aggressive and the transfer layer disappears. Like yesterday it was 75 during the day and then was almost 35 this morning. I needed the mildest compound for street, nothing else seems to work.
I also have sitting in a drawer the following pads:
- Carbotech XP10
- Carbotech XP12
- Ferodo DS2500
- Ferodo DS UNO
- Project Mu 999
- Project MU 800HC
So I did not just randomly just decide, on pads and brakes, we tried plenty.
3. I do swap rotors out when they old ones were warped and pads were getting destroyed yes.
4. Tensioner, I am going to have 4 belt swaps so far on the kit. One to upgrade the belt, the other proactive, the other because I took the blower off to inspect pulleys and now finally to swap in the new idler and new size belt vortech released. Not sure how much pulling and prying on the stock tensioner has effected it so bought a spare, as it is noisier than it once was.
5. Again I know you dont follow my build but if you did you would see I posted all my logging of track temps, street temps and winter temps of oil.
The thermostatic plate opens at 185F but there is always trickle flow to the oil cooler for pressure reasons etc. When it drops below 40 degrees running 0w20 redline oil I could never get the engine oil pas 170 degrees after a 20 minute commute it would settle around 160F. Thats not good.
That's over cooling. So it was disconnected.
Quote:
Originally Posted by ZDan
It really seems to me like a LOT more work is being done than necessary.
Point 1: Did you try tracking the car with the stock brakes with good track pads and DOT4 fluid? That would have saved a ton of time/effort/$$$ right there.
$400 *street* pads? For why?
I run low-noise/low-dust inexpensive street pads on the street on my street/track car. Centric Posi-Quiet, $65 all around, no problemo. I even did an unplanned track event with them and they were actually fine (I did lift VERY early on the longest straight to preserve them).
Also, I wouldn't throw away "grooved" pads, especially if they were expensive. I also use rotors to the bitter end (min thickness) and never have them turned. Grooves and all. I haven't experienced warped rotors in forever (not since I stupidly had my old 535i's rotors turned a couple of decades ago).
Do you *really* swap out the rotors and calipers between seasons? Waste of time/money/effort again.
Q: the "cheap Hawk pads" you used, were they HPS? If so, they're likely worse than OEM. Centric street pads are mucho better-o.
2. Tires. Of course tires get used up. I usually *enjoy* the opportunity to buy and try new tires. Getting NT01s for the RX-7 this year after suffering at the track with street tires...
3/4. Revised kit for more power? New spare tensioner because they are known to fail? Of course aftermarket mods are not as well developed for reliability vs. OEM, so some issues are to be expected. Would hope this would become a non-issue at some point...
5. I always ship tires to where I'm going to have them installed. And they keep my winter wheels/tires in the summer and my summer wheels/tires in the winter. Same with parts I know I'm not going to install myself, I have them shipped to the shop. You might see if you can do this with your shop, saves a lot of hassle.
6. Swapping brake systems between winter/summer is, again, IMO, a waste of time/money/effort. I drive on the big brakes all year on my FD, even New England winters (do try to avoid the salt though!).
7. I bleed brakes before ever other track event (of course including the first event of the season). No big deal, especially as the wheels/tires are being swapped for the track event anyway.
8. This also seems a ridiculous waste of time/money/effort. I wouldn't worry about 0W20 synthetic oil not getting "up to temperature" in the winter months. Do you have a thermostat for the oil coiler? Good on you for inspecting, but all this additional labor removing/re-installing the oil cooler and lines is not buying you anything IMO.
9. Periodic inspection is of course a good idea...
TL/DR: You're doing a LOT more work and spending a LOT more money than necessary to run a modded street/track car.
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