Its our Anniversary, I bought my Emily on 3 Dec last year.
I wanted a rear wheel drive car, to learn to drive properly. My 86 has taught me so much... I love it even more now, because I know how to use it. Well sort of
I have learned a lot here on this forum, So thank you all! Especially Fish Eagle, you are a legend and your advice helped me enjoy my car a whole lot more.
I have put nearly 30,000kms on my car. At least 5 trips to Durban and back, at least 10 skidpan days, and lately 4 track days. She has not skipped a beat, and I drive her hard
The best advice I got was from Fish Eagle, who suggested I go out on the Skidpan before the track. So I went to Zwartkops and had more fun than I imagined. I only missed one skidpan day after that all year. Its low speed, easy on the car and tyres, mostly its very safe. This is where I really learned a lot about the 86. If you new to the 86 or haven't yet been the skidpan, do yourself a favour!
After a few sessions I decided to mod a few things:
Got a extra set of rims for Emily (for the race tyres), I chose A-Line bandits. They are cheap and heavy as stock but they were cheap... I fitted Bridgestone RE002s. They grip like hell, you lose some playfulness in the rear but they feel like rails.
Next I added bushings for LSD, and transmission. Very kindly done by Lee. Sharpens the gears that little bit more, and really transforms the way the car put its power down, you can really feel the extra torque that used to be lost.
At this point I had done a lot of skidpan and I wanted to track a bit, I put in some Motul RBF660 (Again Fish Eagles wise advice), went to Redstar and did a nice 2:30.800 I was very careful on the stock brakes though, at least 2 cooldown laps etc. This was on my street tyres which are Michelin PS4, (I ruined my Primacy HPs pretty quickly). It was amazing the 86 is so responsive on track, I was in love again...I needed more!
I wanted more trust in my brakes than I had in the stock ones, I checked them and after 60,000kms they were still pretty good so I went back to Redstar twice more and managed a best time of 2:25.900, with a lot of 2:26s.
This ruined my rear brake, no pad left at all... Luckily I had done my research and was ready, Powerbrake to the rescue. I fitted Powerbrake discs all round and Endless pads up front with Ferodo DS Performance at the back.
Finished bedding them in yesterday and so far they feel fantastic but only the track will tell the final story.
Which brings me to today when I got a SAV tune
for Emily's anniversary
I really look forward to next year as I am gonna try and do the Michelin cup and Gymkhana SA
Thanks again and I hope you all have a great holiday season and even better new year
