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In the last session I was pretty evenly matched with a 2013 911 Turbo S. We were running in the A Group (fastest group). After the session I went over to talk to the driver. She had a professional coach and does a lot of track days. She removed the factory carbon ceramic brakes and was running Girodisc two piece rotors with dedicated track pads. The tires were Dunlop Sport Maxx and she said she left the Turbo S in auto mode. I congratulated her.
While I have done about 20 days at Laguna Seca, this was my first time in my 2016 Z06/Z07. I did a trackday at Thunderhill Racewaya few months ago, but had a lot of issues. Even after bleeding my aftermarket intercooler reservoir about 30 times and making a nice video, the car still suffered from cavitation and intercooler pump shutdown. The 160* Thermostat went bad and the car also hit limp mode when the coolant temp exceeded 260*. I have since removed the aftermarket intercooler reservoir, replaced the hose, and vacuum bled the intercooler circuit. I was not suffering any cavitation at Laguna Seca. I also replaced the defective 160* thermostat with a 174* Lingentfelter Camaro thermostat and used the LMR housing. The car had the Dewitt radiator at Thunderhill (which didn’t help because the thermostat was defective, and that drove me nuts), and I supplemented it with the GMPP secondary radiator. I would have done the GMPP secondary radiator and thermostat first, but the GMPP radiator was on back order for 6 weeks. I also added the 2017 Supercharger lid but kept the 2016 intercooler bricks. Everything else is stock. The Sport Cup 2 tires had 1 trackday and 5,500 street miles. The alignment is however the factory set it. I have not had it checked yet. I wanted to get a baseline.
Observations –
It was really cool out. The last session was the warmest at 59*F and car was running great. I had lift throttle oversteer on corner entry and oversteer on corner exit if I got too aggressive and/or early on the throttle. It takes about 2 to 3 laps for the tires to come up to temp when it is this cool out. In the fist two sessions I had lots of traffic and slower cars because I was in the B group. When I got into the A group after lunch, it was much better, because the drivers were fast enough to stay spaced apart.
I learned a lot from the fifth session with 911 Turbo S. She was a really good driver and very comfortable with her car and the track. I probably had more straight away speed and much more braking. However she could maintain much higher cornering speeds and the AWD gave her great traction out of the corners. My car was so loose in the turns, I could not get the cornering speeds up. This led me to hitting gas harder on corner exit which resulted in oversteer. So laid into the throttle smoothly, but the 911 would pull away. This is all evident in the video. I recorded pedal position as a percentage, which I think is key to understanding how I was driving.
Summary-
My previous car a 2013 Camaro ZL1, had Detroit Speed sway bars that were two way adjustable in the front and three way adjustable in the rear. I learned a lot about car setup over the 8 or so track days that I did with it. I would change the sway bars settings on a given trackday so I have really good understanding of the effect on handling. I can say that soft front sway bar setting(and any setting on the rear) on the ZL1 had lots of oversteer like the stock Z06/Z07. While I could have ordered aftermarket sway bars, I have researched and found out that I could add a softer/smaller rear sway bar from the non-Z07. I watched a video with a base Z06 (non-Z07) at Thunderhill and that car was 10+ mph faster in most the of the corners. If the smaller rear swaybar doesn’t tame the oversteer, apparently the 2017 GrandSport has a larger front sway bar and I can try that. These sway bars are about $90 shipped, so it is much cheaper than aftermarket. It would be a pain to bring them to the track to swap out, whereas the aftermarket bars would be easy to adjust. But I’m betting the smaller rear sway bar does the trick. I can’t drive hard enough on the street to really setup the swaybars or tell if it fixes the problem. You have to do it at the track. IMHO think the stock Z07 sway bar setup would be great for autocross(because its slower) or a track with more banking.
The 911 Turbo S and 911 GT3 of 2010 and later are serious machines. They are worth every penny, although they are really expensive. I am old school and like to drive a manual, but the times are changing. If I can run with the PDK or pass them, I'm just a little prouder I did it with a manual.
To the guys that track, do you have the same oversteer problems?
Seems like Randy Pobst and Motor Trend complained about the same thing.
Is there a way to just update the PDR?
Mine seems to have crappy video resolution.
If you went with aftermarket swaybars did you soften the rear, stiffen the front or do both? Do you run stiff front and soft rear?
On the video from I used TrackAddict on a iPhone to record the telemetry. I then used RaceRender3 to overlay the temps, so you can see them in real time. The only caveat with this setup is that it takes about 30 minutest to export the video.
Session 5
Min water temp 183*
Max water temp 212*
Approx average was 207*
Min oil temp 176*
Max oil temp 261*
Min trans temp 151*
Max trans temp 217*
Last edited by LagunaSecaZ06; 12-30-2016 at 11:32 PM.
Ok, awesome write up. Really liked the detail behind the temp issues and corrections as it keeps the rest of us from chasing pixy dust solutions. Don't take this the wrong way because you're a very good driver. But that lady was awesome. She absolutely nailed her marks. That has got to be her home track.
I think if you tighten up your lines and use the whole track, you could have easily taken her. As you said, you were making up for your corner speeds in the straights. You are turning in early and lifting on your throttle before that, losing a lot of momentum . Try to go wide before turn and drop tight to the apex, don't be afraid of putting a wheel on the rumble strip, as that wheel is not loaded and you won't damage suspension. Then on your exit, use the entire track, don't steer exiting with steering wheel, use throttle to bring her around while unwinding your steering. A lot of times, when you track out, you are mid track. You need to use the entire track and just as in apex when you put a wheel on rumble strip, put the other wheel all the way along the edge of track on your way out. And use all the space to maximize your speed. You can carry a lot more speed through corners that way.
When you track out, if the next turn requires you to be on the same side, don't weave back in to mid track and then back out for the turn. Stay there. Fastest line between two points is a straight line. No weaving.
Also stay full throttle until just before turn in. These are all fast corners, you can carry speed and lightly brake into the turn towards the apex while turning. With your front wheels loaded under braking, you have a lot of stability and traction cornering as long as you are smooth.
One last thing, you said alignment was factory. You'll need to have it set by an alignment shop according to track set up, with special attention to rear caster. See the manual for a starting point, then fine tune from there to your liking. Factory alignment doesn't let you go fast around corners. Not having rear caster set to zero (some go as hi as 0.8) seems to give a lot of folks a lot of over steer
Good for you and thanks for sharing all the details.
As for oversteer, note that when Randy drove the Z06 that didn't make boost, he ran a 1:37 and complemented the grip several times. No oversteer issues. At the second test, he had oversteer issues running 1:33 lap on a cold slippery track. He later blamed the track condition. He also had oversteer issues that day with a GT3RS and it was mentioned somewhere that it was his first time loosing control of a car on a hot lap during testing at LS. He actually spun the GT3RS. Later that week, photos of that GT3RS surfaced showing it being heavily damaged but no one knew exactly what happened or who was driving at the time of the crash.
Also, your tires might be shot after so many heat cycles (5000 miles), previous track day, and running on a cold day. I would get the track alignment done and try again with a new set of tires.
Ok, awesome write up. Really liked the detail behind the temp issues and corrections as it keeps the rest of us from chasing pixy dust solutions. Don't take this the wrong way because you're a very good driver. But that lady was awesome. She absolutely nailed her marks. That has got to be her home track.
No offense taken and thanks. She was a really great driver. I have no problem admitting she out drove me. It is her home track and I'll probably see her again in 2017. While Laguna Seca is only only 60 miles from my house and Thunderhill is 160 miles away, I have twice as many days at Thunderhill. The weather is more consistent, but typically very hot at Thunderhill. Also It was a 90db sound day at LS and Thunderhill is always 103db. I got meatballed on the 3rd session because I went from Tour to Sport on the exhaust setting and hit 97.7db. I didn't have a problem at Thunderhill running the exhaust in race mode.
I think if you tighten up your lines and use the whole track, you could have easily taken her. As you said, you were making up for your corner speeds in the straights. You are turning in early and lifting on your throttle before that, losing a lot of momentum . Try to go wide before turn and drop tight to the apex, don't be afraid of putting a wheel on the rumble strip, as that wheel is not loaded and you won't damage suspension. Then on your exit, use the entire track, don't steer exiting with steering wheel, use throttle to bring her around while unwinding your steering. A lot of times, when you track out, you are mid track. You need to use the entire track and just as in apex when you put a wheel on rumble strip, put the other wheel all the way along the edge of track on your way out. And use all the space to maximize your speed. You can carry a lot more speed through corners that way.
When you track out, if the next turn requires you to be on the same side, don't weave back in to mid track and then back out for the turn. Stay there. Fastest line between two points is a straight line. No weaving.
Also stay full throttle until just before turn in. These are all fast corners, you can carry speed and lightly brake into the turn towards the apex while turning. With your front wheels loaded under braking, you have a lot of stability and traction cornering as long as you are smooth.
One last thing, you said alignment was factory. You'll need to have it set by an alignment shop according to track set up, with special attention to rear caster. See the manual for a starting point, then fine tune from there to your liking. Factory alignment doesn't let you go fast around corners. Not having rear caster set to zero (some go as hi as 0.8) seems to give a lot of folks a lot of over steer
Have fun, and next time take the lead!
Thanks for all tips. I really appreciate it. Mg front tires had great turn and plenty of grip, the rears were really loose. See the video of an M3 hitting the wall in my session #2. That slowed me down a bit.
Video and telemetry really make us better drivers. There's no faking it. I'm going to have alignment done before the next track day and find a dealer or shop that can check the rear caster.
Good for you and thanks for sharing all the details.
As for oversteer, note that when Randy drove the Z06 that didn't make boost, he ran a 1:37 and complemented the grip several times. No oversteer issues. At the second test, he had oversteer issues running 1:33 lap on a cold slippery track. He later blamed the track condition. He also had oversteer issues that day with a GT3RS and it was mentioned somewhere that it was his first time loosing control of a car on a hot lap during testing at LS. He actually spun the GT3RS. Later that week, photos of that GT3RS surfaced showing it being heavily damaged but no one knew exactly what happened or who was driving at the time of the crash.
Also, your tires might be shot after so many heat cycles (5000 miles), previous track day, and running on a cold day. I would get the track alignment done and try again with a new set of tires.
Agreed. The track was cold and slippery. Motor Trend must get the track with high sound limits and Randy is an awesome driver. If you look at my tire temps and pressure there was a big difference between the front and rear and side to side.
Looks like you had a great time!
At improving your laps, some things to consider.
Once we get the experance where we are in the fastest run groups on track days, we may find ourselves "Plato" that is, have a hard time getting any faster.
The fastest line around every track is not locked in stone, the line will vary based on the car type, weight, tires, suspension, etc. you have to experiment. If you make a change to any of those, you need to reevaluate your line. Simply put, sticker tires, more aero etc may not change our lap times until we change our line.
I see so many drivers shown the "fast line" and never vary at all.
Key to finding the best line is working on car placement prior to turn-in. It's the micro steering movements, power, and braking so the car is in the ideal location, so that the least amount of streering is need to make the turn/apex.
To work on this you need a camera that is mounted on the interior that is pointing at the drivers hands. Some mount a GoPro on the side of your helmet, some mount on harness bar. Regardless, review the footage along with your PDR data, look at your steering angle data and hand movements, look for ways to reduce /clean-up steering movements.
Once you begin getting that ironed out, you will automatically brake less, and be on throttle more.
Other things to look at is %on Gas and %on Brake.
For exercise go out a session and work only on carrying speed, don't worried about lap times, make it a goal to avg less then 30% on brakeing, after that work on 25, 20.
Take your laptop with and review your data between sessions.
In my other cars I had mounted my GoPro in the interior and would review my hand placement and steering input. I'll give that a try on the next day. The % on gas and brake is a new parameter for me to look at and analyze. . I also like the pedal position by a numerical percentage, instead of the bar graph in the PDR.
I have definitely plateaued, and will go to Ron Fellows this year to take advantage of the new corvette deal.
I also agree on the line. I watched Randy's video a few times and this caused me to re-think and change my lines. YouTube is great.
Thanks.
Originally Posted by Operations
Looks like you had a great time!
At improving your laps, some things to consider.
Once we get the experance where we are in the fastest run groups on track days, we may find ourselves "Plato" that is, have a hard time getting any faster.
The fastest line around every track is not locked in stone, the line will vary based on the car type, weight, tires, suspension, etc. you have to experiment. If you make a change to any of those, you need to reevaluate your line. Simply put, sticker tires, more aero etc may not change our lap times until we change our line.
I see so many drivers shown the "fast line" and never vary at all.
Key to finding the best line is working on car placement prior to turn-in. It's the micro steering movements, power, and braking so the car is in the ideal location, so that the least amount of streering is need to make the turn/apex.
To work on this you need a camera that is mounted on the interior that is pointing at the drivers hands. Some mount a GoPro on the side of your helmet, some mount on harness bar. Regardless, review the footage along with your PDR data, look at your steering angle data and hand movements, look for ways to reduce /clean-up steering movements.
Once you begin getting that ironed out, you will automatically brake less, and be on throttle more.
Other things to look at is %on Gas and %on Brake.
For exercise go out a session and work only on carrying speed, don't worried about lap times, make it a goal to avg less then 30% on brakeing, after that work on 25, 20.
Take your laptop with and review your data between sessions.
very cool. thanks for posting it up along with the articulate write up!
from the way you made it sound I thought you were going ballz to the wall and the 911 was whooping you. i didn't see anything close to that in the videos. nice driving and like you said, not your home track. she is a good driver but the Z all in you would've crushed her (imo).
awesome video and write up, search alignment threads on this forum. OVERWHELMING majority of chevy dealerships CANNOT align this car correctly! Most do not even have the proper tool to set the caster correctly, it causes the EXACT problem you are describing, leading you to believe that you need a different sway bar. When aligned correctly, the issue you are describing will completely go away. I also have a Z07 manual.
Mike Levitas is a Daytona 24 hour winner and owns TPC Racing. He has done EXTENSIVE testing and along with his friend Randy Pobst they agree the factory stock setup is dangerous when driving 10/10ths. You can find his recommended set up run a search with his name there is a detailed thread and find a very good alignment shop with the proper tools to do it. Also I read the eccentrics will move thereby ruining your good alignment unless you go "gorilla" when tightening them down. I highly suggest doing that and testing before messing with a sway bar. The stock suspension is awesome, the alignment out the door from the factory is horrific for the track.
I think if you get the GM track alignment done correctly with rear caster angle included you will notice the car behaves much better. I have the track alignment without rear caster because nobody had the equipment to set rear caster when I had the alignment done. I haven't experienced an excessive amount of trailing throttle oversteer when going into a corner although I get a little power on oversteer if I try and follow the OM instructions on how to use PTM by pushing the throttle to the floor on corner exit. Once I hear PTM regulating power to the rear wheels I can't increase throttle as it seems to overwhelm the feature and permits the rear end to step out.
I agree about tightening your lines. That will probably get you a better lap time and I don't think the AWD is helping the P car to come out of the corner any better. When the front wheels are turned there is only so much grip they are going to provide and if the front tires are using all their grip to get the front around the corner adding any power to the front wheels will reduce cornering grip and cause understeer necessitating a lift off the throttle. I am not sure what kind of AWD system Porsche uses but their engineers understand how to get a car around a corner and I suspect the AWD system may not direct much power if any to the front wheels when the car is cornering at the max. As the steering straightens out they probably direct more power to the front.
One thing I noticed and was wondering about is on the straight approaching the bridge you weren't using a lot of throttle when it looks like you could go wide open. Is that where they do sound measurements?
After the session I went over to talk to the driver. She had a professional coach and does a lot of track days. She removed the factory carbon ceramic brakes and was running Girodisc two piece rotors with dedicated track pads. The tires were Dunlop Sport Maxx and she said she left the Turbo S in auto mode. I congratulated her.
I think the guys on the forum want to know if there girl driving that Porsche had a nice booty and great rack. - If so, Please post pictures of her in a bikini.
Thanks for all tips. I really appreciate it. Mg front tires had great turn and plenty of grip, the rears were really loose. See the video of an M3 hitting the wall in my session #2. That slowed me down a bit
Video and telemetry really make us better drivers. There's no faking it. I'm going to have alignment done before the next track day and find a dealer or shop that can check the rear caster.
As far as your set up, if you had plenty of grip on the front, your rear caster may be the major culprit. Don't go to a dealer for alignment either. Try to find a specialty shop for a good set up.
A little bit of rear stepping out is sometimes is not a bad thing. With momentum cars, going through slower corners, I intentionally try to spin the rear around so I can stay on the throttle and point and shoot. You can do most of the reeling-in of the other more powerful cars on corner entry, by trail-braking. It you have a chance, watch a lot of F1 races, and observe the lines they take, although they are totally different cars, they are the state of the art perf cars, using every inch of the track. As long as you have grip, don't hesitate to start your braking right at the last braking cone.
The guy in the beemer seems like he got on the throttle too early before unwinding the steering.
I see a lot of corners taken in this video also from mid track and exiting mid track (by just about most of the drivers). I think with alignment and using all of the track you will see major improvements.
One last thing if I may, I know in our neck of the woods if we post pictures or videos of someone else's unfortunate mishap, we get banned from all track organizations in our state. It's considered bad form. I've deleted the link in my reply, in case you wish to delete the link in your post.
Don't do anything until you get a true track alignment with the rear caster set correctly. Find a dealership or independent shop that 1: knows that it needs to be done, and 2: has the tools/expertise to do it.
A Porsche TTS is a very fast car when it has a set of decent tyres and a really good alignment performed. In most hands it's then faster than the GT3. But a Z06 is faster; you just need to get it aligned and then trust the car in the corners. Seat time is everything.
Very beautiful video
Compliment, it seems they had a lot of fun with your Z06
Many good idea for improve, they have already gotten.
Here are some tips:
Michelin Cup2, you need new ones to be much faster.
If you have stock geometry, the tire burns very quickly outside.
With many tight corners, it seems to be soo with you.
I drive
Camber 2 ° 30 Front and 1 ° 50 Rear
Track -1mm Front and + 4mm Rear
Try once.
Here's a video, I'm going around with this setting
12-30-2016, 11:30 PM
911 Turbo S vs 2016 Z06/7 at Laguna Seca
She was a really great driver. I have no problem admitting she out drove me. It is her home track and I'll probably see her again in 2017. While Laguna Seca is only only 60 miles from my house and Thunderhill is 160 miles away, I have twice as many days at Thunderhill. The weather is more consistent, but typically very hot at Thunderhill. Also It was a 90db sound day at LS and Thunderhill is always 103db. I got meatballed on the 3rd session because I went from Tour to Sport on the exhaust setting and hit 97.7db. I didn't have a problem at Thunderhill running the exhaust in race mode.
