Slip Angle Analysis at CMP
07-17-2007, 09:30 PM
#1
Le Mans Master
Thread Starter
Slip Angle Analysis at CMP
In order to conserve vital national fluids we, once again, combined events to get more track days in with one trip. This time we did three days at Carolina Motorsports Park. The vital fluids may include my "lifes blood" since my accountant is auditing the books to see how much we "really" spend in support of this addiction. But it will be fun, fun, fun until she takes the credit cards away. I came back from Tucson, AZ at 1730 on Thursday, dumped my dirty clothes, grabbed my track gear, ran over the list of essential gear already loaded by Jake, slept in my own bed for a few hours and then left at 0521 Friday to make it to the driver's meeting at CMP.
Turn One/Full Lock had a good turnout with about 35 cars on track. It was a good crowd of "regulars" and quite a few new faces. It was good to see some old friends I had not seen in a few months. I had a 2007 Ford GT500 and Jake had a Lotus Elise for our students. The GT500 was modified a bit with about 600 HP to the rear wheels. It also had a real issue with overheating the intercooler and engine coolant systems. We could get a max of about 15 minutes on track before we came in to cool off the car. The brakes also had a good workout once we got "up to speed". The good news is he had a blast with the six sessions he had on track even though his were about 5 to 10 minutes shorter than everyone else's. I was very attentive to the car and its coolant system since the last boosted Mustang I was in indicated its displeasure with me. With a diet and some massive cooling improvements I think the GT500 would be a lot of fun on a road course. Other than a BMW Z4 rubbing a few tires at Turn 3 it was an incident free day. Not sure what the circumstances were but Turn 3 is the last place to add speed or reduce lap times at CMP. Since I do everything in my power to make Sylvia happy I made sure all my paperwork was turned in to her before I started getting all the paperwork ready for the next event. It is amazing how much paper and signatures it requires to get on track.
NASA-SE folks started rolling in by early afternoon. It was a really full paddock by Friday evening and the smack talk was at a fever pitch. It was the largest crowd I have seen at CMP in July, by far. We were able to corral up with lots of folks and the RX8 contingent even parked close by. Other than sand getting into everything, the paddock layout at CMP is pretty good and logical (unlike Road Atlanta). We did eventually move locations on Saturday to get closer to our students and the new grid arrangement used last weekend. We made sure our "Happy Camper" sheet was clearly displayed on Toby's trailer at both locations!
All of the sessions were pretty full but the flow was really smooth all weekend. It was a little warm but it was darn pleasant when you consider it was mid-July in South Carolina. There were no huge trains or extended track closures due to incidents. Everything even kept to schedule, more or less. The track was very slick. Not 100% sure why there was so little grip all weekend but most everyone was auditioning for the CMP Drift King title it seemed. We could not buy any traction even with swapping to slightly less worn tires. We pushed on corner entry and oversteered from application of throttle to straightening it out on corner exit (where we spun the tires a little more just because we could). It was great fun - but our times showed we were abysmally slow - though some say we are slow no matter what. With all the offs the amount of sand on the track never decreased all weekend. The good news was our efforts were good enough for first in class on Saturday and second (I think) on Sunday. After convincing John, in his killer nice 911, to enter into Time Trial he showed his appreciation by whooping up on us on Sunday - at least we beat him on Saturday. Speaking of beating - Jim at the awards party said "Team England has a fast driver...and his Dad" - I guess he missed that sensitivity briefing at NASA official school. If I can ever keep two cars up we will have to work on that perception I guess. This last weekend the margin was 0.042 seconds for the first loser in Team England.
Jake and I once again lucked out with our NASA students. Pete brought the Car Craft 200 MPH Mustang back down from Virginia. It has been a regular up at Summit Point since we completed our work on it in February. Pete and his neighbor ran it hard all weekend in HPDE 1 & 2. Other than the tires starting to show their age the car ran flawlessly. It was apparent Pete had been practicing with the car since Feb and Ryan took to the sport like a natural. I do believe the next time I have to joint instruct in a car, with a 5 point harness inside a caged car, I want the other instructor closer to my size. Pete's trailer is also a sight to behold. An enclosed Featherlight complete with an apartment up front. One day, maybe, we can buy a wore out one just like it. Jake's other student was in a Mustang from Virginia and practiced his spin recovery on his first lap I believe. I think it got a lot better after that! My other student was Micheal in his mother's C5. Michael did very, very well and was very cognizant of protecting his mothers car. He only spun it into the poles at turn 14 when she was watching. I think he should have been driving Butt Ugly - it spends so much time in the sand it thinks it is owned by David Hasselhof.
Speaking of Butt Ugly, it is getting really old chasing that car around a track now that Wally has it dialed in. It is not fair that Wally has great family, a wonderful wife, a garage mahal full of cool stuff and a fast track car. Kind of makes me want to build a faster car, or maybe learn to drive the ones I have, so I can look at Butt Ugly from the front.
Kim tried to run CMP with NAPA pads on his ZO6. By noon on Saturday the Aardvark Performance Trackside Service Trailer was dipping into its cache of Carbotech XP pads and PG Plus rotors to provide him some brakes that actually slowed the car down. The truth be known, we really did it so we could hang out with his wife. The glowing NAPA pads were quite impressive when seen from the paddock though. Luckily, other than bleeding brakes and changing tires we had no real issues with our car.
The next event is Road Atlanta in August...
Turn One/Full Lock had a good turnout with about 35 cars on track. It was a good crowd of "regulars" and quite a few new faces. It was good to see some old friends I had not seen in a few months. I had a 2007 Ford GT500 and Jake had a Lotus Elise for our students. The GT500 was modified a bit with about 600 HP to the rear wheels. It also had a real issue with overheating the intercooler and engine coolant systems. We could get a max of about 15 minutes on track before we came in to cool off the car. The brakes also had a good workout once we got "up to speed". The good news is he had a blast with the six sessions he had on track even though his were about 5 to 10 minutes shorter than everyone else's. I was very attentive to the car and its coolant system since the last boosted Mustang I was in indicated its displeasure with me. With a diet and some massive cooling improvements I think the GT500 would be a lot of fun on a road course. Other than a BMW Z4 rubbing a few tires at Turn 3 it was an incident free day. Not sure what the circumstances were but Turn 3 is the last place to add speed or reduce lap times at CMP. Since I do everything in my power to make Sylvia happy I made sure all my paperwork was turned in to her before I started getting all the paperwork ready for the next event. It is amazing how much paper and signatures it requires to get on track.
NASA-SE folks started rolling in by early afternoon. It was a really full paddock by Friday evening and the smack talk was at a fever pitch. It was the largest crowd I have seen at CMP in July, by far. We were able to corral up with lots of folks and the RX8 contingent even parked close by. Other than sand getting into everything, the paddock layout at CMP is pretty good and logical (unlike Road Atlanta). We did eventually move locations on Saturday to get closer to our students and the new grid arrangement used last weekend. We made sure our "Happy Camper" sheet was clearly displayed on Toby's trailer at both locations!
All of the sessions were pretty full but the flow was really smooth all weekend. It was a little warm but it was darn pleasant when you consider it was mid-July in South Carolina. There were no huge trains or extended track closures due to incidents. Everything even kept to schedule, more or less. The track was very slick. Not 100% sure why there was so little grip all weekend but most everyone was auditioning for the CMP Drift King title it seemed. We could not buy any traction even with swapping to slightly less worn tires. We pushed on corner entry and oversteered from application of throttle to straightening it out on corner exit (where we spun the tires a little more just because we could). It was great fun - but our times showed we were abysmally slow - though some say we are slow no matter what. With all the offs the amount of sand on the track never decreased all weekend. The good news was our efforts were good enough for first in class on Saturday and second (I think) on Sunday. After convincing John, in his killer nice 911, to enter into Time Trial he showed his appreciation by whooping up on us on Sunday - at least we beat him on Saturday. Speaking of beating - Jim at the awards party said "Team England has a fast driver...and his Dad" - I guess he missed that sensitivity briefing at NASA official school. If I can ever keep two cars up we will have to work on that perception I guess. This last weekend the margin was 0.042 seconds for the first loser in Team England.
Jake and I once again lucked out with our NASA students. Pete brought the Car Craft 200 MPH Mustang back down from Virginia. It has been a regular up at Summit Point since we completed our work on it in February. Pete and his neighbor ran it hard all weekend in HPDE 1 & 2. Other than the tires starting to show their age the car ran flawlessly. It was apparent Pete had been practicing with the car since Feb and Ryan took to the sport like a natural. I do believe the next time I have to joint instruct in a car, with a 5 point harness inside a caged car, I want the other instructor closer to my size. Pete's trailer is also a sight to behold. An enclosed Featherlight complete with an apartment up front. One day, maybe, we can buy a wore out one just like it. Jake's other student was in a Mustang from Virginia and practiced his spin recovery on his first lap I believe. I think it got a lot better after that! My other student was Micheal in his mother's C5. Michael did very, very well and was very cognizant of protecting his mothers car. He only spun it into the poles at turn 14 when she was watching. I think he should have been driving Butt Ugly - it spends so much time in the sand it thinks it is owned by David Hasselhof.
Speaking of Butt Ugly, it is getting really old chasing that car around a track now that Wally has it dialed in. It is not fair that Wally has great family, a wonderful wife, a garage mahal full of cool stuff and a fast track car. Kind of makes me want to build a faster car, or maybe learn to drive the ones I have, so I can look at Butt Ugly from the front.
Kim tried to run CMP with NAPA pads on his ZO6. By noon on Saturday the Aardvark Performance Trackside Service Trailer was dipping into its cache of Carbotech XP pads and PG Plus rotors to provide him some brakes that actually slowed the car down. The truth be known, we really did it so we could hang out with his wife. The glowing NAPA pads were quite impressive when seen from the paddock though. Luckily, other than bleeding brakes and changing tires we had no real issues with our car.
The next event is Road Atlanta in August...
07-18-2007, 08:53 AM
#2
Burning Brakes
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Great write up as always. You are becoming the bard of the CF. Concerning Butt Ugly - keep it in perspective. I may own the most expensive C4 on the track - but then again MY accountant hasn't started to audit the books-yet-so full speed ahead and turn up the funometer.
07-18-2007, 08:59 AM
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W. Detroit Events Coordinator
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Great write up, glad you had a good weekend.
07-18-2007, 10:45 AM
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Drifting
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Great write up as always. You are becoming the bard of the CF. Concerning Butt Ugly - keep it in perspective. I may own the most expensive C4 on the track - but then again MY accountant hasn't started to audit the books-yet-so full speed ahead and turn up the funometer.
Khoi
07-18-2007, 11:27 AM
#6
Le Mans Master
Thanks for the good write-up....
07-18-2007, 04:16 PM
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Burning Brakes
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07-18-2007, 10:10 PM
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Look forward to seeing you there, Jeff. I got my new poly bushings installed all the way around. I had to replace the rotors with NAPA since the new DBA 5000 two piece will not clear the caliper housing....bummer.....I think the reason may be LG duct flange effectively moves the bearing out the thickness of the flange from the bracket mounting surface. But that is a very small amount and I can't imagine that the rotor does not expand more than that little amount. Surely there should be more clearance.
Jerry O is now working on the alignment and computer glitch. Putnam is this coming Monday and then on to RA. I could use a good 'line check' from you if we get a chance since it is my first visit.
Jerry O is now working on the alignment and computer glitch. Putnam is this coming Monday and then on to RA. I could use a good 'line check' from you if we get a chance since it is my first visit.
07-21-2007, 08:01 AM
#9
Le Mans Master
Thread Starter
Look forward to seeing you there, Jeff. I got my new poly bushings installed all the way around. I had to replace the rotors with NAPA since the new DBA 5000 two piece will not clear the caliper housing....bummer.....I think the reason may be LG duct flange effectively moves the bearing out the thickness of the flange from the bracket mounting surface. But that is a very small amount and I can't imagine that the rotor does not expand more than that little amount. Surely there should be more clearance.
Jerry O is now working on the alignment and computer glitch. Putnam is this coming Monday and then on to RA. I could use a good 'line check' from you if we get a chance since it is my first visit.
Jerry O is now working on the alignment and computer glitch. Putnam is this coming Monday and then on to RA. I could use a good 'line check' from you if we get a chance since it is my first visit.
I hope to put some new shocks on the ZO6 and a fresh alignment before Road Atlanta. I had 4 new tires mounted up and 4 others balanced again. TT at Road Atlanta may be tough next month!
07-21-2007, 09:43 AM
#10
Yes Jeff does write up a track event better than most. After reading one of his write up I feel Like I was there. Wait I was there this time. Thanks for the new brake setup it nice to be able to touch the brake and feel the nose set. Patches enjoys hanging out with you also.
It was nice to meet butt ugly's dad Wally. I hope to be allow to hang with the group in the future. Patches is making a list of things that she needs to have now that she is the "official pit mom".
It was nice to meet butt ugly's dad Wally. I hope to be allow to hang with the group in the future. Patches is making a list of things that she needs to have now that she is the "official pit mom".