I agree. I just installed SS lines, even though I know I didn't need them. I ran into the issue of having a stripped brake line fitting when I removed the old lines. Turned out to be more work than I wished for in the end. I wish I had left the stock lines on. They work just fine on the track.

 

It can be very expensive to discover, too late, that you should have left the nannies on.
Always work up to the limits, the car's and yours, gradually.

 

drive smooth, if you feel out of control you are going slow,

 

Gentlemen, I defer to your opinion on nannies being On for track days and especially in the rain. I forget that I primarily run autox where they interfere too much. I also didn't have them available until the purchase of my C6. Starting out, they can save your butt. That is a good thing.

--Dan

 

Great post.

I was going to add that some lessons/instruction of some sort would bring the quickest gains and provide a good base for improvement.

Leave the late braking for the professionals.

From there it is all about $$ and time spent.

 

So reading all of you, drive drive and drive...only change I'm going to do inmediately is the brake oil, all the rest once it is needed (wheels, pads, ss lines...)

My last question (totally ignorant), do you thing it's a good thing changes the lead spring by coilovers?

 

If its your first track day ever, just keep the car completely stock...seriously. I have been attending HPDE's for over 10 years now, and every time a buddy wants to hit the track I tell them to just leave their car the way it is.

That being said, you want to put safety first and make sure your car passes tech with flying colors. You'll be apprehensive on the track at first, but as long as your out with a good club, your instructor will give you tons of insight. Make sure your tires have good tread life left, your fluids are clean/fresh and your pads have plenty of life left.

In the future you'll want to change what others have already said in this thread. I have an 06 Z51 and heres what I've done so far.

-Stoptech/Centric Slotted rotors
-Stoptech street performance pads for street
-Carbotech XP10/XP8 for track
-Michelin Pilot super sports
-ATE super blue brake fluid
-Amsoil trans + diff fluid


I have a bunch of other mods to my cars such as heads/cam longtubes etc, but just focus on becoming comfortable with your car.

I was instructing my friend last year at gingerman in his VW GTi...completely stock. And in his beginning class we were walking all over cars with higher hp and more mods. Its not about the power under the hood, its about being smooth, safe and confident.

Enjoy!

 

If you go to any respected preformance driving school you learn to drive with the nannies on. Once you can drive without the nammies kicking in ( meaning you are making mistakes ) you can start to turn of the aids for more advanced driving technics. It is import to know how and what your car does when the nannies kick in. The most common aid helps when people have poor throttle response. We think we must go from little throtte to 100% leaving a corner. Its impossible to give 100% throttle when your steering wheel is still turned but the male in us thinks we can.

If this is something you think is enjoyable (track days) it will be well worth the time and expense of going to a performance driving school. Kill the bad habbits before they start. Check out this forum for schools like Ron Fellows Spring Mountain etc.

 

I have both a 2010 GS and a 78 C3 I drive on the track. One thing I have leaned is that the thrill of driving on the track doesn't change with what you have in your car. My 78 is stock and slow, my 2010 GS stock with HPS pads. Once you have a base line for your performance with the current car and compared to a experience driver in the same car you wont know if you can out drive the car.

eg. at Sping Mountain on the 2.1 east course the C7 stock Z51 corvette's driven by the instructors can turn 1.28 laptimes while the students only turn 1:32 - 1:39 times, meaning most of use leave a lot on the table simply because we dont have the nerve or skills to drive the car near 100%. Any stock Corvette will do just fine as is, provided everything mechanical is safe. So Brakes are #1. At Spring Mountain the only hardware changes they made to C6 corvettes where using Hawk HPS pads plus high temp brake fluid. The current Fleet of C7's are 100% GM Stock.

 

You don't have to change to coilovers. The stock Z51 suspension is very capable and a good learning platform. When I started, I just did pads, fluid, and lines. Everything else was stock. Once you have done a few days on track, you can start doing suspension mods. It's like getting presents. Spread it out a little and you get more fun and you can feel the effect of the individual changes. You will get faster quicker by spending money initially on track time and instruction than doing lots of mods.

 

I meant if you think that changing (whenever, not now) leaf spring by coilovers would be a good idea or I will just wasting money.

Here in Europe, people are very reluctant with this kind of suspension (leaf)

What I have now clear is that I'm not going to change anything inmediately. At the end of this month I'll test the car in the track and then I'll decide (my first time with corvette buy now my first trackday, I use to go to the circuit several times per year)

 

You are right RC, the traditional leaf spring is not desirable for track use. The Corvette version is significantly different with its transverse mount and wide support system. Also it isn't really a leaf where leaf implies several spring elements, this is a single carbon fiber spring and with its wide mount, also tends to act like a sway bay.
This works well on a smooth road surface but there is cross chaater when the road gets rough.
Coil covers are the best, its what the racers use but the mono spring isn't bad.

 

And Mike what do you think?, for a several amateur trackdays (5-6 per year) do you think it's a good idea to change the C6's leafs by coilovers?

I did not read anyone talking about this.

Thanks

 

Hi RC,

I think it depends on what run group you are in, what issues you run into at the track you are on and how hard you want to push the car. The last issue is the most difficult to resolve. The beauty of these cars is twofold. You already have a car that on any given day, will be in the top 10 fastest cars on the track at an hpde event. The Z-51's are awesome performers. The other thing you have going for you is you can modify the Corvette to fit what ever performance level you desire with all of the after market products available today.

What I have been doing is making changes as I go along, correcting problems as they come up. What I have difficulty now is cooling. Most production cars when taken to the track have the issue so I'm looking at transmission and differential coolers and disk brake cooling (as an example).

I'm still running the stock suspension and have plans to only change the shocks (DRM-Bilstein) to try to correct a compression issue I have when coming down a steep hill and into a turn. The suspension compresses to where the air dam scuffs the ground so this may help fix the problem.

When I have reached the limits of the suspension, I will change to coil overs if I want more performance and by that time I may be on R-compound tires. Realistically, I think by that time, I'll be in the top 5 - 10 percent of the drivers in the advanced group to be able to utilize the effectiveness of coil overs so for the money spent, it will be worthwhile. Until then I want to do the easy things to enhance performance and allow my skill level to grow.

As another example, a friend of mine is an instructor. We took my car out in the advanced-intermediate group (I hadn't run with that group before this particular time). With OEM street tires on the car and my friend behind the wheel, he proceeded to pass every car in the run group - several of which were running R-compound tires. These cars are that good "out of the box" as we like to say.

I'm curious, what track will be your first track day? What's the surface like - rough, smooth, hilly? I run at two tracks, both can be found on the internet, one is The Ridge Motorsports park and the other is Pacific Raceways. PR is an old SCCA track, very technical with large elevation changes. The Ridge is smaller, more turns and not as fast as PR. The area I have compression issues is at turn 7, you come off the hill from turn 6 so at a high rate of speed at 7 and have to brake hard for 8a. I try to brake at maximum compression too which doesn't help, that is where most of the available traction is found for braking (suspension in compression, so lots of down force for braking hard).

Hope this helps..

 

here is a few more:
1) lower the center of gravity , lower your car with stock bolts or aftermarket ones
2) consider your wheel alignment - depending on track conditions re-adjust camber
3) check tire pressure for conditions the day of event
4) eliminate un-necessary weight from the car - tool box, passengers - leave your g'friend on the stands, floor mats, windshield washer fluid level, gas tank level, license tag, radar detectors, books in glove box and yes the mufflers!!biig savings there---every lil thing adds weight to car---il bet that right there is about 300lbs..

 

I noticed there was no input as to changing engine oil?

I ran a few laps at the 1.7 mile road track in my stock 2012 GS (auto). Ambient temp was 101'F and within 6 laps my water temp was 235' and my oil temp at 285'

This seemed like it was high?

I was running stock Mobil1 5-30w

 

If the car will be street driven, stay with the leafs. I know many people running alot of track days, even dedicated track cars and they are still on the leafs. Upgrade to better sway bars later and that will be a huge improvement.

As for brake lines, your ok for now. You'll know when its time to change them. It will be when your in a hard braking zone and you start questioning how much pressure your applying. That's when you need to change them.

For the first few track days, I would use up the factory parts, pads, rotors, tires. Then replace as needed with the good stuff.

And yes good brake fluid should be the first mod.

cheers

 

Water is okay, oil is getting up there though. The issue with the GS Auto's is no oil cooler for the engine. What were your transmission temps?

Last year I upgraded my radiator from stock to DeWitts with an integrated engine oil cooler. My skills increased too quickly, within a few sessions my engine oil is hitting 260 again. Went through my front brake pads too (only 13k miles on my '12GS A-6).

If you aren't doing it already, you may want to monitor your transmission temps, I use the DIC for that, monitor engine oil temps in the HUD and start cool down laps when things get a bit too warm. I start cool down laps when engine oil is at 260 and transmission is at 240.

You may also want to replace the differential oil too.

Until I can upgrade coolers, I plan to change oil before the first trackday event of the season, then after every trackday event. I will also change the differential oil half way through the track season.

When I had the radiator replaced last year, I had a transmission service done too. They said the transmission oil looked perfect along with the filter so apparently it can take some heat. I want to keep the transmission temps down to 220 if I can, that will also mean a differential cooler so that is next on the list. Also thinking about a 160 thermostat. Ultimately the lower thermostat won't work but if it takes longer for the engine to heat up, that's a few more laps w/o a cool down lap until I can get the diff cooler problem figured out.

 

Thanks! - I did not monitor the trans, as once i saw the oil, I just did a 1/2 lap cool down into the pits. I was surprised to say the least.
I will take your advise and do the oil cooler and probably move to water wetter, since I'm in SoCal and don't have to worry about the anti-freeze. The trans should be reasonable due to it cooler??