multi-purpose car & qestions.
 

I have been thinking along time about what my next project car is going to be.
My 1st "project car" turned out to be my DD.
Well I think Ive made up my mind, thing is, I kinda woke up this morning with the idea of racing. But it hasent interfered with my project car idea.

So ok, duh, im going with another rx7. But I plan to use it as a multi-purpose car. Like,: back-up daily, autocross, drifting, drag, and rally.

One of my questions are, How can I set this car up to comply with each racing type? Like tires for example, can I use one kind for all?
Which racing type might I need special equipment for compared with another racing type? Like roll-bar/cage for rally racing.

As far as what it takes to get into these types of racing, I believe I can get into (fairly easly) autocross and drag racing. Ive been to those events befor and know a bit about them.
And Ive been to rally racing events, In South Carolina, "sandblast rally". Though Im not to sure what it would take to get into that.
And drifting, I havent been to a drifting event, and dont know much about how to get into that locally. But kind of like autocross, I feel its pretty simple.

And, I plan to do all this cheap, well not to expensive. And of course Ive heard "Youve got to pay to play". But I plan to disprove that. :smilie:

And the car depends on what I find, but Im planing on an N/A. And as my sig. shows I plan to "bridge-port" it.

Can any local ppl give me info on this? And anyone else have any comments?
Btw: Ive done a small search about this stuff, but I ghess I'm new to all this racing stuff.

Later.

Remember the old saying "Jack of all trades - but master of none? Well that applies to race cars too. At a drag strip, a car special built for drag racing will beat the crap out of a car built for other forms of racing. Same deal goes for autocross, and rally too. You can make a car do all those forms of competition, but it will not be a winner against cars that were prepared for their specific type of racing.

AS for suspensions, rally will work better with a tall and soft suspension, autocross works better with a low and stiff suspension, drag requires a fairly soft suspension.

I don't think it'll work out too well for you, what you want to do is too varied to enable the final setup to be very good. An autocross/road race car is quite possible though.

Well, Im thinking of all this with a "beginner on a budget" mind.
The way I think of it,: building a car is one thing, the racing is an addition to it.
I think I can do the autox, drifting and drag racing on one setup. But the rally racing, should be on another setup. Like tall/soft suspension and different tires.
This is just to get me started/introduced in all this racing stuff, I think its good to have a variety.

I agree with the earlier comment. The car requirements for the different types of motorsports are, well, different. If you want to get good at one or two, you need to focus on those. Personally, I like track driving (road-course). Drag and drifting don't really appeal to me. Auto-X is of limited interest. Rally looks like a blast, but I would need a really different car for that.

If this is a "get your feet wet" kind of experiment, where you want to try out the different areas, then I would suggest focusing on a limited number off things.

1) Reliability - Make sure that the car is in very good mechanical shape. Engine and cooling system shoudl be in good shape. Suspension should be sorted out - check all your bushings, shocks/struts, etc. Fluids, filters, brakes all should be in good shape.

2) Safety - If you are going to be thinking of tracking the car, consider picking up a roll-bar, harnesses and possibly a better seat. The idea is to keep you safe while you figure out what you want to really do.

Both of these areas are pretty useful regardless of which motorsport you end up pursuing. Money would be well spent on both of these.


-b

As long as you don't expect to win every event you enter in all types of racing, you could probably build up a car that would do well in everything except rally. With a decent selection of different tires, and some adjustable shocks, you could probably do well in everything else. Roadrace and autox are pretty compatible, but for drag you would definitely need different rear tires. Tokico Illuminas have 5 different settings that would provide adjustability for road/autox/drag (firm for race, soft rear for drag), but like I said you will most likely need another set of tires for drag...

A modified car will be classed differently for each competition. You should see if you can run a car thats compeditive in is stock class for each event.

Auto-X question:
How far does "stock" go? "Stock" like from the factory. Or whatever they call it.

If I wanted to stay in that (stock) class, but want to modify some things, how far can I go before they upgrade me to a modified class?

Like, can I do an, emissions removal, strut tower bar, presilencer or gut cat, weight reduction, etc...

I know they have a rule on tires, I'm planing on using factory tires anyway.

Each sanctioning body has their own rules with regard to what you can and can't do for a given classification and you will find they're different across types of racing. So any modifications you make for one class in one type of event may displace you in another type of event and then you won't be competitive.

But it sounds to me like you're missing a few critical steps. If you're asking what kind of suspension and tires you need to run in a rally event, you haven't even gotten your feet wet yet. I understand wanting to layout the groundwork for the car well in advance but I think at this time you really just need to start going to events, running rallyx and autox and hpde and figuring out all this stuff as you go. You might find that wanting to do all these different things and actually being able to do them is biting off way more than you can chew, both in terms of financial and time commitment. That being said, I've run my daily driver in drag, road race, autox, rallyx and rally and it's competent in everything and even competitive in some. My suggesting: go out and do some stuff and see what you like to do and go from there. You'll find that if you want to compete and be competitive in a particular event you will have to devote most of your energy and money to that one event to the exclusion of others.

Not far at all. The only real allowed mods in Stock under SCCA rules:

front swaybar and mounts

any shock (must use stock springs and maintain stock ride height)

any tire (must be mounted on a stock sized wheel)

any exhaust after the main cat (stock main cat must be in place and all exhaust before main cat must be stock)

If it's not on the list above it's not legal in Stock, though things like fluids and brake pads can be whatever you like.

Let me give you some advice that hopefully won't make me sound like a dick: You sound like me about 10 years ago, before I learned the hard way that what you're trying to do just isn't possible. Actually, check that: it's what the auto manufacturers spend tens of millions of dollars doing every time they launch a new sportscar.

Let me give you an example. The Porsche 993 Turbo was one of the most capable street cars of its time. Out of the box it was very fast and very driveable. It was a bit heavy, but it was fast enough to:

1) Do a 12.5 second quarter mile
2) Go 0-60 in under 4 seconds
3) Outbrake most cars
4) Win its stock class at the Pikes Peak hillclimb (only modification: a rollcage.)
5) Do reasonably well at the AutoX
6) Run an 8:12 lap of the Nurburgring (faster than the M3, M5, C6 Vette, and the R32 GTR Skyline)
7) Have A/C, radio, power seats, etc.

What you're trying to do is built the ultimate compromise, which is what auto makers shoot for with their flagship 'sports cars' which are really 2-door GTs at this point. (Witness the upcoming M3, GT-R, and other such cars.)

My recommendation is: pick a type of racing you like and set up the car for that. Or, buy a used STi and do it all (except rallying). But in the second case you won't be competitive--you'll just be having fun, which is totally okay. (My current FD doesn't fit into any race series at all. But blowing off GT3s, Vipers, and Z06s at the local track day is priceless.)

-ch