Valkyrie

I might be buying a single-turbo FD parts car (fourth-gen FD, so somewhere around a 97 or 98?) on the cheap, stripping it, and building a full-on track car.

Any tips for getting the most speed for the time and money invested?

The car has a TD06-25 (with a V-mount, apparently) and should make 350 HP or so.

It comes with a Power FC and aftermarket gauges.

I will have to buy a transmission, differential, and brakes. It has coilovers, but they're almost certainly shot... And I might just try to get a big brake it? Who makes one that isn't absurdly expensive?

I figure I will strip the interior, A/C, undercoat, emissions.

Will an ABS delete kit for a LHD cars work for RHD cars? If I can get a kit that comes with a brake bias valve I can kill two birds with one stone.

I will probably be running stock-width 17s or 255s all around. Probably track day tires.

I will probably get a lip and the biggest GT wing I can afford and maybe build some canards.

I guess I should get a cage with door bars and gut the doors?

I will try to find a used diff pumpkin with an aftermarket LSD, and probably rebuild a transmission I'll buy from someone I know.

What else is a must-do for a track car? Engine/mission mounts? Urethane bushings?

Who makes good track-spec coilovers?

fendamonky

iTrader: (6)

A trap that I fell into, personally, was questing to build the "perfect" track setup before actually taking the car onto the track. Many years, and many dollars, later I still haven't gone racing with it.

Based on your questions, I'm assuming (and I could be completely wrong) that you aren't currently involved in racing. If that's the case, I'd suggest just getting the car, replacing what's broken, and getting actual seat time BEFORE investing all kinds of time and effort into making the car look the look.

The BEST way to improve your times (based on my limited experience in auto-x) are through driver mods, and you'll reap the most benefits there through seat time. Get the car running reliably, ensure that its cooling systems (coolant and oil) are up to snuff, and make changes gradually as you need them.


As for a good example of competitive track setups that aren't over-the-top complicated, I would look into what Fritz Flynn runs and/or suggests. Dude knows his ****!

IRPerformance

iTrader: (41)

Have you upgraded the oil coolers? Thats a big must for any car that sees significant track time. Rotaries rely a lot on oil cooling. Best coilovers you can get in my opinion are Ohlins DFV. I sell both the oil coolers and coilovers from Sakebomb Garage.

j9fd3s

iTrader: (3)

if you want to be fast, you need to install good driver. that will do more for lap times than anything else you do. its more true with the more HP you have. examples will be cited below.

for suspension, just buy the Ohlins, worth every penny.

for the rest, if you're just beginning, give the thing a really thorough inspection, replace anything that isn't in great shape. change all the fluids. don't bother "upgrading" stuff yet, as noted above the biggest rookie mistake is building the car before you go racing. the picture you have in your head of racing, is actually quite different than actual racing, so you're building the car wrong from the start.

second, and more importantly, the hardest problem to solve is to figure out what problem you actually have. so it is much better to test a known, simple car than it is to figure some new combination out. i've been racing a long time to learn that.

if it doesn't have a cage, you can run Time Trials, which is a good place to start in road racing. HPDE is a good place to learn the car/track, but you do not learn race craft, so at some point you're just driving in circles.

examples. we raced a miata this year, with two drivers. the faster driver was sometimes 10 seconds faster than the slower one, in the same car. 10 seconds is a LOT.

we used to race an integra with an LS motor in it. we noticed if we entered it into the turbo porsche class, we'd be 4th place consistently. the turbo Porsches are about 400hp, and there were about 3 well driven ones that were very fast, and then the other 7 were not well driven, and we would have beat them consistently in a car with 250 less hp.

we have in car of the miata getting past GTR's and MP4-12C's and such. the intergra was able to get past an F360 challenge car more than once, high hp cars are intimidating to drive. expensive cars are slow next to walls... i think an average driver can't actually take a spec miata to its limit, so there is no hope in an MP4-12C

Valkyrie

No. I haven't even bought the car.

Ohlins's coilovers are definitely on my mind if I can afford them, but they cost as much the car will... hehehe.

Valkyrie

I don't want perfect, I just want it to be reasonably driveable and get good lap times. If I wanted perfect I would get the thing seam welded, remove every last bit of unused wiring, get a weld-in cage, flat floored, lexan windows and hatch, gut the doors, and aero the **** out of it...

I have been racing for four years but never with a track-prepped car.

LOL, I don't care about looks. If I did I wouldn't be buying a former parts car. Replacing what is broken goes without saying. I just pray the pillowballs, bushings, and wheel bearings are in good shape...


That all goes without saying.

Tanks.

Valkyrie

I've been racing for several years. I'm.. serviceable

They cost more than the car... hehe. But Ohlins are definitely on the list. One nice thing about the FD is that people are still making new parts for it.

Naturally.

I wasn't going to "upgrade" anything, I was just going to do basic race prep to make the car easier to drive. i.e., clutch pack LSD (going to need a diff anyway), brake ducts, splitter, and rear wing, if necessary. I wouldn't call that an upgrade, more like standard equipment. And I'll probably have to rebuilt whatever used transmission I find.

Well, every track car is going to have teething issues, especially if you don't start with a brand-new car like every professional racing team does. And especially if you're restoring a junker instead of using a clean example.

I have been racing wheel-to-wheel for several years on and off. I may or may not get a cage or at least a roll bar (or just a cage but leave the front part off). The reason being because I know my head would be within inches of any cage in an FD. I might get a containment seat though...in which case a cage would be a little less spooky for street driving. Except then I wouldn't be able to see anything...


It goes without saying that skill level can make up for a difference in performance in some cases. But at a certain skill level, the car is responsible for most of the lap time. The people I drive with mostly drive fully race-prepped Civics with 1.8 swaps, full aero bits, and semi-slicks. One has a race-prepped big-turbo FC making something like 470 HP. So it goes without saying that my near-stock street car on street tires isn't up to the challenge. But I don't want to strip it or modify it because reasons, and I don't want to race prep my parts car because other reasons.

Valkyrie

Come on, mods, the car just happens to be single turbo, but the thread really has nothing to do with that fact, other than being a relatively high-horsepower car!

Put me back in the 3rd gen forum, pretty please!

j9fd3s

iTrader: (3)

this argument does not apply to a race car. or it applies every time

Valkyrie

I know, I know. It's just that there are cheaper options, like Stance, which cost half as much. I could probably find some NOS Japanese coilovers here on the cheap, too. The Autobacs next door had some HKS coils on sale a few years ago for about $600.

One reason I want to transfer over to an FD is the fact that dual wishbones all around means I won't have to screw around with the geometry or the sway bay linkages like I would need to do with my MR2, even if I drop it to the floor. Second, I could use 255s all around and rotate the tires so they last longer. Third, the car won't need as much camber or rear toe.

But what I was interested were little trips and tricks that don't cost much money to make the car easier to drive and more reliable.

Like wrapping the tie rods with heat insulation? Apparently the brake heat is pretty rough on them.

I'm wondering whether I should a full cage or not, since if I want to make it street legal (just to drive to the track) I would have to leave the ceiling, pillar, and door trim intact. So a welded cage would be out of question unless I go full racecar, but I don't have a transporter (I could use temporary plates, but this is in the grey zone, legally speaking).

Would 11 KG be enough for stock-sized R-comps? Especially if you've got some aero parts.

j9fd3s

iTrader: (3)

we've been racing for 13 years now, and we switched to Ohlins, and it was a wow moment. you'd think the koni's were good, or even the revalved koni's, but the Ohlins were so much better is amazing, worth every penny.

if you're asking the OS gieken was worth every penny too.

Valkyrie

Well then I'll have to consider them. The guy with the 470 hp (flywheel power) FC runs custom Ohlins of some sort.

I'm gonna have to buy a diff anyway, but was the Giken that much better than another clutch pack diff?

Valkyrie

So anyway, what are some things you can do with a track car to make sure it's capable of running at full tilt for at least 30 minutes at a time?

I have read that cutting holes in the plastic behind the oil coolers helps, for one. As would sealing off any gaps around all the heat exchangers.

Is it possible I might need an under-driven water pump to prevent cavitation?

Should I run mostly mostly water and water wetter? I would have to drain it over the winter to keep the engine from getting cracked if I did.

adracer

Was browsing through and after ten years of racing bikes, five years with cars, I can answer your last question with a high degree of confidence: most, if not EVERY, racing organization will explicitly require water (with or without Water Wetter) to be run in the coolant system. The reasons behind this become incredibly clear when someone blows their slippery glycol antifreeze/coolant all over the track making it frustrating as well as dangerous. Furthermore, it takes tons of time away from everyone else while the track gets cleaned up.

billyboy

If it's a track day car, hardly likely they're going to go through lots of multi-purpose cars and tell them to pee-off because of gylcol. There was a push over here some years ago to get race cars to discontinue use of it, but it was all too hard from a manpower point of view and now just recommended....I'd check what the track owners require rather than theorize from a distance.

Don't know about cutting holes in the oil cooler backing channel, there's a slightly higher pressure area in front of a rotating tyre, I'd pay particular attention to sealing the front and call it good. Wouldn't worry about under-drives either, most of the race FDs here don't and I've never seen an impeller with cavitation damage on one. If they're anything like adjustable cam pulleys, in 6hrs of racing, the anodising wears off - then the teeth!

11kg springs might be something we'd run on the back, on a slower circuit, with medium 050s rather than wets.

Half of those Japanese bolt-ins with the L shaped front legs, make me wonder why you'd bother too.

If anything, this should be in the tracking section.

Valkyrie

Honestly they should have just left it in the 3rd-gen section since it's third-gen specific.

I'm wondering what plugs I should use... #10 NGK iridiums? I don't want to use racing plugs since they're absurdly expensive, if possible.

Should I run some premix even though it probably still has the OMP? 100:1 is enough even if you don't have an OMP, right?

I'm also wondering if I should build a fuel surge tank since I'll be running R-comps and (eventually) some aero.

I guess it's not possible to build one using the stock fuel piping?

Also wondering what I can take off on a track car. Bumper supports? Would it be worth the effort to remove extraneous wiring?

Would it be better to keep the power steering?

Will probably just run standard coolant mix unless it's not enough because there are no rules against using coolant on the tracks around here.

j9fd3s

iTrader: (3)

if you're making 350hp on a road race course, you should be running the colder plugs. the stock plugs work @350hp on the street, because you're not on WOT 80% of the time on the street, like you are on the track.

you should premix a little, since the metering pump is there the amount is much less critical, 100:1 what Mazda wants for the MFR carbon seal engines in the 70's.

surge tank is probably not a bad idea, although i'd put it in later. since you're in Japan just buy one, most of the rotary shops used to sell them, they aren't legal here, but seem to work with the stock piping.

if you're running wheel to wheel, keep the bumpers. it isn't worth the effort to remove the extra wiring either, its a TON of work, and a small gain.

keep the PS, in 2015 every race car has PS. the driver is important, and 30 minute sessions are long enough where driver fatigue is an issue. it helps to have PS. its also nice if the exhaust isn't too loud. the cool suits work.