ED9man

Are miatas so goddamn fast? h: They dominate SM2 in my region. Can my CRX be competitive if set up right against them? I saw on H-T some guy put 285 wide tires on an CRX Is that SM2 legal? :rick: Since it's my DD, I dunno if that'd even be feasible, probably very costly too. Although there is a national champion G stock guy in a CRX who ran about 4 seconds faster than me on slicks, and that car isn't swapped and has an open diff, but he is on Konis, I dunno how much of a diff that makes. Proves the car has a lot left in it though. He might have gone faster, I only saw one of his times. I wonder how much faster I could get on slicks and suspension, maybe Miata fast, but I doubt it. I did come very close to beating an FC on slicks with full suspension and some other upgrades, but I wacked a cone on my fast run. They must not be very fast cars. I still had a blast though, even though I placed last in class again, 3 cars in SM2 this time, all the Miatas but one were missing.

ED9man

Also I thought of something I might try next time to get the car to corner faster. I've noticed that if say I'm trying to set up for a corner that gets progressively tighter followed by a transition, or even if it doesn't tighten up, if I give the brakes a quick, controlled tap, I can get it to oversteer nicely loosing much speed, and the oversteer lets me put power down earlier, and transition while keeping my foot down, rather that being easier on the brakes and loosing speed as I try to brake and turn. Basically any time I'm in a faster corner and I want oversteer, I can create it pretty easily by using some quick braking, and it helps with transitions, since it shifts weight forward and overwhelms the rear with braking. It only works though in steady, fast cornering.

Now what I thought of, that I didn't see anyone else try, is how this same technique could be useful in a low speed corner, like the one I was stationed at that was very tough, it wasn't quite a hairpin, I'd say between a hairpin and 90 degree corner. Now of course the technique I described doesn't work at lower speeds because of the steering angle, the car will just plow if you brake while you are making that tight of a turn. But what I thought, is for corners too slow to induce the oversteer by a right foot tap, what if you got your braking done as you approached the corner normally, and the you turned in, and immediately after you got on the gas and used left foot braking. What I was thinking it would do, if timed right and executed properly, would allow the front to do the steering work, since you'd be cancelling most of the front braking with the gas, while the rear would be allowed to go loose, you could get that perfect little bit of oversteer that'd be impossible otherwise so you could unwind the wheel sooner and get back on the gas sooner. And if you did it right after turn in and braking, enough weight should be forward to pull it off. Of course too much would be slower, but I can't think of any other way to get the car to rotate at all in a low speed corner. I keep thinking that left foot braking could be useful.

Kind of a ramble, might not make any sense. h:

DakarM

stop just stop. stop trying to spend money. i don't know how many times we have to tell you. just drive and learn. stop trying to think so much. you are not at that level yet.

and what you describe will most likely just cause you to spin.

ED9man

sounds good, I'm broke anyways h:

CivicSiRacer

As he said stop over analyzing. This is your 1st year autocrossing if I remember right and you are way over head already. Just have fun! Get some seat time, stop worrying about trying to beat the other drivers in SM2 and just get seat time. Maybe ask one of them to let you ride shotgun to see the difference between their driving and your driving.

Spending money on the car right now is just going to be a waste. I was trying to tell this guy yesterday who was running a VW R32. Guy was complaining and bitching that he was in the wrong class (well you picked it) - in AM.

Didn't matter since no one was in AM so he wanted his trophy cause he won (by beating himself - WOO!). So I told him he would be in STX cause of the intake and he gawked at me.
He asked who do I have to beat in STX?
I said me I ran a 63.6 and sitting in 1st.
He said WOW I'll get a supercharger and beat you (punk!).
I said what did you run?
He said "a 79 second run which was flying"
Ummm a supercharger is not going to magically make you 16 seconds faster. It might make you 1 second faster.
He disagreed with me.
I said see that car (my old 1991 Civic Si - who was about to go out). That thing has 100hp, your car has about 250 and weighs 3200lbs? He said yeah.
Watch the new ower run. As he's watching I said he's going to run a 62 second run. He came across the finish line and POOF! 62.5.
He didn't say anything and kept contuning on saying he was going to get a supercharger and be faster.

LOST CAUSE.

Fujiwara Takumi

"If you can't go fast with 90 hp, 900 isn't going to help"

Fujiwara Takumi

this weekend i showed up with H&R springs and Farm and Fleet (think walmart for those not from the midwest) tire specials...giant sloppy balloon tires. I ran about 5-6 seconds off of the pro guys with full setups in my class. These are the guys that took 3-4-5 at nationals last year, and i wasnt THAT far behind them...

In a car im not comfortable with, on my first event of the year, and _I_ am not a good driver. It takes time and practice and some of these guys have been doing it 30 years! STop throwing money at the problem, you're not the U.S. government.

I dunno what your class is like but last year at nats the rex beat the miatas in my class, and the STS civics are faster...the Miata is a great car but it isn't god.

I dunno that you can be competitive in your class without taking that car off the road...sm2 is an expensive class even for me...id rather throw that money on a road course.

ED9man

Well, winning or not it is fun for sure. I really liked the end of the course this time, after an offset gate that was after a tight right hander, there was a 3 cone slalom that was very very big, if you did it right you could take the whole thing pretty much flat out, a lot of guys got into third, i hit the rev limiter in second a lot one time, so I got into third just after the last cone and I came across the line sideways just missing the last gate cone. Fun stuff. I also learned looking ahead is important the hard way. h:

LER510

How does that even work? EM I could see (I guess), but where would he get the idea to run in AM? Did he have a sprint car wing mounted on the roof? :screwy:

CivicSiRacer

He really just picked any class. He said he went to Waterfest and that's where they put him.