In reply to Mister Fister:
I have never autocrossed on anything near as good as S. Drives.
Drive to what you have.
In reply to Mister Fister:
I have never autocrossed on anything near as good as S. Drives.
Drive to what you have.
All the tire hate is kind of surprising from this crowd, for some reason. Yeah, there's better stuff out there, but geez. I've been running S.Drives for a long time as autox/street/HPDE tires and while they aren't the top of the heap, I don't think I'd chalk oversteer issues up purely to the tires.
How did that sneak past the filter anyway?
Yeah, I was wondering about that... I'd have started by typing "berk..." anyway.
My only comment about the Sdrives was if you abuse them too much at an event (such as my boy and I did...), do they lose some of their mojo?
I'm not looking to win the class (yet), just to have fun and improve, and the tires are certainly fine for that (though I do agree with what someone said, when hot, they do have a greasy feel to them...).
gearheadE30 wrote: All the tire hate is kind of surprising from this crowd, for some reason. Yeah, there's better stuff out there, but geez. I've been running S.Drives for a long time as autox/street/HPDE tires and while they aren't the top of the heap, I don't think I'd chalk oversteer issues up purely to the tires.
You can get some real handing changes as grip levels drop. My Locost required a minimum grip level to work or it would just skate around. It didn't start to work until you could put some load into it. My NA does get slippery at the back when the tires start to go. You want squirrelly fun, try a V8 Miata on a kart track with completely greased out overheated R1Rs. Wheeee.
But the easy things to do here are to play with the shocks and the sway bars. That's interesting experimentation in itself and will teach you a bunch. And it's free!
Keith Tanner wrote: You can get some real handing changes as grip levels drop.
This is very true, especially if you have a suspension that provides some amount of roll steer.
Nick (Bo) Comstock wrote: In reply to Mister Fister: I have never autocrossed on anything near as good as S. Drives. Drive to what you have.
In the three years I've been autocrossing I've only done so on bad tires a couple of times. I moved to Hoosiers pretty quickly and a time or two when people have asked me to drive their cars and give improvement suggestions it's just staggering how much difference the tire makes.
If you ever come through KY during autocross season and want a co-drive I guarantee I'll ruin you for street tires in short order.
In reply to KyAllroad:
I've ridden and driven on the purple crack. I know what the difference is. My statement still stands. Drive to what you have. Understand how your inputs affect how the car behaves. Understand how the temps and course changes throughout the day affect the balance of the car. And drive to what you have. Will the car handle differently in different tires? Absolutely, but if your only competition is yourself and your not out there to win a class then tires don't matter because the principles are the same. Only the times are different.
Nick (Bo) Comstock wrote: How did that sneak past the filter anyway?
That guy thinks its awesome to skirt the word filters with some sort of Internet wizardry. We're all really impressed.
\threadjack
Anyway, back to the topic at hand. When I still had my Miata, I ended up running the stock rear swaybar and an FM (?) bar on the front. Otherwise I had more oversteer than I wanted. What's your alignment like?
OldGray320i wrote:Nick (Bo) Comstock wrote: Addressing the driving part. Was it loose on Transitions? Sweepers? On entry or exit? Are you a pitch and catch kind of driver or slow in fast out? Smooth or abrupt off the brakes? Hammer the throttle or feed it in on the way out? Are you aiming for the back side of the cones? Right or Left foot braking? All of those things affect how the car behaves. Recognizing how your inputs affect how the car handles will allow you to adapt to changing conditions on the course. Don't worry about the tires and tighten the loose nut behind the wheelWas it loose on Transitions? Sweepers? On entry or exit? - Both. On Sweepers, the front had great grip, no hint of understeer - and then the back would let go. On transitions (i.e. slalom cones) same thing. Are you a pitch and catch kind of driver or slow in fast out? - Slow all the time, as the boy would say, but I generally favor smoothness in and out. I tried a little pitch and catch, but I could feel the car getting skittish and would back off. Interestingly, the boy attacks, and is always faster than I am, but I'm trying to overcome my 5ish years of driving on back mountain roads where an attack approach could have you attacking rocks or a cliff. My driving style probably indicates why my time only runs are always faster.... Smooth or abrupt off the brakes? - smooth, usually. Hammer the throttle or feed it in on the way out? - it's a Miata, is there a difference?
imho there is a difference between slow in - fast out and slow in - slow out, ask someone who's good to go for a ride along and see what they say. trick for me is striking the balance between attack and smooth, smooth being my enemy since i cant do it.
for what we can do... during what part of the corner does the slip start? its possible to adjust there without spending dedicated tire $$$ since thats the answer to your question. NOT spending more money on tires, let quit the circle jerk because we've read it a million times eh?
KyAllroad wrote:Nick (Bo) Comstock wrote: In reply to Mister Fister: I have never autocrossed on anything near as good as S. Drives. Drive to what you have.In the three years I've been autocrossing I've only done so on bad tires a couple of times. I moved to Hoosiers pretty quickly and a time or two when people have asked me to drive their cars and give improvement suggestions it's just staggering how much difference the tire makes. If you ever come through KY during autocross season and want a co-drive I guarantee I'll ruin you for street tires in short order.
you know what ruins those nice tires? cost.
his goal is fun and improvement with the cards he's got, not a different set of cards entirely. this board has a problem with that...
thatsnowinnebago wrote: Anyway, back to the topic at hand. When I still had my Miata, I ended up running the stock rear swaybar and an FM (?) bar on the front. Otherwise I had more oversteer than I wanted. What's your alignment like?
-2ish on all four corners, I think slightly more at the rear (-2.2, -2.3).
Because the car was nearly ideal on run 3, I'm going to try watching pressures (temp), and play with the damping. I like a little rear bias, I find it easier to run the car (any car) through sweepers, and in tight corner entry if the rear gets light, I gas it to transfer weight back and stop the slide.
TurboFocus, slow in slow out was poor wording on my part - I'm looking for the smoothest path through a series of corners as opposed to point and shoot - I do need to ride with a faster driver to gain some knowledge.
Anyways where do you think the slip n slide is starting?
Entry, mid, exit?
I'd say that if you were happy with the balance of the car in the earlier runs and then all of a sudden the balance went to E36 M3 we need to figure out why that happened.
Did the tires gain a bunch of pressure causing the imbalance? Don't know because pressures weren't taken between runs. Need more data.
Did the tires just get too hot and give up? Maybe. But then we need to look into what contributed to that. Could your driving style be contributing to this? Could the car setup be contributing to this? Maybe a combination of both? Would adjusting the tire pressures between each run help or hurt? Do you need to spray them with water to cool them so they stay consistent? Need more testing.
Did something come loose in the suspension causing a toe change? May be worth a quick look see.
My main point to everything I've said in this thread is to be conscious of what the car is telling you. Be conscious of how your inputs affect the balance of the car. Test different setups and see how things change and whether or not they stay consistent throughout the day. Be the guy that diagnoses the problem methodically instead of the guy that just throws parts at the car. That's the way you learn.
He did say the car is already tail happy in the first paragraph and when he bumped the front shocks up a bit the car settled out.
If we can settle the car even more with a simple adjustment that should help as well.
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