spinning hybrids and plastidip

This weekend I autocrossed a fwd car for the first time. It is a 2011 cr-z. The miata is put away for the winter.

Hondas understeer!

I also decided to plasti-dip my wheels a bright color, for fun. It did not turn out well.

I painted in sunny 50 degree weather, for northerners "t-shirt weather." Unfortunately the spray did not atomize well and I got inconsistent results. The second attempt I warmed the cans in hot water between layers which improved the outcome a bit.

I went with blaze blue, because Honda's are supposed to have neon wheels. I used multiple white base layers and multiple finish layers, unfortunately the blue is relatively transparent and I am no artist, so the color varies with thickness.

And because it is a hybrid, I feel I should share fuel economy.

This graph shows average fuel economy for every ignition cycle (start car, run, shut off.)

Runs 0 and 1 were the drive home, run 3 was the drive there. Run 2 was all five autocross runs.

I'm actually kinda surprised it went that far below 20! In response to the plasti-dip, better luck next time?

In semi-related discussion how's the CR-Z on the highway in terms of manners, road noise, ride quality, etc? I test drove one and never topped 35mph because of stop and go traffic.

Not diggin the blue... I'd go with a cream color, or maybe red.

clutchsmoke wrote: I'm actually kinda surprised it went that far below 20! In response to the plasti-dip, better luck next time? In semi-related discussion how's the CR-Z on the highway in terms of manners, road noise, ride quality, etc? I test drove one and never topped 35mph because of stop and go traffic.

I'm unhappy with the plastidip. I figured it would be less work and temporary if I didn't like the color. I don't like the color, so I'm thinking powedercoat. Since powdercoat is easy to clean, I'm planning white. I do love white wheels on black cars, but I didn't want to try to keep white plastidip clean, so went with blue. Waste of 5 hrs and $35.

As far as highway cr-z, it is similar to late 90's civics. I have not driven the new ones, so can not compare. Objectively I measured 68-70 db at 70mph highway on a phone app, subjectively; it is quieter than the br-z/fr-s on the highway, but louder than the challenger I had. It is smoother than my miata, but bumpier than the challenger.. Rides better than all the k-cars I ever owned.

Nice car. Any plans for stickier tires? What would be great would be some dual pattern 4x100 and 5x114.3 15x8s so you could race both the miata and CRZ on them.

I have not been active there lately but i hear a CRZ has our local H-stock locked up. The last time i competed against him and rode with him he was not there yet with his driving but the car was literally making up for it (on Z1 star specs on stock wheels back then). Apparently he is much better now. I consider myself to be pretty good but i dont think anything i own could topple a well-driven CRZ in H-stock.

Vigo wrote: Nice car. Any plans for stickier tires? What would be great would be some dual pattern 4x100 and 5x114.3 15x8s so you could race both the miata and CRZ on them. I have not been active there lately but i hear a CRZ has our local H-stock locked up. The last time i competed against him and rode with him he was not there yet with his driving but the car was literally making up for it (on Z1 star specs on stock wheels back then). Apparently he is much better now. I consider myself to be pretty good but i dont think anything i own could topple a well-driven CRZ in H-stock.

Dual purpose wheels are a great idea, the miata is currently on starspecs. It would be nice to have 2 sets but I'm worried about the black hole this car could become if I start modding.

The true selling nature of the cr-z for me was its dual nature, it really is 2 cars in one.

I was the only car in hstock, so I don't know. I have never autocrossed a fwd or honda before so I have no baseline knowledge. It was loose the whole time, I thought fwd only came around with lift throttle or unsettled suspension, this thing was loose everywhere.

Quieter than the frisbees? Hmmm. That sounds quiet enough for me. I'm really considering picking up a CR-Z because I hardly ever need back seats and I would be having fun with adjusting driving habits to maximize fuel economy. What sort of driving do you do? And with that sort of driving what MPGs are you hitting? Fuelly is kinda dirtied by the people with automatics and weird driving conditions/habits.

clutchsmoke wrote: Quieter than the frisbees? Hmmm. That sounds quiet enough for me. I'm really considering picking up a CR-Z because I hardly ever need back seats and I would be having fun with adjusting driving habits to maximize fuel economy. What sort of driving do you do? And with that sort of driving what MPGs are you hitting? Fuelly is kinda dirtied by the people with automatics and weird driving conditions/habits.

I was shocked how noisy the frisbee twins are. Not miata loud, but road noise plus intake tube = busy.

These things took a depreciation hit, I would love a 13 with liquid cooled lithium ion batteries, but they have not depreciated as much.

My driving varies significantly.

I seem to average 40mpg around town. That being said most roads are 35-45mph, so it will cruise in 6th gear. The electric assist gives you a boost so you can lug the engine over hills. I think the idle stop function saves a significant amount of gas at stoplights, which my town has many.

If driven aggressively in sport it seems to get mid to high 30's in town.

The autocross averaged less than 10mpg, but I revved the engine over 3000 rpm between runs to charge the battery.

When I get off an evening shift around 3 am and the roads are empty I have been babying the car getting high 50 mpg's, with a goal of 60mpg. That being said, if it were day and other people on the road, that driving style would be a hassle for others, so I drive normal then. I can't imagine getting much over 60mpg doing the goofy "hypermiling."

HIghway is speed dependent, obviously. 70 mph seems to average 39-41 mpg with cruise. I have a 3 hour drive to visit my parents which is primarily 55mph roads so I don't go much over 60, I averaged 48mpg on the last trip and drove normal with cruise. I don't really have highways near me where speeds go much over 70, but I would think the mileage would drop into the low 30's.

The onboard mpg meter is pretty accurate when compared against fill-up vs trip method I keep. I have spreadsheets of all my vehicles but I don't know how to post spreadsheets on the internet to share like pictures.

Trip odo average for one fill up

I hate stanced cars and stupid wheel colors

But a there is a local CR-Z in a pearl white with hot pink volk 28's on it and it looks like "cool beans"

I vote hot pink for the next color.

I was the only car in hstock, so I don't know. I have never autocrossed a fwd or honda before so I have no baseline knowledge. It was loose the whole time, I thought fwd only came around with lift throttle or unsettled suspension, this thing was loose everywhere.

I would put that down to tires. The one i rode in with old star specs on stock wheels (same as yours) turned pretty hard and they were just 205/55/16 iirc. It was still a limit-understeer car, just much less so than the average FWD car.

Thanks for the reply! Those are the kind of numbers I would expect to see from the car. Definitely seems to lean more toward performance than ultimate fuel mileage.

I've retold this story many times but back when i had the World's Only 5spd Dodge Dynasty i had impromptu acceleration contests with an 89 CRX si, an EK si coupe, an ~03 Civic Si, and a CR-Z. They all accelerated about the same with the ep3 being the fastest by a small margin from what i could tell.

Point of this story being, the 6spd CR-Z is really in the same ballpark as most of the older Si's when it comes to acceleration. So even though people who havent driven (or raced ) them complain about how slow they are on the internet, i would say it is balanced all-around more toward performance than a lot of people think. It basically puts old Si performance and HF economy into the same car with modern safety and convenience.

Plastidip'd the wheels of our saturn this weekend. It took three coats to make it look good. Try a couple more coats I bet it'll come out looking good.

gofastbobby wrote: Plastidip'd the wheels of our saturn this weekend. It took three coats to make it look good. Try a couple more coats I bet it'll come out looking good.

I'm at like 7 or 8 coats on the passenger side, the problem with the blue is the more coats I use, the darker it gets. I think it is too dark. I also can't get even distribution, but I think thats primarily due to temperature. It's coming off soon, I'm undecided if I will try pure white for a little, $7 a can....

vigo wrote: It basically puts old Si performance and HF economy into the same car with modern safety and convenience.

It's not a bad place to be, if only I could 'figure out honda's attempt at hands free blue tooth.....

The numbers I average above 40 mpg are with significant effort on my part, this thing would do 38mpg all day if I never paid attention.

I was looking at some technical data last night; the batteries and controller are centered over the rear wheels at approximate axle height (midline with wheels), the gas tank is directly in front. Although it claims 60/40 split weight (F/R) I think the weight directly at the axle with the short wheel base makes this thing tail happy. I understand the tires are nasty however it did not understeer where I was used to FWD understeering.

My Insight is laid out very similarly and i feel like i can tell it has better weight distribution than a typical FWD. It still understeered like crazy until i installed a staggered tire setup (195 front, 165 rear) but i think that is partially because the rear is ridiculously undersprung, a problem i dont think the CR-Z has.

Anyway, if it doesn't understeer where you are used to FWD understeer, you just need to adapt your driving to utilize this. It's not a bad thing!

I hate plastidip, lol.

There was some kid who bought a new WRX and plastidipped the entire car. The next week it looked like he got sick of it, or was made fun of, and started to tear it off. It was the most retarded thing i've ever seen? Who plastidips a new car? lol

Every time I see a car with parts plastidipped it looks like it's peeling off as well. Probably because i'm in Vegas and there is the heat problem.

Plastidip definately only looks good on wheels or to unchrome badges.