Bought not Built

Sweet new DD!
I did my front wheel bearings a couple years ago and used the Harbor Freight kit. Pressed them in and out no problem I didnt have a bench at the time so I ended up working on the floor with my vise bolted to some home made speed ramps. Getting the snap ring in and out of the knuckle was the worst part!

Have you had a chance to drive the car on the new bushings? I have a full set of the Power Flex stuff for the entire rear end.

 

I used almost that exact kit, no problems with the Drivers side, but the passenger side for some reason wouldn't come out, threads started to give on the shaft and I called it.

Haven't had a chance to really dog it yet, just some mild street pulls to check the setup is back in order, only blew off one loosely attached coupler, but everything feels minty. March will be the time to tell the true results, but anything is better than what was essentially no bushing at all.

 

Small update:
Picked up ARP Extended studs from a few different sellers on facebook, all BNIB but less than half the total cost of new. Installed without issue to accommodate the new 12mm spacers I picked up.


^why you need extended studs with wheel spacers

Now that basically everything I wanted to do over the winter is done (5 months later), I'm going in for a custom alignment prior to the track season, especially since I no longer have to drive the car up to track events.

Can anyone recommend what my exact specs should be for a pretty aggressive track alignment, with the understanding that I'm on 225 tires now which will be going to 245 once those wear out? Looking for -1 camber on the rear, but not sure what my other specs should be all around.

 

0 toe all around. Maybe 1/16 toe out if you want a little spicer turn in/rotation
-3* front camber to start. Read tire wear. Adjust as necessary
-1.5* rear camber. Read tire wear. Adjust as necessary
Castor: as much as humanly possible up front. Kinda shit on this chassis as it’s not adjustable and the castor adding bushings are like 2 million dollars


Start with the above. This will get you very close. There is no one size fits all however. You will need to read tire wear and make changes based on what it’s telling you

 

Was hoping you would chime in - thanks! That's what I was cognitively trending towards, probably kick the toe to the 1/16 to help with a particular corner I want to defeat this year.

 

I ran similar specs on my speed

1/16 toe out up front
-3.5* camber front
-1.75* camber rear


That was what worked for my car for most of my ownership

 

Been about 2 months since posting, long story short everything continues to go great, and I have a ton of respect for this car that I don't ever think I fully realized until this last weekend.

On March 2nd I did my first event of the season at Summit Point Main, which was my first time on that track. Car performed well, morning rain, afternoon dry. Really got to test out all the upgrades and find out what else I needed to change, and it really boiled down to a tire limit on the 225 RT660s. I was also able to tow first the first time with the GX460, which did great as expected.

After the event, in order to try and get a buddy into track stuff a little faster I decided to sell him my used 225s and upgrade to 245 RT660s on all 4 corners, which was a big positive.

I finished up my second event of the year (and potentially the last for the year due to Baby #1 coming in May) yesterday, a 2-day event at Dominion raceway just north of Richmond, VA and it was an absolute blast. The track was far and away better than I had expected, very technical and also extremely high speed with a really satisfying uphill esses section. The Speed3 continues to chug along and take anything thrown at it with no complaint.

(Dominion Raceway, April 6 - 7)


The 245s were definitely a positive upgrade, and I essentially was unable to hit their limit outside of fighting understeer powering out of tight corners, which is manageable and expected. They also exposed my next limitation, that being my Hawk HPS brake pads; in all I am extremely satisfied with the track performance of the HPS, never having experienced any semblance of fade with them. The big limitation is lack of an upfront bite, they are more progressive pads and so I found myself braking earlier than I wanted to in order to hit the entry speed I needed before releasing to weight transfer properly into the corners.

The Koyorad radiator didn't let me down, and temps never exceeded 219 even full-bore redlining 4th and into 5th peaking at 120mph, showing an extremely impressive ability to cool down fast; This is a must-have upgrade for any track-focused Speed3. In hindsight I should have brought my vented hood, but the forecast was 50/50 for rain on Saturday and I didn't want to deal with it, and Sunday was much hotter than I expected.

In all, my best time at the track was a 1:41, which as I understand it is a really respectable time there. 10 x 25 minute sessions (220 miles, 111 total track laps) with no problems is my definition of a fantastic weekend.

Next upgrade is a more track-centric pad, and probably seats as well to reduce seat fatigue as they are also showing limitations under increased corner G-forces with the more capable tires. Since I will have a lot of downtime soon, I might spring for a Corksport manifold to run the EWG sitting on my shelf how I want.

 

Shoulda stuck a pair of the 225’s on the rears with the 245’s upfront. Would help mitigate some more of that understeer. Getting a fwd to turn as quickly as possible really is most of the secret lol.

as the saying goes “loose is fast”. People say what they will but trust me, loose is fast.

 

There might be a little more rotation there, but since I'm not at the Time Trial level yet, it isn't as big a deal for me on the second or so it might save me as the ability to swap tires throughout the season front to back given the beating it takes up front.

 

Fair enough. Stagger setup requires full dedication I will say

 

Little mini non-Speed3 update, installed a Hayden Transmission Cooler on the GX460 yesterday - really simple to install, went in well. Gotta love how much space there is everywhere on this vehicle. Should be ready to tow no issue in the hotter months over these mountains.