Building for the road course...again

They have fantastic reviews so I’m excited. Will definitely have a real review

 

I always get the good failures.

my track day Monday sucked. The car is so fucking loose it’s hard to drive but I’ll get there.


Clutch failure…again. This is a fucked one.

all pressure plate bolts tight. 1 broken. Both locating dowels on the flywheel also broken. Nothing anyone’s ever seen before. But I’ll have it sure…

 

Clutch replaced with exedy stage 2 triple disc. Feels great. Kinda like a stock clutch maybe? It does chatter if you ride it but that’s expected.

clutch engagement is super high on the pedal though. Gotta adjust that shit some more/get use to it a bit lol.

replaced a tie rod and bled the brakes.
Softened up the rear sway bar, and installed my new 235/45/17 hankook rs4’s. My rear re71’s were smooth like glass. Amazing even wear but yea they were toast.

ready for the track tomorrow.


next weekend I’m off to gridlife at gingerman to crew/hangout with my buddy competing there.

I think I need a bit of a break from the track lol this will be track day 4…all within the month of may. Usually the season doesn’t even start for me until June/July? Damn lol. I need a break and the car probably wants a break too. Thing just rolled 1/4 million KM’s on the odometer today. I’m willing to bet not a single other car at the track has this type of mileage lol.

 

Sunday’s track day was a great success. it was nice and warm out, 86f sun shining. Definitely good conditions for a car like mine.

Went out there and took it easy as this track will really upset a loose car if not driven properly. The civic was on rails. Thing is ridiculous to drive and using “less steering angle” now that the rear is so loose finally makes sense. The car works well.

Went with my buddies…one of which is a major VIP in the time attack scene. Got the red carpet treatment all day. It was great



Motul is an event sponsor as well as my buddies sponsor. Same with acuity.

VIP was awesome lol. Do what you want go where you want nobody can say shit.


Had my own personal pit crew which was nice “tires pressures to xyz for front, and xyz for rear” then I’d just walk away lmao while he set it up for me.

you wouldn’t believe the amount of people stopping by to check out my literally stock civic. No one believes me on the mods haha.

4 hard full day track days. Top pad is the stoptech sr33 race pads I’ve been tracking on below is a new hawk dtc70. Looks like these pads are gonna last me a real long time. This is amazing for consumables. Combo of robust brake setup…and literally just not using as much brake anymore.


My re71’s from my last 3 track days. I wanted to show what a real alignment looks like when you actually track drive your track aligned race car…what a concept huh


My trick alignment is like 45% of the reason the car is so fast.


Now we take a break. Off to gridlife on Thursday with my Honda buddy. More VIP treatment to come haha.

 

Awesome stuff! I like seeing your posts about Track Days and the results. My co worker has a C5 Vette and I was talking to him about his alignment specs. I asked him if he wanted to use the same specs I use for my Miata for track days and set his up the same. He said immediately he could feel a difference especially with turning effort required.

About your tires though, are they pretty much cooked after that one track day? I need a stickier tire for the street and for the track but am trying to hold off on having to buy a spare set of wheels just for track days.

What did you end up placing in your class? Or was it like a TNIA (Track Night in America) where it's just more of running the track and seeing your times?

 

so I wasn’t competing on Sunday. Just lapping. The lappers were sharing the sessions with the time attackers competing so it was awesome that a lot of these guys had to point me by…like I wasn’t even competing for time hahaha. Good sign for me.

the re71’s pictured above went from brand new, to 3 full day track days and what you see is what was left. Those were fronts. The rears I kept as they still have a little life left for maybe 1 more track day.

if you’re looking for sticky rubber falken rt660’s are the answer but they wear similarly to the re71’s but provide the same/more grip.

the car is currently on its “street” wheel/tire package which is 235/45/17 hankook rs4’s. After my track day Sunday…they still look brand new.

now the grip isn’t even close to an re71/rt660 but the grip is decent and they are very consistent and last forever.

as for alignment…it’s made the biggest difference. The car is SO loose and the amount of steering angle I need to use is literally half. No more crank the wheel and pray the front end sticks. Now it’s barely move the wheel, give it the beans and the rear and just trails around. So much front end grip the rear just wants to follow around. I’m still getting used to it. It’s tricky and we haven’t even run the stagger wheel setup yet.

i spent Sunday getting some confidence back after my disaster last track day last week. Took it slow but by mid day point bys were being given left right and center. I was the lowest HP car on track Everytime fighting my way past various VQ’s, turbo 90’e civics, and a bunch of other rwd stuff all on the time attack slicks they need to run for their classes. Here I am on my skinny rs4’s haha.

I had a buddy time me from the pits as I was just messing about. Posted up a faster time then my buddies k24 swapped frs…which was on 255 wide pirelli trofeo R’s(he was competing) and makes a good bit more power.

the cars a killer. I just need to drive way more better.

 

What specs are you using for alignment?

I normally run -1.5 rear camber with 0 toe and -1.8 front with -0.05 toe. Makes the car dart with very little effort. I forget what my caster measurements are as I haven't aligned it in a long time.

 

-3* front
-1.75* rear
0 toe all around
Now the trick part…
9.5* of caster. This is next level. The dynamic camber gain at turn in and mid corner is immense. The front end bite is real.

most guys just run -3.5* or more of negative camber and they just think yea more is better. Well all that negative camber really fucks your braking, and your corner exit.

we reached my final alignment specs after reading the tire wear after each track day. It’s dialed

 

I will say I am learning a ton on this build. Adding a little more “alignment” based on tire wear is an amazing thing vs my Mazda where I just took that shops word for it…I probably had too much camber in the Mazda all along. Really fucked my brake zones and corner exits.

the civic also now has a 24mm(real big) rear sway bar that is 3 way adjustable. I went from my 22mm to this 24mm again…based on rear tire wear.

I will also say driving this setup is tricky. The whole concept of “less steering angle” is a trip. Like, turn the wheel half the amount you normally would and still make the corner since we have a lot of rear steer now vs crank the wheel as hard as you can at turn in and pray to god the tires bite. Lol.

Now if I crank the wheel hard like an idiot the front bites so hard I just lose the rear immediately. Counter steering a fwd car is just a wild thing to need to actively do but when driven correctly the car is killer.

I’m using SO much less brake(less /no trailing, carry more speed through the corner). I use to be ridiculous on the brakes as you all know. Now? It’s like my buddies said after the last track day “brake light flashes on, then immediately off”. Fuck yea.

example of too much steering angle at entry,

 

Im guessing if you are using less brake, you are not braking to compensate for shortcoming in handling. Therefore faster.
Loose is fast, but you have to be switched on all the time, lol!!!
How much faster do you think your MS3 would have been if you had dialed in the suspension as nicely as the Civic?

Good reading. When you talk tech, I re read your posts a few times to try and grasp a full understanding! I hope it will make me faster on Gran Turismo, haha.

 

So like, the Mazda setup wasn’t bad by any means. It just wasn’t…dialed. Not the same way we’ve been dialing the civic. I think I could’ve applied the same trickery to the Mazda to achieve more caster but I’m not sure. The civic has no caster adjustment we’re just using cheat codes to get all that additional caster which I think is making most of the difference. Having dynamic camber change has really made the difference at turn in, mid corner, and exit. Not to mention still leaving me some good braking ability(not that I need to use them as much with this car). The civic can carry some insanely high corner speeds, far exceeding what I was able to do in my Mazda…and I’m still on way less tire. Part of this is probably driver mod, other part is just chassis. The front end bite on the civic is so noticeable where as the Mazda was always a little vague and it scrubbed a lot.

had the Mazda been dialed in the same way im sure there would be a second to be found at any track. The short comings with the Mazda would be the weight though. The civic is still lighter and that impacts every aspect of the cars ability on track.

the civic also has been corner balanced. Im not sure how much im gaining with that, but I should mention the Mazda was never corner balanced.

loose is definitely fast but haha you are very right. Need to be switched on at ALL times ready to catch it and counter steer. I’m still learning this part lol.


Camber/caster hack picture below. Let me know if you guys understand what we did here and why,

 

You rotated the camber plate to correct caster angle or did you slot the mounting holes to allow the strut to tilt forward or backwards?

 

Yes looks like the camber plate is turned 90 degrees

 

Correct both of you!! The camber plates are rotated to now have adjustable caster, and they still add camber. The other trick is my fortune auto coils, the lower portion is slotted so you can adjust camber right at the knuckle. Pretty trick.

 

By rotating the plates, you are able to use them more as caster plates, even tho you still also have some camber adjustment? Thats cool, but probably completely for track use now? Will the car eat tires a lot more?

 

That’s the beauty of caster. Doesn’t contribute to any tire wear and actually helps save some tire because I can run less fixed camber. I gain more camber as I corner with the added caster so I can run less static camber.

 

Extra caster also helps with ride quality as it allows the strut to be angled towards the bump better. It's something Mazda was really proud of when the originally released the CX-5

 

That’s some interesting info. Definitely cool to have the added and adjustable caster here.

 

Had an awesome weekend at gridlife in south haven Michigan. Friday-Sunday.

Finally met @Maisonvi and @Matt@DM.

this event makes my events back home seem like a joke lol. Gridlife is definitely massive.

 

Track night on Saturday. Few hours of testing out the new wheel/tire package will be interesting.

definitely a little nervous the car will be extremely rear happy…but after driving this setup on the street it feels incredible. Just mash the gas mid corner at lower speeds, point the wheel at the exit, think “holy fuck I’m about to write the car off into that curb” but naw…rear comes around and see ya later we’re outta here.

it’s a crazy feeling. I’m definitely getting more use to it now.

hitting my “home” track on Saturday. Toronto motorsports park. If my “test” laps all go smooth, and I’m feeling it, I will push for some 10/10’s kill laps and see what we can do. These tires feel insanely grippy. Far stickier then my last set of re71’s. This should be fun lol.

the 255’s up front according to falkens website they measure 264mm wide lol. 255 my ass.
Real close to the shock body and it rubs bad at full lock but cruising the streets I had 0 rubbing. Did some good tests lol.

235/45/17 RS4 vs 255/40/17 RT660


Fitment



it looks like the tire is hitting the collar but the collar is above the tire a good bit. We should be ok lol.

I love how I changed what is arguably the most important part of a track car and ya can’t even tell.