For now I am happy with the toe settings. I'm not sure I've got enough data/seat time to really make any adjustments. While the car turned in very well there might be an improvement with a bit of toe out on the car. I've got another event in ~2 weeks then another ~2 weeks after that. I hope after 3 events I might be in a better spot to know the car and what adjustments I might need to make.

My car at basically 0 deg front toe does turn easy on a normal road. It also follows any grooves in the pavement. On the interstate here it's just a slight turn of the wheel to get over the crown in the road then you almost have to counter steer as it changes lanes very quickly.

 

I've gotten 2 more events under my belt. Here is a video from the latest:


I was 1st in class, 6th PAX, and 6th RAW (4th car raw, 1st & 2nd were karts) out of 121 entrants. Getting used the Z.


Made some setup changes from morning runs to afternoon runs and picked up over 1.5 seconds. Some of that was the course getting better but took some compression out all around for the very bumpy surface and could immediately tell a difference.

 

Here recently I've just been driving my Z trying to get used to the handling. During the Black Friday sales I got some of the Z1 2 piece rotors and SS lines to go with the used Brembo calipers I had purchased a while ago. I finally got some time to start putting them on the car this week.

First was to rebuild the calipers. Even though they looked very clean and the seals looked good I wanted that extra warm and fuzzy feeling knowing the seals were replaced:



Next I got the car up on the stands to start the installation:



Then I got all the pretty parts installed front and rear:





Tonight I plan to bleed the system using my Motive Power Bleeder. Then I'll go out later this week and bed in the new pads (Carbotech AX6) and rotors.

I wanted to know if the money spent on the rotors and such was worth it. I know Z1 claims weight savings over stock Brembo parts but couldn't find much information on the weight of the stock '07 brake setup. So I measure parts coming off the car and parts going on the car using a bathroom scale and if light enough (<10lbs) my kitchen scale. Here's what I've found:

• Brembo Calipers no pads (ea): Front: 7lb 2oz Rear: 3lb 8oz
• Stock '07 Calipers no pads (ea): Front: 14.5lbs Rear: 6lbs 2oz

• Z1 two piece rotors (ea): Front: 16.0lbs Rear: 15.0lbs
• Stock '07 86k mile rotors (ea): Front: 21.5lbs Rear: 13.5lbs

Doing the math in the front I saved 7lbs 6oz per caliper and 5.5lbs per rotor. The rear saved 2lbs 10oz per caliper but gained 1.5lbs per rotor. The rear rotors are substantially bigger in diameter (have to cut the backing plate to fit) so I assumed they would be heavier but minimized the weight gained with the 2 piece (Z1 claims 2.5lbs lighter for their 2pc rear rotor vs a factory Brembo rotor).

• Overall total weight savings front: 25lbs 12oz
• Overall total weight savings rear: 2lbs 4oz

I like to do HPDE/PDX/track days and hope to start doing them in the Z this year so that was another reason for the upgrade. I hope the weight savings might help a little in auto-x as well.

I did weigh the Z1 SS lines and hardware at 1lb 2oz but didn't measure all the OEM lines and hardware to see if there was a difference.

 

Some serious weight savings with the Brembos over the standard calipers! I've wondered on the weight savings with the 2-piece Z1 Brembo rotors over regular 1-piece blanks. I think I have some new-ish Brembo rotors in the garage

 

Z1 claims 5lbs front and 2.5lbs rear for each rotor over standard Brembo rotors. It would be interesting to see what weights you get for the standard Brembo rotors.

 

What did cost come out to for the 8300s and mounts as the FRsport does not have it currently listed anywhere? Feel free to PM if that is a better route.

Thanks..

 

I ended up corner weighting the car over the weekend. Here are the weights in auto-x ready prep (all spare, etc removed), no driver, and just over a 1/4 tank of gas.

It looks like switching from the titanium exhaust to the AAM exhaust for sound kept me from breaking below the 3100lb mark. I think it was either 12-14lb difference between the two. Hopefully when the PPE headers and PPE y-pipe with high flow cats are installed I'll lose a little weight and get below 3100. Also hope to lose a bit off the nose of the car to get closer to 50-50, as I'm sitting at 55-45 right now. The only other real item I have left for weight savings is the seats. I figure I might be able to save about 20lbs total if I do both seats to the 25lb limit.

This also seems to be low as a lot of places claim the HR is heavy, like 3300lbs heavy. This is more inline with what I thought these cars weighed:



And here it is with me in the car, helmet on, a hair over 1/4 tank of gas, etc like it would be at an event. Only thing is the front sway bar is still disconnected at this point. I adjust the end-links and reconnected it with the girlfriend and some extra weights in the front seat (to simulate my race weight) so it should be just about perfect. I don't think I could get the cross weight much better on it:

 

So Z1's dyno was (maybe still is) broken and I wasn't able to get the headers and hi-flow cats on the car then tuned before Dixie as I had hoped. I did still go to Dixie over the weekend and was able to take my first National Tour win in my own car!


(I won FS at the Mississippi Match Tour last year as my first win but as a codriver).

I had some good competition from an FRC Vette and a newer STi over the weekend. It came down to my 3rd and final run on Sunday and I was able to pull out the win. I was also able to have the fastest STU runs for both Saturday and Sunday.

I hope to have some videos up tonight. Had an issue with the GoPro on Saturday so I don't have my fastest run from that day but do have my first run. However I've got my fastest Sunday run so no problems there.

 

Congratulations man!

 

Congrats on the win! My friend placed 3rd in his STI, said he had some stiff competition.

 

Thanks!

I was impressed with how quick he was going in the STi being on the Nexen tires!

 

Congratulations! I hope to make it next year maybe, it's a long drive.

Are you planning to do any other national events this year?

 

Yes, I hope to do at least the National Tour event at Bristol, and perhaps the Match Tour event as well.

Then if everything goes right I want to try and make it to Nationals out in Lincoln.

All the other National events are too far away. I was hoping for another Match tour in the Southeast somewhere, the Mississippi site was great last year, not sure why they aren't doing another.

 

I've got the vids uploaded from Dixie this past weekend. Saturday's runs are the 1st run due to technical difficulty the fastest runs weren't captured. Sunday everything worked great and these are the fastest clean runs.

Co-driver Saturday :

Co-driver Sunday :

Me Saturday :

Me Sunday :

 

He doesn't think the Nexens are quite as fast as the HoosierStones, but at maybe 2/3 the price...

I hope to make one Bristol event this year. Should've gone to Dixie and codrive with him, but money and time didn't quite line up.

 

Congrats man. I wanted to make it but had other plans involving a ring

Nice job bud.

Chris

 

A few updates since the last posts from Dixie. I had a baseline dyno done on the car at Z1 Motorsports. They told me the blue was 5th gear and red was 4th gear. This was with all the current mods from above (power wise only CAI, AAM y-pipe back, stock y-pipe, stock cats, stock manifolds) and all on the stock tune. It was run on my 18" wheels with the RE71R 275/35 tires.

The plan is to go back after headers and y-pipe and get a tune at the same time.

Max Torque:



Max HP:

 

With the baseline dyno out of the way I started the PPE Header and PPE y-pipe installation. I was hoping to have it dyno'd and tuned by now but apparently there were a few Z events the past couple of weekends so Z1 wasn't available. Hoping to maybe go this week or next week to have that done.

Here are the before pictures. I ended up with too many places to put O2 sensors since I did the headers and y-pipe. I ended up having to lengthen both sets of O2 sensor wires. I used the direct ports on the headers for the front sensors and plugged the L shaped port. Then I used the post hi-flow cat ports for the rear sensors.



A shot from below after the installation. I bought some DEI Firewall shield and cut it up and put it on both sides of the car from the upper firewall down to the OEM heat shields seen in the photo:



The drivers side was a ***** to get in even with the car off the ground, the steering column disconnected and all the heater hoses and pipes removed. It finally fit but the first few attempts ended with a few scratched in the coating Good news is nothing leaks.



The car runs and drives but I was worried about the stock tune with the headers. I didn't want to auto-x on it even though it drives fine and pulls smooth right now. I just need to get it back to the dyno. So I co-drove a buddies FP S2000 at the last local auto-x event. The GoPro lens had a smudge on it so it's a bit blurry but I was able to beat the car owner and got FTD at the event:

 

Following this thread with interest! I'm curious why you opted for 275/35 tires rather than the 285/35s others have mentioned.

 

There's not a 285/35 or I probably would run it. There is a 285/30 and the reason I don't run it right now is because of gearing. It's about 3 mph less top speed in 2nd vs the 275/35 tire. At Dixie I was on my stock rev limit at 68 mph, the corvette hit 72 mph in the same section (both using SoloStorm). I feel I need the extra mph for National events.