OK, before people get all over me and such, I am a TTZ owner, 10years and 100,000miles, so I don't want to hear any sh*t. Her engine blew almost 3 years ago, because of dot-com bust and other priorities in life, she's not back on the road. Because of those changes in priorities, I picked up a Scion xA RS 1.0 because it's 4 doors, good on gas, cheap, and a hatchback with good storage. The track day came up, so I decided to take it out for a little spin and have some fun.
Mind you, my heart is still with the Z, I'm still involved with Z events and love it, even though I havn't had mine on the road for ~3 years.
The writeup below is what I posted on the Scion board, and was focused towards that group, so keep that in mind when reading. And also to maybe attract some more 350Zs to come out and play!!
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Ever since I got my Scion, I got nothing but friendly teasing from my best friends from Club Z, about my choice of purchase. Everything pretty much referencing that it's a slow car. All friendly teasing, and nothing that really pissed me off, because I totally agreed with them, it IS a slow car. Relative my 400hp TwinTurbo Z, and my other buddies in simlar built or higher built Zs/Supras/Porsches.



I was just going to go, have some fun, and see what she could do. Past experience (done 20+ track days, and 2yr+ autoxing) has taught me that good fade free brakes are essential at the track. Although I've never taken it to the track before, I kinda knew what to expect, and because I wasn't sure when, or if I was going to take it out again, I wanted this day to be absolutely fade free. Consistant responding, fade free brakes are more important to me that horspower, bigger brakes, suspension, or anything else.

So, with that, I bought some Porterfield R4-S pads that I know work well on lighter cars (but bad on 3400lb 300ZXs) at the track. Also, from past experience, I've warped rotors, and I know of other people who've cracked rotors, so I also ordered some extra blank front rotors too. If you have a rotor failure, you day is DONE, AND you may be towing your car home. Been there, done that, seen that. Also, I got some Motul 650 brake fluid too. I planned on flushing out the entire fluid in the system and replace it with higher temp Motul 650. After recieving my pads and rotors the morning I was going to drive out, and installing my new rear sway bar just 2 days before, I was ready.

Later at night, before the event, I changed my front pads at the hotel. These cars are SOOO easy to change brake pads. EEEAAASSSYYY wow. No instructions in our manual, but easy to figure out. Had both front's changed and the car back down <20-30min. Something VERY interesting that I found. The stock pads have been shaved in such a way that there was LESS pad material touching the rotor that could be. I'd say about 15-25% of the pads surface area was lost to the shaving. Never saw that before.. Interesting.. I took pics, and will post them when I upload them.
stock pads on the left, Porterfield R4-S on the right. Ignore the aluminum bar under the left pad. That was the lug nut wrench under the stock pad to keep it's anti-noise grease backing off the wet ground. Notice how on the factory pad, how it was grounded away. Both left wheel and right wheels were like this.



Didn't have much time to bed in the pads, so I tried to bed them in some on the drive to the track the next morning. Decided to just ride the brakes while driving. DON'T WORK I learned. Something in the brake booster and electronics PREVENTS you front riding the brakes while the gas is being pressed!!! Almost feels like some valve in the master cylinder doesn't open, preventing the pad to go down. Well how about that! The second you lift off the gas, the peddle goes down, and the car starts slowing down. "OK", I thought, so I guess I'm going to have to bed these in the traditional way. So I did a number of 80-30 stops, starting lightly, and progressively pushing harder and harder with each cycle. Doing about 8-10 cycles.

Oh yea, almost forgot, the night before, since I don't have my plates yet, and only have this piece of paper from the dealership where my license plate would go, I thought I'd have some fun, (thinking I'd get my *** handed to me anyways) I wrote "BYE BYE!!" on the paper. So now where my rear license plate was, now you see "BYE BYE!!". Thought it'd give my buddies a good laugh after they were passing me, or good for a few jokes in the paddock. Later in the night too, somebody wrote "Z KILLER" on my dirty rear window. That gave me and my buddies a good laugh, knowing well, that this car will be one of the slowest out there.

(btw, I'm skipping all the other stuff that was going on, like karting in Sacramento on the way to the race track, and all you can eat pizza, free beer, and raffle that night)


So, back to the drive to the track at 6am from my hotel, bedding in my brakes, to be there for 6:30am when the gates open. First car on track will be at 7:30am with the begineers doing a parade lap. After signing the usual legal wavers, getting the wrist strap, you got your cars teched by the garages by our sponsor, Z Car Garage. By this time, it was lightly sprinking, and we were expecting rain later in the day. I met up with the track manager and got radios to talk with them, microphone for the track loudspeaker, and started unloading my car. Fortunately, we could put our stuff in the media building to prevent it from getting wet in the downpoor. Driving in the rain kicks ***, but getting your stuff wet sucks, and I didn't look at the weather and wasn't prepared for a wet day.

Anyways, welcomed everybody in, got the begineers to the track entrance, and I led them all (w/o helmets, and could take passangers) very very slowly around the track so they could get their first taste of driving around the 3 mile 15 turn track of Thunderhill Park. After 2 laps, we had an all hands drivers meeting, explained rules of the track, safety, flags, and passing areas. During this meeting time, one of our oranizing staff drove around Thunderhill and placed cones at the apexes of all the turns to help the students find the driving line.

First cars out were the advanced group. After the meeting, I had to take care of some logistic items with the other guys. We had some people come in that morning to attend, so we had to set them all up, and make sure everything was in order. I tried to finish this quickly because I wanted to get the xA out on the track. Originally I wanted to just run in the Intermediate group because I didn't want to hold up all the faster cars in the Advanced open passing group. Although I prefer the open passing, I was ok with the restricted passing of the intermediate group. BUT, I couldn't wait for them to go out on track, so being one of the organizers I can make these exective desisions and run where/when ever I like, so I road with the Advanced Group. Asked one of the begineers if they wanted a ride along the track, and he hoped in.

Man, by this time, it was raining lightly. Took it easy the first lap, getting a feel of the car, the track conditions, the brakes, and let things warm up some. Immediately I could feel that the brakes were awsome. I was slowing the car down much faster than expected and braking way earlier than needed. Slowly but surely, I was braking later and later to find that optimal position. These Porterfield R4-S pads are awsome!


continued in part 2