Went out on the track for the first time last night. Overall it was a lot of fun. I was there with my car club and they gave me a lot of advice but I was still pretty nervous because I didn't know what to expect and everything went really quick once you get to the front of the line. It also didn't help that the guy at the start told me I'm leaking water when it was actually the guy in front of me.

It was brutally hot though, around 84F with humidity around 90%. I ran four times with my first time being the best, 14.470@99.97. My problem (besides being nervous as hell on the line) was I kept spinning out way more than usual and instead of compensating I just put my foot down and rode out the spin. On my last run I got a 2.200 60' but still only a 14.500 1/4.

What advice do you guys that have gone countless times have for me? I plan on going as much as I can from now on, I had such a blast.

What time "should" I be getting with an exhaust, popcharger, plenum spacer, test pipe?

Thanks

Right:

 

You should get what you got. 90 percent of novice racers have problems with 60 feet time. Hot and humid may not be ideal for staging pad traction.

The Z is picking up 20 MPH in the second 660 feet. That is OK.

You will improve 1/10 second increments with practice. Most 350Z racers never improve because they are not willing to commit to practice.

Good luck.

 

Work on your 60ft should be in the 2.1-1.9 range on street tires with a good launch.

Practice, practice and if your not grudge racing forget about your reaction time and get your launch down right. Oh and cooler weather and I'm in the top 10 N/A with bolt-ons, but it took alot of practice to get there. Good luck practice practice!!

 

Yup, humidity will have some effect on your performance. Glad you had some fun!

 

[ADVICE]Dont do that![/ADVICE]

 

^^ +1 you'll eventually bust a diff bushing and/or pop an axle.

 

Sigh...went to a different track today that only had 1/8 mile in Immokalee, FL and I got about 20 or so runs in. I thought I was doing alright until I went up against a bone stock Z and got beat every single time by at least .3 seconds. My fastest time was 9.543@77.13MPH. I really tried everything I could think of.....started at 3000 RPM, 3500 RPM, 2500 RPM, Idle, etc and he beat me every single time....was pretty embarrassing. Could it be that my tires just really suck? Even adjusted the PSI from 36 down to 30 which seemed to help a bit.

It seems like I just do really bad at launch and then catch up at the end but never enough to get a good time. Also my trap speed was always really close to his but he still had .3 or .4 on me....what does this mean in terms of my car / me?

Still had fun though, just want to improve a lot more.

 

Hardest part of drag racing in a MT car is the first 60ft.

Keep practicing. Dont dump the clutch, dont slip it so much you burn it, you want something in between.

Try floating the revs between 2500-3500 and try launching without looking at the tach. Look down the track, and try to get a sense/feel for what the tires are doing. Remember once you let the clutch out those first few moments in 1st gear dont have to be WOT immediately. Sometimes 70% (less than WOT-every run will be diff) throttle until you feel the car hook is good, then you can mat it and go WOT.

Keep practicing and by fall when it cools you will have more seat time.

Back in 2003 my stock time was 2.052 60ft, 8.8 @ 79mph, 13.77 @ 101.4mph

 

I finally made is back to the 1/4 mile track last weekend in Orlando. The only changes I made to the car since the last time (where I got a 14.470 ET) are S-Tech springs, lightweight pulley, and carbon fiber intake in the front bumper. I only got two runs in since it was packed and there were quite a few oil spills and a crash on the track.

Temperatures were in the low 70s during my last run and what don't you know I got a 14.044....finally something decent. I really improved my 60' time by a lot. I'm not sure whether I just got better with the clutch or if it's due to me revving the motor at the tree and not going when the light hit green but instead going when I was going up in revvs (example: I didn't hold it at 3k RPM and dumped the clutch.....I revved from 750 RPM - 3k RPM and then dumped it).

Hopefully I can get into the 13s when I go in December. I'm going to be putting in my new JWT clutch and flywheel next week as well as an x pipe instead of the Borla h pipe. I heard that the flywheel will actually hurt me on the track for the first couple hundred feet due to it being light....is that true?

Here is my slip, I'm #0466

 

Man those are great times! I don't have that many suggestions for you as this is my first year out at the drag strip but my times have also improved a good bit. This weekend I got a 13.93 @ 101.34 MPH with a 2.08XX 60ft time.

Previously, I couldn't do better than 14.3xx @ about 98.XXX MPH

That's 0.4 off my previous best ET and 2.5-3 mile per hour increase in trap speed

What helped me?
- Improved driving (Hyper extending my clutch used to cause grind from 1st to 2nd every time - doesn't do it now that I fixed my foot work. Also, its not about slamming the gear in as hard as you can, I found that really focusing on getting the clutch down past the biting point and back out as fast as possible improved my shift speed. Finding the best launch point - my 2.08 60 ft was achieved with about 3000-3500 rpm launch, as soon as the clutch was fully engaged, the motor was right in its power band. No bogging!)
- Power lab 3/8 plenum spacer (My only mod significant mod aside from 06 airbox and K&N drop in- but made a very noticeable difference)
- 1/4 tank of gas, 26-28psi in the back tires, passenger seat removed, spare tire and & jack removed
- Cooler temperatures - it was about 13 degrees Celsius or around 55 Fahrenheit vs. about 20-25 degrees Celsius the previous times I had went.


For the most part, listening to Kenny G and other light Jazz in between runs is probably what made the biggest difference

 

The flywheel may cause a lot of wheel spin in 1st and 2nd because of the reduced rotational mass, although I don't have personal experience with it. I don't know what the figures are but I imagine that the lightweight flywheel is equivalent to reducing that static weight of the car by a couple of hundred pounds in first gear with diminishing returns thereafter.

It's interesting to see that lightweight flywheels free up noticeable power to the wheels in 4th or 5th gear (forget which one) on dyno's - it would be interesting to see what the effective improvement is on 1st and 2nd gear - I'd imagine it is significant.

Let me know how that x pipe works out for you...