High Performance Drivering Event @ Buttonwillow - May, 6
05-09-2005 | 04:03 PM
#43
May 6, 2005 - Buttonwillow … yet another action packed day tracking with Speed Ventures!
My day actually started the evening prior as I perform the familiar ritual of slowly transforming the daily driving G35 to a track star. If I had my way the ordeal would have already been completed days in advance. But at last that is not possible, because her duty as a tolerable people mover does not expires until I literally pull into the garage after work. So began the midnight oil burning begin, but not until I’ve watched the latest episode of ‘The Apprentice’ on TV of course.
Yes, I have heard of TiVo and I own two of em, but some stuff are just not the same when not watched live. Besides, the TiVo’s already bloated with ungodly amounts of American Idol episodes recorded for Donny (Dizz). He’d be really upset if I purged them. 
It was going to be a long night …as always.
The motivation is always high during the ‘preparation’ phase, as happy thoughts and expectations of the upcoming event temporarily blind sight the hippocampus; work (on the car) was perceived as being fun. I made record time performing and checking off the items in the familiar ‘to do list’ I had compiled over the years. Changed engine oil and filter, adjusted the sway bars to track setting, brake pads swapped for race compounds, etc. etc. Next came the brake bleeding routine; typically a grueling two man affair. Thank God for the Power Bleeder, a nifty little pressure inducing system that straddles on to the top of the reservoir tank, squeezing the fluid out with a gentle 15 pounds of force. Two corners into the bleeding process disaster struck. I was startled by a gurgling note not unlike that of someone just finishing off the last bit of their Pepsi. Yikes! I instinctively closed the bleeder valve as fast I could manage, but it was too little and too late. I had let the brake fluid reservoir run down. Precious exotic Motul RBF600 DOT4 racing fluid is now being replaced by nothing but air … literally. Boy this is not good! Behind modern ABS equipped braking system is a labyrinth of passages and hidden chambers. The possibilities of trapped and lingering air bubbles are not uncommon. That is the last thing I need before attempting fate super heating the system performing repeated high speed brakes in less than just 12 hours. Under those situations, the air in the system could produce spongy brake pedals and/or reduced braking performance. I was really upset at that point. That was one rare foul up by this guy, as I’m always keen on monitoring the fluid level in the reservoir. Upon closer examination … I see what the deal was. I had been fooled by the pockets around the tank, giving an illusion of ¼ tank filled. It’s a complete mystery why this hasn’t happened countless times in the past, but I sure got caught like a fly this time. My first attempt to replenish the system produced an unsatisfactory result. The brake pedal might as well be the clutch pedal … it went straight to the ground. I repeated the procedure once again, but now I’ve got another issue. I’m running out of fresh brake fluid and it is now 1am. By the very last drop, I managed to get her to a workable state, but far from track ready. Tired and defeated, I succumbed in hopes of bumming some fluid from fellow trackers at Buttonwillow. The odds are actually quite good and people are always kind around the track. With that thought, I grabbed a quick hot shower to ease the sores from elbowing the grease then it was off to bed to rack up as much Zs (not the 350 variety) as I could.
The alarm fired promptly at 4:45am sharp. I finished the very last bit of packing and it was off to rendezvous with Tony (Hydrazine from Motordyne) in the Magic Mountain area roughly an hour away. We met up and made a brief pit stop at the local Carl’s Jr. and Shell gas station tanking up our body as well as the car for the day. The trek up the I-5 towards Buttonwillow was fairly eventless. The sky was grey and the air was cool. Some may see it as being gloomy, but I find it as calm and relaxing. Upon entering the Grapevine we were sprayed with a light shower. It brought back some of the concerns of a possible spoiled event (rain) at Buttonwillow. I was hardly fussed, however, knowing as history have often played out in the past, a 30% rain forecast is about as good as 0%. Knock on wood. We made good time tucking neatly behind fast traffics, minimizing visibility to the local troopers as best as we could. V1 was always on the alert and only one bogie was picked off on the way. He was already busy busting someone from the incoming side, so no worries. We arrived promptly and in one piece.
Pulling into the pit area, we see a group of G35s have already settled themselves in quite nicely. It was a warm and welcoming sight; felt a lot like seeing old family members after a long time apart. Oh, did I mention the sky and weather couldn’t have been lovelier? It was no surprise for this veteran.
Amongst the middle of the pack sat a strikingly sharp Daytona blue 350Z. “Cool!” I thought to myself. For once, another Z came out to play with their cousins 
. It is still a complete mystery to me why I don’t see more 350Zs track side. Then again, there wasn’t much of a G35 showing before I came along either. Perhaps, other track clubs have better luck with the VQs participating??? In any case, I didn’t get to meet the owner of the Z in person until much later in the day. As it turned out, he’s a local from Gardena and was a nice fella. This was Mark’s very first track event and he’s had quite an experience to tell; more on Mark to follow. The group did quickly befriended him and also invited him to join us for dinner that was to follow later.
After signing in and attending the mandatory driver’s briefing and getting assigned the appropriate students for instruction, I scrambled back to the car to begin further air purging of the brake system. But first, I needed to find someone with some DOT4 racing fluid. As luck would have it, our good friend Ed (Eagle1) had a spare bottle of ATE (good stuff) … so that was easy. Thanks buddy! I decided to do this bleed manually. While pressure bleeding does work very well, it is not the best way to go about ridding the air trapped in the master cylinder and ABS reservoir. I decided to go manual style and quickly recruited AJ (Zazaracing) to be the pedal operator, while I worked the valves in a very concise synchronized dance. Now I remember why I hate manual brake bleedings ... slow and lame! Thanks for the help Avo! At last, we managed to get my brakes back to it’s original firmness and the rest was history … for the good that is. The brakes worked flawlessly all day. Thanks again to good people.
… to be continued.
My day actually started the evening prior as I perform the familiar ritual of slowly transforming the daily driving G35 to a track star. If I had my way the ordeal would have already been completed days in advance. But at last that is not possible, because her duty as a tolerable people mover does not expires until I literally pull into the garage after work. So began the midnight oil burning begin, but not until I’ve watched the latest episode of ‘The Apprentice’ on TV of course.
Yes, I have heard of TiVo and I own two of em, but some stuff are just not the same when not watched live. Besides, the TiVo’s already bloated with ungodly amounts of American Idol episodes recorded for Donny (Dizz). He’d be really upset if I purged them. It was going to be a long night …as always.The motivation is always high during the ‘preparation’ phase, as happy thoughts and expectations of the upcoming event temporarily blind sight the hippocampus; work (on the car) was perceived as being fun. I made record time performing and checking off the items in the familiar ‘to do list’ I had compiled over the years. Changed engine oil and filter, adjusted the sway bars to track setting, brake pads swapped for race compounds, etc. etc. Next came the brake bleeding routine; typically a grueling two man affair. Thank God for the Power Bleeder, a nifty little pressure inducing system that straddles on to the top of the reservoir tank, squeezing the fluid out with a gentle 15 pounds of force. Two corners into the bleeding process disaster struck. I was startled by a gurgling note not unlike that of someone just finishing off the last bit of their Pepsi. Yikes! I instinctively closed the bleeder valve as fast I could manage, but it was too little and too late. I had let the brake fluid reservoir run down. Precious exotic Motul RBF600 DOT4 racing fluid is now being replaced by nothing but air … literally. Boy this is not good! Behind modern ABS equipped braking system is a labyrinth of passages and hidden chambers. The possibilities of trapped and lingering air bubbles are not uncommon. That is the last thing I need before attempting fate super heating the system performing repeated high speed brakes in less than just 12 hours. Under those situations, the air in the system could produce spongy brake pedals and/or reduced braking performance. I was really upset at that point. That was one rare foul up by this guy, as I’m always keen on monitoring the fluid level in the reservoir. Upon closer examination … I see what the deal was. I had been fooled by the pockets around the tank, giving an illusion of ¼ tank filled. It’s a complete mystery why this hasn’t happened countless times in the past, but I sure got caught like a fly this time. My first attempt to replenish the system produced an unsatisfactory result. The brake pedal might as well be the clutch pedal … it went straight to the ground. I repeated the procedure once again, but now I’ve got another issue. I’m running out of fresh brake fluid and it is now 1am. By the very last drop, I managed to get her to a workable state, but far from track ready. Tired and defeated, I succumbed in hopes of bumming some fluid from fellow trackers at Buttonwillow. The odds are actually quite good and people are always kind around the track. With that thought, I grabbed a quick hot shower to ease the sores from elbowing the grease then it was off to bed to rack up as much Zs (not the 350 variety) as I could.
The alarm fired promptly at 4:45am sharp. I finished the very last bit of packing and it was off to rendezvous with Tony (Hydrazine from Motordyne) in the Magic Mountain area roughly an hour away. We met up and made a brief pit stop at the local Carl’s Jr. and Shell gas station tanking up our body as well as the car for the day. The trek up the I-5 towards Buttonwillow was fairly eventless. The sky was grey and the air was cool. Some may see it as being gloomy, but I find it as calm and relaxing. Upon entering the Grapevine we were sprayed with a light shower. It brought back some of the concerns of a possible spoiled event (rain) at Buttonwillow. I was hardly fussed, however, knowing as history have often played out in the past, a 30% rain forecast is about as good as 0%. Knock on wood. We made good time tucking neatly behind fast traffics, minimizing visibility to the local troopers as best as we could. V1 was always on the alert and only one bogie was picked off on the way. He was already busy busting someone from the incoming side, so no worries. We arrived promptly and in one piece.
Pulling into the pit area, we see a group of G35s have already settled themselves in quite nicely. It was a warm and welcoming sight; felt a lot like seeing old family members after a long time apart. Oh, did I mention the sky and weather couldn’t have been lovelier? It was no surprise for this veteran.
Amongst the middle of the pack sat a strikingly sharp Daytona blue 350Z. “Cool!” I thought to myself. For once, another Z came out to play with their cousins . It is still a complete mystery to me why I don’t see more 350Zs track side. Then again, there wasn’t much of a G35 showing before I came along either. Perhaps, other track clubs have better luck with the VQs participating??? In any case, I didn’t get to meet the owner of the Z in person until much later in the day. As it turned out, he’s a local from Gardena and was a nice fella. This was Mark’s very first track event and he’s had quite an experience to tell; more on Mark to follow. The group did quickly befriended him and also invited him to join us for dinner that was to follow later.After signing in and attending the mandatory driver’s briefing and getting assigned the appropriate students for instruction, I scrambled back to the car to begin further air purging of the brake system. But first, I needed to find someone with some DOT4 racing fluid. As luck would have it, our good friend Ed (Eagle1) had a spare bottle of ATE (good stuff) … so that was easy. Thanks buddy! I decided to do this bleed manually. While pressure bleeding does work very well, it is not the best way to go about ridding the air trapped in the master cylinder and ABS reservoir. I decided to go manual style and quickly recruited AJ (Zazaracing) to be the pedal operator, while I worked the valves in a very concise synchronized dance. Now I remember why I hate manual brake bleedings ... slow and lame! Thanks for the help Avo! At last, we managed to get my brakes back to it’s original firmness and the rest was history … for the good that is. The brakes worked flawlessly all day. Thanks again to good people.
… to be continued.
05-12-2005 | 01:26 AM
#45
Registered User
Joined: Jan 2004
Posts: 273
Likes: 0
From: Anaheim Hills
I was driving the Silverstone Z. Was just checking out the results of the day and I se they must only post each drivers best time . I am listed as 02:27.735. Clint what kind of tires and brake pads did you run? I see you came in 3rd in your class.
Last edited by RKnight; 05-12-2005 at 01:39 AM.
06-16-2005 | 03:53 PM
#46
Registered User
Joined: Sep 2002
Posts: 73
Likes: 0
From: Anaheim, CA
Originally Posted by RKnight
I was driving the Silverstone Z. Was just checking out the results of the day and I se they must only post each drivers best time . I am listed as 02:27.735. Clint what kind of tires and brake pads did you run? I see you came in 3rd in your class.
06-16-2005 | 04:24 PM
#47
Originally Posted by RKnight
I was driving the Silverstone Z. Was just checking out the results of the day and I se they must only post each drivers best time . I am listed as 02:27.735. Clint what kind of tires and brake pads did you run? I see you came in 3rd in your class.
As usual ... I never did get a chance to throw down some hot laps. I was busy instructing and giving rides at approx. 8/10 effort and slowing a lot to let traffics by.
The tires I use are scrubbed (old race worned) Hoosier R3S03s that I've acquired from race teams on the cheap. They are conservatively sized at 225/245 (same as oem). I do have 13" Stoptech all around and am using Cobalt Spec VR pads (front) and Hawk HP+ (rear) pads.
Looks like you were cooking pretty nicely out there. Track was a mess during the first half of the day. Lots of mud-luvas!
See you out there next time!
Cheers,
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