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I really want a track car! How many of you have one?

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Just use the S15. But if you get the bug, buy a cheap, old hatchback or BMW as a dedicated track car. It's much more enjoyable when you don't have to worry about breaking things.
 
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I can hire a track in Lichfield (west midlands) for £565 and the whole place is ours :) if anyone is interested in that let me know???

15 places £40ea
10 places £57ea

No marshalls
open pits

Enjoy :wack


 
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Definately a small lower speed track is a great introduction to anyone who has not had track experience. It allows you to understand your car on a track and will give you confidence to improve
 

S15_SAM

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I went down to a track day today local to me on an old airfield (keevil), it was rammed with such a diverse crowd, lots of caterhams, vx220's, a few scoobys lots of BMW's and one spectacular r33 gtr in midnight purple!!

They did it in 3 groups beginer intermediates and advanced in the morning and then they let it open pit lane for the last 3 hours!

Was really good, 1 golf blew up spectacularly, and 1 BMW broke. German=****!!! So defo gonna head there on the 10th of November to put my car through its paces!!
 
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im trying to get the 10th off now, if i can il book it up next week, be cool to go with another 15 even if it is just us. mike needs to man up iirc.
 

S15_SAM

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I get paid next week so I will book it up then! It will be good shane, all the guys there are friendly and you will end up chatting as much as your are driving! It's good cos everyone seemed to be there to have fun and not be the next Nigel Mansel!

Gonna put in some brake duct venting as all the ppeople brakes were hot and it's key to keep them cool! and get some 10w 50 oil and new filter, plus new gearbox oil!
 
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It's a good thing to do, brake ducting. I was amazed how much cooler my rotors were after I did mine. Fluid change is very important especially brake.
 

Jay

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me and a mate went to an airfield track day earlier this month in an old seat leon tdi. it was the best laugh i have had in ages. and the added bonus was that we both got loads of passenger rides in a variety of well sorted cars (ex time attack r33, 700bhp supra running 2bar boost, caterhams, exige etc)

this is something i would recommend, but be warned... its expensive to do it. average of £120 per day to run, then factor a pair of tyres, fuel, and if you unlucky, repairs. the leon we went in did 4 tyres (we wiped out the 2 fronts with understeer, then swapped front for rears and spent the last 2 hours laughing like mental patients at crazy lift off oversteer!!) oh yeah the leon also lunched the head gasket lol!

one other factor to think on. there are tight noise regs for most track days. if you turn up in a motor that is too loud then you will be asked to leave the track and no refund. 2 people fell foul of this on our day.
 
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I got rid of the my S15 as I wanted something track prepared, as I'm wanting to get back into trackdays. I'd taken my S15 on track a couple of times in the past and it was a very well suited car for the experience, especially being rwd, the handling with road legal slicks is as good as you can get. The main reason I sold it was after Japfest watching the Evo's dominate the track, then going on another trackday and ponsing a ride in a mates 400bhp+ Evo 6, we overtook nearly every car on track and lapped a few before we came off.

If I'm honest, an S15 will never ever beat an Evo on track after what I've been in. I bought a 500bhp Evo 8 and it is in a totally different league to my old S15, however the compressor wheel on the turbo ripped itself apart after 1 day:rotfl:, so it's been sat on a ramp for nearly 2 weeks waiting for the turbo internals to arrive from Japan so I can get it back on the road:D.

It's not all about power, rwd will never corner as well as 4wd. I had a lot of fun in my S15 on track but I went a lot quicker in the Evo, I guess it depends what you're after.
 
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S15_SAM

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I agree a road 4wd will be faster but Rwd will always corner better than an 4wd, it's just road cars are a different breed when on track! The best race cars are rwd, all to do with aero and clever diff's. where as road cars are too cheap for that!

Plus the fastest pro drag cars are RWD!
 
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I'm talking in general, Sam, I can't afford the trick rwd setups dedicated teams can. the quickest drag cars are rwd for a reason, transmission loss!

4wd for the poor man, so to speak, will always be quicker than rwd on a track. Not only that, but why do you think 4wd has been banned several times from competetive motorsport?
 

S15_SAM

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Cos it's gay! I'm afraid I'm just not a fan of 4wd, there's no excitement there for me atall with 4wd. I just feel its the easy way out! Take super cars... All the greatest are rwd the new lambo's and lambo's cheap brother the r8 are kack!

The only way a 4wd drive road car is faster IMO, is when it has 100+ bhp than a rwd counter part! But put a 300 bhp rwd car against a 300hp 4wd and then bye bye 4wd! Well that not totally true as the rwd would have to be well set up with sticky tyres!
 
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Rwd drive is 100% more fun, i stated that in my original post, Sam :D. My car was pushing out good power when I used it on track and I passed everything infront of me, so I will never ever say the S15 is terrible on track. I was very confident in its cornering capabilities and I took some high speed corners in it but when you're at a certain speed you can't keep the back end straight without feathering the throttle, that's all I'm getting at.

If you're truly set on rwd for a track car I coudln't recommend an S15 more. I had so many people mention how quick it was on track when I used it. It's very forgiving in it's control, I found mine very easy to control unless I pushed it past it's capabilities.
 
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I can also assure you 4wd is not boring when you have a toally mechanical diff setup, you can provoke it as much as rwd and it will bite, not to mention with a mass amount of power. If you've not tried it, don't knock it :D
 

craig8585

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The biggest tip I could give is to use something you can afford to be without. May sound a bit odd, but you will have a lot more fun pushing a £2k FWD to its absolute limit, than you would a fannying a £12k M3 round, for example.

S15's do make excellent grip cars as well as drift, if set up well. But most people with S15's can't afford to risk smashing them up on race tracks.



I've done many track days in all sorts now and my £255 eBay special Almera has given the biggest overall grin factor, eventhough its fairly slow in a straight line. So far it's been in a tyre wall at Snetterton (survived), bounced over the monster kerbs at Cadwell (survived) and blown up at Bedford Autodrome (fixed). All in all it's had around £2k spent on it, including the car.


If anyone is still in doubt, I invite you to an outing at Cadwell. Proof is in the pudding afterall ;)







 

S15_SAM

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I wasn't knocking your car Adam! You can't knock 500 bhp and an evo!

I've driven a varying amount of 4wd scooby's, a 400 bhp s202, 22b with plates rear diff, and a full rally car but I just never got that feeling out of them, but I'll admit I've never had them on track! So it's probably a different ball game!

I think your right Craig, if I enjoy the track days in my s15 then I will defo be buying a cheap track car, I just worry after using a 300hp car, going to something slower will be abit of a let down? Not sure tho as I've not done it yet!
 

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It's a totally different experience. I'm not bothered about the straight line speed - anyone can do that. The corners are where the fun is at ;)

I had my Silvia on track too and it was good fun sliding in 4th gear but I didn't dare go too mad because it was worth so much.

I'll be breaking my Almera soon and building an EP3 similar to Mike. That Should be quite some fun but fairly expensive.
 
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4w4 ...................... im going with sam on that one, speaking in terms of track setups, i think rwd will do faster laptimes, BUT there are exceptions i will admit.
The vast majority of track cars are rwd, would a 4wd F1 car be quicker..... no cause the balance would be all wrong for the style of car and would therefore be slower, I have watched a BMW track car thrash over a dozen of EVO9/10 track cars with the same power output and around the corners too, (mt panorama in Aust two years ago) the car that hold the fastest lap time here in NZ around one of our most used tracks in the 2ltr 4cyl bracket is a RWD. For road setups and lack of drivers skill then a 4WD will most prob beat all around it.
 
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