Going Autocrossing again

djr71 · Jul 9, 2014

In the 90' and early 2000's I use to autocross my fox bodies and my 94 all the time.
I have not been since 2001.
I just signed up for the Jeff Gordon autocross for leukemia at New Hampshire Motor Speedway in August.
Adding Cobra front and rear sway bars, BBK rear lower control arms, Gripp caster camber plates and Maximum Motorsports K member brace.
Can't wait.

RichV · Jul 9, 2014

Those are all good mods for handling. I would also check your upper control arms and make sure the bushings are not shot. Those guys make the rear end dance a little under hard braking when they have a lot of slop.

do you have decent springs/shocks?

g36 monkey · Jul 9, 2014

Sounds good man, I wish my car ran a bit better so I could put the countless dollars of suspension upgrades to use haha!

djr71 · Jul 10, 2014

I am going to check the uppers when it's on the lift. I have maximum motorsports springs and Koni shocks and struts. I also have a rear shock tower , frame connectors and moved the battery to the trunk.
Next is to upgrade the brakes. I bought a Cobra front bumper that I am going to put brake blowers in.

djr71 · Jul 10, 2014

g36 monkey said:
Sounds good man, I wish my car ran a bit better so I could put the countless dollars of suspension upgrades to use haha!

I did mine on the cheap swap meets, craigslist and ebay

RichV · Jul 10, 2014

Nice, sounds like you've addressed the main pitfalls of the chassis/suspension.

I wouldn't worry about coolers for auto-x. Mine would not start to fade until you were 10-15min into a session. Even then it was dependent on what track. The minute or so for a Auto-x run the brakes should not fade unless you have some crappy auto part store pads, or you're doing some serious hot-lapping.

What's your brake setup? I ran 99-04 GT front calipers, OEM rears, with Carbotech XP12/10 combo with great success. Properly cooled they never gave me issues or clam-shelled the 4 years I used them. I finally upgraded to 13" rotors with Wilwood 4-pot calipers because the pads were quite a bit cheaper and lasted much longer. Matched the rears with OE Cobra gear, Cobra MC, running HAWK pads now. The stopping power phenomenal, but more importantly it takes the abuse, and I'm not spending $220 every other race weekend on pads.

djr71 · Jul 10, 2014

The brake blowers are for if I make to an open track day. I have been thinking of swaping over to Cobra front and rear.
I would really like to get Wilwood but this is a low budget build for fun.

duh09 · Jul 10, 2014

If you're wanting upgraded brakes, check out the Fully Torqued setup. There is a thread somewhere on here, running S197 front calipers and GT500 14" discs. Seems to be a great budget friendly big brake kit.

I can't wait to get my car to a few events again.

KillNThrill24 · Jul 11, 2014

http://www.sn95forums.com/showthrea...p-GT500-14-quot-rotors-(UPDATE-amp-PICS-pg-4)

Pete, Josef, and Brett have put a lot of time and effort into this and I really think I want to take this route even tho I didn't want 18's.... Just for a reference man. Like said, this is the affordable way to put big brakes on your car

Rich nailed it as always as far as getting your car prepped and ready. Have fun, take pictures. And if it blows up, take more pictures

djr71 · Jul 14, 2014

Th GT500 setup never thought of that.
I will take some pictures. I can never figure out how to post them here.

CC'S95GT · Jul 15, 2014

djr71 said:
Th GT500 setup never thought of that.
I will take some pictures. I can never figure out how to post them here.

It's easiest to use a photo hosting site.

djr71 · Jul 15, 2014

Thanks guy I really appreciate the info and link to the post

djr71 · Aug 10, 2014

Just got back from the track what a great time. I have not run an autocross in years had a blast. I ended up being the fastest in my class and qualified for the final. I was up against a 2008 Mustang with autocross tires and I was on old bald Goodyear eagles. He was a couple of seconds faster than me all day so I took the run as just a fun run thinking I could never beat him. I smoked my tires from the starting line all the way to the first gate slid sideways out of most of the corners. I ran a 35 my best run was a 33.6. The other guy ran a high 31 but hit a cone. If I ran a clean run and tried I could have beat him with his cone penalty. Hew went on to run a WRX who went off course and was disqualified so the 08 Mustang won the novice category. The over winner was a 10 year old girl in a go-cart. She beat all of us BMW's, Miata, Civics she ran a 27 second lap.
After the solo event they lets us no the New Hampshire Motor Speedway road coarse. I was first one out behind the pace car. The pace car driver warned me not to tap his bumper. I thought we were going to go about 30-40 mph. We get on the track and he takes off I chased him we hit speeds of around 85 mph on the straight away. we pulled so far away from the others after a couple of laps at speed we caught le tail end of the cars that where behind us. I had my wife take a video but it was shaky and all you hear is my wife yelling he's slowing down your going to hit him.
I posted some pictures https://www.flickr.com/photos/26318984@N02/
The funny thing was during tech my buddy(95 Convertible) and I have cold air induction kits some guy was walking around talking about the two supercharged mustangs he was pointing to our cars.
I got to give my car credit the motor is stock 222,000 miles on it I ran 14 runs, 8 laps on the track and it was ready for more.
My wife was so excited she was talking about me getting tires, bigger brakes and when are we going back.