The Roadster NA Journey Begins

Magpie · Postby **Magpie** » Sun Aug 02, 2015 8:42 pm

FZ201's are made by Federal. Anyway I will find out next time I'm at QR and the car is 100%. Maybe Max Attack to test them side by side.

Dan thanks for the positive comments. I really felt comfortable in the car, if it was not for the mechanical issues I doubt I would have learnt as much.

Lokiel · Postby **Lokiel** » Sun Aug 02, 2015 10:36 pm

Magpie wrote::
G Plot looks almost the same, however the FZ201's have a wear rating of 60 as opposed to the AD08's of 180 (from memory). The FZ201's give very obvious feedback when over 34 hot like the AD08's however unlike the AD08's the FZ201's don't enjoy being pushed when too hot and will let go without much warning.
FZ201 by Eipeip, on Flickr
:

No, no, no - it's clearly a dragonfly!

Magpie · Postby **Magpie** » Mon Aug 03, 2015 8:16 am

Dragonfly or butterfly at least my car touches the bitumen :twisted:

Here are my thoughts that explains some of the difference between the AD08's and the FZ201's. There was no change in the alignment/set up used between JapNats, Morgan Park or MR Tuning. However the rear brakes have been overhauled, a different splitter/wing end plates since JapNats and driver was a little heavier.

1. At the MR Tuning day they assigned a person to check my tyres every time I came in and adjusted the hot pressures to 32. The AD08's did need constant adjustments after each session. In fact after session 4 a few were over 38 , however in sessions 7/8 there was no real adjustment required. I did my best times in session 6. I started them at 28 cold, not sure what they are now cold will need to find out.

2. At JapNats I did not check the tyre pressures as often as I should have, rather I just started with 26 cold. It was not until the car started to oversteer badly out of corners did I check the pressures, they were on average about 34.5. The moment I dropped the hot pressures down to 30 front and 31 rear did I turn in my best time. My bad that I did not pick up earlier that the handling was caused by tyres that were too hot.

3. At Morgan Park I kept a closer eye on the tyre pressures and kept them at 30 front and 30.5 rear. However the car suffered a bit from rear lock up earlier than the fronts. In contrast the rear lockup was not present at MR Tuning day due to the change in braking style, hence the problems at Morgan Park were more driver/technique related than a mechanical issue.

Which is the better tyre, well at the moment I would have to say the AD08's purely because if they are kept at the optimum pressure they grip really well. The FZ201's, they need another chance solely based on driver improvement plus they need more attention from me to keep them at the optimum pressures/temps.

Again it goes back to all the advice I have been given, nothing beats seat time. The more seat time I get, the more I push the car and what I once thought was a mechanical issue was in fact a driver issue. Hence, the FZ201's do deserve to be tested by a better driver.

MattR · Postby **MattR** » Mon Aug 03, 2015 12:39 pm

If no one else is going to say it I might as well, you are very immature Mark, putting up images of cock and balls on a family friendly forum.....

As you said the tyre performance can't really be compared between the two until you do back to back testing withe same care as done at the tuning day, also you need to be pumping out very consistent times over a few sessions to get meaningful results between them. At this stage you don't really know where the time is coming from, is it you or the car or the tyres.

The only real way is to have a couple of sets of sticker tyres and run them back to back so they are always the same age and use to see a direct comparison, that's why the big race teams spend so much time and money on testing and tyres. And then you have to play with the car set up to tune to each tyre, a very slippery slope of spending evqen more money.

For most of us, about the best we can do is find a tyre that meets our budget constraints and feels nice to drive on with our own driving style.

Magpie · Postby **Magpie** » Mon Aug 03, 2015 1:12 pm

Butterfly, cock and balls lets face it we all want to say vagina...

My times were pretty consistent at the MR Tuning day after the first few sessions, however I can't say the same for JapNats. I'll go out on a limb and say for the MR Tuning the speed came from the driver. Just need more seat time.

No sticky tyres for me, will only use R Specs

MattR · Postby **MattR** » Mon Aug 03, 2015 1:58 pm

R specs are the sticky tyres........

Although slicks are awesome, but open up a whole new can of worms regarding set up of the car.....

Magpie · Postby **Magpie** » Mon Aug 03, 2015 2:06 pm

Hence why sticking with the FZ201's, they are part of the cars baseline and required for consistency.

Magpie · Postby **Magpie** » Tue Aug 11, 2015 12:55 pm

IMG_2636 by Eipeip, on Flickr

Guess what my next project is since the MX5 is not the best as a daily drive...

speed · Postby **speed** » Tue Aug 11, 2015 6:28 pm

Well done, Rev that baby!

Magpie · Postby **Magpie** » Tue Aug 18, 2015 8:34 pm

Car goes on the dyno soon, fingers crossed it will only be another week or so till it is back

September is the start of a busy month with the car and driver, October 16-17 is getting close!

With the possibility of a job change in the air I can get some more track time in leading up to 16-17 October.

Will be offering up the Innovate oil/temp pressure gauge and the water temp/volt gauge. Also auto window regulators, centre console, oil accumulator, ITB vacuum manifold for idle air control and other parts that are at home and not being used.

Magpie · Postby **Magpie** » Thu Aug 20, 2015 11:08 am

Looks like the job change could become reality, I'm a bit sick of changing jobs but it is the nature of the industry I'm in. I could be going back to the company I started out construction with back in 1991 on the Gateway Arterial Old Cleveland Road bridges/interchange. Need to discuss time off for track days between now and WTAC.

ManiacLachy · Postby **ManiacLachy** » Thu Aug 20, 2015 12:48 pm

Hope you get some more track time out of it, mate

sailaholic · Postby **sailaholic** » Thu Aug 20, 2015 2:05 pm

Mark, coming late to the heel toe argument ( I've been awol on cars in general)

I taught myself to heel to in my first car as after the carb swap the choke didn't work and it could stall when cold if you were semi hard on the brakes.

After 10 years of using heel toe on the street I thought I was pretty reasonable... Until I started to teach myself to clutch less shift as I plan to get a non-synco box HR licence.

Learn to shift with out the clutch will teach you a lot about how much throttle you need for the right "blip".

It also has the advantage that it can be done while not on the brake. Therefore you can take the time to get it right. Start with up shifts then go down shifts. Pay close attention in the beginning to what revs you start and finish a gear change with using a clutch and then mimic.

I only use the clutch about 30% of the time now. The 5 speed box is super easy to do it with.

Once you have the rev matching sorted add the brake / heel to back into the picture.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

ndragun · Postby **ndragun** » Thu Aug 20, 2015 11:03 pm

sailaholic wrote:I only use the clutch about 30% of the time now. The 5 speed box is super easy to do it with.

Pretty hard on the gearbox internals though. I went through a bit of a clutchless shifting phase for a while... recently had the gearbox overhauled and had to replace the selector forks due to excessive wear. Prior to the overhaul I'd get the odd bite in the hand from gears clashing between shifts.