Riley's LE NA8

pepejesus · Postby **pepejesus** » Sun Apr 17, 2016 9:08 pm

Forgot to ask the most important thing - have you had a proper (from a place that does race cars not just the local corner shop) alignment done and what settings are you running?

This is THE most important and best bang for buck thing you can do for the handling of these cars. They are very sensitive to alignment settings and a proper alignment can transform the car.

Waiting until you can get a proper coilover or matched spring/damper setup sounds like a good idea. Gives you a chance to just focus on driving and honing your track skills, which is worth more than any fancy coilovers.

I would suggest not doing anything to the car (except.for the alignment if not done already) for the rest of the year and just focus on getting as much track time as you can, improving your driving and dropping your times. If your focus is on the track this is the best thing you can do.

Have you given the brakes a good bleed recently? A nice firm pedal might help with your braking and heel-toe issues.

RileyR · Postby **RileyR** » Sun Apr 17, 2016 9:35 pm

The wheel alignment was done at a reputable place, but its a conservative (not much camber etc) alignment.
Its my daily ride, I have a couple of sets of wheels but dont want to just churn through by daily tyres because of huge camber.
Having said that the outside edge of the old semi slick tyres were the only part of the tyre that was noticeably worn - more camber would definitely prolong my track tyres!
I might look into a bit of a better balance between track and daily alignment set up.
Yeah the brake fluid was only 6 months old before the track day, but I replaced it again afterward as well - noticeably firmer.
Since my clutch is on its way out I think I will go for a new na6 HD clutch and lightweight flywheel since ill need a new clutch and machine the FW anyway. But yeah I agree, I would like to see my times improve because im getting better not so much because the car is.

Its hard not to go too far down the 'track car' path. I still want to be able to enjoy it on a 5hr trip etc. Fingers crossed in 5 or so years I can afford a track car, trailer, tow car etc. But for now its just not an option.

pepejesus · Postby **pepejesus** » Mon Apr 18, 2016 12:53 am

It's toe rather than camber that will really chew out your tyres, and a good track alignment on a car like yours should have zero toe all 'round. You will probably wear the insides quicker with big neg camber but in my experience it's not enough to worry about.

That said I rarely drive my car on the street, so take that with a grain of salt!

RileyR · Postby **RileyR** » Mon May 16, 2016 3:32 pm

DIY brake ducts are going to happen soon

RileyR · Postby **RileyR** » Thu May 19, 2016 5:33 pm

Shifter rebuild happened and fresh Redline MT90 for the gearbox and turret. It feels so much better and shifts very very smoothly now - especially at high revs

RileyR · Postby **RileyR** » Fri May 27, 2016 5:26 pm

Unfortunately I noticed a few drops of oil where I park my car. Then every time I drove it and left it over night I would see a few more.

So I have been chasing the leak a bit like a blind mouse. From what I could tell there was oil coming down the from the front as well as the back of the engine. After lifting the tappet cover and removing the t-belt cover it didnt look like any oil was coming from the cam seals (thankfully!). And the t- belt was dry

So I replaced the CAS o-ring and reused the tappet cover gasket as its next to new and looks in good nick and applied gasket silicone to the 6 corners next to the cams. While the CAS was out I decided to replace the coolant temp sensor or thermo-sensor because its been running rich and hasnt been getting the same fuel economy that I used to - but maybe this is because I like to rev it more with the new exhaust. Either way it was an easy job (not cheap though) while the CAS was out. I thoroughly cleaned the engine bay and underneath so I can easily tell if its leaking again. Fingers crossed that fixes the leak and hopefully the new coolant temp sensor fixes my running rich (esspecially when cold) problem. :DIY:

RileyR · Postby **RileyR** » Mon May 30, 2016 4:48 pm

I havent finished the brake ducts yet (damn uni exams getting in the way of my hobbies). But a better wheel alignment is happening in a couple of days. Ive done a quick bit of research and it looks like the general consensus for a decent road and track set up is:

Front:
-2.0 deg camber
0.0 toe
lots of caster

Rear
-1.5 deg camber (or 0.5 less than the front)
0.0 toe

Hopefully this will be a good balance for a daily dríven car/ occasional track. I do want to be faster and have decided I dont mind a BIT of extra tyre wear to get there.
Any major objections to this set up?

The oil leak looks solved for now...
Brake ducts to come...

datfreak · Postby **datfreak** » Mon May 30, 2016 7:11 pm

Thats the wheel alignment specs I used also. (In Toowoomba I used Charlton Tyre service to do the work).

RileyR · Postby **RileyR** » Tue May 31, 2016 12:22 pm

datfreak wrote:Thats the wheel alignment specs I used also. (In Toowoomba I used Charlton Tyre service to do the work).

Ok sweet it must be a fairly popular set up. Have you seen excessive tyre wear? Good handling?

datfreak · Postby **datfreak** » Tue May 31, 2016 4:35 pm

Tyre wear seems even across the tread so far.
Yes this setup feels great, its more 'gocarty' with less input needed then before.
I put the konis and new springs in at the same time tho.

Magpie · Postby **Magpie** » Tue May 31, 2016 5:10 pm

You will need at least 2" diameter hose to get enough air to the brakes.

RileyR · Postby **RileyR** » Tue May 31, 2016 9:48 pm

Magpie wrote:You will need at least 2" diameter hose to get enough air to the brakes.

What I have is 40mm diameter (so around 1.5"?). Its smooth on the inside unlike conduit - so should flow better around the bends. As a test I mocked up a collector (that will collect the air from behind the gv lip) and stuck it out the window of my gf's car (with pipe attached). While doing 100km/h the result was that tonnes of air was flowing through at all angles - even with a 180deg bend in the pipe. even at 60km/h there was a fair bit coming through. It would be giving the brakes much more air than they are getting now.

Its a daily dríven car with hawk hp+ pads, so I dont want full race spec ducts with a new dust shields because the brakes will be too cold all the time around town. I want to be able to easily plug the ducts when im not tracking it or taking it for a 'spirited drive'. I also want the stock brake shield to 'scoop' the air like it was designed to when the ducts are not in use - so that's staying in place.

The ducts will not go all way to the rotor. The brake shield will be opened some more and the ducts will be 15-20 cm from it blowing air into the brake shield to 'scoop' the air into the center to get flung out through the vanes of the rotor. Im confident that this will provide much more air than before - as a result of my not so scientific tests. And the daily performance of the brakes wont be affected on my way to get milk and bread.

pepejesus · Postby **pepejesus** » Wed Jun 01, 2016 1:37 am

RileyR wrote:Ive done a quick bit of research and it looks like the general consensus for a decent road and track set up is:

Front:
-2.0 deg camber
0.0 toe
lots of caster

Rear
-1.5 deg camber (or 0.5 less than the front)
0.0 toe

Hopefully this will be a good balance for a daily dríven car/ occasional track. I do want to be faster and have decided I dont mind a BIT of extra tyre wear to get there.
Any major objections to this set up?

Looks like a decent compromise set up. Couple of degrees neg camber really shouldn't give you any issues with wear, especially with a few track days in there. The wear on the outside of the tyre on track should balance out any extra wear on the inside on the street. In fact you might still wear the outside of the tyre faster, depending on tyres, track time v street time, and how quick you are.

Do you have power steering or no?

RileyR · Postby **RileyR** » Wed Jun 01, 2016 7:53 am

Yeah the outside of my tack tyres scrubbed hard last time at qr. Ill watch the wear again and hopefully this time it will be less.

Yep its got power steering.

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RileyR · Postby **RileyR** » Wed Jun 01, 2016 9:29 pm

Got the brake ducts done today. I heeded your advice magpie and went with a bigger pipe, its now 4" diameter. I figured if it would give more air then why not. I cut the dust shields and angled them to scoop more air, made the collectors from an aluminium sheet and covered the exit of the pipe with fly screen to prevent any debris unnecessarily going to the rotor. I will find a new way to plug the ducts so that they can (very) quickly be plugged and unplugged - from what I have read brake ducting for daily driving isnt a good idea because the brakes are always too cold (when running higher temp pads). This stuff cost me under $50.