what to prepare for first time track day...?

[robitrice]

TIRES...often the most overlooked performance change to any car.

[farberio]

I'm with StoplightAssassin. For now just do the basics, if your oil is a little old or getting close to the change interval, put new fluid in. If it's been a while since you last changed your brake fluid, that's a good idea too.

 

Otherwise, go as you are now and you'll see what you'll need to modify for the next time.

 

+1. Track is different from an autocross. On your first one you are going to experience super early braking technique and the importance of being extremely smooth with your steering inputs instead of trying to whip the car around the autocross course. Especially with the Spec B.

 

With any track day, make sure the oil is fresh and that the brake fluid is in good order. (I use a higher temp fluid, our car is pretty heavy)

 

As your progress you can go to better brake pads but not necessary for your first.

 

As far as everything else, even if the car is a beast its the driver inside that must be good enough to drive it. Upgraded pads and fluid, even with crappy tires, will still leave you a lot of room for growth as a driver.

[markc0220k]

thanks for your guys all great inputs, after i read few times... here is my buying list --- ss brakeline, ATE superblue fluid, probably front and rear lower arms bars. everything else will be remain stock. of coz, will do alignment and oil change before track day (dec 4th).

 

am i still missing anything please?

 

thanks

[StoplightAssassin]

That's fine. A performance alignment will do wonders for the car.

[markc0220k]

That's fine. A performance alignment will do wonders for the car.

 

"performance" alignment?

[markc0220k]

+1 to nm's list. I would go the same order. Brakes, tires, springs, sways, then stg 2 power mods

 

ok, searching around about brake pads and here are what i found...

 

 

cobbs = heard it's rebrand from others, not much better than stock.

ebc green = heard some miataes said it's worse than the stock pads! Red stuff's even gone faster than green!

hawks hps = very dusty and "dont bother with these on track" !!

carbotech = poor finish, doesnt like cold/wet/short life

hawk ceramic = another "worse than stock" pads. and acutally, i 'd tried it on my miata, it's extremely noisy, dusty and it's very hunger for all disks!!

 

i personally like axxis ultimate, it stop well on my maita, doesn't matter cold/wet, doesn't eat disk, i guess it's just slightly weaker than hawk ceramic, doesn't know if it'd fade on track.... oh, and some reviews say its dust is easy to clean and that's all i could find so far!

 

 

any other choices on brake pad please?

 

thanks

[StoplightAssassin]

"performance" alignment?

 

Yep. Increasing the negative camber will help the car turn in. You might only be able to get 1 - 1.5 degrees or so in the front, but that's pretty much the most you'd want for a daily anyways before the tires start to quickly wear unevenly.

[farberio]

The alignment makes a huge difference, but once again there is no point at this stage of your track life. Also, a track alignment and a street alignment are different things so unless you want to change it back and forth stick with your stock alignment.

[farberio]

ok, searching around about brake pads and here are what i found...

 

 

cobbs = heard it's rebrand from others, not much better than stock.

ebc green = heard some miataes said it's worse than the stock pads! Red stuff's even gone faster than green!

hawks hps = very dusty and "dont bother with these on track" !!

carbotech = poor finish, doesnt like cold/wet/short life

hawk ceramic = another "worse than stock" pads. and acutally, i 'd tried it on my miata, it's extremely noisy, dusty and it's very hunger for all disks!!

 

i personally like axxis ultimate, it stop well on my maita, doesn't matter cold/wet, doesn't eat disk, i guess it's just slightly weaker than hawk ceramic, doesn't know if it'd fade on track.... oh, and some reviews say its dust is easy to clean and that's all i could find so far!

 

 

any other choices on brake pad please?

 

thanks

 

I think everything you listed is a street pad. You need to really figure out how you want to do your brake pads as there are really three categories for track use.

 

1. Streets with SOME trackability. These need cool down laps if you push them but will act like normal pads on the street. Will be a bit dusty though.

 

2. Streetable Track Pads / Trackable Street Pads. These will be noisy and super dusty on the street, but their tempature range will work for the street in a addition to medium track use. You will get squels on the street under braking from time to time.

 

3, Full on track pad. The choices are endless and many and can very depending on what you want from your brakes. These are not suitable for the street but give you mad stopping power on the track. These need to be 'warmed up' to get into the proper temp range.

 

Options 1 and 2 allow you to keep the pads in your car year round, option three means changing pads at the track. If you go with option 3, you also have the option of dedicated track rotors. If you just swap pads you will want to find compatible pads. (ex, stay in the same manufacture. Hawk HPS for street and Hawk DTC-60 or 70 for track)

 

 

On my Subaru I use option 1 since its my DD, on my Mazda I am currently using option 2.

[nm]

The alignment makes a huge difference, but once again there is no point at this stage of your track life. Also, a track alignment and a street alignment are different things so unless you want to change it back and forth stick with your stock alignment.

Actually on our cars, our adjustment is limited so much, that you can use a pretty aggressive (compared to what is possible) alignment year-round.

I drive on my auto-x alignment year-round and get plenty of life out of my tires. At minimum, you can max out negative camber (with maxes at -1 to -1.5) and I'd recommend that as it will keep you from destroying the shoulders of the tires on the track.

[sachilles]

As far as pads go, if they make them for the legacy, I've been very happy with EBC yellows, where I've hated the reds in the past. I use them in my race car(impreza) that does varied duties with great success. I also have had them on my street cars, and they work well there. I have found them to be very linear.

Carbotech are good, but if you drive on the street with them, you'll regret it.

They have good initial bite, but die off quick. They crumble easier with street duty in my use of them, but in fairness, that was not the duty they were intended for.

 

For what it's worth, if you have a sedan, your stock alignment specs will be just fine for a first time track day. I wouldn't go to the expense unless you suspect there was a problem with it. If you start doing more of the events it would be worth it. No sense doing it now until you have a baseline of how the car feels to you. You can then adjust the alignment to better suit how the car feels to you.

 

Impossible for me to know, as my 05 is my first Legacy, so I don't know if this is how they all handle. However, it seems to handle better out of the box, than any of my impreza's did with oem suspension. I suspect my legacy is on oem stuff, but I don't know for certain.

[nm]

The Legacy is very predictable, besides lift-of-oversteer (which is also predictable once you get used to it). The long wheelbase makes it easy to handle sideways.

I've only spun it once and a half times on pavement, wet or dry (not snow or ice), and I kind of try

It handles quite well for the size, and they aren't that heavy at least in the early years in the low-mid 3300s.

A much better track car than an auto-x car.

 

The brakes aren't bad with good pads, but there's a shit load of heat. I like carbotech XP10s for my track pad, but I wouldn't use it as a daily pad. I use carbotech bobcats as my streets (they last forever) and XP10s as my track pads. My main issue is with rotor cracking, the front rotors need to be inspected closely every track day.

[markc0220k]

The Legacy is very predictable, besides lift-of-oversteer (which is also predictable once you get used to it). The long wheelbase makes it easy to handle sideways.

 

can you briefly explain how please?

[markc0220k]

thanks guys! like you guys suggested, i keep everything stock and just simply did oilchange/bleeded the brake fluid before track day. it didn't fade but after 3~4laps (plus 3 slow warmup laps before), it smell like sth was burnt. So i cold it down with 1+laps then let it sit at the pit for another 1+hrs. After that, i didn't see any crack so i brought it back on the track (started raining)! since then, it slowdown and stop pretty good!

[farberio]

Most importantly, did you have fun?

[Gire]

Did anyone mention brakes?

[nm]

can you briefly explain how please?

Go into a corner quickly and lift off completely. You'll lose your back end.

Do the same and when you need a bit of oversteer, partially lift off quickly but smoothly. You'll get just a touch of oversteer.

Best place to play with this is autox. Eventually, it'll be second nature.

[markc0220k]

Most importantly, did you have fun?

 

yea of coz', and i learnt a lot... from communicating with it, driving it smoothly and no need to mention - its sweetish "symmetrical AWD" ! : )

[markc0220k]

Go into a corner quickly and lift off completely. You'll lose your back end.

Do the same and when you need a bit of oversteer, partially lift off quickly but smoothly. You'll get just a touch of oversteer.

 

then when to start applying the accel? thx

[markc0220k]

Did anyone mention brakes?

 

 

i think the OEM brake pad/rotor/line is fine? or i just didn't drive it hard enough?

[wpmarky]

If you thought oem were gOod enough, I bet yOu could have waited later to hit the brakes, and hit them a bit harder.

 

Brakes were first on my list

[RochNY91TSI]

i think the OEM brake pad/rotor/line is fine? or i just didn't drive it hard enough?

 

You didn't (probably won't) drive it hard enough. It takes a few times out to really understand what you're doing and to get faster. I thought the stock brake setup was fine my first time out too...

[rob-2]

I would run a 5w40 syn oil. On the track a regular 30 is going to get thin under the high heat. Check your manual 100f+ suggests a 40 weight.

 

You're probably going to chew through pads but that's fine. Have fun!

[wpmarky]

then when to start applying the accel? thx

 

You have to feather the throttle during turns, and roll back on the throttle after you apex as soon as you can without going off track.

 

If at the end of your turn, you're in the middle of the track, you took that turn too slow: accelerate sooner & brake less. You should almost always be carrying so much momentum into the turn that you drive from one edge of the rumble strips to the other, unless you're in back to back turns trying to set the next one up (ie sharp 90 degree 45mph right turn into a 90 degree left turn with not much room in between).

 

If your tires aren't squealing during your turn, use less brakes and get more speed in your turns. But not at the expense of using your tires to scrub speed. Sideways drifting every turn is not fast. Some pitch & slip is faster than none at all, but not until you get better.

 

If your brakes aren't fading by the end of your session, brake later and harder. OEM brakes should only last 2-3 laps before the performance goes down.

 

 

The funnest part of track days is learning the track turn by turn. Each session out work on mastering 4-5 turns.

 

If you find yourself backing up traffic at the same turn each lap, talk to people and ask for tips how they take that turn.

 

Ask someone in a more advance driving group to be a passenger in your car. They are a great help.

 

Don't use your ebrake after your session is done. Get a wheel chock block to stop your car from rolling while you let your car engine cool down. I let my engine idle in the parking area for a couple minutes to cool down.

[LosAngelesLGT]

+1 wheel chocks.