Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums General Autocross and Open Track 51 lbs air in front is too much!!

Autocrossed today and tried Chris Ludwig's (rrxp689) higher air pressures on my front KDWs. IMHO that's a big no go. I always go fast on my first run and am usually pretty consistent in my runs without big improvements at any given setup:

1st run: 66.595 clean, smooth run
2nd run: 67.139 got way sideways once
3rd run: 68.205 got tail-wagging sideways
4th run: 66.615 went slower and smoother again. Note similarity to 1st run time.
Decided that the car felt funny compared to running it previously at just 45 pounds at previous events. Lowered front pressure from 51 lbs to 46 lbs. Kept rear at 45 lbs.

Result: 5th run: 65.677

A full second faster on a run just as smooth as my 4th run at higher pressures.

We had high quality out of region visitors again so I PAXed my time against theirs. Heath McMillan brought his CSP Honda CRX that he won the 99 National CSP Championship in. He ran a 59.787 raw time. Renee Hines who is now running the same car at Atlanta and beating all the guys in CSP ran a little more than a second slower at 61.035. PAXing their times yielded:

Heath: 50.221
Me STS: 50.359
Renee: 51.269
Me G Stock: 52.147

I always run G Stock but on street tires so I threw in the STS for comparison.

Conclusion: Trust me when I tell you that my first run is often my fastest or close to my fastest. My times are nearly always very close together. So a full second improvement leads me to believe that 46 lbs in front is better than 51 lbs. With that pressure your contact patch is just too small. It is great for tire wear, though. I may start running earlier runs at 50 and then lower to 45 for the final run to save tires!! This was also on concrete where more rollover would normally occur, so if 50 was going to be good anywhere it would be on concrete.

I like to do some theoretical number crunching to see how I compare to other better autocrossers. It is always humbling.

I looked up the numbers for a couple of the guys I autocrossed against this weekend to see how they did at the Nationals. Heath with the CSP CRX finished 5th last year (1st in 99). John Darrow and his wife travel all over the southeast with their Miata. They are an older couple and are very good. But he still finished nearly last at the Nationals. I only say this to illustrate how great the competition is there. Also rrxp689 mentioned he ran against Jack Burns and did really well. Jack finished 4th last year in E Stock. I am also throwing in the times of the 1st place in B Stock and 1st place in G Stock for comparison. Times are the total of 2 courses in seconds:

Heath McMillan 5th CSP Honda CRX...106.050
Peter Raymond 1st B Stock 99 Miata.108.567
John Darrow 50th B Stock 99 Miata.117.530
00 Celica GT-S 26th G Stock......117.272
Jack Burns 4th E Stock Celica GT.114.588
David Fauth 1st G Stock Type R...112.948

At yesterday's race, John Darrow (time shown above) ran 2.5 seconds faster than me with Kuhmo autocross tires. With autocross tires, I am fairly confident I could have equaled his time. Carrying that logic a step further, I could probably have equaled his time at the Nationals as well. If I had it would have put me around 26th in a field of 40 plus. Not good. But you will note the Celica GT-S that did finish 26th was the top placing car of its make in the field, yet was slower than Jack Burns 140 hp Celica GT.

The point is a well driven 99 or 2000 SVT Contour with autocross tires, shocks and every other legal modification could be nationally competitive in G stock after the Type R goes to D Stock next year. Except for 5 or 6 cars, nearly every car faster than 26th was a Type R Integra.

hope you don't see any 4wd talon's there


Your right though, except for Matt's run this past weekend I was just about 2 seconds slower than most of the field of type R's. Considering I was on street tires and they weren't, I feel pretty good about my runs. I'm sure that if the Type R's leave, we'll be one of the most dominant cars in the class. Until something new comes along.

Matt and Dave, I looked up your Northern New Jersey autocross results and was impressed with Matt's times and Dave's,too, without autocross tires. I noted that the Talon guy you ran with finished 19th in G Stock at the Nationals. Matt is pretty consistently a full second faster than him. So if you subtracted a second from the Talon guys times on each Nationals course it would theoretically give Matt a combined time of around 113.8 which would have been good enough for about 4th!!! So Matt, depending on how well you believe your car could undergo protest scrutiny, I would strongly suggest you attend the Nationals in the Type R since this is the last year it is in G Stock.

EDIT: Matt is El Pollo Diablo

My bad on a couple of things. A full 13 out of the top 26 cars were not Type Rs. So half the CURRENT G Stock cars wer run against are still pretty darn fast. And as someone pointed out, every year there's new competition.

Second, Matt, I guess you are about half a second faster on average than the Talon guy so using the same methodology, it would have placed you around 11th with a time of 114.8 which was achieved by a 99 Camaro V-6. You are obviously still very competitive at the national level!

Finally, if someone wants to avoid going through scca.org, here's the web site for the stock national results from 2000:
www.scca.org/amateur/solo2/2000nationals/finals/results/stock

EDIT: Well, I tried but it don't work. Maybe someone can fix it.

SVT Cole, thanks for the praise so to speak. Although no offense to Matt, you need to check out Carlos's times vs. Matt. He's the dominant driver (when he bothers to show up that is.) in the GS class.

Hey Cole, what kinda tires are you running? And I never said it was THE setup, just mine. Wait till ya hear what I got planned for this weekend!

Chris

Chris, good luck with whatever you have planned. Ever autocross the Corvette? Talk about tire expense! I am still running G-Force TA upfront and regular Comp TA VR4 in rear so I have more oversteer than a G-Force/G-force front/rear combo. I thought I would try your set-up since you had success with it, but think its too much, and you are losing front end grip. Congrats on the STS win in April BTW.

Don't you work for Ford? I see you traded in the F-150 on a Dodge Ram Cummins diesel! Is it the new bodystyle? What's with the bluegrass killing the colts up there. Has your dad lost any?

Ran in Cincy today on the tightest course you're ever going to see. It was pretty rediculous but they did the best with what they had. Anyway, got pretty well beat up by another Sube. Lost by a little over a second and finished third to a well driven Civic Si. The moral is that I've been taking to heart what most of you have preached about the 50+ psi being too much and tried some lower pressures. Started at 48 and dropped it twice to end up at 45. I kid you not, the runs got progressively slower (with the exception of the first). On the last run I said what the hell and put 52psi in the front and ran my quickest time of the day. The car turned in alot better. From the middle off it was about the same, but alot more responsive on turn it.

I wanted to try to disconnect the front sway bar but didn't take the right wrench with me. That was going to be my wild test for the weekend since I thought the course would be tight anyway. I had no idea! Maybe next time.

I do work for Ford and build the Super Duty pickups (my Ram's direct competition :)) I just get tired of seeing 700+ trucks that look alike everyday and didn't want to drive home it one. I'm on my second Ram and have loved them both. The Cummins rocks! Alot of aftermarket support.

Funny you should ask about the foal disease, they lost a filly this week. They were supposed to have it autopsied this week to see what the cause was. They're not sure right now.

Take care.

Chris

I was Chris' "crew" for the Cincy AutoX and believe me, the 51 psi really seems to work for him. It may not work for everyone but believe me, after riding shotgun on one of his runs, that car will GRIP!