Another Monaro for the track (occasionally)

[Q_Cars]

Well, here goes another voyage of discovery for tweaking up my recently acquired Monaro into a half-decent track day car. Lots of fantastic info on the forum and of course through the great threads of both Listy and groboz that I have devoured with interest.

About 6 weeks ago I bought an 80,000 km 2005 VZ Monaro (manual), after 4 years of fast germans (a 2003 Audi RS6, and then a 2006 Merc E63 AMG). Both great and bloody quick cars, but eyewateringly expensive to maintain once out of warranty. While shorter on refinement, the Monaro is excellent bang for the buck (and I do pay attention to the rantings of Mr Clarkson).

The previous owners of the Monaro I bought had already put some serious investment into the engine, through Paul Manuell Racing here in Auckland. It had most of the obvious stuff done: OTR CAI, 80mm intake, custom induction, 1 7/8 tri-Ys with decatted 3" difillipo (road legal in NZ for cars older than 2010 apparently!), cam, springs, double-row timing chain, 25% underdrive pulley, beefed up clutch & ripshifter. Short of heads and stroker, it's pretty much the ducks guts from the mojo perspective. Engine is v strong, and the exhaust setup works nicely, relatively quiet & drone-free in the cabin at cruise and bellows beuatifully when you get into it.

Brakes were the standard PBR-sourced Monaro items, and adjustable front sway bar was fitted, KYBs with modestly lowered King springs. All up $32K NZ that stacks up pretty well against a range of bog standard cars available (proving once again that you NEVER get your money back on mods!).

Here's a couple of average shots taken in the pits at the new Hampton Downs circuit about an hour south of Auckland. Next posts will start to tell the track day development story...

http://i1221.photobucket.com/albums/dd478/RS6NZ/Mon1.jpg
http://i1221.photobucket.com/albums/dd478/RS6NZ/Mon3.jpg

[Azman]

Nice ride.

[Q_Cars]

Got a wee bit behind in the story owing to work travel. Here's the next installment.

I've set myself the target of spending no more than $10K in mods over the course of the development of the car (not counting consumables, pads, rotors etc). I am not trying to make a track car, rather something that can go well on the track and still be driveable on the road for weekend fun. Focus on brakes, suspension and steering, with the appropriate risk management investments in cooling (eg power steering).

I did the usual thing and went to Race Brakes in Auckland expecting to have to spend a reasonable wallop ($5K ish) on big brakes. Steve did an amazing thing for a supplier and talked me out of it, and into spending about 600 bucks on Ferodo DS2500s and Penrite 600 race fluid. He reckoned that investment would give me fade-free performance and more braking than the car would cope with given the current setup.

First track day was an absolute blast, and a learning curve all at once. Have done heaps of track days on my bikes (including over 3000 laps of Phillip Island from 8 years in Melbourne) but only 2 in a car before. I use the relatively newly built Hampton Downs circuit about an hour south of Auckland. About 2.8 km, 6 turns with a lot of elevation change. Lap record is 59.840 in a Lola T400 HU7 Formula 5000. Verrry cool car! NZ V8 Supercar lap times are around 1.04.

So what was it like?
Firstly, no shortage of power. I kept pace on the straight with a 429 Mustang that does well in the Muscle car series and is capable of doing a 1.10 lap time. I was just touching 200 on the straight. Easily more mumbo than either car or driver need at the moment.

Brakes were superb, fade free over 15-20 minute sessions, and constant pedal feel from the beginning to the end of the day. Big tick in that box.

Tyres. Rubbish. While the Dunlop DZ101s are good road tyres they sucked on the track, squeally, gave up early (but predictably) and very easily into ABS activation mode.

Handling. Hmm. Work to do here (no surprise). Big understeer (I'd had a standard wheel alignment done beforehand) as per most experiences of Monaros on track, and the much discussed slow steering rack was much in evidence - big armfuls of lock needed to turn in. Once I'd actually got into the corner, it became more fun, and was pretty easy to balance on the throttle (and nice and taily when I wanted to be naughty on the warm down laps).

By the end of the day I was able to do 1.25s with some regularity. Got some onboard footage together with overlayed GPS timing from a very cool iPhone App Harry's Laptimer Pro (NZ$25 but great features). I was there with a mate in a nicely set up '69 Camaro so some nice onboard shots of him at play.

By the way, the sound is crap turn it down if you watch (open window wind noise stuffed up the onboard mic in the camera).


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YcluvbVxunA&feature=plcp (before anyone laughs, the MX-5 that passed us was sporting a 250rwkw LS1 engine - honest! - under the bonnet - fitted v nicely!).

A good start, and clearly next level of improvement, its handling and tyres!

[Q_Cars]

My mate with the nicely set up Camaro had his suspension work done at Centreline Suspension here in Auckland and gave them a big thumbs up, which was good enough for me. I went and had a yarn with Chris about what I was trying to achieve, and we agreed to take a staged approach to improvement to help manage the wallet impact and to help gauge the effect of the changes (ie not try and change too many things at once). I left the car with him to assess and he came up with some interesting stuff:

- the KYB shocks were pretty marginal in terms of stiction and damping
- a previous owner (or their workshop) had installed the front adjustable Whiteline sway bar upside down
- one of the front brake reaction bushes had blown, meaning there was about 15 mm of fore-aft movement of the left front wheel under braking
- the same side radius arm was bent as was the rim, suggesting that there had probably been a pretty big pothole or kerb moment at some stage in the past

Chris sorted all the issues identified above, and fitted a nice set of Bilstein struts and King Springs (just a modest drop), and set up the alignment for some more toe-out in the front to help turn-in on the track. Chris reckons the steering geometry setup of the Monaro is such that they actually generate reasonable negative camber as soon as the steering goes off-centre, and didn't recommend too many radical changes to try and get more neg. camber up front. Costs all up were about $3.5K (mostly the shocks).

So, off to the track again, for a nice sunny afternoon's play. I demonstrated a complete lack of IT capability and buggered up my Laptimer settings (somehow loaded Eastern Creek GPS settings on top of Hampton Downs, thanks to not reading the instructions right) so didn't get any reliable laptimes, but did get speed info.

Seat of the pants, the toe-out changes were definitely noticeable as initial turn-in was much crisper, however the front end felt quite pushy and understeery on entrance. The new settings and the Bilsteins were clearly helping mid-corner & exit speed though as I noticed I was carrying about 8-9 kph more speed down the straights than last time, topping 209 kph. Promising anyway.

Towards the end of the day I started to notice some pedal pulsing and a slight judder from the right front under hard braking, which signalled (I thought) a warped rotor, so I played it safe and called it a day....

.....luckily as it turned out.

As I drove off down the 100 kph road back to Auckland, I heard what sounded like a big rock go bouncing round under the car, which I initially though was picked up because of the warm sticky tyres. Faaark!!!! About 5s later all hell broke loose, the wheel started to shudder, a loud squeal from the front end, and the car slowed as if I'd hit the brakes. I just managed to get the car to be partly on the shoulder thinking I'd done big time damage to the engine, but then realised the engine was happily idling away but the front brakes appeared to be on solid. I had to drive the car forward a few metres against a locked wheel to get it safely off the road.

A check of the front end showed what looked like a front wheel that appeared to be off-centre with the hub, and a deflated front tyre. But I then saw what had really happened when I saw a big score mark right around the inside of the rim. The 'rock' I'd heard was in fact the top-most caliper bolt flicking out, the brake caliper had rotated forward into the wheel and locked it solid. That also explained the pulsing and judder I'd felt on the track - it was the caliper coming loose as the bolt loosened and the caliper vibrating was causing a pressure wave in the hydraulics. Couldn't quite work out why the tyre was down at the time.

Bloody glad it happened at 100 kph on a relatively clear road and not 209 kph down the concrete-barriered chute at the track...

A nice ride back home with the Monaro on the AA (like NRMA) flat-bed, dropped the car back at Centreline and called Chris to tell him 'Houston we have a problem'. He confirmed my diagnosis the next day, and even though his spanner man was sure he'd properly torqued the caliper bolts after the strut install, Chris was a bloody trooper. He said he'd sort all and any damage, at his cost, no arguments and not even the slightest attempt to duck any responsibility. Top bloke. He also offered free labour on the next 2 jobs and trade prices on all parts. It hurt him a bit though because the cause of the flat tyre became obvious once the rim was off. Check out this pic of the inside of the rim:

http://i1221.photobucket.com/albums/dd478/RS6NZ/2012-08-27164432.jpg

The caliper had punched right through the inside of the rim, flattened the tyre and when I'd had to drive it off the road, it ripped open the sidewall of the tyre so that was shot too.

Chris ordered in a new rim from Holden (none available in wreckers) checked out the caliper, loctited the caliper bolts in and we're good to go.

I'm now booked in for the next phase of development, get the car back tomorrow, tell you about that story soon...

[amckiwi]

Buy a lotto ticket buddy

You have to wonder if a WOF check should have picked up these items
- one of the front brake reaction bushes had blown, meaning there was about 15 mm of fore-aft movement of the left front wheel under braking
- the same side radius arm was bent as was the rim, suggesting that there had probably been a pretty big pothole or kerb moment at some stage in the past

Am enjoying your posts
Stu

[Q_Cars]

Thanks mate!

Had similar thoughts myself re quality of inspections. Prior to the brake reaction bush issue being discovered, the car had been through a pre-purchase inspection, new WoF, and the 80,000 km service at Schofields (Auckland main Holden dealer) within a month. None picked it up. Really makes you wonder....

I'm feeling already that I have won lotto given than a front right wheel lockup at 200+ at HD would likely have had me into the wall at the entrance to Turn 1. Getting out of all that with a straight car, and no cost at all is good enough for me.

Having said that, it's 'eyes open' doing track days. Sh#t happens, and if you spend your time worrying about it, then you're doing the wrong thing. Still love the feeling you get from the 100% focus on the driving experience you get on the track.




Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

[Q_Cars]

So, picked up a set of 235/40-18 Dunlop Direzza Star Spec Z1s for $350 per corner fitted on special from Dunlop's Motorsport department (i suspect because the Z2s have been released). These are at the 'road' end of road and track tyres (eg compared to Toyo 888s etc) but since I do still use the car on the road occasionally I wanted to retain some semblance of wet weather performance. Interestingly, they seem to be slightly wider fitted as when I drove off I smelt burning rubber after a while.

Closer inspection showed that they were rubbing on the front strut shaft! Bloody Beaurepaires hadn't even bothered to check the wheels for rotation after they fitted them for me.

Off to Centreline for some further tweaking, unfortunately involving winding off a bit of the camber to give the tyres some clearance! We'll work on that one later one, probably modify the struts a little to allow for some more neg camber.

The focus for the time being is to try and dial out as much of the understeer as possible, and progressively sort out bushes etc. Nolathane bushes into the rear suspension points, and the Whiteline rear sway bar fitted, rotors got a skim (next stop will be some DBA slotted rotors).

A good day on the track on Sunday, and looks like I've picked up a couple of seconds a lap, the car is turning in quite nicely but still getting a lot of front end push on exit.

Will also start paying attention to getting the diff tied down more effectively (Harrop Sports Cover & Mount or something from Mal Wood?). While we're at it, probably have a look at the rear diff and make sure everything is tickety-boo) and looking into sourcing a linear HSV steering rack, and a PWR power steering cooler. That lot will start to chew into the budget!!!

[MANARO]

Wow man that was lucky, will make you think twice next time you get a vibration or noise in the car.

[Toddler78]

Wow, best outcome re the suspension. No doubt it was their fault for the failure, but great effort for stepping up to the plate and excepting responsibility for what happened and compensating accordingly. To me that is better customer service then a mob that never makes mistakes!

[feistl]

So, picked up a set of 235/40-18 Dunlop Direzza Star Spec Z1s for $350 per corner fitted on special from Dunlop's Motorsport department

The focus for the time being is to try and dial out as much of the understeer as possible, and progressively sort out bushes etc. Nolathane bushes into the rear suspension points, and the Whiteline rear sway bar fitted, rotors got a skim (next stop will be some DBA slotted rotors).

looking into sourcing a linear HSV steering rack, and a PWR power steering cooler.

Hey mate,

Firstly i run those tyres on my VX track car. Brilliant tyre, very long life span in comparison to most other slicks. They suit heavy cars (eg commodores) so will work very well for you. Price was pretty good as well.

Secondly, personally i recommend you stay away from whiteline/nolathane bushes... I did the full kit on my VX and had a couple of issues. First, i asked for a "complete set" at the same time i was ordering the whiteline sway bars... They did in fact send me (and charge me) for a complete set, they didnt bother telling me i got bushes with the sway bars (hence had left overs).
Second issue was the bushes are crap... way to soft for track use. I chewed out most of them within a few track days... Next time ill go superpro or similar.

Finally i am looking at doing the HSV linear steering conversion as well, so if you beat me to it can you write up a bit of a review and if you think its worth it?

Also, which car had these as stock? Apparently you need a HSV VIN to be able to buy it. Anyone here got one of these fitted? Id love to drive one a bit just to see what it feels like.

Cheers, Errol.

[dgp]

HSV's that had the linear steering rack in the VZ series were
The VZ Sedam Murphy Pack (NZ Only)
The SV6000
The Dealer Team Spec Option
Not sure about the HRT and Toll clubsports

[calais190]

Fantastic thread mate! Extremely informative and comprehensive. Your ups and downs show the typical events that unfold when you modify cars. It will be a fun journey, and I'm sure you'll love it!

Good pick up with the car too, you saved 10g easily getting it with all the engine work already done! :goodjob:

[Q_Cars]

Wow man that was lucky, will make you think twice next time you get a vibration or noise in the car.

Oh yes, particularly on track. Seriously reduced margins for error!!

[Q_Cars]

Wow, best outcome re the suspension. No doubt it was their fault for the failure, but great effort for stepping up to the plate and excepting responsibility for what happened and compensating accordingly. To me that is better customer service then a mob that never makes mistakes!

Totally agree. Just imagine how many businesses would keep customers by simply saying 'we stuffed up, very sorry, how can we make it right for you". Marketing 101 teaches that retaining customers is a lot lower cost than acquiring new ones.

[Q_Cars]

Hey mate,

Firstly i run those tyres on my VX track car. Brilliant tyre, very long life span in comparison to most other slicks. They suit heavy cars (eg commodores) so will work very well for you. Price was pretty good as well.

Secondly, personally i recommend you stay away from whiteline/nolathane bushes... I did the full kit on my VX and had a couple of issues. First, i asked for a "complete set" at the same time i was ordering the whiteline sway bars... They did in fact send me (and charge me) for a complete set, they didnt bother telling me i got bushes with the sway bars (hence had left overs).
Second issue was the bushes are crap... way to soft for track use. I chewed out most of them within a few track days... Next time ill go superpro or similar.

Finally i am looking at doing the HSV linear steering conversion as well, so if you beat me to it can you write up a bit of a review and if you think its worth it?

Also, which car had these as stock? Apparently you need a HSV VIN to be able to buy it. Anyone here got one of these fitted? Id love to drive one a bit just to see what it feels like.

Cheers, Errol.

Cheers Errol, that's great info re the Star Specs and a good warning re Whiteline/nolathane. Horse has bolted on that one, but will monitor the condition of the bushes.

Will keep you posted re the steering rack. I'll have a crack at this one through the shop that did the engine work on the car (Paul Manuell Racing in south Auckland). They build and operate race cars and I suspect have got inroads to parts that us lot won't have. I'll follow this one up with them at the end of October once the credit card has recovered from the first lumps of dough I've put into the car.

[Q_Cars]

HSV's that had the linear steering rack in the VZ series were
The VZ Sedam Murphy Pack (NZ Only)
The SV6000
The Dealer Team Spec Option
Not sure about the HRT and Toll clubsports

Thanks for the info, that's a great starting point.

[Q_Cars]

Fantastic thread mate! Extremely informative and comprehensive. Your ups and downs show the typical events that unfold when you modify cars. It will be a fun journey, and I'm sure you'll love it!

Good pick up with the car too, you saved 10g easily getting it with all the engine work already done! :goodjob:

Thanks heaps mate! I'm loving the journey so far, and having an absolute blast on track (and it's nice not being the slowest car out there :nyuk:). I fully expected some ups and downs, although punching a hole through a rim with a brake caliper was a bit left field I have to say!!).

I'm stoked with the deal I got on the car, and (fingers toes and everything else crossed) I'm really impressed with how strong the engine is. Engine temp, water and oil levels are all rock solid after 3 track days, and it happily revs to the 6500 cutoff (which I've accidentally hit a couple of times :doh:) all day (normally upshift at 6k though to be a bit sympathetic).

Just have to keep the red mist at bay :vpo:

[Q_Cars]

The Hampton Downs circuit put on a twilight session yesterday from 4.30 to 7.30pm. Beautiful sunny late afternoon/evening with cooling air temps but still quite warm track temps.

No upgrades since last time, but down to 1.23.8 as best lap time. Definitely work to do on the understeer, and more neg camber up front is definitely on the cards. Looking to install the Whiteline adjustable top mounts to pull the top of the struts inboard, which will allow for more neg. camber without fouling the strut (avoids the need to bend/weld the strut itself). Was also experimenting with gear selection through a couple of the tighter corners (60 kph apex speeds) where it is touch and go whether to use 2nd or 3rd. Second gives better drive (and reduced understeer) but for both corners means an extra gear shift before the next corner, whereas third had the tradeoff of slightly slower acceleration but cuts out 2 upshifts. My laptimer gives split times so will start a more scientific approach to that one!

Having said that, the Monaro was more than holding its own against other cars out there. I was chased by a Porsche 911 (996 model) who spun trying to keep up, and was lapping 1s faster than a 2005 HSV GTS with 330 rwkw and AP calipers. The day had a prestige car group circulating in their own sessions, including Ferrari 430 & 458, numerous Porsche GT3s, Maserati GranSport. Awesome sound from that group. The 458 was doing 1.17s.

Also looking at diff options as the (noticeable when I bought the car) amount of lash/clunk in the rear end is getting more noticeable, especially on light on/off throttle applications. The Harrop Sports Diff Cover/Mount + Truetrac looks the way to go. Getting a price on that from local Harrop distributor as we speak. Looking at other threads on the forum, this combo looks to be one of the preferred options.

The other upgrade was to my iPhone timing capability. Invested $200 in a Dual XPGS150 (xgps150.dualav.com) remote GPS receiver that gives 5 Hz GPS sampling instead of 1Hz for the built-in iPhone GPS. This works seamlessly with the Harry's Lap Timer Pro app - well worth a look. Spend $25 on the app and you get amazing functionality and dead simple to use. Interestingly the increased sample rate meant that my apparent top speed as recorded by the App dropped by about 5kph (the software interpolates speed and position between the sample points - more rapid sampling reduces the interpolation errors).

Next track day on 17th - not sure if I can get the diff mods done by then...

[Q_Cars]

Truetrac and Harrop Sports Cover/Mount arrived today :-)

http://i1221.photobucket.com/albums/dd478/RS6NZ/photo.jpg

[Q_Cars]

It took a while but the Truetrac and diff mount are in, together with offset front strut mounts to allow a bit more neg camber up front. I eagerly headed off to a twighlight track day just before Xmas, and had an 'interesting' time....

First impressions of the changes front and back were good - much more positive turn-in (but still some sense of understeer) and waaaay more traction out back on exit. I slowly started to build up pace, and had a really nice play with a BMW M6 where we were pretty much keeping pace with each other, clearly his 373kW and the tweaked LS1 in my car were pretty close in terms of power output. There was one big difference though, he was running stock pads and would cook his brakes within about 4 laps, whereas the Ferodo DS2500s and the high temp fluid I am running just keep on keeping on.

Or so I thought. Towards the end of the second session I started to find that the brakes were struggling to pull up the car at my normal braking points. The session was ending so I was planning to investigate once I came in. I usually use the cool down lap for a bit of fun on the slower corners by turning off the traction control and doing a few skids, so I did that and...oops. I had what Casey Stoner referred to (ref. Valentino Rossi) as an Ambition Outweighing Talent moment...


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9hcjia_pFc

What I had discovered was that while the Truetrac indeed makes a big difference to traction, it also responds a bit different to the Holden LSD when you go to hang out the tail under power - it broke away much more suddenly and I couldn't catch it in time on opposite lock. :doh: I spun off into the grass, and while the video is a bit dark, I ran off onto the grass area that then runs up a slope. Unfortunately I hit a hard patch of dry clay on the transition to the slope and the front of the car dug in, knocking the tyre off the rim, and dinging the front bar just under the drivers side foglight, while the rear of the car skidded up the slope. The vid looks a bit more violent than it was because the impact knocked the camera clamp loose. What a star...

Anyway that was the end of that track day since I only had a space saver spare and I wasn't too sure if there was anything else damaged so I called it a day. The ding in the front bar popped out easily enough with my paint and panel guy and it'll need a respray.

It's got me thinking about getting an aftermarket front bar since the front end cops a heap of stone chips etc (in addition to off track excursions...). I'll post a separate post in the non-driveline section of the forum, but for anyone reading this, do you know whether I have to use a VZ front bar for the Monaro or whether other models' bars (eg VX, VY) will fit? I've got a sense that the VZ Monaro headlights were a different shape/size - can anyone confirm that? There aren't many VZ aftermarket options around but I've found a VY Supercar front bar for sale in NZ and I'm wondering whether that might be worth looking at.

Anyway, the brakes. I check the front pads & rotors after each track day just to keep track of wear, and they were fine. To my surprise however I discovered that the rear discs were deeply scored, and the pads had worn down to the backing. That had me confused for a while until I realised that it's because I've been driving with the traction control on, and it shows how hard the rear brakes have been working to control the wheel spin!! So there's another lesson - check front AND rear pads after each track day. Off to Race Brakes for a nice new set of pads, and I'll grab a set of the slotted DBA rotors to go with them. I'll also get the wheel alignment checked after the off road experience - the rims were fine (got them checked for straightness when I got the tyre refitted).

Plenty of learning experiences that day!!!

[Q_Cars]

It's been a while since the last update. Lots going on and only a couple of track days :mad: A few items attended to:

My little off track excursion also managed to trash the front right hub bearings, so that hub needed replacing before any more track fun.

The next track day I started to notice some pretty severe cracking in the surface of the front (OEM rotors). Check this out:
http://i1221.photobucket.com/albums/dd478/RS6NZ/IMG_0840_zpsea7b220d.jpg

I have replaced the front rotors with the DBA 4000 series rotors, which have the heat-sensitive paint on them. Interestingly after the first track day with the new rotors I noticed that the highest temp paint (630C) just started to change from red to white, indicating that the rotors must be getting pretty close to the 600C mark, which is too hot, so ducting here we come. The brakes performed well, but hat temp certainly explains why the OEM rotors went the way they did, and DBA won't warrant the rotors if they exceed that temp.

I've ordered a pair of the GTO duct brackets, as per feistl's excellent thread http://www.ls1.com.au/forum/showthread.php?162336-Brake-Ducting-and-Harrop-Front-Knuckle-Installation-Pics&highlight=brake+ducting.

And I managed to score a great deal on a set of barely used lightweight 18 x 8.5 (et 35) Koya rims that clear everything nicely (for $800), and 14 part used Michelin 240/640/18 slicks (ex Porsche Cup) for $300.
http://i1221.photobucket.com/albums/dd478/RS6NZ/IMG_0897_zpsd8794805.jpg
Will try those out at the next day and see what happens :nyuk: Hopefully no need to spend anything more on rubber for a while...

[duke5700]

Wrap your slicks in glad wrap and keep them somewhere the temp won't change too much.

[Q_Cars]

Thanks for that. Have got a nice cool, dry, dark storage area, so that should do the trick.

[duke5700]

Good win on the slicks though, the traction should go up a level or 2.

Now you are going to start bending things :evil:

[Q_Cars]

Yep, I've been warned to watch out especially for drive shafts & prop shaft when e.g. hopping kerbs...