My Car Page - 私のクルマページ

July 7th Autocross and MaxQdata Logger

2007-07-08T21:41:00.000-10:00

Last Sunday was the 2nd race of Oahu's 2007 Autocross season and it was a virtual Miata Lovefest - with the most Miatas I've ever seen in one place. They were so many in all classes every which way you looked!!!

(thanks jon&erin for the action pics)

And...I finally got to use my MaxQdata logger "for real"...for the first time. Although it would sometimes register 40 to 60 mph without even moving...blue tooth problems???...it pretty much ran well enough to my satisfaction. Here is the plot of my final and fastest run of the day:

If you asked me what 1 lateral G felt like before, I would have no idea...but now I know. On this right hand sweeper my brother's eunos (the small red "x") was pulling almost 1 G (0.97Gs actually) steady state at almost 33mph. According to the data, the fastest speed I hit during the run was 40mph...which is surprising cause it feels a lot faster when your actually driving. The slowest speed was 22mph at 0.93Gs at the tight right hand U-turn at the bottom of the course. One some of the transitional turns, I got up to 1.05Gs, but these are not really steady state.At almost 1G on that first right hand sweeper, the G force actually makes shifting difficult as your totally slammed against the door the second you take your hand off the steering wheel to make the 1st to 2nd shift!!!

Since the data is only logging at 5 times per second (60 hertz?), it's pretty difficult to see differences of less than 0.2 seconds...although, larger difference are very easy to see. In this plot, I overlayed my fastest run and my slowest run and this was the difference in the end:

32.945 (the blue "x") was my fastest run, versus my slowest at 34.218 (the red "x")...as you can see, I forgot to look ahead far enough ahead on the run down to the U-turn and really "altered" my line...and ran over a cone...

At the end of the day, I also did 2 fun runs in the eunos and could not better my 32.9 run...BUT, I did accomplish something I wasn't sure I could really do...I went back down to 1st gear in the bottom U-turn using the heel-toe downshift technique. I must say that doing that stuff at race speeds is MUCH easier than trying to practice at pedestrian driving speeds...I guess the synchros just don't mesh well at non-racing speeds...

During the fun runs, I also got to run my brothers 6-wagon with the data logger. With his all-season tires and stock suspension, the most Gs I could pull were 0.75 in steady state and 0.83 in the transitions, with a top speed of 36.5mph and a low speed of 20mph.

One thing good about fun runs is it gives you more seat time...and although I couldn't improve my fastest time, my brother finally got "it" on his last fun run. What he got was the looking ahead part...and he bettered his best time by over 1 second!!! Good habits to have for the next race...

RESULTS: As far as placing goes, I got dusted again by in CSP by a good 2.5 seconds by the same M3 and a MR2 that beat me last time...Results http://www.sccahawaii.org/7-1-07.pdf I'm guessing I shouldn't feel THAT bad getting beat though... since they did have the 2nd and 3rd fastest times OVERALL!!! I'll need to track how close I can get to those guys in future races...

Eunos Arc Intake and 2007 SCCA Autocross Season

2007-06-28T21:56:00.000-10:00

Arc Intake: In addition to adding the very very slightly more? negative camber to my bimmer on Friday, I spent last Sunday installing this brand new "used" Arc Magic intake bought off of Yahoo.jp - courtesy of http://www.tetsuyagarage.com/. The install was really easy with the new part just slipping in. The challenging part was getting the old intake piping out without having to remove the top radiator hose.

At first I tried to jack up the passenger side of the car to see if I could "move" all of the coolant to the driver's side to remove the top hose. But that wasn't working...so, I just ended up playing Rubik's cube with the intake piping till I finally shimmied out. Surprisingly, although the right side looks more open, the piping came out on the left side of the hose!

Took it out for a quick spin and I guess??? it does pull a little stronger in the midrange. But who knows??? Should have actually done some "scientific" testing (3rd gear pulls from 2k to 6k) with my datalogger...but...with the gusty winds this past weekend, the data would have easily been flawed. Oh well...at least it looks better!

One downside I can see is that the new intake will be VERY GOOD at taking all the heat from the radiator and dumping it into the intake charge - as the aluminum is a terrible insulator. At least the stock plastic parts transferred less heat! I think I'll be going down to home depot tomorrow to look for some insulating sheets or something!

2007 SCCA Autocross: This coming Sunday will be the 2nd race of Oahu's 2007 SCCA Autocross season. Even though I put the new top-of-the-line RE-01 rubbers on my bimmer, for now, I've decided against racing that car in STS for lack of having enough negative camber. I figure, no sense in destroying those brand new tires. Instead, I'll run my brother's car again in CSP but this time with the new Arc Intake .

At the last race, in CSP, there was an E30 M3 that smoked me by 2 and 1/2 seconds!!!!! So no matter what help the intake might add, I don't think it will make up for THAT much time (lol). Plus that, this guy must be an awesome driver since he took 2nd FTD! Oh well....(again) My brother's eunos is actually THE car to have in STS2. In CSP, the 1.8 eunos is a better match up to the M3...

BUT...all is not lost...since the books I'm reading have really helped in teaching how to better "read" a course, and along with the datalogger, hopefully he doesn't put 2-1/2 seconds on me again...we'll see...

E46 and DIY Negative Camber:

2007-06-25T21:34:00.000-10:00

After much contemplation on whether to "touch" the stock suspension or not...I bit the bullet and decided to add whatever "free factory approved" negative camber I could to my bimmer. No sense in rounding off the shoulder on my brand new set of RE-01s.

Since I didn't want to remove the stock shocks to get at the strut hats, I took a dremel and a small punch to the stock alignment pins and shoved my shock towers in a WHOLE.....4mm!!! Not that I DIDN'T know the amount of camber would be so minimal based on how much room there was to move the strut...but what the heck...

Based on some geometry, the 4mm would gain me about...say... POINT 4 degrees (0.4 degrees) of negative camber...Whooopppiiiieee!!!!!

tan@ = 4mm/(21in x 25.4mm)

Therefore: tan@ = 0.0075

tan @ 0.25 = .0044 <--more than .25 degrees
tan @ 0.50 = .0087 <--little less than .5 degrees
tan @ 0.75 = .0130
tan @ 1.00 = .0175
tan @ 1.25 = .0218
tan @ 1.50 = .0262

Oh well.....any little bit helps as I definitely don't want my new rubber to end up looking like this...although...truthfully...better driving (ie. NO PLOWING) would have helped in avoiding my old tires getting this bad...

Yoshi!!!

2007-06-19T22:29:00.000-10:00

Spent this afternoon putting on my new treads.

At first I wasn't sure how it would look on the car...but now that I got them on, WOW....looks really good to my eyes!

Really tends to lighten up the look of the car. With the stock Bimmer wheels, the car looks a lot more chunky and heavier.

Out with the "old," but still pretty darn good lookin BMW stock wheels.

Difference in height looks to be only due to the difference in depth of thread.

Stock BMW 16" Type 45 wheels with 205x55x16 Bridgestone Turanza weighs in at a lighter 42 pounds, versus the new wheels at 46ish pounds.

Can't wait to get these wider treads on the autocross course...BUT, I definetly need to add some negative camber first as I definetly DON"T want the shoulders of these new 140 treadwear rated wheels to look the the shoulders of my Turanzas...

So...how should I add the negative camber??? Coilovers anyone???

4 Pizzas 4 Me!!!

2007-06-18T22:22:00.000-10:00

4 of these pies were waiting for me when I got home today...

Just had one...46#...20.5 rim + 25.5 rubber...

German Car + South Korean Wheels + Japan Tires = Some Kine of Hapa...

Not bad looking and it looked a lot better in the natural sunlight...had an option of going with the gloss black spokes and was this close --> <-- to going with black...but decided those would not stand the test of time as plain old silver for this rim style...

Hope to get em on tomorrow...

2006 SCCA Awards Banquet & New Shoes!!!

2007-06-14T22:56:00.001-10:00

2006 SCCA Annual Awards Banquet

Last Saturday, June 9th, I attended the SCCA Hawaii Region 2006 Awards Banquet and luckily came home with some hardware...and as you can see by the top pic...practically everyone else did too!!! Awards were given to the Points winners as well as the Championship Runoff winners. Thank goodness I got those driving books which really helped in the runoffs...

The awesome events committee made all the drivers these cool "car name tags" which were actually ice box magnets. Good for identifying people as I know most people by there cars...not the drivers...

New Shoes!!! Just ordered these today from Tirerack...

New 17" x 7-1/2" ASA wheels...these rims are relatively light (about 20.5 pounds), for their size and cost. I would have liked to go with some of the lighter and sweeter looking 17 x 8 wheels...but SCCA's STS rules limit rims to 7.5" wide.

With new 225 x 45 x 17 Bridgestone RE-01 Rubbers...from what I've read, these new Bridgestones are the "hot ticket" in STS.

MaxQData Logger

2007-04-23T21:32:00.000-10:00

I just ordered this MaxQData Logger http://www.maxqdata.com/ last week and I expect to receive it anyday now. You need to use it in conjunction with a Pocket PC w/ bluetooth so I'm glad I already have my HP 2495 ppc which should be perfect for the interface.

Although it costs $300 its suppose to be one of the best "tools" available to improve your autocross driving as several national champions were using this gps data logger to analyze their driving BETWEEN runs at the past SCCA nationals!

According to the experts, this data logger should have the same impact to better driving as what R-compounds have to better grip!

Here is a SCCA Forum thread that I have been following that discusses the pros of using this data logger: http://sccaforums.com/forums/thread/227266.aspx

Hopefully, it should help in whatever car I use.

April 8th Autocross - New Season

2007-04-23T21:15:00.001-10:00

Sequence into the last section of last Sunday's autocross.

Coming out of a fast right hand sweeper...
Into a quick right, then left...
Then a quick right...
Heading to the hairpin turn...
Setting up for the hairpin...
Turn in point for the hairpin...
In the middle of the hairpin ...
And a short burst to the finish...

August 8th was the first race of the 2007-2008 Oahu SCCA Autocross season.

Instead of racing my Bimmer wagon, I decided to run my brother's dropped Eunos on R-compounds in the CSP class. I did OK, considering, this car is totally underpowered (1.6) and under-tired (185 x 60) for the class.

Not to finger only the car, as I figure I probably left a good 1/2 second out on the course due to one very difficult decreasing radius turn that I NEVER got right...even in the 5 fun runs I took at the end of the day.

Check the position of my car, versus the M3 in the same hairpin. I apexed WAY too early and had to swing really wide for the next turns...thank goodness for the R compounds as I would have probably never made the turns with the ES100s.

Notice the properly positioned M3 much farther from the outside cones and already lining up for the next right hander. Not reading this turn right cost me big time - I think!

Here's me on the second run in the same decreasing radius turn where I got all crossed up in the turn...drifting away time...

Settings:
My brothers car has adjustable shocks and on one run I set it up with only a one-click difference between front and back...at that setting the car was practically undrivable do to the back end breaking loose on every turn.

On this day, I found the ideal setting to be the front at the stiffist setting and the back at 3 clicks out. Adjusted this way, the back end obediently followed the front with not much understeering at all. Tires were good at 31 front / 29 back, but I'm not sure if lower would have given more grip...chalk those tires for roll-over next time!

CSP Times:
Ken Van O BMW M3 33.898 33.090 35.771 33.328 33.090 2
Jason T Toyota MR2 39.400 34.484 36.137 34.226 34.226 10
Steven S Mazda Miata 38.530 36.735 35.577 35.481 35.481 26
Leila J Mazda Miata 38.499 39.028 39.990 38.055 38.055 56
Ross C Mazda Miata 39.093 39.978 38.903 38.234 38.234 61
Roland A Toyota MR2 DNF 39.512 DNF DNF 39.512 80

That BMW M3 in the picture is the same M3 that took 1st place in CSP - with the second fastest raw time on the day! Looks like the competition will be really tough in CSP especially since my brother's Eunos is not prepped at all for CSP...guess I just need to improve my driving a LOT MORE!!!

Here's a great write up of the action at SCCA Hawaii: SCCA Hawaii April Autocross.

March 25 - SCCA Autocross

2007-03-30T22:43:00.001-10:00

Those driving books I bought a couple of weeks ago MUST be helping...

(Photos courtesy of Jon and Erin)

This past Sunday was the Championship Runoffs for the 2006 Hawaii SCCA autocross season and the course for this race was another great course for the limited area we have in the Aloha Stadium parking lot.

BMW's are renowned for their braking and I used it to full effect on 2 of the hair pin turns on the course. In fact, as described in the Going Faster book, I tried to trail brake into these hairpins, much more than I ever did in the past, and I was surprised how much the front end squatted down and dug in to those turns!

I also learned that my car is DEFINITELY faster with the traction control FULLY disengaged. In the trade off for a higher chance of a transitional tail happy spin (did it twice that day), you get much better throttle response, especially out of the slow hairpin turns.

My best run of the day, when it counted, was 41.100 seconds. But during the fun runs, I got down to 40.037 seconds with the traction control fully off! UNBELIEVABLY, sans traction control I got over 1 second faster...and all this time I've been running with the traction control only in the semi-off posisiton...

Result: D - Stock 1st Place, for the first time! Guess my tires aren't holding me back as much as I thought!

Overall Results: http://sccahawaii.org/3-25-07.pdf

To Mycarpage.blogspot.com

Shhhh....Secrets....

2007-03-14T19:45:00.000-10:00

Just got these in from Amazon today...maybe...I'm hoping, they will help in the next autocrosses coming up on March 26th and April 8th.

The March 26th date is the Championship for the 2006 season and I will be running my stocker in the D-Stock class again. Maybe these books can help me overcome my Bimmer's lack of HP, tire width, auto trans, etc. etc. etc....lalalala. I would have much preferred running in the "true" STS street tire class.

The April 8th even is the beginning of the new season and I'm still debating whether to run my wagon in STS or the Eunos in STS2 or CSP...

Titles:

Going Faster! Master the art of Race Driving by Skip Barber (270 pgs) - this book is VERY technical (ie, more words than pictures), but, being an engineer, I love it!

Speed Secrets 2 More Prof. Race Driving Tech. by Ross Bentley (150 pgs) - seems pretty basic for a driving standpoint, with some useless stuff, for me anyways, about marketing yourself and being accessible to fans.

Speed Secrets 3 Mental Strategies to Maximize Your Racing Performance by Ross Bentley (150 pgs) - now this book looks very interesting because it deals primarily with the mental aspect of driving. From a quick scan, many of the points can be applied to other aspect of your life too...more like a driving psychology book.

Of the 3 books, I think the Going Faster and Secrets 3 books will DEFINITELY help in taking it to the next levels...I just hope I can get through them by the 26th...

Management Of The Traction Circle

2007-02-09T22:44:00.000-10:00

Pre-grid at Aloha Stadium.

I think I may finally be learning a little more about this autocrossing business.

For me, the most important points are looking far far ahead, so you never get behind the course, and, managing the traction circle and understanding how to best use it to maximize the strong and minimize the weak points of your car.

100% Lateral Acceleration!!! (Picture from Erin and Jon)

This past Sunday it started to finally gel a little better for me as I probably drove the best I ever have! It didn't hurt either, that the track was tailor made for the strong points of BMW's.

Although my car is completely stock and on all-seasons, I ran in the modified DSP class since I wanted to watch the Superbowl in the afternoon. This class has a very high PAX of 0.829, however, if I applied my regular PAX of 0.798 of D-Stock or 0.797 of STS, I would have ended up in 27th out of over 100 drivers in overall PAX. That would have placed me the highest I've ever been in PAX!!!

Evidence left on the pavement of the prior nights huge Drift Session.

Autocross Hawaii - Jan 28th

2007-02-01T00:15:00.001-10:00

One problem w/ stock suspensions - riding on the bump stops!!! (Above and below pics by Jon and Erin, for the pics: http://www.tomo-dachi.net/sccapics/)

Small kine oversteer and rear wiper action on my first run...could be cold tires...but I put more air in the rears just to make sure. Didn't happen on any other runs.

Both me and my brother decided to run our wagons in SCCA's STS Class, instead of the Stock Classes that we usually run in. The reason being, for our cars, STS provides for a much more competitive and level playing field. For instance, in STS, all cars need to comply with the following:

3.1 L max displacement (Mine is 2.5)

7.5" max rim width (Mine is 7")

225 max tire width (Mine is 205)

140 min tire wear (Mine is 400)

No limited slip differentials allowed

Most turbo cars not allowed

In the Stock Class:

R-Compounds Allowed

and Anything Goes so long as it comes stock

This meant that in D-Stock I had to compete against cars that had MUCH higher hp to weight ratios, WAY wider tires, Turbos, AWD's, R-Compounds, etc. etc.

Man...even though our cars are bone arse stock, we feel much more competitive...STS is where its at!!!

Here's my best run...good for 3rd place in the STS class:

My brother's run in his stocker Mazuda 6 on all seasons too:

Here's the times: http://sccahawaii.org/1-28-07.pdf

2007 Tokyo Auto Salon

2007-01-20T23:02:00.000-10:00

I had planned to go to this year's Tokyo Auto Salon, however, I never made it...

Oh well, at least "some people" got to go. Here's a super cool Drift Car from a tuner called Yoshio Factory. Dig the shisa and the tropical motif...looks just like Hawaii.

But more importantly...here is the "real" reason for going to the Auto Salon ... Sukebe-sama!!!

More cars and other pics at: http://www.tetsuyagarage.com/tasmain.htm

Jan. 7th Autocross

2007-01-14T22:50:00.000-10:00

Photo from Kaimoku.com :-)

Autocross got a temporary repreive at Aloha Stadium and 2 more races were scheduled for January, the first of which was last Sunday.

Instead of racing my BMW, on a semi-whim, I decided to try my brother's eunos in a street tire class...what a mistake. I posted the slowest times in the class by a long way. What it goes to show is that it is very difficult to just jump in someone elses car and expect to drive really fast. Especially with street tires (as I did drive that car pretty fast once at Hawaii Raceway Park with the R-compounds).

I just had absolutely no feel for where the limits were. Perhaps if I drive that car around for a couple weeks or so, I should get more of a feel for that car by the 27th, the next scheduled race. One thing for sure, it really made me appreciate my BMW. Plus that...I HAVE some thoughts on how to drive that thing faster...

Oahu's Autocross in Jeopardy

2006-11-16T22:00:00.000-10:00

The fun police are aiming to SHUT DOWN autocross at Aloha Stadium due to "safety concerns." I MUST to disagree.

Even with the National SCCA Safety guy coming down reiterating that the event IS safe and meets all SCCA standards, and, that similar events are regularly held in stadium parking lots on the mainland...it may not be good enough for the blue suits here in paradise. What a loss this will be for motorsports on Oahu.

"Well I know everyone has been waiting for word of our future at Aloha Stadium. After meeting with the Stadium personnel and not being able to satisfactorily address their perceived safety issues of our event, we got the SCCA National Safety Committee Chairperson involved to address the Stadium's concerns. The chairperson addressed each concern basically reiterating what I stated in my meeting with the Stadium. The Stadium personnel are still not comfortable with how we (SCCA) operate a Solo event."

Autocross on Earthquake Day (10/16)

2006-10-28T19:42:00.000-10:00

Let rain nor even EARTHQUAKE stop Oahu's autocross.

The morning guys ran in wet and rainy conditions.

But by the time I went in the afternoon...it was DRY - curse you for STOPPING RAIN!!! (Excuse for slow times: I have all-season tires)

Pics taken by Jon and Erin, for more click here: AutoX pics on tomodachi.net.

Last last Sunday was the 3rd autocross at the Aloha Stadium parking lot. It was a very slow course that needed lots of brain power...instead of horsepower. I probably left a good 1/4 to 1/2 second or MORE out there that day.

I just couldn't think through the 2nd half of the course and ended up totally over cooking the last two turns. As a result...my two front tires are totally shot as it was plow city in both corners.

And I should know what "they" say is true...you gotta go slow in the slow parts. I noticed several times here at Aloha Stadium, where the courses are much slower, that my first run is one of the faster runs of the day! Being the 1st time thru, you try to go fast, but you can't go too fast since you are trying not to get lost and all. And as a result, that run ends up being fast since the course is actually a slow course...I think I'm confusing myself!

Click here for what "they" say: What The Experts Say, but in short:

"...in autocross the shortest line is almost *always* the quickest. This is particularly true in corners more than 90 degrees and is a *must* in corners greater than 120 degrees. Our BMW's have a reputation for "pushing" or "understeering" in slow corners and IMNSHO the biggest contributing factor is usually excessive entry speed..."

Some very very sound advise I would say...

D Stock: Run 1, Run 2, Run 3, Run 4, Best
Tim M. IS350 43.178 43.131 42.330 41.932 41.932
Steven S. 325it 42.436 43.449 42.857 44.292 42.436
Chris T. Legacy GT 52.767 43.976 43.701 42.788 42.788
Nevan B. Type-R 45.082 43.530 43.929 43.253 43.253
Stephen N. G35 48.466 43.609 43.710 44.893 43.609

Sept. 3rd Autocross

2006-09-08T22:20:00.000-10:00

(Thanks for the pictures)

Run 1 - DNF - Still don't know where I went off course...
Run 2 - DNF - Kind of know where I jammed up...
Run 3 - 45.648 - Ok, think I got this figured out...
Run 4 - DNF - NOT!!!

All in all we all really had fun...but...the second outing for Oahu's Autocross at Aloha Stadium was totally BAD for me. 3 OUT OF 4 RUN DNF!!! It all stemmed from me NOT following my own advice to take the second half of the course slow and use the white chalklines as guides, since it was very tight!

As a result, I absolutely shaved off all the outside edges of my two front tires by using what I would call my "plow brakes" the worst plowing ever since I started racing. You know...when you absouoltely cannot make the turn but have no choice but to keep on turning else you'll hit the cones...then you just end up plowing to almost a stop...until you scrub enough speed to finally make the turn. It was definely a cerebral course and and not so much of a "balls" course...and it shows I didn't use my brains on 3 runs!!!

A GREAT Excuse: On a side note, I found this autocross site (Boston BMW Club Classification) where they PAX all the BMW cars based on model. My 325it w/ auto is PAX'd as one of the SLOWEST Bimmers with 4 wheels!!! (And they don't even diffentiate between the sport package wagon and the non sp wagon.) No wonder I have such a tough time...it's the car!!!

Check out the differnce between my non-sport package auto wagon and a 325i stick w/ sport package. For me to compete with that car on a level playing field, i would be allowed to do ALL KINDS of mods to my car, where each new mod adds PAX adjustment points to your vehicle.

2001 325iA Wagon 32.4 pts.
2001 325i 4 Dr. w/ Sportpackage 71.0 pts.

Well...so much for the excuses...if I drove the course better, I probably could have taken off maybe 1/2 second or so...

The Br-other Drivers: My older younger brother decided to run his Mazda 6 wagon and did OK for his first time autocrossing in a very a long time. He DNF'd a couple times too but did manage to pull a decent 48 second run on the difficult to read cone city course. A lot different from the rwd '72 Corolla w/ dual Mikuni 40's he used to run back in the day...

(Thanks for the pictures)

My younger younger brother pulled a 44 and change in his Eunos...pretty disappointed as he KNEW he could have gone at least a couple of seconds faster...but...he'll have to wait...due to circumstances...a while...

(Thanks for the pictures)

Results: SCCA Results.

Video of My Best Run

2006-08-25T00:33:00.000-10:00

Here's a video my brother took of my best run of 39 seconds and change...

AUTOCROSS - August 2006

2006-08-21T21:32:00.000-10:00

Finally...

After searching around since this past April, when Hawaii Raceway Park closed, the Autocross scene is up and running again at Aloha Stadium. Just in the nick of time too since I started to get some withdrawal symptoms over the last 4 or 5 months.

Since everyone else too, had withdrawal symptoms, the field quickly filled up to the 100 car maximum. As of race morning, there were probably only about 12 open spots left for people who didn't pre-register...and I think some who showed up looking for open spots left disappointed. Probably the largest field since I started racing earlier this year.

In my class, D Stock, there were 6 cars with the following results:

Mark P. Acura Integra 36.013
Dan C. BMW 325is 38.639
Tim M. Lexus IS350 39.068
Steven S. BMW 325it 39.543
Nevan B. Integra TypeR 40.087
Nicole W. BMW 325 49.83

I was pretty happy with my result as (excuses coming up) I was the only one running on all-season treads, and my car (wagon) has the lowest power to weight ratio of all the D stockers plus it's an automatic.

I ran really consistently with 4 runs in the 39 second range except for one run with a cone time penalty. For me, the challenge was in deciding the line to take in the 2 decreasing radius turns since the course was set up very wide and you could take whatever line you wanted. In my case, I tried to take a wider line in turns in which my car really plowed, but, the wider, plow free line, was a little slower than just waiting on the plow and taking a tighter line.

For a parking lot course, this one was really easy to "read" since it was about 30 seconds SHORTER than the usual courses we ran at HPR. In addition, there was only one slalom versus the usual 3 to remember which side to enter from. Usually parking lot courses are very difficult to run since all you see is a sea of orange cones all over the creation!

My brother had 3 bad runs and finally had a pretty decent one on his last run with a 37 and change. If not for a mis-shift, probably would have gotten into the 36's.

Although I probably won't do it, I would be really curious to see what my car would do with the R-compound tires all the fast stock guys are running...supposedly, I would take off maybe 2 to 4 seconds off of my all-seasons...

My brother took some video that I'll be posting up soon.

AUTOCROSS - April 2006, Closing of Hawaii Raceway Park

2006-04-08T21:31:00.000-10:00

April 2006 - AUTOCROSS:
It has been a couple of months since I last raced. In February, there was the Super Bowl. And in March, there were the class runoffs that I didn't qualify for.

In any event, I had a pretty successful outing last week with NO fuel starvation problems. I made sure I had just above 1/4 tank at the start, and by the end of 4 runs I was just below 1/4 tank. I also had a good walk through of the course and this was essential as there were 5 slaloms that could be entered on either side. After watching the fast guys run while I worked the track, I found that I was entering the middle slalom on the wrong side as it affected the stability of the car on the turn following the slalom. Oh well...there's always next time...whenever that is! Results: http://sccahawaii.org/4-2-06.pdf

Closing of Hawaii Raceway Park:
April 2nd was the last race ever for Hawaii Raceway Park. As of April 3rd, the racepark is officially closed and over 50 years of racing on Oahu will now be history.

Whoever bought the place must have really wanted it cause I heard (from my bicycle insider) that they have already begun to demolish the place!

Too bad really, since the Autocross events there were the best as you had the feeling of being on an actual road course, versus diving around cones setup in a parking lot. And too bad for the 1/4 mile racers too...as I must have run down that track about 20 times or so myself when I was into drag racing with my brother and friends...

Hope they find a place soon for the continuation of the autocross season.

Here's to some good memories...some last pictures of the entrance sign to HRP...bye bye...

AUTOCROSS - January 2006

2006-01-08T16:05:00.000-10:00

Since I was feeling a LOT better this morning I decided to run in this month's autocross at the soon to be extinct - Hawaii Raceway Park. Since the "stock" class was scheduled for the first heat, that meant getting to the track by 8am or so.

Getting there early, for once, I got to walk the course twice, one time in the correct direction, and the second time in reverse. This really helped as there were about 3 sections which could have been taken on the right or left. (Fwiw, I took the left side on both sloloms and triangles.)

Run 1: Everything going great until the fast section just after the crossover then floorboard and...and...and...what the h#ll???....oh...ok, now the power comes on but softly....finish the run and I realize that in my efforts to make my car as light as possible, I've cut if much too close at a little under 1/8th of a tank of gas! Well, now I've got a WHOLE bunch of lemons...so lemonade anyone??? Btw, I don't get a time on this run due to a timing malfunction.

Run 2: DNF...well, I ain't makin lemonade yet!!! My mind is so messed up thingking about my fuel cutoff problem that I totally forget that there is a really slow section before the crossover and just after! As a result, I completely BOTCH this run up in both slow sections and decide just cruise by the course to conserve the 92.

Run 3: Ok, ok...think lemonade dam!t! Everything going ok just up to the crossover then over race radio..."white bmw wagon and red miata before get re-runs"...oh man 2 re-runs, any other day but today! I'm worried that I may need to push this thing to a gas station!

Run 4: 73.80 sec, Ok, we're sort of thinking lemonade now...seems the fuel starvation problem is most apparent on the fast uphill section after the crossover and after the chicane...

Run 5: 72.93 sec, Ok, now we're thinking lemonade for sure! I try to run the course after the crossover by taking whatever speed the engine will give, then backing off the gas sooner than usual (thinking this will help the fuel system catch up) and coasting into the turns with minimum braking .

Run 6: 72.29 sec, Ok, anyone for lemonade??? I'm pretty satisfied with my time considering...

Lessons learnt:

1) I shall never run my car with less than 1/8th tank.
2) Get there early to thouroughly walk the course - it helped.
3) No matter what, make lemonade!

For some pictures that I took during Heats 3 and 4 click here: Heat 3 and 4 Pics. Sorry no Heat 1 or 2 as I was running.

Also, today I finally got to meet two cool guys, Erik and Troy. Usually they have their video cameras out on the course and lukily for me, I usually end up in one of their videos! For Erik's website, click here: www.erik808.com and for Troy's site click here: www.kaimoku.com.

Results and "official story" of this month's race can be found at: www.sccahawaii.org.

ttyl...

test post???

2005-12-23T16:07:00.000-10:00

ok...blogger says you need to post at least one post in order to preview...
so here it is: here!

My Car Page - 私 の クルマ ページ