STR in 2012

Matt McGrain · **Posted:** Wed Feb 01, 2012 4:02 pm

That's cool Marcus. I'm not sure who they have in STR other than Fenney (he's quick too) but I'm sure they'll be bringing some quick cars to Danville and hopefully Sanford. It's going to be a fun year for sure.

I'm up for the photos, maybe just before the driver's meeting at the first or second first or second event?

JamesShort · **Posted:** Wed Feb 01, 2012 5:19 pm

All STR cars need to park next to each other at the first event in the pits for a photo shoot

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Matt McGrain · **Posted:** Thu Feb 02, 2012 11:01 am

Bingo. We'll be sure to cone it off on setup day.

Ha! ...and I was poking fun how all the S2000 car leave the Cars & Coffee in formation! :lol:

We're just as bad. j/k

What's the story with the local S2k club, do they have any interest in autocrossing? Only takes one event to get hooked as some say...

Karl Shultz · **Posted:** Fri Feb 03, 2012 8:43 am

Matt McGrain wrote:

Bingo. We'll be sure to cone it off on setup day.

Ha! ...and I was poking fun how all the S2000 car leave the Cars & Coffee in formation! :lol:

We're just as bad. j/k

What's the story with the local S2k club, do they have any interest in autocrossing? Only takes one event to get hooked as some say...

Yes. You are just as bad. :lol:

When I had the time to go to the local S2000 club get togethers, I often got asked about autocross, and a handful of people actually came out and tried it. There is some new blood in the group that might show up, I haven't been in a while so it's hard to know. A lot of the core people have busy work schedules including some weekend work, or busy personal lives including shuttling kids around. I eventually stopped trying to convince people to come out, figuring that they want to hang out and be car people on a Saturday morning, and don't want to hear the bald guy's autocross sales pitch.

Matt McGrain · **Posted:** Fri Feb 03, 2012 9:35 am

That's cool Karl. It makes sense as a lot of people are intimidated to try something new like autocross, I know I was, especially not knowing anyone.

I'll probably leave it alone, unless I get a wild hair and feel like making an event post on S2ki sometime this year for the Sanford event since it's the closest, unless of course Burlington come to fruition. ::fingers crossed::

I figured if anyone from THSCC had tried to reach out to them, you'd be the one, especially since you've been an S2k owner for several seasons. :thumbsup:

I sort of like the idea the guys in Charlotte had (maybe it was the Wilmington group?), showing up at C&C with all their autocross numbers/decals on and hand out cards.

JamesShort · **Posted:** Sun Feb 05, 2012 11:51 am

We got the suspension on Jeremy's car. Went pretty smoothly except that putting the NC MX5 sway bar in the rear required dropping the whole exhaust system and a cross member....wtf. And the bar is about 3mm away from the nut heads of the differential mounts in the subframe. I have a feeling on a hard launch the differential could torque enough to tap the rear bar. Oh well.

Once the konis were on I realized that helper springs are highly unnecessary because soon as it runs out of spring, the rubber bushings are so effective at limiting the suspension from drooping any further that the spring never really loosens much at 'full droop'. With the stock springs, which are preloaded at full droop, the springs can push the LCA down against the bushings till the damper runs out of stroke.

After everything was installed, we went for a quick drive and it's surprisingly comfy for 800/650 #/in springs and the dampers were on full soft both rebound/compression. And no noise

.

We did get some conical spacers in between the endlink rod ends and the front bar and the LCA so they aren't binding so the car is actually quieter than it used to be.

Oh, the another annoying part: the spare tire (donut) can't fit any more because it would hit the koni rebound adjuster on the rear passenger side and we don't want that getting bent/buggered up.....can of run flat to the rescue

.

Alignment/ride height

Before:
FL FR: 14.125" -1.3* 14.00" -1.4*
RL RR: 14.25" -1.7* 14.125" -1.8*

After:
FL FR: 13.25" -1.6* 13.25" -1.7*
RL RR: 13.5" -2.4* 13.5" -2.0*

When I was under there, I noticed that the front eccentric for camber was probably a good 60* from the hypothetical max camber, so we are really hoping for -2.2 or -2.3 in the front and square in the rear.

Just waiting on the 17x9s and RS3s to show up....

MarcusMcRae · **Posted:** Sun Feb 05, 2012 12:15 pm

JamesShort wrote:

We got the suspension on Jeremy's car. Went pretty smoothly except that putting the NC MX5 sway bar in the rear required dropping the whole exhaust system and a cross member....wtf. And the bar is about 3mm away from the nut heads of the differential mounts in the subframe. I have a feeling on a hard launch the differential could torque enough to tap the rear bar. Oh well.

Once the konis were on I realized that helper springs are highly unnecessary because soon as it runs out of spring, the rubber bushings are so effective at limiting the suspension from drooping any further that the spring never really loosens much at 'full droop'. With the stock springs, which are preloaded at full droop, the springs can push the LCA down against the bushings till the damper runs out of stroke.

After everything was installed, we went for a quick drive and it's surprisingly comfy for 800/650 #/in springs and the dampers were on full soft both rebound/compression. And no noise

.

We did get some conical spacers in between the endlink rod ends and the front bar and the LCA so they aren't binding so the car is actually quieter than it used to be.

Oh, the another annoying part: the spare tire (donut) can't fit any more because it would hit the koni rebound adjuster on the rear passenger side and we don't want that getting bent/buggered up.....can of run flat to the rescue

.

Alignment/ride height

Before:
FL FR: 14.125" -1.3* 14.00" -1.4*
RL RR: 14.25" -1.7* 14.125" -1.8*

After:
FL FR: 13.25" -1.6* 13.25" -1.7*
RL RR: 13.5" -2.4* 13.5" -2.0*

When I was under there, I noticed that the front eccentric for camber was probably a good 60* from the hypothetical max camber, so we are really hoping for -2.2 or -2.3 in the front and square in the rear.

Just waiting on the 17x9s and RS3s to show up....

You should be able to get >-2 degrees easily. I have -2.1 in the front with the stock ride height. Are you going to even up the ride height?

RamVennam · **Joined:** Thu Nov 11, 2010 7:31 pm **Posts:** 132

Race tires sold...back in STR!

MarcusMcRae · **Posted:** Sun Feb 05, 2012 1:52 pm

RamVennam wrote:

Race tires sold...back in STR!

Excellent!!

I wonder if Keith bought the NB he was looking at??????

Steven Carter · **Posted:** Sun Feb 05, 2012 2:18 pm

Sorry the rear bar was a bit of a pain. FWIW, when I installed mine I didn't drop the exhaust entirely but did have to remove the rear exhaust/muffler from its brackets. I don't think the diff mounting bolts will contact the rear bar....there's a pretty stout bracket that prevents the diff from moving on hard launches.

It looks like a lot of fun installing the driver's rear shock...you had to move that brace and gas tank fill pipe, I guess?

Congrats on geting it done! I'm pretty pumped to see everyone out on the 19th! :thumbsup:

MarcusMcRae · **Posted:** Sun Feb 05, 2012 3:32 pm

[quote="Steven Carter"]
It looks like a lot of fun installing the driver's rear shock...you had to move that brace and gas tank fill pipe, I guess?

quote]

Yup. It's a pain.

And don't drop one of the nuts down into the shock tower. Took me 30 min to get that bastard.

JamesShort · **Posted:** Sun Feb 05, 2012 3:47 pm

Nah, the driver rear is easy....get a 3/8" drive 14mm long socket, with a 3" 3/8" extension and a 3/8"=>3/8" ujoint and you can just compress that rubber boot and it's cake.

Steve, I can see dropping just the rear, but we did the whole thing because we were frustrated

.

Just did the alignment and maxxed out the eccentrics.

-2.3 on the driver front and -2.9 on the passenger front

.

Just have to do the rear now.

Toe was dead f-ing even.

JamesShort · **Posted:** Sun Feb 05, 2012 4:08 pm

MarcusMcRae wrote:

You should be able to get >-2 degrees easily. I have -2.1 in the front with the stock ride height. Are you going to even up the ride height?

Nah, running a little bit of rake.

MarcusMcRae · **Posted:** Sun Feb 05, 2012 4:15 pm

JamesShort wrote:

Nah, the driver rear is easy....get a 3/8" drive 14mm long socket, with a 3" 3/8" extension and a 3/8"=>3/8" ujoint and you can just compress that rubber boot and it's cake.

.

I had to compress the boot event after I loosened the two nuts that hold the pipe. I'm surprised you were able to do it without loosening them.

Why do you want more rake? Aren't you just increasing the weight bias to the front?

Jason Mauldin · **Posted:** Sun Feb 05, 2012 4:53 pm

JamesShort wrote:

Once the konis were on I realized that helper springs are highly unnecessary because soon as it runs out of spring, the rubber bushings are so effective at limiting the suspension from drooping any further that the spring never really loosens much at 'full droop'. With the stock springs, which are preloaded at full droop, the springs can push the LCA down against the bushings till the damper runs out of stroke.

My old 240 did the same thing. It was the reason that I was lifting a rear tire in quick transitions. Tender springs (NOT helper springs) fixed that. Just keep an eye on it. You can have someone watch for you to see if it's happening.

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