TravisJB Journal

Mike

rent one from uhaul

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NISSAN: 75 280Z / 86 300ZX GLL /87 Sentra SE / 03 350Z / 23 Z
Porsche: 93 968 / 23 Macan GTS / 93 968

sig11

That may be what I do. I rented a dovetail from a local company and while loading the car by myself I got high centered.

I had a good line on a nice enclosed trailer but I was too busy to go see it last week and it sold.

wstar

Hey, wanted to pick your brain on coilovers and spring rates. Been trying to do some research on the subject in general, happened to notice some recent commentary you've made on the subject over in your profile comment thread.

The stock suspension is now clearly too soft on the track for the way I'm driving and how hard the brakes are biting. I see it now in braking nosedive, and I see it now also in the car being too slow to react in transitions at the speed I want to make them (e.g. brake, turn-in, straighten, brake more, turn in hard - it's all happening lightning fast and the suspension hasn't even finished rebounding and settling from the first action by the time I'm wanting to do the 3rd, so I have to slow it all down just to keep the car under control).

I thought maybe I could fix that temporarily by getting better at progressive and properly-applied trail-brake-steering in some of those transitions, but it seemed to make things worse instead of better so far (probably just me sucking at technique so far, but I'll get there before I get any new coilovers installed regardless, at current budget rates).

So - advice on a coilover vendor, and more importantly a spring rate setup?

I really don't care about sacrificing ride quality on the street. The car does more miles either on the track or on the way to it than it does for my little trips around the corner to parts shops or whatever. What I do need to be concerned about, though, is my home track is rather bumpy (ripples, pavement seams, etc), even in some of the fast sweepers and such. I can't have a suspension that's just locked down for perfect pavement; it has to be able to react to the bumpiness and maintain grip. I think my super-soft stock sport suspension has probably been helpful in that regard so far, especially in the rear, and I'm a little nervous that if I go with a poorly-tuned coilover setup with a very high spring rate, I'm going to be skipping and bouncing and losing traction all over the place.

Sooo... quoting your TL;DR from your profile thread: "Tl/dr 18/12 spring rate for track cars, 14/10 or 12/8 for street cars... get adjustable sways and try different tire pressures... for street with some track, front -2 camber and 0 to 1/16 toe out".

I'm pretty comfortable now with adjusting my traction a bit via tire pressure, and at least my rear sway is adjustable (I run it on the stiffest setting for now, but I could soften that to offset traction problems if necc). What should I be looking at here rate-wise given all the above? Would you still recommend BC ER? The JRZ's look nice too, but outta price range at this point. KW V3? Tein Monoflex? There's a lot of other cheap options out there, but I'm worried a lot of them are just targeted at lowering and looks for street driving and may not really hold up in practice.

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7AT Track Car!
Journal thread / Car setup details

ChrisSlicks

I have Travis' original (his actual) setup of BC ER coilovers with 12K/10K springs. It's pretty firm on the street if the pavement is rough but works well on the track for me. There is a wide range of very progressive damping controls.

The KW V3's get great reviews from people that use them on the street, my understanding is these usually get revalved/resprung when used exclusively on track with anything beyond a street tire.

If you brake hard over bumpy stuff you can get the rear end to dance a little bit, but that is as much the fault of the stock brake balance as anything else.

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Hotchkis ARB | Stillen CAI | Art Pipes | Berk CBE | Stillen AP Racing Brakes | AE Performance Oil Cooler | BC Racing ER Coilovers | Doran Control Arms

Jamaica

Any news In the sc?

travisjb

You guys pick the date and we can rally at my place beforehand...

car should be done at ZFever this week... I'll ask them to take some pics

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2009 370Z #104
*For Sale*

VQ37PWR

Hey TravisJB I just want to know how many HP are you packing total?

travisjb

I told the guys to tune it to 380whp.... more to come on it later this week

I switched to the smaller blower, by the way... quicker spool up

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2009 370Z #104
*For Sale*

SPOHN

That's defiantly perfect HP for a car that's lite like yours. And extremely reliable.

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MightyBobo

I use UHaul trailers all the time with my car. A few tips, since they are almost all the same:

-If you keep the 2 little bolt-on spoilers on your bumper, you'll need to get some wood to make the angle of the ramps less aggressive.
-Make sure to check the stoppers at the end of the rails - I had one that was bent back somehow and didn't notice it. It grabbed onto my bumper and gave it a good yank, almost ripping a corner of my bumper off. Was a PITA at the track, but I did ok...
-Enjoy climbing out the window, and don't forget to use your key inside the FOB, to automatically close the windows from the outside

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I don't own a car anymore.

sig11

I may have problems with a UHaul trailer due to my height. I'm ~1" lower than stock right now (but probably should come up a little).

Window? Heck the UHaul trailer I rented to tow the lemons car had a folding fender! Wish I remembered the key/window trick before climbing in and out of the rear hatch.

travisjb

Update from shop... engine is running, car goes to dyno next

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2009 370Z #104
*For Sale*

SPOHN

Woot

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Mike

great news

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NISSAN: 75 280Z / 86 300ZX GLL /87 Sentra SE / 03 350Z / 23 Z
Porsche: 93 968 / 23 Macan GTS / 93 968

travisjb

interesting update from shop... when they started the motor, there was insufficient oil pressure to the engine and they shut it down within 30 seconds because it wasn't getting enough... they think the new oil cooler system has an issue with delivery/pressure, which would explain a lot!! in any event, first thing tomorrow they are going to run some bypass tests and troubleshoot and I'll have more to report later

on the topic of fuel starv... they are also going to get rid of the two secondary pumps in my fuel tank - they've convinced me this is a potential safety issue b/c when the pumps are no longer wetted they get extremely hot... he put more foam in to help control slosh, and he's going to make a secondary hose going to driver's side from which the primary (passenger side) pump will pick up to help control fuel starv

unrelated note, here's my new garage with high lift kit!

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2009 370Z #104
*For Sale*