My S2000 Weekend/Track day warrior

[eskimo_firefighter]

Hello Peter,
I look forward to seeing how this performs at Sale on Sunday!
This is very exciting!

Very excited for the weekend and very keen to give this new diff a good workout!

Been patiently waiting for this install.

Anxiously awaiting your feedback from the next track day with this

Haha, the wait for the install was hard. But it is done and working all good.

Did you consider a 8.8 inch Ford diff? Apparently they are super strong haha


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I have heard of this conversion but never considered it due to the cost and effort of it. This rebuilt differential should more than cater to my needs as I don't plan on running ridiculous power or plan on ripping massive burnouts or anything that causes the diff too much grief.

[Alex_Walker]

Yeah fair enough haha have heard it is a bit of a pain


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[Toddxxx]

good stuff as per usual pete. im keen to be at the stage for a LSD!
cusco comes already broken in or?

[eskimo_firefighter]

Yeah fair enough haha have heard it is a bit of a pain


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Haha yes indeed. But it maybe worth it for high power S2000's. A Nissan R200 differential is a common swap also it seems on the internet.

good stuff as per usual pete. im keen to be at the stage for a LSD!
cusco comes already broken in or?

Thanks Toddxxx. Cusco does not come broken in, so 30 minutes of figure 8's is required for it to be broken in, followed by a fluid change.

I forgot to mention the Cusco RS is pretty loud and loves to lock and pop during low speed turns. It sounds painful! But it adds some extra character to the car, haha.

[Toddxxx]

Thanks Toddxxx. Cusco does not come broken in, so 30 minutes of figure 8's is required for it to be broken in, followed by a fluid change.

I forgot to mention the Cusco RS is pretty loud and loves to lock and pop during low speed turns. It sounds painful! But it adds some extra character to the car, haha.

nice work. good to know
cusco sounds like a good option. might try and purchase one in japan

[plAythiNG]

nice pete, have u broken it in yet? 30min of figure 8's is so painful hey!

[eskimo_firefighter]

nice work. good to know
cusco sounds like a good option. might try and purchase one in japan

You can't go wrong with any of the Japanese LSD's really. Just depends on your budget. OS Giken seems to be the most highly rated.

nice pete, have u broken it in yet? 30min of figure 8's is so painful hey!

Have done the break in procedure with a fluid change.

Yeah going around in a figure 8 motion for 30 minutes can really make you a bit dizzy haha. Probably hardest thing about it is resisting the urge to plant the throttle for a cheeky slide.

[eskimo_firefighter]

East Sale Sprints with the RAAF auto club

As it was my first day with the newly installed Cusco RS 1.5Way LSD, I was very excited to see how it would perform and how much it would have change the handling characteristics of the car.



This was a very interesting event as the track was laid out using cones on the RAAF airbase airfield, the track layout had a quite few tight chicanes and corners which would really put the new diff to the test. A lap on this track would be roughly around the 1min mark to 1:10 mark for a street driven car.

I opted to go without the rear Wing + AD08R's for fun and mostly to gauge how much the diff has changed the car without any aero aids.



First session

As it would be first time here, and first time driving the car with the 1.5way. I used the time to get accustomed to the new track and car setup.

Cusco RS - First Impressions
I had more control of the rear end and braking stability seemed to have improved also. Upon throttle, I can get the rear end to rotate at will which was very difficult to do with the OEM torsen and it does this progressively, I can really feel the diff working to put power down more efficiently. Although I wasn't pushing the car hard at all, it was a lot of fun to drive but demanding at the same time. A session gave the group one warm up lap followed by three hot laps. By the end of the first session I had done a 1:05, barely pushing the car at all. A low 1min mark lap or even breaking the 1 minute barrier was possible in the car.

After coming into the pits, disaster then struck as we heard my front right brake rotor had cracked whilst it was parked. The track was fairly harsh on the brakes and it didn't help that there were no cool down laps. These brake rotors according to this blog has lasted me since November 2015, with 8 track days since then. Which is pretty good value for money considering how cheap these RDA blanks are. However from now on I will bring spare rotors!



Unfortunately after 3 laps, the car could not continue on with cracked rotors. I'll have to wait until the next Winton day to really put the new LSD to the test!

Despite this it was still a great day out, just by basing off those 3 laps I can really see the huge potential this car now has.

[eskimo_firefighter]

EXE-Crew Double Track Day 10/09/2016-11/09/2016.

Coming into this track day with a new 1.5way LSD and was very keen to see how it would perform. Especially getting teased by the 3 laps I did at the RAAF airbase track day with the early retirement due to cracked front brake rotors.

Coming into this day I had.

- New front RDA brake rotors.
- New HC+800 front brake pads.
- 1.5WAY Cusco LSD.

Unfortunately this weekend did not go according to plan. On Saturday an incident occurred involving a few of my mates which had me retire from the track day to go see my friend at the hospital. Thankfully both are on the road to recovery.

It was an eye opener to how dangerous Motorsport can be and that this can happen to anyone out there. Safety is paramount and I will look into beefing up the safety gear for the car.

While driving up on the freeway the newly installed rear differential had begun making loud whining noises, which prompted me to pull out of the Sunday's track day to avoid any possible damage. After doing many google searches on the possible issue, its hard to deduce what the issue exactly is but it can be something out of spec, like the backlash/preload being slightly off causing the loud noise. It was definitely not worth continuing on the day risking damage.

Not a good outcome, but I will look at getting this fixed ASAP and perhaps get out there soon.

Only a total of 3 pretty casual laps was done this weekend and the diff felt great, but I will need to push it hard to really give a proper review though.

Courtesy of Gripshiftslide for the photo.

[chaumeh]

Glad to hear that your mates are okay Pete.

Keen to see what safety gear you've got planned

[eskimo_firefighter]

Rear Differential Fix

The rear differential was making a loud whining noise under deceleration from the last track day where the car had only done 2 relatively tame laps. Luckily the differential had no damage and everything was reinstalled to spec.

The reason why the differential was making this noise was due to the pinion preload being slightly off.

The S2000 at Raceline Motorsports with the real deal MINES Motorsport BNR34 GT-R.


Retirement of the great Nitto NT01's
Upon closer inspection of the tyres, I decided it was time to put retire these as the cords were starting to show. According to this blog this set of tyres had done 10 track days, with 7 driven up and back from the track. Very impressed with the longevity and consistency of these tyres.



With the NT01's retired, it was finally time to mount the Hankook Z221 C50 (Medium) compound tyres that I had bought and stored from early this year. 255/40/17 square on the 17x10 CE28 setup.


With these being a 80 treadwear opposed to the 100 treadwear rating on the NT01's, these should theoretically grip better. In addition it seems like the Z221's have a much stiffer sidewall than the NT01's would should improve feedback and consistency. Extremely excited to see how these perform.

Whiteline FSB out, OEM FSB reinstalled.


From the measly 2 laps from the last Winton track day, I decided to remove the Whiteline FSB and reinstall the OEM FSB back in, due to a number of reasons.

- The Cusco 1.5WAY, locks much more aggressive which is causing some push understeer upon throttle, which is potentially slowing the car down.
- The new LSD has provided the rear end with a lot of feedback and stability under braking due to it locking up 50% under deceleration, therefore not requiring a stiff front to stablise the car under hard braking.
- Thanks to the cars awesome alignment and rear bumpsteer kit, this has made the car easier to control. Therefore decreasing the need for an overly stiff front sway bar which is biased towards UNDERSTEER, understeer is generally easier to control and more safe in my opinion. Of course all down to driver preference.
- Softening the front should increase the front end grip and give it better turn in, with hopes of faster cornering speeds. However this may cause the rear to rotate easier under throttle which can be tricky to control, but fun.
- The LSD with a softer front should not suffer from push understeer upon throttle through a corner.

This is all theories that I could come up with. I will keep the Whiteline for now just in case this setup sucks.

Just for reference
Whiteline - 30mm SOLID bar.
99 OEM AP1 - 28.2mm Hollow bar.

The Whiteline is far stiffer and heavier than the OEM.

Went for a Sunday morning drive to get a feel for the change and I am pretty sure the cars setup is going in the right direction, only way to know for sure is to get out on the track.

[KVZT]

Thanks for the words on the Whiteline sb man, my S2K is relatively standard to yours and the effects that you felt with the sb installed is exactly what I am looking for on my intermediate setup for now, especially the rear end stability under hard braking!

Keen to hear your thoughts on how the car feels now that you reverted back to stock.

[eskimo_firefighter]

Thanks for the words on the Whiteline sb man, my S2K is relatively standard to yours and the effects that you felt with the sb installed is exactly what I am looking for on my intermediate setup for now, especially the rear end stability under hard braking!

Keen to hear your thoughts on how the car feels now that you reverted back to stock.

No worries at all. If I were to go for an aftermarket FSB, I would look at something hollow and adjustable, such as the Eibach. The Whiteline I feel is too stiff and decreases front end grip too much and causes a bit of understeer. This isn't all too bad as understeer in this car is easier to manage than oversteer. Definitely keen to see the difference with reverting back to OEM with a 1.5Way LSD.

[Toddxxx]

Definitely need a black oem hardtop pete!

[eskimo_firefighter]

Would like an OEM hardtop, but its a bit too pricey.