My S2000 Weekend/Track day warrior

[eskimo_firefighter]

Rear boot/trunk reinforcement.

Unable to source the Club Racer reinforcement kit, which is an OEM boot reinforcement kit made by Honda for the Club Racer edition which is only offered overseas. It was preinstalled in the Club Racer bootlid as it came with a OEM rear wing that actually provided downforce, Honda wanted to reinforce the lid to prevent warpage and flex to the lid.

I took the liberty to attempt a DIY kit that replicated the purpose of the Club Racer kit. With some research, the CR kit places rubber grommets and plastic pieces at various spots in the boot to stop the trunk from pressing down under load.

I pushed down on the trunk with it closed and it has a surprising amount of flex.

Bunnings Racing Spec

Quite a crude creation to say the least, but it serves the same purpose as the CR kit. Placing these grommets underneath, it’s now tough to close the lid however it no longer has that flex that it had prior with the lid closed. Hopefully this translates to a more stable rear end.

The Bunnings special reinforcement kit, that sits on the rear quarter/chassis.



The Rubber is pressed against the underside of the lid where the wing baseplates are when closed.



To go further beyond, more reinforcement pieces that sits on the rear chassis.



Which is then pressed against an OEM plastic piece under the bootlid when closed.



Give or take this sub $10 kit mixed with hardened rubber, plastic and superglue now has to withstand 250KPH at the Island, don't try this at home kids.

[eskimo_firefighter]

Phillip Island – Alfa Club Spring Round 8 - 08/12/2019

With the boot reinforced, new A050 soft tyres, lots of analysis and track time, I was expecting some huge gains at PI.

I went over the previous PI lap and concluded that T2-T3 sucked big time. The line that was taken I previously took was way too tight and treated it as if it was a single apex corner. T2-T3 should be considered a double apex corner I believe and I took that in mind for this track day.

Advan Yokohama A050 G/S.

They do not need much in terms of warming up and grip from the get go. Insane amount of grip however it does tend to have a sharp drop off when overheated. Extra care is required when driving on these tyres to not delaminate these as I've been told they're quite fragile.

Boot reinforcement

This seemed to have worked wonders as the boot stopped bending! As the rear end was still feeling a little tail happy, I ended up adjusting the attack angle of the wing one level up. The rear end has stablised itself nicely, giving me a lot of confidence in the high speed corners. The handling balance at PI is now close to where I want it to be with this change.

Ended the day with a new PB of 1:43.0771, besting my previous PB by 1.1 seconds. The car felt great but I feel like I could still gain much more time from this track with a few fixes to my driving to get into the 42’s or maybe even into the high 41’s!

Notes for next time.

T2-T3 double apex worked wonders, the car was much faster there today using this driving line.

T10 – Maybe take 2nd instead of 3rd. For T11 stop the short shift into 4th, carry 3rd all the way until redline.

According the racechrono data, the biggest chunk of time made up was through T1, which is one of the most intimidating corners in Australia. With the fix of the aero + new tyres it netted me roughly about 25kph, which is huge. Along with small gains throughout the track, it equated to a 1.1 second reduction in laptime.

Laptimes for the day.

2:33.5701 2:10.2640 1:48.7145 1:47.4518 2:01.7787 2:07.6291 1:43.8777 1:52.8485 2:25.5571 2:01.0852 2:10.3637 1:43.0771 2:14.8175 1:55.0450 2:51.5107 2:09.6563 2:11.3289 1:57.7553 1:43.3289 1:51.7596 2:04.7410 1:52.5010 2:09.4188 1:43.9095 1:44.6814 2:07.4231 1:56.6512





Cheers to Tobes and Brendan for the company and banter.

[eskimo_firefighter]

Sandown – Tampered Motorsport - 14/12/2019

Being a track so close to home, roughly about 45 minutes away it’s a bit odd that this is my first time here. Despite being advised that it isn’t a great track, it's still a good outlet to let the car free.



I thoroughly enjoyed the track more than I expected. One thing that I do agree with what most people say is that this is a relatively dangerous track, with not much run off and it is very tough on brakes! A few drag strips congregated with a few sharp corners.



After using a few sessions to figure out the driving lines, gearing and braking zones. We ended up with a 1:18.4774, which I was really happy with. The car handled very well here with the exception of a tiny bit too much oversteer on low speed corners but easily correctable with the right inputs. Sandown is pretty bumpy in some sections and kerb jumping is advised to get an OK laptime so a bit more compliance within the suspension may help. I am fairly confident with a bit more time here it can do a 1:17.

1:27.2499 1:39.3872 1:53.6450 1:22.9074 1:21.2463 1:19.4147 1:40.6404 1:19.9976 1:39.5599 1:21.0582 1:21.8095 1:19.0163 1:18.4774 1:21.4006 1:18.8928 1:58.2516 1:19.1270 1:57.0798

Photo Credit Ying.B. Thanks to all who came to this day to hang out and/support. It was a great day.

[eskimo_firefighter]

2019 Recap

This year would be the 2nd year with the car being supercharged. All initial goals that I had set with this car had been achieved and it feels great looking back at this blog once in a while to see how far this car has come and how far I have come as a driver and a tuner. Despite all the successes of this year, it wasn’t without its ups and downs, but hurdles are part of the journey and it was a good learning experience overcoming those hurdles. Overall it was a very joyous year full of great people, memories and PB’s.

Hope to carry on this momentum indefinitely. Also I hope to make more of effort to keep this blog updated regularly, instead of waiting for a global pandemic to occur.

Winton - 1:28.0
Wakefield - 1:03.9
Phillip Island - 1:43.0
Haunted Hills Figure 8 - 58.7
Sandown - 1:18.4
Broadford HillClimb - 47.9

[eskimo_firefighter]

Spoon Rear Control arm Bushing Replacement

After complaining about rear end stability and being advised by my wheel alignment guy that when adjusting the rear camber bolt, he could feel some flex within the lower rear control arm bushing. I elected for the Spoon hardened rubber bushing. I’d like to keep all the bushings on this car rubber to maintain some level of compliance and movement in the suspension.

Any slop within this bushing is probably causing the rear end instability as the LCA is moving under load, altering the rear end alignment otherwise known as bumpsteer.

Only one bushing on each control lower control arm for the rear were replaced, which was the inner rear bushing where the camber bolt slots into. The front inner bushing is not load bearing and is simply there to hold the LCA to the chassis, Spoon nor Honda offers no replacement part for this. The other bushings were still in good condition so I opted to not replace it.

Bushings replaced were the bottom ones of the LCA as depicted in the photo below.


New Spoon Bushings pressed in, cheers Kev.


Process was simple, pop the ball joint, undo the anti roll bar end links, LCA bolts and shock mount bolt.

Hopefully in replacing this, it could stabalise the rear.

I got another alignment at Tyrepower Reservoir and stuck with the same alignment as always and confirmed that the bushing is solid.

-3.5 camber front
2mm toe out front
-3.0 camber rear
2mm toe in rear

[eskimo_firefighter]

Repco Winton Sprint Series Round 1 - 22/02/2020

Despite the weather not looking too shabby with the temps being near 30 degrees, I went ahead anyway. With Winton alterations to T3-T4, I was keen to try it out. Basically they have gotten rid of the harsh kerbs on the exit of T3, inside and outside of T4. It looked like it could speed up the track as the kerbs were flattened possibly allowing a change of driving lines and earlier power inputs. Only one way to find out was to test it out for myself.

Funny enough this day almost didn’t go ahead.
When signing up for the day at the sign in office, the office administrator advised that I was not allowed to run sub 30’s as it is an entry level motorsport event? I’m here already, might as well keep at it and check out the new turns.

With that in mind, I set a 1:30.0230 with a bit of a lift to abide by the rules. It was nice to get the car out and enjoy the day regardless of said limitations. T3-T4 felt great but I wasn’t able to fully test it out as they had placed cones on the outside as the new kerbs were still setting in. The car felt great but we need no limitations and better weather to have a better gauge whether replacing the rear bushing helped or not.

I only did 8 laps, as I wanted to conserve the cars consumables for Nugget Nationals.

1:55.4120 1:30.1400 2:16.8160 1:54.2010 1:30.0230 2:07.6320 2:03.2980 1:31.0350

Regardless it was still a great day. Thanks to the Honed crew for hanging out!

[eskimo_firefighter]

Nugget Nationals – Winton - 14/03/2020

With optimal weather conditions, new Kerbs at winton fully set in with the removal of the witches hats and the car confirmed ready to go from the previous Winton day, I knew today would be a prime opportunity to dip into the 27’s.

With no changes to the car, I just went for it in the first two sessions. 1st session 1:28.5 was set, with this in mind it really gave me confidence that it can do it today. 2nd session was a bit of a throw away session due to running into some traffic. Then in the 3rd session a 1:27.9850 popped up!!

Not much in terms of driving approach had changed to much, it was more so the matter of linking up all the sectors up. However even in the 27 PB video I spotted some mistakes, namely the S bend where I carried a bit too much speed through the initial half of the S which costed me a tenth or two.

The new rear bushings seemed to improved the balanced a bit. The car seems to be more neutral biased more so towards oversteer. I am quite happy with the balance as it is at Winton, at the limit the car can understeer or oversteer but it is easy to alternate between the two depending on my inputs, it's a great feeling getting it right.

1:47.5320 1:28.5200 1:44.9790 1:28.2840 2:23.0430 1:43.4350 1:34.6420 2:03.0750 1:27.9850 2:31.6530 1:58.5710 1:31.4230 1:51.2400 1:31.3130 1:53.2890 1:28.1320 1:28.6310 1:56.4500 1:29.0960 1:55.9870 4:00.2700 1:57.8790 1:29.0960 2:05.7250 1:44.9730 2:03.1990 1:47.6560 1:28.6740

According to the data in comparison to the 28.07 PB, the main gain in time was at the sweeper. Oddly enough there was a reduction in speed in T4 even though the kerbs have been flattened nicely. Unsure whether to trust the data or whether I was being a pansy through there. Racechrono shows an optimal of 27.6, there’s a tiny bit more in it but for now I’m extremely satisfied. For this car to drip into the 26’s would require some significant changes which I am not ready for yet.



But for now, I am content. A great day to remember, thanks all to all who made it even more awesome.

The blog is officially up to date. Note to self, don’t get lazy and keep at it.

[M@lew]

Excellent updates Pete and congrats again on the 1:27

Good to see you've still been capturing all the updates.

[felixR]

Congrats on the new PB Pete

[eskimo_firefighter]

Excellent updates Pete and congrats again on the 1:27

Good to see you've still been capturing all the updates.

Congrats on the new PB Pete

Thanks guys!

Street wheels - SSR GTX01 17x9+38 + 255/40/17 Dunlop Direzza ZIII in Dark Silver

After a few years of running a single set of wheels and feeling guilty of street driving semi slicks on a casual drive on the road, I decided to place an order on a set of SSR GTX01's which is a cast aluminium wheel, these look very similar to the Wedsports TC105N/X, the downsides are they are heavier, less attractive however the upside is they are quite affordable. Good mate Lok from Dunlop then hooked me up with a set of Dunlop ZIII's, many thanks for your support!

I didn't weigh the wheels but they are noticeably heavier than the CE28N's that are 1 inch wider, no matter though as these are not my performance orientated set of wheels for the track. Although I do plan on still doing track days on the Dunlops just for the fun of it and to satisfy the curiousity of just how fast these tyres are.

So far I am enjoying driving the S2000 on the street more regularly, guilt free of burning away expensive semi slick tyres. They are more comfortable with a softer sidewall so they seem to absorb the roads undulations much better than semi slicks, they are less noisy and should have great longevity. With much less grip than the DZ03G's and A050's, I can see this car being more of a riot to drive on track, so that should be quite an exciting experience.

17x9+38 comes in FACE B. Has a good amount of concavity and it clears the Stoptech front BBK by a large margin thankfully. A 255/40 on a 9J rim has a chunky look which I don't mind.







Driving this thing just for the sake of driving feels awesome. Now that it has a set of street tyres, weekend drives should be more of a regular occurance.


Random photoshoot with mates. Thanks T.Hoang for the stellar shots below.

[eskimo_firefighter]

Retribution of the S2000 in NSW tracks. June 14th-15th.

With the COVID-19 restrictions easing, the borders to NSW were open and track days were operating at business as usual in NSW with a few tweaks to accommodate for social distancing rules. The last visit to NSW tracks last year didn’t end so well, with unfinished business it was time for redemption. A return to NSW to complete a double interstate track day, Wakefield Park + Sydney Motorsport Park.

After completing quite a few track days since the Wakefield blunder in 2019, I had was confident in the reliability of the car.

Despite the experience I had last time I opted to drive the S2000 down to do two track days, following a similar plan to my last visit to NSW. This time on the Dunlops with good mate Ying.B carrying the CE28's with the A050's for me in her blue crush Echo.

13th June – Drive to Goulbourn
14th June – Wakefield Park Track day
15th June – SMSP ARDC Track day
16th June – Drive home

14th June – Wakefield Park Raceway – Trackschool Track Day

The weather forecast showed it would be clear for the rest of the day at 19 degrees and clear.

The only change to the car since the last day it was at Wakefield were the tyres, DZ03G to A050 and rear Spoon Bushings. However I have since analysed my previous lap here and figured there was more time to be extracted as the current PB of 1:03.9 was quite messy.

Following Toby in his much cleaner S2000.


In terms of driving changes, I experimented with taking T3 in 4th gear opposed to 3rd. And T8 (fishhook) in 3rd gear opposed to 2nd. T4 felt slower and was harder to nail in a higher gear, the fishhook in 3rd was definitely the way to go. With that in mind, the car achieved a new PB of 1:03.7932. The car felt great overall but I am starting to notice that the rear end was slightly unstable under braking for T1-T2, the bent rear boot under high aero load is not helping so this needs to be addressed.

Lap times from Natsoft. 39 laps completed.
1:21.5603 1:16.2952 1:15.5946 1:15.2790 1:12.2248 1:09.7505 1:05.9534 1:05.3619 1:05.9463 1:08.7259 1:04.5835 1:05.3395 1:43.4599 1:06.1440 1:05.7565 7:29.4045 1:04.6339 1:06.0139 1:04.3829 1:06.1768 1:04.2611 1:14.0236 1:04.0947 1:14.5941 1:10.6573 1:04.2926 1:04.2213 1:04.0061 1:14.6786 1:03.7932 1:25.9939 1:16.1072



I drove as cleanly as possible not putting the car at too much risk, thankfully this time around, the car had completed the day without any issues, with a new PB to boot and another track day SMSP tomorrow. It was setting out to be an awesome trip.



Many thanks to the Trackschool crew and mates for a great day out. It was fanstistic to get back into the swing of things after the isolation period and so much negativity that is currently looming over the world right now.

Photographs courtesy of DOPHOTO.

[eskimo_firefighter]

Sydney Motorsport Park – ARDC Test and Tune day. June 15th

The big one. A track that I’ve always wanted to do ever since I started this hobby. Being my first time here I didn’t want to put too much emphasis on lap times, more so on understanding and learning the track, particularly what lines and gearing to use.

Review of the track

After a few sessions of the track I can say with conviction that this is one of my favourite tracks in Australia. Second to only The bend Motorsport park in South Australia. The track is challenging and rewards skill and finesse after T1, T1 is similar to Phillip Islands T1 which rewards big balls, but more so at SMP as is bumpy through the corner and is not cambered to assist the car to turn in. Overall SMP is a more complex track to me as Phillip Island mostly consists of high sweeper sweepers.

Credit to SVP for the snap.


After using session 1 to get a feel for the track, session 2 I got a decent gist of what needs to be done to get a decent lap here. Unfortunately, being a test and tune day traffic was a major issue where cars of huge variance in speed were bunched up together. Finally, in the second session I was able to get somewhat of a clear lap and got a 1:42.43.

Notes to myself for improvement.

T1 – I am leaving a lot on the table. Later in the day I was shaving -0.5 on this corner alone as I carried over 10kph more than in the PB lap.
T2 – Double apex, be patient on the throttle on exit, slowly feed the power and ensure no snappy oversteer occurs on exit, this costs a lot of time!
T3 – Short shift into 4th
T4 – 4th, brake hard but keep it in the powerband and punch it through the corner.
T5 – 4th gear again, can apex slightly early here and use the outside of the track on exit. Can carry a lot more speed on exit here.
T6 – 3rd is fine.
T7 – 4th is fine.
T8 – 3rd is fine, get on the throttle earlier, use the outside more.
T9 – slight brake, feed the power.
T10 – Quick downshift into 3rd, Drop the wheels on the inside kerb then wash off onto the outside of T11
T11 - Don't be afraid to use the outside kerbs, keep wide to apex late onto the main straight. Then boot the shit out of it for a hectic PB.



The remainder of the day I was unable to improve on the PB unfortunately, it was slightly agitating as I was getting accustomed to the track and kept running into traffic. Despite that I had a blast and was thankful that the car actually did the track day here and was able to drive it back home!



With newfound knowledge of this track I look forward to my next return to SMP with hopes of smashing a second or two off.

The car finally did it and I was ecstatic.

Big thanks to all who made the trip as memorable as it was.

[Toddxxx]

Those SSR look awesome Pete! Might have to look at a set for myself

Congrats on the smsp times! Very keen to head out with you next time you come up

[eskimo_firefighter]

Thanks Todd, keen to head back, hopefully with less traffic this time around! I'll give you a heads up on when I intend to go back but it won't be for a while that's for sure due the the rona situation in VIC!

[eskimo_firefighter]

June 28th - Boradford Motorsports Complex.

Just two weeks after the wild double interstate track day, I had booked a spot with the good people at Nugget Nationals at a track that the S2000 has never done. The full Broadford circuit.

The track is 2.16km with 12 corners, although I don't count 3-4 as corners as they are basically a part of a long straight. A small circuit but with a few complexities, which includes a lot of elevation changes, slightly blind corners with not much run off.



As per usual, as it is my first time here in the S2000. I find it vital to be detailed in my note taking to reflect, be self-critical and analyse to improve for my next time out here.

T1 - Brake deep into the corner and apply much more throttle through T1-T2. T1's braking zone is uphill so I think I can brake later than I am.

T2 - Balance the car with the throttle, as I start to see the straight. Get on the power asap. A lot of time can be made here as it leads onto the longest straight.

T5 - A sketchy corner, fairly blind on entry. Not much run off on exit. Be careful with this one. It's not worth taking too much risk here as the corner is relatively slow and leads onto a tricky and relatively slow section of the track.

T7-T9 - I am pretty happy with my current approach. Quick dab on the brakes approaching T7 and balancing the car with the throttle.

T10-11 - Main area of improvement here. I got the braking zone down, but the downshift into 2nd is costing me a lot of time. It turns out carrying third from 10-12 can easily be done by utlising the cars midrange, which I sometimes forget this car now has with boost.

T12 - A difficult corner, the car loves to oversteer here due to the camber of the corner. The key here I believe is to improve on throttle control, being smoother with my steering inputs on mid/exit phase of the corner. Corner exit oversteer should not cost me too much time as long as I do NOT have to lift off the throttle, this requires a lot courage and right amount of steering lock as the I can potentially run to the outside of the dirt. There's enough run off here to take a bit of risk here though.

The s2000 ended up doing 12 laps with the best lap of 1:02.076 (lap 9) before being blacked flagged for exceeding noise restrictions. The limit was 95DB measured from 30m I believe, with the registering at 97DB. Having only one session for the day in the car, I was pretty satisfied with the time, however there is much more potential to be extracted, until next time.



With the track being only 40 minutes away from home. I ended up driving the S2000 home before lunch and picking up my back up track car, the Renault Clio Sport 172. The perks of being close to the track. Any track time is a good time regardless of vehicle choice.



Photo's courtesy of Taku Mode.