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That was what at 35 second run? Not much time to get heat in the tires.

When you get a warmer day and PM run group, measure the tire temps (outside, middle and inside) on each tire and let us know what you find. Usually the backs are much hotter, by tens of degrees, than the front, so you'll we wondering how to get more heat into the fronts. Especially if you are experiencing understeer, i.e., the front washing out.

One solution is to reduce the tire width in the front so that the heat secured is distributed over a smaller area all in the name of the most critical thing, i.e., figuring out at what operating temperature your tires get sticky and start providing more than just mechanical grip. If you are not to the "sticky" stage then you're not getting the most grip for your tires.

That's why it's so much fun to run the Medford enduro. You are guaranteed to get a "sticky" tire as opposed to mechanical grip tire t some point over the +/- 3:50 minute course. When it happens you feel the grip and can increase your speed around corners.

BTW, finding the understeer point in your car might take some pushing as you've set it up right, i.e., it's well balanced.

IMHO the objective in autoxing is to get all tires to the sticky point so your grip is more than just mechanical. If you haven't been there, when it does happens it'll be an eye opener.

Usually our courses are 40 - 60 seconds. We had a large turnout, 127 drivers, so they ran a short course. I'm sure the tires will get plenty warmed up in the next few months. By March we will be seeing mid 80 degree temps if not hotter. 3:50 minute course? Wow, wish we had something like that down here. Here's a pic going into a sweeper slowing down from around 55 - 60mph to around 40.


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Also think your spring rates are good, as the car looks balanced as your entering that corner.

Guessing the course went off to the left, but there isn't another cone in that picture. Was that picture taken on the same course for the video you posted?

Yes same course. That is the entry into the first left hand sweeper and there is a cone on the other side of the car. The setup feels great but I'm maxed out on the front 19mm swaybar. I am thinking about going up a size on the torsion bars to 22mm so I can ease off the swaybar A bit and gain some adjustability.

The adjustable ones are great. I've got one from Smart Racing that allows for about 6 or 8 settings. You change the tortion bar between either side and secure a bunch more adjustability in a number of ranges. For autoxing I have the lightest bar, adjustable from 60 to 110lbs if I remember correctly.

I think you may have misunderstood me. I currently am running a 19mm weltmeister swaybar on its stiffest setting. My torsion bars are 21mm. I am contemplating going up in torsion bar size to 22 mm so I can loosen the swaybar off the full stiff setting. The car drives great as it is but I don't like being maxed out on the swaybar. A smart bar would be nice but I thought they closed up shop.

Mine looks like this one:

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Smart Racing offered 4 different bars, like 21/22/23 or 24mm for the set up. Must be somewhat like what weltmeister offers? I had the opposite problem of you, i.e., my original bar was like 23mm and I had it on it lowest setting and that wasn't soft enough, so went with the 22mm and it works perfectly and allows for adjustability.

The weltmeister is similar just nowhere near as nice as the smart bar. I wonder if someone will start making them again. Chris's setup looks well made. http://tangerineracing.com/suspension.htm#...Anti-Roll%20Bar

These guys <http://www.imgt3performance.com/smart-racing-performance-products/> look to be making, or selling, the Smart Racing products for 911's. Maybe they can still do the 914 version?

On the other hand everything that Chris Foley makes is ace. I have his stuff everywhere on my car and have been really pleased with everything I bought from him. Also he's a great person to deal with, would have my vote for Vendor of the Year, if there was such a prize.

BTW Woody, PM me your email address and I'll send you a video of a practice session at Medford.

Your vid shows a lack of "tight stuff".....not that there's any thing wrong with that.

Suspension:
I'm of the "as soft as possible" school of thought. Spring rate for T bars is not adjustable. Any rate increase in front has to be balanced by an up-rate in the rear for balance..... also you run the risk of over powering your shocks. An up grade in sway bar makes a lot more sense. Mine was a hollow Tarret with an effective rate of 22mm.....half hard setting.

Either way, you need to make sure your shocks are effectively dampening your suspension movement....with soft rebound to keep the tires in contact with the ground....you don't want to "pump down". That said, your venue looks pretty smooth.....and open. There is nothing wrong with setting up for your "home". Mine was *really* rough but my soft set up *worked* everywhere....but was less than ideal on a smooth surface. Good enuff to do in the Marina bunch if a bit floppy.

This course only had one real tight spot and that was the right hand half Chicago box type thing. I've always had problems with Chicago boxes up until now. Usually the car would understeer but I didn't see that on this particular course. The venue we use is very smooth, just dusty. So you think 22mm torsion bars would be too much?

Dunno, never BTDT.

IF I ran full time at your venue I would *guess* not, but those alone will cause all sorts of difficulties........*BALANCE* means all parts of the suspension working in concert to make he car do do what you want under all circumstances.....easy to say but nearly impossible to attain....but you want to come as close as you can.

The beating the car takes with stiff suspenders is another facet to take into consideration........and since the chassis is a flexi flier more strengthening there is needed. The chassis is not strong enough to force the suspension to do its job now and you want to stiffen suspension ? Ya don't want to get the cart in front of the horse......

When I stiffened the chassis ( tubes to the towers), it was a revelation....probably the single best move I made.....that was 6-7 years into the build and I kicked my own ass for not doing it sooner.

+1 on that modification and JP vision.

It was as dramatic as going from 205 hoosiers to 9 inch Canti slicks.

This thread came about the right time for me. I am in need of new tires and thought it might be a good time to do the same, jump to 275 tires.

What rim should I look for? I have some old Cup rims that are 17x9.

What is the best offset to use? Or better how to measure? I can drop a rule from the edge of the rim to the bolt flange. I found online, Et47, ET55 and ET70.

I love the Etoile rims, but where to get them?

Sorry for the hijack, but this seems to be the best thread to put this.

-- brett

Found this: http://www.gbsalpine.com/wheel/gotti/eng/j55a.html

Brett, I'm running 15x10s on the rear with the 275/35/15 A6s. I ended up using 22mm of spacer with the glass fenders trimmed way down. The wheels show 6 1/4 inches from the mounting surface to the inner lip.

Etoile and Gotti are basicly the same, the only difference being the centers. Of course there are 16 and 32 bolt barrels, however, 16 bolt barrels can be changed into 32 bolt barrels easily (but carefully). If you want to know how let me know.

You measure the backspacing from the back of the center section to the outside of the inner rim.

Where to get them? Look around the web and all the car sites. You can buy them from Alpine, brand new, but very very expensive.

I've got some spare parts (barrels/centers), but it all depends on what size you need.

There are several good postings on Gotti wheels on this site (paddock section).

Couple of pics with the 225/275 setup. Car feels great.

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My fastest run today. Car is really coming together. The A6s are addicting.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZgtmY6OTCy0...be_gdata_player

Woody,

sorry for the hijack...

what is a fair price to pay for those kind of rims? There is a set for sale on pelican.

asking $1200 for 15x8,11.

-- brett

I would think that's a reasonable price depending on condition but Randal is the expert on the Gotti wheels. Maybe he'll chime in. My 10s are very tight under my flares. 11s wont fit unless I go with bigger flares. Also, make sure you can find tires that will work on those. My 275s are perfect on the 10" wheels, an 11" wheel would be stretching it a little bit.

There is another dimension you need to think about, i.e., other than overall width when buying three piece wheels.

As background, there is an outer barrel and an inner barrel. Make sure you find out the exact configuration of the wheel as it can make a huge difference. I found this out the hard why when I put together 3" (outer) and 8" (inner) barrels to make a 11 wide wheel. The problem was the offset on the 8" inner barrel was way to much.

Best situation is what I have on the back now. 4" outers and 7" inners. The offset comes out to less than 6 inches, so I can run without spacers. Why isn't the 7" offset matching the size of the barrel, because the center mounts with most of it within the 7" inner barrel, so the net ends up being less than 6 inches.

And make sure the bolt pattern, i.e., 5 x 130 is the one your buying. If your running 4 bolt wheels I don't now the exact dimension, but someone on here will.

4x130 I believe.

If they are really clean and don't require the outside barrels to be polished, then $1,200 is OK, abet a bit pricey.

Are you looking for looks plus functionality or just functionality?

Go not show. :-)

This is for an autocross car. They just need to be straight and round.

I have one person looking for me,but I am open to ideas.

thanks guys.

--brett


--brett

Diamond racing wheels or realwheel have good stuff at very reasonable prices.

http://www.realwheel.net/products.php?catid=20

Realwwheel has some light weight stuff as well.

I checked it out. I would like to find 16x8 and 16x9 in 5x130 bolt pattern as I think that would be ideal for my setup and tire selection. THe site you mention does have light rims and at a good price, but they are only 15's.

Still looking.

-- brett

Before you buy 16"s remember that 15"ers work great for Autoxing as they spin up faster, get more torque to the ground coming out of corners and typically have less unsprung weight, i.e., a 16" wheel will typically be heaver than a 15".

On the other hand when I was looking for 15" Gotti parts, all I could find was 16" wheels.

I have personally seen various folks go to big wheels on 914's only to switch back to 15s.

We even have two guys who have converted to 13" wheels and tires and they love that setup for autoxing. Also the race tires are CHEAPER.

You running a 6 or a 4?

I originally had 17's and dropped to the 16s. The problem is the tire I am running in the front are not available in 15s.

And I am running a 2.7l six. By the way, I think we met at a DeAnza AX about 3 or 4 years ago.

-- brett

Hey Brett - was that the day at DeAnza when I blew my front cooler oil line and left oil all over the parking lot? Very embarassing.

So what size tires (and compound) are you running in the front? If you're primarily doing autox there are tons of 15's available, but some of them are very expensive, like the Avons. On the other hand once you put them on you'll be wondering why you didn't earlier.

We had a 2.7 (Matt Lowrence motor) in The Beast - so nice. If you ever run your car at Laguna, the sound, going up from 5 through 6, is something you will never forget.

I think that was the time.

I am currently using 245/16 Hoosier A6 tires in the front and rear on 16x8 rims. the problem is, the rears are doing all the work and run about 15 degrees hotter than the front. It's too easy now to steer with the throttle.

-- brett

After having run a square setup for years, went to a staggered setup and so far it's outstanding. We used the overall balance of the car to determine tire sizes, after first deciding what size we wanted to use on the front.

That's the smart way to do it.

I went with the "OMG, i need those shiny wheels!" approach.

Front:
9x17 with 245-45 Hoosier Dot R's

Rear:
11x17 with 315-35 Hoosier Dot R's


The 245 on 9" rims might be too much for the front.
We'll see how that is going to work for me. Got the wheels and tires, so what the hell, i'll give it a try.

I do know i need all the help i can get in the rear. Right now, it's just to easy to spin them.

I weighed my front WT assy (8 X 15 Fuch with cantis) 31lbs. Weighed a buddy's 245 X 17s on 9 inch Fiskes.....42 lbs. This was on a bathroom scale, but hay........a couple pounds is inconsequential, but 11 lbs per corner is NOT. The big back assys were worse......13 lbs difference.

I agree. Except, my car is not a dedicated AX car and i'm only out there for fun.

Most of my time is spent on the street.

Heh, you sounded pretty serious at the few AX events we attended together.
Musta' been all that red mist blowing in the air.

I'm serious when i'm at the event. I'm competitive in nature.


But once i drive off the event lot, i'm back to street driving and the comforts that come with it.

good data point. When I get home, I will weigh my 16x8 with 245 hoosier a6 and see how they compare.

--brett

I am really curoius about how you are going to get that size tire under the gt-flares.

( it's what is driving part of my rim choice.)

--brett

I won't ...


I have a set of extra wide GT flares for 9"/11" wheels that i'm going to mount.

Mark put an extra strip in my wide GT flares in order to fit my 11" wheels with 10.7" wide tires. After finishing and checking the Avon's have about an inch clearance on the inside, but not much outside. Could change to 6" inners and 5" outers to get the wheels closer to the inside, but I'm happy for now. Just saying, check your inner spacing before you cut the flares as you might be OK without the extra strip.

I'd much rather have them spaced towards the outside.

Back track is 68" wide, so having to learn to stay a bit further away from cones. I could save two inches if I went with the bigger inner barrel, but not sure it is worth the effort to rebuild the wheels. Easier to just change your driving a bit.

Finally got around to weighing my rims. 16x8 and 245/45-16 Hoosier A6: 41 lbs.

We'll see what rims I can find, that will support my tire selection.

-- brett

Andy,

what size are the rims you are replacing?

--brett

7"

These cantilevered 9" slicks on cookie cutters weight 32lbs.

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This thread has pretty well publicised the fact that larger wheel/tire combos are heavier than
smaller ones ......both widths & heights carry a penalty with heights being the worst of the 2, IMO.

Heights can get one in trouble by raising ride heights of the car and getting the car back down to mother earth can compromise your suspension.

Wheel widths can over reach the front suspension geometery of a x19 or 911....BTDT. Scrub radius can get out of control. Heavy steering and a monster push are the results .

Take care *before* you spend your money.