I've been conspicuously quiet for a reason... There was a incident at COTA where I was chasing a very modified GT350 around the track and while he gave me the pass, I was just having fun so I hung out on his tail for another lap. My car, with the newly installed camber plates, the new plus sized MPSC2's, new Pagid pads, and playing with 105 octane race gas had just set my best lap time of 2:36.59 by 3.00.05 seconds. Car was running excellent.
Then, some doof in a ZL1 let my lap buddy by, but held me up. So much so that by the time I got around the ZL1 the grey GT350 had disappeared from sight.
Within 1/2 lap I was closing on the GT350 at turn 15 and I decided to downshift to 2nd for turn 15 (usually I'm in 3rd) so I could lunge at him on exit. This worked perfectly, but unfortunately had me set up to be redlining into turn 16, the sweeper.
In 16, I attempted to shift to third mid entry of 16 and my shifter jammed. I backed off and tried again and it was still stuck, so backed off one last time and pushed kinda hard and ended up in first instead of 3rd and releasing the clutch quickly caused the rear tires to lose traction and come around.
Anyone who knows COTA turn 16, knows on the inside there is a concrete wall with Armco barrier after only 5 feet of grass... The usual event is carrying too much speed and running wide out where there is plenty of space.
I can say the plus size tires function excellent, it was clear my car was much better stuck to the track than the car I was working on, which also was set up very nicely. The Pagid pads do provide excellent stopping performance even when pushed hard. I was running -1.8 degrees of camber and that was working well too. Really runs great.
I'd like to blame the shifter, but it was my responsibility to be patient catching up, then if the anomaly occurred, slow down and reset instead of pushing it, it wasn't a real race after all, and I wish I had the ability to drift the car in control, but it came around pretty quickly...
So, I have my car in the shop for some major surgery.
One thing I was already planning to work on, was the hood shake at +140mph. The grey car I was chasing had quick latches on his hood, albeit in a strange location mid hood, as well as a full exhaust, headers and all, screaming, and a full roll cage... Seeing the QL's on the new GT500 is also inspirational, so I ordered some 1 7\8" quick latches in blue to match the electric blue of my car.
All that to share that I went to the body shop today and the new GT350 composite core support that came in turns out to have been tooled for the hood pin's for the GT500 latches already, they share the same core support and the location is in the perfect place to mount quick latches on the GT350 hood
while matching the location of the GT500. Cool. I wonder if the 2019+ GT350's have the new revision and can more easily adapt Quick Latches.
p.s. I also ordered a MWG shifter ;-) Not sure it will fix all the problems with the nut between the steering wheel and seat, but one can hope.
Then, some doof in a ZL1 let my lap buddy by, but held me up. So much so that by the time I got around the ZL1 the grey GT350 had disappeared from sight.
Within 1/2 lap I was closing on the GT350 at turn 15 and I decided to downshift to 2nd for turn 15 (usually I'm in 3rd) so I could lunge at him on exit. This worked perfectly, but unfortunately had me set up to be redlining into turn 16, the sweeper.
In 16, I attempted to shift to third mid entry of 16 and my shifter jammed. I backed off and tried again and it was still stuck, so backed off one last time and pushed kinda hard and ended up in first instead of 3rd and releasing the clutch quickly caused the rear tires to lose traction and come around.
Anyone who knows COTA turn 16, knows on the inside there is a concrete wall with Armco barrier after only 5 feet of grass... The usual event is carrying too much speed and running wide out where there is plenty of space.
I can say the plus size tires function excellent, it was clear my car was much better stuck to the track than the car I was working on, which also was set up very nicely. The Pagid pads do provide excellent stopping performance even when pushed hard. I was running -1.8 degrees of camber and that was working well too. Really runs great.
I'd like to blame the shifter, but it was my responsibility to be patient catching up, then if the anomaly occurred, slow down and reset instead of pushing it, it wasn't a real race after all, and I wish I had the ability to drift the car in control, but it came around pretty quickly...
So, I have my car in the shop for some major surgery.
One thing I was already planning to work on, was the hood shake at +140mph. The grey car I was chasing had quick latches on his hood, albeit in a strange location mid hood, as well as a full exhaust, headers and all, screaming, and a full roll cage... Seeing the QL's on the new GT500 is also inspirational, so I ordered some 1 7\8" quick latches in blue to match the electric blue of my car.
All that to share that I went to the body shop today and the new GT350 composite core support that came in turns out to have been tooled for the hood pin's for the GT500 latches already, they share the same core support and the location is in the perfect place to mount quick latches on the GT350 hood
while matching the location of the GT500. Cool. I wonder if the 2019+ GT350's have the new revision and can more easily adapt Quick Latches.p.s. I also ordered a MWG shifter ;-) Not sure it will fix all the problems with the nut between the steering wheel and seat, but one can hope.
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