So this is how it starts...

[bngl3rt]

OP - solid driving for your first time! What have you done to your car, tires, etc...? Can't really add a whole lot to what others have said, so keep hitting the track and getting seat time.

The cayman didn't leave you from power. They are fairly even acceleration wise with an nsx. He was carrying a ton of speed through the corner as he caught you. Not sure what tires he was on but with equal tires, your car can do that.

Thanks for the compliment & good to know about the Cayman. My car has headers, exhaust, Koyo radiator, Comptech short shift, and weighs 3020lbs with a half tank of gas (I have taken various crap out here and there). It's on stock 16/17 wheels with Falken RT615K up front and Michelin Pilot Super Sports in back.

haven't gone on this site for awhile and while this kind of "old topic" still drawing my attention, I'm surprised the opinions being different from time to time.

that of course, "Being a better driver" is the only stay true advise and no petrohead can argue that this is not anyone's goal, well at least at the track talk forum. I'm sure 100% people up here would not want to learn to be a worse driver.

As we all recall the joy of track driving at the very beginning... That excitement, I meant the night you loaded everything in the nsx. Going off your "to-bring" checklist. Losing sleep even you know you will be up 5am next morning. That pure excitement, I think everything else afterwards went downhill, soon after you gradually chasing lap times, modification improvements / headache, ego and others. Anyone here have good idea of how to start someone to keep that enjoyment longer??

I am more interested honestly in keeping the car reliable and having it last a long time. I don't think I will be doing any mods that detract from its street performance or cause any headaches with it.

I'm also *trying* to avoid spending a ton of money here, which leads me to my next question...

I have bought a Comptech harness bar that came with a single, expired 5pt harness. I think it makes sense to yank that one off and put new ones on, so I'm debating between 5pt and 6pt. I would really like to keep stock seats as a way to save $$ over buying buckets (plus I like the luxury car feel of electric seats). Obviously the way to go with 5pt is titaniumdave's antisubmarine bar and a small hole in the seat + the Dali cushion.

However, for the integrity of the family jewels, I am also considering 6pt. I have read and searched all the threads on this and not really found a good RECENT answer (a lot of it seems to have been discussed several years ago and I wonder if the thinking has changed). Shouldn't it be possible to bolt the two anti sub belts in a 6pt harness down to the front seat rail bolts? I assume attaching both of them to a single anti sub bar would be pointless.

 

[jwmelvin]

Shouldn't it be possible to bolt the two anti sub belts in a 6pt harness down to the front seat rail bolts? I assume attaching both of them to a single anti sub bar would be pointless.

It's my understanding that the angle of the straps for a harness is rather important. And TitaniumDave's anti-sub bar seems like a pretty good solution in that regard. I don't see why it's bad to connect both belts in a 6-point to the same bar. That's my plan when I put in his bar in the next few weeks with my 6-point Crow harness.

 

[illwillem]

SFI/FIA text say anti sub straps must be a minimum of 20* back from the hole they come though. (basically just back behind the family jewels) through the floor pan with combo plates.

pay attention to the MINIMUM part..

I'd bought the hardware to do as instructed but realized after taking out the carpet, the floor directly under the seat id need to drill isnt flat, I wouldn't be able to get everything tight together becasue the spot i needed to drill was half in the middle of a hump in the floor pan. i wouldnt be able to torque down the nut on the backing plate and belt loops to get a good safe sandwich. Even if i tried, the seat is so low it'd be resting on the backing plate nut itself.

After a few calls to so people 'in the know' accompanied with some pictures and measurements they confirmed that looping them around the bottom bar will be sufficient because it was under the max length and still had correct angle when attached to the bottom rung. Thats how I run mine now.

Do NOT attach them to the front seat bolts. a step farther even... IMO drilling anything through 2/32nds of aluminum (the floor) and expecting it to stay put in a high g impact is ludicrous. The harness bar on the other hand is bunged, reinforced and anchored to the frame. I have seen seat brackets the have provisions on the bottom of the bracket itself near the rear mounting bolts, I suppose those would be fine too but you really are working with limited clearences if your seat sits low

 

[bngl3rt]

I don't like the sound of drilling into the car... I think TiDave's bar will work great.

I actually just emailed Crow - their website lists Bolt In and Clip In submarine belts, but you have to click on their PDF order form to see a price for Tube Mount (wrap around) submarine belts like the type that would be needed to run dave's bar. I asked if they have stopped selling tube mount gear or taken it off their online store for some other reason. Will post the result here...

 

[jwmelvin]

Yes Crow sells sub straps with wrap-around ends. I used the custom order form, which gets you where you need to be. The online store just shows a couple of preconfigured harnesses.

 

[jrd95nsx]

Congrats and welcome to the GFCP Club (Go Fast Crack Pipe). By the way a Cayman S is a very good match for a stock NSX, very similar performance envelope.

I wish I could do what you are doing now, starting from scratch with a great car like the NSX. You have the chance to do this track thing the right way and learn from the rest of us that did it the wrong way.

First DO NOT PUT A SUPERCHARGER ON YOUR CAR. Yes I am yelling this. Do not put any power adders on your car yet. Spend your money on a driving school or private tutor and lots of track time, if you can find someone with a NSX background great but what you are looking to learn first is the proper skills to drive a car at its limits. The NSX even in stock form is a very fast car in the right hands, it is a very easy car to learn on and when driven to the 90% range is forgiving enough to be safe but still teach you what not to do. Second stay on street tires, good tires and brakes are all that is needed at this point, the rest is all YOU. Keep video of all you track days, if you do the school or tutor get a good external mic and audio recorder that you can record what you and the instructor are saying and sinc it back to the video, get Harry's Lap Timer and start a log book for your car to track your progress. Do at least 1 track day a month, if you are going to different tracks study as much video as you can before you get there, you want to learn the track in your head before you drive in your car.

Resist the desire to add parts to your car untill you have moved to the intermediate or maybe even the advance group. You want to improve the driver and not the car, you can do a more track friendly alignment but I would stop there untill you have learned the basics.

This is a very fun and expensive hobby so make sure you know what you are getting into, you have been warned.

Dave

Good advice, I am moving from a 2001 S2000 to a new (for me) 95 NSX. I've run the last two years on tracks through NASA and have literally been passed by everyone and everything but have worked on my skills while trying to ignore all of the power mods. I loved my S2000 and the way it handled/drove- what a great car. Now I am in to a new learning oppertunity; signed up for a 3 day Skip Barber in Sebring and cant wait for the new Great Lakes Nasa season to start.

 

[9doors]

The only thing I am not willing to do is risk crashing the car. Writing off my childhood dream car would break my heart. (But using it for what it was meant to do, on a track, gives me great joy).

At some level you have to get over this, or track another car. Things happen on track, much of which is in your control (i.e., going off track), many things are not. Stuff fails. I've seen cars burn to the ground, I've seen cars flip and roll, both on and of track, I've seen cars fail and wreck other cars, I've seen people airlifted to hospitals.

And, yes, you can say all this can happen on the freeway, and it can, but it happens at much higher speeds on track.

and then there's the mechanicals. I'll give you one personal example. Last time out a pin dropped out of the shift selector in the transmission and logged itself so the car was stuck in 1st gear and you could not enter the shift gate or neutral. First off, thank goodness this happened in the paddock and not on track. Ravi, Coz and I spent 14 hours over two days, pulling the trans at the track, finding the problem, putting it all back together and testing it. This was a GOOD thing. For had the pin not lodged itself, it would have torn its way through the transmission. Boom.

I'm not trying to put the fear o' god in ya here, but just sharing realities.

"The track is a hole in the asphalt into which we pour money"

 

[Coz]

LOL...so true.

"The track is a hole in the asphalt into which we pour money"

 

[bngl3rt]

Egg on face. Tail between legs. Humble pie.

 

[docjohn]

nice leather jacket.....

 

[9doors]

nice leather jacket.....

lol. Fonzie driving an NSX?

 

[docjohn]

AAaaaaahhhhhhhhh!!!!

 

[bngl3rt]

It gets cold in Monterey with the windows down in the morning!

The car is fine modulo a cracked side skirt. My ego, on the other hand...

 

[Dhalsim]

I applaud your first off track adventure. Not too bad. I have actually gone off track on that same corner but on the other side. How was the rest of your day?

 

[bngl3rt]

I applaud your first off track adventure. Not too bad. I have actually gone off track on that same corner but on the other side. How was the rest of your day?

Good! The crash knocked both of the tires on the right side of the car off their rims, but the Big O Tire crew and the Skip Barber Racing crew at laguna seca helped me get them mounted back up. So that wasn't the end of my day, I actually went back out for two more sessions (slower and with an instructor haha)

 

[docjohn]

hard to tell what was going on because of the glare ,,but did you lift on a downhill turn?

 

[bngl3rt]

hard to tell what was going on because of the glare ,,but did you lift on a downhill turn?

I don't exactly remember. Wish I had telemetry/data logging to tell me.

I do know that I came into the corner way too hot and that there is a camber change in the middle of it.

Turn 9, the one after the corkscrew at Laguna, if anyone is curious.

 

[illwillem]

Sounded like a slight lift at the apex, or you were just asking the rear to do too much when that corner drops away, i was sensing it as it happened while watching the video and was trying to mentally countersteer for you. hah.

Glad it was just re mounting the tires (weird they came off though???). Good job getting back on the horse that's a scary place to go off.

 

[docjohn]

Do you remember what your cold tire pressures were?

 

[Ponyboy]

I don't exactly remember. Wish I had telemetry/data logging to tell me.

Something as simple as Harry's Lap Timer will be able to tell you if you lifted.

Welcome to the Farming Excursion Club, and to keeping the shiny side up. Be of good cheer, the line b/t being in control and out of control gets thiner with experience.

 

[RYU]

Look where you want to go haha! Love the jacket too

Maybe just cold tires on that first lap. That's great that you went back out there. Awesome man! We've all been there.

 

[9doors]

Yeah...I'm guessing cold tires and on the gas too early, but very hard to tell from the vid.

 

[bngl3rt]

Something as simple as Harry's Lap Timer will be able to tell you if you lifted.

Welcome to the Farming Excursion Club, and to keeping the shiny side up. Be of good cheer, the line b/t being in control and out of control gets thiner with experience.

I had TrackAddict running, but only with GPS. Need to order one of them OBD2 widgets to get at all the data from the car.

I agree the video sucks - where do you all put your GoPros so that they can see your hands on the wheel and the shifter, but also see the track outside? Seems like I might need another GoPro... one pointing at me from the passengers side and one pointing out the front...

The car felt fine but I'm a paranoid so I spent the day looking into it to make sure it WAS fine. Some carnage:

Disconnected oil level sensor - wtf? I'm thinking the hard hop over the curb just shook an already-decaying connector loose.


Side skirt - ow. Guess I left some purple plastic somewhere at Laguna.


CT header, scratched and ever so slightly bent.


Alignment shot to hell.


Realigned the car and reattached the oil sensor today. The header, though slightly bent, is not cracked or leaking so I think it's fine. Not sure what to do about the side skirt.

You live, you learn! Surprisingly I was doing better lap times later in the day after the crash - I was being "slower" (i.e. smoother) and found about 6 seconds over my pre-crash lap times (2:11->2:05).

Of course, Jeremy Clarkson's 1:57 is in my crosshairs :smile:

 

[FF Drifter]

Wow wow woooooooooo ~ ! Yeah very tough to see the track in your video so I was following along with a map in my mind. I could feel the pucker down the Corkscrew but didn't expect the spin afterwards. Glad to see you tracking it! Egos can be repaired, hope to see more video soon!

- - - Updated - - -

For GoPro setting, try putting the camera closer to the windshield. Also I've not tried it yet but I believe the Spot Meter function is designed exactly for these situations: the camera positioned in a relatively dark area pointing outwards to a much brighter environment.

 

[RYU]

I think ffdrifter mentioned the setting. Its the setting with a box and a dot in the middle.

6 secs is a lot of time to make up! Great job