That is crazy!

 

Well, Albert got his 3rd brake flush of the year.

Yup, he getting to go on another track day this coming Saturday, at Lime Rock Park. It is an afternoon event, so that will make getting there pretty relaxed, but it will make for a rapid fire on and off the track for 4 sessions event. Eat before it starts and hope there is time to get some hydration in before it all ends.

Hopefully no rain/showers. The forecast has been iffy on that account. But one thing is guaranteed - it will be chilly. The 200 TW tires will be near their cold temperature limit to start the trip there and the right rear may never get up to temperature while on the track, which will make the one left hand turn a bit dicey….

Albert also got a good once over for his tech inspection, beyond the brake bleed. No issues as expected. This car is a rock. New Carbotech XP12 brake pads up front, and some somewhat worn shoes to wear, which is why I am hoping for dry to dry-ish conditions.

This event was to be for Smokey. I was looking forward to putting a few more miles on that -3 deg front camber. However, upon performing the tech inspection I found that one of the camberplates I put in pulled a Humpdy Dumpty (came apart in a way that can’t be put back together). Long story short, I may have screwed it up when I modified them. Not sure as the other one is still ok, so it is a toss of a coin as to who is at fault here. Any rate, Albert has been pulled into service for this event; I am sure he doesn’t mind…

 

Have fun, I'll be at the Glen Friday and Saturday to end the season, rain forecast both days. Now I can see how the camber feels in the wet

 

Maybe you will have wet on Friday but my weather apps are saying dry-ish to dry on Saturday. At any rate, enjoy!

I am looking at wet to wet-ish on Saturday at LRP. The Apps can’t make up their minds. I am planning to run the mostly worn out Falkens. This should be interesting.

About wheels….

I came across this post about 949 and them coming out with new wheels. Good weights on the 15” and an 8” width. That and a set of 225-45x15 tires, you’d be golden. There is, however, a note about the previous version failing… :eeK:

 

I'm fine with the Sparco wheels and 205/50-15s, the Sparcos are holding up well unlike those Konigs I told you about

So Friday started out dry and cool, first run was dry and fine. Second run the typical WGI microclimate kicked in, rain in the Boot and nowhere else, then rain all over. It was great fun bombing through the B/S and into the Carousel at speed only to find a wet track halfway down the hill....Survived that one, next run started out ok until the slippery flags came out with nothing on track to be seen, but it was felt going through T6 as I got a major wiggle mid-turn. Turns out a Camaro lost its serpentine belt and blew coolant out. Black-flag all, long clean-up, session and day over for me. Was supposed to stay for Saturday (today) but thought how awful I'd feel if something happened on the season's last day especially with all the $$$ I've just sunk into the car, so I bagged it and came home having to settle for a nice, round 30-trackday season I'll take it and run!

 

@gbuff1 , congrats on a month long track season without any accidents!

 

Thanks VV, hope all is well, there were plenty of chances but was fortunate to avoid them all, must be the angel on my shoulder

 

Ya - I figured you were set for wheels. Always fun to see what is out there. It was also interesting to read that those guys had cracking/failure issue too.

I have had multiple occasions to find antifreeze in the middle of a corner at WGI. The worst was, a few years back, hitting some at the apex of T3 at 100+ with the foot to the floor. If the back end had started to come around, I don’t know what I would have done as there was no more “get on the throttle”. The car behaved very well, thank you. I, however, was not so good and took the exit at the BS flag station….

Glad you made out ok. Good call to have left in one piece. In skiing the saying is (something like) “The best last run is the one I didn’t take”.

 

Saturday reminded me of one of those campy murder mysteries - It was a dark and dreary night…

Only it was morning as Albert, all loaded up, and I headed down the road to LRP for an afternoon track event with SCDA.

Fall foliage is about at its peak here in the northeast, and slightly past peak in the higher grounds. This year is pretty spectacular and made for a great ride through the back country, even with the heavy gray skies and threat of rain.



As a pilot would say - we have a very low ceiling


The spectacular NE fall foliage


Valley fog over LRP

I had to wonder as I headed into the village at LRP whether the fog was actually in the park.


The “Park”

As it turned out, the weather gods were kind to us today and the Park was looking wonderful.

No precipitation as I unloaded the car and set up the popup with the requisite tarps to cover tools and whatnot and to close off the sides of the popup for a wind rain break. Got to love the silver HF tarps of all sizes

I was glad to have a chance to meet up with ZRE for lunch prior the start of the event. I missed out on participating with him at the WGI event a month ago.

Sorry no car pictures this time as many opted to bail on the day, which turned out to be their loss. But it is understandable with a high HP car. This track in the wet is not overly friendly to those cars with even a slight blip of the throttle…

There was a great sounding C5 Corvette race car on Toyo R888R tires. One of the worst DOT tribes in the wet, but the driver made do. There were also some really nice Mustangs that seemed to do ok.

As for Albert, he was wearing a set of heavily worn Falken 660 tires. I have seen a lot of tire test where these were considered to be one of the best wet weather tires. I don’t. Not even close. A Miata on Hankook RSRs, which are supposedly worse, was doing as well or better. For Albert, the first 2 session were like driving on summer tires on well packed snow. And the track was well washed of any rubber that had been on it. Understeer is your friend. Embrace it!

But this all makes for an interesting learning experience. For example, I found that I could turn into the up hill, let the front end understeer and slide into the compression area where the tires would hook up and launch the car straight up to the top for a perfect track out just to the right of the white line marking the edge of the track. Woo Hoo! Living on the edge.

With session 3 a dry line started to show up and the Falkens came into their own. Dry track is where these tires shine. Maybe not quite as good as some tires out there, but none the less - fun! Albert and I got to play with a new-ish MX5. We were very well matched in lap times but got there totally different ways. He was a bit better in the corners and Albert had a bit more power for the straights. That was a really fun session. Session 4 was in the dry, and the track was devoid of cars. I had had a great event and ended the session a little early.

And as I headed home the sun came out to reveal the true colors of the NE in the fall.

And the sun comes out as I am leaving

Of course.

All in all a great day and a great finale to the season. The all season tires will go on Albert when I go home and I will get to spend a few months contemplating what to do with the broken camberplate on Smokey for next season.

Enjoy and motor on!

 

That region of Connecticut is my favorite, both for the roads and the scenery.

 

In the process of changing out the tires and brake pads on Albert, I found this…


Well, that’s not right


One thing does not look like the other.

I know this happened at some point between the start of the event and arriving at home. I switched wheels around between this one, the left front, and the right rear. Everything was torqued to spec before I started my first session, so I know the bolt was “good” before I started. Did I check bolt torques during the event… No. Should I have? It looks like the answer is “yes”. Why didn’t I? I don’t check bolts/nuts when they have heat in them because when they cool, just this sort of thing can happen. How will I check them in the future? Carefully and at 10 to 15 ft-lbs below spec, just so they don’t become over-torqued. I figure if they have come loose or broken, this is high enough to show that. But at the same time it should not move/tighten the bolt/nut if it is where is should be for tightness for the temperature and cold torque it was set at. Hope that makes sense…

Note - At LRP, all but one turn are right turns. This means that the stud with broken bolt was on the most heavily loaded wheel on the car. Disaster was avoided, but only by luck. Is there a way to inspect bolt or stud threads? To my knowledge, not really unless you can see the crack by eye, which is unlikely. GVC tells us at each event that bolts and studs are “wear” items and need to be periodically replaced. Were these in need of replacement? By my experience, no. These were relatively new and had not seen many cycle, not in comparison to other bolts I have used. These were purchased from Turner, whom I have had good luck with in the past, so this was really unexpected. But this happens, as I have seen many times over the years of doing track events. That is why I carry a wheels worth of spares.

In looking at the fractured end, crescent shaped striations can be seen that are typically a result of cyclic fatigue. My guess is the crack started at a thread root defect and each time the bolt was torqued to spec the crack migrated an increment. When the cross section became thin enough, the bolt could no longer withstand the load from the torque being applied and broke. Interestingly the head of the bolt was still in the wheel when I got home. It might have been still attached by a thin segment which was snapped by the impact wrench. Can’t tell for sure as the head part was spun against the other part which would have obliterated any evidence to that effect. None the less and for whatever reason it was there.


Classic fatigue crack

The nice thing was that this was a bolt, not a stud. A stud would have been put in with some LocTight which requires a torch to heat it to release it. That would have been a pain. As it was just drilling the hole was enough to rotate the piece and from there an ezy-out made quick work of removing it.

All bolts on this side been replaced with brand new bolts. The other side still needs to be replace, meaning I need to order a new set.

One more thing to check when at a track event…

 

I change all my bolts yearly (or if they fail to stay torqued from wear, stretch etc) and have never broken one which is why I've never gone to studs which seem to break regularly at the track....though if I had 19 or 20-inch wheels/tires that weigh as much as I do instead of my puny, lightweight 15s I might change my tune on that With all the loosening/tightening sometimes they just fail like anything else could I just get them from RockAuto and buy a few extras and so far, so good.

 

Not a bad idea to change them regularly.

I have never had a bolt loosen on me. I know you have had that happen. This one was tight until it wasn’t. I think this is a bit like the investment advertisements… “past performance is no indication of future performance”. I have not had issues in the past so I figured no problems in the future. I just need to be more diligent in checking during events.

I’ll look into Rock Auto.

 

Yeah, with the number of days I do in a season it's cheap insurance but you still may get a bad bolt The only time I've had bolts loosen A LOT (i.e. more than 1/8 of a turn) was with those Konig wheels I had, I can only guess because they were so flexy hence the cracks they eventually showed. I do put a little antiseize on the bolt seats on the wheels themselves as you saw with my Sparcos which are more robust and it's been all good.

 

These are what I get:

https://www.rockauto.com/en/moreinfo...t=7680&jsn=787

 

Cheap insurance, indeed. Very glad to hear this didn't cause any problems while you were on track or on the way home.

I can't think of a better way to end the season than a final session at Lime Rock with few cars on track.

 

Yikes! I have a stud conversion, but I do not use lock-tite on them. I just tighten them up, then bolt the wheels on. I've never had one come out with the nut when removing a wheel either.

Maybe a late season session at Watkins Glen?

 

I have always put a little never seize on the threads, too. If nothing else it will help to minimize the wear on the treads in the hub. There are other reasons for doing this, too, but more than i care to get into.

VV - yes and yes. The day ended on a very good note; an even better note considering what I found later.

I see no reason for studs to be any worse than the bolts. The point of typical failure (see my above picture) knowns no difference between it being part of a bolt or being a stud with a nut on the end. So, with everything else being the same (strength, hardness, thread form, etc), they should have the same rate of failure. But I know it seems that studs fail more often. Could it be that they are the cheapest out there and not of good quality? Or they are over used? Or is there something about them that makes them different (don’t think so)? I do honestly believe that, if they are of a high quality, they will last as well as a bolt. I have them on my R56

As for LocTight on studs, that is just insurance that they won’t come out with the nut being loosened.

Late season event at WGI? Nothing that I am going to. Next June, maybe? Time for me to start prepping for the upcoming ski season. Oh, I am so out of shape…

 

I have always found tires to be an interesting subject, especially having grown up in the snow belt region of upstate NY. In the days before radial tires and hydrophilic rubber compounds for snow tires, one had to do with a tire that “looked like” it would do the job in snow, especially deep snow. I remember seeing the police car with a Goodyear snow tire that had an interesting interlocking tread pattern that just seemed to just claw through the snow. Then there was the conventional wisdom of “a winter tire needs to be narrow to work best in the snow”.

That thought of needing narrow tires for the snow has been rolling around my head for decades. Yet in this day and age where tires on cars are far wider than those bias ply tires of the past. Cars today seem to have no problem in the snow (with decent tires) with wide tires. Yes, radials and rubber compounds are a huge difference. But what about the fundamental physics of the narrow tire compressing the snow, blah, blah, blah?

Well, the Tyre Review guy tested this idea and seems to have an answer…

It makes no real difference. Well, that was a surprise.

If anything, a wider tire seems to have an advantage under braking conditions in the snow.

As my MINIs won’t being seeing show, this was purely academic, but fun to know.

Enjoy and motor on…

 

Narrow tires will get you through thick slush better then a wider tire. The wider tire will "float" and "hydroplane" over the slush. Let me tell you, that's an exciting feeling when the car floats at low speeds. Most roads in the winter, in my experience, will be relatively clear by the time any cars drive on them, and size won't matter as much in those conditions. Tread pattern will.

 

With the snow you must experience I am not surprised by your comment. The same should be true for deep snow.

But I must say, I have narrow tires (BFG KO2s) on my Wrangler and it gets bounced all around by the road slush on the highway. Then I see cars with what are likely AS tires doing much better. Not sure why, as they surely are on wider tires than what is on my Jeep.

Then there are the pickups with monster diameter tires (compared to my KO2s) and they just cruise. I would think the Wangler would do better than it does. However, at slow speeds and in deep snow it is a monster. From the comments in that video and what I have seen in snow wheeling videos, it seems much larger diameter tires are the way to go. I wonder what it would take to stuff some 40” tires in the wheel wells of the Jeep…

 

Replying from other thread (quoted above) and taking you up on your offer to post here.

eDLC: Yeah, I'm learning to hate this thing (assuming it's like the R56 JCW). It works great for the magazines but not so much in real track duty. That's why I am just going to bite the bullet and go with a real LSD. Probably Wave-trac, as I can't seem to find the Quaife in-stock anywhere and I don't really want to play the waiting game (only have so many weekends to work on the car until spring!)

Pads: There is good boxing day sale on DTC-60, so may get these (have to decide before New Year), so I may give them a try. I've been warned that these tend to go into "Ice mode" on my Z06, due to the friction characteristics. I got Ice Mode 1 time (or what felt like Ice mode) on my '12 JCW, but that was when one of the pads had gone metal to metal... Whoops, interesting note: They still had plenty of braking power! haha.

Is IceMode a common thing with the Mini? I'm hoping my experience was just due to the pads wearing completely out...

Re: Pro JCW coilovers... Where do you source these? A mini dealer? Any info out there on them? My initial thinking is that I'd prefer to stay with the current Adaptive Shocks, they really are great on the street. I'm not quite ready to compromise on the general street characteristics of this car. I actually find it to be exactly what I like in the 'mid mode', which has the shocks in normal setting. I even changed the 'sport mode' for now, so I run in the normal/soft setting on the shocks when in Sport mode (which I run 100% of the time pretty much, love the snap crackle and pop!). I will surely enable the hard setting once the track opens back up. I should note that our track is still pretty new and very smooth, and I also don't bounce over the curbs (I'm not sure anyone does actually). I didn't get much/if any benefit from swapping out the stock shocks on my Z06 (to custom valved Bilsteins). That said, my plan is to play things out with upgraded swaybars front/rear, and then maybe lowering springs (but still tame), and THEN see what I want to do from there. I see coilovers as a 2025+ problem!

Back to wheels: I like what you did with the +48 17x7.5 Sparco, and then run a spacer as needed. It seems to me that would let you move the wheel out only as far as needed. Going with a 40 offset doesn't let you do that. I'm still scouring this site to find info on what wheels I can run. Also, I tried to find the Sparco's you have on TireRack, but haven't had any luck.

Would love to hear your current thoughts on wheels (keeping in mind I'd like to try 225's, and I don't mind getting a be creative with some minor clearancing, if required (emphasis should be put on minor, aka I won't be going to flares any time soon, but a bit of rolling is fine with me!).

P.S. Yes Mini's certainly are a BLAST!

 

Welcome to the wacky world of MINIs….

What track(s) do you frequent?

JCW Pro suspension can be purchased through a dealer or from a place like ECS. I got mine from my dealer as I had them install them. i could have done it, but I was under warranty at the time and didn’t want any issues with that. Also, I was lazy.

I never ran my JCW on the track with the stock suspension. However, I have heard and read that the base suspension is “soft” for that purpose. I remember it being “comfortable” for road use. The change to the Pro suspension was very noticeable. A firmer ride, flatter, better control, but very much to the liking of my wife who likes spirited rides.

I got them as I figured MINI and their multi-millions of $$$ of engineering talent would come up with something better than I could do. I found this to be true when looking at the different suspensions MINI offered on the R56. One issue with cobbing together something based on “conventional wisdom”, or without knowing spring rates, etc, is that it can get one into unexpected problems. So, MINI it was, and I have been happy with it.

Based on my experience with my R56 with the larger front and rear sway bars is that the combination is fantastic for the track. I have the rear sway bar set on soft to dial in a bit of understeer, which I compensate for with aggressive trail braking. The downside is a very stiff ride around town. The Bilstein B8s helped a lot over the MINI shocks, but it is still noticeable. I would really like to hear how the sway bar change works for you, when you do it.

About wheels, the Sparco wheels I have as listed on TR as “for the F56 Cooper S”. I am not sure they are still there as they were on a pretty good discount when I bought them. But, none the less, try looking under Cooper S for wheels on TR.

ET40 and 7.5” wide wheels with 225 tires are too far outboard. Look up Charlie Thompson and read his thread about autocrossing his 2016 JCW. He found a set of 8” wide ET45 wheels that he uses with 225 tires. Only minor rubbing on the liner, which is what I have with my setup. I think you will be okay, but just keep an eye for any metal rubbing. Likely no rolling needed.

Using the 2mm spacer up front is pretty ideal without having to go to an ET40 wheel to get clearance to the caliper. Having more offset (eg: ET45) allows better clearance with the rear wheel well. As I said, it is all a tight fit.

Brakes - never ran into the issue you described. However I have run into “lumpies”, which I think is pads melting onto the rotor and making them feel like warped rotors. As for the DTC60s, the only issue I found is that they are really hard on rotors on tracks that don’t have enough hard braking for them to get into their proper temperature range. They need heat to work right. Also, use the same pads front to rear. Or at least a pad on the rear that is as aggressive or level as the front pads. This helps to balance the car and to take some of the braking load off the front rotor, which are already heavily used. “Conventional wisdom” for MINIs is to put a lesser pad or even stock on the rear. Nope, wrong. The back end will do a dance under hard braking. Very unnerving.

 

My home track is RMM: https://rockymotorsports.com Since I am a member there, that's where I'll spend most my time. There are a few other tracks 3+ hours away, but I'll probably do those days in my main track car (the c6 Z06).

Re suspension: I've pretty much got my Z06 on the borderline of enjoyable-streetable. That is to say it's still a great street ride on 90% of the roads around here, but it gets worse as the road gets worse. Since my Mini is going to be 10 seconds a lap slower than the Z06, I have the luxury of not caring (too much) how fast it is.

My goals are:

1. Fun (big green checkmark already). It's a manual = fun. It has some pace (i.e. with other cars in it's range) = fun. It rotates into corners = fun. Also, I LOVE the underdog, and I feel I will be, in opinion at least, to the majority of cars in the same ballpark. P.S. My '08 Z06 is also an underdog to all the 201x + P-cars on track, which is definitely in the majority at RMM.
2. Reliable (hoping the B48 proves I made a good cal)l. The other car on my list was a BRZ/GR86 and I got spooked by the oil starvation issue that's not really solved yet
3. Not too hard on tires/consumables (fingers crossed). This is where the Z06 falls short, haha.

Sway bars: Yes, time will tell how this experiment will go.

Coilovers: I did put Bilstein PSS10 on my '12 JCW 1 week after I got it. Long story short, I bought the mini and found out it had a blown front pass strut after taking it to the track on it's first shakedown. I wanted to get my son out to the track and use up his free track days (as I member I get 4 for him) and they had PSS10 at RockAuto with quick delivery. I had PSS9 on my Miata many years ago and it was a good compromise system for the Miata (great on street, not the 'best' on track, but respectable). The PSS10 on the R56 was amazing on the track and I was able to dial in the car to handle exactly how I liked. They got plenty stiff and I tried a couple laps with them at the top end of the scale, and they were way to too stiff and lap times went down. They ran perfect just over the mid mark (I went a bit harder at one end, but can't recall which). Anyhow, I hate how they ride on the street 70% of the time (way to bouncy, or way to stiff, no in-between). I tried them at both ends of the height adjustment, currently highest setting. I don't want to do that to the F56 JCW....

Brakes: OK thanks. My track tends to heat up brakes pretty good, so I'll give the DTC-60 a try. That said, what is your favourite pad?

"Lumpies" I saw you using that term before on another post. Here is my experience on that (forgive me if you already know all this). If your "Lumpies" tend to go away afterwards, like say when you are driving home and everything is all cooled down, I would look for runout stacking on your brake rotors. I had an issue I was battling with 1/2 this season on my Z06 where the brakes would be PERFECT, sometimes for more than one track day, until they got really hot. I had a Wilwood BBK and my rotor runout (measured off and on the car) was within spec. I also found that I could lower the runout if I put the rotors on the hub in a specific location (meaning I had some runout somewhere else as well). So, naturally I indexed the rotors on the hubs to get the least amount of runout. Turns out that the runout from the car itself was coming from the bearings and would get really bad once they got up to temp... New bearings (SKF X-tracker) fixed the problem 100%... If your "lumpies" never go away once they start, and your rotor runout is still in spec, you are likely just getting poor pad transfer (maybe your street pads aren't compatible with the race pads). On that note, I tried many different compounds this summer and found that Wilwood H pads did NOT like to be bedded over top of ANY other pad that I had tried in the past. I had to turn the rotors to get them to run smoothly (not good because you never want to remove thermal mass from your rotors if you can help it).

Anyhow, sorry if that was too much unsolicited info on the brakes for you, but hopefully someone else can learn from it as the bearing runout was a real eye opener for me!

 

RMM looks “just” like a track near me - NYST (New York Safety Track). At 2.2 miles and 18 turns it pretty well matches RRM at 2.17 miles and 19 turns. Facilities, not so much. OK, I think in “mile”, less so in “KM”. It is a real MINI track. I can see why you are enjoying the MINIs there. A real HP equalizer. I chased a couple of track prepped Porsche GT3s around it for a few laps in my R56S. BTW search my Eddie07S screen name on YouTube for my videos, if you wish.

Oil starvation - I should mention about this for the MINIs, be sure the oil is topped off, full, all the time. If it goes down, you can have starvation issues. I have never had starvation issues with the oil at full, but have heard people having issues when it has gotten lower. How much lower, don’t know, so I just keep it full. Neither of my MINIs use oil so that isn’t a big issue. As for oil, I know in the R56, it needs a real quality oil like Red Line or Motul and I run 5W-40. If you put a SCANGAGEII in the car you can read oil temp. The R56 runs really high oil temp (about 250F, yup, really). Those 2 oils are the 2 I have found that will stand up to the rigors of track use for 3-4 day and not looking like black water coming out. So far, I have only used MINI oil in the JCW and have not checked its condition like I have the R56S.

I have run my F56 JCW against a basically stock R56 JCW at WGI and we were pretty well matched. The F56 JCW may be a tick faster, but close. That said, the F56 is a better track car, given the better engine cooling and the better brakes. So, if don’t find much difference between your 2 cars, don’t be disappointed. The F56 is the better car for this.

Very interesting about the runout issue you had, and I understand how it could be similar. My issue would show up after a couple of laps, then would go way when thing would cool down, but then come back the next session. It was less of an issue if I was easier on the brakes; worse when I was more aggressive. It was an issue at WGI, not at LRP (which is a bit easier on brakes). I found the issue is with the brake pads. With a change in pads it would go away. WGI is extremely hard on brakes. My R56 has Wilwood brakes on it and I would have my issue with the Poly H pads. The lumpy issue went away with a change to the DTC60. I can run the Poly H at LRP, though. I had a similar issue with my F56 JCW at WGI with the pad I started with (iSweep). I have since gone to Carbotech, which I really like. I would like to try other pads, but finding ones that fit has proven to be difficult even though the plate is the same as that for the earlier M2 BMW, and other BMWs. The differences is that those BMW application pads are 1-2 mm thicker and don’t fit.

Tires - The Falken 660 are really good compromise between lap times and cost. Ultimate lap time, the new RE71RS.

Try running your F56 JCW with stock camber and see how tire wear is. If it is too much for your liking, look at adding Vorshlag camber plates to it with about -2 deg camber. That would be a good compromise between street wear and track wear. K-Mac is another options, which also allows for some additional castor. Charlie Thompson has the street version of these, but I don’t see them listed on the K-Mac web page, even through they are listed at ECS. So don’t know about those. The Vorshlag seem to be the go-to standard for camberplates for MINIs.