Enigma

It has been a busy few days.

Friday: The SSR Competition wheels arrive with Kumo Escta V700 225/40-18 front & 265/35-18 in read. They were pre-mounted and heat-cycled by tirerack. After some strange looks from the UPS for buying tires with almost no tread I carted the tires into the house. A few hours latter they were installed. I measured the weight of the new tires&rims and compared them to the old tires&rims (conti’s). 38 lbs less

The car was now:
2002 M3 SMG II with all options other than rear air bags.
Front & rear strut tower bars. (Dinan)
‘R’ compound tires on all 4 corners on lightweight rims.

Saturday:
Got up early and went to the drag strip. Drove there on the ‘R’ tires to try to scrub off the mold release. The temperature was quite cold 35-40 degrees. On arriving they announced that they had new concrete for this season (first day open). This with the cold temperature made for a slick track.

First run: I had gone with some friends. The goal of the day was to beat my friend’s z28 (~293 rwhp). We failed to line up together so I tried a simple “drop the hammer in S6 approach.” There is a lag in the SMG while the engine revs to about 3K before it dropped the clutch. I spun through 1st gear and was slow shifting into 2nd.
Result a very poor reaction time and a 13.905 @ 103.29

Second run: Failed to line up with the z28 again. Decided to try the US launch control. I got a MUCH better reaction time but a lot of wheel hop in 1st. I was also a little slow going 3-4 but it shouldn’t have affected the times though it did hurt the trap speed.
Result a ok reaction time and a 13.914 @ 102.42

Third run: Dropped the air pressure in the rear tires from 35 to 25psi. Decided to give A5 a shot because my shifting wasn’t doing much good. I also did a bigger burnout this run than the other. Because I wasn’t using LC I punched it as 2nd green light appeared in the tree. This offset much of the lag resulting in a better reaction time. This run I got a bit more traction off the line but the A5 shifting while precise felt much softer than the S6 runs.
Result: ok reaction time and 13.832 @ 102.09

Fourth run: Back to S6 with the same approach as the first run. Another smokey launch and another poor ET. Good shifting this run.
Result: ok reaction time and 13.907 @ 103.17

Sunday: Autocross #2

Get up and load up the car. I stuffed a rear Conti, jack, air compressor, and snacks in the trunk. I fold down the rear seat and toss in the other three Conti’s. They don’t fit well at all because they are about 0.6” too tall to put two side by side on the rear shelf. I stack the third on top of the other two. Drive to the autocross and unload the car.

The car is running in SM because its one of two classes open to the new E46 M3. The other is SS where the Boxer S and Z06 live. I take my chances in Street Mod (SM) because it allows me to make most any modification I want as long as its is still street legal and has pretty much the same index as SS.

Because this is only my 5th event ever, 2nd in this car, and first on the new tires I asked another driver to co-driver it with me. He was nice enough to accept and ran the car in 2nd heat while I drove the 3rd. Our guess on tire pressure was to start at 37f/37r. Temperature was again cold. ~40 degrees.

Bud’s first run was an exercise in oversteer. He kept the car under control but couldn’t get the power down. A5 proved troublesome going 2-3 in some places where it was not desirable to do so. Result 56.810 + 2 cones

Bud’s second run had us reduce the air pressure in the rear tires to 32 psi. The oversteer was better controlled but the car got away in the second turn costing a great deal of speed during the recovery. Also more A5 shifting problems. Result 57.462

Bud’s third run we transitioned to S6. This cured the shifting issues and he had a good run for the 3rd time ever in the car. Result 55.594

Between heats we move the car into my slot for the next runs. We also checked the tire temperature and found that they were NOT making it up to operating temp on this day.

My first run: I take off in S6 and shift 1-2 on the initial minor turn. For those who have never driven on ‘R’ compound tires they behave very differently than normal street tires. They grip, grip, grip, and then once you step a hair over the line they breakaway very quickly. Exiting the slalom into a right hand turn I lifted the throttle a bit too quickly and the rear tires broke away. I caught it but not until after running over one cone and passing the wrong side of another. I finished at 9/10 effort to feel out the tires. Result: DNF (did not finish)

My second run: I didn’t push this one as hard as the first. I wanted to get a better feel for the tires. Despite this I was carrying much more speed than I would have on the conti’s. It was a clean but consertive run. Result: 57.753

My third run: Since it was the last run and I now have some experience with the tires I went full out. Believe me when I say these tires grip like mad (even when cold). I was what felt like about 2 seconds ahead of the about run when near the end I cooked a turn a bit hot and plowed a cone during some braking induced understeer. I would have hit other cones had I not braked so it was a lost cause. I got the car pointed in the right direction and finished. Result 60.384 + 1

We finished the day with a 2nd and 5th place finish in class (out of 12). FYI: the 1st place time in SM was a 55.364.

After the last run I jacked up the car and put the conti’s back on for the drive home. The Kumo’s being slightly lower profile fit nicely in the car without the stacking problem the conti’s had.

If anyone wants to know I can post the results of the next event in about 2-3 weeks.

MAVERICK

Very good summation of your track day. Thanks. Hope to hear more stories from you. Isn't A5 the full automatic mode. Why did Bud run the car on the autocross in that mode instead of S6?

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"Friends don't let friends drive automatics!" -- Alpinadvl

Enigma

There were a couple of reasons that the first two runs were done in A5 as opposed to S6. They are in order:

1: First time with the car on the course.
2: First time on the new tires.
3: Wanted to sort out the tire pressures.

Once we finished those three he turned to other things such as manual shifting. We thought that all of the above plus getting used to the paddles might have been much for hist first few minuets in the car.