Cheapest, Most Fun Track Day Car ?

[evil_weevil]

Dammit.....

this thread sucks.....why?

Cause there are sooooooooooooooo many options to go for!

I think a manual R31 could be the go for me - keep it n/a and have a nice set up for hillclimbs/motokharna's!

Plus I can drive it there and back with spare tyres in the back

[TTT]

Dammit.....

this thread sucks.....why?

Cause there are sooooooooooooooo many options to go for!

I think a manual R31 could be the go for me - keep it n/a and have a nice set up for hillclimbs/motokharna's!

Plus I can drive it there and back with spare tyres in the back

dude he already got a car..

LOL

Oh Sweet - ! How funny !

I figuerd he cat thing ! smile.gif

I can't work out what model Haltech it is ! And how to tune it ? Does it need software ? It does need a bit of a tune - Cold start is crap.

What's the ECU adjustment knob thing ? Ray told me air/ fuel - but I find that hard to understand.

It needs a bluey - so not sure if seats will pass.

Hand brake is hydrolic - so might need some work for bluey.

Also might need to hide the brake bias adjuster.

Something is draining the battery when switched off - thought is was the fuel pump (seems to be on all the time - so that needs rewiring to ignition)

Man - it has some awsome potential - but whoever worked on it recently has done some dodgy stuff smile.gif ha ha ha

It does need software.

it needs to be tuned on a laptop.

I "DID" have a floppy disk of the software back when I owned it but it's long gone.

but those haltech's are upgradable by software version so any place that has laptop software and correct cable for the laptop "SHOULD" be able to do the work.

I only know one haltech guy and it is "Adrian Vos" (known for the VOS chip for the liberty RS turbos).

he can be found on the libertyrs forums..

http://www.rslibertyclub.org/forums/index.php

he is on there as "adrianvos"

he might be able to point you in the right direction or mayb even plug in and have a look.

you need to become a member of the forum or I can pass on your email address to him..

yes that knob is a air/fuel adjuster thingy..

not sure if it works.. it was supposed to be for rally times.. depending on what altitude they were at or something.. they could just adjust it.

that car has 2 pumps.

one is active as per usual and the other is via a switch somewhere on the right hand side.. kinda under the indicator stalk on the right, on the dash there..

Does it still have that cut off key down below next to the brake bias?

it needed a red key like one of those safety battery cut off things that race cars MUST have.

Let me know if I can help

[evil_weevil]

gts - im talking behalf of myself - as in I want a track car!!

[nfi]

I know its too late but when I was at uni I had a mirage of all cars with:

Adjustable Koni Yellows

King springs

Front camber kit

15 inch wheels

The chassis is really stiff in the mirage compared to a lot of other small cars. With the shocks wound to half the car felt quite stiff and handled awesome!

I took this car to REGULAR super sprints it it never broke down once in the year I had it. Then my brother bought it and continued to regularly take it to the track and it never once broke.

Then he sold it to his friend who took it to the track.

Best time I did in it was a 1.22 at wakefield and a 58.00 at Oran Park South with Firenza tyres ( cheap road tyres).

I was great fun to drive and had a habit of oversteering on turn in which was nice. Then get a bit of understeer/4 wheel slide on exit.

The car was so cheap to own. Its apparently still going now some 3 years later with no problems although a little low on compression across the board. (just worn out)

[Roy]

I could have done you a nice deal on this...

Chassis n° 2202 year 2003 N-Technology Ready to race Technical spec : 2004 FIA GT Regulation Transmission Pankl Traction control Carbone AP Clutch Carbone Breaks Dampers Ohlins Kit suspension 2 Rearwing version 2 July 2005 Splitter version July 2005 Front bumper version 2005 Flat bottom version July 2004 Aerodynamic kit July 2004 Data acquisition das4 Fuel tant ATL homologation Double Restrictors 31,8 mm (possibility 31,2 mm) Paint and stickers : Version Italien GT 2005

FIA GT 2004 Italian GT 2004 (4 races, 2 victories) Italian GT 2005 (1 victory)

Its only 550,000 Euro, so you may have had to leave your luxury yacht moored for a few weeks to pay for it

[B-Man]

Keep the ideas coming folks - Just cause I have my little project, doesn't mean that thread should end -

There are heaps of good ideas here.

I probablly would have chosen something different, but an opportunity fronted and I went for it. Should turn out to be a great little track car for the $$ - Even has brake bias ajustment.

Left it at the mechanics today - Needs new clutch, Rear suspenstion getting totally rebushed. Brought up to standard for Rego. Then some goos semi slicks and I am ready to race ! Yeah !

[evil_weevil]

sounds awesome !!!

my eyes are always open!!

if I keep doing alot of driving and thrashing to my line it'll break - may as well break something cheaper !!!

[evil_weevil]

I have my eyes on a suzuki swift Gti - similar to James mirage mods - but stripped out with just a drivers seat

just got to finf one now

[Turbo Tim]

Gotta say a corolla of sorts.

Reason being, rwd, reasonably light and lots of engine and diff options available.

Last year we (me and a friend of mine from uni) did the mega budget track car for some local sprints, bought a dirty toyota t18 from a wrecker, did a lot of weight reduction, got some low hard springs, ra60 celica front brakes and sigma control arms for about 3 degrees negative camber on the front. Only engine mods were a set of sidedrafts, extractors and clutch we bought second hand from toymods. Final cost was less than 1k. That included the export quality paint job in panda (just to shit the ae86 drivers ).

Probably the most fun i have had in a car. Unfortunately it wasnt registered.

It ended up going ok on the 7 year old street tyres we found in the back of the other blokes garage. At the end of the season we were 0.4sec's a lap (on a 50 sec lap) behind my brothers gti-r and pretty close to some less well driven 200sx's and 180sx's. Managed to out do a new cooper S amongst other things. It was a tight track which worked in our favour.

I would say, avoid a fwd. If you do a box its big hassles and expense in most cases, especially gti's.

Buy something predone as well, will end up saving yourself in the long run i think.

[evil_weevil]

predone for sure!!

but for my needs and reasons, ill need it to be rego'd too...hmm..narrows it down hey!

[Rexx]

Well since there really was no real restrictions on cars and where they are from for 6K USD which is about 8KAUD you can get a camaro/firebird that is street legal and most run in the 11's for this amount. you add another 2 k and you can get a 10 sec car that street legal hard to believe that for 8k USD you can have a car that runs in the 10's and drive everyday. Well if you could afford the fuel. I know prolly not what ya'll want to read but hell I'm here to add color

[scathing]

Well since there really was no real restrictions on cars and where they are from for 6K USD which is about 8KAUD you can get a camaro/firebird that is street legal and most run in the 11's for this amount. you add another 2 k and you can get a 10 sec car that street legal hard to believe that for 8k USD you can have a car that runs in the 10's and drive everyday.

Aren't those things allergic to corners though? The impression I got is that they're after a circuit car, not a drag sled.

You could buy an old V8 Commodore if you wanted to go drag racing on a tight budget. Bringing in a Camaro / Firebird would be a hassle, relatively speaking.

[Turbo Tim]

Yeah forget a sled like that for anything resembling corners!

One bloke turned up in a 12 second one where we were racing a couple years ago and was nearly 2 seconds a lap slower than our dirty corolla.

As for buying one predone so to speak, keep an eye on my105.com i guess. It might be hard to transfer rego if it is really heavily modded though.

[evil_weevil]

my105 - check

yeah it would be for circut not drags - I'd rebuild the VL a mate and I went halves in for the 1/4mile - RB30 powah!

Im thinking as something to learn in properly and to geta foot into it - im thinking a hot hatch likethe swift - I just dont want to break my pride and joy - the R33 (sure sure call me soft haha)

[Turbo Tim]

Really consider a rwd hey. Its just so much more fun, and like I said, fwd boxes on the whole are fragile and expensive things.

My old tx5 turbo box was close to $1500 to replace second hand! Not to mention it cost me nearly $2500 to get an lsd into the thing.

I guess if you dont want something older a hatch might be the way to go. Just count on breaking things unfortunately, and the older rwd's are generally cheaper for parts.

[Rexx]

Aren't those things allergic to corners though? The impression I got is that they're after a circuit car, not a drag sled.

You could buy an old V8 Commodore if you wanted to go drag racing on a tight budget. Bringing in a Camaro / Firebird would be a hassle, relatively speaking.

Well a camaro/firebird can be made to haul ass in a straight line no doubt. But once again its how you set the car up. they are so many parts to make them handle as good as vettes. I know its not AWD but hey they can take some pretty serious corners.

Yeah I know it would be a hassle to ship one in and etc but I was just adding a my experiences.

Please not trying to buts balls or anything but a a camaro/firebird is no way shap form close to a commodore. I have never seen a 4 door camaro/firebird.

As a circuit car I figure it wouldnt be half bad.

Edited September 2, 2006 by Rexx

[Abo Bob]

Nice one B-Man, I should have the secret to myself

[Duncan]

hahah good stuff brendan, hope to see you out there soon

Ask Neil how much work an old race car can need....but once it is sorted it should be great fun.

On topic.....for $8k I would go S13 or 32 gtst either with rally rego. If the budget was say $12k I would get a GTR. And I did.

[Duncan]

actually I should take that back.

Buying pretty much any club car is cheap, there are heaps filling up garages all over the place....my105 (SonofSKs) site is the best place to buy an advertised one.

The expense is keeping them on the track....tyres say $1k a set for something decent. Pads $800 a set. Discs $500 a set.

Oil changes - engine, gearbox, diff and heaps of other if you do have gtr

Brake fluid

Harnesses with current dates ($500)

New Bushes - you can bet anything will need them

Adjsutable Arms

Rebuilt shocks

New heater hoses, radiator hoses

Turbos, seals, dumps, exhaust.

Man this never ends depending how far you want to go

[Duncan]

any of you guys seen OFRT from the Eastern Creek Days? They have a couple of stock looking hatchbacks they take out and have fun until they die.

then get new ones.