Track day

Hi I am planning to join the track day first time in my life in 10 days which is F1 circuit in İstanbul. It will be 20 minutes section and circuit is aprx. 5.3km. If it is some referance, one of my friends did it last Sunday with his 2001 740i sport ( it was his first time also ). He drove very conservative with his throttle and brakes and completed each lap around 3 minutes and his top speed was 168kmh. Experienced drivers in F458 Italia were completing around 2:15-2:20 with top speed around 260kmh. Under this circumtances, for health and reliability of my 94 840 auto, to complete this first 20 minutes day which points should I care about like mechanic-fluids etc. O should I say which part of my car may fail me that day. Any advices welcomed

I may be misunderstood with my question..

I am not asking about making best possible time, I am asking about reliability of the car. My concirn is during force drive for 20 minutes, as this car wasn't built for this which parts may fail or I need to take care about drive.

I believe at least some of you might had some trouble during similar kind of drive some time in the past and I just need some clues. May be some had some trouble with engine heat or cooling or some breakage of carriages like arms-bushes?? Or might be some troubles with auto transmission or brake hydrolics??

My only need is to drive without giving any damage to the car. ( but don't tell me not to do it )

Thanks Graham, it's nice to hear that. I am still working on the videos to get an idea about the track, turns and possible speeds. As this will be my first time I don't think I can push the car to its limits I'm planning to shoot a video, I will put here everything I got there if I menaged to be there ( fingers crossed )

Thanks dudu and Timm.

After all those posts I could get an idea which is not the tranny, engine ( can say ), carriage but the BRAKES! So I should be easy on them instead of braking as late as possible. As it will last only 6 laps, 1st for warm up, 2nd-3rd push, 4th cool down, 5th push and 6th cool down and will see what happens

Anyway I haven't heard anything to change my mind about to be there.

Deniz

Thanks again

2nd gear gives me up to 120kmh and 3rd gear up to 160kmh. So I will probably be using my 3rd gear most of the time there. 4 possible low speed turn series are around 60-75kmh and may be done on 2nd gear if I dare to select during brake to slow down And again 4 possible straights that I can exceed 160kmh with 4th. So my guess, engine will be around 3500-5500rpm most of the time.

How did you tell temperature gets 3/4 ? I have ever seen so far is the needle standing right up 90 degrees angle..

Deniz

Thanks Egil, that was fantastic advice about breaking .

Sounds like we do on the aircrafts. When the load is not close to max. weight, aircraft tends to go faster even in idle and we let it go till like 55kmh and brake to slow it down until 20kmh if the brakes are carbon to control the overheat on ground before takeoff. If the brakes are steel it requires continous light application for same goal. Until your message I was thinking to do what I must not do! So you probably you saved the day

Tyres are Y rated but I've never thought look at heat grade which is first thing right after I send this message to get an idea

Track is F1 and the attenders told for perfect traction, so this may be reduce disadvantage a little bit. Session will be 2X20 minutes or 1hour continuous, we'll get the details tomorrow and I will make a plan about my strategy.

Last thing is engine oil. I'll make the car service on friday for yearly check even it's only on 2500-3000 km since last and planning to use 10-60 oil incase of high rev. driving which may lead overheat. Any comments on this?

I've checked and treadwear 280 traction AA heat A. I believe it's good news

Nurburgring is a different story, on the fourth lap means you've already completed around 70km and if you're pushing, it's not as easy as Istanbul Park And I believe small traks are not good for e31s because of the tight turns against weight factors. I will mind your advices, thanks again.

My example about the aircrafts was not for landing, that was for normal taxiing on ground from gate to runway or vice-versa and you are not allowed to use reversers.

Reversers are a bit like urband legend
I'm fliying on A330-340 in Turkish Airlines. A340s go up to 275 tons. Believe me, airlines tends to use more brakes than reverse on dry runways for some time because brake units cost much less than fuel. Again on dry runways there is no risk for hydroplanning and less need for antiskid, for 2600meters dry runway stopping distance around 190t which is just belove max landing weight is around 2300meters with lowest selection of autobrakes without reverse ( reversers are only idle ). In same condition using engine reverser effect is only minus ten meters each so for A340 its about only fourty meters On wet or slippery runways reverse are much more efeective which is about minus 60meters for each.Airlines reliesed this factor and encouraging pilots to not to use reversers on dry runways, because we feel safer when we hear that huge noise

Deniz

Yes, all same, we can use both at the same time but reversers are mented to be use only on the runway not on the taxiways. My first saying is during taxi between the runway and the gate

On the other hand I flew to Norway couple of times and I frequently fly to Sweden and Finland. Runway conditions are not like Türkiye, most of the time rain is there and reverse effect plays a the key role then.

Come to the my brakes, I've discussed your advice with my friends today and it make sense. All thanks goes to Norwaaaaaayyy

By the way session will be 1 hour continuous on sunday, you all wish me luck. I hope I will be able to drive back home after the day with some videos.

Deniz

Mission accomplished . I completed full hour. Front tyres and rear brakes are in terrible condition. Probably on the last lap part number #6 cracked http://www.realoem.com/bmw/sho…_4895&hg=11&fg=35&lang=en and all coolant has gone. I figured out on the way out to the park area upon session completed. I couldn't drive home but hopefully that's the only damage on the car. I' ll be back with photos and videos when ready

Brief info about track day, I was at the track for full hour and spend almost half of it for cooling down. I pit once but return to track immediately without openning door because of smoke coming from brakes . I felt very slow when compared to the supersports but the car was very steady and rigid most of the time until the brakes were no more reliable. So I enjoyed it.

After damage control; yes part number 6 on previous post has broken and replaced. It's shame that couldn't find any other replacement other than another plastic one. There is some oil sprayed from tranny which is about 10-20 gr. Little spray from diff. All brake pads are finished! Right front tyre is badly weared and that is all. I will look for brake upgrade for the next track day, slowing down is ok but endurance is sooooo weak on stocks.

Here are some videos from the day. First one is what I've seen most of the day, some on my fast turns and some on cooling laps.

Second is fails of the day, some because of brakes, some for trying to give way to the fast cars and some are because of inexperiance of me.

Third one is one full lap with some recorded data ( partly unreliable ) together.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wb9-pdpui8o&feature=youtu.be

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTe3w-iI6ho&feature=youtu.be

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BcZmJcTZxXs