- Thread starter
- #121
True but this NASCAR cars are made to do 9500 RPM the Gen 2 5.0 can barely do 8000 RPM. As I said my engine is running as it should but it's losing oil I will know more when my dealer check it on Friday.
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S550 2017 Grabber Blue Mustang GT Build Thread Profile - S550 Mustangs
- Thread starterbnight
- Start date
My double duty Road/Track Grabber Blue EU spec Mustang GT
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- Thread starter
- #122
Dealer did a compression test and filled it with new 5W20 Motorcraft. I did 110 miles drive on the highway with it trying to vary RPM's and the oil level was stable. No Missfires or Codes on the computer as well. I think I dodged the bullet but will try to keep an eye on oil consumption.
Next event is Dracon Speed Cup R2 27.04 can't wait to see what it will run with the A052's there.
Next event is Dracon Speed Cup R2 27.04 can't wait to see what it will run with the A052's there.
- Thread starter
- #123
- Thread starter
- #124
Dracon Speed Cup R2 - Dracon - 27.04.2024
So after the Money Shift scare at Serres which luckily was short lived and required only an oil change and compression testing to be solved. It was time to go to Dracon for the 2nd round of the Dracon Speed Cup.
This was going to be the first real test for the A052 tires which to be fair didn't looked any good after the 51 laps at Serres.
For me this tires are amazing on the road they don't tramline a lot, they are quiet and have insane levels of grip. All of which made for a great trip on the way to the track. It was raining a lot the last week but it was cold and clear on the way to the track. It was supposed to be a nice weather for track. I arrived very early around 8:00 and prepped the car.
Something that I noticed during the Serres event was that the A052 was wearing on the middle which suggested that I was driving them overinflated. So I decided to put lower pressure mind you this pressures were set after an 1 hour or so highway driving.
I think the rear was really low as this comes down to 1.6 bar when cold.
The car was ready for tracking at 8:36:
The drivers briefing was at 9:30 and the difference was that this time the sessions will be 12 minutes instead of 15 minutes. The driving started at 10:00 and my first session was at 10:35 I recorded my cold pressures and temps on a piece of paper and exited to drive the Air temp was 18C(64F). In the first lap however there was a red flag and the session was interrupted a driver from the other class has flipped a car on it's roof so it required medical but he exited the car on his own and had only scratches on the hand from the glass in the windshield the car was an old VW Polo I think. It took 20 minutes or so to get the car out and the Ambulance back on position so we can start driving again.
I was getting around 2.0 on the front during lapping and 1.9 rear so couldn't manage to get uniformed pressures. The temps of the tires which I took after the session showed higher temps in the middle of the tires but It was taking 3 laps to get them high enough for a good lap.
I only manage to do 1:07.001 on the end of the session in the 6th lap. The BMW 440i did 1:04.7 and was first in class I was second. My driving was very hectic because the 295/35 tires moved the shift points a lot. Which lead to a lot of confusion. My brake pads R12 were also on there last moments as after Serres I only have around 30% or less brake pad left.
After the session I took tire data, checked the oil (no visable oil burning) and checked the brake pads they looked good.
Second session was at 13:24 Air Temp 22C (71F) so the tires were cold by then so was the engine. I again didn't manage to get the tires working fine though I did a very very slow warm-up lap so I can give myself a lot of space to the other people on track. First flyer was only 1:08.54 and the second only 1:06.99. I cooled down a bit the motor. The Power Pack 3 did an amazing job I only saw a high of 108C (226F) CHT and 1 lap was good enough to drop the temps down to 99C(210F) CHT. This allowed me to do my fast lap of 1:06.788 (only 0.05 against the worn out AR-1's) at the 7th lap of the session.
After that session I checked the oil again and no burning again. I guess the fast corners on Serres combined with the faster overall speed lead to oil burning will need to have that in mind for next time I'm there. The problem was brake pads though they were done:
So I decided to sit out the next session the only car that was close to my time was a Megan R.S. Ultimate who was 3rd in class and was running both Street (on a different set of tires) and Street Tuning on Nankang AR-1's. His best time after the 2nd session was 1:07.290 but with weather getting hotter so was the track. I didn't have chance to improve so waited for session number 3 to see if he can improve. However he started to run into some brakes issues (Dracon is really brake intensive track) in fact his four piston Brembo callipers both started leaking fluid from the bleed valves. I guess there is a huge design flow with this bleed valves. So at the end he was not able to improve his lap times.
I spend the next 5 hours having lunch at the track, talking with people and packing. The Awards ceremony was at 18:00. My class was like this 1st BMW 440i : 1:04.7, 2nd Me with the S550 Mustang 1:06.788 and 3rd the Megan R.S. with 1:07.290.
This marks the end of Dracon Cup for that configuration on the track. The track is closing end of May for a resurface and change of the configuration.
Тhis is how the front Right looked today:
As well as the cold pressures:
I'm not sure with the hot weather this year and with no brake pads in side I will be able to reach my goal of 1:05 before end of May.
So what is next:
I need new pads both street and track for track I can ether buy new GLoc pads the R12 hold 209 laps (282 track miles) but they are not up to task in terms of force and the rear R8's have 343 laps on them.
I guess this leads to moving to R16/R12 for track set and probably GS-1 for street use.
The tires situation is also grim the fronts on the A052 looks very worn out on the middle and the rears I guess are not good ether.
Will need to figure out what to do for tires ether a new Set of AR-1's or run the A052 till they are slicks or corded.
So after the Money Shift scare at Serres which luckily was short lived and required only an oil change and compression testing to be solved. It was time to go to Dracon for the 2nd round of the Dracon Speed Cup.
This was going to be the first real test for the A052 tires which to be fair didn't looked any good after the 51 laps at Serres.
For me this tires are amazing on the road they don't tramline a lot, they are quiet and have insane levels of grip. All of which made for a great trip on the way to the track. It was raining a lot the last week but it was cold and clear on the way to the track. It was supposed to be a nice weather for track. I arrived very early around 8:00 and prepped the car.
Something that I noticed during the Serres event was that the A052 was wearing on the middle which suggested that I was driving them overinflated. So I decided to put lower pressure mind you this pressures were set after an 1 hour or so highway driving.
I think the rear was really low as this comes down to 1.6 bar when cold.
The car was ready for tracking at 8:36:
The drivers briefing was at 9:30 and the difference was that this time the sessions will be 12 minutes instead of 15 minutes. The driving started at 10:00 and my first session was at 10:35 I recorded my cold pressures and temps on a piece of paper and exited to drive the Air temp was 18C(64F). In the first lap however there was a red flag and the session was interrupted a driver from the other class has flipped a car on it's roof so it required medical but he exited the car on his own and had only scratches on the hand from the glass in the windshield the car was an old VW Polo I think. It took 20 minutes or so to get the car out and the Ambulance back on position so we can start driving again.
I was getting around 2.0 on the front during lapping and 1.9 rear so couldn't manage to get uniformed pressures. The temps of the tires which I took after the session showed higher temps in the middle of the tires but It was taking 3 laps to get them high enough for a good lap.
I only manage to do 1:07.001 on the end of the session in the 6th lap. The BMW 440i did 1:04.7 and was first in class I was second. My driving was very hectic because the 295/35 tires moved the shift points a lot. Which lead to a lot of confusion. My brake pads R12 were also on there last moments as after Serres I only have around 30% or less brake pad left.
After the session I took tire data, checked the oil (no visable oil burning) and checked the brake pads they looked good.
Second session was at 13:24 Air Temp 22C (71F) so the tires were cold by then so was the engine. I again didn't manage to get the tires working fine though I did a very very slow warm-up lap so I can give myself a lot of space to the other people on track. First flyer was only 1:08.54 and the second only 1:06.99. I cooled down a bit the motor. The Power Pack 3 did an amazing job I only saw a high of 108C (226F) CHT and 1 lap was good enough to drop the temps down to 99C(210F) CHT. This allowed me to do my fast lap of 1:06.788 (only 0.05 against the worn out AR-1's) at the 7th lap of the session.
After that session I checked the oil again and no burning again. I guess the fast corners on Serres combined with the faster overall speed lead to oil burning will need to have that in mind for next time I'm there. The problem was brake pads though they were done:
So I decided to sit out the next session the only car that was close to my time was a Megan R.S. Ultimate who was 3rd in class and was running both Street (on a different set of tires) and Street Tuning on Nankang AR-1's. His best time after the 2nd session was 1:07.290 but with weather getting hotter so was the track. I didn't have chance to improve so waited for session number 3 to see if he can improve. However he started to run into some brakes issues (Dracon is really brake intensive track) in fact his four piston Brembo callipers both started leaking fluid from the bleed valves. I guess there is a huge design flow with this bleed valves. So at the end he was not able to improve his lap times.
I spend the next 5 hours having lunch at the track, talking with people and packing. The Awards ceremony was at 18:00. My class was like this 1st BMW 440i : 1:04.7, 2nd Me with the S550 Mustang 1:06.788 and 3rd the Megan R.S. with 1:07.290.
This marks the end of Dracon Cup for that configuration on the track. The track is closing end of May for a resurface and change of the configuration.
Тhis is how the front Right looked today:
As well as the cold pressures:
I'm not sure with the hot weather this year and with no brake pads in side I will be able to reach my goal of 1:05 before end of May.
So what is next:
I need new pads both street and track for track I can ether buy new GLoc pads the R12 hold 209 laps (282 track miles) but they are not up to task in terms of force and the rear R8's have 343 laps on them.
I guess this leads to moving to R16/R12 for track set and probably GS-1 for street use.
The tires situation is also grim the fronts on the A052 looks very worn out on the middle and the rears I guess are not good ether.
Will need to figure out what to do for tires ether a new Set of AR-1's or run the A052 till they are slicks or corded.
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- Thread starter
- #125
Free Day - Dracon - 22.05.2024
With the track scheduled for closing I wanted another shot at 1:05 before it closes. So straight after the April event on 29.04 I ordered a new set of GLoc R16/R12 pads in hope for them to arrive before track closed. By the time of writing this still don't even have a shipping date not sure what is going on with GLoc production but it's not ideal. Ether way I called the friend I sold my R10's to who hasn't put them on the car and bought them back. The R12's were done:
With the R10's back I want to the shop to rotate tires and move the fronts to back. This turned out to be pointless as there was very minimal difference in wear front to back I guess the A052 is just not holding well as the wear is excessive.
Ether way the car was ready for another attempt this time with better tire pressures. Also since Serres my new settings for the Ohlins were -13/-15 clicks so a bit more rebound.
With that in mind the day didn't go as planned.
First session the R10's started getting the pedal hard in just 4 laps. Still did 1:07.011 in that 4th lap. This was good for a first session. I got out of the track and just get the tire pressures hard. However the only other car on track got into a nasty crash lucky the driver was ok but the car not so much though fixable. It took us an hour to clean up the track so the weather was already hot.
Also when back on track after a crash you always have something on your mind especially with brakes that act up. I did 1:06.93 in that session which was my best time for the day. Theoretical best was 1:06.6 though:
The rest of the day I spend playing with settings as the suspension was feeling really soft dropped down to -10/-12 clicks but the balance was just not there the front was very slow to turn in and the rear was oversteering on exit though the overall body roll was feeling much better.
I plan to move 1 click back to -11/-13 and probably stiffen my front swaybar.
The rest of the day got very hot and the timing issues were still there in the later session the terminal speeds dropping from 189 to 184 km/h so there was no way the laps to improve.
I spoke with the track and they are now closing not earlier than 16.06.2024 but I don't know if my Gloc brake pads will get here on time.
I drove home and got the car in the garage just before a major hailstorm that hit bad my Fiesta which usually sit infront of the garage but lucky not the Mustang.
Overall it was very disappointing day with the new M4's doing as low as 1:02.9 lap times on Nankang CRS tires and the Mustang constantly in the 1:06/1:07 range I'm not sure that this build has any real reason to continue at least not as a Time Attack build as is really out of the top guys in the class pace.
However I will get my brake pads eventually and will probably order new set of AR-1's or CRS tires in 305/30/19 the 295/35/19 is to tall for this track and the acceleration is just slow. In fact the telemetry shows that the AR-1's were faster on the straights because of gear ratio by a lot 4 km/h more on the start/finish line.
I still need to figure out the cooling of the engine as well so I can do more than a few laps at max pace.
What's next:
1. Hopefully my R16/R12 brake pads will arrive and more hopefully will work.
2. New set of track tires the A052 will be relegated to street duty as they are amazing on the street.
3. Track will be closed for configuration change so we will see what that will bring.
The summer is close though and I have a lot planned with the car as a GT.
With the track scheduled for closing I wanted another shot at 1:05 before it closes. So straight after the April event on 29.04 I ordered a new set of GLoc R16/R12 pads in hope for them to arrive before track closed. By the time of writing this still don't even have a shipping date not sure what is going on with GLoc production but it's not ideal. Ether way I called the friend I sold my R10's to who hasn't put them on the car and bought them back. The R12's were done:
With the R10's back I want to the shop to rotate tires and move the fronts to back. This turned out to be pointless as there was very minimal difference in wear front to back I guess the A052 is just not holding well as the wear is excessive.
Ether way the car was ready for another attempt this time with better tire pressures. Also since Serres my new settings for the Ohlins were -13/-15 clicks so a bit more rebound.
With that in mind the day didn't go as planned.
First session the R10's started getting the pedal hard in just 4 laps. Still did 1:07.011 in that 4th lap. This was good for a first session. I got out of the track and just get the tire pressures hard. However the only other car on track got into a nasty crash lucky the driver was ok but the car not so much though fixable. It took us an hour to clean up the track so the weather was already hot.
Also when back on track after a crash you always have something on your mind especially with brakes that act up. I did 1:06.93 in that session which was my best time for the day. Theoretical best was 1:06.6 though:
The rest of the day I spend playing with settings as the suspension was feeling really soft dropped down to -10/-12 clicks but the balance was just not there the front was very slow to turn in and the rear was oversteering on exit though the overall body roll was feeling much better.
I plan to move 1 click back to -11/-13 and probably stiffen my front swaybar.
The rest of the day got very hot and the timing issues were still there in the later session the terminal speeds dropping from 189 to 184 km/h so there was no way the laps to improve.
I spoke with the track and they are now closing not earlier than 16.06.2024 but I don't know if my Gloc brake pads will get here on time.
I drove home and got the car in the garage just before a major hailstorm that hit bad my Fiesta which usually sit infront of the garage but lucky not the Mustang.
Overall it was very disappointing day with the new M4's doing as low as 1:02.9 lap times on Nankang CRS tires and the Mustang constantly in the 1:06/1:07 range I'm not sure that this build has any real reason to continue at least not as a Time Attack build as is really out of the top guys in the class pace.
However I will get my brake pads eventually and will probably order new set of AR-1's or CRS tires in 305/30/19 the 295/35/19 is to tall for this track and the acceleration is just slow. In fact the telemetry shows that the AR-1's were faster on the straights because of gear ratio by a lot 4 km/h more on the start/finish line.
I still need to figure out the cooling of the engine as well so I can do more than a few laps at max pace.
What's next:
1. Hopefully my R16/R12 brake pads will arrive and more hopefully will work.
2. New set of track tires the A052 will be relegated to street duty as they are amazing on the street.
3. Track will be closed for configuration change so we will see what that will bring.
The summer is close though and I have a lot planned with the car as a GT.
- Thread starter
- #126
Free Day - Dracon - 02.06.2024
A friend of mine bought a new M4 xDrive Competition and decided to test it on the track in stock form on 275/285 Michelin PS4s. The track was open for a free day since it's the beginning of Summer and it's suppose to be closing for renovation.
I decided that going to the track is always a great way to spend your Sunday so packed my helmet and get into the car.
I manage to get on track at 9:30 and the first session was at 10:00 we are in the middle of a heat wave though so at 10:00 was 26C(79F).
I manage to do 1:07.25 while my friend with the M4 did 1:08.80. However the biggest issue in such temps is CHT and my CHT's were going all the way up to 108C(226F) in just 2 hot laps on the end of the 2nd hot lap my brakes were overheating as well (this at that point is to be expected).
I waited another 30 minutes before I start my second session. I only did 1 fast lap 1:07.160 and again CHT all the way up to 110C(230F) decided there is no point in boiling the engine so I let the car rest. In mean time the M4 got down to 1:07.6.
He waited another 1 hour before doing another session and this time he manage to get down to 1:06.175.
We can say the M4 is really capable car out of the factory and since the Mustang was able to keep up with it in the first 2 sectors. I think the M4 has a lot more potential than the Mustang. I recently was with another friend to a BMW Cup event and with Stock M3 he did 1:05.3 but the weather was much colder.
We packed around 12:00 and travelled together on the interstate I can keep up with the M4 there but in doing so my CHT went up to 110C(230F) again so needed to cool down.
I guess the thing we learned today is that Stock M4 is much better car than a modded Mustang and that I really need cooling and brakes (still waiting on Gloc R16/R12) but my front disks are starting to form micro cracks in them (spider-web).
I need to do something about the cooling as yesterday I was on a mountain run with another friend with a Mustang GT/CS and my car was reaching 105C(221F) CHT while his with a Mishimoto oil cooler was staying cold.
A friend of mine bought a new M4 xDrive Competition and decided to test it on the track in stock form on 275/285 Michelin PS4s. The track was open for a free day since it's the beginning of Summer and it's suppose to be closing for renovation.
I decided that going to the track is always a great way to spend your Sunday so packed my helmet and get into the car.
I manage to get on track at 9:30 and the first session was at 10:00 we are in the middle of a heat wave though so at 10:00 was 26C(79F).
I manage to do 1:07.25 while my friend with the M4 did 1:08.80. However the biggest issue in such temps is CHT and my CHT's were going all the way up to 108C(226F) in just 2 hot laps on the end of the 2nd hot lap my brakes were overheating as well (this at that point is to be expected).
I waited another 30 minutes before I start my second session. I only did 1 fast lap 1:07.160 and again CHT all the way up to 110C(230F) decided there is no point in boiling the engine so I let the car rest. In mean time the M4 got down to 1:07.6.
He waited another 1 hour before doing another session and this time he manage to get down to 1:06.175.
We can say the M4 is really capable car out of the factory and since the Mustang was able to keep up with it in the first 2 sectors. I think the M4 has a lot more potential than the Mustang. I recently was with another friend to a BMW Cup event and with Stock M3 he did 1:05.3 but the weather was much colder.
We packed around 12:00 and travelled together on the interstate I can keep up with the M4 there but in doing so my CHT went up to 110C(230F) again so needed to cool down.
I guess the thing we learned today is that Stock M4 is much better car than a modded Mustang and that I really need cooling and brakes (still waiting on Gloc R16/R12) but my front disks are starting to form micro cracks in them (spider-web).
I need to do something about the cooling as yesterday I was on a mountain run with another friend with a Mustang GT/CS and my car was reaching 105C(221F) CHT while his with a Mishimoto oil cooler was staying cold.
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- Thread starter
- #127
Last week Steeda Europe wrote this lovely feature on the car:
steeda.eu.com
Some interesting things to come in the upcoming weeks. Will keep you guys posted.
Hristofors Time Attack 2017 GT
Long time Steeda customer Hristofor purchased his 2017 Mustang GT in 2019, in stunning Grabber Blue, and after a few months settling in with the car he took it to the track for the first time and entered a local Time Attack style competition at Bulgaria's only track, Dracon, and finishing with a...
steeda.eu.comSome interesting things to come in the upcoming weeks. Will keep you guys posted.
Bill Pemberton
0ld Ford Automotive Racing Terror
Hristophors,
What a great write up and it is so interesting to see how you and the car have progressed over the years. We have had some indication of your successes here on TMO, but the Steeda story really put it all together. Great to have you as a member and we all look forward to hearing your future exploits on tracks in Europe. You are now a bit of a celebrity on Track Mustangs Online as I am not sure too many other drivers had such great press written about them, ha.
Congrats and thanks for the great post!!
What a great write up and it is so interesting to see how you and the car have progressed over the years. We have had some indication of your successes here on TMO, but the Steeda story really put it all together. Great to have you as a member and we all look forward to hearing your future exploits on tracks in Europe. You are now a bit of a celebrity on Track Mustangs Online as I am not sure too many other drivers had such great press written about them, ha.
Congrats and thanks for the great post!!
- Thread starter
- #129
I think is best to provide an End of Year update for the build and where we are.
Transfagarasan Trip - 28.06.2024
In June my local track closed for renovations. However I had something better planned for end of June. A weekend with a lot of cars over 20 in Romania to visit the famous Transfagarashan (TopGear World's best Road). If you don't know what that place is here is a Video from Ford Europe:
This is a road I wanted to drive but never got the chance. A friend of mine organise this trip every year and I actually wanted to go last year but the car was having issues with bleeding brake fluid from calipers and parts just didn't arrive on time.
It's a 1300 kms (807 miles) drive across 3 days (Fri-Sun). The car was still on the track set of wheels and the A052 tires and my final Ohlins settings were -10/-10 which is the firmest I ever driven them.
Friday - 28.06.2024
So we had a meeting on a Shell station around the edge of the City at around 8:00 AM. In trying to park there I hit the right rear rim on a curb and created some curb rash on the Apex wheel (nothing major just annoying) so my day didn't started the best.
We needed to travel the whole day of Friday first to Vidin to cross the bridge over Dunav to Romania around 2.5 hours of driving but it was raining and we needed to go through a mountain pass (first for the day) so driving slow in the mountain pass made the trip a bit longer.
Once we reached Vidin it was easy to cross the bridge a few minutes of waiting on the border and off we go to Craiova for Lunch another 2 hours of driving. By the time we got in Romania the rain has stopped the sun was up and was shaping up to be a lovely sunny day.
In Craiova was really hot around 26C and we had great lunch and ice cream before we start the final part of that days trip to Curtea de arges that's a small town just 5 km south of Transfagarasan the goal was to get there on Friday so we can attack Transfagarasan early morning from the South and have the pass to ourself. We got to the hotel at around 20:30 had lovely dinner and got a nice walk around the city center. Lot's of discussions around cars. That marked the end of 450 km's trip and over 8 hours in the car. Which was amazing to drive the A052 were performing amazing on the street and the car was great.
Saturday - 29.06.2024
We wake up early 7:30 had great breakfast and jumped in the cars the weather was nice and sunny and everyone was excited to attack the famous Transfagarasan.
When we entered the pass we immediately received notifications on our phones for Bears in the region. Transfagarasan is famous for it's Bears which are mostly harmless and well used to people and cars. We didn't manage to see them though.
In the pass we first stopped next to the famous Vidraru Dam to take photos and continue up the pass. The line of cars was amazing my friend with the M4, 996 911's, Cayman S and the Mustang chasing and being chased by such amazing cars on one of the most famous roads is insane. The roar of the V8 in the tunnels as well as the great performance from the Ohlins and the A052 going through corners chased by Porsche's was a bliss.
We stopped for photos a bit before the top:
And to catch that famous road:
We then stopped at the top for lunch. The weather was amazing there was some signs of snow and we managed to enjoy the nice weather. We spend around an hour on the top than we started going down on the North side of Transfagarasan for our next stop:
Sibiu it's a small town by that point the weather was 32C and was really hot so getting Ice cream and coffee at the center of Sibiu was great there was a festival going on and a lot of people so naturally was super fun. We spend around 1 and half hours there and the next part of the trip was as much exciting attacking Transalpina from North And stopping at the top for spending the night.
Transalpina is another mountain pass that is around 130 km's and usually close around 18:30 so you need to enter before that. We managed to enter the Transalpina at around 16:30 so we were fine. I was chasing a lovely S2000 but in the mountain pass the small and nimble S2000 is hard to catch. However the roar of V8 echoing from the mountain and mountain pass that was completely empty and to ourself with a lot of fast corners made for another automotive bliss. To be fair I'm not sure I ever enjoyed the car that much. The grip from the A052 combined with the firm settings of the Ohlins made changing directions instant and the V8 was super responsive.
At some point being a mountain it started to drizzle but the tarmac was still hot and the tires as well. We stopped for photos at the dam:
After that we had another set of maybe 30 km's in the mountain and even that it rained it was amazing to drive. The car performed on another level. The street is obviously not demanding enough for a carat that level of preparation as the A052 was providing more grip than I could ever want on the street and I spend insane amount of time at the top of 3rd gear which is between 140 and 158 km/h. Such speed in a mountain pass is insane. It goes without saying that spending so much time at top of 3rd in 26-30C means that my CHT's were up to 110-112C (233F).
We stopped for a short break before the final trip to the top of the mountain. At some point it stopped raining and we managed to catch Rainbows over the mountain we got to the hotel. Porsche guys have that habit to check oil after such drives and with my car been hot the whole Transalpina trip I checked as well. I was down 1/2 quart of oil but was lucky enough to have a spare bottle in the car so filled it up. The Porsches were down more so I call that a win. It was 315 km's of driving and what a lovely driving that was.
Sunday - 30.06.2024
The next morning we got breakfast in the mountain my car was almost empty on gas so we slowly get down to the nearest gas station on the South side of Transalpina and started the 450 km's road trip back to Sofia.
It was mostly an uneventful trip we stopped for Lunch in Vidin on a boat at the Dunav river. Great restaurant where we all shared emotions from the weekend and had great food. Than we travelled through the Petrohan pass where a deer jumped infront of the car that was ahead of me but luckly was super fast and nothing major happen. I reached Sofia at around 17:00 stopped to spray the car at a car wash and tuck it in the garage full with another set of amazing memories with the Mustang.
Summer 2024 and Upgrades
After that June trip and from middle of June Dracon was closed for configuration change. Rumor has it it was going to open in October. In August I had planned a lovely summer vacation from 1st of August till 18th however prior to that I needed to change my tires to street ones. I was driving the car on the A052's and was planning to go to Plovdiv on 28.07 when I got to the garage to take the car out for the trip this happened:
You can see the nail as well as the curb rash I did to that rim. Naturally I called my Tire shop and they were able to patch the tire but as you can imagine at least 2 of this Tires needs to be replaced.
Ether way since I have second set of tires I just changed to them and was ready for 18 days next to the beach in Sunny Beach. Lots and Lots of cocktails and sun.
The only thing that happen during the Summer vacation was that I actually got in contact with Steeda regarding a Catback and they offered me a deal on a 3" Steeda Catback as well as did the Feature I posted on the car in the steeda.eu blog.
In mean time the lovely Mach 1 was in Unitesta for installing an inner chiller for the Supercharger so I asked him to order me a set of this lovely things:
Unitesta 2 Piece slotted rotors front and rear. This bad boys are a total of 33 lbs lighter than the OEM ones on the car that will both improve the car performance and hopefully help stop the car on track.
Dracon Reconstruction
By the end of August a new information started leaking around the Dracon track with some events planned for September like Ford Fest (which sadly I was not able to attend). And with that a lot of new information regarding how the track will look like:
This is the new layout that looks like it's taylor made for the BMW M4 as the longer straights will give it an advantage. I however can't wait to take the car out on the new track. However with time moving on as of this writing the track is not yet finished and the final tarmac will be done in Spring.
Dyno Day - 29.08.2024
With the 3" Steeda catback on the way I decided to take the car to the Dyno to see where we stand. The Car is hitting the speed limiter in 5th because the 275/40/19 tires combined with the 3.55 put 7500 rpm somewhere around the 280 km/h mark when the car is limited to 260 km/h. So the Dyno was not exactly what I was expecting we need to do it next time on 4th.
Red on that graph is my old Dyno with just a K&N drop in Filter and the OEM IM manifold.
Blue is the Power Pack 3 as you can see the old one makes a lot more torque down low and since I'm hitting the speed limiter we were not able to see the Power Pack 3 advantage all the way to Red Line (7500 rpm).
I know for a fact that my car is faster on track just the Dyno don't show that.
I installed the Steeda 3" Catback and didn't manage to get a real Dyno of it yet or a 100-200 km/h measurement but I'm happy with how the car sound with that Catback some pops and bangs here and there and for a 3" is actually not insanely loud which was the goal.
The second part of the season most of the cars were driving on Serres with the BMW M4 of my friend posting a 1:26.7 lap time he also did 1:28.9 with the Mustang back in March. A lot of fast times as the BMW championship 3rd round was planned on Serres.
I was planning to do another day at Serres but with the flat tire and all the upgrades decided it's not smart to prep a car for a single event.
In mean time there were rumors of another track been build in Bulgaria a big company that build most of our Interstates announced a project for a 4km track 60 km's away from Sofia that is planned to be build by August of 2025. The Project looks amazing and if finished will be amazing.
So what is next:
Season 2025 preparation
I still didn't install the new disks on the car or the new brake pads. And the car will need to be taken out of hibernation after the winter and be fully prepped. My goal for 2025 is to spend more time on Serres and hopefully get the car from my current PB of 1:30.5 all the way down to a high 1:27.
What needs to happen:
1. Full brakes revision:
New 2 piece Unitesta front and rear rotors
New Brake Pads (Gloc R16/R12) or (Ferodo DSUno/DS2500) still not sure
New Bolts and rattling brackets for Brembo Calipers
New bleed valves for front Brembo's
New Castrol SRF fluid (this is actually magic)
2. Tires:
2 A052 295/35/19 for the front as my other 2 tires look good and I don't want to trow a full set over a flat tire.
3. New Fluids and spark plugs
4. Probably some form of oil cooling/engine cooling this is still TBD as I lean Mishimoto for a Plug and Play kit but not sure.
This was longer update than I envisioned but I hope you will enjoy it. I wish all of you happy holidays and joy with your families.
Transfagarasan Trip - 28.06.2024
In June my local track closed for renovations. However I had something better planned for end of June. A weekend with a lot of cars over 20 in Romania to visit the famous Transfagarashan (TopGear World's best Road). If you don't know what that place is here is a Video from Ford Europe:
This is a road I wanted to drive but never got the chance. A friend of mine organise this trip every year and I actually wanted to go last year but the car was having issues with bleeding brake fluid from calipers and parts just didn't arrive on time.
It's a 1300 kms (807 miles) drive across 3 days (Fri-Sun). The car was still on the track set of wheels and the A052 tires and my final Ohlins settings were -10/-10 which is the firmest I ever driven them.
Friday - 28.06.2024
So we had a meeting on a Shell station around the edge of the City at around 8:00 AM. In trying to park there I hit the right rear rim on a curb and created some curb rash on the Apex wheel (nothing major just annoying) so my day didn't started the best.
We needed to travel the whole day of Friday first to Vidin to cross the bridge over Dunav to Romania around 2.5 hours of driving but it was raining and we needed to go through a mountain pass (first for the day) so driving slow in the mountain pass made the trip a bit longer.
Once we reached Vidin it was easy to cross the bridge a few minutes of waiting on the border and off we go to Craiova for Lunch another 2 hours of driving. By the time we got in Romania the rain has stopped the sun was up and was shaping up to be a lovely sunny day.
In Craiova was really hot around 26C and we had great lunch and ice cream before we start the final part of that days trip to Curtea de arges that's a small town just 5 km south of Transfagarasan the goal was to get there on Friday so we can attack Transfagarasan early morning from the South and have the pass to ourself. We got to the hotel at around 20:30 had lovely dinner and got a nice walk around the city center. Lot's of discussions around cars. That marked the end of 450 km's trip and over 8 hours in the car. Which was amazing to drive the A052 were performing amazing on the street and the car was great.
Saturday - 29.06.2024
We wake up early 7:30 had great breakfast and jumped in the cars the weather was nice and sunny and everyone was excited to attack the famous Transfagarasan.
When we entered the pass we immediately received notifications on our phones for Bears in the region. Transfagarasan is famous for it's Bears which are mostly harmless and well used to people and cars. We didn't manage to see them though.
In the pass we first stopped next to the famous Vidraru Dam to take photos and continue up the pass. The line of cars was amazing my friend with the M4, 996 911's, Cayman S and the Mustang chasing and being chased by such amazing cars on one of the most famous roads is insane. The roar of the V8 in the tunnels as well as the great performance from the Ohlins and the A052 going through corners chased by Porsche's was a bliss.
We stopped for photos a bit before the top:
And to catch that famous road:
We then stopped at the top for lunch. The weather was amazing there was some signs of snow and we managed to enjoy the nice weather. We spend around an hour on the top than we started going down on the North side of Transfagarasan for our next stop:
Sibiu it's a small town by that point the weather was 32C and was really hot so getting Ice cream and coffee at the center of Sibiu was great there was a festival going on and a lot of people so naturally was super fun. We spend around 1 and half hours there and the next part of the trip was as much exciting attacking Transalpina from North And stopping at the top for spending the night.
Transalpina is another mountain pass that is around 130 km's and usually close around 18:30 so you need to enter before that. We managed to enter the Transalpina at around 16:30 so we were fine. I was chasing a lovely S2000 but in the mountain pass the small and nimble S2000 is hard to catch. However the roar of V8 echoing from the mountain and mountain pass that was completely empty and to ourself with a lot of fast corners made for another automotive bliss. To be fair I'm not sure I ever enjoyed the car that much. The grip from the A052 combined with the firm settings of the Ohlins made changing directions instant and the V8 was super responsive.
At some point being a mountain it started to drizzle but the tarmac was still hot and the tires as well. We stopped for photos at the dam:
After that we had another set of maybe 30 km's in the mountain and even that it rained it was amazing to drive. The car performed on another level. The street is obviously not demanding enough for a carat that level of preparation as the A052 was providing more grip than I could ever want on the street and I spend insane amount of time at the top of 3rd gear which is between 140 and 158 km/h. Such speed in a mountain pass is insane. It goes without saying that spending so much time at top of 3rd in 26-30C means that my CHT's were up to 110-112C (233F).
We stopped for a short break before the final trip to the top of the mountain. At some point it stopped raining and we managed to catch Rainbows over the mountain we got to the hotel. Porsche guys have that habit to check oil after such drives and with my car been hot the whole Transalpina trip I checked as well. I was down 1/2 quart of oil but was lucky enough to have a spare bottle in the car so filled it up. The Porsches were down more so I call that a win. It was 315 km's of driving and what a lovely driving that was.
Sunday - 30.06.2024
The next morning we got breakfast in the mountain my car was almost empty on gas so we slowly get down to the nearest gas station on the South side of Transalpina and started the 450 km's road trip back to Sofia.
It was mostly an uneventful trip we stopped for Lunch in Vidin on a boat at the Dunav river. Great restaurant where we all shared emotions from the weekend and had great food. Than we travelled through the Petrohan pass where a deer jumped infront of the car that was ahead of me but luckly was super fast and nothing major happen. I reached Sofia at around 17:00 stopped to spray the car at a car wash and tuck it in the garage full with another set of amazing memories with the Mustang.
Summer 2024 and Upgrades
After that June trip and from middle of June Dracon was closed for configuration change. Rumor has it it was going to open in October. In August I had planned a lovely summer vacation from 1st of August till 18th however prior to that I needed to change my tires to street ones. I was driving the car on the A052's and was planning to go to Plovdiv on 28.07 when I got to the garage to take the car out for the trip this happened:
You can see the nail as well as the curb rash I did to that rim. Naturally I called my Tire shop and they were able to patch the tire but as you can imagine at least 2 of this Tires needs to be replaced.
Ether way since I have second set of tires I just changed to them and was ready for 18 days next to the beach in Sunny Beach. Lots and Lots of cocktails and sun.
The only thing that happen during the Summer vacation was that I actually got in contact with Steeda regarding a Catback and they offered me a deal on a 3" Steeda Catback as well as did the Feature I posted on the car in the steeda.eu blog.
In mean time the lovely Mach 1 was in Unitesta for installing an inner chiller for the Supercharger so I asked him to order me a set of this lovely things:
Unitesta 2 Piece slotted rotors front and rear. This bad boys are a total of 33 lbs lighter than the OEM ones on the car that will both improve the car performance and hopefully help stop the car on track.
Dracon Reconstruction
By the end of August a new information started leaking around the Dracon track with some events planned for September like Ford Fest (which sadly I was not able to attend). And with that a lot of new information regarding how the track will look like:
This is the new layout that looks like it's taylor made for the BMW M4 as the longer straights will give it an advantage. I however can't wait to take the car out on the new track. However with time moving on as of this writing the track is not yet finished and the final tarmac will be done in Spring.
Dyno Day - 29.08.2024
With the 3" Steeda catback on the way I decided to take the car to the Dyno to see where we stand. The Car is hitting the speed limiter in 5th because the 275/40/19 tires combined with the 3.55 put 7500 rpm somewhere around the 280 km/h mark when the car is limited to 260 km/h. So the Dyno was not exactly what I was expecting we need to do it next time on 4th.
Red on that graph is my old Dyno with just a K&N drop in Filter and the OEM IM manifold.
Blue is the Power Pack 3 as you can see the old one makes a lot more torque down low and since I'm hitting the speed limiter we were not able to see the Power Pack 3 advantage all the way to Red Line (7500 rpm).
I know for a fact that my car is faster on track just the Dyno don't show that.
I installed the Steeda 3" Catback and didn't manage to get a real Dyno of it yet or a 100-200 km/h measurement but I'm happy with how the car sound with that Catback some pops and bangs here and there and for a 3" is actually not insanely loud which was the goal.
The second part of the season most of the cars were driving on Serres with the BMW M4 of my friend posting a 1:26.7 lap time he also did 1:28.9 with the Mustang back in March. A lot of fast times as the BMW championship 3rd round was planned on Serres.
I was planning to do another day at Serres but with the flat tire and all the upgrades decided it's not smart to prep a car for a single event.
In mean time there were rumors of another track been build in Bulgaria a big company that build most of our Interstates announced a project for a 4km track 60 km's away from Sofia that is planned to be build by August of 2025. The Project looks amazing and if finished will be amazing.
So what is next:
Season 2025 preparation
I still didn't install the new disks on the car or the new brake pads. And the car will need to be taken out of hibernation after the winter and be fully prepped. My goal for 2025 is to spend more time on Serres and hopefully get the car from my current PB of 1:30.5 all the way down to a high 1:27.
What needs to happen:
1. Full brakes revision:
New 2 piece Unitesta front and rear rotors
New Brake Pads (Gloc R16/R12) or (Ferodo DSUno/DS2500) still not sure
New Bolts and rattling brackets for Brembo Calipers
New bleed valves for front Brembo's
New Castrol SRF fluid (this is actually magic)
2. Tires:
2 A052 295/35/19 for the front as my other 2 tires look good and I don't want to trow a full set over a flat tire.
3. New Fluids and spark plugs
4. Probably some form of oil cooling/engine cooling this is still TBD as I lean Mishimoto for a Plug and Play kit but not sure.
This was longer update than I envisioned but I hope you will enjoy it. I wish all of you happy holidays and joy with your families.
Bill Pemberton
0ld Ford Automotive Racing Terror
Fantastic write up and what a great road trip with friends. The graph is interesting and the one thing I would interject is the car is likely faster now as you are faster! I know we all hope to hear about the new track when finished and I can really sympathize with you on the nail in the tire situation as my wife and I have had 3 needed repairs on 2 of our cars this year.
Have a wonderful Holiday Season and I always appreciate the time you take to keep all of us informed on your track and driving experiences in various parts of Europe!
Have a wonderful Holiday Season and I always appreciate the time you take to keep all of us informed on your track and driving experiences in various parts of Europe!
- Thread starter
- #131
After the Power Pack the top speed on Dracon jumped from 182 km/h all the way to 191 km/h so 9 km/h more this is primary because now I have 1000 RPM more 6850 rpm red line with 7450 rpm allowing me to stay in the top of 3rd and 4rd a lot more. So I'm sure the graph is right as it's the same from what we see in that lovely MotoIQ article regarding Power Packs back in the day. However I really think the PP3 is better on track.
JDee
Ancient Racer
I found that a higher redline is a mixed blessing. I had the FP power pack 2 tune in my '16 and it raised the redline to 7250. I found there was little, if any, improvement in lap times but there was a major increase in fuel consumption and oil consumption.
I kind of worried about it, the plugs always looked to me like they were a little bit lean and that can be bad. But I'm old school from the days of carbs and maybe fuel injection these days is way smarter than I give it credit for so a plug that looks mildly lean is probably fine.
Given that I was just doing lapping days, I didn't think that tune was great. That's at Mosport which is a very fast track with a long back straight, I was hitting 148 mph on it, my converter says that's 238 km/h. I saved a pile of gas shifting at 6500 rpm and it was only a second or two slower.
Given that in lapping days were we're not even running for a trophy I can accept that loss of a second or two. Racing though, as always, is a totally different story, gaining a second is priceless.
I kind of worried about it, the plugs always looked to me like they were a little bit lean and that can be bad. But I'm old school from the days of carbs and maybe fuel injection these days is way smarter than I give it credit for so a plug that looks mildly lean is probably fine.
Given that I was just doing lapping days, I didn't think that tune was great. That's at Mosport which is a very fast track with a long back straight, I was hitting 148 mph on it, my converter says that's 238 km/h. I saved a pile of gas shifting at 6500 rpm and it was only a second or two slower.
Given that in lapping days were we're not even running for a trophy I can accept that loss of a second or two. Racing though, as always, is a totally different story, gaining a second is priceless.
- Thread starter
- #133
My lap times actually didn't improved. On Seres where there are longer straight the car dropped a few seconds but that could easily be accounted to the change in tires from 305/30 to 295/35 as I was making a lot less gear changes.
There is an increase in oil consumption but considering this engine is now the same as a Mach 1 I wouldn't worry about it. In fact on the Dyno session we taken a Mach 1 A10 with me and the A10 was posting 70 NM (51 ft-lbs) less torque than me and HP was looking close to the same but have in mind that EU spec Mach 1's have less horsepower around 460 instead of the normal 480. Regarding fuel consumption I didn't notice anything out of the ordinary on track 1-2 liters more or less is not a big deal and on the street in my trip to the sea cost the car did 22 mpg so I call that a win.
I'm overall happy with the power the only problem I have with that setup is high IAT's in traffic on the street but I can live with that. I'm also interested to see what difference the 3" Catback will make so far it sounds nice but it feels like the car again loss power down low still need to do 100-200 run and a Dyno run as well as take the car to the track so hopefully will know more on that subject when the new season begins.
- Thread starter
- #134
Pre Season preparation 2025
At the end of last month I decided is time to start preparing the car for the season. On 28.02 I took the car to my local dealer so they can prep the car for the season as usual this was a new oil, trans oil, diff oil, air filter and also the new 2 piece Unitesta rotors in combination with the new Gloc R16/R12 brakes.
However the shop run into a problem with the rear brake disks they were not able to fit on the wheel hub because they were 70.3 mm center bore while the wheel hubs were 70.5 mm so the disks won't stay flush with the wheel hub.
I ordered a set of OEM blank rotors and lucky for me they were available locally so we installed them on 04.03 together with the R12 rear pads.
We also changed spark plugs so what a lovely time to see how this old plugs 20 000 km's and I think 2 seasons on track looks like:
The next Day 05.03.2025 I took the car to my regular alignment shop so we can get the car into track spec. This took a solid 3 hours because we messed the caster on front left and took us a bit to get it into spec.
When we were under the car I noticed that the diff was sagging on the left side:
Turned out my rear left bushing is gone:
I'm not sure what the proper motorsport solution to this is for a street track car ? I probably will get the Steeda diff inserts and try to see if that will fix it as I really really don't want to drop the cradle completely as who knows what else might come up. So if anyone has suggestions let me know.
Same evening I installed the track wheels changed the Ohlins to -7/-7 clicks.
Spend the night talking with the lovely members of the Speed Therapy Academy by Kenny Brown and went to bed at 04:00 at the morning of 06.03.
On 06.03 at 20:00 was the first Muscle Cars car meet for the season and even though I was very tired I decided to join it and was amazing 35 different cars including a Dark Horse jointed the event and we went for dinner in a lovely restaurant driving together. So much fun. Can't believe this is my 7th season with the Mustang.
Track-Speed 1st Premium Track Day 2025 08.03-09.03 - Serres - 1:28.875
I booked a two days track day on Serres a few weeks ago which was why I was prepping the car so intensively I had a lot of concerns regarding the weather because when I booked we still had snow and was wondering what the weather will be like in beginning of March. I obviously work as a Cloud Engineer so I tried my best to engineer great weather. I booked a hotel for 07.03 and 08.03 and get 07.03 off work so I can travel in the warmer part of the day. Turned out it was a lovely 20 degrees celsius weather and dry and sunny what a beautiful weather for a drive. However with the car set for track wheels, tires brake pads and super firm suspension as well as the diff bushings not in great shape it was a very bumpy and noise 3 hours drive. I made it to the hotel at around 18:00 and an outside thermometer was showing 17 degrees celsius very nice weather indeed.
I woke up the next morning at around 7:30 and after a fast breakfast with a lot of orange juice I made it to the hotel parking lot looks like I was outgunned from the start:
This was just a small part of the participants turned out this McLaren was not as fast as it looked though.
At around 9:00 I made it to the track:
It took me a while to pass the registration, getting the transponder, installing it and prepping the car for the track but at around 09:30 I was on track. It took the car a while to warm up as well as the driver as it was 13 degrees celsius but at the 4th lap I did a new PB of 1:29.92 getting me very close to the Record my friend was holding with my Mustang. I exited the track lowered the tires another 0.2 bar all around and 30 minutes later I got out again.
I only did 1 fast lap but it was enough for 1:28.875:
I was feeling hopeful that maybe will be able to get the car into the 1:27 or even lower. However the next session the temps were already around 20 degrees celsius and the brake pads begin to acting up. I also started to notice some wired noises from the front and mostly loud bangs from the rear in some corners. Turned out that us playing with the caster made my tires touch the fender liners more as we had too much caster (newer knew this was a thing). And the Catback was touching the rear bumper (I actually noticed when car was at the dealer that a rear bushing on the rear handlers of the Catback is torn) and was starting to take the bumper with it:
Ether way it was noon so my fuel was down to half which means only one thing time for refuel went to a local Shell station to get a fresh supply of V-Power 100 octane. I need to mention that fuel in Greece is not only more expensive than in Bulgaria but also it's worst quality.
I manage to get back on time for the next session but with full car and really warm weather I couldn't improve.
I noticed the car was running ruff so I read the errors turned out I have a P0345 code:
Last season on Serres I did get a P0349 code that disappeared after cleaning it. Same happened here however I decided not a great idea to continue driving it with all the issues.
Waited a few hours and checked the oil turned out in only 22 full laps my oil was down 0.7 quartz. I had similar consumption last season in Greece (CW track).
I decided it's time to call it quits so didn't run more that day and decided with all the issues better take the car home the next morning.
I manage to do that safely though again such a bumpy drive the car has tons of vibrations and noises at the moment most annoyingly the door windows let air in the cabin I guess this could be fixed as I know is a common issue.
Ether way I was 17th that day out of 30 cars most of them BMW's and Porsches also I was around 2 seconds behind the G82 M4's but if you are keeping score my lap time is actually better than my friends Cayman 4.0 GTS from last year. Also in one of the sessions I was chased by Cayman GT4 RS and was managing to get away from it on the straights however in the corners was catching me.
Here is the full results:
Oh and btw that McLaren 1:30.9.
What is Next:
There are a number of issues that need sorting:
1. That Oil consumption is excessive and I'm guessing it's causing the P0345 errors I'm guessing is the dreaded Valve cover leak so will order GT500 aluminium valve covers and wonder what else should I do while in there ?
2. Diff bushings - Steeda Red Inserts hopefully will solve the issue.
3. Catback bushings handlers
4. Brake Pads will switch to DSUno front / DS2500 rear as I'm sick of the hard pedal with the Gloc. Also DSUno easier to find and based on spec have higher temp range though the initial byte might not be as good.
5. Rear Wheel hubs (I feel the rear left is going out so maybe get new ones and hope they are -0.2 mm so I can fit rear rotors).
I wish everyone a lovely new track season 2025 !
At the end of last month I decided is time to start preparing the car for the season. On 28.02 I took the car to my local dealer so they can prep the car for the season as usual this was a new oil, trans oil, diff oil, air filter and also the new 2 piece Unitesta rotors in combination with the new Gloc R16/R12 brakes.
However the shop run into a problem with the rear brake disks they were not able to fit on the wheel hub because they were 70.3 mm center bore while the wheel hubs were 70.5 mm so the disks won't stay flush with the wheel hub.
I ordered a set of OEM blank rotors and lucky for me they were available locally so we installed them on 04.03 together with the R12 rear pads.
We also changed spark plugs so what a lovely time to see how this old plugs 20 000 km's and I think 2 seasons on track looks like:
The next Day 05.03.2025 I took the car to my regular alignment shop so we can get the car into track spec. This took a solid 3 hours because we messed the caster on front left and took us a bit to get it into spec.
When we were under the car I noticed that the diff was sagging on the left side:
Turned out my rear left bushing is gone:
I'm not sure what the proper motorsport solution to this is for a street track car ? I probably will get the Steeda diff inserts and try to see if that will fix it as I really really don't want to drop the cradle completely as who knows what else might come up. So if anyone has suggestions let me know.
Same evening I installed the track wheels changed the Ohlins to -7/-7 clicks.
Spend the night talking with the lovely members of the Speed Therapy Academy by Kenny Brown and went to bed at 04:00 at the morning of 06.03.
On 06.03 at 20:00 was the first Muscle Cars car meet for the season and even though I was very tired I decided to join it and was amazing 35 different cars including a Dark Horse jointed the event and we went for dinner in a lovely restaurant driving together. So much fun. Can't believe this is my 7th season with the Mustang.
Track-Speed 1st Premium Track Day 2025 08.03-09.03 - Serres - 1:28.875
I booked a two days track day on Serres a few weeks ago which was why I was prepping the car so intensively I had a lot of concerns regarding the weather because when I booked we still had snow and was wondering what the weather will be like in beginning of March. I obviously work as a Cloud Engineer so I tried my best to engineer great weather. I booked a hotel for 07.03 and 08.03 and get 07.03 off work so I can travel in the warmer part of the day. Turned out it was a lovely 20 degrees celsius weather and dry and sunny what a beautiful weather for a drive. However with the car set for track wheels, tires brake pads and super firm suspension as well as the diff bushings not in great shape it was a very bumpy and noise 3 hours drive. I made it to the hotel at around 18:00 and an outside thermometer was showing 17 degrees celsius very nice weather indeed.
I woke up the next morning at around 7:30 and after a fast breakfast with a lot of orange juice I made it to the hotel parking lot looks like I was outgunned from the start:
This was just a small part of the participants turned out this McLaren was not as fast as it looked though.
At around 9:00 I made it to the track:
It took me a while to pass the registration, getting the transponder, installing it and prepping the car for the track but at around 09:30 I was on track. It took the car a while to warm up as well as the driver as it was 13 degrees celsius but at the 4th lap I did a new PB of 1:29.92 getting me very close to the Record my friend was holding with my Mustang. I exited the track lowered the tires another 0.2 bar all around and 30 minutes later I got out again.
I only did 1 fast lap but it was enough for 1:28.875:
I was feeling hopeful that maybe will be able to get the car into the 1:27 or even lower. However the next session the temps were already around 20 degrees celsius and the brake pads begin to acting up. I also started to notice some wired noises from the front and mostly loud bangs from the rear in some corners. Turned out that us playing with the caster made my tires touch the fender liners more as we had too much caster (newer knew this was a thing). And the Catback was touching the rear bumper (I actually noticed when car was at the dealer that a rear bushing on the rear handlers of the Catback is torn) and was starting to take the bumper with it:
Ether way it was noon so my fuel was down to half which means only one thing time for refuel went to a local Shell station to get a fresh supply of V-Power 100 octane. I need to mention that fuel in Greece is not only more expensive than in Bulgaria but also it's worst quality.
I manage to get back on time for the next session but with full car and really warm weather I couldn't improve.
I noticed the car was running ruff so I read the errors turned out I have a P0345 code:
Last season on Serres I did get a P0349 code that disappeared after cleaning it. Same happened here however I decided not a great idea to continue driving it with all the issues.
Waited a few hours and checked the oil turned out in only 22 full laps my oil was down 0.7 quartz. I had similar consumption last season in Greece (CW track).
I decided it's time to call it quits so didn't run more that day and decided with all the issues better take the car home the next morning.
I manage to do that safely though again such a bumpy drive the car has tons of vibrations and noises at the moment most annoyingly the door windows let air in the cabin I guess this could be fixed as I know is a common issue.
Ether way I was 17th that day out of 30 cars most of them BMW's and Porsches also I was around 2 seconds behind the G82 M4's but if you are keeping score my lap time is actually better than my friends Cayman 4.0 GTS from last year. Also in one of the sessions I was chased by Cayman GT4 RS and was managing to get away from it on the straights however in the corners was catching me.
Here is the full results:
Oh and btw that McLaren 1:30.9.
What is Next:
There are a number of issues that need sorting:
1. That Oil consumption is excessive and I'm guessing it's causing the P0345 errors I'm guessing is the dreaded Valve cover leak so will order GT500 aluminium valve covers and wonder what else should I do while in there ?
2. Diff bushings - Steeda Red Inserts hopefully will solve the issue.
3. Catback bushings handlers
4. Brake Pads will switch to DSUno front / DS2500 rear as I'm sick of the hard pedal with the Gloc. Also DSUno easier to find and based on spec have higher temp range though the initial byte might not be as good.
5. Rear Wheel hubs (I feel the rear left is going out so maybe get new ones and hope they are -0.2 mm so I can fit rear rotors).
I wish everyone a lovely new track season 2025 !
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Bill Pemberton
0ld Ford Automotive Racing Terror
Always enjoy your great write ups of your " Track Adventures " and sorry to hear about your engine issues. Also I am a little confused about your concern about a hard pedal with the G-Locs as one usually wants a hard pedal on track. Is it more of a situation that you find the pads harder to modulate as they would have more initial bite than say a R-12. Keep posting and let us all know what the issue is with the oil usage and sad to hear about the poor Greeceeee fuel. I imagine the cost for it would cause many of us to faint in the US.
- Thread starter
- #136
No ever since I moved to Gloc R10/R8 I started facing an issue where the pedal will get rock hard in a brake zone after a few laps my feeling was it was brake pads overheating so I jumped to R12 and they start doing it less but sill do it and the R16 still do it also my brakes as squeaking even when not pressed which to me mean they are glazed. So I will be changing brands to see if this issue continue with another brand.
The Oil issues and to an extend the P0345/P0349 errors Camshaft position sensor bank 2 (Driver side) might be caused by a leaking valve cover which is a common issue on the S550 I have a passenger side catch can but not a driver side one so considering Serres is Clock Wise track while Dracon is not and the issue is on the left side and my car is pulling 1.5G in corner it may be just slashing oil through ether the IM or valve cover and causing excessive oil consumption and more importantly oil pressure drops. Ether way I'm guessing the valve covers will be coming off as I need to first get a better understanding of the issue and 2 to make sure a known issue is addressed. I just wonder what else to do while in there ? I'm thinking and least do the chains and probably the FP version of the cams phasers (this will also address to an extend the P0345 errors as the FP version requires less oil pressure to work).
The P0349 error last season went away after Serres and didn't come back until this track day at Serres as a P0345 error this time. My guess is the error come out because of lost oil also the engine was not sounding happy ruff idle which may indicate that error ones the error was removed and oil added I didn't get the error back on the road back home which was also the case last time out. Again it might be losing pressure may be sensor on it's way out or an electrical problem (alternator going bad ?) My dealer will be helpless to diagnose that or an oil leak in such extend so will need to figure it out.
Also. the issue with the Diff bushings is annoying me as hell hope the Steeda diff inserts work.
Bill Pemberton
0ld Ford Automotive Racing Terror
I will admit I am not sure about your concern with a hard or firm pedal as that is what I would want, and the squeaking is no surprise with semi metallic race pads. That said, I have told friends and students if a race pad did not meet their braking style or comfort to try another quality pad. Good luck with the engine issues and you write some of the best track stories of anyone on this site, so congrats!
- Thread starter
- #138
There is a difference between firm pedal and rock hard pedal with no braking force I mean you can't press the pedal because there is gas under the pad hard. It's not a nice feeling when stopping from 133 mph.
Hey H,
I had a P0345 Friday afternoon. This is after I replaced the CPS in November for the same thing. I'm wondering if I only get the code when in Track mode...is Track Mode incompatible with my tune? It was really cold Friday so I was in normal and Sport mode most of the day. My first session in Track Mode...P0300, P0308, and P0345. Same as November. Spark plugs looked good in Nov.
I'm going to Road Atlanta this weekend. I'm going to run in normal mode with TCS and Advance Trac turned off. I'm thinking that if I get through the weekend, that will reinforce my theory.
I had a P0345 Friday afternoon. This is after I replaced the CPS in November for the same thing. I'm wondering if I only get the code when in Track mode...is Track Mode incompatible with my tune? It was really cold Friday so I was in normal and Sport mode most of the day. My first session in Track Mode...P0300, P0308, and P0345. Same as November. Spark plugs looked good in Nov.
I'm going to Road Atlanta this weekend. I'm going to run in normal mode with TCS and Advance Trac turned off. I'm thinking that if I get through the weekend, that will reinforce my theory.
- Thread starter
- #140
I run the car in Sport+ mode do you check your oil consumption ?
My spark plugs are brand new but as I mentioned I had lost 0.7 quarts of oil on track when the code presented itself. My guess is that I have oil slosh issues and that might be causing the P0345 though I only had P0345 if you have P0300 and P0308 codes your car is also misfiring so I will start by checking if I changed clutch lately and if yes do a crank relearn.
Keep me posted as this needs sorting out prior to my next outing on track. I plan to do the GT500 aluminium valve covers. Do the timing chain while in there and probably buy the FP version of the CAM Phasers:
2015-2017 5.0L/5.2L COYOTE HIGH PERFORMANCE CAM PHASER
2015-2017 5.0L/5.2L COYOTE HIGH PERFORMANCE CAM PHASER|Ford Racing Parts
performanceparts.ford.comAs well as new cam position sensors.
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