Holden Performance Driving Center... In a Nissan :)

Today was the day to see all this hard work pay off...  A day at the Holden Performance Driving Center, compliments of Hardtuned.net.  Had to be there at 7.30 in the morning, so it was a very nippy start, full of chilliness and plenty of exhaust steam =P

Needs to be said, what a way to start a winter's Sunday...

After passing scrutineering, I got my very own sticker... yay!  Number 23... first racing number I've ever been given :)  Had to laugh at the irony though, just turned 24... swing and a miss!  I wonder if I'll end up obsessing over this number like Jim Carey did...

We had a quick drivers briefing, which was an overview of safety requirements, general rules, and what parts of the track to be aware of.  Turns out this info came in very handy after we got into it.

First look at the track... what a stunning day!!

I ended up in Group 2 - there were 5 cars per group, 11 groups in total.  They placed us based on car type and power output, with driving experience also influencing placement.  Group 1 started the day off, so my day began with queuing up, ready for group 2 to grace the track.

There ended up being 4 cars in my group.  A 180sx, an s13, s14 and then my one via.  All in all, we were very evenly matched :) although sprints was a bit boring, as the racing against each other was measured by a clock, nothing tangible.  Honestly, I'm not a big fan, but hey, can't keep a closed mind when it comes to these things.

Getting shots with a small point and shoot camera was tricky, and an iPhone didn't fare much better... my beautiful girlfriend got some very good photos none-the-less :)

The track itself was very small and tight.  I was lucky to get into 4th gear let alone think about getting into 5th.  There's some very high speed corners, and some very tricky sections, but all in all a very fun track.


After the first session out (we had a total of 5, i only completed 3 due to exhaustion and not wanting to do something stupid), I got pulled over coming off the track... Turns out my car was leaking fuel.  The fuel was coming from the filler cap, although after lifting the car up and having a nosey around, I couldn't work out how that was even possible.

Regardless, I couldn't deny the fact that there was an issue... the solution?  Grabbed a rag from the boot and stuffed it in the filler cap hole.  While it didn't fix the issue, it did slow down the leak enough that I could complete a session without having any more leak out.  What it did mean though is that I was pulling the rag out at the end of each session and rinsing it (it was DRENCHED in fuel), ready for the next session.

There was plenty of eye candy throughout the day... some very impressive motor vehicles graced us!!  We saw a white Lexus LFA rock up... but within 5 minutes we saw this - a chrome plated LFA.  All of a sudden the white one didn't seem to matter anymore... Some people have too much money =\  Wouldn't you hate it if you got a scratch or a ding in that paint?

This was a treat... an Aston Martin DBS...

... that headed out onto the skid pan :)  What was quite funny was he spent most of his session turning off all the electronic assists that seem to grace exotic cars, but once he got that sorted, it did surprisingly well!

Given that I'd never ever drifted before, I thought I might as well give it a shot!  I mean, what better way to do it than on a skid pan, with plenty of water and nothing to hit.

Just a tad nervous waiting to head out...

It needs to be said, it was fuducking hard!!!  And that's even in an ex-comp drift car on a wet track... I could only go off of assumed knowledge, I'd had no formal training per se.  While it was easy enough to get sideways, maintaining that was a real challenge.  Before I knew it, the session was over... back to sprints.

The second session brought with it a little bit more confidence, as I'd had time to learn the track.  Seemed a little bit too much confidence though, had an off on my first hot lap.  Nothing serious, just gave her a bit too much coming out of a corner, spun out and ended up on the grass.  I went on to a third sprint session, nothing overly exciting, just working on improving my times (which I had no idea of... so it was kind of just more spirited driving lol).

What I was a lot more interested in was persevering with the skid pan.  After having a yarn with a couple of guys regarding techniques and what I could improve on, I had to try and see if I couldn't put some of that to use.

Big thanks to Chris for jumping in with me and giving me some flying pointers for a session or 2 :) needless to say it did net an improvement, but I still had a long way to go...

What amazed me was how dirty the car got!!  

The organisers then decided to throw out a Gymkhana track, which I gave 2 tries with Erin as my passenger... good fun!  But a tad hard when I'm still learning to drift, let alone control one.  The solution?

Chris took me for 2 runs in my own car :)

Thought a thumbs up was a good indication for what was about to happen...

This was the second run... wicked fun!!  Had an issue though that the water was getting into the rear brake pads, and basically rendered the handbrake useless.  Didn't stop Chris from throwing it around, although you could see where it was affecting him.  I'll be honest, I didn't pick up that much, was a bit too focused on having fun =P

I managed to get in another 2 sessions on the straight skid pan (no gymkhana) with Erin as a passenger.  She had a smile on her face, could only be a good thing :)  The hardest thing to learn initially was throttle control.  I started getting the hang of it, but then I had to deal with figuring out counter steer.  Apparently less is more, but to me it was completely counter-intuitive =S

Throughout the day there were also cruise sessions, got to take my beautiful for a couple of blips around the track!  Match that up with drags with random people on the main straight, some good clean fun was had by everyone.

All in all, a very very fun day :)  learnt a lot about both myself and Stacey... hopefully skills I can use in the near future!  There will be more photos coming once the professionals start posting theirs (yay for trawling).  Can't wait to see what comes up :)

Mechanical Panadol... Doesn't help!!

So to catch you up... Brakes were knackered, battery tray was knackered.  Yep, that pretty much sums it up.  Allow me to give you some pictures to narrate...

After unsuccessfully trying to remove the spacers, I began to try drilling the studs out...  Yeah that went well, 20+ odd drill bits later, made no real dent.  Had to get a bit more extreme!!

While I tried to figure out a solution, I went back to the battery tray.  For those keen of eye, there's a bracket down the side of the chassis rail that's no longer there.

Monday: After a bit of backyard fabricating, I plated up the absolute abomination that was the post-battery-tray procedure.

^^ see?

All back together :)  Much cleaner!  Not very permanent mind you, but for all intents and purposes, it does tidy it up a hell of a lot.

Turns out the only way to sort out the brakes issue was to remove both the hub and the LCA (lower control arm), and to take them into a workshop.  That in itself was an incredible nightmare... I've never tried to pop a ball joint before, but once I knew the technique, turned out it was quite easy... good to know for next time.

Tuesday: Tobs doing some industrial drilling on the hubs... this took a better part of an hour and a half to sort out.  Nice to know that studs don't break terribly easy, but at the end of the day that's very little consolation.

The end result :)  2 new ball joints in the LCA's (the old ones were absolutely shagged) and some de-spacered and de-rotored hubs.

Wednesday: Given that I was in Redcliffe all day for work, I didn't have daylight... unfortunately I also didn't have the luxury of waiting around.  Always fun trying to work under a stupidly bright fluoro light, but that said it did help to see things.

Tightening the studs up... Always learning!

At 9.30pm, I'd successfully installed only one rotor, including new wheel studs and spacer...

However once I put the calliper on, I noticed one incredibly big (or small) issue... the calliper was too small, by about 30mm in diameter.  I measured the original ones before I ordered these, and I simply don't know how I could've mis-measured by 30mm... regardless, this posed one very big conundrum.

Doing a track day with ill-fitting components (especially brakes) is obviously a big no-no.  Unfortunately, removing the spacers rendered the existing rotors useless.  I could've limped the car as is, but that would've meant that I would not be able to return the rotors.  I also didn't want to forfeit the track day, especially after all the work I'd put in for all this, plus the entry fee was a bit high to wave goodbye to... The other issue is that these rotors have to get ordered in, it's not just a pick up off a shelf kind of deal - and trying to get them sorted before the weekend would be very tricky...

Luckily, it helps to know people :)  I did pay out the ass for the privilege, something I'm hoping to make back once I have time to sort it all out, but I'd invested too much time and effort to say goodbye to this track day.

Front hubs back together... thankfully they fitted the callipers properly this time!  The spacers came with super long studs, so had to chop them back.  I put nuts on them to protect the threads while I grinded them off.

*insert appropriately contexted comment here*

Kim, if I'm to be honest, I'm a little worried about your obsession with taking pictures off my ass...

Once the brakes were sorted, I decided to tackle a few other outstanding things that I had time for... just random aesthetics more or less.

Tint was one of the big kickers for me that I wanted to sort out.  It was relatively easy to remove, just used a heat gun to melt the glue, and a stanley blade to get me an edge.  After that, just some windex to clean up any residue, and happy days :)  You can really see the difference in visibility, and more importantly, legality.

Kim giving me a hand to improve the paint... The buffer did this really cool thing by dispersing the detailing spray, unfortunately the camera didn't capture it.

Something cheeky for the track day :)

Annd all ready to go for Sunday!!!  An absolute nightmare, but got there in the end... I guess the important thing is that I learnt a lot from this experience, but  somehow that doesn't make me feel any better from the headaches that such a simple job has caused =\

Alas, stay tuned for track day shenanigans :)

A week out, and... Headaches!!!

Carrying on from the post yesterday, today began with the expectations of accomplishing 2 simple things:

- Replacing the front brakes/rotors.

- Cutting out the battery tray to finish off the battery relocation

Easy enough right?  Yeah, that's what I thought...

I started off with the brakes, as they were the most important thing.  The battery tray is realistically only cosmetics to please the piggies.  

The first thing that needed to happen was to pull the spacers off.  The front hubs are 4-stud (standard for the s13), and I used 4-to-5-stud spacers to a) allow me to run my wheels off the s15, and b) fill out the gap in the guard created by using said wheels.

What's unfortunately happened though is that over time, the heat from the brakes has fused the lock nuts on the spacers.  Try as we might (using a rattle gun, spraying the crap out them with Inox (you can see the puddle of Inox underneath the rotor), using a massive breaker bar), we couldn't undo the nuts... 'We' because I needed an extra person to press the brake pedal to stop the hub from rotating while I tried to undo the nuts.  Long story short?  Rounded all the nuts... yep.  Dead end.  So onto the battery tray.

This was the hole I was hoping to sort out.  It doesn't look so bad from the top, but underneath shows a completely different story.  Told you it was a dodgy job right? =P

Removing a battery tray is simple in theory - you drill holes where the factory has spot welded the tray to the chassis, and then use a crow bar or something similar to lever the tray away from the chassis.

Never hurts to use PPE :)  Glasses, muffs and gloves make Clinton a responsible boy!

Yep so the theory was sound... this was my progress after 3 hours =\

4 hours saw the easy half out.  A tone of drilling, crow-bar-ing, dremel-ing, mallet-ing, chiselling, and grinding... the biggest issue was that the battery tray seemed to be made of metal that was 3 times thicker than the chassis that it was tacked to.  What this meant was that I was tending to tear the chassis whilst trying to twist off sections of the battery tray.  Tearing metal for crying out aloud!!  Maybe I'm in the wrong profession =P

Here's what's left of said battery tray... 

And whats left of what's not left of said battery tray ;)

You can see here just how fragile the metal on the chassis is... the tears, the rips, the oddly shaped drill holes... I'm definitely going to have to plate this up once I'm done to reinforce the chassis.  On the bright side, it will look a hell of a lot cleaner once done!  It's also going to make tidying up the hole a tonne easier.  There's still some bracket left on the side of the chassis rail (top of the photo) which will be tidied up (hopefully) tomorrow, but all I'll say is this - screw doing this job ever ever again!

I decided to go back to the brakes conundrum with what little daylight I had left...  After hitting a dead end with the rounded bolts, I had to get creative... That spacer is basically sandwiching the rotor to the hub - very frustrating given that I needed to replace that rotor in the middle!


The alternative?  Well, there aren't many, I'll say that much.  The only thing left is to remove the hub, and then drill out the studs.  It'll wreck the current studs, as well as the locking nuts for the spacer, but if I want to replace these brakes, that's what's got to happen... and I can't do a track day on shot brakes - I did that back in April and it took a lot of fun out of the day!  This poses another issue too - I can replace the studs, that will be pretty easy.  But a 4-to-5-stud spacer is not so easy to come by.  If I can't get one of them in time, I'll have working brakes, but no wheels to fit.


I began with the task of removing the hubs.  Once again, more breaker bars, more Inox, and more rattle guns.  Alllllll going well until I had to remove the ball joint at the bottom... yet another brick wall.  Out of daylight, out of energy and out of ideas, I think that's as good a place as any to leave it for tomorrow - watch this space.