Wrecked my car :(

Ransure · Post by **Ransure** » June 18, 2006, 3:09 pm

So just two days after getting the new wheels/rims put on, I took the car down to VIR (Virginia International Raceway) for a BMW/MB/Audi driving school... it was an incredible event... I actually had to switch out to race pads on the second day because I burned through almost 3/4 of a street pad in a day.

I got to pass an E60 M5 and a bunch of other cars that had WAAAAY more power than me on the track. It was an excellent learning experiance, and I know after I get the car fixed I will have it back at the track again.

Heres some pics...

Car is sitting at the track 250 miles from my house... and now Im working on borrowing a friends trailer to get it back here...

Boogahz · Post by **Boogahz** » June 18, 2006, 3:21 pm

Just curious, but do they sell separate insurance policies at the tracks to cover things like this?

Ransure · Post by **Ransure** » June 18, 2006, 3:35 pm

Not that Ive ever heard of.... well at least not for amature drivers... but I would be willing to be that they dont... or that if they do its insanely expensive. I expect to be out 1-2k for these damages and get my new paint job out of it.

Sendarie · Post by **Sendarie** » June 18, 2006, 3:49 pm

There is absolutely no racetrack I have ever seen that will insure amateurs/enthusiast.

Wrecks MUCH worse than that are daily occurances on autox tracks and not terribly uncommon on 1/4's.

Ransure · Post by **Ransure** » June 18, 2006, 3:52 pm

Had I not slowed down and slammed the brakes I woulda hit that wall going 80mph... luckily I got it down to about 30ish before I hit.

Boogahz · Post by **Boogahz** » June 18, 2006, 4:33 pm

Sendarie wrote:There is absolutely no racetrack I have ever seen that will insure amateurs/enthusiast.

Wrecks MUCH worse than that are daily occurances on autox tracks and not terribly uncommon on 1/4's.

Yeah, the reason I wondered is because your Personal Auto Policy will not cover it either.

Kelshara · Post by **Kelshara** » June 18, 2006, 4:42 pm

Unfortunately, that is the risk we take when we take a car to the track

Nice car Ransure, what have you done to it?

Ransure · Post by **Ransure** » June 18, 2006, 5:09 pm

Just put on some BBS 2pc 17" rims with Kuhmo All season ECSTASA(sp?) not the best tire for the track by the way, gonna get some summer tires next time, then consider R comps in the future. (Edit, the race pads I put on were Hawk HT10's... and WHOA, they made a difference... Im also a bit of a car noob but I changed them myself in under an hour with a few friends giving me direction and tools).

I have Vogtland springs with Billie sport shocks... an E30 M3 shift kit and the motor is stock except for a chip. Other than that all of the upgrades have been cosmetic.. euro trim, 5k halogens, tint, french fogs, alpine head with Dynaudio components and a JL 10w6, running off of a JL 450/4 and a 500/1.

This was my second track event... and a few instructors thought my M5 handled pretty well (its a 525

) they were surprised that the 525 was so nimble... I was tossing her through the turns, and I was keeping up with my friends C32 AMG... his top speed in the straights was 126, and I was getting up to 120. I definately had him in the corners

Kelshara · Post by **Kelshara** » June 18, 2006, 7:34 pm

The drop/ride height looks pretty damn good. Very nice! And yeah, break pads will wear out extremely fast heh.

Sendarie · Post by **Sendarie** » June 19, 2006, 2:27 pm

I use the same pads and love them.

When I did mine though I did a full brake upgrade.
Brembo rotors all the way around
Hawk HPS pads
Motul Super Blue Racing Fluid
SS brake lines with teflon overwrap
Full rebuilt all 4 calipers and full new shim kit
300Degree master cylinder brace

Blew me away the difference in stopping power is amazing.

Ransure · Post by **Ransure** » June 19, 2006, 2:56 pm

I had been planning on doing a 750iL brake upgrade to the car and my instructor said that I should just upgrade the fluid, rotors and pads... which I will be doing. My brake fluid looked like coffee when I got to the track, I wish I had thought to flush it before heading down.....

Sendarie · Post by **Sendarie** » June 19, 2006, 3:07 pm

Ouch no kidding. That brake fluid could have made the difference of hitting the wall at 30mph and hitting it at 10-15mph.

I'm sure you were well in the area of brake fade by the time you smacked the wall right?

Ransure · Post by **Ransure** » June 19, 2006, 4:01 pm

Yea, live and learn.... Im going to learn to flush my brake fluid at the track so I dont have issues like this in the future.... and Im researching what rotors I want to upgrade to right now...

First and foremost its get this thing fixed... I spoke to my mechanic today to let him know that the car was comming in... and he just got an E34 parts car on friday..... so looks like ill be good to go on the repairs... he hooks me up pretty well.

Boogahz · Post by **Boogahz** » June 19, 2006, 4:29 pm

Ransure wrote:First and foremost its get this thing fixed... I spoke to my mechanic today to let him know that the car was comming in... and he just got an E34 parts car on friday..... so looks like ill be good to go on the repairs... he hooks me up pretty well.

As long as the parts car isn't your own, you're lucky

Sendarie · Post by **Sendarie** » June 19, 2006, 5:01 pm

As far as parts selection I know the cool thing these days is to go with drilled/slotted rotors. If this is going to be your DD and part time track car I highly advise going with a good set of Brembo blanks.
Daily driving on d/s rotors = cracks and warpage b/c they are made to cool down much faster than blanks then during daily driving they will heat up and cool down too frequently as opposed to the track where they stay relatively warmed up most of the time.

Not to mention, you want to see decreased pad life slotted rotors will give you a better bite but if tracking it I would start ordering pads by the case.

Ransure · Post by **Ransure** » June 19, 2006, 5:12 pm

Awesome advice Sendarie... thanks.. .I was thinking of some slotted rotors... but maybe I will keep an extra set of slots/race pads to swap on the track.

Kelshara · Post by **Kelshara** » June 19, 2006, 5:41 pm

That is what I would do.. and what I know most of the guys do.

Sendarie: The slotted/drilled rotors have been argued back and forth on 3SI forever. A lot now seem to favour slotted but not drilled and argue that having both will weaken them quite a bit. What is your view on this?

Ransure · Post by **Ransure** » June 19, 2006, 7:10 pm

Ive read the same, you gain no benifit from having both slotted and drilled over one or the other, people just think they look cool.

I have also read that slotted create less brake dust than drilled.

Neziroth · Post by **Neziroth** » June 26, 2006, 6:23 pm

I can vouch for drilled rotors, they came stock on my bike (Ninja 636).

I know it's a little different but I've had my bike to the track a few times and after a day's abuse (Nothing like braking from 155mph to 45mph in a matter of seconds) I had almost no brake fade.

To be fair, I don't know if rotors have a lot to do with brake fade or not, but I'm just posting saying that drilled rotors hold up very well under abuse in my experience

Good luck with the car

Sendarie · Post by **Sendarie** » June 27, 2006, 11:21 am

Kelshara wrote:That is what I would do.. and what I know most of the guys do.

Sendarie: The slotted/drilled rotors have been argued back and forth on 3SI forever. A lot now seem to favour slotted but not drilled and argue that having both will weaken them quite a bit. What is your view on this?

Sorry for taking so long I forgot to look in "Cars" for a few days.

IMHO, slotted is fine if you can afford it. I've never seen slotted only rotors crack and I havent noticed any SIGNIFICANT increase in warpage for slotted rotors. Just expect to have to change pads much more frequently but there is a definate performance increase there.

Drilled the ONLY way you should have drilled is if they are track only AND larger than stock. I know there is always a debate and a lot of people fire the "I have d/s and mine are fine for 59 years!!!". In my experience I have SEEN with my own eyes more times than I can count cracked rotors around the drill wholes.

Many of those times were from the people that had them forever and thought they were fine. Of coure for mild daily driving they would usually hold up until they took them out to the track and wind up in a wall somewhere from failure.