Marek And Duncan Blitz Eastern Creek Today !

[TheTunersGroup]

Hi All,

For those of you who haven't heard yet, some absolutely amazing lap times were set at Eastern Creek today by Duncan and Marek in their R35's running in the NSW Supersprint Series.

Back in February, the class 4D lap record at Eastern Creek was 1 min 42.41 sec. The old record has stood since 2005.

In March Duncan broke the 5 year old class 4D record by a massive 1.3 seconds, posting a lap time of 1 min 41.087 seconds. There is an article about Duncan smashing the old record in March here with a link to the in car video from that event ...

http://www.tunersgroup.com/TunerWire_Live/..._EC_record.html

On 16 May the series again visited Eastern Creek with Duncan bettering his March time by a further .89 sec, posting a 1:40.195. Marek posted a 1:42.8074 that day.

Today the NSW Supersprint series returned to Eastern Creek ...

With Duncan's 16 May lap time of 1:40.195 set as the benchmark to beat, Marek's car was prepared with some modifications before today's event including E85 and a set of JRZ Suspension.

Today Duncan posted an incredible time of 1:38.9376 (beating his 16 May time by 1.257 second).

Today on his 6th timed lap of the day, Marek in the white R35 posted an incredible lap of 1 minute 38.8263 seconds, beating Marek's own 16 May lap time of 1:42.8074 by a massive 3.9811 seconds, and bettering Duncan's laptime set on 16 May by 1.369 second.

So today Duncan ran a 1 minute 38.9376 second lap today and Marek ran a 1 minute 38.8263 second lap, to beat Duncan by 0.1113 of a second.

These times are truly incredible and to put Marek's lap time in perspective in terms of how fast the times have improved, Marek's lap time today is a massive 3.59 seconds under the old February Class 4D lap record that had stood since 2005, and 2.26 seconds under the Class 4D record that Duncan set in March.

Congratulations to both these drivers on some absolutely incredible lap times. Marek's time is particularly impressive as his car is his daily driver, and both these cars are road registered.

There is an article with more info about today's event and the modifications made to Marek's car in the leadup to today's event, and some comments from Marek about his time today here ...

http://www.tunersgroup.com/TunerWire_Live/...ust_8_2010.html

- The Tuners Group

Edited August 8, 2010 by TheTunersGroup

[JAGR33]

Unbelievable!!! Congrats to both, that is just insane...

What tyres were these cars running???

[Martin Donnon]

Glad to be of assistance to both of you guys (Marek and Duncan)

[Martin Donnon]

I bet the brakes are starting to get hot at that pace though

[FST513]

I was at the event taking photos and damn, they are quick! Congrats to both of you, you should be extremely proud.

I believe they are running Hoosier tyres (judging by the hoosier writing on the sidewalls i saw).

[Tangles]

wow, thats awesome

congrats to all involved

[LSX-438]

I was at the event taking photos and damn, they are quick! Congrats to both of you, you should be extremely proud.

I believe they are running Hoosier tyres (judging by the hoosier writing on the sidewalls i saw).

Almost we are running michelin porsche cup slicks

[Neil]

Sensational times boy's. You guy's have those cars really perculating nicely. 1.38.826 and 1.38.938 is bloody fast!!!.

Cheers

Neil.

[GTR59]

Well done to both Duncan and Marek.

Can you guys describe how the new JRZs feel on the road and the track?

Are they the tripples of the pro silent models?

I know i have asked you previously, are you planning on sticking with the OEM sway bars?

How much do you think the suspension contributed to the gains?

[rob 240]

nice work marek . you havent slowed down changing from the old car then !!!!

[LSX-438]

Well done to both Duncan and Marek.

Can you guys describe how the new JRZs feel on the road and the track?

Are they the tripples of the pro silent models?

I know i have asked you previously, are you planning on sticking with the OEM sway bars?

How much do you think the suspension contributed to the gains?

We are running the RS Pros however Marek and I are running different spring rates. On midway-ish bump/rebound settings i was struggling to detect a difference (vs stocker setup) - despite massive spring rates (curiously) and was quite disappointed straight up to be frank; last time out at EC i ran a 1:40.1 on older slicks and this time (with fresh S7 slicks) i ran about 1.2 seconds faster. FWIW i would have expected at least a second from the new slicks alone. So i have not gained much at all [yet].

I tried tweaking the dampers but to be frank i don't know what i am doing. I can see from the onboard video (how the car is responding) that i need to get some proper advice on setup before i can say it was worth the (very considerable) cost to buy, install and corner weight the car. I want at least a second from the system at EC. So, until i get some proper advice on setup i am just not going to say either way. At this stage, out of the box, i have nothing positive to report, but there is work to do. One thing is for sure, it's not like adding power (e85) or buying grip (slicks) or reducing weight, which are all no brainers in comparison (not to mention much cheaper).

[Martin Donnon]

Remember....as you get faster the incremental windows start to close. While a second might be easy to gain at 1:42, its a lot harder at 1:38 - or its always seemed to be from my experience

[LSX-438]

I agree Martin it's diminishing returns for sure. I went from a 1:40.1 (used S9's slicks) to 1:38.9 (brand new S7's) ~ the combination of new S7's plus coilovers should have yielded more than that IMO.

I might have to learn how to drive..

[N1GTR]

Do you have in car video we could watch?

[LSX-438]

Do you have in car video we could watch?

I have this

it's a bit sloppy (and bouncy!)

[kessian]

Unbelievable, the car looks so tame around the track. Once again amazing time!

[TheTunersGroup]

We are running the RS Pros however Marek and I are running different spring rates. On midway-ish bump/rebound settings i was struggling to detect a difference (vs stocker setup) - despite massive spring rates (curiously) ... So i have not gained much at all [yet].

I tried tweaking the dampers but to be frank i don't know what i am doing. I can see from the onboard video (how the car is responding) that i need to get some proper advice on setup before i can say it was worth the (very considerable) cost to buy, install and corner weight the car. I want at least a second from the system at EC. So, until i get some proper advice on setup i am just not going to say either way.

Hi Duncan,

As we say to all our customers, getting the best lap times out of any set of adjustable shocks is a two part process ...

The first part is actually installing the shocks (bolting them into the car).

The second part is track testing with the assistance of an experienced suspension engineer to determine what is the best spring rate to run, and dialling in the shock settings to the ideal settings for the track and the individual driver's driving style.

In many ways, getting the most out of a set of adjustable shocks is similar to the two part process of buying and tuning an aftermarket ECU / fuel injection computer. The best results with an aftermarket ECU are often gained after an experienced dyno tuner tunes the car using the new ECU to adjust the fuel and ignition settings to accurately suit the combination of parts used on that car such as the particular exhaust, intake, head work, cams etc.

Duncan you mentioned E85 above. Just as with E85 where you first install the required hardware parts to run E85, the second part of running E85 is to then tune the computer with maps to run E85. If you have "ready to go" maps to run E85 in the R35 with the combination of parts that you run, that is a huge timesaver as it lets you get up and running quickly with E85. If you didn't have those maps you would have to retune your car on a dyno to run E85 well.

So far you have only completed one step of the two part shocks process - installing the shocks (bolting them into the car).

Marek mentioned ....

"We ran baseline shock settings provided by a team overseas. The car was very balanced but there is still more time in it once we dial in the JRZ suspension."

That is spot on.

Track surfaces and track styles are different in different parts of the world, and it'd be very rare indeed for settings from a team developed for a particular driver on overseas tracks to be the ideal settings for a driver in another country running on different tracks.

Duncan you also mentioned above "So, until i get some proper advice on setup i am just not going to say either way."

With the greatest respect, while someone may be able to give you some advice about how to setup your suspension, because each driver's driving style is different, using someone else's shock settings that are ideal for their driving style is unlikely to be a set of settings that will work best for your driving style. There was an interview on TV a few weeks ago where one of the V8 Supercar drivers drove his team mate's car and he commented on how different the two cars were.

Just like having an ECU tuned on a dyno by an experienced dyno tuner (to suit the unique airflow characteristics of the particular combination of parts used on your car) is the best way to get the most power out of an engine and it takes experience and skill to tune a car well, the best way to get the fastest lap times with a set of adjustable suspension is to get an experienced suspension engineer to come out to the track with you and spend the time to tune your suspension to your driving style and to the particular track.

That process requires experience and specialised knowledge, and as such highly experienced suspension engineers don't tend to publish on the internet how they do what they do.

There is an article on our website titled "How to get the best lap times from your adjustable shock absorbers" which has some info about the process of the second part of the process - dialling in the shocks to suit your driving style and the track conditions - here ...

http://www.tunersgroup.com/susp_adjust.html

- The Tuners Group

Edited August 10, 2010 by TheTunersGroup

[LSX-438]

Adam, yep i think Marek and i both recognise what's missing.

Testing just takes time, and (thus more) money.

We will get there in time.