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You have no insurance coverage on a race course, which is what this counts as. You're not likely to ever hit anything other than cones, but any damage you do is on you. The club likely has insurance to cover damage to the lot / surrounding items & injuries to people, but other than that you're out of luck. Autocross is safe though, I've never seen anyone hurt their car by crashing into something, and I've never seen a stock well maintained car have mechanical issues. Modified cars and poorly maintained ones are another story though. E: also watching one of our top drivers destroy like 3/4 of field with a Toyota echo where the only modification is tires (Rs3's) is pretty hilarious.
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Feb 20, 2014 16:42
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| # ? Jun 1, 2024 09:39 |
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I've seen a few accidents, and my brother busted the suspension up in my car so it does happen. He over-compensated a slide and snapped the car into a curb bending both lower control arms, and needing to replace most of the front suspension. It depends on the course - the club I used to go with has small terrible parking lots with light poles, signs, curbs and more often than not completely unaffiliated parked cars within the course
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Feb 20, 2014 16:47
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There are unsafe autocross courses out there, but any club that isn't a complete joke will design courses that will keep the cars out of harms way. That said, accidents do happen and people do find ways to wreck their car at autocross. Some of it is purely mechanical (eg- E36 LCA failure), but the majority of it is drivers trying to be a hero and saving something that they should have gone 2 feet in 10 seconds ago. Nothing is impossible, but people who manage to completely wreck their car at autocross usually are begging for it to happen.
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Feb 20, 2014 18:57
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Phone posted:Some of it is purely mechanical (eg- E36 LCA failure) always hatin' on those e36s, huh phone One time, I forgot to make sure that my lugs nuts were secure before an autocross. That could have ended up really nasty. You gotta be hyper-vigilant and make sure everything on your car is in proper roadgoing order before you race it, because that's the surest way to avoid an accident.
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Feb 20, 2014 19:07
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goatse guy posted:You gotta be hyper-vigilant and make sure everything on your car is in proper roadgoing order before you race it, because that's the surest way to avoid an accident. This for sure. The week before an autocross I had a new sound system installed in my Miata, and they didn't bolt the battery in tight enough. I didn't notice this of course until the battery rolled during a run and the insulation on the wiring caught fire. It could have been a huge deal that totalled my car, but I got lucky.
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Feb 20, 2014 19:11
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Phone posted:There are unsafe autocross courses out there, but any club that isn't a complete joke will design courses that will keep the cars out of harms way. For new people, I honestly wouldn't worry too much about this. Every serious accident I've seen (one exception) was with very experienced drivers trying to go faster than they should have. Corvette through a chain-link fence because he went through a straight finish wide open and stayed on the gas 100' or so beyond where he should have been hard braking. CP Camaro into a guard rail when the very experienced driver (who wasn't the car owner) piled on the gas instead of the brakes when he started to lose it in a corner (hello 600hp monster). Similar junk with curbs in a region where the finish went through a narrow 'lane' between curbs and some people had to try for that final thousanths of a second through the lights at a local event. As far as car wear, the more modified your car is, the more likely you are to break something, as the forces and stresses on the car tend to rise rapidly as you improve suspension and tires. Stock car on road tires shouldn't be an issue. We have a highly modified '65 Lotus Elan that regularly spits out the drive-line 'donut' thingie, and I've seen a number of old British cars have to be pushed off the course, but then they usually came to the event on a trailer anyway (I'm pretty sure that's to keep all the oil from coming out before they even get to the event). I've personally broken a half-shaft on course in my old Cobra (again, modified and running race tires), torn the entire cooling system out of the BMW when a fan exploded due to a motor mount bolt dropping out at some unknown point in time prior to that particular run (guest driver dropped the clutch at 5k rpm after being specifically told not to launch it hard - on race tires). I also broke far more parts than I like to think about on the CP Camaro, but again, hugely modified car on 14" wide racing slicks pushing out well over 500hp.
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Feb 21, 2014 03:38
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Sudden Infant Def Syndrome posted:There's very likely a clause in your insurance that won't cover any damages while participating in anything like autocross. You'll have to consider that if any damages happen, you'll be paying out of pocket. This goes for health insurance too... I ended up going through an insurance agent who does the top level motorcycle road racers in the US to make sure everything was straight after seeing how many people get stuck with six figure medical bills after track crashes.
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Feb 21, 2014 07:59
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Do you pay per event, or just an overall policy for year-round?
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Feb 21, 2014 08:02
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Its an overall policy year round through Aetna. Seems like most medical policies exclude poo poo that happens on a race track - maybe not so much a worry for car people but for motorcycles crashes literally happen at every trackday/race weekend. Eventually my number will come up and I don't want to be in debt for the rest of my life if the worst (financially, not life wise) should happen.
BlackMK4 fucked around with this message at 08:07 on Feb 21, 2014 |
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Feb 21, 2014 08:04
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We have had newbies almost total cars, but unfortunately we can't really make the safest possible courses due to awful venues. The first one was a floor mat problem. They got lax with tech inspections because of the number of cars at that event and a 280z with a v8 got the mat jammed in the throttle pedal. Luckily he was smart enough to go both feet in and right to neutral, but a powerful car can very quickly go off course. Another second and it would have been in a big ditch. Second problem was a new guy in an FRS on the stock tires trying to hold a drift after a long sweeper. We run events on a local speedway and he almost put himself into the pit wall. We've also had people hit runway lights but that is from overdriving and trying to hold it.
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Feb 21, 2014 15:05
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Ziploc posted:Spoke to some in the know today regarding Snokhana, looking for a date really close to March 1st. Any updates?
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Feb 22, 2014 01:42
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shoophobo posted:Hey guys, I was there instructing. How'd you enjoy the event? I was jealous of all he seat time you guys got. Anyway, here's my best run from Sunday. Good for 12th over all (out of 80-90 or so) and 3rd in street class. http://youtu.be/wNsMxjfG3SI
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Feb 27, 2014 04:59
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GOD IS BED posted:Disable any driving assists you can (ABS if possible) This is terrible advice, double terrible to a novice.
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Feb 27, 2014 05:55
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animeliker posted:Any updates? gently caress. I forgot about this thread. It sold out in less than 24 hours when it was officially announced a week or two ago. It's this Saturday. It was only posted on the TSC forums.  Looks like you should watch this subforum though: https://www.toronto-subaru-club.com/forums/snokhana-2014-march-1st-huntsville/
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Feb 27, 2014 06:04
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FatCow posted:This is terrible advice, double terrible to a novice. I would leave the ABS alone, but you should certainly disable all other traction and stability control nannies.
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Feb 27, 2014 16:13
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ABS is nice to have. I could probably threshold brake a little better at this point, but being able to go into a corner and not have to worry about it (leaving me to focus on everything else) most certainly results in a faster time. The other nannies... I'd leave them on until they prevent you from doing what you're trying to do. For example the FRS/BRZ traction control is immediately turned off as it's aggressive and means the back won't slide, and immediately kills the power. I've driven one or two cars where I didn't realize it was on despite a little bit of sliding though, so it really depends on the car in question.
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Feb 27, 2014 16:28
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I know BMW traction control up to e46 is pretty intrusive and noticeably hurt times in my 330 and m3. I like ABS, my old 328 had none due to electronic issues and it was hairy at the track. Locking up in a downhill, late apex corner with little runoff was always a reality check for me.
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Feb 27, 2014 16:35
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Sadi posted:I was there instructing. How'd you enjoy the event? I was jealous of all he seat time you guys got. Anyway, here's my best run from Sunday. Good for 12th over all (out of 80-90 or so) and 3rd in street class. http://youtu.be/wNsMxjfG3SI shoophobo posted:Oh, and I only say "if" because I might have to make a emergency trip, my mom is ill and I may have to drive home to visit if she gets worse. Yeah I was not able to go, had to drive up state to visit my mom. That video was pretty cool. Thanks for posting it!
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Feb 27, 2014 17:27
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Ziploc posted:gently caress. I forgot about this thread. It sold out in less than 24 hours when it was officially announced a week or two ago. It's this Saturday. No worries. April is close anyway.
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Feb 27, 2014 19:20
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FatCow posted:This is terrible advice, double terrible to a novice. I was just repeating the advice given to me as a novice 2 years ago. Learning to threshold brake instead of relying on the ABS worked well for me, so YMMV.
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Feb 27, 2014 20:38
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GOD IS BED posted:I was just repeating the advice given to me as a novice 2 years ago. Learning to threshold brake instead of relying on the ABS worked well for me, so YMMV. From what I understand isn't it still possible to Threshold brake even with ABS equipped? Unless I was taught wrong or misinterpreted information. I was told you need to brake just before the ABS kicks in. I can't do it consistently yet.
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Feb 27, 2014 21:25
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Unless you have an absolute garbage ABS system, trying to brake hard but not so hard that you engage ABS is making you slower. Threshold braking is going to involve some amount of wheel slip / lockup, and that's going to engage ABS.
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Feb 27, 2014 21:28
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As I understand it, the threshold that you brake on can be either the moment ABS kicks in, or the moment the tires lose grip. I understood the ABS would kick on before the tires lost grip, so if you can brake harder than the ABS without locking the wheels, you will brake harder and be faster. That said, I am still very much an amateur and the traction control and ABS are linked in my MX5, thus my advice. Please correct me where I'm wrong. e: ^^^ cool, sounds like I'm not a complete dummy.
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Feb 27, 2014 21:31
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IOwnCalculus posted:Unless you have an absolute garbage ABS system, trying to brake hard but not so hard that you engage ABS is making you slower. Threshold braking is going to involve some amount of wheel slip / lockup, and that's going to engage ABS. I engage the ABS quite a bit so I thought I needed to hone my technique.
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Feb 27, 2014 21:41
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Leave ABS on, he's not going to be Schumacher for his first event.
Suburban Dad fucked around with this message at 22:51 on Feb 27, 2014 |
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Feb 27, 2014 22:48
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animeliker posted:I engage the ABS quite a bit so I thought I needed to hone my technique. Unless you're really good at threshold braking, just stand on the pedal and let ABS do the work for you. If you are really good at (or are trying to get better at) threshold braking, you need to disable it altogether so that you're not fighting it. ABS only works best when you keep your foot down hard on the brake; trying to threshold brake with it is going to hurt you.
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Feb 27, 2014 22:54
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IOwnCalculus posted:Unless you have an absolute garbage ABS system, trying to brake hard but not so hard that you engage ABS is making you slower. Threshold braking is going to involve some amount of wheel slip / lockup, and that's going to engage ABS. Threshold braking does not involve lockup, if you've locked up the tire you've gone to dynamic friction and hosed up. Then you have to let off the brake to get the wheel rolling again and get back on the brake up to the threshold point. ABS will do nothing except prevent you from turning round tires into square tires.
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Feb 27, 2014 23:29
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Thinking about swerving through some comes this Sunday; maybe even drag my brother along. Any goons gonna be there? It would greatly influence my decision-making 
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Mar 6, 2014 00:33
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Any good iPhone autocross apps? Something to record video and overlay odb2 data? I'm going to my frirst national level event in college station this month and finally wanted to get something to record the occasion.
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Mar 6, 2014 02:03
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MiniFoo posted:Thinking about swerving through some comes this Sunday; maybe even drag my brother along. Any goons gonna be there? It would greatly influence my decision-making I don't plan on going (sort of on a break right now), and the only other goon from the area I know of usually sticks to the events in Marana. Don't let lack of goons keep you from attending though, the Phoenix group runs a good event, and they'll make you welcome, just let them know you are new and maybe ask for an instructor to ride along with you for your first run(s).
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Mar 6, 2014 04:24
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I'm not new to AutoX, just this area. I do want to make sure though, do they lend out helmets?
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Mar 6, 2014 04:28
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MiniFoo posted:I'm not new to AutoX, just this area. I do want to make sure though, do they lend out helmets? Yes, and they are actually semi-new, we had to replace all of them about 1-1/2, 2 years ago. Should have 4-5 of each size.
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Mar 6, 2014 05:04
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Looking for some tire advice, I plan on autocrossing my Yaris this year and want to buy a set of dedicated tires. I'm not trying to be competitive and I'm not too concerned about classing I just want to get some seat time for as cheap as possible. I've already picked up a set of 15x6.5 Konig Heliums, here are my my current tire choices, all 205/50-15's Falken RT-615K: $364 Federal RS-R: $368 Kumho Ecsta XS: $396 A lot of local guys say the Azenis are junk, and the RS-R's don't have a ton of info available, so any input would be greatly appreciated. Also, the Falkens and the Kumhos would be through discount tire, is heat cycling worth it for the extra $60?
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Mar 13, 2014 02:48
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If you don't care about being competitive don't worry about heat cycling. The XSs are fast if it's dry, and scary as poo poo if it's wet. Dunlop ZIIs are $386.00 after rebate on Tire Rack.
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Mar 13, 2014 02:53
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Should have mentioned, those prices are after shipping. I'm Canadian, so the mail in rebates don't apply, ZII's end up being $506.
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Mar 13, 2014 03:20
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OneStopShop posted:is heat cycling worth it for the extra $60? Absolutely no. For a pure race tire, if you are going to Nationals and want that extra 0.05%, maybe. For a street tire? gently caress no.
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Mar 13, 2014 05:05
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I had 615s years back and they worked really well for me. I guess the formulation could have changed pretty radically in the intervening years but at the timeI thought they were pretty well regarded as far as cheap performance was concerned. Mine gripped very well, wore well (I did rotate like a fiend) and even broke away pretty progressively. Again that may have all changed but they were pretty drat good when I had them.
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Mar 13, 2014 13:02
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I had no problems with 615s. Or the -K. They were OK in the wet. I don't remember them being stellar. Big tread blocks and all.
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Mar 13, 2014 20:44
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I never had too much trouble in the wet with them. There might be better performers but they certainly weren't sketchy at all. In fact I was pleasantly surprised at how well they gripped on a particularly wet track day.
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Mar 14, 2014 02:13
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| # ? Jun 1, 2024 09:39 |
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Can someone please explain to me why adding a pedal cover knocks you into Street Touring category?
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Mar 14, 2014 04:47
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