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Old 05-01-2018, 12:07 PM   #141
clyde
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So, no response to what I sent on Friday. As far as I can tell from what I think they've done, I'm going to have to get a MD used car inspection, then some kind of magic will happen somewhere somehow and I'll get a title and registration someday.

I just sent an email to the dealership GM leaving off the other staff and laid out where we are and asking him for a proposed resolution.
GM responded with profuse apologies within 20 minutes. Asked for a little more time to see what he can do. I thanked him and said I looked forward to hearing from him soon.
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Old 05-02-2018, 08:28 AM   #142
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GM responded with profuse apologies within 20 minutes. Asked for a little more time to see what he can do. I thanked him and said I looked forward to hearing from him soon.
Getting the GM involved seems to have made things move. It's going to take a little while longer yet since I'll need to get the car inspected, send stuff, etc, but they'll be sending me a check refunding the doc fees for the service they didn't provide and reimburse my expenses. Still negotiating about how they're going to compensate me for my time.
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Old 05-02-2018, 10:40 AM   #143
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Getting the GM involved seems to have made things move.
I'll bet that's the only person in the dealership hierarchical chain that truly cares about the dealership's reputation. Everyone below them already forgot your name, and doesn't give a rat's ass about your post-delivery problems (i.e. "Pfffft. How would I benefit from helping you? I already took your money!").
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Old 05-02-2018, 10:41 AM   #144
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Getting the GM involved seems to have made things move. It's going to take a little while longer yet since I'll need to get the car inspected, send stuff, etc, but they'll be sending me a check refunding the doc fees for the service they didn't provide and reimburse my expenses. Still negotiating about how they're going to compensate me for my time.
Sounds hopeful!
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Old 05-02-2018, 10:55 AM   #145
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Ugh, that sounds like quite a debacle, but it will hopefully be resolved soon!
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Old 05-03-2018, 09:46 AM   #146
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In other Camaro news...

I played mechanic on Monday so I could bend the dust shield on the passenger side front brake and chip some paint in the fender lip of the same corner. Wait, that's not why I did it. Those were the bonus rewards I gave myself while taking slop out of some bolt positions to give myself a bunch of camber up front.


My new buddy named "Chip."

I don't have before measurements, or particulary good pics, but most Camaros seem to be delivered with about -0.5 degrees and the FSM spec for "Street" use is -.75 deg +-.8deg. The "Track" spec is -1.5 deg +- .15deg. Based solely on visual observations, I'd estimate my initial camber at -0.5 driver side and 0.0 passenger side without driver.




These 24mm nuts on the bolts fix the knuckle to the strut mount. The upper hole is elongated and allows for quite a bit of camber for an unmodified MacPhearson strut. Loosening the nuts and tapping them back to free the splines in the bolts lets you use that extra space in the upper hole to push the strut in towards the engine which also pulls the top of the knuckle in and changes the kingpin inclination to give you more camber. When I did the adjustment with the car raised by taking a wheel off and using a ratchet, the rotation from tightening worked against me (counter clockwise if you're looking from the front of the car) on the driver side and in my favor on the passenger side.



The Team WTF?! camber gauge showed 2 fingers of camber on each side Monday evening after moving the assembly.

Tuesday, I got it on a rack at a local shop with a highly recommended autocross friendly tech who asked me what specs I wanted, let me sit in the car, etc, and this is what I have now (L/R):

F Camber: -1.9 / -2.0
Caster: 7.0 / 6.9 (non-adjustable)
F Toe: 0.00 / 0.00

R Camber: -1.5 / -1.5
R Toe: 0.03 / 0.04



The before setting on the rack (after my driveway work) was -1.7 camber for left front and -2.0 on passenger side. Hitting with an impact while on the rack to loosen and re-tighten gave me an additional -0.2 on the driver side compared to what I could do by myself in my driveway.

I'm uncertain about the rear settings I chose. My goal is to make it easy to drive fast. The only reference point is Mark Scroggs, who 1) was the only one competing in the car last year, 2) stomped the class at nearly every event all year last year (and doing the same this year), 3) is kind of an alien driver. Mark is pretty free with sharing info, so I had not only his settings, but what he was trying to do with them.

At the time, he was using a fair amount of rear camber and a little toe in at the rear to try to tame power on oversteer when the boost hits on corner exit. My inital thought was using the same camber and a little more toe for a little more stability would be a good place to start.

Then I saw the before numbers on my car. Less camber (-1.2 compared to -1.75) and a LOT more toe in (.2 vs .06 total degrees). When I saw that, I thought about how the car felt on power coming out of turns.

My initial thought was "take what Scroggs did, add a little toe in and see where things stand. When he posted his specs (at the time), he was trying to dial out some of the boost induced power on oversteer so he could be earlier and more aggressive on the throttle. I thought adding a little toe in from that would be a good place for me to start. It reminded me a lot of a certain time in the RX-8 when John and I were both pretty quick. I was happy with the rear and JV wanted it to be a little looser. We eventually went looser and JV picked up a lot of time. I did not, but for other head-up-ass reasons. So, what to do? Aim for making it looser than it was Sunday.

So, I went with -1.5 camber and .08 total toe in (I know it says .03 and .04 above). I expect it to be quite different than last weekend, but tires should get warmer too (it was cold and windy last week and tires never got warm).

My thought, or hope, was that it would be easier to borrow some toe plates and add a little more toe in on site this weekend than having to futz with camber, too, and that we'll be better off dialing in from too loose than from too tight (or, rather, will help me more as a driver).

One weird thing was after the alignment, we did a steering angle sensor reset. After the reset, the sensor was reporting full right lock when pointed straight ahead. Reset it again and same thing. We had to let the car sit about 15 minutes and third time worked.
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Old 05-06-2018, 05:33 PM   #147
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Neil is a good guy and a good driver. He's the one that bought the used one in Florida the same day I bought mine in Ohio. I haven't spoken to him since he arrived at PittRace, so I'm not sure what to make of the results given the weather.







The Salisburys bought one, Terry Baker and Curtis Staples are another one, plus Kevin and me in mine. That's six in the class in addition to 11 others in DS on Sunday.



The car is really, really fun to autocross. It's kind of weird in that no one ran one in 2016 (when it was in FS) and Scroggs was the only one in 2017 and he stomped everything else. That alien driver performance has led to a mini-lemming effect this year with some people like Neil and me buying the car. I mean, Scroggs performance told me that the car is worth a consideration rather than "this is the car for its class". What I didn't know until Sunday (but had a glimpse of a couple weeks ago) was that it's such a blast to drive. You think of some cars that have been dominant, but boring or unfun to drive. This is not like that at all.



It's a car that I think should be more popular based just on that, but it has a some things going against it. A Camaro that's not a V8. Hard to see out of. Limited use back seat. But it's cheap, easy on tires, super fun, and competitive in class.



But that last may only be for now. If the Focus RS moves in next year, that probably kills the Camaro for Pro Solo even if it can win at a Tour. We also still don't know what a Civic Type R can really do with a top driver. Looking forward to seeing Scroggs, Sparks (in the new WRX) and a top level driver in a Civic Type R at the same event...hopefully with a well driven RS or two in the same heat. May not happen before Lincoln in September, though.


This was a fun read. Sounds like a blast and why you bought it!
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Old 05-06-2018, 06:41 PM   #148
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How was it at the NJ pro?
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Old 05-06-2018, 08:20 PM   #149
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How was it at the NJ pro?
A learning experience. More later...
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Old 05-08-2018, 03:05 PM   #150
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A learning experience. More later...
I started writing something about this past weekend and our first Pro Solo in the car, but by the time I hit 1,600 words, it didn't even feel half done, so, I'm going to try again... It's still not short, but...

Found out at practice starts on Friday that the drive by wire programming is super annoying as all fuck. If you roll into throttle, RPM won't go over 2k...until it does and becomes impossible to modulate between rev hang and sensistively unpredicatable throttle response. Texted with guy that knows what he's doing in the car and he basically told me "if you figure it out let me know" and told me he constantly blips to try to keeps RPM constant and hopes boost will be up at launch.

Saturday, in grid before starting, I played with the gas a lot. Learned that punching throttle will get RPM up quickly and then allows controlable modulation at the RPM where I wanted to launch. Nowhere near as good as a mechanical system, but it's workable.

We cut 2.0 and 2.1 second 60 foot lights all competition long. On asphalt. Slightly uphill. For reference, a well driven FoST in my class (yes, the 2.0T Camaro and FoST are in the same Pro Solo class, but with different modifiers for calculator racing) was cutting 2.3-2.4 60 foot times on the left and 2.2-2.3 times on the right course. Biggins was inconsistently cutting 2.4ish times on both courses in his twin (same class and modifier as the Camaro). JV's car was cutting 2.0s and 2.1s (with a single 1.9) when it wasn't breaking differentials (again). To be blunt, we were amazed at how well the car launched once we figured it out.

On course, the car is big and have to account for it without over compensating. I didn't think I had much problem, I only hit two cones all weekend, but looking at the little video we got, it looks like I was mostly way off the cones on the driver side. So, that's something to look at. I didn't feel like I had any issues seeing out of it. I adapted to the slower steering to the point I didn't think about it at the time, only realizing that I was moving my hands like I used to (before training myself to keep them at 9 and 3) when I was saw video.

Overall, the car felt good. On Saturday afternoon when temps were a bit warmer (but not really hot), the car got progessively looser as the tires heated. When Kevin took his runs a few minutes after mine, we dropped pressure a couple pounds in back to compensate after his first run and he thought that helped a lot. It was on one of those loose runs that I had my fast time on one course. That run, I thought I overdrove a few parts, went too wide through one turn and was late to the gas in a few places (because I was tentative about the tires). But, damn, the car was fun to drive. It just really, really felt good. Balanced, predictable, and eager to do what was asked. After Saturday afternoon, I was sitting in 4th of 8, just a tad bit out of third. Thinking through my runs and where I might have gained some time, I was pretty sure I was the only reason I wasn't sitting in first. This was the first time at a National event where I wasn't wondering at all about what I could have done to have top time in class. I knew what it was and that felt really good. Of course, you never know how much someone else left out there and whether they can get it, but it still felt good. Meanwhile, Kevin didn't clean up at all and finished Saturday without a clean time on the left side course.

Weather forecast for Sunday had been tricky all week. Went to bed pretty sure that it was going to rain enough overnight and possibly into the morning that Sunday's runs would only be good for learning the car in a wet or damp environment. Woke up to see the parking lot was wet. Car was covered in drops of water. A mile away at the site, there had been no rain. Promising. We unloaded the car and went to walk the courses. Walked the right side and started the left...where it started raining a little. It was done raining by the time we got back to paddock and bagged everything we didn't want to get wet. It was also a good bit cooler Sunday than Saturday. We had no idea how things would go.

The first group of cars (mostly Ladies classes) mostly improved their times a bit, some by a good bit. We were in the second group. I think I was the only driver in the class to not set a quicker time. I would have improved slightly excapt for a cone and managed to drop a spot to Biggins after he clocked a really nice run on one side, dropping a bunch of time.

After I ran, I felt like I just didn't have my head in it. Not that I was driving like it was up my ass. Just, I was out there just going for a ride and not trying to hit marks or follow a plan. Like I wasn't really awake yet. Kevin turned in a clean run on his dirty side and wound up about a tenth and a half (pre-index) behind me on each side.

We really only have video of Sunday. Hopefully, I'll be able to post tonight, but... Our styles are very different. It kind of reminds a bit of JV and me when we were in the RX-8. I was calm and composed and John looked like he was attacking all the time. Kevin's driving is much more violent to the point mine looks almost lackadasical. Yet our overall times are ridiculously similar. Won't be sure about segment times until reviewing vidoe more closely, but I still won't be able to compare my fastest time on one side and only a fast scratch time with a cone on the other.
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