Going Solo... SCCA style

[Groovytimes]

New here. I have had my Ralliart Sportback about a month and half. For the moment it remains stock, and I'm undecided on what if any mods I will do.

Reading through the threads it looks like several of you have run your Ralliarts at Solo/AuotX events. I just signed up for my first event and was wondering if anyone had any pointers.

Specifically I am curious about starts with the SST transmission. I read somewhere that running the revs up to 4000 RPM and holding the brake in causes the clutch to slip. Seems like a bad thing. Any recommendations? I'll take any other pointers as well.

Thanks

[Scarab23]

you have to do the gas tapping method with our cars. hold the brake and repeatedly tap the gas until up to 3500 or so rpm then let go of the brake and the clutch will let go and you'll get launched.

if you want to read in more depth about it search the forum, theres a thread on here called "about launching our car" or "about launching this car" or something like that and it will explain it all.

you don't want to get to aggressive with the revs or else you'll have like what you said, clutch slip, and you'll throw the slow down light.

best of luck!

[Jackal]

Wow Scarab read the post he is not going Drag racing so everything you typed has nothing to do with what he will be doing for SCCA Solo Sprint and Auto cross which I do.

There is no problem in regards to starts as you are basically just racing your self that's why it is called Solo Sprint. The first lap the warm up doesnt count so just make sure you are on the gas when you get back to the start/finish line which starts the timer on the beginning of your second lap. Just keep transmission in automatic and sport mode so you can concentrate on your driving.
I have my current SCCA Solo Spint Licence and I will tell the stock tires are pretty useless. I would highly reccommend you go and find some cheap used GSR rims with 245mm rubber to give you some grip. You may wanna roll the rear wheel wells because you are sliding the car's body,chasis and suspension sideways so you have lateral suspension movement and you will need a little bit more clearance between tires and fender.

You need to get a hemet and check with your local track or car club that runs these events to find what certiification the helmet needs to have. You will also need to buy or rent a Transponder that is set to the track you will be racing at.

I have found that our Tranny can be a real pain if you try to run more than 6 laps at a time. Our club usually has 1 warm up lap then 3 or 4 balls to the walls timed laps in sport mode then a cool down lap use it to drive slower around the track in normal mode and try not to use the brakes if possible. This will greatly cool down everything from brakes, tranny and engine oil, turbo etc.

Oh and don't forget to turn ASC off everytime you start up the car because you you be flying along a straight section then throw it into a corner and the sensors will detect your car starting to lose traction and will cut your fuel until you regain traction and will kill your lap times by several seconds.

You really need to pump up the air pressure in the tires especially if you try to run on the skinny 215mm stock tires. The high sidewall will flex and will roll over destroying the tires. You will have to experiment Start with around 40 PSI and try going up or down from there. Best is to talk to someone already running in your class to see what they are running.

Make sure your races are not longer than 6 laps or trans will get to hot and you will have to pull over to cool down or if you push it you will start losing gears. Don't worry they come back once tranny cools down just don't push your luck. And I would upgrade to Hawk or another performance track / street pad. Our brakes suck so just experiment again with different techniques. Best to attend a driving school at the track at which you want to race at.

Autocross AKA cone Killing is also fun and depending on the number of people racing gives your car plenty of time to cool down between your runs. Try walking the course first and hopefully with one of the instructors to get a better idea where you ideal line will be for a particular course.

Sorry once again I am writing a novel, just trying to help out. Let me know if you have more specific questions and hopefully this has answered a few of your question.

[Groovytimes]

Thanks Scarab and Jackal for the feedback. I might have confused things with my terminology. In my region they are referring to Solo as cone killing. I might have needed to refer to it as Solo II. Sorry for the confusion, new to SCCA and Solo competition.

Scarab - I will search for the launching thread and see what I can find thanks for the info.

Jackal - I appreciate the info. I am running the OEM Yokos at the moment and everything I have read said they are complete garbage. For now I will keep them on until I burn through them. Probably OK since I am learning.

Interesting that you mentioned the Hawk pads, as I have been looking at adding those. Just curious how they do. Have you noticed them increasing stopping power? What about fade?

Thanks again for the feedback. Sorry for the confusion.

[GAbOS]

I run Solo II as well in DS (D- Stock). Our format is a little different than how Jackal explained his. We only do one lap at a time, where the start and finish are different points on the circuit, so launching the car correctly can be beneficial. You dont need to go crazy with the launch, it still isnt drag racing.

Smooth hands is key in Solo. I was consistently faster in Auto/Sport than Manual/Sport. This allowed me to concentrate on the steering. Try to keep your hands at 9 and 3. You dont ever want to death grip the steering wheel. Keep your hands nice and relaxed using your thumbs to help steer the wheel. Stay away from jerky inputs. In Solo, the old racing adage "slow is fast" is easy to see.

You probably have a forum for your local SCCA group. They can help point you to local SCCA friendly shops. I would recommend taking it to one to get it aligned. Custom alignments are very handy in Solo. You can go so extreme that its not really great for daily driving but does great on a solo track where you barely get into 3rd gear at times. I asked my local guy to do a middle of the road job on mine so I could still do both but not eat tires between events.

Stock is a great class for our cars, very competitive. Once you move above Stock, they start putting us in the same categories within each class as the STi's and Evos, so be ready to spend money to get the extreme edge of that class to stay competitive. Changing your wheels to anything other than stock size (18x7) will automatically forfeit you from stock. (fyi)

Jackal is correct. The stock rubber is useless. Our cars push already with the oem setup and the tires make this much worse. Solo allows for very few mods. You can do a drop in filter, cannot modify the intake. Cat back exhaust is open. Brake pads are open as well as fluid. Front sway bar is free, but rear is not. They do allow you to take the spare tire and gear out of the trunk, but that's the only weight savings allowed.

Take a small spray bottle with water as well. Even though you may never get over 40mph on a course, you are constantly beating the crap out of your tires and they will heat up, and fast! You do want to run higher pressures than normal, then after a run lay your hand flat on the tire. It's going to be very cool on the inside of the tire, but the outside will get to the point where you cant leave your hand on it for more than a few seconds. The added heat will further increase your tire pressures. Keep a good gauge handy and find the temps that work best for you. Use the water spray to lightly coat the tire between runs to help keep the temps down. The water will evaporate upon contact in light misting sprays.

[Groovytimes]

Great info GAbOS. I was wondering about the transmission and that makes sense. Also, thanks for the info regarding modifications. Not really interested in spending the money to keep up with Modded STIs and EVOs.

Thanks for the info on the tire spraying. I had seen a few people doing this and had no real idea why.

[Groovytimes]

Update - I have completed my regions Novice program and my first event in class. So a few things that I learned.

The Ralliart in stock class is competitive and fun to drive. I bounced back and forth between Auto and Manual, with mixed results. I found the effectiveness of the paddles depended on the configuration of the course. We had one course that was a combination of long (by AutoX standards) straights with some low speed sections. I found it easier to use auto on this.

On the downside the understeer on the Ralliart is ridiculous especially with the OEM tires. After 3 events the front tires are destroyed. I am hoping that new tires will help correct this.

As noted by GabOS above there are limited mods that can be done and stay in stock class. One of my instructors recommended a larger front sway bar. He noted that in many cases this would increase understeer, but feels like the excessive body roll on the front may be causing a change in the suspension geometry that could be lessened with the larger sway bar.

Going to go with new tires and a compromise alignment that is good for street/autocross.

GabOS - I was wondering how big a difference the tires/alignment change was for you. Could you tell a difference? Was it significant?

[GAbOS]

The alignment was able to get me some off-throttle oversteer in some of the mid to high speed esses.

I have yet to do the front ARB, but what you are hearing is correct. It will increase understeer but!.. The understeer feel happens at a higher speed. So you will gain corner speed before this happens. As I'm sure you well know now, smooth hands is key, and the OEM tires are junk.

[Exyia]

interesting Jackal, you make auto-x in Canada sound a bit different. here we're just given 5-6 runs and that's it. no warm-up or cool-down

but the advice is correct. I would upgrade wheels/tires before thinking about anything else. the chassis and suspension isn't bad - what you read all over various forums is mainly from bad drivers

even in my stock Evo X, I'm beating nearly everyone (incl full bolt-on, coilover X's) - and the RA is arguably a better auto-x car

[Groovytimes]

Originally Posted by GAbOS

The alignment was able to get me some off-throttle oversteer in some of the mid to high speed esses.

I have yet to do the front ARB, but what you are hearing is correct. It will increase understeer but!.. The understeer feel happens at a higher speed. So you will gain corner speed before this happens. As I'm sure you well know now, smooth hands is key, and the OEM tires are junk.

Smooth hands is key for sure. I have a lot to learn. My times have been decent, within a few seconds of the top guys class, but its going to take a lot of practice and discipline to make up that last bit.

I know that anything I do to the car may help, but ultimately improving my driving is going to make the biggest difference.

Thanks for the info. The Ralliart Sportback gets a lot of attention in the Atlanta Region, because it is the only one most of the guys have ever seen. The downside is I don't have anyone to ask questions about it specifically. I talk to the EVO guys but a lot of their info doesn't always translate. So I appreciate the input.

About the tires. They are so bad... as an example. You mentioned in your original post to run higher pressures than normal. I was running 45 PSI in the front and those crappy Yokahama's were still rolling over to the sidewalls.