Track Day 6 (TNIA @ PIR) & AX 3
So a lot happened since the last track day. Specifically, we unloaded the car and noticed that the steering pump sounded horrible, and we also needed to manage some really high trans temperatures we were seeing. While our small trans cooler was an improvement over the OEM complete lack of a cooler, it just wasn't up to the job.
The mods & Repairs coming into these events were:
The power steering pump not only was having issues, but was leaking. These Honda power steering pumps are renowned for leaking from a plastic bit with an o-ring on it, and we weren't having that. So Dave took his exceptional fabrication skills and tig welded an AN fitting on to a new pump in favor of the OEM plastic bit. Now there's no o-ring to fail or plastic to warp, and it's in general more robust!
The Power Steering reservoir also had to go. The oem plastic one wasn't terribly high capacity, and had zero baffling. We bought a nice aftermarket unit that was baffled and higher capacity and fabricated a mounting point for it in the car.
The power steering cooling was yet another potential weak point. From the factory the car featured just some steel line exposed to the air, so our small cooler was an improvement, but likely inadequate. Fortunately for us this was an easy upgrade, as the small cooler we'd used for the power steering was identical to the one we'd used for the trans which was being upgraded. Thus, we took the old trans cooler and doubled it up with the power steering cooler, doubling our cooling and capacity. Simple, and hopefully effective!
Transmission Cooling had been a problem on previous track days. With Dave and myself driving the car HARD for 40 minutes straight, we were seeing 260 degree trans temperatures, which is well above the ideal trans temperature. This isn't exactly surprising as an issue since the trans cooler we tossed on was pretty minimal. So... we decided to upgrade to a much larger trans cooling with significant capacity while also putting a fan on it.
Oil cooling also got upgraded, but not because we needed to do it, just because our current oil cooler didn't fit with the new trans cooler, so we got another cooler identical to the trans cooler and installed them side by side.
Front Brakes Were Replaced. We're currently getting about 5 track days out of a set of pads, and when two drivers are driving an event at once we count it as 2 track days, not one. We're running EBC yellow street/track pads, and they are working good, but just nor proving to be as durable as we'd like. Unfortunately the choices for these calipers are quite limited, so this is the best that we can do.
How The Events Went
Track Event
The event was a Track Night in America, so a high traffic and just 3 session event. The car held up fine though, with Dave just reporting that the trans temps were still higher than ideal. We had only done the power steering work for this event however, and that did work without issue. We would install the upgraded oil and trans cooling in the weeks after but before the AX event.
Autocross Event
The Autocross event was a great succes! We ran the car in every available run group (AM early/late, PM early/late) and so it got a good shakedown. Autocross is DEFINITELY lower demand on the car as far as cooling goes, but it definitely is jarring to the car and a good test that it's all holding together. It's also a great way to get folks excited and out without the full rigamarole and costs of a track day. Consequently, it was Mark and Winslows first day and they both had a BLAST! Winslow would wind up taking 2nd in novice overall and also being the fastest person in our group, altough in Dave and I's defense the whole course was pretty dirty in the morning sessions until folks had cleaned up all the lines.
Here's a little video clip of Mark crushing it! AX video rarely looks that exciting, especially when it's a $500 Honda Accord. I forgot the GoPros or we'd have much more fun footage.