My first day on a track with the 355

So, Ive owned my 355 a couple of years now, and after much toil, blood, sweat, I finally took her on the track as Id been working towards for so long.

Bit of history of the car, when I bought her, she was an abused dog, her previous owners had treated her very badly and let things get well out of hand...but I got her cheap and she needed rescuing.

Now shes in a near perfect mechanical state, and the only thing thats remaining to be done is some uprated front brakes, which became VERY apparent yesterday And perhaps some additional/uprated water/oil cooling.

At present she has the following mods...

Custom made exhaust system from manifolds to rear box
Uprated coil overs/suspension inc shocks, and all bushes and a good amount of time setting up.
Uprated rear brakes, grooved and dimpled.
Challenge wheels
Uprated clutch
A Diet

Plus lots of other recommended bits and pieces from a local Ferrari racing specialist (plugs, leads, coils, filters etc etc) and various work performed rectifying the other owners abuse.

The result, she is INCREDIBLE!! I thought I knew were the limits were and I was out by around 3 light years of distance Ive had (and still have) very fast, well handling cars before, but this was in a different league!

On each lap I pushed a little more in the corners, no tyre squeal, no scrubbing, lurching or anything. It got to the point where me and my passenger were groaning and grunting in the corners from the stress of trying to keep our heads up, it hurt at times, really hurt!!

At one point we had a Radical SR I think behind us coming through a section of the track, banked turn, short straight, double chicane, straight. Coming to the banked turn he was on me, by the time we had got to the 2nd straight, I had a good 7-8 car lengths between us, I was doing the banked turn and chicanes faster than he was....then he came past as it had a lot more power Also on many occasions I was quicker through turns and corners than a number of the westfields and caterhams there (Atoms however were a different story, them things are FAST!!!)

Ultimatley I was unsure if all the time, money and effort would be worth it...it is..and then some more.

One of the highlights of the day was the tangle with an Audi R8, we went out pretty much at the same time and he was just behind me on the out lap. Hot lap we are both going for it, in the straights I was pulling away, and at the corners is was a clean walk....his brakes were better than mine though, and he was braking later and harder than I could and so staying with me. Great fun...and I was happy that straight line, I had the edge
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She's a beauty Dan, glad you had such a good time on the track, where was it? Oulton Park ?

 

Nice - and I'm glad you had a good time!

I know what you mean about holding your head up in the corners. I had a ride in a two-seater converted F1 car once. Not sure if it was genuinely an F1 car or not - but it was very quick either way, with working aero in the corners. It was three hot laps and by the third lap my neck was exhausted! Whenever we turned left, my helmet would thunk against the bodywork on the right, and vice versa.

Very fun though - I'd recommend it.

All the best,
Andrew.

 

Thanks...yeah it was at Oulton. JMH was in the pit garage next to me, with a Porsche and thier F430, them cars are incredible fast!

I had a pop at the Porsche one lap see if I could hold it off after it came screaming up behind...I was swiftly handed my ass

 

Do JMH prepaire your car for you?

 

Yeah they've done some work on her. Though a lot of the time I like to do it myself, Im pretty good with spanners and stuff and have built entire engines before etc....time permitting with work, I enjoy it, helps me clear my head.

Still, theres somethings that are best left to the pro's

 

Let me know when youre next doing a track day and I may pop over and say hello.

I'm supposed to be meeting up with another of JMH's clients at the end of March to take a run in his 360 Challenge car at Silverstone, just trying to book my work around it so i can make sure im there.

Neil

 

Will do, Im hoping to do another one as soon as I have uprated the front brakes on her.

I'll keep you in the loop

 

What have you doen to improve the front brakes? small changes or have you gone for larger discs and calipers?

 

I didnt do anything the fronts just yet.

I wanted to do a track day first to decide whether to just overhaul and improve the standard ones when they need it, or whether to go for a full on replacement along the lines of AP or similar and stump up the cash.

After yesterday, just improving the standard ones is out of the question, most of the time I was driving to save them, and when I did push hard, they were giving up after a lap or so.

She builds speed very quick now and on some laps where I was going for it I was having to brake hard from 120+ to 30ish on a number of occasions and it was just killing them.

Im now going to decide on what I want up front and get it ordered asap.

 

Im after a spare set of calipers to get painted in red for mine, PM me when you swap them out. Make sure you keep us updated with pictures as you improve her.

Good luck and enjoy getting those lap times down.

 

What pads and fluid have you been using?

 

Great story Dan, That's what it's all about. You have the passion!
Did you get any video?


"Ultimatley I was unsure if all the time, money and effort would be worth it...it is..and then some more."

That sentence should sum it up for anyone sitting on the fence for Ferrari ownership

Cheers!

 

I didnt manage to get a great deal of video, I dont have any mounts in the car to house a camera as yet and its not allowed for even a passenger to hold and film.

I got some vids on the pit wall of the other cars, including the crazy JMH Porsche and 430.

My friend also took a couple of me going past the pits solo which I can post if interested, you'll notice Im braking though VERY early and using my gears to help slow down, brakes were shot by then and these solo runs were the last of the day.

I'll edit them a bit later and post a composite up once Im done at work.

Plans for the future after the brakes and cooling is just weight loss and lots of it....shes well sorted now in the handling stakes and will just need some tweaking when the weight comes out...Im considering "going to town" in this department too.

Enginewise I dont think theres much more I can do, Im thinking about a Gruppe-M intake as Ive read a lot of good stuff about them and potentially swap out the clutch for a proper racing item.

That should keep me plenty busy for this year

 

Excellent...I like the white wheels by the way.

 

That was exactly what I was thinking. If the fluid isn't fairly fresh or is a poorer spec than ideal for this type of use, this could be half your problem! If however you had fresh, high quality DOT 5.1 in then ignore my comment. Fast road / race pads installed in the standard calipers will obviously help enormously with retardation.

 

Fluid and pads are fairly new, I replaced them the same time I upgraded the rears last year and she only clocked up a few hundred miles since then, mainly motorway miles too.

 

About the brakes. Eric made a nice write-up about a "not so expensive upgrade" for the 355. I have completed this upgrade this winter and it looks great and hopefully works as great too ;-)

I made a few extra sets of brackets if you are interested...

You can read about this upgrade here: http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=258160&highlight=expensive
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First let me congradulate you for taking your Ferrari out where it was designed to run--a real race track.

Second, I have been doing similar things for 6 years, and even in the midst of Texas summertime heat, there is no reason to put better brakes on the car if you stick with street tires--upgrade to semi-race pads, and the rotors can take the heat (with fresh fluid). I happen to use DS2500s right now and these are streetable down here in the mild Texas winters. Others have found suitable pads from other vendors.

I get about 5 track weekends on a set of pads, and about 30 track days on a set of rotors.

Third: I have found no particular reason to do anything to the suspension, either. If (when) you learn to 'drive to the car', you will find that the suspension is sorted quite well. A near perfect comprimize between soft enough for the street (barely) and hard enough for the track (also barely). I may take 500 laps (or so) to learn how the car wants you to caress the wheel and pedals to drive to it. It does NOT like being driven a Vette--muscled around; it likes to be driven like a ballerina, with gentle smooth balanced inputs.

 

First, thanks Indeed it does belong on a track

Second, the pads are Ferodo, I think the same as yours, the fluid is pretty fresh as stated, but I believe the rotors are the originals, thier condition isnt great at all, and when getting warm you can feel the warp in them.
Also I may be harder on the brakes than normal, Im running very sticky tyres so I can stand on the brakes and they dont let go.

Either way, Im intending on turning her into a proper track animal, so upgrading the brakes is part of the plan.

Third, I can drive And while you are right, that the standard setup is great, I wanted that little extra for track use and "fettling".

Finally, your correct again, no car "likes" being muscled around, in the end it'll get pissed at you and bite your ankles, smooth, precise and direct movement of weight transfer around the car is what you want, even when your in a pickle, brash actions only make things worse