Light track work in BBI

Just got back from a club event at Wilzig manor. First time I have really driven to the edge with my new PS2 tires.

The track is pretty tight, about 1 mile around, some curves are heaviily banked.

While its hard to compare different cars because of different drivers I can say that the BBI anihilated a 348 in terms of drive and grip. It was also clealry faster down the straight than a 360. the straight is short and I dont know what the 360 driver was doing but most cars usualy floored down a straight. The track is essentialy a 3rd gear track with a liitle 4th.

I say I dont know what the 360 driver was doing because the boxer with PS2s had the leggs on him through the bends too. Lets say the performance was at Cali level, with more drive out of bends.

On the handling front the car once comited to the bend clearly needed to be balanced on the throttle. Feedback was such that this was easy. the dominant effect was light understeer the limit which you could play with by the throttle. What liftoff oversteer there is, and its still there, was mild and easily correctable with a bit of throttle or countersteer.

In other words, nothing nasty at the limit, but you have to concentrate, your stability control comes from throttle, steering, and feedback of which there is lots. The key is seting the car up speed and gear wise for the bends, and then using the throttle and small wheel inputs to dance along the edge.

All of which is also a way of saying you can go really really fast in a boxer, but you should know the road and whats comming because you have to comit, and once you do there are not the modern options for backing out, if conditions change.

I also had 3 other f car drivers of newer machineary come up to me and say they owned boxers too, but that theirs ran nowhere near like mine did. in fact 2 were unimpressed with the way theirs drove.

I said it before and I will say it again, these are incrediably sesitive cars, a Good running boxer is only 60% of a great runnig one, and sometimes I think there are hardly any great running ones.

Apart from the exhaust, mine is stock, but it has the right plugs, with the right gap, the distributor has been redone to work and advance propery, the ignition has been upgraded, the FI system is balanced and properly set.

Most recently we dialed in the mixture using a Lambda probe at various revs, looking for that ideal 14.5-15 air fuel ratio.

In short the car runs great, its faster than a 360, at least below 110 which was the track speed, and with modern rubber the grip and handling were every bit that of the recent moderns. I am sure it can and would bite the ham fisted, but to make a boxer go you also have to dive in and comit.

There is so much potential in a boxer, yes a458 will smoke it, but below that the performance oncce rolling really is there , you just have to know the car and set it up properly. But I will best you will have a lot more fun driving hard at agiven speed in a boxer than with the modern video game nanny cars

 

Yes the skill or familiarity with the car quotient is a definate factor, and also part of what makes these older cars so much fun to drive. Instead of having electronics intervene there is all types of seat of the pants feedback, it is a total immersion experience, that I guess some of the moderns lack. Perhaps electronics means on modern cars that seat of the pants feedback is gone because the driver no loger is the one to dial things back. The driver does not need or get those feedback messages and the chassis and setup does not have them designed in. The older cars I liken to analog stability control utilising the driver as a component or part of the feedback loop, now a computer does that part, along with the shifting. Newer cars are faster, but you have to go much faster to really enjoy them.

360CS is a great great car though, must also be a lot of fun to drive, there was one at the track on Sun it looked and sounded awesome.

For serious track work I run my lotus elsie on slicks. This was a casual f-club event at a private persons private track, yes amazingly his own personal track.

Sometimes its nice to be able to just stretch the car and not worry about cops, deer etc. A boxer is not really ideal for track compared to some others, not least the brakes, but it was surpsingly good and relatively competant, the motor and noise is half the fun too. On a lotus the motor just does the job.

Would love to try the boxer at Nurbering, you dont have to drive to the limit, can go really fast and have fun.

Of course if I were at the nurbering then something like your F40 would be even more fun, those that seem to know all say the F40 has the highest fun quotient for really hard charging.

 

The sad part is so many people do not rate boxers in terms of performance. I attribute that the the so so running condition of most boxers. I imagine Fastradios runs 101%.

The other boxer thread here seems to rate countaches as THE car from the era. From my personal expeirence with both, there is a vast difference int he way they drive, and to me the countach is more of an arrive than drive type of car.

Anyway long may boxers be underated, that way we wont feel bad about driving them the way enzo and Luca(it was the first road car he was involved in) intended. Somehow when the price gets above a certain level then people think they are too expensive/precious to really use, and they become more museum piecs. Look at 288's and even now some F40's locked away.

Said it before many times, the best single change you can make to a boxer is wheels and tires. But here I preach to the choir.

Thanks for the poisitive feedback, you have no idea how passionatly anti boxer some people are, even owners, I always try tell them that this only means their car is not setup right, but they dont believe me.

 

At a location which shall remain nameless I got my car on sat up to 7000rpm in 4th and then into 5th for just a little bit more. No mirrors flew off, but at speed it really just hunkers down. Too bad that these days these types of cars have so few places where you can really run.

Thanks for the feedback on the 360cs, I have been leaning towards a Superformance GT40 as the next track car upgrade. You know looks power sound, lowish running costs for track. But the steering did seem a little loosey goosey on the one I tried, planning on trying one or two others setup differently before deciding. But maybe I should rethink and head towards a CS, especialy as you describe it as closest thing to an F40.

I can see why a 600hp F40 is going to scare you, I have heard that even on a stock F40 when the turbos ligh up everything goes into warp speed.

 

Please tell me about the updated AC, where and how.
Also what shocks/springs do you run on your car, and is the ride still streetable, or how is the ride compared to stock shocks/springs.