First AutoX event is in the books.
X Sedan performed admirably - finished middle of field.
Got a few "Hey, that's faster than I was expecting" compliments, which was a nice ego boost
But of course now I'm obsessing.

Definitely need to step up from the all-season tires, lol
They were squealing around every corner and I could constantly feel them rolling over.

Current setup:
Swift Springs, Goodridge Steel Lines, DOT-4 brake fluid, aFe Drop-In Filters, Mishimoto Silicone Intake tubes

Planning:
Hotchkis F&R Sways - already purchased
Tires - Potenzas?

And obviously I, as the driver, can still improve a lot.

Any other upgrade suggestions that are worthwhile?
It's my daily driver so I don't want to go too overboard.
It's an informal event also, so I don't need to account for SCCA class requirements.

Lastly, anything I should do to keep the car in good health? Oil cooler, removing engine cover, etc?
Certainly don't want to blow up the family sedan.

Any insights from the veterans are much appreciated!

(I'll do better at getting pics & vids at the next event)

 

For an informal setup that looks quite good!
I'll always say, first improve the driver. Then good tires, then remove weight.
You've got more than enough HP to get around a little cone track, pedal and momentum control will net you many more seconds than pure power. Until you can walk that tightrope between grip n slip around every corner, theres no point in adding power, it will just he wasted in burnt rubber and lost time.
As for handling upgrades;
The Sways are a good choice for the X in a DD situation at least... I would read the Z forums for more info on AutoX. Quite unintuitively, lots of 350/70Z AutoX setups dont use a rear sway.
Additionally, endlinks would be a good insurance policy. Aftermarket sways love to eat OEM endlinks for breakfast.

AutoX isn't all that demanding on the engine. Slap a bigger oil filter (QX56 is compatible), and use the good synthetic stuff... If you've got the 7AT, do the drain and fill more often. As well as the F&R diffs, and transfer case. A lil ODB2 dongle and $10 investment in TorquePro & Infiniti EX add-on, will give you peace of mind about oil-temps and other parameters.

 

With soft springs, a stiff rear roll bar will reduce rear traction. If you like dorifto life, then go with the Hotchkis in the rear. Running without the rear bar requires wider tires up front to deal with the extra understeer.

Any of the ultra-high performance summer tires will help. Lowering will help. Better dampers, even on stock springs, will help. Until you get wider tires up front, raise front tire pressures to combat roll-over. A chest strap will help, you'll spend less attention keeping yourself in the seat and more attention on the course.

 

I've only ever auto-crossed at three events. First time was in a brand new 1999 Maxima SE 5MT, and twice in my 2011 G37S 6MT. So in that respect, I'm pretty much an Auto-X noob, too.

When I ran the G, it was one year after the other, and IIRC the only modifications between those events were Eibach Swaybars and a FSTB. The difference after the swaybars and tower brace was huge. I distinctly remember the slalom section of the course, lunging through the cones that first year with the G, and the next year lacing through the cones with surgical point & shoot. So for what it's worth, my recommendation is to prioritize swaybars. (Well, and summer tires, obviously.)

On the track, turn off traction control. Times were significantly improved without it. Also while on the track, as much fun as it is to oversteer around corners, don't do it. Maintain traction for better times.

 

No rear sway is surprising. I wonder if they're trying to get the car to be more neutral under the tight corners?
Would that still apply to the AWD?

Thanks for the heads up about endlinks. I'll look into that.

Thanks for your insights!

 

Interesting. Would you be willing to elaborate?
I always find suspension geometry fascinating, though am still pretty new to it - I'll have to fire up the google machine.

I was running 35psi in front, 37psi in back.
Seemed ok, but yeah, lots of roll over. And the all seasons just didn't seem up to the task.

Thank you!

 

Oh man, yes! Absolutely know that "lunging" feeling. Felt so sluggish.
I rode along for a couple laps in an S2000 and that thing was incredible - flat and tight.
I don't know if I'll ever be able to get that nimble with the big sedan.

My first lap I was trying to be safe and left traction control on, it was terrible. Cutting power just when I was trying to get out of corners.

Yeah, I started emphasizing smooth & quiet toward the end of the session, felt like that was definitely the way to go.

Hey, I'm learning

 

Lap times...

 

I used to Autocross in NC every month from 1999 until I left in 08. 85 RX7, 91 RX7, 90 RX7 Turbo, NA and NB Miatae. Autocrossed my RX8 in Savannah a few (dozen) times too.

All the above cars are front engine, rear wheel drive with close-to-even weight balance that were stock designed to understeer to keep the idiots out of the jersey barriers. *none* of them had traction control. All of them liked being steered with the throttle when properly set up.

My usual setup was uprated sway bars, bigger/ball-end end links, 28psi fronts, 35 rears on summer or high-perf all-seasons depending on my budget at the time. Smaller diameter tires (on 14, 15, 16" rims) I went with the standard 35F/37R PSI. Usually tried aligning for max negative camber and close-to-zero toe on the track-specific cars and oem just less toe on daily drivers.

I will tell you that the NB I spent time in had *only* struts and sway bars and it was insanely fast. More accurately, it wasn't all that fast but it didn't need to slow down for much of anything - handled like thought.

The funnest car was the 85 RX7 - it had old trailer tires on 13" rims and was like wearing worn out sneakers on lake ice - fun as hell but you occasionally fall. It needed a soundtrack, and with the flames/backfires from an unmuffled rotary it always got applause.

With a bigger wheelbase car like the G, I would be practicing partial drifts - you'll need to get the tail out fast rather than try a tighter-than-the-car line in corners more than 90*. You need to be able to plant the nose and pivot the rear, just a little, to get around those corners faster. Otherwise IMHO the chassis is plenty stiff once you ditch road-comfort things like soft springs and sway bars; the steering is good, brakes are great, amount of lateral traction is good.

Our car club did several autocross training classes - get same venue as autox, set up discrete sections like slalom, 150 degree, constant box, decreasing radius turn, and have folks repeat those sections for 30 minutes with an instructor. Second day we did a standard autocross and they got to use their learnin'. Good solid weekend of fun and people got drastically better. See if any clubs near you do something similar - ours was the Mazda Sports Car Club of North Carolina (so we had RXs and Miatae) but we opened to all marques about halfway through the registration window. Had everything from a Saturn sedan (surprisingly nimble) and a few Lotus Elises... Elisi... more than one of them. THOSE things were like injecting pure go-fast crack.

//also had a few cops show up to watch (we were permitted and insured, they just heard the tire squeal) and convinced them to run their crown vics in the autocross.

 

Good story, Mike! All those cars and all that experience... probably just what the OP wanted to read.

I'm reminded of the last time I did this, someone showed up in their brand new GT-R. It got a whole lot of attention while parked, but on the cone track it looked kind of useless. Driver fail, I suppose. The cars that took the day were hot hatches.

 

Zero toe-in up front would help, for both turning and tire life. Toe-out is even better for turning but may not be liveable on the street.

Lots of negative camber up front would really help but that requires adjustable front control arms. Costs money and might get you noticed and reclassed.

 

There's a reason I always paint my swaybars black. LOL

Rochester, a lot of bigger high power cars are not really suited to autocross. Corvettes, Vipers, Jaguars, M5s come immediately to mind. They're just designed for something different - which is why they (well, sans the viper) do really well on tracks and road courses. I'd suspect that our G cars do better on the track than the cones. I think the fastest non-S2000 autocross car I've ever seen was an MR2 (2nd gen) with a V6 motor swap. Torque enough but not huge weight difference and well balanced chassis. Of course, S2000s tend to be king followed by handling-specific exotics like Lotus and Ariel.

Re: autocross vs. HPDE track day... my friend who is now an instructor had a really good point. Compare cost, time spent in prep/work/idle, and car maintenance required versus actual track time. HPDE is cheaper per minute and you spend MUCH more time on track, which is also much more like road driving conditions. I think autocross is a good starter motorsport, but I don't think I could do it as an end goal. I may have missed the boat on Formula Atlantic or Formula Mazda but while I have the health to three-pedal a car around VIR or Roebling I'd much rather do that.

 

Thanks again, guys, for the insights!

Right now I'm thinking I'll throw both sways in to get an understanding of how the car will feel with that (cause I spent the money on em and I'm excited, so )
Then adjust accordingly to see if I can squeeze out some better times.
With the AWD pulling me out of the corners, I'm interested to see how the rear will behave with the stiffer bar.
I mean, thinking back on it, I can't recall even one incident of too much oversteer. And I actually like the back to come around a bit.

So maybe stiffest setting up front, middle or softest out back.

And of course, a set of track wheels/tires.

Again, it's an informal event, they don't run SCCA classes, so no consideration there.
If I really want to get serious, I'll probably invest in a track car, likely a miata.

 

I've not run many AWD cars through the cones. Is there a way to (I'm guessing electronically) lock the center diff to 50/50 so you have fulltime AWD, not just upon slippage?

 

You mean, is there a Subaru button? That would be a neat trick.