I finally took the plunge and did a race day at Lime Rock. Basically you pay for four 20min sessions with an instructor on the track to learn how to drive better and faster.

Good

The v6 engine had no problems and plenty of power. The paddle shifters were a great help and mostly I stayed in 3rd.

Bad

Handling was just so so with the stock Michelin's. The car could have definitely used more grip and I'm sure part of it was me the novice driver. I was easily outgunned in the corners.

The brakes...what can I say? Acura should be ashamed they built this car and left these brakes on it. I even put cryo treated rotors and EBC red stuff pads on the car prior to the event (roughly 3000 miles on them before going to Lime Rock). After just a few passes the rotors were shaking and the car could barely stop. The already stock soft pedal just got worse and worse. You could smell them a mile away. I'm planning to go with EBC slotted rotors next but I'm not optimistic. The brakes are poorly designed on this car. It probably needs new calipers to fix this but cost is an issue.

Lots of fun. Try it some time.

 

Have autocrossed mine once and had several 100 to 70 quick slow downs due to alerts from the V1. Stock brakes have not had any issues and still feel strong after 18k miles. Stock Michelins are decent but I put a set of Pilot Super Sports on mine for summer along with a Progress RSB and it made a HUGE difference in handling and grip. Must add, mine is a 6MT Special Edition which does weigh a lot less than your V-6 so that may be part of the issue. The V-6 carries a lot of weight bias towards the front which may offset some of the "novice driver" aspect. There is only so much anyone can do when there is so much weight on the front end...

Sounds like a great way to spend a day though (lapping Lime Rock)!

 

Stock brakes on my i4 are terrible.

Autocrossing / track day sounds like some serious fun. the i4 is not that fast but i think it would still be a lot of fun.

 

I've also added an AEM CAI and the RV6 precat delete. Car runs really strong for an I4 and the autocross was great fun. Was in 2nd - 3rd most of the run and actually placed in the top 3rd for drivers on the weighted averages and 3rd in my class. Have not autocrossed for nearly 7 years so was great to get out again. With the 6MT and the tires and upgraded RSB, the car handles really well. Even got it to rotate into oversteer a few times!

 

I wish i had the 6MT but sadly just an auto

did you notice any difference with the CAI and precat delete? i have read that CAI does not do much but i am curious about the cat delete.

 

Honda engines live for red line. Anything you can do to open up the intake and exhaust (while still maintaining some backpressure) will really help this engine. Frankly, I think the CAI just sounds great and would have it even if it did not add to the power but frankly, I think with the 2 mods, the car just pulls harder to redline. Not sure why the links aren't working. You can copy / paste the link into your browser to see the video. By the way, notice that the traction control is on through first and part of second gear...

 

Here is the actual link

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jpv2w...ature=youtu.be

 

First of all, awesome! Second, brakes would be my first concern with our cars on a track. Now that I have the Stoptech brakes, I would have confidence to take it out on a track at least for a little while. I simply do not trust the design of the single piston vs. 4 piston calipers. At the same time of doing the Stoptech, I did SS brake lines front and rear and flushed it out with ATE fluid. Being on a track with those temps, your brake fluid likely made a difference as well. I haven't changed rear pads/rotors and do not plan on it because the rears hardly do any work from forward weight transfer. On my M3, I put EBC Yellow and new rear discs and had to bed them in. I actually never could bed them in well in the rear because the fronts (Brembo 4 pots) do so much of the work.

 

I assume you don't have any pics or in car videos?

 

Very cool! I would love to do some laps in mine someday!

 

I really want to get mine on the track, but then I realized I would eat half the life of my tires in a day. My tires are way too expensive for that.

 

buy new tires and then head back. I bet your brakes will hold up with better tires.

 

What tires do you have?

 

19" Continental DW

 

where is this place? Would it be funny to take my 13 i4 tsx to the track?

 

Just take it to your local track... and why would it be funny to take your i4?

 

Correct me if I'm wrong but don't our V6's have wider & larger wheels than the i4?

 

Question: Would my stock spoiler improve handling on the track? (jk! haha)

 

correct.

 

the v6 has 18's stock. I don't think they are wider though.

And lol, spoiler...

 

I think you're thinking of a straight line track
where it would be silly and would net 15's or 16's or even 17's(dont quote me guise, i'm just blindly guessing)


but on a road course or a auto X track is AWESOME!
you get to find out the cornering limits of your car.

 

Mr. TTL's video was a 6MT SE TSX. That's an i4. Sure sounds fun to me.

Edit: The only thing about track days as far as I can tell is the brakes are a point of concern.

 

It has 8" wide wheels.

 

8 inch wide?

 

the i4 is 17x7.5 and v6 is 18x8 if memory serves

 

TSX is a great street car, but the lack of a lsd will limit it on the track...but it can still be fun.

 

you mean a highway?


you mean an on ramp?

You are right though. With a 62/38 weight distribution and stock brakes cornering at speed can get a little hairy if you are using all 280hp..still fun as he'll though. Be sad when I have to sell mine in a few weeks.

 

Question about the lack LSD - and I promise I'm not trying to start a winter driving/what tire do you use thread here..but I noticed something interesting when there is a good layer of ice on my driveway a month ago. First, our driveway starts with a pretty decent slope so I was having trouble just getting my car in far enough so that the rear end wasn't sticking out into the road. So I shut off the traction control and got up the slope as far as I could.

Anyway, I set the e-brake while I figured out what to do, but kept it in drive. I then noticed that my front wheels were spinning at idle when I took my foot of the brake. With the e-brake still set and the car in drive I got out and looked (I know...) Sure enough, both front wheels were spinning at the same time and at what seemed to be the same rate.

Without a LSD, would that just be due to the lack of traction being equal at both front wheels? In other words, there wasn't a clear "path of least resistance" for the power to go to so it was split? Just curious I guess.

 

interesting, i did the same thing and only my driver side wheel spun.

 

I'll be taking mine to Autocross soon. TSX handles better then many of the cars I've driven