I ran two track days in my '07 TL-S 6 speed. In the process of doing so I learned a great deal about the car. This was also interesting for me since I had run my track bike ('01 Honda RC51) on the same track the weekend before. I've done waaaaay more track days on the bike than in a car, so I'm probably a bit biased. I can see the places where a car has an advantage on that track, but nothing beats entering the kink at 130 with my knee puck sliding across the bump in the pavement at the apex.

First off, I was really surprised how well the car's engine performed. The engine is of course very flexible, pulling from a relatively low RPM. That combined with the limited slip differential allowed me to get on full power leaving a lot of the corners before some of the allegedly faster rear wheel drive cars there.

I'll preface this paragraph by saying that this is where drag racing performance diverges greatly from performance on a road course... I was amazed to see that, given enough drive out of a corner, a C5 Corvette could never get enough of a head start on the power to do more than just hang even with me down the front straight and the straight between turns 7 and 8. Then again by today's standards a C5 isn't what we'd call amazingly fast, AND we're only talking about hitting a max of 110 to maybe 115 (between 7 and 8)... Still I thought it was cool.

CMP is a front wheel drive favorable road course, only one part seems to favor rear wheel drive, and that is the turn 5-7 complex (the "Carousel"). Through this area of the track I had to come into turn 5 trailbraking a bit to get some rotation, but I still had to be gentle with the throttle to avoid understeering too much before hitting 7.

One of the things I wasn't prepared for was how the car would beat up a set of tires. I was using Dunlop Direzza Sport Z1s, and my front left tire started chunking pretty bad. We rotated them at the end of Saturday, but the same thing happened the next day:



Also I was using Hawk HPS brake pads at the suggestion of my brother, but they turned out to be a less than optimal choice. They turned to ash pretty much and their inability to cope with and shed heat resulted in some unfortunate brake fade. And when I say brake fade, I mean that I almost opted to hit a sand trap at turn 8 when the brake pedal was smashed against the carpet and not much deceleration was happening at 110+. Luckily at the last second, the brakes bit enough that I could make the turn, albeit not very tidy. I think that with some better pads, the brakes would be alright.

I also munched through a set of rear pads while I was there. VSA was off, but apparently the EBD must ensure the rear brakes get a lot of use. They were the original Honda pads (25,000 miles), and before going on track they seemed to have a little more than half of their thickness. After 1.5 days on the track, they were down to the backing plates. We made a trip to a nearby Advance Auto and I got the cheapest pads they had on hand. After one session, those $18 pads were already worn halfway.

Anyway I'm going to do it again in November... this time with different rubber and brakes. We'll see how it goes.

Tires


Front rotors


Discolored Acura decal on calipers

 

wow that sounds sweet. tires look messed up lol

 

Sounds like fun. But most cases that i had with brake fade were due to junk break fluid. Did you change the brake fluid? I am firm believer in good brake fluid. I have never tracked my TL but i did track my old suby and talk about sticking in turns and coming out of the turns was just a blast in that car.

 

Wow sounded like a great time but what im taking here is that you now need new tires, new rotors and pads

Acura logo color shift on the caliper is awesome

 

Wow sounds like fun. Im very surprised to hear about the braking issues though. I will say the OEM Brembos from my experience are amazing. I wonder if those hawks pads are that bad!

James

 

I'm inclined to think it was the OEM brake fluid boiling that caused the brake fade. The stock Brembo pads bit VERY well, as I've tracked my TL numerous times before I changed my setup to RacingBrake components. Once you change out the brake fluid, you'll be good to go.

However, for the tires, unless you run drag's, any tire's going to get chewed up and start chunking.

I've experienced all of this as well.

...Can't wait until I go to the track myself!

 

Sounds fun except for the tires and brakes.

Holla at me prince.. Im down to go tracking!

 

Awesome and thank you for sharing. THe track beats up a car, tires and brakes especially. Check your tranny fluid as well (might want to add a cooler)

 

Cool!! I've been there.

- Worn tires? Check;
- Discolored Logo on Caliper? Check (not as bad as yours though);
- Brake Fade? Check (with slotted fronts RB ET500 Pads and Amsoil Dot4 Fluid);
- Bitch of a time geting out of the Carousel? Check.
- 110 MPH at the end of the 7 --> 8 straight? Uhhh, no. ~100 MPH for me.

Here's my thread: https://acurazine.com/forums/3g-tl-photograph-gallery-96/track-day-carolina-motorsports-park-714284/

Those Hawks destroyed your rotors.


BTW - yes, I was at a Turn One event and no car-to-car incidents; all passing on the straights only and a wave by is required.

 

i have the same brake setup as you and my calipers look exactly the same!!! perma-brown FTW!!!! I guess i'm not the only one with the same problem. The hawk pads do fade quite a bit. i had a really firm pedal but no stopping at all(from 140KM/H). I guess they just are not designed for track use. If your pedal was dropping to the floor then a good brake fluid will be a good idea. I use motul DOT 5.1 and have not run into any problems yet on the track,even when my calipers were at 220'C the pedal feel was still perfect.

 

I'm going to Streets of Willow on December 12th. You down?

 

Discolored Acura Logos on the brakes seems like a special "badge of honor" for having tracked your cars. Congrats in the regard.

 

That sounds and looks like fun!! Damn, I gotta get the TL into racing!

 

its pretty awesome to see the faces of people when they see a TL at the track. Even more awesome when they see the kinda of lap times it puts out, gives little RSX-S's a run for their money.But i do beleive tires and brakes are the most important in our cars.with 3600lbs being thrown around, they do take a major beating.i personally shaved 4 seconds a lap going from all seasons to a semi-decent summer tire.Hopefully i'll have enough $$ for some NT-01's next season.........

 

Im going to mark that down.. I'll try to make it.

Might take a trip down to L.A around that time, but don't know when yet.

 

Alright. Let me know. Spots get filled up, so if you're gonna sign up, it's a good idea to do it beforehand.

 

Nice.. those rotors are destroyed.. lol. Video next time

 

Wow, I just put some starspecs on my 05 and was considering taking it to the track. No way am I gonna do it now. I'll stick to my other car for track days.

Horsepower is over-rated for a road course car. A small light car with great handling/brakes can smoke most of the overweight buses out there. My 94FD more than holds it own with only 260hp.

BTW - how many miles on those Dunlops???

 

Thanks everyone! ^Those tires have no more than about 1000 street miles on them. I kept the tire pressure monitoring display on so I could get accustomed to how much of a rise in pressure I was getting. I tried to cap the hot pressure somewhere around 38 psi, which sometimes meant a cold pressure around 28.

I was using ATE Type 200 fluid, but it wasn't brand new, so that may have aggravated things. I'm supposed to do another car event at the end of November but it is at VIR (full course). I'm going to use some other tires (I doubt these will be in usable shape by then), and most definitely going all out with brake stuff--good rotors, pads, brand new fluid. If it's another 2-day event, I intend to flush the brake fluid at the end of the first day.

I'd like to think the stock brake hardware is sufficiently sized to accommodate the occasional track day, and I believe that with fresh fluid as well as brake pads that are designed for very high heat the brakes will be just fine.

I have to say, my TL was probably the largest car out there that day... except maybe for the E39 M5. Still, the driver of the E39 M5 was driving slooooow, so I was most definitely the fastest large car out there. My brother got pictures and a few videos, and I don't know when he's going to get around to uploading them. There is something kind of funny about watching and hearing a loud MR2 Turbo coming out of turn 14 onto the front straight, and an almost inaudible TL climbing right up behind him, maybe a bit of a "whoosh" sound coming from the exhausts, but that's it.

And that brings up another point... Though exhaust systems don't add any significant performance to these cars in this context, the added sound almost makes it worth it. With the windows down, my helmet on, and the buzz of louder cars around me, I had to keep a close eye on the tach to know how when to shift--I couldn't hear my own engine!

Oh and one more picture I forgot to share... Nav breadcrumbs FTW:

 

^^

haha. Great pic.

 

damn.. I'd feel much less confident if I couldn't hear her. I think the greddy catback is probably one of the louder production setups.

 

^ seems like it's only loud at low rpms.. you should probably do a custom setup.