Friday night the local track is holding a test and tune. I've been knocking on the 12 second door when the weather gets nice but once it warmed up I fell from 13.0 to 13.2, then I put on a ported tb and ran 13.16 this past weekend. Hopefully I'll get into some good air later in the evening and finally nab that 12 second slip.

Without removing anything or spending a bunch of money what can I do to help the et a little bit? This is really the first time I've made a effort to run a specific time, for the most part I'm a bracket racer so I don't concern myself with what the et actually is on raceday. Any of the gurus got any trick up your sleeves?

 

tires

 

Vaccum the car (dirt = pounds)
1/4 tank of gas.
Maximum air in the tires that will still stick.
Stage as shallow as possible, just bump in....
Don't concern yourself with the RT, just make sure the rpms are exactly Where you want them at the launch.
I am "assuming" this is a street car so drain your winshield washer container.
Clean or replace air and fuel filters before you go.
Re-seat plug wires and electrical contacts.
Allow some cool down time (get there early)
The best combination is hot oil and cool air. You want the engine at temperature but not "hot". As much as many bracket racers, myself included, warm the motor with the hood up before racing, the car wants to be running for a full minute prior to staging so the computer is properly set (more consistent). Consistent in the context of a quest for lower ET means less variables so you can focus on your launch and shift point rpms to determine the most efficient points for performance instead of consistency as those are almost always different.

 

Pull the back seat out. Spare tire and jack too. Don't leave anything in the car that adds weight. If you have the time and are not taking a passenger, pull that seat out too. What kind of 60ft. times do you normally turn? Got stickys? I know you said you don't want to take anything out, but it's not that hard. Good luck.

 

It's not so much the difficulty of removing weight but the fact that I need to be ready to go to another 2 day race in PA the next day. I'll have to leave at 6am and the wife and my daughter are riding along. I'll probably cut weight later in the season when I don't have to be somewhere the next day.

I'm running nitto dr's and right now I'm not making the power to spin with these unless track prep is total crap. I'm cutting consistant 1.9 60 times right now.

Thanks for the input. Hopefully the track prep is as good as it was on sunday. It was the first time I've been able to stall the car to 1600rpm. By the way, what usually works better for you guys, flashing the convertor or braking it up?

 

My car with the stock converter launches better when I load it up to about 1500 rpm.

 

Back when my car was an A4, I had best luck with the rpm at 1000 and then flashing it on the launch.

 

tnthub,

Good point on the compute I hadn't thought about that. I'm thinking that the O2s have to be up to temp to run open loop? Is that correct? Do you literally mean one minute. Usually I start car when I have to (at bottom of hill slash staging lanes).

Thanks KJA

 

When the O2's get warm the computer goes into closed loop. It goes open loop at WOT anyway. I think he means you want the car running for a minute so the computer is on track and the engine is giving consistent feedback to the computer.