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Nelson Ledges?


theweiser1

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I was shocked at how good (better than I remember) the track was at the fun day I did in April. Track is smoother than Indy (O'Riley Raceway Park) road course... I'm planning to go back for a race weekend the first part of 09.
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I always felt the broken asphalt at the apexes and generally bumpiness was part of the track's charm, kind of keeping with the agrarian nature of the rest of the facility.

 

back in my bike days we always said that Nelson was a true way to improve street riding skills as you had to dodge the potholes!

 

Andrew, in all reality while it's still a very bumpy track since they've repaved some of the worse corners it's no worse than anything you'd run into on the street ever.

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We (www.MVPTrackTime.com) are renting Mid Ohio the weekend of October 18-19, 2009. You guys are welcome to join us for some on-track fun.

 

Feff

 

Approx. how much are you entry fees on average? This group looks very interresting. I was thinking of signing back up for Chin this year but this may be a better bet.

 

Andy

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Approx. how much are you entry fees on average? This group looks very interresting. I was thinking of signing back up for Chin this year but this may be a better bet.

 

Andy:

 

Entry fees vary by track and are available on our seb site at:

http://www.mvptracktime.com/id47.html

 

Mid Ohio, as an example, is $350 for the weekend or $250 for a single day. Hope you'll join us!

 

Feff

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back in my bike days we always said that Nelson was a true way to improve street riding skills as you had to dodge the potholes!

 

Andrew, in all reality while it's still a very bumpy track since they've repaved some of the worse corners it's no worse than anything you'd run into on the street ever.

 

Just like driving on the street...except that you are 100 mph, turning, downhill, on a 35 ft wide bumpy road. At least if you are doing it right.

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back in my bike days we always said that Nelson was a true way to improve street riding skills as you had to dodge the potholes!

 

Andrew, in all reality while it's still a very bumpy track since they've repaved some of the worse corners it's no worse than anything you'd run into on the street ever.

 

Well, the thing is, even on public roads I tend to be a bit on the slow side because I have to, "read" the pavement for bumps or nasty dips to avoid. Every day I fear the life of my GTIs oil pan lol. I do think that it would be worth my time to make some adjustments to my suspension for the trip out, I'm almost positive the geometry of my suspension is completely fubar'd from being as low as it is anyhow.

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Well, the thing is, even on public roads I tend to be a bit on the slow side because I have to, "read" the pavement for bumps or nasty dips to avoid. Every day I fear the life of my GTIs oil pan lol. I do think that it would be worth my time to make some adjustments to my suspension for the trip out, I'm almost positive the geometry of my suspension is completely fubar'd from being as low as it is anyhow.

 

This is no shot at you, but why would you have your car so low it's practically useless??

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Well, the thing is, even on public roads I tend to be a bit on the slow side because I have to, "read" the pavement for bumps or nasty dips to avoid. Every day I fear the life of my GTIs oil pan lol. I do think that it would be worth my time to make some adjustments to my suspension for the trip out, I'm almost positive the geometry of my suspension is completely fubar'd from being as low as it is anyhow.

Particularly if you are going to do any track days. One off course at a place like Nelson or even Mid Ohio will bottom out your car and break things.

 

Also, as you are likely aware, when you lower the car particulalrly more than an inch or so, you have to pay attention to many things in order to gain performance benefit from lowering. Things like bump steer, shock travel, bump stop clearance, etc.

 

While lowering generally makes the car look better, if it isn't done in concert with other things it can actually have a detrimental impact on handling.

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Particularly if you are going to do any track days. One off course at a place like Nelson or even Mid Ohio will bottom out your car and break things.

 

Also, as you are likely aware, when you lower the car particulalrly more than an inch or so, you have to pay attention to many things in order to gain performance benefit from lowering. Things like bump steer, shock travel, bump stop clearance, etc.

 

While lowering generally makes the car look better, if it isn't done in concert with other things it can actually have a detrimental impact on handling.

 

Oh yes, I'm very much aware of how much it can throw a vehicles entire geometry. I've done plenty of suspension geometry research and suspension development on my old Corolla that I wish I could get some kind of college credit for it, lol. I could talk about geometry, corner balancing, shock travel, spring preload, dampening, etc and etc all day.

 

It wouldn't be too difficult to make it out a day for the track, I'd just have to raise my car up a couple inches and get some quick measurements.

 

This is no shot at you, but why would you have your car so low it's practically useless??

 

Eh.. It's part of living the low-life :)

 

I just like to stand out in ways that people would normally find crazy.. being low definitely proves balls of steel IMO. Most people have no clue the effort it takes to do such a thing daily, yet I still make my way around just fine, albeit a little slow :lol:

 

Remember my Infiniti? That shit was less than two inches away from the ground and I drove it everywhere like that. Beached it a couple times, but all in good memory.

 

In fact, I've come to think of people on airbags as cheaters because you're too bitch to roll as low as I do.

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Andrew: What suspension is on your car? Is it really soft?

 

I think everyone blows the track surface at Nelson way out of proportion. With them re-paving the surfaces in the turns over the last 5 years or so it's really not bad at all. It's no Mid Ohio surface but it's definitely not pot hole types of changes in pavement.

 

My 996 is nearly at Porsche Cup Car ride height. The front splitter clears speed bumps by about 1/4 inch and I sometimes scrape the brake ducts going over said bumps. Yet I've never experienced any bottoming issues at Nelson at all. Thankfully my wife has never come home with missing parts either since she drives it most of the time on the street. Same splitter is still in-tact 2 years later. However, I do have 900lb springs in the car which is why I ask how the suspension stacks up.

 

Andy

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Andrew: What suspension is on your car? Is it really soft?

 

I think everyone blows the track surface at Nelson way out of proportion. With them re-paving the surfaces in the turns over the last 5 years or so it's really not bad at all. It's no Mid Ohio surface but it's definitely not pot hole types of changes in pavement.

 

My 996 is nearly at Porsche Cup Car ride height. The front splitter clears speed bumps by about 1/4 inch and I sometimes scrape the brake ducts going over said bumps. Yet I've never experienced any bottoming issues at Nelson at all. Thankfully my wife has never come home with missing parts either since she drives it most of the time on the street. Same splitter is still in-tact 2 years later. However, I do have 900lb springs in the car which is why I ask how the suspension stacks up.

 

Andy

 

I'm running FK PowerTech coilovers.. discontinued but probably the best of what FK made for the MKIV VW. Quite nice considering most coilovers for VWs don't even have dampening adjustment, but these have it all. The spring rate I am quite unsure of, but they are a linear coil so always better than running progressive anything(apparently they don't disclose springrates to public, but I know it's around 400+lbs from previous research). In my opinion I'd say they're not soft by any means, but definitely not terribly stiff. The dampening alone can make a big difference in the behavior of the ride, but in comparison to all of my coilovers, they're probably the softest thing I've driven on. In my Corolla I was running 8kg front and 7kg rear(roughly 480lbs and 400lbs), which is pretty stiff for a car that weighed maybe 2000lbs?

 

I've made a couple trips to Hocking Hills at my current lowest point and had no problems getting around, just a little rubbing on high speed turns where there would be more Gs.

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The ZX2 I ran at Nelson this year had much stiffer springs on it (in the 6-800# range) and the track was great. I haven't run my Civic there, but plan to this spring. Civic has 700#/f 1000#/r springs on it, so we will see how it does. I'm guessing it will do fine. (Just hope I do!)
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  • 4 weeks later...
We all thought that our "Fundays" were going away with rumors of a sale of the track, but apparently that deal fell through so we'll still have "cheap" lapping days for next season.

 

I'll be making the trip up for one of the first days in Mar / April next season

 

Andy

 

 

 

REALLY! Sean crewed there last year for the 24 hour race... I thought they were changing owners as well! Well hopefully next year there is another 24 hr. race!:cool:

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