autocross
 

i'm wondering what all do i need to do to be competitive in an autocross. i am on a very, very tight budget since i am in college, but want to at least be competitive and not get blown away. any ideas??

You need to give us more information... what class do you intend to run in, what level of mods you have, etc. This is a VERY broad question.

It sounds like you haven't done much autocrossing before. If this is the case, I can tell you one thing... the main thing that will make you competitive is PRACTICE. Being competitive has relatively little to do with the car and a LOT to do with the driver. When you are starting out, you should EXPECT to be blown away. You should autocross to have fun, NOT to win, because when you are starting out, chances are that you will NOT win. :)

BTW I'm not trying to discourage you. I just want you to be aware that autocrossing is NOT easy. :D

The best thing to put money into is driving schools and training so you can get as much experience and seat-time as possible.

Also, tires are pretty important in the overall scheme of things. Even relatively un-experienced drivers can turn fast times if their tires will hold up to the abuse. When on a budget, check with local competitors or racing clubs in your area to see if anyone has some used Solo I or track tires they are getting rid of. Many times tires that are no longer suitable for the track have a lot of autocross life left in them.

I'd have to agree on rjakobs's statement concerning tires. It's my opinion that good R (or Hoosier A) tires should be your first investment if you are serious about autocrossing. You don't need to buy them new. Alot of people, especially road racers, will be selling highly discounted, used tires, that still have a lot of life left in them for the auto-x track.

What I would do is go to a junk yard and get a set of wheels, steel or alloy, that closely match the size of your stock wheels (they don't need to be pretty) just to mount a set of race tires to. Therefore you'll have to sets of wheels, street and race.

If you can find a cheap way of getting more power, like an intake and/or exhaust, then do that first. If not, go for the suspension - springs, struts, strut bars, sway bars, etc.

so far i just have an intake. i am looking at getting an exhaust, short shifter, and strut brace when i get my tax money back in a about a month. is the pacesetter exhaust anygood? i've heard it's not the best, but i found it for only $158 and thought i couldn't go wrong for that cheap.

as for the class i want to run in, i have no idea what i could run in. i am just wondering more about mods i have to do right now. whatever the basic class for beginners is i will probably run that one.

p.s. i do know that i am in the land o' lakes region of scca if that helps at all

I do not know if $158 you are going to pay for a cat-back or just a muffler. But on ebay, you can get a good high-flow muffler for $50-60.

i found the pacesetter full catback on importperformanceparts.net for only $158

I would personally recommend Street Touring (STS) if you want to hot-rod your car. This is a class for lightly modified, small sedans on street tires. Read more about it here:

http://www.moutons.org/sccasolo/Rule...t_touring.html

You can ask some G1 Protege owners for some good setup hints, I'm not too familiar with these cars. However, I know that you can get some really nice, inexpensive parts- like the Ford Racing ZX2 Tokico strut kit for ~$160. Pseudo? :D

You could also take the intake off, get race tires and run in H Stock. Your car would make a decent, inexpensive choice for either class.

I strongly disagree with this. Horsepower has very little impact on an autocross course, particularly on a novice-driven car. A good autocross car is 70% chassis, 20% brakes and 10% power IMHO. If you're on a tight budget, your money is MUCH better spent on tires and suspension, usually in that order. Sticky tires, good shocks and a big rear bar will improve a stock Protege's times more than 100 extra horsepower will. :D

There is one exception to this: I like a louder-than-stock exhaust system on an autox car, mostly because it makes it easier to hear the engine while wearing a helmet. If you're looking at low-budget systems, don't waste your money on a Pacesetter system; you're better off buying a 2" Dynomax Super Turbo muffler ($35 from Jeg's), going to a local muffler shop and getting a custom 2" cat-back system built (should cost $50-$100). It won't be mandrel-bent and won't look pretty, but it will give you ~80% of the horsepower gain of an expensive bolt-on system for 30-40% of the cost. :D

Good luck! :D

Chris, I can agree with you too. I was reffering to the first time I went autocrossing, and it was a very tight and twisty course, and my 92 bhp 1.5L with only a front strut bar did not fare well against Neons, Focuses, Civics, and etc. My car had stock 13" tires, and a strut bar that dropped me from stock into STS class. Though I do agree, with a set of lowered springs, firmer struts, strut bars, and grippy tires, you are good to go.

in the h-stock class can i still use an exhaust? i'd like to get one, mainly because i like the sound of a good exhaust, but because i thought it would help when racing.

is the custom piping with the dynomax going to sound nice, or just loud. i really don't like it when i see a honda with some loud exhaust and they think it's cool and just cuz it's loud it's gotta be fast. i want something with a nice deep tone to it. and what size do i get? 2 or 2 1/4 in? the pacesetter is 2 1/4 and i know that darryl used the piping from that just with a different muffler.

i just called a couple different muffler shops in my area and they said for 2 1/4 in cat back piping only it would be from 300-700bucks. i thought only the muffler on the pacesetter was bad for rusting, but is the piping still good?

$300-$700 for a custom-bent system?!? Holy overpriced piping, Batman!! :eek: That price is OUTRAGEOUS. You obviously have not called the right muffler shop. The ones you called are trying to :inthebum: you. I've had several custom-bent systems built for me; the most I've paid is $120, and most of them have been in the $60-$80 range.

BTW I have a hint... muffler shops tend to come in two varieties- the glossy, nice-looking chain stores like Midas, or corrugated-metal shacks in bad parts of town, staffed by scruffy-looking guys wearing dirty brown jumpsuits with "Billy Ray" stiched on the front pocket. :D The ones that do the best custom work, believe it or not, are usually the SECOND kind. The national chains' main business is bolting on prefab stock replacements, and they usually charge too much for custom work and often do a crappy job. Ask around and find out who the racers in your area use.

To address the noise question, Dynomax Super Turbos are not the best-sounding mufflers in the world- they sound kind of blatty and they tend to resonate a bit at highway speed- but they aren't excessively loud IMHO, as long as you keep the diameter reasonably small, and they will not give you the high-pitched, loud-ass "ricer" wail of the Ebay-special, oversized, straight-through mufflers that the Honda crowd seems to like so much (most of which are actually glorified louvered-core glasspacks, but I digress). However, keep in mind that you get what you pay for. It will NOT sound as good as a $400 Racing Beat system, but the Pacesetter system will not be any better. :)

Do you think the Dynomax muffler will give you a headache after driving for a long time? I rode in a crappy Honda that had some kind of funky exhaust, it got really annoying really fast...

the shops i called were midas, meineke and car-x. i thought that seemed pretty spendy. could i get the pacesetter, ditch the muffler and get like a magnaflow or other type of muffler? is the piping bad also on the pacesetter or is it just the muffler?

SInce I have personal experience with this, I figure I should comment.

First, I replaced the stock muffler with a Dynomax Super Turbo (2 1/4"). The car felt stronger, climbing hills in 5th that it hadn't before. Not a big change, but noticeable. Of course, the stock muffler had 175k/12yrs on it. Noise was slightly higher, but most apparent when coasting down hill. Tone was fairly deep. Drove from LA to Seattle with that set-up, and hardly noticed it.

Last September, I finally installed a Pacesetter header, and the car got a lot louder, but still not too bad. The exhaust drones a little until you get over 65-70mph, at which point the sound disappears. But even then, it's still not very loud. My GF (oops! my fiancee) is now driving the car daily, and I can hear her drive up to the house if I'm in the front. But it's no where near as loud as either the old Rod Millen (Liestritz) exhaust or Darryl's Pacesetter/Magnaflow.

From outside the car, it's a little loud at higher RPM, but not annoyingly blatty like some of the ricers.

And compared to the other exhausts, it apparently doesn't lose much HP. Or if it does, it makes it up with torque.

But, back to the subject of autocross set-ups. I agree with Jesse (not to big a surprise:) ) that if you're going cheap, running stock is the way to go. If you can find a '92-'94 Protege rear bar, that's a cheap stock class upgrade ('90-'91 use 20mm, '92-'94 use 21mm. Apparently, '91-'96 Escort GTs also use a 21mm rear bar as well). But replacing the stock struts with the $160 (for a set of 4!!) ZX-2 struts will make a noticeable difference. The ride will be stiffer, but FAR more controlled, and not too bad.

Many regions offer street tire classes (on the theory that not everyone wants to spend the money for extra rims and race tires). For street tire classes, you can get a set of Falken Azenis, which are cheap tires ($45 or so each) that you run during the season, and then switch to snow tires for the winter. Depending on how many events you run, and what kind of surface, the Azenis should last 1-2 seasons.

Sorry to divert off-topic again:

Yeah, the typical "long" drive that this car usually takes is from Santa Barbara to San Francisco, so about 330 miles.

The muffler might be rusted from the inside, as the car was sitting for about two years...you wouldn't believe how much water came out. That would mean doing the upgrade wouldn't be unjustified. Going that route would probably still be cheaper than having the dealer install one....

Why bother? You will just wind up with the same thing as a custom bent system for more money. The Pacesetter pipe is not any higher quality than what you'll get from a muffler shop. Re-read my earlier post... you need to call Scruffy's Performance Muffler Shack. :D

BTW if you're determined to use a chain store, make sure they thoroughly understand what you're doing. Some chain stores have gotten into the "ricer" muffler business with their own overpriced brands of bolt-on cat-back systems. Make sure they are quoting you the price for a simple custom-bent pipe, NOT an entire cat-back system including the muffler.

Check classes and rules...
 

My 2 cents - having done a lot of AutoX a few years ago - if you want to be competitive, check the classes and rules before you decide on mods. It may turn out that some silly unimportant mod you decide to do will drop you into another class, where everyone else has extensive (expensive) mods, and you might not be competitive. Some of the other posts mention this, but I suggest you make it a starting point. Or, at least start out in Stock (if allowed), and see what others are doing before making major decisions.


Good luck!

dont even bother... with an intake u aint runnin nething good...
Sileighty?? u got one?? im close, but i need the sr20DET...

i don't have a sileighty, but someday, hopefully. what i really want is a skyline gt-r. that would rule over anything on the road after i got my hands on it.

also, this might be for a different section, but can anyone tell me what to do about oversteer? today on the way home from school i was going about 60 mp/h on an offramp of the freeway and i cornered fine, but then i could feel the back end start to kind of kick out. would i need a rear lower tie bar or better shocks/struts or..??

BTW a little oversteer is GOOD. :cool: It helps rotate the car coming into tight autox corners and couteracts the inherent tendency of FWD cars to understeer while accelerating. The fact that a Protege WILL oversteer in stock form is one of the reasons they make good autox cars. Many newer inexpensive compact sedans (Civics and Corollas spring to mind) will not break the rear tires loose on dry pavement unless you use the handbrake. :(

as for the quality of the Pace system, i can only comment from my own experience. and mine has been good. It's been on for about 4 years and the piping is just fine. looks like crap, but thats normal. It also fit perfect. I just hated the sound, so i swapped mufflers and added a resonator. Fine for racing, but sucks for daily driving. So i swapped mufflers once again to an N1 for a regular ole 3" tip and a silencer, which to my suprise works pretty well...

As for performance, the Magnaflow and N1 showed a better flow than the Pace, but are pretty equal to each other.

The quality of the RMM (leistritz) and the Pace i'd have to say are pretty equal. When i pulled the RMM off when it died, i compared it to the Pace and it looked pretty much identical except for slightly less of a bend over the rear axle. Mind you the RMM muffler sounded much better,

As David said, the addition of a header will noticably boost the sound.

As for autocrossing...as suggested, tune the driver, then tune the car. Although in my case the car was already pretty mod'd. So as i went on, i just replaced with better parts. But don't make the mistakes i made early on, by changing the car for every race...it just creates a new learning curve each time. Learn the car as is, get comforatble with driving at the limits and learn those limits. Once you uderstand how to "drive the course" you'll start to understand how to "drive the car".

good news everyone! i found the scruffy shop you were tellin me to find. they said $50 for just the pipes and about $75 to install. i just went to qwestdex.com, but in exhaust and looked for shops in weird little cities. it worked. thanks to all who helped me with everything on this post.