cschow

I'm probably going to be heading to the drag strip tonight. It'll be my first time, whats the best way to launch?

James F. Cannon

It depends on the car, weather and track condition. First try turning ESP off, stay out of water, brake torque and spin the rear wheels fast enough to smoke them. Make sure your trans is in fourth or drive when you stage. Left foot on brake, right foot on accelerator to 800 rpm, at last yellow light get off brake and smoothly depress accelerator (don't jam it to the floor or you may go up in smoke). If you get the hang of it you will see your 60' time improve (below 2.000 seconds is good, below1.900 is excellent for street tires). The trick is to minimize wheel spin off the line and get to full throttle as quickly as possible. You should have a good tire pressure gage and lower the rear tire pressure to 28psi to start. You should raise the front tire pressure to 45 psi to reduce rolling resistance. Hope this helps and good luck!

SiLvaC32

nice write up!

my401

What the hell is Cannon talking about? The best way to lunch is second light right turn and two blocks on right. Bubbas Lunch Wagon!! :p

cschow

Well, I did a bunch of runs, my best was 13.484 sec @ 106.28 mph. I had about 3/4 tank of fuel and no spare tire. Ambient temperatures were low, starting at about 50F and dropping to 40F by the time I left. Good for the supercharger but bad for tire grip!

I guess this puts us about 1 sec and 10 mph behind a stock E55. Will a Evosport stage II upgrade get us to E55 performance?

Here's the best time slip and some data gathered by my Gtech Competition. Note that the Gtech data is a bit optimistic for the 1/4 mile ET.

James F. Cannon

Not shabby for your first trip to the track! Did you play with the rear tire pressure? What was your best 60' time? Do you know how to cool down the engine between runs?
The G-Tech is always optimistic, especially with MPH!
Relative humidity has an effect on performance as well as ambient temperature. It has been my experience that as the temperature drops during the evening the relative humidity goes up and track times go up because traction is diminished! My best ever run was early afternoon, sun high to heat the track, low humidity(50-60% here in S. La.), temperature low to mid 60's, and managed a 1.925 sec. 60' time.

cschow

Thanks for the tips James. I did a bit of experimenting, but I decided I wanted to see what sort of acceleration my car could do the way I normally run in on the street, so I did not change my tire pressures.

I was interested in seeing how the heat build-up would affect the car as the runs built up, but my performance didn't seem to decrease from any heat soak, probably due to the cold ambient temperatures.

I sat out about 15 min with the hood up to try to cool things off near the end, but I think I forgot to turn off ESP in the post cool off runs, so those times ended up being worse!

My best 60' distance was on the above-posted time slip. I did another 2 runs in the 2.1's, but most of them were in the 2.5 - 2.6's.