Eagle's Canyon Raceway 12/8/2011.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=etkgRD-kGIM (spin around 5:30) what not to do

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pSSW3YXrFH4 (Les Betchner driving. 20 year Bondurant instructor) (For some reason some of the video doesn't sync well, but I highly recommend listening to what Les has to say about the the car and his impressions of how it handles etc..)

A couple videos are posted with me driving at ECR and Les Betchner driving my c63. Les was an instructor at Bondurant for 20 years and is an awesome driver and instructor. I engaged him to help me out for about a 1/2 day to understand the car etc...

First, let me qualify things a couple of ways, please ignore some of my stupid commentary! Second, I am by no means a great driver, I have done quite a bit of time at the track over the years, but this is my 4th event in about the past 6 weeks and I hadn't done a track day/event for about 5 years prior to about 6 weeks ago, so I'm a bit rusty. Third, this was my first day at the track in the C63 and I went to the AMG from a Boss 302 Laguna Seca, which for all intents, is a beast at the track in the right hands (not mine obviously).

I have always been a bit of a wuss with traction control, in this case I drove the first half of the day with it on, but in sport mode. The traction control, even in sport, was very interferring, it would let the tail end come out a little bit, but not much and when exiting corners and getting on the gas the light was constantly flickering indicating the TC engaging. I suspect this would be helped by better and bigger rubber, the stock Yokohama's did ok, but they are not track tires!

Brakes-they work great BUT the pads are not really up to track days, about mid way through the day the pads were turning white and getting quite hot. A couple of times while braking at, roughly, the same brake point with the same pressure they weren't stopping as well as the previous lap which found me having to give more brake to the point of ABS a few times. With that said, when they were not hot they worked great and I felt more confident in the brakes of the AMG vs. the Mustang (though in the Mustang I never had to worry about pad fade).


Body roll-for such a heavy car it was not bad at all, though I believe (for me anyway) some suspension tweaks will be on my to do list) stiffer spring rates for sure, a bit lower to compensate for being so top heavy because of the stupid panorama thing, would also be nice to get a little more camber in front. Will start investigating which set-up may make the most sense for me.

Acceleration-wow, this car hauls a**. On the straight I was regularly hitting 117/118 mph, which was about 10 mph faster than in the Mustang. This car is deceptively fast.

Wheel/Tires-OEM tires on the OEM wheels does not a track day car make, at the end of the day my passenger front was past the wear bar. 275s/255s would be awesome, especially with some R-compounds (PS Cups or something), which I was running on my Mustang (P Zero Corsa System).

Transmission-first part of the day I had no problems leaving it in sport handling in manual mode. The second half of the day with TC off in Manual Mode shifting near redline I would get kicked out of manual mode and put into S+ and the the power was retarded somehow. I would give it full throttle and it would barely move the car forward. It was strange and I had to come off the track a few times. Finally, the last couple of sessions I started short shifting at about 6k rpms and staying out of 2nd gear and the problem stopped occurring. This was not cool at all, I was getting no error codes, the oil temp was around 270. Don't know, but the dealership will be looking in to.

Seats-if you have a long torso sitting in a proper driving position with a helmet on is tough. Great side bolster though, held in place quite well, though an aftermarket harness is ordered and on the way.

Traction Control-much more fun with it off, though if you are not an experienced driver I highly recommend having a very good instructor with you. My next instruction day is going to be spent at a skid pad learning car control, I think that (if you're like me) learning car control will totally open up the possibilities of the car for us, I don't want to learn how to spin on track days! I failed miserably at it as you can see from the video.

Feel-the car really let's you know what it is doing, but not quite as much as the Mustang and some other products out there, but that also may be just a lack of experience on my part. It feels good all in all.

All in all it is a totally fun and awesome car. Not quite as fun as the Mustang was, but that was a purpose built car used on the streets.

Finally, on my spin I hit a cone and the cone somehow got wedged between the car and dirt for a moment and one of the corners of the cone dented the underside plastic protection under the passenger side oil cooler either breaking an oil line or the cooler itself. Had to have the car towed.

Oh, I know it's not the best video but I was using my HTC Thunderbolt. You get what you get.

 

Great write up
Looks like u enjoying u c63 the rite way. Good for you drive safe.

 

Thanks.

Update on the oil leak. The screw that holds in the plastic covering is pointed (really???), when the cone pushed the covering up the pointy end of the screw hit the steel brake line and caused a pinhole leak in the line, under pressure it squirts a stream out. Also loosened the line a bit. New line on order, be in Monday. C250 loaner! Whoohoo!

 

Nice spin !

I like people pushing the car to the limit !

Enjoy the car in a safe way !!

 

Nice vid. Thanx

 

thanks.

 

I can't wait to get my OS Giken LSD installed and hit the track! Thanks for the write up.

 

It only gets better, everything you plan to do will make the car more suited for track duty and you will be surprising plenty of "sports car" drivers.

 

When oil temps get above 270 the car will start acting the way you described it is not any fault that the dealer can correct. At that point manual mode is useless and makes the problem worse. Sport mode buys some time but you really need to back off and let the oil temps drop back below 260. I find that often the tires are scorched by then also so a couple cool down laps help in several ways. I understand that the BS and SLS have a different aux oil cooler that is 50% bigger which may be something to look into.

 

Wow, that's really not that hot! Is there a sw/tune that can raise the temp before shutdown? Any idea where to find an aux cooler?

 

+1 ????

 

Nice vid, great write up and THANK YOU for taking your AMG to the track and DRIVING her.

 

Really enjoyed your write-up. Sounds like you're having a great time with your ride.

I saw a Boss Mustang on the road the other day. It looked and sounded great.