Yesterday at MIR I ran for the first time ever in my life down the quarter mile. Did it in my SL55 first pass in my life got a 12.48 @114 mph with a 60 ft of 2.125 which left a lot on the table I was told, but not a bad "pop your cherry run"....had to get advice from guys like Clayton, Jay, Ahmad and Tony on how to do basic things like stage, burnout, strategy etc...half way down the track on my first pass I remember having a huge grin accross my face when I realized "hey this is pretty fun, just relax and enjoy it!!"

After that I was lining back to back runs all day until Tony finally told me to relax and let the SC cool off...used lots of bags of ice through the day, thanks again Jay!

My times were 12.4x mostly with Jay running my car to a nice 12.3x @114, 2.0 60ft ...and then coming and telling me a few more pointers...

With a few hrs left in the day Clayton (Benz-O-Rama) asked me if he could drive my car and I agreed. To my amazement (and the Eurocharged crew as well as Ahmad and the others)...BOR piloted my car to CONSISTANT 12.0x runs at least 8 runs back to back with a small ice break after the first 4...we were pushing real hard to try to get into 11.9's and the guys and I felt like we may have had it (if I had drag radials but I was on street tires...but we pushed anyway) and BOR gave it a great shot but we came just short at a best time of 12.03 @115 mph w/ 1.73 60 ft time ... a testament to Driver's skill comparing my times to Clayton's in my own car I have to say

I had so much fun and wanted to give a big thanks to Tony and the Eurocharged crew for their support and coming all the way from Chicago...as well as Clayton, Jay, Ahmad, and all the other guys out there that made this event such an awesome one for me and helped me along.

My SL55 is bone stock with street tires and Tony's stage 1 flash, which seemed to really help my otherwise stock car...I have no other mods at all....no TB, pulley, cams, exhaust or non of that stuff...not yet anyway ....so I am very pleased with the results from yesterday, not only in my experieces in learning and working to improve & having fun but also the car's performance...

Looking forward to the december 5th event....and breaking into 11's

(Copied for those that don't venture out of the SL55 forum)


Thanks for the kind words, Sunir. Truth be told, I had a lot of practice yesterday launching my car on all-seasons, so your car felt like it had full blown race slicks to me.

Your car will no doubt go 11's. I think if we would've let the car actually cool down a bit, we would've done it. That one 15 minute ice down didn't do jack. Too bad we were running out of time.

For those that don't know, Sunir is a road race instructor at V.I.R., so he knows his way around a race track. Just not the ones that don't have turns in them. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that he'll be able to pilot his own car into the 11's on Dec 5th. It was nice to be able to hop out of my SL600 and into his SL55. I was able to get a real world comparison between the two. As expected, the SL55 felt frantic. Like a bazooka shot at a target from point blank range, while my SL600 feels more like a sniper shot from 300 yards. When you mash the gas in his SL55, you feel it rattle your kidneys, but in my SL600, I was getting a massage at 120 mph. I'm not making that up. I really did have the seat massager on.

They're both remarkable cars, each great in their own way.

Then I drove JAYCL600's car. That thing is just stupid.

Awesome, good runs Sounds like plenty of fun was had. I can hardly wait to get my tune and hit our track also.

Hey!

Nice runs! I'm surprised a SL55 with stock engine bits and an ECU tune could run so quickly!!

Yep, I was impressed with it too. We were sooooooo close to cracking the 11.xx barrier but after 8 hot laps, the car was tired. Should also mention that this car was running 19" CCWs with low-pro tires.

Yeah before my first ever run I was just hoping for a mid 12's day...I was able to knock almost a couple of tenths off and then...we (actually BOR) atarted to knock the times lower and after several repeated 12.0x runs we were pushing hard for an 11 sec run...on a stock sl55 with a tune that would be just fantastic!

Alas we'll have to wait and see what happens in Dec...although I think we would have done it with Drag radials I kinda wanna see if we can do it with street tires in dec

John any advice on DR's (size and brand) for our cars? Also what did you do about wheels...just change the rears? what kind of wheels did you use (I was thinking ccw's maybe 18's...can 17's fit?)

Depends on the rear rotor size... I know on my SRT I can fit a 16" drag wheel over the 300mm rotor depending on backspacing and all that jazz...

i'd be willing to bet you could fit a 17... maybe a voxx mg 17x8 (some SRT guys are using them, but we need shorter bolts so you may need to check that out too).

although I'm sure there are lighter wheels out there that would be good for drag wheels over the voxx mg.

not sure about srt wheels or my brake size or any details that you mentioned; which I'm sure would help for sure...just asked John since he has an '03 SL55 also

Did a quick search...

Looks like the stock wheels sizes are:

F: 19x8.5 ET25
R: 19.9 ET28

Still haven't found stock rotor sizes... I'm sure it will be posted up here shortly though

stock on the sl55 (non 030 package) is 18x8.5 and 18x9.5 .... from '03 - '08

boo... definitely meant to put 18s.... i knew that...

hmm... well then just forget waht i said earlier...not sure now if the offsets are right... i'll search again later.

This is my former drag wheel setup: https://mbworld.org/forums/wheels-ti...mg-brakes.html Once was available for purchase but snapped up quickly by a saavy shopper.

Unfortunately my setup cannot be duplicated as Rial no longer sells those wheels (per Luke at Tire Rack).

CCW has 16" wheels that will clear the rear calipers but the tire widths are better in 17s.

Per all accounts Hoosiers and Mickey Thompson both make a great drag radial. The Hoosiers are several lbs lighter than the MTs, which is why I went with them.

HTH