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Here is one of my sessions from Sunday in good weather and after I had some seat time in the car to know where its limits were (still haven't found some of them).
Track was between drizzle/damp and sunny/dry. It was raining off and on both days. Temps were low 40s to mid 50s with moderate wind at times.
Overall the car did great. I ran it in manual mode for the A8 trans, in Sport Mode, all nannies on, 35-37PSI front/rear and the only performance mod done was the Motul RBF 600 in the lines. I was running the OEM Track Vents, but I don't count those as a mod since they're from Chevrolet directly.
I have an A8, non-NPP, MSRC and 4 piston fronts. This is with the OEM pads, rotors and lines.
I didn't have any serious fading issues all weekend long (10 sessions at 20-25min a session over Sat/Sun).
Oil temps shot to 270F-ish and stayed there. Trans temp never got much over 180F. Tires gained about 4PSI front/rear from track use, but settled back down after. Need to run the Dexos2 0W-40 next time in the engine.
About 60% through the session I could feel the tires getting a little slippery, but it wasn't bad and was easily corrected with backing off a little.
For those of you that know RA, you'll know it's rough rough rough on brakes and you're always advised to have spare pads/rotors and to run higher temp fluids at a minimum.
My Grand Sport would lie in the HUD about gear at times. If you braked hard, from high MPH (like 120+) and manually commanded down gears, you'd get to a point to where the HUD would indicate, say, 2 but in reality, it was in 3. When you're going in to Turn 5 and your trans decides to downshift finally, that's a car upset danger. ----- I did not notice any such behavior with the A8. If I told it to upshift or downshift, it would do it and indicate correctly in the HUD.
I will point out, that for me, the Tach in the HUD was a little slow from the analog. To the point that a couple times I got complained at by the engine management systems because I was pushing to near red for some shifts due to RPM/Speed and corner speed. It's not that it's wrong, it's slow to ramp for some things. SO, just be aware of that if your local track has speed/RPM that make you straddle the red before you can safely shift.
In the last two sessions of the weekend, I was just then starting to get brake complaints from the car and it was a minor complaint that was corrected by changing up braking and entry speeds a little
Overall, I feel GM hit a serious home run with this thing. Even without a manual trans, the lighter 1SS, the upgraded track brake 6/4 kit, the car was solid all weekend long. I put around 205mi of hard track time in it and not once did it complain, over heat, brake fade to failure, tire over temp to failure or pop any sort of DIC messages or DTCs. Granted I'm still learning and not an expert, but I wasn't being easy on the car either.
I even had several others come over and ask about the car and state that it was quick. When 1LE and ZL1 come about and are in the hands of the capable, they're really going to surprise some people on the tracks (if the overall behavior and performance of my 2SS auto is any indicator). I'm still floored that I took what was basically a factory stock Camaro, only did a brake fluid change and it took an over 200mi track beating with a smile on its oversized grille.
Good job, Chevy..
Note: Around 20:00 in the video, you'll see a truck coming out. A car went off (they're ok, no impact) and I cut that part from the video as you could see the car, plates and number and I felt it would be disrespectful to leave it in. The session ended after Turn 14 anyways, so nothing missed in track time (though, the more important part is that the driver was OK)
Video link below
Track was between drizzle/damp and sunny/dry. It was raining off and on both days. Temps were low 40s to mid 50s with moderate wind at times.
Overall the car did great. I ran it in manual mode for the A8 trans, in Sport Mode, all nannies on, 35-37PSI front/rear and the only performance mod done was the Motul RBF 600 in the lines. I was running the OEM Track Vents, but I don't count those as a mod since they're from Chevrolet directly.
I have an A8, non-NPP, MSRC and 4 piston fronts. This is with the OEM pads, rotors and lines.
I didn't have any serious fading issues all weekend long (10 sessions at 20-25min a session over Sat/Sun).
Oil temps shot to 270F-ish and stayed there. Trans temp never got much over 180F. Tires gained about 4PSI front/rear from track use, but settled back down after. Need to run the Dexos2 0W-40 next time in the engine.
About 60% through the session I could feel the tires getting a little slippery, but it wasn't bad and was easily corrected with backing off a little.
For those of you that know RA, you'll know it's rough rough rough on brakes and you're always advised to have spare pads/rotors and to run higher temp fluids at a minimum.
My Grand Sport would lie in the HUD about gear at times. If you braked hard, from high MPH (like 120+) and manually commanded down gears, you'd get to a point to where the HUD would indicate, say, 2 but in reality, it was in 3. When you're going in to Turn 5 and your trans decides to downshift finally, that's a car upset danger. ----- I did not notice any such behavior with the A8. If I told it to upshift or downshift, it would do it and indicate correctly in the HUD.
I will point out, that for me, the Tach in the HUD was a little slow from the analog. To the point that a couple times I got complained at by the engine management systems because I was pushing to near red for some shifts due to RPM/Speed and corner speed. It's not that it's wrong, it's slow to ramp for some things. SO, just be aware of that if your local track has speed/RPM that make you straddle the red before you can safely shift.
In the last two sessions of the weekend, I was just then starting to get brake complaints from the car and it was a minor complaint that was corrected by changing up braking and entry speeds a little
Overall, I feel GM hit a serious home run with this thing. Even without a manual trans, the lighter 1SS, the upgraded track brake 6/4 kit, the car was solid all weekend long. I put around 205mi of hard track time in it and not once did it complain, over heat, brake fade to failure, tire over temp to failure or pop any sort of DIC messages or DTCs. Granted I'm still learning and not an expert, but I wasn't being easy on the car either.
I even had several others come over and ask about the car and state that it was quick. When 1LE and ZL1 come about and are in the hands of the capable, they're really going to surprise some people on the tracks (if the overall behavior and performance of my 2SS auto is any indicator). I'm still floored that I took what was basically a factory stock Camaro, only did a brake fluid change and it took an over 200mi track beating with a smile on its oversized grille.
Good job, Chevy..
Note: Around 20:00 in the video, you'll see a truck coming out. A car went off (they're ok, no impact) and I cut that part from the video as you could see the car, plates and number and I felt it would be disrespectful to leave it in. The session ended after Turn 14 anyways, so nothing missed in track time (though, the more important part is that the driver was OK)
Video link below
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