There’s definitely a time and place for an Audi race car, just not sure the B8 is there yet. But in terms of powertrain and driveline, it absolutely kills it out there relative to other vehicles in the class. Especially for less skilled drivers.
I think what moves people towards this (the wrong way IMO for this nice of a car) are the factory track cars, like GT2 RS, Boss 302 LS (new GT350R), Z/28…pretty much cars with factory roll bars and no AC. Maybe the M3 ZCP to a limited extent.
I’m still agonizing over this decision, which I’ll probably make later this summer. I think there’s three ways to go about it:
keep the car OE plus: Recaro Sportster CS in black/red
go full racecar: Recaro Profi XL in red, 6 point cage in back
go half racecar/reversible: driver-only Recaro Profi Spa (carbon), driver-side only rollbar retaining partial use of rear seat
All 3 options cost about $4k. The last one is the most interesting, and I’m not sure it’s even possible. I don’t mind inconveniencing myself with harnesses and belts and a narrow seat. It would be nice to have a regular seat with a 3 point belt for the occasional passenger. And the ability to take a 3rd passenger in the right rear position. Let’s say I wanted to sell the car in 2019 - I’d put the driver’s seat back in and have the rollbar removed.
I think my motorsports shop would let me try a Sportster CS for a track day, and then I could assess whether it actually held me any better. If it was insufficient they’d simply order me the Profi’s.
Pretty much all the organizations (BMW, Porsche etc) require equal restraint for both driver/passenger. That kinda kills your drivers side only rollbar. Also not sure how that’d possibly be implemented.
You’re spending a ton of money on something that you’ll get limited benefit from. As mentioned previously in the thread, get yourself a cheap track only car. You’ll learn so much more at that point.
The $5-7k you’re looking to spend will easily buy a track prepped car that already has all the safety equipment in it…
The S4 is my cheap, old, paid off track car. I have no fear about driving it on track so I’m able to learn on it. I’m an instructor so technically I don’t need to take anyone in the right seat, or even have one. The rules typically say it has to have the same restraint type, not be the same seat.
The $5000 track only car is a fallacy. You can pick up an old e36 M3 for like $12k, then you’re in for another $3k of repair mods to the subframe and the other weak points. Then whatever performance mods you think are appopriate, $5k-$10k. It will perform like it’s 15 years older than my S4 beacuse it is. Oh, and you have to store this leaky old car in an expensive parking space in San Francisco. No thanks. My buddy who I go with did this to keep the wear off of his S5. He missed the last track day because the car was in the shop for repairs. So I got to go for free.
This would look really great as the only seat in my car:
Put two Recaro Sportsters in and call it a day, talk about paralysis by analysis. Unless you’re 5 5’ and 150lbs the Sportsters will support you just fine.
You’re an instructor now? It wasn’t that long ago you were practicing your shifting abilities. As an “instructor” I would think you would be taking quite a few passengers (one at a time) to demonstrate the proper line…and show students how it should be done.
I am under 150 lbs. The Recaro Profi fits quite nice. I think I’d need a Profi XL for passengers. Since you can’t get half pregnant with motorsports seats, you might as well get HANS protection if you’re going that far.
Lol about the Internet conjecture on my shifting. Believe it or not most Audi’s are automatic. You can’t really teach someone how to shift. All you can do is teach them the line, how to be smooth, and how to safely deal with ambiguity at speed (why is that car on the dirt, why is that flag waving, how do I take a corner offline, how do I deal with changing track conditions like sunset or rain).
@sakimono did get through to me and I spent an entire day working on additional shift points. I’m now using 5th gear on the front straight and 2nd gear on the slowest turn at thunderhill (11). It’ll never be as quick as PDK but I halved the time I was taking to shift. The single mass flywheel allows me to do that smoothly. My old habit was ingrained from babying the dual mass to not cause any chassis disturbance mashing gears.
I had ordered the rear side airbag option when I bought the car. On the passenger side there is a wire going into the rear seat back for a passenger occupancy sensor. The purpose is so that the car knows whether to blow the passenger curtain airbag, as a passenger could be sitting front or rear or both. It’s always going to blow the driver’s side airbag so no sensor on that side in the rear.
If anyone is curious, the rear seat backs weigh 67 pounds and the foam bench weighs 14 pounds, for a total of 81. I already had the foam bench out and the middle seat arm rest, so I lost 51 pounds today. This is to make room for TC Design to install some sort of 6 point cage. I presume it will weigh something on the order of 30-40 pounds (I have no accurate guess).
I think I’m going to go with Recaro Profi Spa (carbon back), Recaro steel side mounts, Recaro seat sliders, and 6 point Schroth harnesses. They shop is running a quote for me.
With the 650 pound rear springs the back seats are incredibly uncomfortable for any passenger. Everything feels great from the driver’s seat but I’m the one holding the wheel. The front passenger seat is no problem for a passenger, in terms of ride comfort.
So the 4 point, double cross rear cage painted black from the best welder on the west coast is quoted at $2000. Takes about 7 business days and I’m scheduled for end of June. They will paint it black. It weighs 2 pounds for every foot of tube; 40 feet of tubing are needed. So no net weight savings in the back.
Getting the final quotes on the seats. Those need to go in first so he can put the harness bar at the appropriate height.
Thanks for weighing the seats that’s some useful information there. 2K is not bad for a high quality cage for a 4 point but when your getting something to save your life why worry about penny’s either way.
Update: I ordered 1 Recaro Profi Spa, for the driver’s side. I want to compare the build quality to the SPG before I order a second. I also want to have a few people sit in it, to see if it’s an appropriate passenger seat. If it’s not I may need an XL on the other side.
This may not sound logical, but I’m going to order it with the Recaro steel side rails (as opposed to aluminum), and with the Recaro manual seat slider. I know the steel is heavier than the aluminum but I don’t care about weight in the floor boards. All I really care about is the strength of the seat. I hope it flexes a bit less than the plastic one (SPG). Not zero flex like the Ultima 1.0 HANS, but less flex.
West, are you building your car to race in a certain class?
Don’t forget to re-do corner balancing after you have all this work done. There will be changes.
