Honda Performance Development

[krash]

I was just stumbling around reading about suspension stuff when I came across this:

http://hpd.honda.com/racing-line/

Now, I do my fair share of poking fun at hondas, but damn. THIS IS AWESOME! It's mind-blowingly cool that they're actively contributing something to enthusiasts and people that are into motorsports. Boy wouldn't it be cool if ANOTHER company were to have a similar attitude? *hinthintnudgenudgewinkwink*

[flohtingPoint]

Easy answer for this one, Honda made a couple outstanding vehicles that perform well in national level competition. EF civics (and some EG civics) and the S2000's are mainstaples in amateur motorsports. Honda has contingency money they give out too, to winners/podium positions, hell I even won stuff from Honda when I karted because I (like most other shifter kart drivers) drove a CR125. Honda/Mazda are excellent about:
a) Building cars that can perform out of the box.
b) Caring about the customer

Nissan has two awesome cars in the GTR and the 370 (one of them is even affordable!), but they offer no support and have a crap motorsports department in "Nismo".

[krash]

You pretty much summed it up Jim haha

[float_6969]

I was going to mention that Mazda had the same thing, but he brought it up already. It really would be nice if Nissan would support it's racing heritage like it used to. Now they're only interested in you if you're in F1.

[RicerX]

I have to say that, for sport compacts, Mazda really nailed it with the Speed3 suspension-wise. My benchmark for that was my B15 Sentra Spec V. The cars almost don't compare. I have always been impressed with OEM suspension setups in every Mazda I've driven - (3 sedan, speed3 hatch, protege, MS Miata).

Fighting the temptation to blow money on cobb's website for the Mazda once I'm financially ready to play with cars again.

That little Honda website there is neato. Makes me sad about Nissan's current state in Nismo.

[flohtingPoint]

I have to say that, for sport compacts, Mazda really nailed it with the Speed3 suspension-wise.

Huh? That car is made of concentrated garbage. With it's horrible McStrut setup that we couldn't achieve any camber out of, the car did NOT turn, even when we dialed in rear toe. We fielded one in national competition two years ago and were about 6 seconds off the pace, that car savagely sucks. Another plus to it's suspension that "Mazda really nailed" is the fact that it snow-plows the moment you even look at the throttle. Here is what our set of r-compounds looked like after 15 runs. The tire on the left is a front, the tire on the right is a rear.



That is piss poor tire wear from a piss poor car. After two events, the car owner sold the car, he moved onto a Z06, I went to the shifter kart.

[RicerX]

perhaps I should rephrase - for my particular application i think Mazda did a great job. my particular application being not any type of god-like pro stock driving.

i was good with your post until i read the part where the owner bought a corvette after trying to make a speed3 work for what he wanted it to do. we call that kind of purchase a "misfire" in my industry.

[krash]

In his defense I think it was his buddy's mazda. I don't think that its a piss poor car if it didn't do good in one scenario. But Jim is very critical of his machines haha

[flohtingPoint]

perhaps I should rephrase - for my particular application i think Mazda did a great job. my particular application being not any type of god-like pro stock driving.


i was good with your post until i read the part where the owner bought a corvette after trying to make a speed3 work for what he wanted it to do. we call that kind of purchase a "misfire" in my industry.

The MS3 runs in a class called D-Stock. We were trying to make the MS3 work for D-Stock level times, we were 6 seconds off the pace with the dial-in from a multi-time national champion (who has a business selling parts and giving advice on setup) setting up the car for us (the same multi-time national champion set up both of the vettes we currently own, I trust him implicitly). The car owner then sold a D-Stock car and bought a car that runs in Super-Stock (totally different class), that is a proven vehicle in that class. Two different tasks at hand here. Trying to be competitive in D-Stock and trying to be competitive in Super-Stock. The only "misfire" was trying to make a car, that is horribly engineered, be competitive. I have no idea what your "particular application" is, but I have timesheets and data logs (sustained lateral g, transitional lateral g, acceleration vs distance vs time, etc) from a motorsport (that exposes any weakness in suspension design) at a national level that prove the car is just terribly designed. Even if I didn't have both of those things, look at that tire wear!!!! 15 runs and the fronts were trashed. That set of r-comps cost 1,100 dollars and in a weekend we destroyed two of the tires in a fruitless effort that was monstrously off the pace. Will the POS get you to/from the supermarket? Sure. Did Mazda "nail it suspension-wise" with the MS3? Not a chance in hell.

The car Mazda "nailed it, suspension wise" was the MSR, a purpose built vehicle in support of the competitive drivers.

Everyone likes to make the copout of "oh I'm not trying to be a pro racer, blah blah blah", well neither am I. All I'm trying to do is the same thing anyone is trying to do when they stomp on the go-pedal, I'm trying to be fast. You cant make the claim that something has a great suspension if you dont give a crap about actually making that suspension function... Going to Walmart isn't going to expose the weaknesses of a car, the MS3 will be on equal ground as an MP4/4, there is no benchmark on public roads.

[krash]

I think his application is just daily-driving with some spirited driving every once in a while, maybe some auto-x. I don't think xenonSE-R is really out there to compete, but just to get a smile on his face. Plus, you can only go so fast on windy public roads.

Now, if he was out there looking for a car that would take him to work and compete well at auto-x, then evidently the MS3 is a poor choice.

[RicerX]

Honda/Mazda are excellent about:
a) Building cars that can perform out of the box.

That car is made of concentrated garbage.

Glad you could finally clarify which of these opposite statements you meant. Unless there's some pro-stock D class I don't know about where it's possible to have a car that's made of concentrated garbage perform well out of the box.

I think you just like to argue and overly assert your amateur racing experiences as much as possible, and that's fine. I suppose that's what car forums are for. I humbly withdraw from this discussion.

[flohtingPoint]

I think you just like to argue and overly assert your amateur racing experiences as much as possible, and that's fine. I suppose that's what car forums are for. I humbly withdraw from this discussion.

If that's what you're reading into what I'm saying, you're just being overly sensitive... If anything, you're the one with the ego problem, trying to make this about you being "asserted" upon by me and my experience. Dude, I said I got obliterated in that POS, that isn't me bragging... 6 seconds off the pace, thats one of my worst losses ever. This isn't about YOU or ME, it's about how bad the car is. Read my actual words, stop getting defensive. I'm not saying you have to do what I do, or you should do what I do. All I'm doing is posting ACTUAL FACTS supported by ON TRACK EXPERIENCE and reviewed TELEMETRY so that I can back up what I'm saying about the car. I'm not saying I'm superior, I'm saying the car is inferior. Like I said, I have no idea what your "particular application" is, but unless you're actually making the suspension function, you're not going to really know if it has shortcomings or faults. If you're just daily driving and going to 7 Eleven, the MS3's suspension is as well done as a Ford Ranger's, or a Ferrari F430's because you're not making them work.

Honda/Mazda are excellent about:
a) Building cars that can perform out of the box.

That car is made of concentrated garbage.

Glad you could finally clarify which of these opposite statements you meant. Unless there's some pro-stock D class I don't know about where it's possible to have a car that's made of concentrated garbage perform well out of the box.

You're creating a logical fallacy. I said they made cars that perform well out of the box. I didn't say ALL Mazdas perform well out of the box. It's Modus Ponens...

Like I said, anytime anyone is presented with actual on-track knowledge of (insert vehicle here) or (insert car component here), they always cop out with, "Oh, well I'm not trying to be a pro racer". Drop that garbage, thats a weak and foolish response. Think of it this way, if you walked into a house and said, "man, the people that built this house really nailed it with this place", but then a structural engineer comes by, tears off a piece and shows you exactly how the place is being rotted away by bad plumbing and shoddy drywall, would you be a jerk and say "oh, well I never wanted to be an architect anyway"? No, you'd say, "wow, never knew that, good information".