Take a set of Continental ContiSportContact 3 tires, TEIN Mono Flex coilovers, Hotchkis sway bars, four hours of sleep, and mix them together. Repeat this for two days and what do you get? In our case, an opportunity to shave critical seconds off lap times with improved vehicle handling. Sounds pretty easy, doesn't it? As much as we'd like to say it was a lot of hard work, it really was as easy as it sounds.
Here at 2NR, we're always looking for reasons to get out of the office, and for this month's excuse, we set out to Fontana, CA's Auto Club Speedway, to test our project Mitsubishi EVO X. And if this particular Mitsubishi looks familiar, it's because this is the same car that competed in the Continental Tire STI vs. EVO Shootout that took place a few months prior.
The purpose of this test was a simple, yet effective experiment with adjustability of the TEIN coilovers and Hotchkis sway bars, to achieve faster lap times. For anyone who has tried to do track testing, you'll know that it can be a tedious and time-consuming process, not to mention expensive. Luckily for us, Continental Tire's launch of their new line of ExtremeContact DW and DWS tires happened to coincide with our testing schedule, and Terry Smouter and Dana Zamalloa of Continental Tire were gracious enough to slot us in for a quick test session the morning of the launch. To ensure consistent lap times, we enlisted the help of ex-staffer and race car driver, Andy Hope. We wired up a Racepak G2X Pro data acquisition to gather vital information on vehicle performance through various sectors of the course, and to record lateral Gs and vehicle speeds entering and exiting turns, to see how well the car responded to our suspension changes.
 Wheels : Volk RE30, 18x10.5...  Wheels: Volk RE30, 18x10.5 +25mm offset
Tires: Continental ContiSportContact 3, 265/35-18 |  Sway Bars : Hotchkis Sport...  Sway Bars: Hotchkis Sport Sway Bar Set
Front: 32mm tubular two-way adjustable bar: 50% and 70% stiffer than stock.
Rear: 32mm tubular three-way adjustable bar: 155%, 195% and 245% stiffer than stock. |  Suspension : TEIN Mono Flex...  Suspension: TEIN Mono Flex w/EDFC
Front spring rate: 12kg/mm
Rear spring rate: 10kg/mm |
Day 1
The EVO rolled onto the track at 6 a.m. with no new modifications since its STI vs. EVO Shootout debut-the premise was to test the car in the same condition as we'd last driven it. The stomping ground for this test was the 13-turn, 1.45-mile infield road course of Auto Club Speedway-known as a tightly designed track, capable of supporting speeds up to 110 mph. The testing procedure consisted of one warm-up lap, two timed laps and one cool-down lap, with the EVO posting its fastest lap of Day One at 1:16.30 seconds.
With the first stage one of our testing complete, we stopped by the local joint for a quick breakfast and drove the EVO to Santa Fe Springs, CA, to have Corey Bedthora of Hotchkis install their sway bars. We've heard horror stories of how long it takes to replace the EVO's front sway bar (which requires the steering rack to be dropped), but it only took Bedthora an impressive three hours to install both the front and rear units. After the sway bar installation was complete, we trekked our way to TEIN USA's Downey, CA, headquarters for some suspension consultation. Talking to head engineer Katsuma Nakai, we were advised to adjust the EDFC-controlled shock settings of our Mono Flex dampers to a mild setting of eight clicks in the front and eight in the rear (with 0 being the stiffest and 16 the softest).
Day 2
Once we figured out the shock settings we wanted to run for the final test, we headed back to the track the following morning to see what improvements our changes made to the EVO. After two timed laps, we immediately noticed Andy was able to induce the rear end to rotate much easier with the Hotchkis sway bar setup, and data showed track times a full second quicker, at 1:15.363.
As with all tuning, it's important for all parts installed to work together. In this case, the addition of the sway bars was able to bring the entire suspension setup together to work in harmony. Stay tuned for the next installment, where we take on the new Garrett 3071R bolt-on turbo, Deatschwerks 800cc injectors, and AMS intake, intercooler and downpipe, to bring our Project EVO's horsepower to a whole new level.