Please List Model 3 PERFORMANCE track times

[stickman]

Yea we were surprised and were expecting a 1:55 or so, Randy himself thought that was doable. The traction control/track mode was being overbearing and we suspect it may have been due to the carbon ceramics throwing off the "balance" of the system, not positive yet.



Were using Cup 2 tires, which it seems are actually a bit slower than RE71s - but yea should be more than 3 seconds.



Yes, CW 13

Just goes to show you that putting on a bunch of expensive parts doesn’t mean you make your car faster. totally not singling you or anything @kbecks13 , it’s just a good reminder to folks that if you’re actually trying to improve lap times taking upgrades in a stepwise fashion and seeing the results of your mods before moving on is always a good idea.

 

[dfwatt]

Just goes to show you that putting on a bunch of expensive parts doesn’t mean you make your car faster. totally not singling you or anything @kbecks13 , it’s just a good reminder to folks that if you’re actually trying to improve lap times taking upgrades in a stepwise fashion and seeing the results of your mods before moving on is always a good idea.

That's one conclusion but I've got a slightly different angle. Namely that when you do several things at once you don't know what their interaction is going to be. In theory of course you're only doing things to make the car faster so the interaction should be synergistic but in some cases not. For example take the carbon-ceramic brakes. In theory they should give you essentially an almost unlimited heat tolerance for heavy braking. However if your stock rotors are not severely heat stressed and are able to get rid of heat adequately, all you'll gain is a modest weight savings. And if the CC brakes interact undesirably with vehicle stability control systems, which it sounds like they might have from what KBecks describes, you've got an undesirable interaction that you could not have easily predicted. In any case, I salute kbecks and anyone else who's exploring the outer envelope of performance on these cars. They are scary fast, way too fast to be exploring their upper performance limits on the street

 

[kbecks13]

Just goes to show you that putting on a bunch of expensive parts doesn’t mean you make your car faster. totally not singling you or anything @kbecks13 , it’s just a good reminder to folks that if you’re actually trying to improve lap times taking upgrades in a stepwise fashion and seeing the results of your mods before moving on is always a good idea.

Don't worry, i didn't actually buy all those parts...they were on loan for testing Only things that i've bought are in my signature.

In any case, it's still the fastest a Model 3 has gone around Buttonwillow CW 13!

 

[MountainPass]

I have to say that makes the 1:59.1 we did on the OE compound PS4S tires in Cameron's car feel really special, especially considering we hadn't ever been there before. Really looking forward to our next California visit!

Cameron did do a 1:58.7 at the last Tesla Corsa on A7's, but likely Randy went faster, not sure what the exact time Randy did was.

All in all, it's very cool to see everyone pushing and developing to make this car faster. Super impressive that the car out of the box can do 2:01's. Tesla did their homework!

 

[kbecks13]

I have to say that makes the 1:59.1 we did on the OE compound PS4S tires in Cameron's car feel really special, especially considering we hadn't ever been there before. Really looking forward to our next California visit!

It is pretty darn impressive!

Cameron did do a 1:58.7 at the last Tesla Corsa on A7's, but likely Randy went faster, not sure what the exact time Randy did was.

Just barely beat him with a 1:58.5 and that was on Cup 2's, which i've recently learned are actually less grippy than an RE71 contrary to what TW numbers would suggest. But really surprised we couldn't get to 1:55, the car certainly has it in it.

 

[SD_Engnr]

I have to say that makes the 1:59.1 we did on the OE compound PS4S tires in Cameron's car feel really special, especially considering we hadn't ever been there before. Really looking forward to our next California visit!

Cameron did do a 1:58.7 at the last Tesla Corsa on A7's, but likely Randy went faster, not sure what the exact time Randy did was.

All in all, it's very cool to see everyone pushing and developing to make this car faster. Super impressive that the car out of the box can do 2:01's. Tesla did their homework!

Impressive indeed!

When's your next visit to Cali? Weekend of June 29/30 in Monterey?

 

[Zoomit]

Yup, totally stock. Randy is amazing like that! Someone also managed a 2:06.7 in a RWD with minor mods, which is also super impressive.

I was thinking the stock 3P had Super Sport tires, not PS4Ss, on the 20' OE wheels. Can't remember about pads or fluid though. Either way, it was very close to stock.

Don't worry, i didn't actually buy all those parts...they were on loan for testing Only things that i've bought are in my signature.

I also wonder how much the tire size affected the results. IIRC, weren't the Cup 2s oversized at 265/35R20 on forged wheels?

 

[kbecks13]

I also wonder how much the tire size affected the results. IIRC, weren't the Cup 2s oversized at 265/35R20 on forged wheels?

Yup, about 3% larger than stock. My typical set is a 265/35/R19 which is about 0.8% smaller than stock.

This was done on purpose though, thinking that we'd get a little more top end acceleration.

 

[dfwatt]

Yup, about 3% larger than stock. My typical set is a 265/35/R19 which is about 0.8% smaller than stock.

This was done on purpose though, thinking that we'd get a little more top end acceleration.

A bit strange though don't you think, that they didn't run 265/30-20? Wouldn't that have been a touch faster?

 

[SD_Engnr]

Yup, about 3% larger than stock. My typical set is a 265/35/R19 which is about 0.8% smaller than stock.

This was done on purpose though, thinking that we'd get a little more top end acceleration.

With the drawback being a slightly longer time to get there, right?

 

[Zcd1]

I don't think guys posting fastest laps and driving McLaren's and GTRs are Weekend Warriors? Indeed Randy himself has a bunch of results on fastest laps so I'm not sure what your basis is for concluding that the lap times are somehow not reflective of the best or close to the best a given car can do?

It's not that I don't think Randy can get the best out of any given car - he has proven that he can time and again.

It's that fastestlaps.com isn't really a very reliable resource for lap times. Anyone can post any time up there, verified or not. I should know - I posted one of my own laps up there years ago, before I realized that there was no process or procedure for vetting of anything ever posted there.

 

[dfwatt]

It's not that I don't think Randy can get the best out of any given car - he has proven that he can time and again.

It's that fastestlaps.com isn't really a very reliable resource for lap times. Anyone can post any time up there, verified or not. I should know - I posted one of my own laps up there years ago, before I realized that there was no process or procedure for vetting of anything ever posted there.

So you didn't have to produce any kind of time slip? that's pretty sketchy for sure. If there was no vetting of any kind, you would expect the listing of times to be populated with highly implausible nonsense, but I've not seen a time that seemed crazy out of line. Given the grotesque predisposition of males to brag about their hardware (in all its protean forms!) you would think the lists would be covered with junk reports, but that doesn't seem to be the case. Perhaps there is some kind of quality control?

 

[kbecks13]

A bit strange though don't you think, that they didn't run 265/30-20? Wouldn't that have been a touch faster?

Depends on what you mean by faster, it would probably be quicker with a smaller tire but not faster.

With the drawback being a slightly longer time to get there, right?

Yes, but only at low speeds. Take a look at the awesome MPP HP/Torque graph to see what i mean, you are essentially stretching the ground speed portion of the X-axis (by increasing the amount of distance traveled per motor RPM) which does mean you spend more time in the "low power" region of the graph, but that's all < 50 MPH. Once you are past the start of the power drop off (around 50 MPH) you start to get some benefits by having more power and torque available than you normally would.

 

[Zcd1]

So you didn't have to produce any kind of time slip? that's pretty sketchy for sure.

Nope - Nada.

It’s not a valid reference source.

 

[MasterC17]

Depends on what you mean by faster, it would probably be quicker with a smaller tire but not faster.



Yes, but only at low speeds. Take a look at the awesome MPP HP/Torque graph to see what i mean, you are essentially stretching the ground speed portion of the X-axis (by increasing the amount of distance traveled per motor RPM) which does mean you spend more time in the "low power" region of the graph, but that's all < 50 MPH. Once you are past the start of the power drop off (around 50 MPH) you start to get some benefits by having more power and torque available than you normally would.

Indeed, same reason I went with a slightly larger tire than stock (275/40/18).

 

[MountainPass]

Depends on what you mean by faster, it would probably be quicker with a smaller tire but not faster.



Yes, but only at low speeds. Take a look at the awesome MPP HP/Torque graph to see what i mean, you are essentially stretching the ground speed portion of the X-axis (by increasing the amount of distance traveled per motor RPM) which does mean you spend more time in the "low power" region of the graph, but that's all < 50 MPH. Once you are past the start of the power drop off (around 50 MPH) you start to get some benefits by having more power and torque available than you normally would.

Buttonwillow is pretty fast, taller tires would be nothing but advantageous.

 

[paranoidroid]

Yea we were surprised and were expecting a 1:55 or so, Randy himself thought that was doable. The traction control/track mode was being overbearing and we suspect it may have been due to the carbon ceramics throwing off the "balance" of the system, not positive yet.

I think with the brakes now being majorly front biased from stock it throws off the VSC control loops which was tuned with the stock factory bias. You would have to do some calculations and figure out how to increase rear brake bias to compliment the new front brakes so the proportion is similar to stock.

Bias Calculator

 

[Mike Prachar]

Hi there - found this thread looking for some input after my day at Thunderhill last weekend.. Anybody have experience there yet?

 

[SammichLover]

...that was on Cup 2's, which i've recently learned are actually less grippy than an RE71 contrary to what TW....

The RE71R's tread wear number is widely seen in Autocross as a wink-and-a-nod cheater number. As far as I can tell, and have been told, TW # isn't really a firm, objective standard but rather largely what the manufacturer claims the number for a given tire is.

The big thing about RE71Rs is they hit their operating temp window a lot quicker that pretty much any other top performance quasi-street or track tire. That's a key part about why they are so favoured in Autocross, and it also is why they work so well for time attack in the Model 3, as maybe half lap from a cold start and they're already up to temp. That ready-to-go-now fits very well with a BEV which has its best performance near full SOC, at the maximum SOC where it still has battery room for full regen braking.

 

[Lucky13]

Hi there - found this thread looking for some input after my day at Thunderhill last weekend.. Anybody have experience there yet?

I did a couple days there. What exactly are you curious about?