Prodrive Day Report

[DaveCollins]

The following is a short (well it started as a short one) report on my Prodrive day last Friday and in summary it is an excellent day.  I would urge all those RX-8 owners offered this by Mazda UK (first 5,000 cars sold) to take advantage of it, as you will not be disappointed.

The day started at 08:30 and cars were directed onto the circuit to park in front of the hospitality suite in 4 lines of 8 cars. It was a great site to see so many cars all together.  There seemed to be a fairly even mix of Red and Titanium cars, with a couple of Black and Silver cars and one Blue in attendance. Unfortunately I did not get a photo of this line up.

The day starts with a presentation to the whole group.  This covered a quick run through of the vehicles in the Mazda range culminating with the RX-8.  Then there was a run through on the history of the rotary engine and the Mazda rotary heritage, including pictures of Cosmo, RX-7 and of course the famous 787B-002.  Following on from this heritage and rotary engine description there was a talk about all the relevant technologies on the RX-8 that would be demonstrated by the activities during the day.  Super LSD, DSC, ABS, Electronic Brake force distribution etc. All in all the presentation was very good and very informative both for people like myself with some idea of rotary heritage and for those new to the engine and Mazda heritage.

Following the presentation we were split up into two groups, the first would head off for some on road driver training, and the second would start off with the track activities.  I was lucky enough to be in the group heading off for the on-road training which I think was the best way round to do it.  I had a very knowledgeable instructor who advised me on all aspects of roadcraft as we drove about 90 miles around Warwickshire over the next few hours.  It appears there is no set route however the route we took used both town roads, A and B roads and Motorway.  I found it very useful to get tips on road positioning, how to try and preserve gaps on the Motorway and a whole host of other items.  I must admit that the 2.5 hours we were driving round simply flew by.  Helped I guess by the fact that it was a lovely sunny day.

On return to the Prodrive facility we were treated to a buffet lunch before everyone swapped over activities.  Those of us about to do the on-track activities were given a quick safety briefing.  I would say that if anyone is worried about attending because they do not want to drive fast, or think they might damage the car then this is not an issue.  It was stressed several times throughout the day that people only need to go as fast as they are comfortable with and there is no pressure to do anything you do not want to do.  My advice is to go and do the bits you want to do because you will learn from it.  Anyway the following are details of the 4 on-track activities, each of which lasts for about half an hour:

Adverse Handling Track â€" This track is probably about a mile long (although I did not trip it) and varies between about 1.5 â€" 2 car widths in width for the majority of it’s length.  It has a mixture of tight bends from open hairpins to 90/60 degree bends.  There are also various camber changes and strategic bumps in some of the corners.  Initially my instructor did a couple of laps to show me the way round and then we swapped over.  Following my instructors advice I did several laps of this in 3rd gear without using the brakes.  This was obviously not the quickest way round, but it did demonstrate the accuracy of turn in and smoothness of the car.  Also showed that 3rd gear is very usable, and infact in the morning I was advised that this is the recommended gear for driving through town (30mph limits).  After a few laps like this I started to try and push the car a little bit more using 2nd and 3rd gear.  It was possible to generate some understeer but I think that was mainly when I went into corners a little bit too fast.  I was very impressed by the stability of the car, especially through the corner that had a 4 inch mound on the inside.  Whilst you could feel the car going over it, it did not seem to un-settle it at all.

Avoidance braking/ABS demo â€" This next exercise was split into two sections.  The first was to simulate hazard avoidance and consisted of driving at some cones .  On top of the cones were a set of lights which indicated the way that you were to swerve around them.  I only once chickened out and started to swerve round them before the lights came on, thinking I was getting a bit too close.  The car seemed very stable under this manoeuvre.  The next part of the exercise though was probably the most memorable part of the day.  First of all the instructor asked us to guess the distance it would take the car to stop from 70mph.  We all guessed and were all wrong by about a factor of 2.  We then all went and did a run upto 70mph and performed an emergency stop at a defined line of cones.  The main impression is that the car just stopped, the ABS was not as violent as some cars I have experienced and there was no panic with steering or anything.  Also all 4 cars stopped almost exactly where the instructor had said.  This shows how consistent the performance must be.  On the 2nd run at this the instructor said that I could accelerate upto whatever speed I wanted, except as soon as I started the emergency stop I had to take my hands off of the steering wheel!  Well I got upto about 85mph and started the stop.  Initially the car seemed to start to pull fractionally to the left, but it then almost immediately compensated for this and stopped in a straight line.  I guess this really demonstrates the ABS and electronic brake force distribution working effectively.  The instructor said that the braking performance of the RX-8 beat many “supercars” that he had tested.

After a quick tea break we got onto the final pair of exercises:

High Speed Handling â€" The high speed handling circuit is a 1.5 mile circuit which consists of long fast corners, chicane, 2nd gear harpin.  It also has various surface changes on some of the straights between different types of tarmac.  After 2 sighting laps performed by the instructor we were let loose to find out what the car does at speed.  I must admit to building up speed slowly whilst getting to grips with the track but it was an excellent experience and really demonstrated the stability of the car.  Especially through the long right hand corner, which I was taking at about 65mph in 4th. The fastest speed I saw was 97mph at the end of the long run from a 2nd gear hairpin upto the long right hander.  Afterwards I noticed I had done all of this with the A/C switched on.  I wonder if I would have got upto the 100mph without it.  I could probably have gone quicker but I was not braking especially late or hard into the corners as I was more trying to find out what the car would do without damaging it.  Although I did clip a cone by entering the chicane section a bit too quickly on one lap, luckily no damage done!

DSC demonstration â€" The final section of the day was a few goes on the skid pan.  This is one of only 3 in the U.K. and consists of ceramic tiles which are sprayed with water and simulates ice.  The first couple of runs were done with DSC switched on.  We had to weave from side to side and whilst you could feel the car sliding enough to apply corrective steering input the DSC prevented it from spinning.  On the third run we had to weave in a greater arc which would put the outside wheels off of the tiles and onto a concrete surface.  As soon as the two wheels hit the concrete then they gripped straight away.  Then to really demonstrate what the DSC system does we had to turn it off completely.  This was done by holding the switch in for over 7 seconds.  As the instructor said to me “you now have a 1970’s car with no driver aids”.  Well I had only done about two swerves on the skid pan before I totally lost it and spun, I guess the DSC is better at backing off the throttle at the right time than I am.  The first time I stalled the car and then switched it back on again.  The DSC was still totally disabled even though the ignition had been turned off and on.  Thus it seems like there is some minimum time that the ignition needs to be off for to reset the system.  I managed to spin on every attempt and it just goes to show how much the DSC does.  Also it just goes to show what skill people like Ingvar Carlsson had to keep a 300bhp RX-7 rally car pointing the right way without these sorts of devices!

The day finished just after 4:00 and a lot of very happy people made there way home to wash their cars.  

All in all a very good day which has given me even more respect for a great piece of engineering from Mazda.  I really did experience that childlike enjoyment that is the spirit of “Zoom Zoom”.  

A big thanks to Mazda UK for organising this for us lucky owners.

The following are a few pictures from the day.

Line up of RX-8s during lunch break

[DaveCollins]

Just to proove it was at Prodrive!

[DaveCollins]

Hazard avoidance

[DaveCollins]

Waiting for the skid pan - centre distance

[DaveCollins]

Silver car having fun on skid pan

[DaveCollins]

No danger of hitting anything on skid pan!

[DaveCollins]

Red Car on High Speed circuit

[DaveCollins]

Time for a wash

[scooby_si]

sounds damn good fun i\'m not at all jealous http://www.smileycentral.com/?partner=ZSzeb008\' target=\'_blank\'>http://smileys.smileycentral.com/cat/4/4_6_217.gif\' border=0> lol
Si (aka jealous!)

[druck]

Sounds like you had an almost identical day to me, great fun wasn\'t it.

Interesting you did the advere handling in 3rd, I kept it in 2nd which was great, it just hit the red line by the end of the back straight. Could have changed up, but it was just before the braking area and we weren\'t doing timed laps. On the no brakes laps, I cheated by shifting down to 1st for the hairpins the first time round. The instructor asked if it was a company car then, it isn\'t and I got the hint, so  decided to dab the brakes to save the engine and gear box after that.

I think everyone chickens out on the ABS tests the first time - you want me to get my brand new car how close to those cones!

Did you hook up a good lap on the high speed circuit? I wish I had a bit longer, as I was a bit inconsistant and doing different corners well each time, but not all together on the same lap. I was a bit disappointed with my performance there.

I only did one press to turn off the DSC on the skid pan, which reactivates the electronics on braking, but you dont need to brake there, just lifting off the throttle will get you a good 360 - and you\'ve got to give that a go at least twice But then pull off a clean slalom to please the instructor.

The trouble is I want to do it all over again now, so how am I going to resist doing a track day before long? :burnout

Cheers
---Dave

[Worthywow]

Any idea how close they are getting to the end of the first 5000 cars sold ?

I\'m getting mine in June and am keen not to miss out on the Prodrive day !

Richard

[druck]

Its got to be getting close. The ProDrive instructor I had for the road section was involved with the launch, and told me there were 3500 pre-orders (which is more that I though) and I saw somw figures that over 1100 had been sold in January. So I\'d get your order in now.

Cheers
---Dave

[DaveCollins]

Dave - last 10 or so laps of adverse handling circuit I was using 2nd and 3rd and the brakes.  It was much more fun that way.  I was interested to be told that this particular circuit is one of the places they do basic setup and test of tarmac suspension on the Scooby WRC cars. No wonder it is so narrow and twisty, and I wonder what sort of times they take to get round it.

I had a couple of what I considered good laps on high speed circuit but just when I got it all together someone hooked a cone out into middle of road between the 3rd gear right and left before the 2nd gear harpin which was just on the correct line so had to slow a bit to avoid.  It would be good to have been shown a hot lap by the instructors as I am sure they could go significantly faster, however I guess they would not do that in someone elses car.  I did find it useful to see just how stable the car is in a high speed corners.  It has given me the confidence to try a track day now and I will probably go for Japfest at Castle Coombe on 22/5 as that is my local circuit and I know which way the corners go.

On skid pan I was told to fully disavle DSC rather than just press once.  Instructor also told me that all my spins were due to too much throttle rather than lift off oversteer.  It just went to show how good that traction control system is.

I must admit I wouldn\'t half mind another go.

Dave

[MikeLMR]

Was this done on prodrives own test track ?  If so is it the Old British Leyland test track ? (half remember that it is from the Prodrive tour I had a while back)

Mike

[druck]

If anyone wants to see some more ProDrive day pictures, mine are here on the RX8 Owners Club website.

Cheers
---Dave