Track Prep Advice for 3.0si

[Molinites]

Hi,
Having owned my 3.0si M Sport manual Roadster for a month'ish It's already had an outing drifting at Oulton Park and on the Curborough Sprint track and although it impressed I'm worried about the oil.
It has been serviced with the correct Castrol oil however I think it should have a different oil for regular track abuse. Does anybody track theirs with an oil more fitting to the high temps?
Also looking into fitting an oil temp guage or iPhone OBD app to know if the temps are high if anybody has any experience of that too it would stop me trawling the web :?
Thanks

 

[Artful-Bodger]

I use Mobil 1 motorsport 10w60
it's expensive but fully synthetic and gives good protection, it's also very good in over 70K mile engines which have natural wear and rear.

 

[Scooba_Steve]

Oil recommendations are only of any use with oil analysis, which is only valid of that engine, with that driver.
I happily run on 5w30 with no temp issues on track. You'll have to experiment to find what's best for you.
Brake fluid is always worth changing before you go, picking something with a high boiling point.

 

[Molinites]

Thank you for your differing replies. It has 5-30 Castrol in at the moment but 30 seems quite low for track use? Glad to hear you have had no issues though. Plan to change gearbox diff and brake fluid also but want to get everything done at once. Hmmm what to do....?!

 

[Artful-Bodger]

Bear in mind the oil specified at the factory is for high mileage low drag (emissions) road use where the engine spends most of it's life in the 2-4K RPM band.

Track use increases load as well as temps due to much higher rpm so going for a higher spec will be a necessary insurance, I used the Mobil 1 10-60 in my Hillclimb /Sprint 325 Sport which spent most of it's life in the 5-7k rpm band, the engine lasted 2 years with up to 12 competitions a year and on stripdown had very little wear on the bearings, tappets, piston skirts or valve stems.

Whilst a lower spec oil may possibly have coped as well you have to factor in the cost of the oil to the cost of repairs!

 

[HelenZ4]

I would ask one of the oil manufacturers what they recommend - try people like MORRIS LUBRICANTS as they are a smaller, more customer focused supplier with a known quality and good reputation.

Great dirty photo by the way!!

 

[mr wilks]

Do some study on Millers CFS or Nano oils then buy some

 

[Molinites]

Thanks for the advice, will read up on your suggestions. Never imagined I'd read so much oil info

 

[mr wilks]

Thanks for the advice, will read up on your suggestions. Never imagined I'd read so much oil info

There are too many options & indeed too much written online making it hard to decide at times . Ive used Millers for many years in all sorts of vehicles , its not all about the supposed performance gains , its more about operating cooler when engine is hot & also from cold start

Couple of reviews here to kick you off

http://www.fastcar.co.uk/tuning/millers-nanodrive-test/

I also use the gearbox , brake & diff fluids from Millers but scroll down this one to the part where they discuss the CFS engine oil


http://asia.vtec.net/TArticles/Millers/index.html#.V50IwY-cHNM

 

[goldbcfc]

Castrol 5w30 in mine for track aslong as its LL01 or LL04 you will be fine if you want to use a oil with higher working temp go for a slightly thicker grade like 5w40 I used to use this in my e46 to reduce oil consumption over using 5w30. The older the car get should be using thicker oil anyway for better protection

ive done curborough twice this year what group did you track with?

 

[Molinites]

Sorry finding, buying and then sorting all the little jobs on my eldest's first car suddenly took over my life! I think that cars now had more jobs done on it in the last 4 days than the last 4 years.
Thank you Mr Wilks the write ups on the Millers products seem very good.
On a side note but to add to the headache my car does intermittently suffer from the infamous cold start HVA tick. Wonder if the Millers Nano tech would help with that??
Some friends occasionally privately rent Curborough so we keep the numbers down and miminize track waiting time. Great mix, E30 M3, E30 (E46M3 lump), GT3, Boxster S, caged Civics and MX5, Carrera, Modded Mini, Caterham type things, 335i, AMG C63, Colt CZT, Integrale.
Z4 surprised some, it certainly didn't embarrass itself
Who do you book through as I could do with some more dates?