houston half-mile shootout - Big Mac Kicks Italia Butt!

5454 Views 29 Replies 14 Participants Last post by Jerry, May 18, 2012

texas mongrel

Discussion Starter · May 12, 2012

Just finished running the car in the first Houston half mile top speed event. Lots of fabulous cars there (including a highly-modified, full race Ford GT that ran 212 in the half-mile!). Luckily for us, there was a white 458 Italia coupe running too. I made three passes, all within 2mph of each other. My best run was 157.5mph for the half mile - about what I expected. The best run the Italia made was 147.0! I think this pretty much puts to rest all the BS about Ferraris in the real world being different machines to the cars that are supplied to the journos - the McLaren was over 10mph faster every time.
I could never get launch to work, so all my runs were done in track-track with auto shifting. Maybe its a 160 car with launch? Using 'aero' (spolier up) gave me my slowest time of 155.5
For my last run, an on-line car blog called Gearheadflicks.com fitted two cameras plus a borrowed V-Box. I'll post the link when I get it.
Final comment about MP4 vs 458; there were crowds around the McLaren all day, no-one took any notice of the Italia. Crowd reaction was 100% positive, usually along the lines of "I never thought I'd see one of these" I'm consistently amazed by how much the car-loving public seems to know about the McLaren heritage and technical innovations.
This was a great day, the rumor is that the next one will be a full mile; what do you think - 190+?

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andy c

· #2 · May 12, 2012

Tex,maybe your not doing the launch control just right,i didnt get it to start to start with as i was being too gentle on the throttle to build up revs.JUST PUT IT IN LAUNCH .THEN MASH THE THOTTLE.before letting off the brake,works every time now

mac4lyf

· #3 · May 12, 2012

texas mongrel said:
Just finished running the car in the first Houston half mile top speed event. Lots of fabulous cars there (including a highly-modified, full race Ford GT that ran 212 in the half-mile!). Luckily for us, there was a white 458 Italia coupe running too. I made three passes, all within 2mph of each other. My best run was 157.5mph for the half mile - about what I expected. The best run the Italia made was 147.0! I think this pretty much puts to rest all the BS about Ferraris in the real world being different machines to the cars that are supplied to the journos - the McLaren was over 10mph faster every time.
I could never get launch to work, so all my runs were done in track-track with auto shifting. Maybe its a 160 car with launch? Using 'aero' (spolier up) gave me my slowest time of 155.5
For my last run, an on-line car blog called Gearheadflicks.com fitted two cameras plus a borrowed V-Box. I'll post the link when I get it.
Final comment about MP4 vs 458; there were crowds around the McLaren all day, no-one took any notice of the Italia. Crowd reaction was 100% positive, usually along the lines of "I never thought I'd see one of these" I'm consistently amazed by how much the car-loving public seems to know about the McLaren heritage and technical innovations.
This was a great day, the rumor is that the next one will be a full mile; what do you think - 190+?

Holy fark, you crushed the 458!!! Don't recall your spec do you have the heavier electric/heated seats or not?

TougeSpirit

· #4 · May 13, 2012

Yeah, you need to be flat on the gas then drop the brake! Not sure why you're not getting it to engage

texas mongrel

Discussion Starter · #5 · May 13, 2012

Guys
I am following the correct sequence exactly. I' ve tried "launch" about ten times. Once it worked perfectly. Twice it aborted with a message saying 'high clutch temperature'. The rest of the times, the light wouldn't come on when I pushed launch. I follow the same sequence every time. Regardless, I much rather gloat over trouncing a 458 than debate the idiosyncrhracies of Ron's software!

TougeSpirit

· #6 · May 13, 2012

Hmm sounds like something the dealer should check out the next time you bring it in. Still, crushed the Italia no sweat

andy c

· #7 · May 13, 2012

texas mongrel said:
Guys
I am following the correct sequence exactly. I' ve tried "launch" about ten times. Once it worked perfectly. Twice it aborted with a message saying 'high clutch temperature'. The rest of the times, the light wouldn't come on when I pushed launch. I follow the same sequence every time. Regardless, I much rather gloat over trouncing a 458 than debate the idiosyncrhracies of Ron's software!

Gloat away! it was very impressive ,more so on the fact that you did it yourselve and the fezza would be on launch

I had similar problems when i started using launch,thats why i mentioned it,infact i got the gearbox temp too high and this resulted in the hydralics aborting the use of the airbrake untill the whole system cooled down.It seems there are alot of sensors protecting me from destroying my baby

Sorry,started a debate again!!!
Well done ,great result lets see how far you are ahead at the mile run!!!Maybe far enough to stop for a cup of tea while your waiting for the competition

Stewart W

· #8 · May 13, 2012

Sounds like you had an amazing day..cant wait to see the vids..! Congrats...

texas mongrel said:
Just finished running the car in the first Houston half mile top speed event. Lots of fabulous cars there (including a highly-modified, full race Ford GT that ran 212 in the half-mile!). Luckily for us, there was a white 458 Italia coupe running too. I made three passes, all within 2mph of each other. My best run was 157.5mph for the half mile - about what I expected. The best run the Italia made was 147.0! I think this pretty much puts to rest all the BS about Ferraris in the real world being different machines to the cars that are supplied to the journos - the McLaren was over 10mph faster every time.
I could never get launch to work, so all my runs were done in track-track with auto shifting. Maybe its a 160 car with launch? Using 'aero' (spolier up) gave me my slowest time of 155.5
For my last run, an on-line car blog called Gearheadflicks.com fitted two cameras plus a borrowed V-Box. I'll post the link when I get it.
Final comment about MP4 vs 458; there were crowds around the McLaren all day, no-one took any notice of the Italia. Crowd reaction was 100% positive, usually along the lines of "I never thought I'd see one of these" I'm consistently amazed by how much the car-loving public seems to know about the McLaren heritage and technical innovations.
This was a great day, the rumor is that the next one will be a full mile; what do you think - 190+?

TAG

· #9 · May 13, 2012

Bruntingthorpe Aerodrome..

http://cars.uk.msn.com/reviews/mclaren-mp4-12c-2012-onwards-1

texas mongrel

Discussion Starter · #10 · May 13, 2012

OK, I think I've deciphered my "Launch" problem: The manual states that Launch will only activate provided that the airbrake has performed a self-test during the current ignition cycle. This self-test occurs at the beginning of every ignition cycle when the vehicle is driven at a speed over 9mph. Thus, when I'm waiting in line to make a run and I turn off the car whilst waiting, when I turn back on to creep forwards in the line, the car hasn't gone over 9m,ph, so the airbrake self-test hasn't occurred and the launch is therefore not permitted! I think the solution will be to either not turn the car off whilst waiting in line, or make sure that when I creep forwards I go over 9mph to allow the brake test to take place, or perhaps doing the airbrake self test manually is good enough? I'll figure all this out at my next event and report back, but it looks like this is the source of the intermittent success I've been having with Launch. Told you it was Ron's software - its waaaay too logical.

Oh, and to answer an earlier question on this thread, I've got the heavy "old man" power seats.

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mac4lyf

· #11 · May 13, 2012

texas mongrel said:
OK, I think I've deciphered my "Launch" problem: The manual states that Launch will only activate provided that the airbrake has performed a self-test during the current ignition cycle. This self-test occurs at the beginning of every ignition cycle when the vehicle is driven at a speed over 9mph. Thus, when I'm waiting in line to make a run and I turn off the car whilst waiting, when I turn back on to creep forwards in the line, the car hasn't gone over 9m,ph, so the airbrake self-test hasn't occurred and the launch is therefore not permitted! I think the solution will be to either not turn the car off whilst waiting in line, or make sure that when I creep forwards I go over 9mph to allow the brake test to take place, or perhaps doing the airbrake self test manually is good enough? I'll figure all this out at my next event and report back, but it looks like this is the source of the intermittent success I've been having with Launch. Told you it was Ron's software - its waaaay too logical.

Oh, and to answer an earlier question on this thread, I've got the heavy "old man" power seats.

Wow even more impressive that you have the heavy seats!!! Can't imagine how many car lenghts you had on the 458! Love it!!

andy c

· #12 · May 13, 2012

texas mongrel said:
OK, I think I've deciphered my "Launch" problem: The manual states that Launch will only activate provided that the airbrake has performed a self-test during the current ignition cycle. This self-test occurs at the beginning of every ignition cycle when the vehicle is driven at a speed over 9mph. Thus, when I'm waiting in line to make a run and I turn off the car whilst waiting, when I turn back on to creep forwards in the line, the car hasn't gone over 9m,ph, so the airbrake self-test hasn't occurred and the launch is therefore not permitted! I think the solution will be to either not turn the car off whilst waiting in line, or make sure that when I creep forwards I go over 9mph to allow the brake test to take place, or perhaps doing the airbrake self test manually is good enough? I'll figure all this out at my next event and report back, but it looks like this is the source of the intermittent success I've been having with Launch. Told you it was Ron's software - its waaaay too logical.

Oh, and to answer an earlier question on this thread, I've got the heavy "old man" power seats.

Thats good info TEX,another think i didnt read in the manual!!

skela

· #13 · May 14, 2012

2

Texas Mongrel... for some reason I figured I'd find you in here...

This is Brett aka the VW driver who lent you the Vbox.

First off, thanks for bringing your car out to the Texas Half Mile... it definitely classed up the place.

I down loaded the data file and have a few things of interest to show you.

I trust you are okay with me posting it here for your other members.

First, note the data

Accel results
Speed(mph) Time(s)
0-60 04.0
0-100 07.5

Accel Distance results
Distance() Time(s) @Speed(mph)
0-60' 02.7 37.6
0-1320' 11.9 131.0
0-2640' 18.1 157.5

User range
Speed(mph) Time(s)
30-50 01.1
50-70 01.3

Misc
Vmax 158.0mph
Vavg 64.2mph
AvgLatG 0.07G
PkLatG 0.54G
PkAccelG 1.65G
PkDecelG 0.74

I draw your attention to the max lateral acceleration of 1.65G. That car launches HARD.
I experience a max of 1.2G in my car and it's no slouch. I can only imagine what yours feels like.

Here is a jpg of the run...

Please excuse the speed in km/h and distance in meters... what can I say, I'm Canadian...

and one of your car from the event..

I have the raw data file ready to send you as well. When you get your own software you can play with it as much as you like. Just drop me your email details and I'll forward what I have.

I'll leave it to you if you want to cross post this over on the FerrariChat or not...

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texas mongrel

Discussion Starter · #14 · May 14, 2012

Hey Brett
Thanks for posting this. The 0-60 is interesting 'cos it shows that launch control would definitely improve the figures - the factory quotes 3.2 sec, which is a bit quicker than my manual launch of 4.0sec. However, my 0-100 seems a little quicker than factory? Regardles, 1.85G is impressive!
FYI the rest of the forum, Brett's VW golf is a streetable 650++ HP machine that ran only 2 mph slower than the 458, it is a very stout car!
I e-mailed you last night, I'll have another attempt if you didn't get it.

skela

· #15 · May 14, 2012 (Edited)

You were in my spam folder..

I sent you a bunch of info, a new mph graph plus the raw data files to the email address you contacted me with...

it should be noted though on my runs I was running street trim, so I was around the 550 bhp mark in a 3700 lb car with me in it, which makes the 458's trap of only 2 mph more then mine more surprising to me.

andy c

· #16 · May 14, 2012

interesting results,was the track as damp as it looks when you did the runs??,by the way you were at least a second down on the 0-100 factory time if i read it right,but very impressive in those conditions with a maunal start

6th element

· #17 · May 14, 2012

skela said:
it should be noted though on my runs I was running street trim, so I was around the 550 bhp mark in a 3700 lb car with me in it, which makes the 458's trap of only 2 mph more then mine more surprising to me.

Seems about right. The first 458 press cars were weighing around 3500 lbs, which means that most customer cars are probably higher than that. The only customer 458 dyno I have read is the Fabspeed one, which returned 550hp vs factory claimed 570.

Another member on this forum posted his independent vbox tests, in which the 12C had similar accel G to the all wheel drive Nissan GT-R, which is telling.

ergoproxy

· #18 · May 14, 2012

I understand there are factors other than power/weight ratios at play--launch software, grip, shift times, torque area under the curve--but it's difficult to imagine the 458 keeping up in any setting. Nice to have independent real-world data on private cars though.
Those runs must be fun!

sumbaco

· #19 · May 14, 2012

6th element said:
Seems about right. The first 458 press cars were weighing around 3500 lbs, which means that most customer cars are probably higher than that. The only customer 458 dyno I have read is the Fabspeed one, which returned 550hp vs factory claimed 570.

Another member on this forum posted his independent vbox tests, in which the 12C had similar accel G to the all wheel drive Nissan GT-R, which is telling.

The Italia's hp is 550. The 562hp or 570ps figure includes the ram air affect whilst traveling at high speeds.

Ritesh

· #20 · May 14, 2012

The 12C is quoted at doing 100 MPH in mid 6's. So 7.5 would be a bit disappointing. Then again... you aren't using LC and are driving in wet conditions. So that would obviously affect the results!

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