Just went to a trackday at gingerman raceway saturday october 13. I had to trailer my car over there, as it's about 3 hours from ann arbor. Weather was looking a bit bleak from the beginning. Really cloudy, a bit damp and windy. I had just put new brake rotors (Mustang Cobra rotors modified to fit the evo 5) and pads (Porterfield R4) in, so for the first 15 minute session, I was slowly trying to bed those in. Also just trying to learn the track a bit. Car felt pretty strong, as I've just recently got the boost control working well, so it's got a steady 15 psi of boost.

After the my first session it started to rain, fairly heavily . We were all pretty bummed. I have Kumho V700's on the car, so I didn't figure those would work too well in the wet. Next session out there was some standing water around the track, and the car hydro-planed a bit. Really felt like a wuss out there, but soldiered on. Sort of had the feeling that this car is too expensive for me to be flogging around. But at some point there, once I was aware of where the standing water was, I started pushing a bit harder.

This was my first real experience with the active yaw control rear differential. Previously I had only had the car out in ideal conditions, and didn't push things to the point that the AYC was doing a whole lot. Well the rain and damp track made things pretty slippy. My AYC had some air in the hydraulic lines that I need to bleed out, but for the time being, it just makes a tad more noise than is normal, I'm told. Sort of a whiny groaning noise. At first it was pretty hard to tell exactly what it was doing, but you could hear it in the corners doing something. With each lap I started pushing a bit more, and was amazed at how forgiving the car felt. Seemed to me you could be a monkey and drive these cars fast.

Go into a corner a bit too hard and the tail comes around a bit (maybe around 10 to 30 degrees). What's amazing though is how natural it felt. Seems like in many fwd and rwd cars, when the tail steps out, you've got to react pretty quickly to catch the slide or things just get worse. Here it require just a slight steering correction -- basically just pointing the car where you want it to go. So turn in, tail comes around a bit, get back on the throttle, and the AYC seems to keep the car pointed where you steering it amazingly well. Some understeer was there for sure, but the car really felt quite neutral with the oversteer being very easily controlled.

So I just started to get a feel for how cool the AYC was in the second session. At some point after that in another run group someone crashed a fairly new C5 corvette into the guardrail. It was a pretty serious wreck as the whole front of the car was destroyed, and both airbags went off. Everyone was OK, but it was a sobering event for sure. Can't imagine an insurance company being too sypathetic, but who knows.

Anyway, for the remaining sessions, it dried out just a bit. At least there were lines to take around the really big puddles. The Kumho's turned out to be a pretty decent tire. A friend of mine there had Kumho V700's on his VW Corrado as well for the first two sessions, but switched over to Yokohama A520's for the last two sessions, and he said grip got quite a bit worse. I was pretty amazed following some of the others around as well. In some of the fairly gradual corners, I couldn't feel any slip at all, while the cars in front of me were drifting all over the place.

The ABS buzzed in probably about 5 times during the day. I was getting up to about 95 mph and 90 mph on the two main straights, and then braking for some fairly tight corners, maybe 30 - 35 mph (hard to tell there, but going from 5th gear down to 3rd, could have probably been 2nd). With puddles here and there, it wasn't super predictable braking. My new pads working pretty well, as I didn't get any fade or change in pedal feel. It was really a pretty good day to have some ABS on your side.

Continued on pushing things and putting more and more faith in the AYC. THIS STUFF IS JUST AWESOME!!!! The last two sessions were just unreal. Really wish some of you could have been in the car. I don't think I have gobs of driving talent, but I must say I felt like Tommi several times. The ABS and AYC gave me huge confidence, and the tires, power, and awd definitely make the car quick in those conditions. I heard all sorts of people complaining of traction problems in the rwd cars while accelerating down the straights. I was ramping up the throttle coming out of the corners (sometimes with a bit of tail out power oversteer) and then just matting it all the way down the straights. Really no traction problems at all on the straights.

I was planning on selling the car this fall, as I can't find a way to register it. So it was great to have such a fun time with the car before then. On the other hand it makes it even more sad that I have to part with it. So I'm still pursuing a few loopholes, but it's looking a bit bleak.

This event has made me want to get a legal EVO here even more though. I imagine the 7 will be even better than my 5, although who knows. I'm really impressed with how much you can drift the car. It seems like a lot of the driver aids / stability control devices out there made by Bosch and Teves really kill the fun with all sorts of brake intervention. The Teves system intervenes at slip around 4%, while Bosch is supposedly around 8%. I was out a couple times at 30% probably and the system was still helping. I don't think the Mitsubishi system uses brakes to control things, just splitting torque left or right to provide a yaw moment to help point things in the right direction.

So I'm not sure if I'll hold out for an EVO 7 or just search for another loophole to get another E5/6 in with a title or if my money will go to Evolution Imports for a completely legal one. But yesterday was enough to kill any of my ideas about getting a modded impreza or eclipse. This AYC stuff is really that great.

-Robert

 

Glad you had a great time on the track, the AYC does make alot of diffrence on the track I own a Lancer Evo 6 gsr here in the UK.. Just pointing out something, you say you AYC makes a noise? It should almost be silent.. You should change your AYC fluid every 4.500 miles or sooner.. U might already know though, so if you do forgive me! ENJOY THE FASTEST A to B through very tight bends car there is!

 

if you r AYC makes noise that is bad. There was a recal for the AYC on the EVO V. the noise was largely due to the shims inside the diff
wering out and some metal shavings woudl get stuck.
In some extreme cases the rear diff would completly lock up
sending the car spinning of the road. You may need a new AYC
I suggest calling TAD Motorsports in Chicago
(they will out racing this weekend in Michigan, LSPR rally
in houghton http://www.lsprorally.com/ they will be servicing 6 EVO's )

they might have some good used AYC's as they replace them with the
RS and ralliart diffs for rallying.

their contact info
511 Telser Road, Lake Zurich, IL 60047
847-550-8116, 847-550-8018 (fax)
Web site: www.tadmotorsports.com/

you can tell then George Plsek sent you

-george

 

i've been on the the lancer register and evo yahoo group a bit, and i was given the impression that the noise is typically air in the hydraulic lines. the mitsu manual gives a procedure as to how to bleed the lines, but it requires a MUT-II, Mitsu's own diagnostic tool. someone on the lancer register said you can also jack the car up, run the car, and steer to one side, and bleed the lines then. that's supposed to get the ayc unit pumping fluid, just as the MUT-II would. i still need to bleed them obviously. i'm expecting this will solve the problem. if not, then perhaps i have other problems. i'll report back here, when i get to that.

from what i've read, the ayc recall is a software issue, and from what I've read that's typically not what causes the noise. i guess i'll know when i bleed those lines, if it's fixed or not.

i'm a bit surprised the rally driver's don't use the ayc. seemed to me like just the ticket for slippery surfaces like gravel, mud and snow. or do some of them use it?

DjacK - where do you get your ayc fluid, and how much is it?

-Robert

 

the AYC unit is not as strong and reliable as the std RS or ralliart diffs.
There is one car here that uses the AYC and it seems OK so far.


If you are in Michigan check out the rally, it will be awsone, there should be at least 6 EVO's
-george

 

I get my AYC changed by a RalliArt garage, I cant do it as I dont own the tools to do so, but when I just get the fluid changed it only takes 5 mins and uses very little fuid, normally costs about £24 ..

 

The AYC recall only changes the software in tha AYC computer. Not much use if the unit is mechanically damaged

The AYC fluid should be changed every 4500 miles, this is different to what the manuals state. You need the MUT-II tool to do this properly. My AYC fluid was recently changed using a 'box of tricks' which connected directly to the pump(s) and controlled them directly. This allowed the fluid to be changed without any major headaches.

Any noise from the AYC should be investigated. Hopefully, it will be due to air in the AYC fluid, changing the fluid should remove the noise. If not, its probably the AYC dying. If this is the cause, you could remove the AYC fuse to disable the system. After that, its either a replacement unit or a swap with a RS spec rear diff, both of which are expensive. One other alternative is to fit a Cusco rear LSD.

 

drove around with someone in the back seat peering into the trunk. all the noise is coming from the hydraulic unit (abs looking thing) on the right side of the trunk. this furthers my belief that the problem is air in the hydraulic lines, and that the diff itself is probably fine.

is there any chance the Mitsu AYC fluid is something fairly common, just rebadged as AYC fluid by Mitsu and marked up accordingly? I just hate having to have stuff shipped over from the UK, as it usually takes forever and/or costs a fortune.

based on last weekend I would hate the see the AYC go in favor of a standard Cusco diff or something similar. i'm really geeked about the AYC. really quite curious to drive a 7 now as well.

i would love to go up to the rally. i went to michigan tech up there for 7 years, so i've spectated there a lot. it's still 550 miles away from there though. work is stupidly busy, and i don't have much vacation time left. i'll probably make the call to go or not at the very last minute, depending on the weather forecast. i've got about 10 friends from here making the trip up. looks like there's going to be a ton of very fast drivers.


-Robert