15X8 Volk TE37’s replaced the 15×7 wheels that the car had always run. Spacers were used to push the front track even wider.
The cars last outing was the 2015 SE-R convention and the Nissan VS Honda race at Buttonwillow. The Dog Car was the fastest car at the convention time trial, the fastest NA class car and the Fastest Nissan in the Nissan vs Honda race coming in 4th. I was also about 6 seconds a lap slower than I used to be! My young stud self would have made a better accounting of myself in the same car!
The cars new owner is a dyed in the wool Nissan Enthusiast who happened to be the second-fastest at the Convention. If you follow the Nissan tuning world, I am sure you will continue to hear about what the Dog Car is doing and the new owner will have the time and interest to bring out to the track more!
10 comments
whats the replacement?
E46 M3!
I am glad to see the Dog car has found a new home. I am also glad I got to see her in person when I was in SoCal earlier this year. I have followed this car for many years and it will be a shame to see her go. I have been building my sentra for the past 20 years, slowly trying to get to the same level as the Dog twins. Great write up, and great job on a great car. Good bye Dog car!
Some of those photos reminded me of the old “robot vs monkey” articles in SCC. Its fun to see a longer story to tie it all together rather than what could fit in the magazine.
Poor Jared, his performance was so poor the series didn’t continue. The monkey was so bad, he never made it past the morning warm-up! They never did get the story because his car always broke before qualifying.
That was a superb intro/out-tro to Dog Car at the end of it’s tenure with you. I think even for long time-ish readers of MotoIQ, the story of this car is not known. The stories from its development of a crap car into a competitive car with good handling and good aero would make great articles.
If they are already on print somewhere, I hope they can be brought together here for your global readers.
In the last picture, you can see the Sentra has a well balanced suspension with minimum roll, while the Acura appears to have an oversized rear bar, and low roll stiffness up front. Great job on developing that car Mike !
I believe it had no front bar, really stiff rear bar and rear springs which is popular with Honda racers. Although this was a competitive car in a higher series I was proud that the Dog Car with its crude suspension was much faster in the turns. A lot of this was due to Dai’s driving as well.
I remember reading about this car in SCC. Jared’s B13 too. Great memories. Thanks for sharing this car with us for so long Mike!
What a send-away.
You never forget your favourite car and the racing stories with it!