Church

See how are things time/mileage by similar intervals as during warranty regarding oil and other things change. I'd just keep on similar routine/frequency at least.

Some use old pads as some lever to press in pistons. But imho tools for that are not that expensive, simpler to buy one. I suggest to be double careful for fluid to not overflow out from brake fluid tank (which probably is opened, to ease pressing pistons in). Each corner you do, level will rise. And brake fluid is very aggressive against bodywork paint. So possibly excess will be needed to syphoned out of tank or bled via bleeding screw on caliper.

For auto hill-hold, maybe try this:

For FR-S TSB S-SB-0009-14 (it's PDF) Maybe this. BRZ equivalent.

git-r: for very first trackday you may even try to go with everything completely stock. You'll feel better what is to your liking and what is not, some baseline, against which you will be able to evaluate changes, limits you'll hit and now will know by own butt-dyno feel/experience which and if and to what extent may need improving. Also twins imho are surprisingly capable even in completely stock form (probably due low weight). Just that i've seen people first modding s**t out of cars with 10K+ budget, and then at most doing one trackday at most at leasury pace if doing at all, with eg. BBK installed more "to better fill new big wheels", not to rise thermal capacity (after all, best performance mod ever is making driver better, not car, with more seat time & maybe help of HPDE instructors to shorten learning curve). My "minimum track set" would be rear LCAs, front camberbolts in both holes, performance alignment with those, more track oriented brake pads & brake fluid of higher boiling temps, that's it. I arrived to it in "steps", but it also better educated me as to what were limits i hit, what i now wished to fix, which mod, installed/changed one step at a time, affected what and how. Eg. stock alignment ripped outsides and was a bit too understeery in some turns - felt how extra camber (especially front) helped with that for higher speed in curves and grip balance easier to drive with, changed toe settings to even and slight toe-in rear - helped both for winter driving and accelerating out of corners on track, brake pads & fluid - i now could drive longer sessions without fade .. but i still feel beneficial to had first felt how stock fluid boiled and pads overheated/glazed to get that brake fade feel and importance of improving that part :). Beneficial to have those tires worn in non optimal fashion and to experience that front understeering first. Grippier tires upped speed .. but i'm glad to first wear down completely stock primacies when familiarizing with car both in daily driving & tracking it, instead of upgrading right away after purchasing car, to had experienced what people were spoken of "fun from low grip playfulness" instead of dulling everything with high grip "tramlining" tires to not loose traction even if i do stupid driving inputs and with which i wouldn't know how to handle when (at much higher speeds) they will loose grip in probably less progressive/more abrupt manner. One can call primacies in names as no-grip, "prius" tires and such, but in reality even with those one can pull respectable side-Gs on skidpad and often go with confidence on roundabouts at 1.5x normal speed of generic family cars. If one will loose grip, it's usually because of driver inputs, especially of steering yanking and accelerator lead-footing and by then imho lower grip limits ease actual learning of fine control, input steadiness, how to correct when one looses grip .. and make mistakes cost less

Lauren: in some combinations with other parts and in some of joints i'm certain slight extra NVH of pillowball bushings can be acceptable for most. Just not in this particular case with stock shocks and at topmounts for me. Many aftermarket coilovers have in stock set own camplates, many report their moded suspension often even more comfortable then stock and with acceptable NVH even when going over bad quality paved roads with potholes. I tried several iterations, like reinstalling at other shop, asking to take extra care, check for common mistakes (eg. not tightening top nut), get most camber at lower mount with camberbolts and just a little at topmounts .. gave up. I doubt a bit misinstallation, i doubt for camplates to be at fault (AFAIK many use raceseng ones with wide selection of shocks without much issues). I - couldn't. I have stiffer bushings in several places (eg. rear velox LCAs, front LCAs have whitline extra caster bushings & powerflex for camber, topmounts while rubber, but are stiffer group-N ones, i have gearbox & tranny bushings, rear subframe bushings, planning to install even more, like engine mounts, steering rack lockdown and such), i do notice more NVH after installing most of them, but all that extra NVH was below my tolerance treshold. With exception of front camberplates with pillowball with my current still stock shocks. That lone part was unbearable even if i tried hard to live with that. I may try 3rd time installing camplates, when i will install not delivered yet B6 shocks, but maybe not .. after all, i reached camber of -3 using other means. It's proven and works and didn't had those issues.

I won't agree with you won't notice bit. I did notice .. to unbearable extent that i quickly reverted to rubber top mounts and searched for alternative ways to get front camber. Possibly with some aftermarket shocks it would have been different (as many drive with camberplates coming eg. in set of coilovers and say NVH is acceptable), but for me (stock shocks+raceseng camplates) it was unbearable on local roads :/. There is difference of just driving over some road pavement defects without minding them, or hear loud hit noises like dropping toolbox on concrete, that make impression that soon something will break, and thus trying to keep in mind every defect on roads and steer around them every time. git-r: there are front adjustable arms too. But almost never they are considered, because unlike rear LCAs, front ones relatively cost fortune and also all have pillowball joints (non street legal @LV). For example these . Hence on twins to gain camber adjustment most popular way is adjustable rear lca-s, and different combinations of camberbolts + topmounts (most commonly camberplates) front.

git-r: "right way" to choose optimum camber is via using pyrometer, as it may differ a bit for eg. different tires. But for some generic numbers "in ballpark"/as starting point .. - it mostly depends where and how you are going to use car. Where most of wear happens. For example - i may wear down ~ 10-15% thread per 10K km if dailying only. I can wear down on track in 10 trackdays tires till cord is sticking out :). So for me, with both dailying and tracking, with tire set usually around for one season, with 5-10 trackdays per summer, most of wear happens on track. Hence i optimise alignment mostly for it, as it's where i wear 90% of tire thread, despite daily driven mileage (but with little to no wear) being much much larger then that driven on track. So i put -3 front, -2.5 rear. Some for track rise upto -3.5 .. but it might be driver and tires dependent, and if one is serious about THE best/optimal, see mention of pyrometer usage to see exactly how contact patch is and how grip/wear results from temperature differences between outer/mid/inside of tire right after driving you want to optimize for. - if you don't push much and have only 2-4 trackdays per summer at most, i guess interim -2 to -2.5 front and -1.5 to -2 rear may work as good compromise. Yes, if tracked more then that tire thread outer side will still wear more, but not that drastically different as if tracking with stock alignment (of 0 camber front, -1.2 rear), so there will be more grip and better wear then stock aligned anyway. Nice bit, that this is easy to get for cheap - leave rear stock aligned, just add (cheap) camberbolts to front. - if one daily drivers only, and/or tracks only in winter on ice tracks , imho some -1 to -1.5 front and stock -1.2 rear is fine. Such relatively little camber (as there is not much tire sidewall flex during turns to compensate with static negative camber) will also work well on low grip. For example snow/ice/wet/gravel (from sport, including rallying/rally-x that is). Again, cheap, just add to front camberbolts, just one set of those at that. - drifiting optimal alignment needs loads of negative camber front due how tire is placed when countersteered in mid drift. Seen numbers like -4, -5 or even -6. Thus if one is serious about drifting, there is lot of other things to do/mod, for example increase maximum steering angle (lacking on ours due wide boxer engine/lacking clearance w/o rubbing), add more power, maybe completely redone suspension with eg. wisedfab and alike kits .. Wear/optimum camber .. as far as you are happy with wear and handling, it's good. With stock alignment on track i was not happy :). Penny pincher in me hated to change tires due completely worn outsides when there were still more then 50% thread left mid/inside. Extra camber also upped a bit cornering speeds due more grip. Downsides from more camber - slightly worse braking in straight line, and car tending to a bit more follow longitudinal grooves in road surface. Wear wise there extra camber in range of -1.5 to -2.5 shouldn't add much extra camber wear, it's toe, if off too much, that may act as tire wear killer. Thus when doing alignment, suggest being extra anal about toe, getting it even side to side and to extent of just what one may wish. My choice usually is zero toe front, and slight toe-in rear of eg. total toe ~ +0.15 to +0.2 degree. Almost like stock, with exception that i ask alignment techs to dial it way more precize then what is allowed as passing for OE alignment :). If you noticed, in most sample camber numbers i usually aim in front by half degree negative more camber then in rear. That is to make car less understeer-y then with stock alignment (0 front, -1.2 rear).

Oh, right. There is also option of slotting holes, as Deacon mentioned, but i somewhat dislike non-reversible mods. KW/ST shocks have top hole pre-slotted. IIRC also koni yellows in full set, not just inserts, have larger then stock upper hole. Word of warning, if deciding to dremel/slot strut hole, then to use stock bolts, eccentric camberbolts may slip there, people advise against camberbolts usage in slotted holes. If one needs more camber probably for track purposes, then imho worth front camber upto -3 at least (and rear -2.5). For rears i'd advise to get LCAs though. Cheapest of them are not that much more expensive (OEM stamped steel alikes clones like SPC/Whiteline/Eibach) vs eccentric rear LCA bushings + shop time for tedious adjusting with those bushings. If you mentioned stock height, i guess more rear camber from lowering not exactly best option to gain rear camber, thus better get rear LCAs right away.

With stock suspension and at stock height: Camberbolts at both upper 16mm (Whiteline KCA416) and lower 14mm hole net me ~ -2.2 to -2.3 front camber maxed out. Supposedly those that lower suspension a bit via eg. lowering springs got with both camberbolts & lowering reached ~ -2.5. To get to -3 with stock non-eccentric topmounts i needed to use also eccentric front LCA bushing (Powerflex PFF69-801G or PFF69-801GBLK(stiffer)). There were at some point in past eccentric rubber Com-C topmounts by Whiteline (IIRC KCA335), but their bearing soon binded for most, whiteline tried few times/revisions to fix, finally gave up and delisted twins as compatible with those. Advising against buying/trying these. Recently Pedders released something similar to Com-C (PED-580096), but supposedly without it's issues. I haven't yet saw review/experience by someone installed/using them though. So with stock shocks & at stock height for -2.5 to -3 camber range, try both camberbolts + powerflex bushings, or camberbolts + pedders topmount.

Code on metal tag at spare keyfob is to enable to get & pair by dealership new car smart start keyfob in case you loose it, i believe. As i have it too, even without having UK's sigma autoalarm system and it's small keypad in glovebox.

Kinks? Should you really change?

As Lauren mentioned - from cons a bit more sidewall flex, thus a bit less sharp steering feel. From pros - 225/45/R17 is very common tire sizing and tires will be cheaper. Tires will fit and 225 is safe to be used on x7, even though closer to one of ends of optimal tire width range for wheel width, so i'd probably think of tires with stiffer sidewalls or getting 215.

If one does proper maintenance imho FA20 can run long enough, certainly way more then 150K of rotaries. Imho it's reliability is there on same level as most other modern engines. What "big" issues you refer of? Valve spring recall? Toyobaru handles it free of charge for owner, i don't see it as issue. Battery an issue? I haven't yet had any issues after free change to 65Ah one. Small issues like rattlish interior i don't count as issues either, it's simply because this is cheap car, and that actually is one of it selling features. I got what i wanted, cheap car to buy, cheap car to maintain, cheap car to track, and even with all the cheapness bits still providing unexpectedly good handling and driving fun, it also provides minimum level of practicality for me for only car. I'm still happy with owning it 4 years and intend to keep driving it for long. See no reasons to worry. And if i'd compare this to other cars, twins in my mind are aking more modern 180sx/200sx/320 beamer coupe, then mazda rotaries. (BTW, i love RX8 .. but engine is killing desirability. RX8 with 1.8 or 2 turbo inline four as stock option would make me wish it much more)

Varelco: just that some BBKs manage to get extra weight savings with drum parking brake deletion from rears. Of course that should immediately make car non street legal/mot impassable.

Varelco: just rear disc weight? There is also weight of drum mechanism, drum brake shoes and such ..

Lightness of brakes shouldn't be taken to extreme and at expense of main function, stopping car reliably/predictably/for long time. Yes, as due construction/design, often BBKs let save unsprung/rotational weight too (due eg. lighter calipers, that might be monopiece, and or forged, also due common for BBKs dual piece construction of iron/steel outside and aluminium hubs unlike all iron monopiece disks of most OE brakes), but one can also go overboard with lightening and end up with brakes of less thermal capacity then even stockers, which will compromise one of main reasons many buy BBKs - for them to last longer on track. Drilling/slotting rotors also will make them less reliable and will reduce their thermal capacity. Digging around my bookmarks .. pitty this website seems not available currently, but may illustrate what i mean, with very very lightweight brake kit for drag racing, but probably less capable & safe then even stock brakes. I'd rather look at other specs when choosing BBK, like bias closeness to OE, thermal capacity, possibility to add airducts if needed, street daily driving "friendliness", pad shape commonality/how wide is choice of misc pads in that shape, how much wearables like rotors/pads of that kit cost, wheel clearance, relative closeness of local serviceability of brakes, kit cost .. lighter weight .. just free bonus to all that, not main goal in choice.

Reduced consumables cost - i guess one needs to check out pricing & commonality for pad shapes and disks of specific BBK. If for Essex Sprint set it was one of goals, to choose calipers with common pads and with extra material thickness & also extra thick rotors lasting longer, it's not given that all other BBKs on market will have such. As for pad price .. i have ready for next season CSG spec C1 pad set. With shipping price spiked to 1025eur .. and there still was import tax & VAT to pay

Of course not the case of accidental fillup with diesel?

I wonder which of these all BBKs can be cleared with R16 wheels of winter/rally setup too ..

Lauren: just that there are much bigger "rpm-jumps" between first two gears and rest, so close gear ratio lets easier to keep car in powerband for quicker acceleration. But as those first gears seem ok for daily driving, i wouldn't want them end too soon, rather bring rest of gears down so that 4th & 5th gets more usable on track. CGR+FD combo seems that should be doing just that.

Lauren: but what do you think of FD+short ratio gearset, that makes 1st & 2nd longer (eg. TRD/Cusco set of FD & gearset)? This way 1st & 2nd stay somewhat same, but other gears come lower. About the only drawback i see is cruising on autobahns in 6th at higher rpms, more noise, worse economy. But for daily driving & track - better acceleration and more usable 5th.

Our cars have stock nuts and stock wheels of tapered 60deg conical seat. Which is most common for aftermarket wheels too, eases wheel/lugnut choice a lot. So stock lugnuts can be used with most aftermarket wheels, and vice versa with wide choice of aftermarket lugnuts usable on stock wheels too. Stock thread indeed is m12x1.25, but some do install extended wheel studs (eg. ARP ones), and sometimes choose m12x1.5 ones, with supposedly coarser/stronger thread. Also sometimes might be of use knowing stock wheel axle center bore being 56.1mm. As wheels with conical lugnuts are mostly lugcentric, one can safely enough use wheels with center bore of such or bigger diameter.

After some .. hmm.. already 8 mountings, finish on my rays gunmetal duranuts also is scratched, so i wouldn't count on that as lasting very long nor blame it as issue. Normal wear. Except if advising choosing finish of such more neutral colors instead of bright paint ones, so as to scratches to be less noticeable :). So - bronze, gunmetal and such, not some violet/red/yellow/green/black whatever, through which grey aluminium surfaced will be very noticeable.

I'd say 7075 T-6 alloy duralumin wheel nuts are safe enough to use, if: 1) one doesn't track car thus does not do many wheel swaps each season 2) if one takes care of not using powertools to undo or retighten them and not letting tire shops do same, as that is main reason to damage their finish and strip their threads. For daily driven car with two seasonal wheel swaps per year and tightened with handtools they are strong/reliable enough with no caveats except that they are relatively expensive for relatively little functional gain. Forged aluminum is strong enough to hold wheel with enough force on par with steel lugnuts, it's frequent remounting and using wrong tools is what such are not too strong against.