I'm not sure a lower final drive will help you - it very much depends on which corner you are on, swings and roundabouts.
Wheels and tyres are your simplest and cheapest way of going faster IMO, other than some driver coaching which made me many seconds faster (I've not watched your videos son not sure how good you are:) )


Knee soreness is very common :D

Yeah the tyres will definitely make the biggest difference. For the sprint tracks up here with a standard gearbox and final drive it will be too high geared as you don't get above 80mph, so will be hard to keep in VTEC but I know you can go too far and loose time changing gears, there's a couple of S2000's that sprint up here and both do have lower final drives, choosing the right one is difficult though!

I've been doing sprints and hills for the last 5 years in my MX5 so I'm fairly handy but still learning the S2000 and can always learn more in general!

Look at DaytonaDave's threads on his sprinting/hillcimbs, lots of great info there and he quantified the benefits of final drive on getaways.

Yeah I've read quite a lot from him and the other guys that used to post frequently about the sprints and hills down south, shame they're not active on here anymore.

The 2024 season prep has started already... I've been wanting a hard top for the S2000 since I got it and do regret not getting a car with one or picking one up when they weren't trying to be sold for £2K! So when a slightly damaged one popped up on Facebook I jumped on, it was a slightly tiring 13 hour door to door drive to get it.... including a detour to get a rear window but it was worth it to save a lot of money for other mods.

A previous buyer of the hardtop had ratchet strapped it down to a trailer far too tightly and managed to gouge the side of the top on both sides and shatter the glass!

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It seems to fit up fine though and the damage isn't too noticeable. I do however need to figure out how to seal the replacement screen on.

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With the hardtop acquired I no longer need the soft top, so I quickly set about stripping the interior out to also get it ready for fitting a rear cage.

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I still have some sound deadening to chip away then it will be ready for the cage.

I'm hoping to get the weight down a bit further and even with the addition of the cage I think it should be possible to get close to 1150kg... I have been checking what's come out!

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Next I'm hoping to again pick up some cheap parts in the black friday sales then get started fitting the cage, bucket seat and harness.

This is my favourite thread on here :heart: keep it coming!

I still have my s2000 but no longer use it for track days, just a summer cruiser. I'm currently using a E46 330 which is extensively modified and works pretty flawlessly, but it's just not the same. Ultimately I didn't feel safe without a rear cage (even though i had a hard top) and she's too nice an example to start doing what you're doing. I also simply couldn't get on with the brakes. I found PBS pads to be the best option, but I didn't have any ducting and burnt through pads in only a few days. I do keep thinking about getting another, rattier tor even damaged s2k to modify for the track... so this thread is inspirational!

Ha thanks, I'm old school and like a build thread, shame more folk don't do them anymore. I'm not doing anything ground breaking but like to have the progress to see for myself!

I do have an update to get done...

Big update... for my workshop, whilst I was busy stripping the S2000 my mate was fitting and wiring the lights in my workshop so I now have the luxury of a big and bright workspace:

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With the seats removed from the S2000 they could also contribute to the man cave part of the workshop, I'd been thinking about this for a while after seeing something similar online and it was a good Christmas project... S2000 furniture!

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I'll do the same with rear bench soon, once I figure it out as it's a little more complicated.

Back to the actual car...

I liked the original red carpet and seats but with those removed the red door cards were going to look out of place and despite it being a track/race car I'm still fussy! If I end up doing sprints/ hill climbs in the road car class I also need to keep the interior standard where possible other than removal of the carpets or where parts affect safety items (ie rollcage). So I decided to have a try at dyeing the red leather on the door cards and after an iffy start they came out well:

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Next my first lot of black friday purchases finally arrived, some easy "bolt on" parts..... up first the standard issue replacement steering wheel for an S2000, a Personal Grinta plus HKB boss;

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Being tight and not needing the airbag/SRS delete kit (removing the light from the dash is simpler than fitting resistors everywhere!) I went for the non-airbag version of the HKB boss but noticed quickly it wouldn't fit with the clock spring in place, the OEM wheel has a space for the clock spring wiring and "peg" holes:

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The HKB boss has a plastic housing with an old school brass contact ring, at first I thought I could make holes in this for the clock spring:

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But it still fouled.... so then I realised the plastic housing pulled off leaving space for the clock spring (probably how the SRS version comes):

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But (2) doesn't then have provision for the clock spring pegs to rotate it with the wheel, so after a little plastic cutting and gluing i came up with this:

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Finally allowing the wheel to fit and have a functioning horn;

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Next and very important was a bucket seat, I went with a Sparco EVO QRT, this looked like a good fit for both me and the car, plus weighs just 7kg:

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To mount it I decided to not be tight (for a change) and went with a PCI adjustable mount which I hoped would make adjustment easy to get a good seating position but also get the seat as low as possible.

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However when first fitted to the seat I was disappointed that on any of the lower mount positions the seat fouled the bracket, plus for the position I wanted relative to the pedals/wheel I seem to be right in the middle of the adjustment range and even though the side mounts can be flipped side to side to give a more forward or rear bias both options they still clash with the bracket bolts to the car, making install very difficult. Without modifying the bracket the lowest seat height was probably the same as the OEM seat.

After a bit of head scratching I looked at this option...

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Making my own mounts! But even doing this the seat would only get slightly lower due to the shape of the floor with the exhaust tunnel, LHD would help here.

So, the grinder came out, with a slight trim to the bracket the seat could sit lower at the back:

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The seat is now hard up against the bracket and bending it slightly but it's in and on the second lowest position:

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Not ideal but the seat is now in and I'm happy with the seating position, the seat is a perfect fit for the S2000 as well and thankfully doesn't foul the dyed door cards!:

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Now back to waiting on more parts and hopefully a big box with a rear roll cage...

I used M2 mount when I fitted my EVO seat. Also you will need the scroth flat mounting plates to clip the harnesses too as eyelets foul the transmission tunnel.
Buy Schroth B23A Harness Clip Kit | 01324 | MSAR London

I did consider the M2/Buddy club/Tegiwa rail but seen some have had issues with the welds and also thought I'd be able to get the seat lower with a fixed bracket, that doesn't seem to be the case!

Thanks, I think I will need a set of those :thumbup: