[apexit53]

my first camaro was a 1ss, did road america on stock rotors, used hawk 5.0 road/race pads I believe, and swapped the fluid. car was perfectly fine lap after lap

[DPE]

Good to know apexit. Thanks for that. If they hold up at Road America, they should be fine for the tracks I frequent. Were those Hawk 5.0 pads a notable step up from the OEMs?

Also appears that I won't be the first person going from a 2019 CTR to a Camaro 1SS. Nice work on being an autox champ in the CTR too. What made you go from a 1SS to a 1LE? Or did you have the CTR in between them? Just curious.

[ponyboy96]

Stock Brembos and pads are fine. Just be sure to swap fluid to SRF or equivalent. You won’t need the full on race setup until later when you really start cranking the times.

[SSEssence]

Motul 660 or Castrol SRF fluid is a must, after a long day of tracking, my pedal went to the floor, luckily it was a cool down lap.

[DPE]

Yup, I'll get the dealer to do the 'free' first oil change at 500 miles, probably have them do the track alignment at the same time, and then I'll swap in Motul and put on the deflectors and such. I've seen varying opinions on what to do with the rear diff; do you swap fluid at 1500 miles and then go to the track? Or do you go to the track after 1500 miles and after the first track day swap the diff fluid? Not that the car is going to be going directly to the track at mile 1501, but I want to do things in the right order. Seemed to be some variation in advice on the diff, and not sure if it's different for the e-diff vs. the normal LSD like what I'll have.

Thanks to all for the advice thus far.

[wakespeak]

Originally Posted by DPE

Yup, I'll get the dealer to do the 'free' first oil change at 500 miles, probably have them do the track alignment at the same time, and then I'll swap in Motul and put on the deflectors and such. I've seen varying opinions on what to do with the rear diff; do you swap fluid at 1500 miles and then go to the track? Or do you go to the track after 1500 miles and after the first track day swap the diff fluid? Not that the car is going to be going directly to the track at mile 1501, but I want to do things in the right order. Seemed to be some variation in advice on the diff, and not sure if it's different for the e-diff vs. the normal LSD like what I'll have.

Thanks to all for the advice thus far.

I change the diff fluid usually before every event here in TX. Its not a relevant cost compared to tires or brakes or engine oil. If I plan on doing a lot of driving after the event I will change again. A worn diff is not cheap to fix and the whine/howl is annoying to live with.

[N Camarolina]

I did mine after 1500, then again after first track day. There was a whining sound I heard on my drive home from first track day, and it disappeared after I changed the fluid a second time.

The change at 1500 miles gets the break in debris out of the diff. But after the first track day (using the diff a lot more presumably) there is more gunk. These first two changes had considerably darker fluid (black coating on some the gears that is meant to wear off), so probably best to get rid of.

It's really quite easy to change the rear diff fluid yourself, and you can save yourself quite a bit of money as dealers way overcharge for this service.

[cdrptrks]

Originally Posted by N Camarolina

I did mine after 1500, then again after first track day. There was a whining sound I heard on my drive home from first track day, and it disappeared after I changed the fluid a second time.

This is correct per the manual: first diff fluid change after the 1500 mile break-in but before the first track event and 2nd change after the first track event.

Originally Posted by wakespeak

I change the diff fluid usually before every event here in TX. Its not a relevant cost compared to tires or brakes or engine oil. If I plan on doing a lot of driving after the event I will change again. A worn diff is not cheap to fix and the whine/howl is annoying to live with.

That's way overkill. The manual says to change it after every 24 track hours (after the first 2 changes mentioned above). I have over 50k miles including a lot of track days following the 24h recommendation with no diff issues.

[cdrptrks]

Page 179 of the 2023 Camaro manual has the info mentioned in my previous post.

Interestingly it also says do not drive as long or as fast the first time the vehicle is driven on the track or raced because high rear axle temperatures can occur.

[cdrptrks]

The part about changing the diff (axle) fluid before the first track day is the last bullet point in the break-in section on page 192 in the manual. Idk why it is not also mentioned on page 179.

The manual sometimes makes a distinction between "racing or competitive driving" and a "track event" but both will place similar demands on the diff fluid whether the event is timed/competitive or not so I would treat them as the same thing for the purpose of the fluid change schedule.

[DPE]

Thanks for the input on that; ultimately change it at 1500 miles and after the first track day and it sounds like you're good. And take it easy on the first track day, which will be a touch difficult but with a new car I probably won't be at 11/10ths on the second lap anyway. Given the 24 hours of track time interval, I'll likely just go annually as I rarely get to 24 hours on track in a calendar year.