Prepping The Miata For Battle

[Native]

Happy birthday.

[SlowMiataDrew]

Unfortunately I won't be bringing the car out this weekend...

So what was the rush? Do like Steve and keep it a hobby, borrow cars and keep a smiling lady friend. Let your lack of sleep be for a better reason than an autocross car

Well unfortunately it is my only car at the moment so whether I go to co drive or not I gotta bring the car out, but you make a great point!

Happy birthday.

Thanks Steve!

[twistedwankel]

Too late for Happy BD. Never race your daily driver. Asshole Doug for a co-drive instead Why didn't your lady friend take you out on your BD? Even my Ex-wife went autocrossing with me twice on a Sunday (and she was a Jesus freak).

We love you for being so much like "no shoes".

[Jamie]

Never race your daily driver.

Bah! Don't listen to him -- driving your race car to work makes the drive more interesting!

[SlowMiataDrew]

Haha I've been racing my daily driver for over the past year. Sometimes it makes things hard but that's why I try my best to keep it in top shape!

[twistedwankel]

Bah! Don't listen to him -- driving your race car to work makes the drive more interesting!

Says Jamie the less than first guy. Just sayin'. The truth. Damn me.

[aw614]

motor swaps...expect the unexpected, what might seem quick and easy turns into days, weeks and months to solve

[SlowMiataDrew]

motor swaps...expect the unexpected, what might seem quick and easy turns into days, weeks and months to solve

Well luckily it seems that this is just days. Hopefully no more major problems arise

[SlowMiataDrew]

So far so good with the new motor going to fashion some classic det cans hopefully sometime this week so I can get some more thorough ignition tuning done. Found this great channel on Youtube about EFI tuning, I just need to spend some time to watch and absorb the content so I can spend more time fine tuning the setup. I think I'll also drop some cash for the knock module add on for the MS3 so I can take advantage of the OEM knock sensor on this motor. Plus it will help me sleep better at night. Hopefully I'll have the timing more dialed in for the event on Saturday. I think it will be fine if I run the tune I have now, it just wouldn't be as punchy as it could be, still a bigger punch though.

Also going to order some new seals for the torsen sometime this week and get that thing thrown in by the 17th hopefully. Plus I scored Ryan's old VICS manifold when he switched to the Junk2 unit so I'm going to be getting that thing put in soon as well. As soon as I have the time/energy to do the swap which would include splicing in the new connector (my donor harness didn't come with it and I planned on running the gutted VICS I have now for the time being), and cleaning up my wiring in general. I really want to get rid of some of the clutter. The time crunch of the swap and the issues I ran into led to some less than pretty configurations, so I'll be addressing those when I do the intake swap.

[twistedwankel]

I ran into led to some less than pretty configurations,

The good old days when IBM required a suit, tie, white shirt and VOM to do computer wiring jobs.

[SlowMiataDrew]

Wow, I have really neglected this thread...

Anyways, some big changes are coming to Skippy and I figured I'd resurrect this thread for my own sanity's sake just to see how far this car has come. Let's get up to speed...

So, we plopped the motor in and got it running fairly well on the MS3 but there were still a couple of cob webs to clear out, mainly getting the Idle valve, VVT Solenoid, and tachometer to play nicely with each other. Long story short, I couldn't have the idle valve and VVT solenoid plugged in at the same time, with their respective settings turned on or off, without my tachometer bouncing around haphazardly and my car either sputtering and dying or having the idle running away to the tune of 4k+ rpms with no throttle input. After much searching and checking my connections I don't know how many times, I found the solution. A simple jumper wire that would provide a ground in the pwm circuit that controls the VVT and idle valve. I put the jumper in and things functioned as they should! Here's how everything came out with the swap... dirty and cluttered. More on that soon...

Not much changed in there since November-ish aside from a solid RacingBeat sway bar and a new LRB under tray and cooling panel. Onto the good stuff now

Boost has always been the end goal for this car. I wanted to swap the motor and have it boosted about a year later. Well my initial goal was to have the car boosted on my birthday, one year exactly since the swap, but I'll be honest, I'm tired of waiting I decided not to wait and pulled the trigger on some shiny go fast bits. I went with the Kraken full 3" turbo exhaust with a straight through muffler. His kit also comes with a beefy cast T25 manifold and 3" cast elbow. The great part about it is all the connections are V-Band

66691542_900533266980074_5515031934150901760_n.jpg (113.25 KiB) Viewed 2478 times

IT'S SO PRETTY

Got it on order but I had to wait about 3 months since his cast elbow was still in early production phases. I did't mind the wait since I was still sourcing parts. What amazed me was he shipped it out from Bulgaria by Monday 8am EST and it arrived at my door Wednesday at 2:30pm EST. TWO DAY SHIPPING FROM BULGARIA ARE YOU KIDDING ME That's awesome!

Here's the box of joy I received 20 mins before leaving for vacation for a week

Came with all the oil and water lines as well as the fittings.

[SlowMiataDrew]

While that simmered in my living room for the past 2 months, I went ahead and got around to some other parts of the build, cooling. For air, I jest went with a cheaper eBay DIY intercooler kit. It came with a rather large tube and fin intercooler and some 2.5" piping, clamps, and couplers. Best part is, it's all BLACK. Ya know, for maximum performance gains, street cred, and stealth all in one package Also scooped up an all aluminum radiator and some slim fans to help with the added heat of le turbo.

2fancy

Also pulled the trigger on some bigger PNP GT500 injectors. These should be overkill for my power goals but they are far superior to the RX8 yellows I was going to use.

Still dialing in the tune for the new injectors and Ryan's old manifold that I finally got around to installing. His VICS solenoid is busted so I'll need to get a new one but that's no big deal. I should be done with the adjustments to the fuel table this week and then I'll be looking to scale it for boost.

Things are happening fast...

Ching Chang Spinny Thang

[Native]

Wonderful updates!
Got boost targets?

[SlowMiataDrew]

Wonderful updates!
Got boost targets?

Relatively low to start. I think the wastegate spring is 8lbs. Ive got an EBC as well that I will hook up once the car is running the way I want it to. I'll probably shoot for 12-14psi but I'll just have to see what the car likes and what it doesn't. Eventually I'll get it to someone that really knows what they're doing behind the computer.

[Native]

[Kshader]

Geeze seems like almost everyone is leaving the party we got going on in M3 now. Time to start spreading lies that there’s a 205 tire limit

[twistedwankel]

Geezus Andrew.
I was so proud of myself learning to set up a TracFone Android that cost $42 delivered yesterday. Mostly because my old camera died with 1/2 the capability and I wanted to get a couple things that only work with a Smart phone (aka small laptop). Any 2 year old could have done it for me Good for you. Killer clean engine bay. I actually can see emoji's with my new phone now other than little rectangles.

[Van48]

Andrew - stay in m3 for one more season.

[SlowMiataDrew]

Killer clean engine bay.

Clean is not a word I would use to describe my engine bay haha but thank you nonetheless

Andrew - stay in m3 for one more season.

I'd love to but my quest for boost has overwhelmed me The competition there has gotten very stiff in the last few months!

[Van48]

Will you be in M2?