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Long overdue update to this. Did a couple more races with great success, , changed out a bunch of parts, wrapped the car, currently it's being prepped for the Portland International Raceway booth at the Portland Auto Autoshow this coming week.
Basic Mod List of what it has now, I'm sure I've missed a few things. Future plans include a suspension upgrade and a different exhaust.
Suspension/Chassis/Body
-AMR Engineering Single Adjustable Dampers(Going to MCS singles in the next month or so)
-JR front sway bar w/949 Endlinks
-ISC Delrin front Offset Bushings
-NB Front lower control arm with poly bushings
-Caged and gutted NA6 Chassis, cage by Racetech Motorsports
-LED Lightbar
-Tubular Front and Rear crash structures with integrated central jack point
-APR GTC-200 with risers
-EP front air dam
-Laser Cut aluminum splitter and undertray
-Humming Aero Hood Vent
Engine/Drivetrain
-VVT Swap with NB2 wiring harness, painstakingly stripped by Curly
-Spec Miata non compliant head
-BE Oil Pump
-Manley Forged Rods
-VICS intake manifold with Skunk 2 Throttle Body
-Custom intake with cold air box fed by duct
-Coated Racing Beat Header
-Custom test pipe to Borla Exhaust
-Koyo Radiator/Coolant reroute
-Coolant reroute
-4.3 Torsen swap with Garagestar Diff mounts
-949 flywheel with Exedy OE disc and ACT HD PP
-AWR Motor Mounts
-Kazspec Engineering Oil Pan Baffle
-MS PNP Pro with tablet display tuned by Curly
-148whp/135wtqBrakes/Wheels/Tires
-1.8 brake swap front and rear
-Cobalt Friction Pads
-SS lines
-TSE 2.5 inch front brake ducts
-FFD 15x8 +32 Wheels/205/50/15 AD08R
-Garagestar Brake Master Brace, gutted factory prop valve
I'll update this thread more frequently now.
Our crew chief Dan in the background
APR mirrors on Kazespec Engineering brackets
Schroth Profi II HANS, huge upgrade over our old harness, easier to adjust and fits much better with a HANS device.
I've been busy bugging Andrew and asking for way too much proprietary information. Looks like we'll be ditching the stock cross beam for starters.
In other news we had a bit of a disaster of race last time out. I wasn't able to make it, but the car is now fairly munched up on the passenger side, and they had an alternator failure on Saturday.
Sunday when they went to start the car up after a driver change and fuel stop, the MS started smoking. This is the 2nd time it's done this, and probably our 4th or 5th NB alternator. Enough is enough, we've got some wiring gremlins and we decided mix things up by starting with an NA internally regulated alternator and changing up the kill switch wiring. Previously we were cutting the big blue wire that normally comes off the ignition switch. This eventually went through a bunch of fuse boxes and wiring to power the main relay, so the kill switch was functioning correctly. We decided to leap forward in the wiring harness and now just kill the the green/red wire which directly powers the main relay. Our thought is with the battery cable cut, some power was going through the tiny ~22 gauge regulating wires to the ECU and frying it with 100amps, well before the 500mA fuse was able to blow. Hopefully the combination of new kill switch wiring and non-ecu controlled alternator will halt our ECU frying issues.
This is all kind of a stop gap though, we have big plans for an eco-tech swap this winter. We're very happy with our "stock" VVT rebuild making 150hp, but we're getting blown way on the straights by some pretty incredible machines in the Lucky Dog Racing community. For endurance purposes we're against forced induction and the price of donor engines and swap kits kills the K-swap option.
Well you can see it has a lower cross beam already. Behind whats left of the stock bumper the structure is only bolted where the crash beam used to be bolted to, and we could easily add a bar across the two mounts for more rigidity.
Big update, race season went quite well for us, a number of podiums including a 1st and 2nd over all at Oregon Raceway Park in September. We are always at the pointy end of the field however the speed creep is real, racing against 260whp E36s, 350whp mustangs, and other various cars in the top class has lead to the need for more power. The VVT motor is out and sold, and replacing it will be a 2.4L LE5 Ecotec motor with swap kit parts from ecotecmiata. We're shooting for 200/200 at the rear wheels on pump gas. Below is some footage from our second to last race this year, as well as some photos from the last race where the car met a mustang and a wall, and still finished 6th overall.
Update from curly. engine made it's way to CSTG and the tear down began. I haven't seen a lot of photos online of the Ecotec, and I took a bunch before I touched anything, so here ya go.
Then I removed the oil pan and valve cover. Valve cover was starting to seep, and the oil pan is swapped to fit in the Miata.
On the chassis side of things, since we're re-wiring from scratch rather than tapping into the already butchered '01 harness that was running in our NA chassis, I needed a custom relay panel to provide power to everything. I contacted Tony at https://ceautoelectricsupply.com/custom-relay-panels/ to make a 6-relay panel.The panel is done, mounting of it isn't, and 90% of the wiring I've done is temporary, not heat shrinked, etc. Just trying to get the proper lengths, routing, and pay attention to future serviceability.
ECU, starter, accessories, and lights will be controlled with the switch panel. Fan and Fuel pump will be controlled by the ECU.
2018 is upon us and after some delays with parts we have the motor in the car. Along the way a V8 roadster subframe was installed to make more room for exhaust routing and shave some weight off the nose of the car. We also installed SPL front tie rods on our manual rack, and SPL rear upper control arms which are half the weight of the factory arms. We need to tidy up some wiring, run our fuel lines, and mate the header to a miata stock location exhaust and then the car will be ready for testing. Then its off to the body shop before we get it rewrapped in a slightly different shade of green.
Non-potato phone picture. Our MAF is on it's way, otherwise it would start up. Currently it coughs and sputters, and hopefully the missing MAF is all that's causing that. Ecotecmiata.ca's wiring harness fit great, with the exception of an incorrect locking tab for the intake VVT solenoid they're sending us.
Fuel setup is all temporary, once the lines reach the bell housing we'll be bending them up to get them away from the exhaust.
Exhaust will most likely be the hardest part, if you run the V8R subframe, and modify one of the engine mounts, you can run the exhaust straight down, under the oil pan, and along the stock miata's routing.
Huh. Looks pretty, but those rear UCA's ... The rear LCA, and its two bushings, is now alone in resisting rotational moments of the rear knuckle about the axle, and also in transferring fore/aft momentum changes to the chassis. There's going to be some amount of flex for every acceleration and deceleration, every time. This does not concern you? Even if the LCA itself doesn't flex at all, the change in force levels exerted on those lower bushings is going to be significant, orders of magnitude different compared to have a second triangulated arm on top.
The shitty stamped upper control arm was bent when I pulled it out of both sides. If the paper thin upper factory arms are stronger than the billet arm that is sandwhiched with a solid bushing between the upper tabs I will be very surprised. This is with probably 100+ hours of racing on those factory arms. We shall see but I am not particularly concerned.
I think his concern is more with the lower control arms and bushings, not with the strength of the billet arms.
I'd be interested in seeing how durable everything ends up being as well.
Not a critique, just curious.
You went from a triangle to a line. It's not that it's "strong enough" it's that there is no strength at all now in the fore/aft plane. I won't even call it a bad design, as it's not designed at all.
01-19-2017, 11:55 AM
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