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Thanks for the update. Curious about the air supply to the filter 'box'. NB8Bs have a big hole behind the headlight, NAs have the gap around the headlight cover, is that enough? Or is there something else helping the cool air getting in?
Any interest from the law using that big wing on the street?
Always good to see a quick track car used on the road.
As of right now the filter box mostly just feeds from the crack in the headlight lid, but I have a CCP fab NACA duct on the way to feed it properly. Not too bad with the law, but to be honest people drive pretty crazy now days and I'm usually the least of their worries. The **** gets the attention of younger men mostly, but lots of people seem to like the car now days. Really funny because when I got it nearly 20 years ago in highschool I got so much **** for it.
Haha, you could say that. Hopefully the last brake kit I ever need!
For anyone following along, I've been underbraked for a long time. I drive around it, and never lean on my brakes, and they do OK for time attack format with 3 hotlaps per session. Currently on NB sport brakes with hawk pads.
After a bunch of research I went with the f88 kit for these main reasons:
Cheap rotor blanks, ~60 a pop, and they are super common non-proprietary.
Cheap pads, relatively for their size. Hella availability.
Support future goals of tracking the car on 300+whp setting. And even eventually the idea of a turbo upgrade to GTX series and 350+whp.
It was a sacrifice though, I had to give up my favorite set of wheels (15x9 6ul's). So more updates coming soon, with more shiny new parts.
As you can see I'm also upgrading my intercooler setup, will be upgrading the piping setup, as well as the radiator to a supermiata crossflow. Maybe a splitter, and definitely will refine my ducting when I re-do everything. Also want to go with an oil cooler.
The goals for the car are to take it from "able to stay cool for a time attack heat, aka 3 hotlaps" to "a solid 20+ minute session HDPE capable" car. So lots of cooling upgrades incoming. And hopefully a tow rig/trailer setup this year too.
Nice build thread man! Very cool to see the progression and changes over the years (I started reading the thread somewhere pre-turbo when you were building the motor). I must have missed it but I'm assuming you're running a 6 speed tranny? Unlikely the 5 speed would still be in one piece at this point. Also, interesting how you haven't chosen to add hood vents (although maybe that's in the cards) and good to see the car was able to stay cool. I guess you run a lower boost setup on track and maybe take it easy after a handful or so of laps to cool her down..? Looking forward to more updates. You waited a while to add aero which is smart. It definitely makes you appreciate the wing. I remember first time I went from non-aero to a big rear **** it was like a cheat code the car is just much more stable at speed.
This is getting exciting! It always blows me away seeing how much bigger the 11.75" rotors are than the stock units. What're you going with for wheels?
Going from three laps and smoked to a 10+ lap endurance hero will be killer as well. Negating the absolute need for cooldown laps at an HPDE is great. You paid for the seat time and now you get ALL the seat time! I remember taking one of our local time attack 350z guys for a ride along at Chuckwalla earlier this year. Towards the end of our 20-minute session, he exclaimed "How is your car still pulling laps this quick? I would've had to pull off multiple laps ago!"
Excited to see the car perform once all the new upgrades are in.
Nice build thread man! Very cool to see the progression and changes over the years (I started reading the thread somewhere pre-turbo when you were building the motor). I must have missed it but I'm assuming you're running a 6 speed tranny? Unlikely the 5 speed would still be in one piece at this point. Also, interesting how you haven't chosen to add hood vents (although maybe that's in the cards) and good to see the car was able to stay cool. I guess you run a lower boost setup on track and maybe take it easy after a handful or so of laps to cool her down..? Looking forward to more updates. You waited a while to add aero which is smart. It definitely makes you appreciate the wing. I remember first time I went from non-aero to a big rear **** it was like a cheat code the car is just much more stable at speed.
Thanks! Still actually on a 5 speed (a newer one from an NB), which has surprisingly held up. I think it's due to the power delivery on the oldskool gt2860, it's super linear. I also have mechanical empathy for it and don't bang gears for flat foot shift (yet - I do wanna set that up and see what happens).
Hood vents are on the list! Probably this season. I've been putting them off because I love the clean look of a stock hood, but they cooling and aero benefits on a track focused car can't be denied. Leaning towards the r theory vents at the moment, but the singulars are still in the running as well.
Temps have held up on the track for the most part as long as I keep it on lower boost (12psi), after a good session of 3-4 hotlaps CLT is usually around 205 - 208*, when I pull into the pits it will creep closer to 215* but catch and cool itself down. No way I'd run the allofit map for more than a lap or two right now though, and I want to be able to run it at full song all the time.
Aero has been huge for the stability of the car. I haven't had a single "oh ****" event or an off since I went aero, so I can definitely say even the relatively mild aero I'm running has huge payoffs on track.
Originally Posted by Z_WAAAAAZ
This is getting exciting! It always blows me away seeing how much bigger the 11.75" rotors are than the stock units. What're you going with for wheels?
Going from three laps and smoked to a 10+ lap endurance hero will be killer as well. Negating the absolute need for cooldown laps at an HPDE is great. You paid for the seat time and now you get ALL the seat time! I remember taking one of our local time attack 350z guys for a ride along at Chuckwalla earlier this year. Towards the end of our 20-minute session, he exclaimed "How is your car still pulling laps this quick? I would've had to pull off multiple laps ago!"
Excited to see the car perform once all the new upgrades are in.
Going with 15x9.5 Konig Freeforms for track wheels. I like the idea that 9.5's will fit under my stock fenders a bit better and still allow me to run 245's. Might try some rt660's in 245 next season, but then again I might go with something a bit lower treadwear and more track specific - especially if I get my tow setup going which is the plan. I also wanna pick up the new 6ul's when they come out in 15x9, for street wheels, because they are beautiful.
What you described is exactly what I'm going for with my car, as-is it does not overheat on time attack sessions, but I want to bulletproof the cooling setup for longer HPDE sessions so I'm going all out. I also noticed IAT's creeping when pushing 20+psi out of this turbo, so the intercooler should help with that and allow me to run high boost for longer periods.
Originally Posted by redursidae
oh man. Those brakes are HUUUGE. I'm excited to see how it does at Super Lap next year with all the new cooling mods.
Yeah buddy! After feeling your little big brake kit I'm getting excited to feel what real brakes will be like on this thing. Should be worth some time for sure if I can harness the new found power and confidence.
Originally Posted by Gee Emm
Now THAT is a rotor
*Australian accent* That's not a rotor... THIS is a rotor!
Damn, those are good looking wheels. The color combo’s gonna look better with the chrome instead of black IMO.
Funny how your tastes change over time. I was soooo into matte black wheels as a kid and now they no longer excite me lol.
Thanks! The wheels on the car used to be friggin' gold, which actually didn't look terrible on the car, but yeah, not at all my style anymore. Then I bent one of those wheels, and goodwin discontinued the gold color, so I had to buy a silver replacement and paint the whole set, so I went with the gunmetal gray. I think they look aight, but certainly not the look I want for the car. Plus they are 8's, so meh.
I've been debating wheels for the last few months, knowing I needed to get a new set to fit my new SM BBK. I really liked my 6ul's, they were to this day my favorite wheel for a NA miata. But they won't fit my brakes, so they gotta go.
I was looking at x10's for a bit, but couldn't convince myself they actually look good tucked under stock fenders. I found quite a few people had "made them work", and they don't look TERRIBLE, but it just wasn't my style. Plus I don't think they actually fit, most people who "fit" them didn't fully cycle the suspension and use full lock while doing so to see if they contacted, if you check earlier in this thread I had done exactly that with my x9 6ul's and they BARELY fit, so yeah, I decided against those.
I looked at 15x9.5 freeforms, which actually seem to fit NA fenders better and would certainly be faster, but I couldn't get over the style. I think they look pretty cool, just not at all the style I like for my car. I like phat lips and a more oldskool style wheel.
So after wheel shopping for a while I had goodwin check clearance on a few wheels vs the SM F88 BBK template and these were one of the wheels that I actually liked that fit. Now looking at them in person I'm pretty amped, they should look great on the car, in a similar vein to the 6ul's with a similar finish even and chonky lips.
And even better, I heard from Emilio that the 15x9.5 6ul's will be a thing, so currently the goal is to rock these x9's this season as track wheels, rotate them to street wheels next year and pickup some 9.5's to run 245's.
Now I'm still debating what tires I'll run, but that's a different story. I'm shopping trailers right now so hopefully I'll be towing this year, which opens my tire choices to a world I've never looked at. Maybe Proxies RR? If anyone following along has any suggestions I'm all ears. Looking for something super200TW pace for time attack, but perhaps more longevity/heat tolerance for lapping use?
Funny how we have so many damn options at our fingertips and it's still barely enough haha.
Interested to see how the fitment is on the 9.5's with 245s on them. Will definitely be watching your thread for results. I wanted to go with 10s for my car when I was in your shoes and upsizing wheels to fit a BBK, but didn't want to deal with fitment difficulties and went with 9's to be safe. I'm definitely going to bite the bullet and grab a set of 15x10's at some point, but still don't like the fact that they generally seem to make contact with the FUCA at full lock haha.
As far as tires go, I don't have a ton of tires to list, but I've been mostly happy with my RT660s. Running those and the Kumho V730s back to back, I can say the 660s definitely have more peak traction, and when the traction begins to fall off, they still seem to be faster than the V730s. Some will say the 660s fade and fall off after only a couple laps. My experience is that they're good for 5-6 laps before you can tell they're falling off.
V730s were consistent as heck for me, which was cool. I had a couple sessions on them where my lap times were all within a second of each other, and the tires felt good the whole time. They wore out faster than the 660s though, and offered slightly less grip while doing so. Don't think I'll grab another set unless they're on sale for super cheap somewhere.
I've been working through the hood project, taking my time, trying to get it as perfect as possible. It hurt me to cut my factory hood, so I wanted as good an outcome as possible to make it worth it.
Probably spent 2 hours applying this decal, measuring from every point i could find to make sure its symmetrical. Finally said f-it and hit the corners with the Christmas tree bit. Now I'm committed.
Lots of layers of metal to work through. Was happy with how symmetrical it's looking at this point.
Mock up on the car. Psyched on the path of hot air out the rad.
and the intake box separation. Adding the NACA duct lid for cold air, just mocked up for now.
I chose nice stainless buttonheads instead of rivets for serviceability, wanna be able to pull them off for paint easily later.
With the vents bolted in I had to mock it up with the headlight lid. Digging the look.
Vents back out to finish up the underside. One thing that annoys me on a lot of vent installs is a hacky/unfinished underside, so I cleaned it up as much as possible and hit it with some blue.
I noticed a lot of structure gone with the cuts required to dit the vents. I made some little supports out of hockey pucks and panel bonded them in. Also used lots of panel bond in strategic spots to glue the skin to the skeleton after the hackery.
it's all curing now but next weekend I'll bolt the vents on for good and get the hood back on.
I am about to start on this, so very interested in yours. Looks good, very neat, and I like what you are doing to reinstall strength after cutting those supports. That has been exercising my mind a lot, and I now have something to explore..What did you use to make the cuts, it is a very professional looking installation?
I am thinking of only doing the smaller central vent to start, and see how that affects temperatures. But I suspect that when push comes to shove, I will decide that I am only going to do this once, and do the lot in one hit. Besides, I have a spare bonnet in the right colour that I picked up from someone who was going to do the same, only his car was totalled before he started, so if it goes pear-shaped I have a get-out-of-jail card!
Thanks for the kind words! I looked for a spare hood for a while but couldn't really find anything nice enough to use. I definitely think it's a good idea to re-enforce it after all the hacking, it's pretty flimsy. After the re-enforcement it feels much more solid, I didn't show any pics but I panel bonded the entire front seam, and anywhere else that it had gotten loose over time (or from the cutting).
I made the top skin cuts with a dremel, again, taking my time. I thought about yoloing with an angle grinder like the instructions, but after doing it this way I think you'd have to be a wizard with that tool to make it look as nice. Dremel was easy with the re-enforce cutting wheels and taking your time. I probably spent a few hours making those cuts. Then used a sanding drum for the rounded corners, and used a hand file to make sure the straight cuts were straight.
The bottom skin I went angle grinder, it's a lotta crap to remove under there with multiple layers of metal. Really pretty tedious. I also took the time to clean up these cuts and make them more presentable, rounding the edges and sanding everything, etc.
Looking good man! Love the hockey pucks for support. Gotta do something like that on my hood. The substructure rattles a bit at idle on cold starts without any support.
Ah good, thanks for that, I have a Dremel and a bunch of disks that have hardly been touched. I also have another 'spare' bonnet that got draped over a windscreen, so I might get in a little practice with that first!
09-11-2023, 10:55 PM
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