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I tried and hated a pedal extension. Ended up gently bending throttle pedal arm towards brake pedal. I roll the right edge of my right foot to blip the throttle.
I also learned after practicing on the street then going to a track day that the brake gets pushed significantly further during track day stops and had to make adjustments to throttle pedal height.
You being "nearly 6ft tall" pass broomstick test with the hardog hardcore single diagnal, with sparco seat and PCI brackets? Just curious if so and how much room you have, as I may be only an inch taller than you (almost 6'1").
Great 10AE, 3770 owner here.
So far I haven’t been broomstick tested because I rock a hardtop and I fit under the hardtop with the helmet on with sliders anyways. I’m definitely more torso than legs.
Originally Posted by 90LowNSlo
I have never been able to heel-toe. It's like I can't get my foot turned enough without trying to put my one through the dash. I left foot brake and float for my downshifts...
Still tell me how you like the pedal extension. (I'm 6'- 6'1" also)
Just using on the street it has made no difference. My friends all tell me that I’m stupid and doing something wrong but I feel like I need the pedal to be longer not wider, but then it would hit the floor.
I’ll see how it works out at autocross on Sunday, I think it might be easier if the brake pedal wasn’t so far above the gas pedal.
I'll probably be sticking with my tried and true left foot braking. Been doing that for years.
Heh. In truck driving school the instructors would occasionally knock the truck out of gear with out warning. It was to get practice recovering a gear. Legally you can't roll out of gear for more distance than your vehicle is long. You are not allowed to float gears in school but I had always floated my cars and had been using my left foot technique long before trucking school. One day the instructor snatched the truck out of gear while I was on the brakes going down a hill. I had been getting ready to drop a gear (normally while double clutching) more for my own practice anyways. I put my left foot on brake with my right (both feet on the pedal for a brief moment), took the pressure with my left, gave it some throttle with my right (it's not a blip like in a car) and floated down a gear. I was lucky and it was almost perfect, it didn't grind, and you almost couldn't feel any difference in deceleration. The instructor asked me how I had done that and when I told him he seemed very impressed. He later told me, after I was finished with school, that I was the only person to get it back in gear down that hill.
Sorry to derail but I just remembered that little moment.
Last edited by 90LowNSlo; 09-10-2019 at 09:51 PM.
Reason: typo
Car felt pretty good on Sunday. I didn't really get much of a chance to practice with the heel toe since there was one downshift the entire course and I didn't want to throw away a run if I blew my braking, but I did give it a shot during a run I knew I coned (see end of video). The pedal extension sorta worked, I can definitely hear the engine revving up (albeit not enough) under brakes on video so I guess I just need more practice.
The car is also a bit tail happy, which from what I understand is making me slower most likely but its a lot of fun to drive so I'm gonna leave the FM rear bar in place for now.
I also out of curiosity checked my coolant temps mid run. I had a feeling my car ran hot because Miata, and also because I have the OBD data logs from when I did emissions on the rollers and I hit 225°F water temps after 3 consecutive 4-minute tests. So after one run when I was waiting in grid idling for 10 minutes in 90°F weather, I plugged in my OBD reader and checked coolant temps.
Pleasantly surprised to say that coolant temps never crossed 208°F when sitting waiting to run again.
God damn do I look too tall for the car in that photo. I don't scrape the hardtop with my helmet but I think it's time for a lower seat mount.
Also I'm thinking about running spacers to get some nicer fitment with the 6ULs. Only reason I am hesitant is because I have unrolled unpulled fenders and I don't wanna mess anything up.
Nicer fitment? The 9" 6ULs you're running are pretty much optimized to fill the fenders without ruining stuff. If by nicer fitment you mean you would like your car to not work as well... Go right ahead.
I think it looks good as is... I don't like a lot of Gap but I could never understand adding weight to the hubs for no other reason than to change it's looks.
If you're goin hella' flush are you going slammed as well?
I tried and hated a pedal extension. Ended up gently bending throttle pedal arm towards brake pedal. I roll the right edge of my right foot to blip the throttle.
I also learned after practicing on the street then going to a track day that the brake gets pushed significantly further during track day stops and had to make adjustments to throttle pedal height.
The weekend to install the reroute finally arrived.
Pictured: The reroute housing when we thought it was installed.
And it took, quite literally, the entire weekend.
I went over to a friends place Saturday morning, we let the car sit for maybe an hour before draining and beginning work, and we had the reroute physically bolted up to the back of the car and everything back together by maybe 3PM.
Upon filling up with water, we noticed a decent bit of water dripping onto the floor but we were unable to track it down. We thought that it was just residual water dumping off a subframe from the bleeder valve but it didn't stop.
Upon further research, the water was running off the back of the head at the bottom of the reroute. What I am inclined to believe happened is a few things:
1. The head was not entirely clean of old gasket material
2. The EGR was butting up against the housing and putting tension on the lower bolt that made seating it more difficult
3. The housing did not go on straight and gasket got pushed out
Coil pack out, EGR out, housing out. We were pretty tired of wrenching by this point so we packed up for the night.
Next morning we got back at it. We backed out the lower housing stud on the head to clean the surface better, where we did remove a couple decent sized pieces of old gasket with a razor. We deleted the EGR entirely with an M22 x 1.5 oil drain plug and a DIY aluminum plate. More goop on the housing, straight on application, let the gasket set for about 3 hours before filling the car with water. No leaks. Started up fine, no leaks. Ran the engine for a few fan cycles and flushed out al the unknown coolant and replaced with brand new stuff. Took a while to get the heater core filled, we were worried about leaks because we damaged the inlet and outlet ports but no issues so far.
So far, all is well. I drove the car home and didn't see any leaks. Just waiting to see if the wetness by the overflow reservoir is a leak or just some residual coolant that got spilled. Temps on the drive home hovered between 185 and 200 the entire time.
is me at the last autocross of the season with my fancy new gloves that I don't need but I bought because they match the car.
I was a bit optimistic with my brakes at this event and as a result I have a couple nice flat spots that I could feel for the entire 130 mile drive home.
First track day is in just under 2 weeks. All I need to do before then is put in my ATE Type 200 brake fluid and change the oil in the rear end.
I can't believe people can actually get the reroute installed with the engine in. I had the engine out for other reasons and did mine then. It was still a PITA getting it to not leak. Ended up having to sand min to a rough polish and that finally worked. Props to you.
It wasn't as awful as people say it will be. We didn't even go through the effort of unbolting the PPF and tilting the transmission forward. The worst part was only being able to turn the bottom nut on the housing about 15 degrees at a time, and the braided clutch line was in the way of the ratchet handle.
I had one friend install a reroute with the engine out and when he got the car running it leaked, so he had to do it again while the engine was in. That was probably not fun.
On an unrelated note, my brake lines are not positioned correctly off the calipers and rub the wheels at full lock. So far I've just worn away the rubber coating and the metal is fine, but that's something I will need to address soon. I think I can just zip tie some more tubing over the part that makes contact and undo the banjo bolt and turn the lines forward more.
Car drove wonderfully. Spent the first two sessions learning the track and watching water temps. Didn't see them cross over 200 when the air temp was probably in the low to mid 50s.
Spent the second two sessions running laps for time. It was a bit of a busy day, so it was really hard to find some clear track space. There were a couple people there who definitely had no idea what they were doing. I got a bit frustrated at one particular driver of a Corvette who would floor it on the straights and then park it on the apex of every corner. I'd back off for 2 or 3 laps to make a gap and then I'd catch him before finishing my hot lap.
I managed to squeeze out a 2:19.59 driving pretty conservatively. From what I understand, that's about 10s off a Spec Miata and about 2-3 seconds off what more experienced friends who drove stock power Miatas could manage. Not bad for a first track day. I feel pretty confident I could have pulled out another second or two with another session or if I was able to get more than 2 hot laps.
Also now I'm hooked on track days. Already starting to figure out when the next one is gonna be.
edit: upon further research it has been pointed out to me that the Spec Miata lap record is a 2:09 but they generally lap in the low to mid teens.
09-10-2019, 06:46 AM
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