This is one option to replace those quarter windows
https://www.carbonmiata.com/shop/cm-...ata-na-nb-1349

 

Excited to hear about oil temps. How was the heat and area around the turbo?

 

Those are super cool and I wanted a set for a long time. https://revlimiter.net/blog/2023/01/...nstall-review/

 

So what to comment on first. Last time I tracked the car it was on an open diff, BC coilovers, 5 spd, and no rear wing. Changes since last time are Xidas coilovers, 6 spd tranny, 3.6 torsen diff, and the 9lr street ****. The first thing I'll say is the car is much more "composed" with the Xidas. Good shocks make a big difference and I'm happy with how it absorbs the bumps/undulations that would've unsettled the car a bit with the BC's. The Xidas soak them up. I started the day with the Xidas on front 12 clicks from full soft, and rear 10 clicks from full soft. This is with the front bar I have on full stiff (not the largest front bar) and the rear bar on full stiff. First time out the car was very confidence inspiring. Handling wise it def pushes a bit, but definitely makes it easier to drive. Especially at speed, the rear wing definitely helps. Any of the turns where I'm in 4th and the hard braking zone into 1, I'm sure the wing is helping a lot. Going into turn 1 my top speed according to the gps was 125 at the top of 5th.

It took me the better part of 2 sessions to shake off the rust but I was feeling better and pushing the car more. After the first session I set the Xidas to F12/R12. Hard to pinpoint the change but it seemed to help the car rotate a bit more. Turn 1 and turn 5 there's a good bit of trail braking and getting the car to rotate helps. Ultimately I still felt the car pushing and ended up with the Xidas set to F12/R14. This helped the car rotate a bit more in the braking zones but in the higher speed turns the car still pushes a touch which makes it easier to drive as long as you don't come in too hot to a turn. That's definitely the wing doing its thing and taming the rear end down. I'm quite happy with the balance of the car, it's fairly neutral.. I had Dave take the car out for a session and he commented how he thinks it's setup well. Has a touch of understeer on the higher speed stuff but not bad at all and makes it fun for an HPDE car. So I think that's enough praise for the Xidas and the rear wing.

What about the 6 spd? I have no real complaints. Is the 5 speed better/easier to find gears? I'll say for sure YES. I had one pretty good misshift the whole weekend when I was checking my mirror while downshifting into a braking zone and grabbed 2nd for a split second when going for 4th, but that's really on me. You have to be clear and deliberate picking gears over the 5 spd. There is a bit of a learning curve when going from the 5-6 spd. It took Dave a handful of laps to get semi-comfortable finding the gears in my car, but once you get it sorted it's not bad imo. It's a great shifting 6 spd, just not quite as good as the 5 spd.

The other thing that I find a bit tricky is consistently threshold braking but I think that's more a lack of seat time vs anything. Dave commented he found the pedal "too stiff" and a little tricky to find that limit also, but I'm sure he'd sort it out with more time in the car. I locked them up a couple times but nothing bad. Dave locked them up once and we did a very uneventful 4 off into the grass, but not the fault of the brakes. Brakes were great all weekend, PFC pads in the front and rear. I think 11/97s.

Best full timed lap according to the lap timer was a 1:28.3. I should be capable of a 1:27 w/ me driving better and without traffic, but is what it is. This is the first session on Sunday, lap timer didn't work for the 2nd.


In the last session on Saturday Dave of course did a 1:26.81 with my fat *** sitting shotgun. This was his first time in the car since the one session last fall figuring out the 6 spd and brakes. Jeez, car's got a 1:25 in it then easy w/o a passenger. If a cooler day and with a couple session he could proly get a 1:24.



Here's a shot of the car w/ some dirt on it.


Some other thoughts on the day. Met some nice folks around the paddock. An s2k with a K swap (F motors are getting rarer and expensive). Another fellow Miata owner Johnny I believe. Thinking about joining the dark side.. Hard to beat the reliability of N/A though. It sure is fun with more power though


The drive home sucked royally in mid 90's full sun without a/c but even if my vajj was sweating a bit, it wasn't unbearable. First world problems. The lack of storage space for a pop up tent/etc sure makes a tow vehicle more and more appealing. If these guys weren't there for me to mooch off their a/c and shade I may not have signed up. Fortunately didn't need the spare alternator I brought. Like I said, was a pretty smooth event. No issues with the wastegate arm connection like last fall. Taking it off and bending it a touch was what it needed so it didn't put stress on the circlip. No bolts/nuts backing out yet that I can tell so that's good also. I gotta review the logs and play w/ the gopro footage.

 

Oil temps I think hit 220's tops. I'll pull the logs but that's all I saw when peeking at the gauge periodically. Nothing melted or broke around the turbo so I guess it's good..? I'm sure the heatshielding, vents, and header wrapped downpipe are helping. I'll inspect things more closely next time I change the oil/etc.

Ah one thing you did remind me of. I need to add another support for the upper radiator hose closer to the radiator. With a lot of heat it's sagging more than I like and proly bouncing around when on track.

 

Here's a video of me turning laps on the morning Sunday session. Definitely should've gotten a 1:27 but is what it is.

This is Dave in the Miata doing some laps. Of course since it's a gopro it had to f*ck up and record in time lapse (probably user error.. apparently a long press of the record button does a timelapse video but that's a dumb default). Uploaded it for the hell of it. Impressive in a handful of lapse he ran a 1:26.8 with me in the passenger seat.

 

Yuck! Nevermind. Thanks for the link so that OP can ignore me lol

 

All good, appreciate the input. I ordered some from Moss, the plexiglass kind with a hole and vent you can open and close. Seems like they are decent, they don't have to do much. https://mossmiata.com/901-695-quarter-windows-with-vent

 

Good sh*t dude! The car looks friggin' sweet with the street **** and I'm glad to hear it was all smooth sailing with the new laundry list of upgrades.

Car looks nice and composed. I'll for sure take a little push over tail-happiness when getting acquainted with a slew of new mods.

 

Nice work getting it out on track, and nice vid! It looked like solid driving and good line choice without pushing the limits too hard, so definitely room to improve. You had way better lines than that Supra in front of you! And the timelapse was cool too, I actually liked it, funny to see him terrorize that c8 and you can see it dipping tires in the dirt too trying to get away.

Glad the car ran well for you. Here's to many more trackdays in it

 

So haven't done too much lately with the car, but finally got time and did some wrenching after the last event to fix some issues with the car. I can't believe summer is winding down already and kids go back to school next week.. :/ It's been a fun summer so I can't complain. One fun trip (which even included some motorsports this summer) was we did a trip to Spain with the family. I had no idea, but Spanish folk love them some karting! I visited 3 different karting places in Spain and there are a bunch of places around main cities. Here are a couple pics of an indoor kart track in Valencia. Initially I thought eh, must use electric karts.. but no no! Gas karts and a ventilation system! It has a raised section that adds some elevation changes and makes the track bigger as it loops back underneath. You can see a shot of it behind my son's picture. They take their karting seriously in Spain!



Around Madrid here's a shot of all the karting places (maybe a cpl are kart related and not actual tracks). Honestly I'm quite jealous. Here in the US we have 1 good karting place up by baltimore (united karting), and the rest suck. I guess here in the US karting is viewed as a "kids" activity whereas in Spain it's a "motorsports" thing and plenty of adults enjoy it. We showed upto one place and didn't reserve a time ahead of time and couldn't get on track because it was all booked up for the day (midweek, not even a weekend). Anyway, definitely a very cool thing about Spanish culture. If you're visiting Spain, make sure to stop at some different kart tracks!



So, back to the car.. It's probably didn't need it but it's been a couple events and the better part of a year so I figured I'd do an oil change. The oil drain procedure w/ the oil temp sensor in the drain bolt was a piece of cake. Just unclip it and slip a wrench over. Some ppl gripe that this makes oil changes harder but I disagree. The oil cooler lines however made it a pita this time around to remove the filter. They were almost resting on the filter and didn't have enough slack to get a new (slightly longer) oil filter on, so I had to loosen and reposition the -10 an lines a bit angled away from the filter. Hopefully this shouldn't be a problem going forward now that the lines are angled a little more away from the oil filter.




Also, look what I found when I parked the car right after the last event.. Fortunately made it home fine but I didn't snug down the positive terminal property or have the battery tie down positioned exactly which allowed some movement. Got a new terminal on and should be good now. Properly snugged down the battery w/ the tie down now as well.



One other thing I got knocked off the list was the passenger triangle window. I got the Moss miata plastic/lexan kit. It wasn't hard, just a bit tedious. Take your time. There's a good youtube video showing the install which made it quite easy.




A couple other minor things I want to do for the car to get it in tip top shape before the next event. It's been a hot summer and I have no desire to do a track day again in mid 90's heat and high humidity, so I'll wait till September till my next event.

 

Another question I wanted to pose to you folks is regarding building an exhaust for my Honda. We got a lot of knowledgeable and skilled folks in here so I figured I'd pose it here.

I want to make a new exhaust for the s2k because it's a little loud (it's an HKS N1 3" single) and I need to cut and adjust the downpipe also since the ground clearance isn't ideal. I plan to make a 3" single exhaust but does anyone have recommendations on quality/quiet resonators/mufflers or exhaust design? I'm over the days of loud exhausts, so prefer it on the quiet side. The existing 3" isn't loud, but it's not quiet, and has a bit of drone. I know drone is something that's very tricky/hard to eliminate so I might just start building a quietish 3" exhaust at first and then maybe try to tackle drone later on. Any advice/suggestions are appreciated. The Honda does have a turbo also, which helps quiet things down a bit.

Here's a couple shots of the current exhaust.. not that the pics help that much..

 

Dude, the Spain karting scene bit is nuts not a piece of trivia I expected to learn this morning! I've always wanted to go to a multi-level karting track. We have lots of electric karting spots (K1 speed and such) around here but they're all single level. Nothing wrong with it, but having elevation changes and neon lights everywhere looks fun lol. It does seem like the karting scene around here is kinda losing traction with the track/driver enthusiasts with all of these new sim racing centers popping up recently.

At any rate, glad it was a good summer and hope the rest of the Spain trip was awesome!

I gotta look into those lexan corner windows. Didn't even know that was an available option. Driving my car around in the summer heat with no A/C has me wishing it had crotch windows lol.

As for the exhaust on your S2K. I have no worthwhile input. Put a turbo on it, that should quiet it down

 

Haha well that was the only place indoor like that, but still noteworthy in the middle of a big city they have this nice indoor karting track. Not sure if there's anyplace like that in the US though. Thx man, the rest of the Spain trip was fun. Been there once a while ago and it's a cool culture where dinner starts at 8-9pm and people stay up late (kids included). That indoor karting place closes at 11pm everyday.

I do have a turbo on the s2k.. just getting to old man status. I think the miata exhaust is just right loudness wise. Kraken uses a larger muffler and resonator than I have on the Honda.

 

I'd assume that the karting scene is larger over there in the big cities due to the difficulty of owning a car. At least in Barcelona there wasn't much space to own a car, and with public transit being as good as it is I'm not sure I'd really want to drive much in the city. Having said that, they also seem to have a good number of tracks over there, so someone's building/racing cars (although I assume that's more in the countryside). It's not surprising that Europe produces so many F1 drivers.

Glad you got to go over and have some fun!

I might have to steal that oil temp sensor. I've been dragging my feet on doing a cooler or sandwich plate to add a sensor. The wire from the ECU is already in the engine bay, I just need to get a sensor installed somewhere.

 

Karting is huge in Yurrup... IMHO it's one of the reasons Americans have so much trouble breaking into Euro open wheel/ F1. They want to see karting experience, and it's pretty rare for US drivers unless they spent a few years in Yurrup as a youngster.

That facility looks like a ton of fun. I'd like to try an indoor track with decent karts. I tried it on an outdoor track last year and the no-suspension ride on the base level rental kart was brutal on this old man's body!

For the S2K, IMHO the answer will be a non-straight through muffler. I know it goes against the grain for a turbo car, but that's how you quiet things down. Lots of folks here have had good luck with one of the Magnaflow mufflers, don't have the part # handy, and it may be a tight fit in the Honda. For the drone, it seems like the helmholtz resonator works pretty darn good. I have one on our NC and zero drone. Again not sure if they make one for the S2K... getting it to work requires some specific calculations for the application.

 

Ya I think part of it is definitely that less "fun" cars exist in Europe, petrol (or as we call it gas) is more expensive, and perhaps motorsports with a car isn't economical for many people. With that said, my friend is Spanish and he said it's just a cultural thing. I know it isn't big in the UK, but I'm not sure about other parts of Europe, but I'd assume not (where similar conditions exist). I'm a fan of karting as it's 80% of the fun for much less cost and you can drive the s**t out of the karts and not worry about expensive maintenance or damage. The tracks I visited the guys running them commented "it looks like you have some experience" to which I smiled.. Most karting places list the kart specs, Honda engines, etc. on the website so you know what you're getting into ahead of time. You can also buy beer and food onsight to add to the karting fun. My kind of place.. groups of guys meet up after work for a pint and some karting.

Ya it's nice to have an apples to apples comparison for temps at the pan.

 

LOL "Yurrup"

Ya here in the US (at least here on the east coast) karting seems kind of limited. I think there just isn't the demand for it. Lord knows we have the land and affordable gas. Regarding the ride.. ya it's a heckuva workout. On that indoor track after 2 sessions I was feeling it pretty good as you get tossed around a lot and have to hold yourself in the seat. It makes it fun though.

Thanks appreciate that advice Roda. I'll trade a few HP's these days to make it noticeably quieter so I'll look into a non-straight through muffler. I've don't some digging on helmholtz resonators and while very cool, they are obviously tricky to get just right. The OEM exhaust has a factory heimholtz, and this is a cool video I came across trying to design one. Obviously the turbo manifold/turbo changes the calculations quite a bit so it might take some trial and error if I'm really trying to tackle the drone w/ a helmholtz resonator.

 

I enjoy me some karting as well but we have a similar situation to you. We've got 2 places to go karting around here and they're pretty expensive for what they are. It is fun to go full bore around the tracks though.

I've definitely seen the kart guys at autocross hauling their karts around in the back of their pickups or behind a sedan and thought that would be a pretty good setup.

 

So I finally took a peek at the logs from the hot weekend in June. Temps were low-mid 90's and sunny so it was cooking. My 19 row oil cooler setup looks to be doing well oil temps peaked at ~227F (108.5C) but I'm only on low boost ~200whp. Coolant temps peaked at ~207F which is cool. This is a temp probe in the pan. Nice to know the car definitely has excess cooling capacity as ~230F oil is just nice and warm. I won't bat an eye till at least 260+. The new from China alternator looks to be doing fine as well as voltage hung ~14V, sometimes dipping a touch below but generally above 14V.

This means the cooling system can handle more power (heat). I just wanted to log these numbers should someone else be wondering how my setup actually performs on track.