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I'm going to be jumping around a lot from this point on given the number of things to do and I just attack whatever feels right at the time.
First, I went to a car show with the kids on Saturday. Is it a sign that I'm getting old when a nearly stock NA with RML 15x8 daisies caught my attention more than most other cars? These wheels look great in person.
Next up was some further garage organizing. I still have my buddy's NA8 taking up valuable garage space, so I'm working around that, but I was able to get my TV hung up. Really nice to have music or [insert video of choice here] streaming while wrenching away.
My NB is reduced down to basically... well.... a chassis with a few body panels on it.
The interior still has a couple fairly non-intrusive panels left and the carpet. My pruned down and re-loomed factory chassis harness is not-so-beautifully showcased here. Part of the reason to go PDM is to ditch a huge majority of that bulky mess and really make the wiring something I can be proud of as this was something I was never truly happy with when kswapped. I've got a thought coming together in my head on the pedal assemblies now that they are visible, but more on that later.
In a bit of forward progress, because of digital dash plans, the Longacre coolant temp and oil pressure gauges are no longer needed in the tombstone (and they were included with the kswap sale), so the eyeball vents went back in. I also finally installed some Hall Roadster Parts HVAC and console blanking plates that I've honestly been sitting on for 2+ years. The console blanking plate requires shaving off geometry from the bottom of the tombstone so the panel can sit flush against the tombstone, but 15 mins of precision dremel effort made quick work of that. It was pretty awesome for Charles to meet my specific ask on supplying the console delete with no holes in it (he generally sells these with window switches installed and an NA6 specific plug). Obviously that plug doesn't work because I have an NA6 dash in an NB1, but I'll admit I'm the weird one. Most people for a build like this also won't keep a radio in the car, but that's a weight addition I'm willing to keep for street car reasons. This car will be driven to MATG again. That 10hr drive isn't great to begin with, but it's much less great without tunes.
The carrier still hasn't shown up for the kswap parts at this point in time, so I'm also sitting on all that hardware waiting for it to go so I can reshuffle a lot of equipment around and open both of the NB doors fully. So far, I would not recommend this carrier. Communication has been, uhmm, awful at best?
I couldn't do a TV in the garage. Especially one so small.
Kidding of course. I found myself just watching whatever I'd put on, even if it was a re-run of a race or star wars movie I'd seen a million times before. So when the wife said, "when I said I didn't want a bedroom TV in the new house, I actually meant I did", I moved it up there. Don't miss it. I did get a fairly large PC screen that I can pull up giant wiring diagrams or blowup a data log for closer inspection. THAT is very handy. Takes up a bit less wall space too. It's a 27" that definitely needs to be in the 40" range.
When we moved, I upgraded the living room TV and mounted our old 65" in my shop. Works great for putting up shop manual stuff, YT how tos, etc. Love it for streaming racing in the background while I'm working in the shop.
Streaming racing on the garage TV sounds like one of the better options for someone with raging ADHD. I'll stream music on our garage TV via YouTube but often end up spending a bunch of time skipping songs or changing playlists. It's gotten to the point that I'll keep myself from turning the TV on at all if I need to focus or am working on a limited timeframe that night.
Those 15x8 daisies are hard. Looks so good with the extra outer lip.
This 32" TV is my now ~15 year old college dorm TV that I've since just tossed a Chromecast on to allow for streaming services and voice commands with my phone that easily links to it.
It would be slick to stream to it as a PC display when I'm 3D scanning in the garage, but it is actually a bit too small for that given the location. I'm really getting deep into first world problems here though if I'm complaining about that.
If I get really deep into things, the house has an integrated 8 speaker system in it on various ceilings. 2 speakers in garage, 2 in family room, 2 in loft, and 2 in master. The biggest challenge is finding the right central receiver to connect to the speakers to such that I can link the TV/Chromecast audio to the garage speakers while keeping the others on their own zone. The family/master/loft speakers would most likely be used by the wife to play music throughout the house while connected to our google home system. I'm not much of an audiophile so I've not explored how to best integrate this all yet.
The first LS related part is here, and let me assure you, it's not as exciting as anyone here would hope. I told you I'll be jumping around on topics like crazy, so here we go.
The plan is to be running drive-by-wire to support any sort of pedal to TB sensitivity adjustments, tq curve manipulation tweaks, and/or traction control strategies that may prove useful when making ~4x more tq/hp than mazda intended this chassis to have. It's another layer of tuning complexity, but well worth the initial effort given the potential long-term benefits.
There are a wide variety of DBW pedal options out there. The world is your oyster to pick whatever you want, but am not looking to reinvent the wheel and I don't feel that I'm alone here. The only true "off the shelf" solution that I am aware of was KPI's Honda Fit DBW solution, but I am not a fan of how their big ole chunk of billet bolts through the firewall. It's overkill (both in cost and weight) and aesthetically unpleasing to see random bolt heads on the firewall. Sticking to the GM family of parts led me fairly quickly to what our friends in the LFX-swap world like to do. Both of the links below showcase very similar methods to how 2010-2015 (5th gen) Chevy Camaro DBW pedals (GM PN 92199239) can be mounted to the OEM Mazda pedal assembly. https://www.miataturbo.net/engine-pe...4/#post1327003 https://www.miataturbo.net/build-thr...2/#post1590026
I think both Camaro pedal executions linked above are far more elegant than what KPI offers on the Honda Fit pedal solution, so I ordered up a used pedal on eBay. Now... if I had a welder at my immediate disposal, I'd probably do literally EXACTLY what they did and hack/whack/weld some one-off thing, but I still don't have a welder.. I do have a tool that can be equally as useful as a welder though when you have design software at your disposal, a 3D scanner... so I got to work tonight
Light scanners like my Einstar aren't really the "best" at scanning dark black objects such as this without scanning spray, but after about 45 mins of messing around and taking my time, I generated an STL file of the throttle pedal that I'm quite happy with at a 0.5mm resolution. The protruding alignment tabs, bolt pattern, and general geometry are all quite well defined, which is all I need.
Ran short on time tonight, but as you can probably assume, the next step will be to scan the OE pedal assembly and see what further design opportunities exist once brought into the 3D CAD world.
Exciting stuff. Nowhere near as necessary on my rig, but I've been having a bit of fun experimenting with the DBW map and finding personal preferences for pedal sensitivity. My car didn't come with traction control from the factory so once I put some real power in it, I'm planning on limiting torque (or boost if I make bad decisions) in 1st and 2nd gear via the DBW tables.
I assume this will be all even more necessary with 500whp to deal with
That first picture made me think you still has an old school console TV. Yes, I am old enough to remember them because my parents had one in the early 80's.
Got the "not so mobile" scanning work station moved out to the garage to start hammering out a pile of files.
First up was honestly not even my NB. Remember that laguna blue NA that's been sitting in my garage all winter? It is time. I got 5 separate files all scanned, meshed, and uploaded to the website in the matter of about 3 hours total. You can find details in the specific thread linked below that I keep up to date with these files. More uploads coming soon... As always, feel free to reach out to me if you are looking for something specific. I've got a list of "desired scans" that I try to get for people in short order once requested. https://www.miataturbo.net/general-m...3/#post1665539
Conversation with the buyer started on March 18th... Just over 2 months later, we finally have kswap pickup! I honestly quite enjoyed the swap overall, but I'm excited for the challenge ahead on what's next, so lets tread along shall we?
"Reusable P" ANDDDD "fun inside". Say less GWR! But honestly, what's in the bag is a classic case of moving one step backward to eventually gain that step back. I sold the DW200 fuel pump assembly with the kswap so that way the buyer had a full drop-in "kit". As it turns out, with the LSx swap you don't really need that much fuel pump to support ~500whp. 255LPH will get you there (yay for benefits of 1 atmosphere of intake pressure), so I simply ordered a new DW200 from GWR and will install it in a spare NB fuel pump assembly that I had laying around for years. No need to worry about frying OEM wiring with the DW200 which is part of the reason I had it with the K24
Last bit for tonight, got another scan meshed on the interior side of the firewall. Why this is important will make more sense as we move along, but part of it is related to the DBW Camaro pedal that I posted earlier. I now have exact OE Mazda brake and accelerator pedal positions to reference. Why I scanned all the way over to the passenger side is something I'll leave up to interpretation
No need to worry about frying OEM wiring with the DW200 which is part of the reason I had it with the K24
This is probably something you already know, and I'm not sure what you'll have left of the stock harness after thrifting it and mating it to the LS wiring harness, but I'd recommend you don't use the factory relay under the dash to power the fuel pump. It's a known failure point and I had to replace it even on my stock NB2.
Originally Posted by Padlock
Last bit for tonight, got another scan meshed on the interior side of the firewall. Why this is important will make more sense as we move along, but part of it is related to the DBW Camaro pedal that I posted earlier. I now have exact OE Mazda brake and accelerator pedal positions to reference. Why I scanned all the way over to the passenger side is something I'll leave up to interpretation.
This is probably something you already know, and I'm not sure what you'll have left of the stock harness after thrifting it and mating it to the LS wiring harness, but I'd recommend you don't use the factory relay under the dash to power the fuel pump. It's a known failure point and I had to replace it even on my stock NB2.
I appreciate the heads up; I'll make myself a note on this. The chassis has ~145k on it and has still been using the OEM "as built" pump relay the entire time as far as I know (at least I never changed it). I have had turn a signal relay fail on me, so maybe "old Mazda relays" are just suspect in general. Odds are they will all be replaced with how my wiring layout is looking.
Wow, never considered that bit about needing less fuel pump with the manifold pressure never surpassing atmo... Kinda cool you don't have to go nuts with the fuel system for this project, although there's obviously other areas that will make up for that one easy bit lol.
Very interested to see what you come up with for the pedal/mounting solution. Seems to be one of the most contentious points of the LFX/LS swaps. My guess is the Accusump idea has already been thrown out the window and the lines for the dry sump are gonna go through the passenger side of the firewall.
Zak, I'm going to keep my secrets until further notice, but good guess. We will see how right you are over time
Not much for huge progress over the last week. Feels good to have the kswap parts out of the corner of the garage so I can start refilling it with other bits and pieces.
I consider myself lucky as my birthday always falls on Memorial Day weekend, so naturally I get a 3 day weekend to make plans on. This year, I took a few extra days off to make myself a 5 day weekend, tossed a 3D scan holiday sale up for LLD, and took the family on a 3000mi road trip in the burb down to Venice Florida where I've got some extended family on my wife's side. Road tripping that far with 18mo twins and a 10yo is nothing short of interesting (some would say we are a glutton for punishment), but they all managed the trip surprisingly well. Driving through the night makes for some long days, but the ole cammed burb jumped from 254k to 257k without a hiccup! Here's my proof that it made it to the Venice beach.
Throughout the week I've been starting my junkyard searches for driveline parts that I know I need. Found a 3.23 ratio G80 LSD Getrag diff in a local-ish yard in a 112k mi 2008 Cadillac STS (GM OEM PN 25862519 for those curious). Made some calls and they removed it for me and shipped it to my house for $325 shipped, which I felt was a deal for not needing to lift a finger. The downside of northern junkyards will always be the corrosion you face on parts. This part is in good shape for its age but still a little crusty for what I prefer to install on the car, so I'll be spending some time de-oxidizing the housing and cleaning up bolt heads. More on that later.. More leads on driveline parts finalized today as well, but also more on that later..so it begins
I winced a little reading the road trip bit at first haha. I’ve pulled the trip from SoCal to British Columbia (1,400 miles each way) several times, but those were all either solo or with a single buddy. Glad to hear it went smoothly with all the kiddos in the car!
That’s a solid come up on the G80 diff! I think I paid $450ish for my 3.91 G80. There might be fewer of those floating around, though? I really wanted a 3.73 w/ the LSD but those were near impossible to find when I was looking. Guess that’s one less problem to have when your power goal’s almost twice what my car was making
Yesterday's used part find was a LS3 intake manifold assembly on marketplace. Fuel rail, injectors, intake manifold, MAP sensor, and 90mm DBW throttle body are all part of this nice cost effective package for 5 Ben Franklins. This manifold is pretty much a requirement if you are looking to fit an intake under the hood of an NA/NB. Aftermarket intakes exist, but few outperform this GM OEM part's resultant powerband so the decision to use it was pretty easy.
The LS3 injectors on it are spec'd at 42 lb/hr (441cc/min) which isn't particularly large, but they "should" be able to hit my goal of ~500whp. Foreshadowing: the L94 engine I plan to source has 54 lb/hr (567cc/min) included on it as it is a factory flex fuel engine, so I'll have L94 injectors as backup if the LS3 injectors run up short of my goal. It's nice to have cheap options at my disposal. For those continuing to wonder "why swap from K24 to LSx for 500hp?"... well, this fuel system is part of that story. The K24 would have needed a larger pump (with beefier wiring) and much bigger $1k+ injectors just to support the same power level that this OE GM setup will run without a sweat. Staying N/A has it's benefits, and fuel system costs is definitely one of them. The factory DBW throttle body coming in this package that doesn't need vibration isolation like K24-mounted Bosch throttle bodies do is another huge win overall.
Interesting, no Ford 8.8? I bought a Getrag for my swap at first, but re-sold it and went with a Ford which I've been very happy with.
The first Ford 8.8 I bought had the oem tag on it for a 3.23 ratio or something, turns out it was actually more like a 4.x something. The ebay seller wasn't aware. I've since moved to a 3.23 which is a great ratio. I don't think the Getrags came in many different ratios IIRC, so you're probably good.
Interesting, no Ford 8.8? I bought a Getrag for my swap at first, but re-sold it and went with a Ford which I've been very happy with.
The first Ford 8.8 I bought had the oem tag on it for a 3.23 ratio or something, turns out it was actually more like a 4.x something. The ebay seller wasn't aware. I've since moved to a 3.23 which is a great ratio. I don't think the Getrags came in many different ratios IIRC, so you're probably good.
8.8 is physically larger and heavier (making exhaust packaging more challenging), but it is argued to be stronger, has more aftermarket LSD options available and higher ratio options.
Getrag is lighter and makes exhaust routing a bit easier while still being plenty strong for my application. Ratio combinations from 2.73 up to 3.91 are available if you want to piece meal something together, which covers anything most 400+whp miata builders will want. The G80 factory LSD that I got in mine is not as great as some offerings that the 8.8 has, but recently an OS Giken has been made available through GWR at a notable price tag (https://www.good-win-racing.com/Mazd...4OZTAnVABnNvjz).
In the end, it boils down to preference. I chose the lighter/smaller Getrag unit knowing that the G80 LSD may not be as good as 8.8 LSD options that would cost a small(er) premium. It's nice to know there is a future option to go to OSG on the Getrag if I'm feeling spendy, but I won't be pursuing that right away to attempt to keep the project somewhat under control on scope. I can't fault anyone for choosing 8.8, but it wasn't my preference.
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