golfandcars

Coming from someone who has been a bit of a procrastinator on this thing, get after it. You won't regret it.

Got out and did some additional tuning tonight, only have the 40 degree cam angle maps to get done now and I would say the tune will be about 97% done.

Shitty gas station photo since i dont think i have really posted a full car shot in a while. Still rocking the stock 10AE wheels for now, just waiting until i get the tune squared up to swap on my other wheels and tires.


Also picked up some aluminum flat bar to make some mounts for the heat shield i have been tinkering between the header and fuel line, got little side tracked and made an ECU mount instead, it was just riding loose in the glove box and that was bothering me so i ditched the glove box altogether and make a bracket, i dont think this is the final solution but it is better than it just being loose in the glove box. Dont judge the wiring, it looks alot worse that it is because of the extra slack in the harness.

golfandcars

Made some more progress on some small items over the last few days, would have gotten alot more done but had to leave town for a wedding this weekend. Tonight I went for a drive and *tentatively* finished up the fuel adjustments, the car feels amazing, even with the tired K20, i cant imagine what a ~250hp K24 would feel like in this car...

So when i mounted the ECU the little vertical was right over where the USB cable plugs in so i had to move that over so i could plug that in, you can see what im talking about below


Made a little gas pedal extension since i was not comfortable heel toeing in the really in the miata so i solved that.
Plate cut out

Holes drilled

riveted in place

and grip tape installed


I have been needing to fix up and undertray and some rad ducting, right now its not an issue but i know this summer on track, in Texas it will be an issue. So i snagged a piece of ABS plastic off Amazon

I did start cutting and fitting it but i dont have any photos of that just yet.

Another item i need to address is wrapping the header, its right next to the fuel line (which has fire sleeve on it) but i still want to wrap it just in case. So i ordered some header wrap off Amazon.


and dumped in a bucket of water for when i get around to installing later.


Also placed an order with 949 last week, my driveshaft had been squealing when going in reverse or letting off the gas so i ordered a driveshaft which came in over the weekend, i threw that in tonight, not photos of it installed but it is definitely a much more robust piece than the stock driveshaft, and no more squeal...



Also ordered a clutch hydraulic overhaul kit as well, i think i boiled the fluid in the clutch line the other night, have any other K swap guys experienced this? I am going to install the replacement line and put some fire sleeve on it to hopefully counteract that issue, i am probably just going to keep the slave and master for later, i have some receipts from the previous owner replacing them not long before i bought the car

More updates throughout this week, got a bunch of things to get cleaned up before autocross, mostly just maintenance stuff, fluid replacement, bleed brakes and nut and bolt the suspension. Would like to get that header wrapped as well but not sure if i will get to that this week, we will see.

golfandcars

So small update on the car, got the header wrapped. Major pain in the ***, the runners are all so close together it was hard to wrap them individually.

and installed


While i was in there i installed the 949 clutch line


also installed the flywheel cover i forgot to put on when i first did the swap, absolutely could not get this on with the exhaust on the car.


Built a small heatshield for the fuel line



Also wrapped the intake just in case it might make a difference... I really need to find a better solution for this, i know i am losing power because of this intake


Thats it for now, hope you enjoy

golfandcars

So small update guys did a little more work on the car, redid my seat mount so that i was sitting alot lower in the car.

But the biggest update is I finally got the car out on track, and it performed flawlessly. I did get some videos, sorry i dont have all the fancy overlays and timing gear all you guys have, i am just getting started in all this.(also if anyone has some introductory info to that stuff let me know as i would like to learn). Constructive criticism is welcome, i started to find the line a little better and get more comfortable with the car in the 4th session, the last lap i ran was a 1:32 and was my fastest of the day but i had to cut the session short as i was almost out of gas and was pretty much out of time anyways. couple of things i know i need to work on 1) being more consistent with my lines, obviously i was trying different things just feeling things out but i was not hitting my marks every time 2) overall braking, hitting my braking points everytime and i feel like i was under utilizing my brakes almost everywhere and could probably run alot deeper into almost all of the corners and use more brake power. One thing to note on this is i have never driven a car without ABS on track so that may have been in my head a bit just trying to feel the limits there. overall it was a good day, and i will probably be back out next weekend to try and improve some more.

session one towards the end i had a little off track excursion for those who get enjoyment out of seeing others fail, I know i do.




and one shot in the pits for good measure

golfandcars

So it is time for a much needed update on this car...

I have been busy with life etc. but have fit in some time on the car cleaning up some small details. I did get out to the track again a few weeks ago... and noticed something didnt quite feel right with the suspension.

Found this leaking shock front right



I pondered my options here, buy new Bilsteins, rebuild the ones i have, or just bite the bullet and invest in some XIDAs. 4 days later these showed up at my door:



Such gorgeous pieces, true art for the gear head. I feel bad installing them and getting them dirty... but i got right to it.



Ran into a small issue on the front, i had installed some cheap junk adjustable FUCA, as i installed the XIDAs it seemed that there might be an issue. Sure enough when i lowered the car the control arm hit the adjustable collar. You can see a little mark on the orange in the photo below.



So put the OEM FUCA back on and ordered up some from ELBJ's from 949 to compensate, got it aligned last weekend and took it for a spin and boy does it feel much different compared to the bilstein setup.



Also cleaned up a few other loose ends, got a small under tray made to force air through the radiator. Didnt take any photos of that, was kinda boring anyways.

I had been having trouble with the car getting up to operating temperature when not just giving it full beans on track, i suspected that the thermostat was hung open for whatever reason. I needed to redo the lower rad hose and install the aluminum couplers i purchased several weeks back anyways, so i decided to knock it all out at once. If you look back through this thread you will see i have a swivel T stat housing from K tuned, on this housing the t stat is retained by a circlip which had somehow popped out and allowed the T stat to flip sideways and was basically doing nothing. So i reinstalled the t stat with circlip and that seems to have corrected the issue for the time being. We will see what happens long term with it...



I also fixed the lower rad hose, i was lucky it had been rubbing on the AC line and the frame, much longer and it would have probably worn through. Luckily i have plenty of pieces of hose to replace it with and i tweeked the routing a bit to avoid the same issue again, there is not much space down around this area with the AC compressor there as well... also took out the plastic couplers, i was worried these would fail at some point.





I change the tranny fluid as well which wouldnt be anything to talk about normally but there was an alarming amount of metal on the drain plug and you could see some suspended in the fluid as well, is this normal? I feel like it isnt but wanted to consult the community here as i know you guys are well versed in the destruction of 6 speed gear boxes.



Some of the stuff you see in there is bubbles, but you can see some metal in it, especially on the upper left.



Also re greased the shifter when i filled the tranny back up, i use to use this honda grease on the shifter in the S2000 and it works well. I know it isnt necessary but i cant imagine a tremendous amount of fluid makes it up to the shifter.



also emptied my catch can, its interesting to actually see it accumulate something, but it is a bit confusing. This is the second time i have emptied it, both after days at the track and the liquid in it seems to be a mixture of gas and oil, is this normal? I know oil is normal but is it normal for it to have fuel in it?



Finally got around to painting my valve cover, did a pretty hack job but it looks better than the shitty yellow from 10 years ago...





looks so much better, but there are several runs and sags in it lol, my painting skills are rusty at best.

The next item on the agenda is going to be modifying the header to increase ground clearance, on my previous coilover setup my ride height was over 6" from pinch welds, now it is at the 949 recommended height. When you run the K miata header with a K20 the header hangs low because it is designed for the taller deck height of the K24. As it currently sits the header cant be more than a couple inches off the ground and on my first drive with this setup it bottomed out a few times and i really wasnt throwing the car around much. I know on the bumps at the track it would bottom out badly so i need to try and remedy this.

I have also been struggling to get my AC setup to work, something is up with my wiring setup and i cannot figure out what. All the bits under the hood are in working order and the system is charged, it just wont kick on. I think it is something under the dash not functioning correctly but i have not had time to dig in and start checking stuff. If anyone has any insight on this, any advice is appreciated.

and one last photo because i thought this was cool...