Great. Now I gotta put cardboard into my rear window so you don't x-ray me and/or blind me if you ever drive behind

Are those the lights that you were trying to sell for eleventy brazillian dollars?

Chemtrails bruhhh.

Actually, the cutoff is really good for oncoming traffic. I aligned them according to legal requirements.

There is a little embossed square in the center of each light portion on the front of the headlight housing. On my car this is 23 inches from the ground. The cutoff for the beam pattern must not be higher than 23 inches at 25 feet.


Yes. :)

I bet they can see your car from outer space

Even all the way from Uranus!

Little update... I attempted to "tune" today. Basically just fumbled with tuner studio, cursed alot at the serial to usb cord until everything connected with ms3basic, then freaked out some more.

The car was running pretty rich for a while, (11.5-11.8:1 wot at 7100rpm) and I just kept making small percent changes to Fuel VE Table until i got 12.9-13.0:1 wot at 7100rpm Feels stronger now, but who knows. I couldn't figure out how to find the virtual dyno software.

Then, I changed my vvt table from this...
https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...72f51d4126.jpg


To this...

https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...f95baaf900.png

And holy shit that made a huge difference in low end acceleration. I don't really understand how, but now the car can be on cruise control in 6th at 40mph. Accelerating requires much lower throttle inputs than before. Really staggering. I probably messed something up.

Why did you remove the 0's from the lowest load rows?

No idea, i just copied that table from someone who posted it in the vvt tuning thread.

Was I not supposed to change those 0's?

the car will buck on cold starts now. that's why I don't run advance that low or that early

I was mostly wondering how it would affect things re:engine braking. I.e. if you step off the gas during cruise. That's a pretty low load and not really something you'd see out of vacuum, no?

I have no experience tuning VVT. I just thought that similar logic would apply to this as it does to spark advance.

Oh. Well, it already wasn't smooth, so maybe I wont notice. Otherwise, I can just take it back out? Having too much advance down low doesnt damage anything, does it?

You need a 0 before 1500 because anyway it doesn't work lower than that, and you can go up to 40 deg.
It really is best to tune it on a dyno though.

So, just to clarify, I can try values of up to 40 on that vvt table? I will take out values before 1500.

Also, is there some way to get ms3 basic to hold a specific afr? It doesn't follow the afr table, but I think thats because I adjust the Fuel VE table (which i dont really know what this does, V just told me to alter this when adjusting fuel for different altitudes, so that's what I've been using)

Should I be setting the afr table to the values I want to target, and not using fuel ve table? Can I set an afr hard limits at various rpms?

Is there a graph where I can mess with the altitude fuel correction? I vaguely remember seeing a curve that could be adjusted.

Sometimes the afrs keep climbing and other times (same altitude, and settings, just a different pull) they stay rock solid.

Don't the AFR's depend on where in the VE table you are when you do said pull?

dude you need to start reading up on ms tuning and don't touch your car until you actually know what you're doing. no offense of course, but you're seriously just pecking away and copy/pasting stuff into tables that you don't even have a shread of a clue of how they work or what they do. and that's how people blow stuff up and/or damage their engine

In the theme of what Vlad is saying, read up on "Incorporate AFR Target." If you don't have this on or if you turned this off, changing the AFR table won't change fueling at all.

The problem is that lots of settings interact, so you need to learn a fair amount about the whole picture to make constructive changes.

his car should have it on. I tuned it a year or more ago. it ran flawlessly here in Sacramento. his troubles are from taking it to 7000+ elevation and not making any adjustments

Ooooooooh. Ok. Thanks guys.

Update!

LOVE THE MANUAL STEERING!!!!

Turns out I had over 8 degrees of caster, so that was why my steering effort was extreme.

Just got an alignment today with regular (i was running extended length) ball joints, and my caster is now 4.5.

I'm actually surprised how light the steering is without ps.

Even parking lot stuff is very manageable now.

YAY!

Glad to hear it. Caster makes all the difference.

^I think the steering will convince you to properly deflower your rack.

eh, I'm happy with my setup, not worth the time/effort/cost/another alignment. Also... how would you know? you haven't driven my car remember? lol

Ok, but fyi, no alignment needed if you remove the inner tie rods at the rack.

Only cost would be getting new tie rod captive washer/tab things.

And having it welded. and a new rack if that gets botched up.

If it was a DD, sure i'd probably do it. But for what I use the car for, I have zero complaints on the steering, especially after this new alignment. Can't wait to get it on track.

Oh yeah I forgot about the welding!

Me too, hope I can come with!

We need to go to pahrump this summer before MRLS.

Woah, never heard of that. pahrump Valley speedway?

Yessir!

Edit: nope. it's the motorsports club I was thinking of. Not quite ready to dirt track this thing.

Giggity

did you see the 45k per year per person race track country club also in pahrump? wild lol. Dude is minting money.

This makes me want to depower my rack for all the steering feelz....

In reality, its maybe 20% more road/tire feel, and maybe a few extra pounds steering effort, but 15 pounds off the car, lower parasitic drag on the engine...

I'm honestly shocked at how light the steering is, even in a higher speed corner. Just make sure your caster is under 5 and you will love it at all times.

Turns out, that's the one I was thinking of. I think they still do open track days... researching...

Damn. Looks like they don't. Just a super expensive place to go play.

That's so frustrating.

"Take it to the track."
"Ok, i'll go to the track. How much does it cost?"
"That'll be $40,000 please, or only $3500 for the weekend."

:facepalm:

EDIT: never mind, they do!

https://www.motorsportreg.com/events...s-vegas-881632

Course, I can't make it that weekend. Way too soon.

Oh well.

Oh lol the speedway is a dirt track lol!

WOw that club track is sexy. Great looking turns

Do it. Get a second rack though, that way you can always go back if you decide its not your cup of tea.

Yeah, the track looks awesome.

Reasonably priced too. $225/day, or if you sign up for both days, only $350 for both days.

Hopefully they do the same event next year so i can go then.

U bend intake "results"
 

Okaaayyy....

I was as scientific as possible. I had the custom intake ready to be installed, and a 10mm socket for r and r.

I did 6 base line VirtualDyno runs yesterday, and 4 baseline runs today(35*F colder today), numbers all over the place. (Anywhere between 105/94 to 112/100)

I installed the U bend intake on the side of the road, drove a bit to settle the IATs, and then made 3 back and forth passes. VD is all over the place, and within the same number range as stock intake. Totally inconclusive, and not even close to as precise as i need.

Absolutely accelerates harder. Feels like sea level now, and im at 6000feet. Pretty cool. Too bad the vd plots meant nothing (why i didnt post any)

I even used earplugs to mitigate intake sound influenced placebo effect.

Here is the almost finished result... 21inches from throttle plate to diameter increase within the air filter.

https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...4df043813c.jpg
I still have to get a bung welded for the return intake breather, and insulate the coolant tube. The intake pipe just soaks up the coolant heat.

IATs with the new intake stabilized at 120*F while it was at 96*F with full oem intake.

I am surprised the car pulls harder even though IATs are much higher.

filter is way too small
I doubt it's flowing more than oem with that filter, and with higher ait's I doubt it's making more power, but if it feels faster then great, just kinda surprising

the bend radius looks good

where did you mount the AIT?

https://i.imgur.com/WhdLtQY.jpg

That's what I'd done, except I tested with the stock airbox. VD showed a 5hp/5tq gain. I.e. within the margin of error. It definitely felt a bit better though. I stopped messing with it because Lars yelled at me for wasting time to do stupid shit when I should have been installing my turbo instead.

Also, you should really buy the MT 'town bicycle' turbo kit that's making the rounds right now. You can legitimately turn around and unload it for what you paid or a couple of hundred less and it should more than hold you over till you have the cash to build an engine on the side and pay for an EFR kit. Hell, there might be some used ones out by then. If the manifold worries you, just get it reinforced before you install it. I know that folks had figured out ways to do that.

Perfect is the enemy of good. And honestly, as Vlad will attest, if I haven't blown up my engine yet with a shitty tune, you should be just fine. Just start off with a baby wastegate and overboost protection on MS. You'll slap yourself for wasting all this time trying to figure out if you actually did gain an hp or not.

Believe it or not, some folks actually like just goofing around chasing small improvements at MINIMAL COST, despite the time investment.

It's something of a foreign idea to me, but it's prevalent enough that it no longer surprises me. Marcello is enjoying tinkering and experimenting while spending almost no money to do so. It's fun for him.

True.

But if he spent the same amount of energy/time looking for a job, he'd probably have one by now. Or so I think

That's another topic entirely and not relevant to this discussion.

hahaha ok I'll stop being a buzzkill

N/A powahhh bruhhh :D

100% correct

i have a shitty job right now, and Im making little attempts every couple of days to get a better one, but its hard for me to stay motivated when i keep getting denied basic 7-10 dollar an hour jobs.

so i tinker, and make "progress" that way!

i have a larger filter for a velocity stack coming eventually.

i had read emilios post and they found no change in numbers with a small filter vs a reall large one, but I do agree the one Im using looks pretty small.
​​

I'm sure the difference in your application is .001, so that sounds about right.

but hey, you're chasing that last .000001hp, so might as well do it right :D

I'm like that too, but it's a time thing too. At some point you have to look at how much you value your time for the application and your desired goals. At some point his frustration with the marginal gains will lead him to make drastic changes. He'll eventually stop deluding himself that the iota of change is drastic enough to make power like the car would at sea level when he's at 6k ft.

Ugh. Sorry to hear about that Marcello. Good luck with the prospects. I'm sure we've all been there and it blows, but chin up and keep at it.
I had a year where I was injured and couldn't even get a call back from local restaurants to bus tables. My mom is a mid level (MBA) that was caught in the sea of lay offs and the sea of new grads with that. She applied bloody everywhere and finally got a job in a place where she loves to work at a level that she's used to working with an international company. She responded to a random ad she saw online (or in the newspaper). When I was talking to her the other day she told me that she did it even though she didn't think anything would come of it because 'why the hell not'.

Good luck.

This guys results fall in line with the established intake doctrine.

https://www.trackjunkies.org/topic/3...in-a-99-miata/

I modeled mine after Crusher. You have to make custom top radiator mounts to space it out a bit and widen the notch in the core support but it's pretty easy. I put the filter to the side of the bumper mouth so it wasn't in direct spray of rain. Couldn't tell you if it made much of a difference, was still tuning the MS at the time.

https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...f0059bed65.jpg

Make a diy Randall with the stock box. And compare the two, for science.

except that requires a hole in the firewall.

Are we all just going to ignore that sticker? :likecat:

No. Saw it, smiled, was too lazy to comment :likecat:

Oh i saw the sticker, but i was too dumb to figure out what it meant when I first saw it.

it has been occupying my subconcious for a day now, and I finally understand.

its kind of like "miata" except if a cartoon cat said it. Meow-ta

It's a custom sticker I designed and had a local vinyl guy cut a half dozen of. I need to get a new radiator panel made up so I can add it back again. Works well on helmets too.


https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...89fd681f14.jpg

Not sure if this uploaded...

a little video of how slow my car still is.

intake is a rowdy binch!


Oh my. The intake is WAAAAY louder in person. Like, you can barely hear it on the cell phone video, but it's far louder than the stock catless exhaust (which has a rattly resonation between 2.5k and 4k rpm)

Post your tune. Something is off I think, that is like 1.6 NA automatic slow from your video. Where you driving up a hill into a head wind or something? It sounds good though.

He's a very high elevation. Nothing wrong with his tune unless he screwed it up

Just from pausing the video, 25 to 55mph takes right around 6 seconds. What's the 0-60 if it's 6 seconds from 25 to 55? 10 seconds? I know at sea level a stock 99 is a lot faster than that.

EDIT: What elevation since you're saying that's the reason.