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Thanks, Fire! I’ve got no doubts the built motor will survive and be a blast on track. Just gotta get these parts back from the machine shop and she’ll be ready to rip for the winter.
I rescind what I said earlier this week about being unwilling to temporarily drop the old motor back in. The machine shop called me today and let me know they won’t starting the on my block until next week.
F*ck it I wanna drive this thing again already. Went into work early this morning and started bolting all the peripherals back on to the old motor. Dropped it into the car during lunch and spent a little time this evening drilling and tapping the valve cover breathers for 10AN fittings. Hopefully that’ll keep it from sweating as much oil as it used to.
The current plan is to drop the old motor in, up the boost to 12-13psi and race it at NASA Buttonwillow on 10/7. 233whp is the max I can run in TT4, so upping the boost just a little over wastegate pressure should get us there. I’ll put the built motor back together as time allows. Hopefully I’ll have it ready and broken in for GTA finals Buttonwillow the second weekend of November. I’m favoring this over waiting as it’ll keep me from getting impatient and rushing the rebuild. We’ll see how things play out.
I’ll also be upping to 245 RT660s instead of the 225s I’ve been running and might upgrade to 1000cc injectors following the NASA race. It’d be nice to have the car already up and running on the bigger injectors once the built motor goes back in with the bigger turbo.
Shop’s open from 7-3:30 tomorrow. We’ll see if I get her all buttoned up by the afternoon.
Thanks man, that's the nicest thing anyone's said to me this week
Motor's back in and the car's running. It's only been two and a half weeks but damn it felt good to hear her start up again. Changed the CAM/CMP wiring back over to stock, put the 6 speed back in and changed the settings back in Megasquirt. All went smoothly and hopefully I'll have time to start datalogging and setting up open loop boost control later this weekend.
Only off-putting thing that happened during the install was that the coolant mix I put in came out sh*t brown again while bleeding it. I used about 85% distilled water, 10-15% Motorcraft green coolant and 6oz of a water wetter solution that's gatorade lemon lime green color. I'll continue to monitor it and see if I have the same issue with coolant temps shooting up quickly in boost. If so, I have to imagine my radiator is partially blocked with some sort of gunk. I've already replaced the radiator cap and thermostat and the head gasket on the built motor showed no signs of combustion gas intrusion into the cooling system.
Took the car up to the mountains north of LA today (and somehow didn’t take a single picture of it). Car’s running well. The only thing I forgot to tighten when I tossed the OG motor back in was one of the charge pipe clamps at the turbo outlet, resulting in no boost but some really cool noises.
The cooling system concern is still there. I’m irritated that it’s persisting, because that means something is wrong. I’m also relieved, because that means the problem wasn’t with the built VVT motor. Coolant temps are running about 10* above where I’m used to seeing them for a given ambient temperature, and they still jump up fairly quickly when accelerating hard. Average temps on the freeway today were around 200*f, and they got as high as 220*f during spirited jaunts through the mountain roads. They shouldn’t be that high in 65-75* ambient temps. I’m gonna vacuum bleed the system tomorrow then pressure test it. The only two constants at this point that haven’t been changed or replaced at this point are the radiator and heater core.
I also set up a very unfinished open loop boost table on the way home today (had over an hour on the freeway to experiment). Currently the car’s running 11psi of boost, tapering up to 12psi above 5,000 rpm. Basically 2psi above what I was running before. I think/hope it’s putting out about 225/230whp now. It’s got an occasional boost spike up to 13psi in lower gears right when I get on the throttle but I’ll play with it more this week and get that figured out.
New radiator solved the cooling issue. Dropped a freshie in on Friday and average coolant temp dropped about 15 degrees. She’s back to running slightly below thermostat opening temp on the freeway and 205*f max in the canyons in ~75-80*f ambient temps. I can probably do a little better job with my ducting but those temps are satisfactory for me right now.
Thinking I’ll probably try to get some sort of cleaner and backflush the old radiator and keep it as a spare. A lot of the lower fins are bent but I’m sure it’s still useable. Given how much sediment I found in the cooling system after the first couple flushes, I’m sure that thing is just partially blocked internally.
I bypassed the heater core for now as well and am gonna hook some tubing up and backflush it this week to make sure none of the crap that might be in there makes it’s way into the new radiator.
Got stuck at the top of Azusa Canyon for a couple hours today because an accident shut the road down. Passed the time by taking two hundred pics of my car at the top.
Next week: we see how much of a fender pull is going to be required to stuff the 245 RT660s on 15x9s into my car.
First thing I ordered for my car when I got it as a big pile of **** was a new radiator and hoses. Fighting coolant leaks/temps is so freakin annoying! And I flushed the heater core with a garden hose in both directions.
You wouldn't believe how much crap I got out of a Mini JCW on day.
That thing was fully blocked and the radiator didn't look any better. Iron block aswell
First thing I ordered for my car when I got it as a big pile of **** was a new radiator and hoses. Fighting coolant leaks/temps is so freakin annoying! And I flushed the heater core with a garden hose in both directions.
You wouldn't believe how much crap I got out of a Mini JCW on day.
That thing was fully blocked and the radiator didn't look any better. Iron block aswell
Agreed, there's many issues I'd rather be dealing with than coolant temps.
Still gotta flush and reconnect my heater core but I'm hoping to see a bunch of crap dislodged from it just like yours.
Onward. 245s are mounted. Damn, it looks so good haha. 1/2" of clearance at full steering lock between the tires and coilovers and only 1/4" clearance between the tires and sway bar haha. 15x9's will definitely be staying on for a while, I don't want to deal with any more clearance concerns for now.
I took the car out to a local canyon road late last night. This specific one has a nice fast right hander with a g-out in the middle that I can usually get the car to bottom out on. I got some rub on the top of the fender well running the front end at 4 1/8" ride height. Enough to smell burning rubber for a second. Front left tire looks fine but there was definitely some good contact that can be seen at the top of the fender well. Played with my coilovers today and brought the car up to 4 3/4" all around. I'll see if that keeps the tires from rubbing and maybe bring the ride height back down a bit if there aren't any clearance issues.
NASA Buttonwillow with the boys is next weekend. Just gotta align the car with the new ride heights, change the oil, and d*ick around with the trailer light wiring on my van and we're sitting pretty.
Last weekend was a damn riot. The car ran great, I drove halfway decent, and we somehow rounded up six of my buddies to come out and drive at the second to last NASA SoCal event of the year.
I grabbed a Uhaul trailer at noon on Friday, got off work a half hour early and started the short but traffic-filled drive up to Buttonwillow. Got about an hour in before realizing I left my helmet at home. Dammit. It was honestly almost for the better. I turned around, drove the half hour home, grabbed my helmet and showered, and got back on the road just in time for most of the BS LA traffic to clear. Got up to Buttonwillow at 11ish. My buddies from San Diego were already all set up in the corner next to Sunset and had saved me a spot. I set an alarm for 6am and knocked out pretty quick.
Big air, man!
Saturday was one of the smoothest track days I've ever run. I got my car tech'd ahead of schedule, remembered to grab my TT transponder right after the drivers' meeting, and was actually ready when our group was called to grid at 8:30.
Course layout this weekend was CCW25. Basically the classic 13 configuration without the Bus Stop and with the Star Mazda. Super high speed. Once comfortable, I was coming out of riverside at 105mph and reaching almost 130 by the end of the straightaway. Super cool.
I'm getting ahead of myself though. First session, I came out of the gate and just could not wrap my head around the track. I drove at 6/10 the whole session and didn't feel comfortable at all. My lack of confidence was probably just the fact that I hadn't tracked my car in almost four months but at the time I just chalked it up to me being a noob of a driver.
Second session came around and things started to click for me. Bummer it took that long because the temperature jumped up from 65 to 85 degrees between sessions 1 and 2. Still, I was at least able to drop my time from a 2:10 to 2:07.
The car was driving great for the most part. I was still dealing with the pad knockback that I only ever experience at Buttonwillow but at this point I was in the habit of giving the brake pedal a few taps at the end of every long straight. It's not a big deal for now. I also noticed after each consecutive high-g corner that my straight ahead steering wheel position was shifting from left to right. My other buddy running 245s on his Miata told me that he dealt with that after going to the wider tires as well. He said he realized his alignment eccentrics were slipping due to the extra traction generated by the tires. I cranked all of my eccentrics down another quarter turn and the issue subsided.
Session three I was finally in the groove and really feeling "on". Temps were 95* at this point but I was able to pull a 2:05.3 that session, enough to ratchet myself up to 4th place from 5th (out of 5 lol). I was now just two tenths of a second up on the next guy but still pretty happy as it was my best result to date.
The rest of the day went pretty well. Final session was still hot and nobody PB'd but I was having the time of my life. The layout was so much fun once you got the general rhythm down. I think my favorite part was bouncing off the curbs going though the esses at 110mph.
The two extra hood vents seem to be doing the trick as far as cooling goes. Last time out here I had to do a handful of cooldown laps throughout the day due to coolant temperatures surpassing 230*F. This time around, coolant temps maxed out at 220-225 most sessions, maybe reaching 230 or a touch higher towards the very end. I can still improve my ducting a bit but I'm ok with this as the car already runs well below thermostat opening temps driving around at home in 65* ambient, and it's going to get a decent bit colder here soon.
The ProCarInnovations wing (unsurprisingly) blows the NRG wing I had out of the water. The rear end stays more planted in almost all scenarios and high speed oversteer is much more muted now.
Left to right: ITB 1.6 Miata, Turbo Miata, ~260whp K-swap Miata w/ CNC head.
I should've put 245s on as soon as I turbo'd the car. It was probably for the better that I learned to drive it with the 205s then 225s but it's so much more fun just being able to put down full power coming out of low-speed corners without having to mitigate as much oversteer.
Even with the BMW E30 front hubs, I'm still getting pad knockback after bouncing off curbs, especially after high-g turns. I have other things I want to change and diagnose before moving onto that but I should probably figure out the issue eventually.
Hot dogs to the rescue following the last session. I slept like a damn baby Saturday night.
Can't wait to race Chuckwalla at the end of this month. TT is cool. Having a running car is cool. Camping at the track is cool.
Additionally, the VVT block and head are back from the machine shop! More on that soon.
In related news, I got the block and head back from the machine shop last week. Motor's built again and (hopefully) ready to make bigger numbers than last time. Unfortunately, I'm signed up for Chuckwalla with NASA next weekend and am going to be at GTA Buttonwillow two weekends after so the install is going to have to wait until mid-November. Part of me wanted to get the new motor in the car this week then drive the heck out of it to break it in before Chuckwalla... but I know that's a stretch and I don't want to lose out on my entry fee if something goes wrong haha. Current plan is to get it back in after GTA and throw on a GTX2860, 1000cc injectors and wire in the e85 sensor to make big power on the street.
While timing the motor, I was surprised to find out that it is now an interference engine. The block and head weren't decked at the machine shop this time around so I think it's safe to assume that it was already like this after the first rebuild. This had me a little concerned but after some searching on here, I found out that it's fairly normal for these motors to become interference engines following a head/block deck. Thanks again MT.net.
I'm going to pull the timing belt today and rotate the intake cam 3 teeth forward to see if there's still enough P-V clearance to run the VVT at full advance. My VVT table was previously maxed out at 30 degrees so I'm sure everything is safe but I might as well check while the engine is out of the car.
Realized last night that I hadn’t drained the catch cans since I put the OG motor back in the car. Pulled both of them out, noted that there were some small particles accumulating at the bottom of each. Huh, that’s weird. Drained the oil. Found faint traces of glitter in the oil.
Damn, talk about perfect timing. VVT motor’s getting swapped back in this week. I’ve got two weddings in my way this weekend (not so perfect timing) but should be able to have the VVT motor running and broken in by the end of next week. Probably won’t make it to Chuckwalla but the extra power will be appreciated at GTA assuming it doesn’t blow up!
Also ended up doing the 3-tooth advance yesterday and found that there is no piston to valve contact at full VVT advance with this motor, at least cold at 0 RPM. 30 degree max should be completely safe.
Re-timed the engine and advanced the intake cam three teeth to simulate full VVT advance, then turned the engine over two revolutions by hand to make sure there was no piston to valve contact at any point.
I put the motor back together and found while timing it that it's now an interference engine, so just wanted to be safe.
Sweet track updates! Glitter in the catch can? Seems pretty surprising even if a motor was letting go, usually it's only vapors that get into the can and condense there.
What have you put in the breather chamber of the VC? The scrubbers need to be carefully selected, IIRC SS is the current favourite, some are known (alleged?) to deteriorate ...
Sweet track updates! Glitter in the catch can? Seems pretty surprising even if a motor was letting go, usually it's only vapors that get into the can and condense there.
Keep us posted!
Thanks, Fire!
The stuff at the bottom of the catch cans wasn’t glittery, it was more like small black particles. About the size of a properly sharpened pencil tip. All I can imagine is that they were tiny bits of silicone from when I used a polishing wheel to take off all the old silicone from the breather covers. That being said, I cleaned out the valve cover with a solvent-based parts cleaner and it looked like I got every single bit of debris out of it. I only saw the particles after dumping the catch cans in an oil bucket so I didn’t get to check them for glitter.
Originally Posted by Gee Emm
What have you put in the breather chamber of the VC? The scrubbers need to be carefully selected, IIRC SS is the current favourite, some are known (alleged?) to deteriorate ...
I’m currently running the breather chambers without anything in them. Have heard so many conflicting opinions on whether or not to run scrubbers and what type to run that I decided to go with none and only add some if the cans started filling startlingly fast. I had about 1,200 miles including a track day and some spirited driving and both cans were about 1/3 full when I drained them. I didn’t think that was too bad on a 208k mile motor with a bunch of blowby.
After a f*cking hell of a week, she's back up and running again! I would've had the motor swapped out in record time if it weren't for a serious debacle on the way haha.
I took the car into work early Tuesday morning and spent the AM, my lunch break, and some extra time after work yanking the motor out and transferring parts to the VVT motor. Did the same thing on Wednesday and had the car put back together and ready to start Wednesday evening. I cranked the motor over, ran it for five seconds and saw zero oil pressure buildup. F*ck.
Tinkered around with it a little bit before the shop closed. Pulled the connector on my oil pressure gauge and confirmed the gauge was reading correctly (open circuit results in flashing white lines instead of a "0" reading. Pulled the spark plugs/coil and injector connectors and cranked it with one of the oil cooler lines disconnected and confirmed zero oil flow. F*ck again. Ok, I did some searching on here and came to the conclusion that my oil pump relief valve must be open. Came in early again Thursday morning and pulled the front subframe out, dropped the oil pan and found the relief valve was actually stuck closed instead of open. Triple f*ck. I ended up getting a ladder and pulling the oil pump with the engine in the car and the car still in the air.
With the oil pump out, I confirmed the relief valve wasn't letting any oil through. I then removed the gear housing cover and found my issue. I replaced the gears in my Stage 2 Boundary pump after I found some mild scoring on the outer diameter following the engine failure. Smart move I know, but I replaced them with gears from a standard VVT pump (0.393" depth for the OEM pump instead of 0.430" for the Stage 2). That 0.033" was enough for the pump to generate absolutely zero oil pressure haha. I took the replacement BE gears I purchased, threw them in the OEM VVT pump that came with the motor, bolted everything back together (quicker said than done) and had oil pressure once more!
OEM VVT size gears in BE Stage 2 pump. Note how the gears are just a tiny bit shallower than the housing.
I finally got the motor started and did the initial break in on the dyno Saturday. Currently got 160 miles on it and am almost ready to start throwing big boost at it. I'll probably hold off on upping to 1000cc injectors until after GTA in November, but the next upgrades will definitely be that and a flexfuel sensor. ~300whp here we come!
09-15-2023, 09:20 PM
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