Sim, I'm excited to see how she fares on track as well! And I appreciate you referring to my reducer setup as "interesting" instead of something more offensive lol. Did you get used to your PTX whistle pretty quick? Day three with the turbo for me and I'm already used to the whistle and no longer bugged by it lol.

Feel free to talk smack on my coolant line/fitting mess! It's god ugly and was cobbled together from whatever I could get my hands on. I could try and explain, but that situation is a product of haste, and one that might (almost certainly won't) be gone through until after GTA since I have all these other projects I need to get done before then. But yeah, agreed with you, Nate. It’s borderline inexcusable lol. Constant tension clamps are gonna be needed at minimum.

I swapped out the regapped factory spark plugs today for a set of NGK 6510's. These plugs are one step colder than the factory units, and are what most of the boosted MZR/Duratec guys are running. Mine came gapped unevenly from .039" to .042". I ended up gapping all of them to .036" before throwing them in. The plugs I was running showed no signs of detonation, but better safe than sorry...

I also enlarged the hole I drilled in the passenger side of the core support so I can run the air intake into the front bumper instead of behind the radiator. I'll be installing said intake later this week.



This is a before picture. Ended up extending the hole almost all the way to the hood latch and am gonna run the intake through there with a 90* bend so it sits behind the center of the bumper cover.

With the OEM piston ring lands being a weak point on this motor, I want to make sure IAT's and combustion chamber temps stay as low as possible. Hopefully that helps. I ordered an MBC to play around with too. Will probably set up EBC on this thing after GTA. That's going to involve contacting ECUtek to see if I can get an older version of the software, as closed loop boost control via the purge valve wiring isn't supported on the newest updates due to emissions restrictions. I've read they'll happily send you an older version if you ask, but I know that endeavor's going to be time consuming and time isn't something I have a ton of currently

No good segue here. Here's a couple more random pics from Streets two weekends ago.



Sh*t, I'm gonna need to up the spring rates when I put 255's on this thing lol.




Coming off track with my buddy Tim.

 

haha, whoah whoah whoah, I didn't go that far! It'll probably hold just fine, but coolant failures at the track suck and I just despise worm clamps in general now days so I had to point it out. They work fine 95% of the time.

Loving the idea for the new intake routing, and good call on the plugs!

 

Dude can I fly you over to work on my car? You don't waste any time!

 

many s awarded

Awesome work Zak.

 

Yeah, I got used to the whistle pretty quickly, but whenever I pull all of the intake shields off I'm surprised again by how loud it is without any muffling. I don't really mind it anymore. I think its a fun addition to the intake note, the only time I think much about it now is when I'm trying to move around a parking lot or crowded area and don't want the attention.

 

Haha thanks all! And agreed, Nate. After hearing about a car spinning into the barrier at Streets due to a blown radiator hose, I'd rather not chance a coolant-related failure. Appreciate you looking out. Honestly sometimes I have really ghetto-rigged ideas and knowing that I'll catch sh*t for them on here helps me steer away from acting on them. Most of the time

Sim, I gotta see what mine sounds like with the intake off. I know you said yours got a decent bit quieter when you installed the intake shields. Wonder if mine will quiet down a bit with the air filter located in the bumper. You can already hear this thing whistle when hit hits high idle on cold starts lol. I also don't like drawing too much attention in parking lots/etc. Feels very ricer-ish.

Intake solution is roughed out. I hacked up the supplied intake and used it in conjunction with parts from my homebrewed 3" N/A intake setup for the Fab9 manifold. Fitment isn't absolutely perfect, one of the couplers is mildly fouling the BOV tee, even after readjustment of the charge pipe, but it's not bad enough that I'm gonna worry about it.



So far, the trend I've seen is that IAT's climb 8-10* up from ambient per gear I pull through. I was able to get temps to climb from 70-90*F the other night pretty quickly by rowing through 3rd and 4th. Like I said, I got IAT's up to 104* in the canyons, but I'm not on the gas there nearly as consistently as I will be on track. I've looked at enough logs that the difference should be pretty immediately noticeable if there is one. I can't imagine there's going to be anything but a benefit with this setup, aside from the front bumper requiring removal to service the air filter.

 

You could always just run straight water on track instead of slippery antifreeze.

 

MZR's are not built the way BP's are.
Unless he sees a 2.5 as a disposable item.

 

Why would straight water harm a MZR or any other engine type for a track day?

In my race series, everyone runs straight water by rule. Only harm I have seen besides some rusty water is those in cold areas have problems with freezing in the winter if it is not replaced with antifreeze or drained. I don't see that as a problem for that in SoCal.

 

I mean I kinda do lol. Don't get me wrong, I don't want to do an engine swap anytime soon but a $500 junkyard engine and a hundred bucks of one time use parts is part of the reason I went this route.

What's the reasoning behind the MZR not wanting to run straight water? I'd assume that being an aluminum block, it'd be happier to do that than an iron block.
Semi-pertinent: I've been running a mix of 80/20 distilled water/ Motorcraft yellow coolant since I got this car. Might have half a bottle of water wetter in it right now. Can't remember.

 

Clogged passageways, water pumps and rotten coolant lines, but probably over longer periods than what a 2.5 will hold for you lol

 

Ahh yes. The end goal is definitely for this engine to die a noble death, like from a cracked piston or throwing a rod out the side of the block. None of that weak rotting from the inside out type of thing

Got some more learnin' and doin' done in the tuning department. Since I installed the turbo kit, I've been getting conflicting readings on my Innovate vs OEM O2 sensors. For reference, I've got a brand new factory O2 sensor running to the ECU, and a standalone Innovate controller that I'm only using for a gauge on the dash. What I really should do is run the Innovate wideband signal to my ECU and recalibrate the O2 settings in ECUtek accordingly. However, I've got a bunch of ongoing projects on this thing and I'm not ready to add another for the time being if it's not an absolute necessity haha.

Oh right, so ever since I installed the kit, my Innovate gauge has been reading about 1.1 points richer than the OEM sensor when in boost only. At stoich, the sensors read within a tenth or so of each other. The two sensors are located inline in the downpipe, within an inch or two of each other, with the OEM sensor up front. Because of this, I assumed the proximity was causing the "trailing" Innovate/Bosch wideband to read richer for some reason, and based all of my fueling in boost off of the factory O2 sensor (currently aiming for 11.5:1 across the board). I remembered earlier this week, though, that some folks had reported the OEM sensor reading inaccurately when in boost. I posted a question about this on one of the 2.5 FB groups and got this response from Bryan at Fab9, along with a couple other confirming comments.








So anyways, yeah, I've been running this thing at 10.3-10.8:1 since installing the turbo kit lol. I leaned out the tune a bit in boost before driving to work this morning and am inching closer towards 11:1 probably a bit more power to be had once I'm actually at ~11.5.

Also, I played with my VVT settings a bit and installed an MBC earlier this week to get a bit of boost back at low rpm. I currently have a 5psi (135kpa) spring in the wastegate and the system was creeping up to up to 6.5-7.2psi (145-150kpa) by 4,300 rpm. After installing the MBC and making some quick adjustments, the system now hits 145kpa/6.5psi at ~3,300rpm, peaks at just over 150kpa at 5,200rpm, then tapers to 145-150kpa from there to 6,800rpm. Those numbers sound weak but the car's a f*cking riot haha. I'm not going to put any more boost into it until I line up a dyno day. Until then, I'll just be playing with VVT, spark, and fueling. I advanced timing slightly at full boost to 17-19* across the board and haven't seen any activity from the knock sensor yet.

Turbo blanket and more heat sleeve installed. Couple more bits needed but I've got almost everything covered. Running the intake into the front bumper had a positive impact on intake temps. IAT's only climb about half as fast at full throttle compared to the original intake setup.





Lil' MBC guy. Running the softest spring it came with and 2-ish turns from full soft. Got the system to hit "MAX BOOST!!!™" 1000rpm sooner. The car feels much more like a turbo car than a supercharged car now when you get on it without downshifting.



I've got overboost protection set to 9.5psi currently. I know I'm probably not in the danger zone at that boost level, but the car is quick and I don't want to find out that it's able to kill a bottom end or trans at 10psi lol. I also haven't driven a boosted Miata in over a year, so maybe my butt dyno is also out of calibration.

Gonna install the bigger oil cooler tomorrow, swap some tires out, install my side skirts again, then stress test the car up in the mountains again. Miraculously, my list of things to finish/remedy before GTA is getting small and I think I'm actually gonna be somewhat ready and prepared for GTA next weekend. Knocking on wood though, because that would almost be too good to be true...

 

Alright, I don't wanna Jinx this but uhhh.. I think she's ready to race this weekend.

The final piece of the puzzle as far as cooling goes was the oil cooler. I've been running an Evil Energy 19 row cooler, which is just a rebranded Mishimoto cooler, since I first started tracking the car. It's worked great while N/A, but I assumed I'd need more oil cooling capacity once the turbo went on. I ordered a big ol' CSF 8066 dual pass oil cooler after reading a few testimonials about them working substantially better than the average single pass coolers. Went into work on Saturday and got the cooler installed. I ended up mounting it using some aluminum angle bolted into two of the old mounting points for the A/C condenser. The cooler ports are already AN10, so all I had to do was chop my existing cooler lines a little shorter and reinstall the fittings.

Ended up getting so sucked into the install that I forgot to take any photos. I then tried to take some today but it's basically impossible to see the oil cooler with the intercooler installed. So, with some incredible photoshopping skills, here's a before and after shot of the oil cooler setup.



New oil cooler may or may not be to perfect scale. Also, excuse all the ugliness with the current ducting. It's been a long few weeks and making things prettier isn't currently high, or anywhere, on the priority list




So I finished that up yesterday, fired it up for a minute, changed the oil and filter, confirmed there were no leaks, then proceeded to take it for another stress test yesterday morning.

Immediate positive difference. Oil temps are about 15*F lower when driving the car in anger, and cruising temps are down too. The thermostat on my oil filter perch seems to open at about 180*, and oil temps pre-turbo held firm at 184* on the freeway in most temps. Post-turbo install, they were up to the low 190's on the freeway, and took a long time to recover if I got them up to 210 or higher while street driving or doing pulls. With the new cooler, freeway temps are back down to 184*, temps sit lower in stop and go traffic, and they recover much faster if the oil is pushed over 200*F. I think I saw temps peak at 229* or 230* in the canyons yesterday morning. That's actually cooler than they would get pre-turbo.

I also brushed up another bit of the tune yesterday. At part throttle boost (1-4psi), I was running the engine lean in certain parts of the rev range. Tuning with G/rev (via the MAF sensor) as a load unit is kind of weird because you'll hit different G/rev readings even in a stable MAP range, and vice versa. I'm trying to think of the best way to explain this. For instance, at 145kpa constant, my G/rev ratings will sit between 1.6 and 1.9 depending on what RPM the engine is at (G/rev is basically directly equivalent to torque being produced). Anyway, I spent a bunch of time tuning the load scaling table, then added some fuel at 1-4psi via the MAP sensor scaling table, and got AFR's at part throttle boost back to the low 12's/high 11's compared to 13's/14's where they were previously.



Gotta swap a couple tires out and add some heat shielding to the O2 sensor harnesses and then my preflight checklist is basically done. Global Time Attack this weekend is gonna be a party. It's looking like there's at least four of us that will be driving, and a handful of other buddies and family who will be coming to spectate. Fingers crossed the car holds together and doesn't disappoint!

 

withholding likecats until the photos in this last post are fixed

 

I thought about going to the GTA event to run with WTCC, the tune (and leftover tires) from WRL would make my car slot into their rules fairly easily. Alas it's the same weekend as the final NASA NorCal event so I'm going to Thunderhill instead.

Next year we've got two crossover NorCal/SoCal NASA events though, one at BW and one at Sonoma.

--Ian

 

Ah, that's weird. The photos show up when I go to edit the post but I can't get 'em to work even reuploading from a different device.

Codrus, I swear one day we'll cross paths lol. WTCC should be fun to watch this weekend. Looks like they've got a decent turnout. Looks like we're going up to Sonoma twice next year actually. I'm iffy about the July 11/12 event due to temps, but the guys and I have decided we're all gonna go to the May 23/24 event.

I tried to post the photos on this reply as well and they show up in the editor but not when I actually hit post. Weird. I'll try uploading from a different computer later.

 

FWIW, @SlowTeg also posted some pics today that aren't showing up... are you using a hosting service or the MT.net upload?

 

Ahh, right on. Yeah, I'm using the MT.net upload. Never had a problem with it before. I posted some pics in Redursidae's thread and they showed up fine. Looks like that was a couple hours before Teg's post. Yeah, must be a site issue...

 

Sonoma in July isn't too bad, mid 80s to mid 90s is typical. Could go higher, but it doesn't happen very often. I expect it will be cooler at Sonoma in July than BW in June.

And yeah, the photos showed up in my editor when I hit reply, but not in the main view.

--Ian

 

Any way you could shoot over a picture of your APP table (that you used while the car was NA)?