Pat's fruity two seater beater
 

Mod List as of 3/14/11
Hard Dog Hard Core M2 Double Diagonal Roll Bar
Monsterflow intake (for an NA, modified to fit my NB)
Momo Drifting steering wheel w/NRG short hub
Racing Beat front endlinks
Removed rear sway (had to, endlinks were rusted so bad I had to cut them off, haven't replaced them yet)
Motegi Traklite 15x7 +35 w/Federal 535 205/50/15
XXR 521 16x8 +20 w/Falken FK452 215/40/16
Raceland Coilovers
Some random shift knob
Foamectomy on the driver's seat (still too high, more will be removed)


Day 1: Bone stock with 119k on the clock and in desperate need of an oil change, and a buff.
Attachment 190449
Stoked face
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Shortly after: Buff, wax and oil change complete along with a borrowage of the other miata's hwheels.
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Racelands and sportmaxx, flame away! (xxr 521, 16x8 +20)
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MOTORSPORTS!
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Goin legit homie...
Now sportin a hdhcdd roll bar, momo wheel w/nrg short hub and after I find some tires, these for my motorsports endeavors :giggle:
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As is obvious, I haven't gotten into a motor build yet. Eventually it'll happen after the funds come along and I've taken care of everything else I consider necessary.

Maybe its just the pics, but those sportfags look pretty good on that car actually.
New rims are so much better though

Oh you're the guy from the NW thread on cr.net. What width are those new wheels, and what is your tire going to be?

Any power goals?

18psi I had that wheel design (mesh with some lip) in mind from the day I got it and with my lack of budget, the sportmaxx seemed tits.

Curly, yeah I'm that dude haha. The traklites are 15x7 +35. I'm looking for some used slicks or I'll get something along the lines of kumho xs or star specs. 205/50/15.

Not sure about power goals. Likely going the boost route. After a basic setup I'll probably get power hungry

I have some R888s if you want to come to Oregon City, probably not though.

Did you eat lunch at subway?!!

Good job cleaning up the car.

Mowed down at subway like it was my final supper.

How much ya want for the r888s?

$75, but they're not worth it to ship. Are you actually in Montana?

Yeah I'm in Missoula. How much tread is left? I may snag them if I head out that way soon.

Not much, they supposedly only have two SM races on them, they're slicks, but with plenty of track days left on them.

Traklites are on! I had some federal 535's in the garage and since I can't afford a new set of tires at the moment, I had them mounted. I think I'm going to go a little lower, but I like the more business stance that it has now. First pic posted of the rollbar and steering wheel too.
Attachment 190381

Ride height looks great, don't go any lower.

I love the tracklites! Just be careful if it's your DD, a buddy of mine had his bend from pot holes.

I autocrossed a few times on the federals and they were surprisingly not all that bad to drive on. If they got too much heat they felt like pudding though. The last event I skated all over. Since then I've had my eyes peeled for a good deal on some used slicks and got very lucky today. Picked up a set of 13x8 +4 Rota RB's with 20x9x13 Hoosier R25's on them, as well as a second set of R25's and a pair of R35's, all with quite a bit of life left. The deal also came with some brand new 6 inch wide R45's but I think I may sell those to recoup some of my expenses. Also planning on selling the Traklites. Here was my poor subie today, stuffed with 4 wheels and 12 slicks haha.
https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1313994052

and my glorious purchase stacked up in the garage.
https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1313994052

I've also got a set of Tein HA's that need to be cleaned up, then they will go on as well. Everything should be ready to go for my next autocross in 2 weeks. So excited!

Since my last post I've also put red tint over the amber part of the tails to make them all red and clear. Looks much better IMO. Had a 2.25" catback made as well. No muffler, just a resonator right after the flange. Has pretty much 0 rasp and isn't hellishly loud either.
https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1313994052

Uh-oh... The 13's are for the NB? Did you test fit them?

I like seeing cars brought back from faded fail.

The 13's are for the NB. I don't have sport brakes and from what I had read, the 13x8 +4 fit just fine. Test fitted them today to be certain and they fit great. I do believe I'll need a fender roll before the car's ready to run with them.

Here's how it looks on them. BEEFY!
https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1314071738

https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1314071738

https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1314071738

https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1314071738

she looks good those are some wide tires!

The wide hoosiers are mighty effective!
https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1317608575

My first FTD and I wound up #1 in PAX as well!

I was 2nd in PAX and 2nd in raw times my first event on the Hoosiers also. I love these things! I wound up getting 3rd in PAX on the street tires (traklites and federals) and 8th in raw times last weekend also. I've learned a lot this season and can't wait to come back next season with an even better setup!

You must run with a small club. No near stock Miata will ever FTD in the Tennessee Valley Region, lol.

It's Montana. They let lifted 4x4 trucks run there.:giggle:

I kid, I'm from Nebaska, which is just as bad, plus without mountains.

Yeah it's a small club. Stein, while we don't let lifted trucks run, the usual FTD is an SSM Chevy Luv lol.

Welp it's almost time for race season and that means it's time to prep the car for the action ahead. I spent some time in the garage today working on the coilovers and they're about halfway done now.

The story behind them:

Being a college student, I've always made my decisions with the idea of building a quality, budget race car. Last year I found a set of cheap Tein HA coilovers on the east coast via sccaforums.com. With the little money I had in my paypal, I made it happen. The seller was very honest about their condition and was a great source of info about autocross (fellow miata auto crosser running CSP with the big boys.) After receiving the coilovers, the seller agreed to purchase a new set of seat locks for them since the old ones came in a bare finish and wore out over the years. After going back and forth with a Tein distributor, I wound up being sent the wrong seat locks. Because of this, I wound up just running the racelands last season. After a conversation with a very helpful guy at Tein USA, I was able to track down the right seat locks and have begun the restoration process on the coilovers themselves.

They were in rough shape when they got here, lots of surface rust, not pretty. I actually had to break the old seat locks off.
https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1332549287

After some time with the wire wheel, a rust remover, a couple different steel brushes and a lot of patience, success. I was able to clear off the surface rust and the threads are still very much useable after some chasing.
https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1332549287

I ground off all the old nasty paint and surface rust and refinished the dampers in a Rustoleum hammered finish to give them some nice durability and combat any further rust. I'm pretty chuffed with how they came out. :)
https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1332549287

Now just the fronts to go and they'll be ready to go on the car!

You are correct, those are likely the most haggard set of teins in existence. That said, I respect a guy that will spend little carefully and invest labor to improve that small investment. You sound a lot like me when I was your age.

Hell, you sound like me now and I turned 45 yesterday!

BTW, if you say "wow, you are older than my dad!" I'll never post in your thread again.:giggle:

those slicks are ultra gangster, going to be running the same deal, except mine are 22x10x13 on the same wheels, hopefully it will fit!

Thanks guys! Yeah the Teins are a bit rough but I've always wanted a set and it's far more worth it to me to sacrifice my labor and time than money, since I don't have much haha. These are really just a temporary solution until I can afford something more proper like a set of Koni Races with higher rates.

I love my slicks! If it helps, mine fit without any rubbing with just a light roll in the rear, stock fronts. I can't remember what my ride height was but it was fairly low.

I just can't wait to get out and run the car again!

Wow, nice job with the car.

Those xxr 521, 16x8 +20 looked great.

So what, do you run in XP with those slicks? How the hell would an XP stock Miata take PAX? Unless you were registered in CSP or SSM...?

Amen on the poor college student, I'm in the same boat.

Falcon, I drove like a baws ;) Jokes. I had a good day behind the wheel I suppose, or everyone else just had a bad one.

Finished cleaning up the Teins and installed them. Wound up having a hell of a weekend! I spent a ton of time setting things up and preparing to autocross for the first event this year only to have an alignment shop snap off one of my rear camber bolts. I dropped the car off with a friend at another tire/alignment shop and he modified a camber bolt from a ford focus to work with my car and I was driving at the test n tune a few hours later! Gotta love having friends in the car world.

Sunday's autocross was great. I wound up running the Hoosiers for fun, which meant I had to be in D Prepared class, essentially throwing out any PAX result. No biggie, I wanted to see if I could compete with a certain A Stock corvette with brand new A6's as well as a turbo Porsche Cayman putting down 390 wheel horsepower and 476 lb-ft of torque. Wound up just edging out one corvette driver (co driven car) by just over a tenth and losing to the other by about three seconds (driver has placed at nationals driving an f mod). I got the Porsche by almost two seconds!

Here's a video of my quickest run of the morning. I ran 4 tenths quicker in the afternoon.


Something to keep in mind with results from my region: An average autocross for us is like 30 cars. This weekend was "huge" with 50 something registered drivers. So me running close to the top happens solely because there isn't much else out there to compete with. I'm fully aware that I'd get eaten alive at any national level competition in a prepared class and most likely also in STS where I normally run the car.

Results can be found on the race results tab on our site: http://www.bigskyregion.org/index.html

Finally got some pictures back from a friend of the Frenchtown event.
https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1336670342

https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1336670342

https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1336670342

https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1336670342

Autocrossed last weekend on the street tires. Tightened up the Teins a bit and it made a big difference.

Wow, haven't updated this in a while! I recently picked up a 240sx coupe and have been busy replacing the engine on that for the past while (don't get excited, it's just a KA24DE). Since it's winter and I have the 240 to daily now, the Miata has been in the garage. I began teardown for the offseason refresh and got some frightening results.
https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1362189014
Resto1 by Pat Gentilli, on Flickr

RUST CITY!
https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1362189014
Resto3 by Pat Gentilli, on Flickr

https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1362189014
Resto2 by Pat Gentilli, on Flickr

The PPF bolts are so stuck in the diff that I wasn't even able to punch them out. I got the top spline locked threaded portions out, but the bolts just spin in place. After trying to punch them out, the spacer piece between the diff and the PPF cracked and broke. The power of rust is insane.
https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1362189014

The subframe is out now too and will get blasted and powdercoated next week.
https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1362189014

Ohhhh projects....