Always blaming Aidan for your problems, clit doc. Time to stop posting and start reading, mister elite member.

To be fair, aides started out very similarly lulz

:bowrofl: :likecat:

(I hope folks realize that the 'listen assholes' bit was in jest. I think this is hilarious.)

Potential content update warning!

Did a thing over the long weekend. Stefanst had graciously offered to supervise the DIY bilstein suspension build and help with the install. I took a study break to go do so.
https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...1512c109dc.jpgStarted out by sanding the rust off the shocks and getting ready to paint them
https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...3ec7b48cdc.jpgTaking over my mom's back yard. It's been nice to be home with a dog and a nice back yard.
https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...61d0260728.jpgI bought metallic silver paint. It came out like glitter. Stefanst offered to get me rainbow stickers for them. Sadly, he was kidding.

I did forget to tape up the rods, but managed to get all the paint splatter off with brake cleaner and a rag.
https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...b86f9e7b0d.jpgAssembly line. We ended up not using the newly cut grooves for the spacers since I wanted to stay around stock ride height.
https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...f22506919c.jpgAlmost done!
https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...115af81caf.jpgAnddd in!
https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...b486aaa902.jpg

Thanks again to Stefanst for all the help and guidance and hangouts when I've been sick of the books while I'm home. Also huge thanks to bahurd and the DIY thread folks for all the help getting the things I needed together. One of Stefanst's friends has an awesome machine shop and cut the grooves in my shocks when we were all hanging out there. And the he let us work in the shop area after he was done for the day so we didn't have to be out in the rain.

So... I forgot to measure what my ride height was pre-install. Does anyone know what the stock ride height is for a base NB1? My driveway back in MA is stupid and there's no way I'm getting my car up there if it's lowered by more than half an inch or so. I was thinking of using keith's ride height from the targa miata, which was 14F/14.5R as a starting point. I think that's probably just about stock, no? Either that or starting with 13.5F/14R and evaluating based on how ridiculous it is to pull into the garage back home.

Pretty stoked to get an alignment give this thing a bit of a break in. Steering wheel is basically cross eyed right now haha.

I'm honestly really happy with the car right now. I know I'm not even close to taking advantage of the power capacity of the stock engine, let alone Todd's turbo setup, but I'll install EBC and get around to tuning that when I get time. The spring Todd had in the EWG maxes out at around 7 PSI, so I'd like to end up with a 7-12 PSI range for the EBC. Should end up in the 220-230 range max. The 160-170 it's at right now is pretty awesome for a DD. I'll have to do a bunch of things to get underhood heat controlled before running it at 12 for any appreciable time. Probably starting with some shielding for the turbo and manifold. It's a bit hard to put together because of the EWG so I'll have to get some metal, reflective shielding, and get creative with a dremel to cut something out in a decent shape to stop everything in there from melting. I know the singular hood vents help force air through the radiator, but I'll have to do some digging to figure out if there's ways to do things so the heat from the back gets sucked out a bit more. Guessing the additional ventilation from the singular vents probably help push the hot air around the manifold and turbo back through the opening for the exhaust.

https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...de28430ea1.jpgAs an aside, there's this picture. I've confirmed that the joins for the feed aren't leaking oil. Where could this be coming from? I thought oil leaking from the turbo seals would show up in the exhaust?

if it's coming from the housing then it's the seal

So one the front shocks you used the stock groove and on the rears you used the new "lower" groove? Why?

So need less oil pressure into the turbo, right?

Would a larger drain line help even if the fitting size into the pan isn't changed? I know that's garretts first rec. Or do I just need to get a smaller OD fitting for the oil feed where it meets the turbo?

I'm guessing #datstancelyfeyo

I'm curious about the..what looks like glue??...between spring seats and tophats?

On hats that aren't Two Six or custom units like mine, there's nothing for the ES spring isolators to "seat" on. So you either glue/RTV them to the hat, or glue/RTV them to the spring, or do neither and just accept whatever happens. (Usually fine.)

I'm more concerned about the lack of helper/tender spring sliders, myself. That's a really bad idea.

umm, that seems really sketchy, but what do I know

The glue/RTV? Or the lack of slider?

One is, one isn't.

the slider mostly, but if the glue holds the seat to the hat and the spring droops and then doesn't re-seat, isn't that really sketchy too?
and if the spring is always preloaded, hten I don't see the need to glue the seat

Couplers/sliders are a good idea as is something for the spring to seat on the collar if not using bearings.

I found the RTV doesn't hold up anyway as the spring moves the locator around.

The isolators fit snugly enough in the springs that un-seating isn't something i'd worry about.

The spring won't droop off in this scenario because he has helper springs, just didn't do them properly.

Interesting...

What's the risk of not running the sliders? Binding?

I have delrin washers beneath the helpers. Have 4 more spares I could have run between the spring and PU isolators but didn't think that was necessary.

About the rears being on the new grooves for the circlips... It's possible I goldfished, but I think the height adjustment worked fine so we left it.

what part of stacking a spring onto another spring sounds ok to you?
lulz

Yeah you need sliders/couplers. It's not optional.

You can either buy Eibachs at about $20-25/ea, or send me $40 and i'll drop a 1 season used set of Wide Open Designs in the mail for you. You will need to reverse your spring stack if you use them.

These suckers?

http://www.wideopendesign.com/Product/56/2.5-Tender-coil-Slider.aspx

Yessir. I swapped them out because i like having the tenders on the bottom, and those sliders do not fit over the sleeves.

And I'm guessing that the pricy eibachs do, huh? Any reason you prefer them on the bottom?

Let me think about it for a tiny bit. I have no clue when I'm going to be able to redo this. It's not hard, just time consuming, so paying to have it done wouldnt be cheap...

Pricey Eibachs do in fact fit over sleeves.

I prefer them on bottom because Xidas have them on the bottom and i'm a lemming. I haven't noticed any performance change.

I was actually going to add 'or because xidas' in my post haha.

C'mon, wannabe Doc! I can do the whole job in under 2 hours, without a lift, with beer. Lots of beer. If I can do it, while seeing double, in 2 hours, you should be able to do it in 3.

Seriously, though. You must fix that.

But, if they are on top, they are technically unsprung weight, right?!

I'll let myself out...

Probably less of a problem in my setup. I run Hyperco C100s.

Other way around. If they're on top, they don't move as much in relation to the body as if they're on the bottom. And all this assumes they're at block length :)

Well, crap. I can't even get my own joke right. Springs on top of springy things are sprung. :loser:

RTCs combo is very similar to mine. I was not able to use the Wide Opens. If I remember right, with the helpers on top, the extended tophats (1'f and 1.5"r), lowered allstar sleeves (1"), the sleeve will hit the spring-coupler before the shock hits the bumpstop. If memory serves me right, the Wide Opens also add maybe 1/2" to the height of the whole stack and thus required to lower the lower spring perch by another half inch, which would have led to binding of the perch on the half-shaft under full deflection.
Now all that was a while ago, so I may be wrong on some details. Anybody else here who has a similar setup and uses the Wide Opens successfully? How did you make them work?

I was able to run my setup stance-y low without any issues.

Lowered circlips about 1.5", 6" hypercos, wideopen sliders, CS100 tenders, 1" front, 1.5" rear extended top hats. My Wide Opens added 1/4" to the stack. Eibachs added 1/8".

My only issue was that i didn't cut my front bump stops long enough at the time, and my travel was limited by my tire jamming itself into the car itself.

Also on the allstar sleeves? That would be virtually identical to my setup. I'm running 7" main springs from Summit (forgot what brand), so my lower perches would have to be a lot lower than yours, hence the binding on the half-shaft. Running 5" pinch-weld in the rear, 4.75" front.

Got the sleeves from Cord Bauer, not sure what they are. Look largely the same as the ones 5x Racing sells.

The advanced autosports sleeves I have are 4 inches vs the 5 inch ones from 5x racing.

Stefanst has been running his setup like this for a while now, including track use, with no issues. I think I'll eventually install the sliders, but I don't think it's happening till I get a chance to do it....so it's gonna be a bit.

I do understand that the interface of the springs would be far cleaner with the sliders which totally makes sense. I was going to put a delrin washer or something in between, but it snapped. I think i forgot to put one between the spring and the poly pushing on top as well, which explains why adjusting it was such a pita. I'll get around to it sometime I guess.

Okay, just to keep the thread title relevant, what's the issue with having no slider?

-undue spring wear
-noise/vibrations
-potential of spring ends riding over each other at the interface

Im curious because both the ends of the spring that are touching may have little rotational freedom, but the ends on the PU and delrin can rotate.

​​

Nothing coupling the springs. Much increased chance of things going cockeyed. Putting a delrin washer between them will do absolutely nothing.

Sliders/couplers aren't on literally every dual spring suspension option on the face of the planet ever just to sell you more parts.

this is getting borderline troll-thread.
like, soon people won't take you seriously enough to even bother helping you
thread title was a joke, you don't need to try and live up to it ;)

Vlad, I just think you guys have been slacking on picking on me this week.

I'm obviously going to fix things if I made a mistake because I forgot to order something. No one had mentioned the couplers when I was talking about helper springs, but early on in the thread there was a lot of chatter about them which I missed because I probably didn't know wtf they were talking about at the time lol.

I understand the theoretical cockeyed bit, but if rotational freedom is the issue, doesn't having the two ends free to move around let the springs coil/uncoil at will if there's any interaction between the ends? I can see how having a perfectly flat interface for both springs with a coupler would make things cleaner.

I agree with your second statement re: on everything. That could also be because this is likely going to be more noisy and folks tend to think that things are broken if they make too much noise! The springs rubbing on each other could potentially cause the coating to wear off and make the springs rusty. I guess companies don't like having pictures of their shocks with rusty springs on the interwebs!
The helper spring here is doing pretty much nothing for the overall spring rate right? It's just there to make sure the main spring doesn't pogo like a mofo if you hit a bump large enough to fully deload the shock. The helper is pretty much fully compressed with the car just sitting there.

I'm guessing that interface isn't sensible for something like a bearing either?

With your sleeves being 1" shorter than mine and having them lowered, you may be able to run the wide-opens without binding. If you want to try, you can have mine. I'm never going to use them, because having spring-on-spring action where they are not internally guided seems to me like just asking form them to get cockeyed and then we get shockbody-hit-coupler-coupler-hit-upper-perch. This would extend the life of the bumpstops, but makes for somewhat unpredictable handling.
So, just for you, there's a free set of wide open couplers.

I like build threads with boost and wining and track results and cool fab work and vids. This thread needs more of these things.

Yeah. Cool fabwork not gonna happen anytime soon in this thread. But, considering that RTC apparently didn't know anything about how cars work before embarking on this journey, I think he's doing quite well. While driving everybody crazy of course.

RTC: No. You can't use bearings as spring couplers. Torringtons are skinny and will bend at the slightest uneven application of force. So no-go between springs. The only thing that will work between springs are spring couplers- that's why they exist.

Rotational freedom isn't the issue.

Put one of those springs on your garage floor.

Now jump on it. See what happens.

Then get out your pogo stick and see what happens as you jump with it already "attached" to you.

In your pictures each spring only has one end of it held in place. Not acceptable. You'd be better off not running helpers at all.

Go take some big speed bumps in it

Jump into a field. thats how i tested mine.

Each spring is more or less held in place at each end, but free to articulate in the middle. As you hit bumps, each main spring will win one battle at a time, until the war on its helper spring is won. Those couplers will look awfully inexpensive, as you gaze upon the remains of 4 mangled helper springs.

or a gouged shock stem

^ No worries. Those seals are self-cleaning AND self-healing. :P

Springs

Sliders

Rotational something or other

Indian food.

I'm caught up.

Sold!

Fab work? Jesus man. I couldn't fab my way out of a tin can. Like, if you put me in a tin can and gave me tools. I'd probably come on miata turbo and post about being stuck in a tin can instead of fabbing my way out.

Also, I thought miatas made us all fab?

I think there are more fields where you are. Post vids plz.


Good thing they have two ends!

Yes you are friend, yes you are.

I did get excited when concealer first mentioned sliders. I was hoping he was offering me a fine version of these:

https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...67213546f6.jpg

This is almost sig worthy.

Quoted for truth.

:laugh:

Getting yourself out of a can includes actions which are mutually exclusive to "fabbing".

"Fapping" is probably happening while stuck in the can, however.

I'll touch just about anything, but I'm not touching that.

But you touch it very frequently

NTTAWWT

Better put​ some gloves on

Hey, look at this awesome quote I found:

Totally agree!

Yeah, well... that guy is all talk.

Here Vladamir, be happy.
https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...e969edca6b.jpg
Just noticed that my poor fender liner is fubared. :/

Did a pull tonight.

https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...364cedf2b3.jpg

I always get a bit nervous when I hit 6k so I tend to pull the plug there-abouts. I really should do one out to redline, but that sounds scary and would be pretty damn fast on the roads I tend to test on.
In any event, looking at the log, I punched it at about 2100 and was making 6psi by 3000rpm. It crept up to 7psi over the next 500-1000 rpm or so. I think the ewg spring is between 4.5-5ish psi, so its just gingerly creeping up. There was a knock spike at ~6.3k that jumped to 27.1% or so. From what I've read on here (written by aidan and brain), that's barely anything and could just be noise. I'm going to pull a degree or two of timing at that load and see if it changes things. The weird thing is that I saw a few values in the low 20's after I took my foot off the gas. I'm guessing that was definitely noise because it wouldn't make sense otherwise!

I haven't really changed anything in the setup other than fueling and the tune a bit, ie no changes in boost. The following is a log from a month ago.

https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...5342ccec69.jpg

All in all, I'm very happy with how things are right now. I want to install EBC, but it's going to be a little bit. I need to check off a few things first: install undertray after cutting for piping, get some heat shielding together for the engine bay, coolant reroute, and figure out if my turbo is actually leaking at the seals. That last one I don't know if I want to do anytime soon because I'm not sure I want to know the answer. I don't know what else I'd do except for trying to figure out a larger drain. I've talked to the previous owner and he never had this issue, so I'm not quite sure what's up!

Aye almost 200whp, maybe if you held it to 7k! Congrats on that, torque looks nice and flat.

Gives me hope as we both probably have the same knowledge that I'll be able to enjoy boost soon. :likecat:

Ah, forgot to mention that I sucked it up and paid to have the clutch done. I'm still a bit bummed about it because that would have been half the price of a 6 speed, but I honestly couldn't say when I'd have the time to get the car up on jacks for a few days. GF has my subaru for now, so working on the miata for the few days I'd need to do the clutch would have meant not having a car. Womp.

Unless you sell the car and get your neighbors!

​​​​​​And yeah. I think my rev limiter is 6.8k or thereabouts. I don't really want to bang into it. The car is a lot of fun as it is. The nut behind the wheel just needs more experience. In an ideal scenario, id get everything done to tune it and have it running well at like 10-12 psi and run autocross with it at like 7-8psi. So basically... Why bother going up anytime soon lol.

Actually, you can see where I hit cutoff in the old chart. I think I still had 500rpm left in the run I did. Might have to try again soon!

Are you saying you are doing full throttle pulls to redline to break in your new clutch?

Clutch is new, but only to me. Was run for a year before I bought it. It's been broken in.

I didn't think it had to be re-broken in. Please correct me if I'm wrong! Eek.