The bearing was so torn up not even the puller from autozone and a slide hammer could get it off so I found a piece of tube a little smaller than the bearing and welded it to the bearing. Then I took a nut with the same pitch as the slide hammer and welded that to the other end of the tube. After a couple pulls the bearing came popping out. Put a new one in, I did look for one with a rubber seal but couldn't come up with anything else. I think this one may have had a rubber seal, or at least something was sealed with rubber. Just got the clutch back on, now for the bellhousing, and then the worst part of all, the transmission.

As for failure, I never changed it after the rebuild, just never thought about it. I'm guessing, and maybe I'm wrong here, but when the crank was cleaned I'm guessing all the grease in the bearing went bye bye. Then 800ish miles later, the bearing finally grenades, and here we are. That's the only thing I can see happening other than me just ******* it (the installation) up, which is possible, or a bad bearing (much less possible). Although I suppose me not replacing it is also me ******* it up, so I guess in the end I fucked it up either way lol.

 

That'll do it. Did you get a number off the bearing?

 

I did, it was f65354. Yeah, I confirmed my guess with my buddy at the shop. Actually pretty surprised the bearing lasted that long with no grease!

 

pilot bearings are a real pita for just about any car. half of the time i leave them out of frustration. but glad it was a $20 part. should be back on the road in no time.

 

Yeah they are. Just gotta get the trans back in, it's most the way, but doesn't want to go that last half inch. When you weigh as much as the trans does, it isn't fun to wrestle it around lol

Just signed up for the tracknight on July 5th, hopefully everything is running well at that time. I'm thinking of adding a couple cheap guages temporarily, mainly water temp and oil pressure. I'm thinking I'm gonna have some cooling issues on track.

 

honesty I've never have cooling issues with water. oil is another story. it can get up to 250 easily. and at that point, i'll let it cool.

 

250 degree oil temps are for OEMs trying to make their engines go 500k miles. You can go warmer than that without problems, especially if using synthetic oil.

 

Maybe it was oil temp that was ******* with all the FM cars then, I remember when I was at their summer camp all their v8 equipped cars were overheating. Then again, I'll probably be so damn slow I won't even warm it up.

Got the harness, foam, and tow straps. Gonna try to rope one of my buddies into helping me remove the rollbar and put it back in after I weld the harness bar on tonight.

 

Those needle pilot bearings are a pain, Rx7's have them. I used to just drive an awl to collapse one edge of the housing in until I could get a needle vise grip in to clamp and twist them out.

 

true I try to keep it between 180-250* that's what redline told me. and I notice at anything over 250 I start loosing PSI. for ls motors you want 10psi x 1000rpm. over 250* i'll see 59-58psi at 6000rpm, close but not good enough. so i cool it off to save the motor. last engine rebuild we did at 3 years of running everything looked new. so it's a good plan to keep.

 

Trans is back in and I did a little driving yesterday! I think I just needed to step back from the car for a couple nights and try putting the trans in again afterwards. Went in pretty smoothly the other night. Adjusting the harness took some time and I ended up staying up until about 3:30 the other night getting stuff done but it was worth it. Also I think I figured out my clutch line sealing problem, I needed to de-bur the copper washers. Basically just ran them across some 330grit and then some 1000 to give them a little polish, and they sealed on the first try. T-minus 12 days until the track.





Also all the cars at my house, or rather all the miatas were kinda dirty so I lined them up and washed them all yesterday. Was kinda fun to take a couple pictures, one of these is not like the others.




And the umbrella stands are finally done!

 

it's all down hill from here

 

As my buddy who's owned somewhere between 20-30 g20s said, "It starts with two."

 

You guys wanna see a couple funny pictures? I've hidden the pictures from when I first bought the car for a long time, those wheels gave me nightmares for a long time. I also told my girlfriend I'd stop wearing my shoes/throw them out after I finished the miata so I guess it's time to retire them, they lived a hard four years lol. At the time I hated that my mom took these pictures because I was so embarrassed of the wheels, now I'm glad because I can look back and laugh.

 

Finally got my ride height adjusted, went smoothly today, I don't know what was up with it the other day/week, probably me being stupid or something. It's set at around 4.6 at the pinch welds which translates to about 3.6 at the frame rails. I think I'm gonna start measuring from the frame rails since I have the v8r reinforced ones which aren't crushed up and they seem straighter than my pinch welds. I guess at this point it's just a measurement to reference from so it doesn't really matter where I measure it as long as it's consistent.

Going in for an alignment in the next couple days, critique my alignment. Tell me if something stands out as stupid, I based it off emilios dual duty and race alignment, basically kinda in the middle of the two.

Front
Ride Height: 4.6"
Camber: 3 - 4 (negative)
Caster: 3.5-4.5 (no power steering)
Toe: 0

I'm leaning towards 3.5* camber and 4* caster

Rear
Ride Height: 4.6"
Camber: 2.5 (negative)
Toe: 1/8"

I realize that the alignment is just a base for me to work off of and no matter what will need adjustment down the road, but is this a good base? I can corner weight the car at my buddy's house later down the road as well as adjust camber/toe.

 

Someone needs to visit a barbershop for a sharp up

 

i'm sure i got mega more spring then you do at 750/600 but my specs are.

3* front camber (i'll pull .5*- 1* out of the inside tire front and rear dependant on track rotation.)
2* rear camber for Road Atlanta, 1.5* rear camber for autocross and everything else.
5-6* caster *power steering and i love it.*
tow front +1/8 to +1/16
tow rear 0 to -1/16

we got a little different requirement than a standard Miata. quadrupling the power will do that, we really need to get the power down. "standing up" the rear tires helps with that.
and i ran a 550/440 spring rate in my autocross days with great success and mild street manners. raise your *** end up a little but. when the tires hook the rear will want to squat. if it bottoms out you'll lose a all traction and tires will just spin. i run with a 1/2 rake, V8roadsters recommends 1/4" rake.

 

So I had my trackday wednesday, cliffnotes: it went well. Car didn't overheat, and nothing broke so I'd say it was pretty successful.

I lifted the *** end up 1/4" but all of the speed shops were too backed up to do an alignment and I don't trust the chains since I had buddies who worked at them. My buddy was gonna bring over his toe plates and we were gonna do it ourselves until he realized he left them at the track, so I went with whatever my car was aligned at by my buddy. Not optimal, but let's be honest, it probably wouldn't have made that large of a difference. I wasn't taking down my laptimes anyway.

Had a good time, it seemed really well organized, better than I expected so that was a relief. Met some good people, a lot of people seemed to like the car cause you've got the small sports car fans and then the big v8 fans. There were some pretty gnarly cars there, 2 hellcats were in my session as well as a Mclaren 650s. There was another 650s in one of the other sessions as well. A gt350, a couple shelby mustangs, 4 or 5 miatas.

Lapping went well, I think going to a slightly softer spring rate might have helped, the track is decently bumpy in some areas since it's such an old track. The other problem is the first and second corners look straight into the sun. I had one oh **** moment where I kinda got blinded at the top of 5th and missed the apex on the first corner and came into the second corner all wrong. Meant touching the brakes in a non-straight line, felt quite a bit of weight transfer as I barely touched them to re-position the car and scrub off some speed but luckily it held. Took the next lap a touch slower after that and then got back into it, this was at the end of the night.

The car is pretty crazy out of corners, it handles well through the corners too, but man, the speed it comes out of corners with is crazy. Power is easy to deliver, just roll onto the throttle and away you go! By the end of the night I was starting to get a decent feel for the track, excited to go back again.

I had one srt4 guy who didn't want to give me a point by (there's always someone). I knew he was kinda cocky when an instructor referred to his car as a dodge neon and he said, "don't call it a neon, it's way different". Alright bud, chill lol. Anyway, he got a blue flag the first time I came up on his *** at the main straight but he either ignored it or didn't see it. He was slower through the corners too which was annoying. Second lap we come up on the main straight again and I throttle hard out of the last corner while shifting to his left...nothing. Had to let off the throttle to keep from passing him. So I sat on his *** to the end of the straight and through the corners to the back straight, again no point by. Finally after my third lap being behind him he got the message of the blue flag and moved his *** out of the way. His car wasn't slow to, say the least, it just wasn't as fast as he thought it was.


Also had a mustang owner tell me that he was worried I wasn't gonna stop when I was behind him, bruh, just cause you started braking 100 feet early doesn't mean I'm not gonna stop lol.

Oh and about an hour ago I got rear ended in Brad. Luckily damage is just cosmetic, hoping I can get some money for it and put it towards the next trackday/car. This is why I like having a beat up daily driver, no ***** given at all lol.

 

Sounds like fun, good stuff!

 

Shame I have but one to give that video.