Congrats on the new PB!

Interesting they limit the cage to 6 points of attachment. That's just main hoop, rear stays and front legs... I would think that would rule out a lot of existing cages. Mine is 10pt + the A pillars, and I don't think I would want any less for W2W...

I understand the desire for a minimalist ruleset, but IMHO it's a very low bar for W2W.... a non-caged car with stock belts would be legal, but you're average spec Miata wouldn't.

 

Thanks!

I agree that it is a bit odd and lax, and it is all unclear at the moment. I had not realized that the 6 point ruled out Spec Miatas, and there are a lot of those around. The goal of this Super Cup is to merge South West Motorsports into this event, and lots of them have more intricate cages too. I honestly don't know what their ultimate vision is as far as format and type of racing, but the organizer did mention that there would be two groups per class, one where cars are allowed to pass anywhere (so W2W racing, requires cage/rollbar), and the other where passing is only on the straights (a non-caged car would be here). No idea how the later will play out and sounds more like an HPDE/time attack to me. I'm not opposed to adding more safety to the car, but a full cage may just be too much for my goals and it would make more sense to get a Spec Miata at that point. Of course safety is always be top priority, and if I don't feel safe I will continue to do time attack instead. To me, a roll-bar car should be in the same group as a non-caged car because of the lack of side impact bars, but that's not what it sounds like in the current PDF.

 

Great work last weekend, Ricardo! Seriously you were cooking, less than a second off some seriously fast NC, ND, BRZ's, which is super cool.

I hadn't seen those rules yet. Honestly I really want to w2w, but my car is just too irreplaceable for me to ever do that with. It was my first car, got it in 2004, and my moms before that. Scooter might be less irreplaceable to you, and if so, w2w definitely an option. Personally I love the idea but it has to be a different car. And I am still considering it, maybe in a 323 or another miata!

And for other followers, yes those rules are crazy lax. Like kinda insane, really, and definitely concerning. That said, we're still kinda the wild west out here, the first time I drove this track they had me out there with the track sweeper/cleaner on track at the same time and just told me to "drive around him". The guy even offered to spray water for us if we wanted to drift. Haha. And trackdays/TA were $80 entry, but recently just jumped to $150. Basically, it's NM (one of the poorest states in the union), and this is cheap racing.

So I'm not surprised. And it's super tempting to get in there for some budget w2w. But keep safety in mind. This is a new event with a lot of green drivers, I expect some carnage to be honest, so I think even if I do jump into this it would have to be after a season or two when they iron out the kinks. I do appreciate that this exists and I'm not hating at all. Just need to understand the potential drawbacks. Again, not to discourage you, as I completely understand the appeal and am very tempted myself. Also, I kinda expect that the no passing rule is more of a "no passing rule" and that it will be ignored, kinda how some other things are.. overlooked at our track.

 

I'm with Nate bigtime. My cars haven't been nearly as sentimental to me as his Miata (2 years vs 20 is a pretty big difference lol), but even once I got to year two with my NA, I had decided it was too precious to me to ever risk it getting smashed racing W2W. Like he said, though, another Miata or 323 or the like as a W2W-only car would be awesome to have. I envy you guys a bit. If I had the extra space out here in SoCal to store a track-only car, I might have tried getting my NASA W2W license by now haha.

Definitely a good idea to sit back and watch how everything plays out over the first season as well. How long has that track been around? Is this the first time that W2W has been done there? If so, those "rules" may change rather quickly after the first couple events depending on how things go.

 

Well done, that's a good result!

I read those rules, blimey, that would be a hard pass for me. Nothing about seats, not even a '5/6 point harness recommended', nothing about HANS devices, and you can run w2w with a factory seatbelt and no rollbar of any description . It is probably telling regarding who they are targeting they even mention skateboard helmets, but the bit about flashy paint jobs wanted sealed it for me.

I'm curious about the insurance environment there, is there a requirement for circuits to be licensed, carry insurance? I can't see an insurance company saying, 'yes that event looks fine', I reckon the circuit owner, promoter and officials are all hanging it out in breeze, I wouldn't want to be one if someone is in hospital on life support, or worse.

 

Thank you brother, and you also did great. I felt very proud of our friend group setting PBs left and right!

I'm certainly considering all of these points, especially the green drivers. Scooter means a lot to me, but in recent times it has become more of a tool and learning vessel. I don't want to lose it or the story we have, but even in time attack anything can happen. But as you mention for others reading, this is the wild west of racing. Very much "enter at your own risk" kind of track and events. At the same time, the w2w I've spectated in SWMS is mostly a gentlemen racing sort of ordeal, except for Spec Miata, we all know that Spec Miata is a contact sport.

The track has been around for a couple decades at least, and w2w has been around, but under a different organization (South West Motorsports). Here is a video of what it will probably be like:
Thanks Gee Emm. And I appreciate the insight. As far as insurance, it is a definite requirement and they are insured, but I know no details. Again, the wild west of race tracks here.

I'm glad I mentioned it here for you all to make me reconsider the risks more realistically. I will sit out for a year or two and see what the event is like and let them figure out the kinks. In the meantime, the Super Lap classing system will be favorable for Scooter and let's see how that goes. Gotta schedule some dyno time and rescale the car.

 

Gotta be honest, W2W racing in an open top car looks pretty fun despite the potential safety concerns haha.

Good luck next year with the new classing system! Super sick Scooter should be classed competitively.

Being similarly competitively classed this year in my car is an awesome feeling. Last year, I was underclassed by quite a bit (30whp under my limit in TT4 and then 30whp under limit again when I put the built motor in and bumped up to TT3) and spent every race simply trying not to get last place. I still have some wiggle room with the NC in TT5, but with the car being closer to its class limit the dynamic feels like its totally changed. Long story short, having a competitively-classed car is fun! Lol.

 

I assume you added that fuel pressure sensor to you car at some point?

Not sure why it would drop. I believe fuel pressure will drop linearly with boost, but since you're not running boost I can't imagine that's it. Out of curiosity, what's the max KPA you hit with your setup?

I doubt the fuel pump is running out of steam unless it's failing altogether. The stock pumps should be good past 200 WHP.

 

yes, the fuel pressure sensor has been installed for a bit.

The max MAP kPa I see is atmosphere, so anywhere from 74 to 85 kPa around here. To clarify, I'm seeing the absolute fuel pressure drop and differential pressure is the one that linearly decreases with boost as you said, although in my case they're always around the same at full throttle.

Ha. Scooter is nowhere near 200hp. I'm wondering if it's an indication of a failing pump or regulator? Maybe something is clogged? Or maybe this is normal behavior? Just trying to learn. I've always seen a bit of a drop and asked about it in the Link ECU forum, where I was told not to sweat it, but at that time the drop was to 370kPa, and now it is lower to 345kPa. Still plenty of fuel pressure for the injectors, but odd. See attached picture and log of what I see, around the 106s mark. I had to crop it because of the size.





@SimBa do you have a fuel pressure sensor in your car to compare?

 

Thanks, it should be fun. I miss your NA, but I'm looking forward to your progress with the NC with great interest (even if I don't post on your thread much). That is shaping to be a competitive and fun car!

 

@redursidae Nope, no fuel pressure regulator for me. My Link should be here tomorrow though, so maybe I'll see what it takes to add one . I've never monitored fuel pressure, so I don't have much information to help out on this one unfortunately.

Have you done your fuel filter since you got the car? I know a guy locally who was having weird fuel pressure issues that ended up being a clogged/clogging fuel filter.

 

I think you meant fuel pressure sensor, you obviously have a regulator in your car in the tank.

I've got a couple log pics that might help. I have a N/A NA, my turbo NA, a N/A NB, and a turbo NB.

First, my turbo NA. It has a aeromotive boost referenced FPR:



Second is my friend's NB, big fuel pump and injectors, but stock regulator/hat.



Thirdly, a customer's NA track car, disconnected stock FPR, but naturally aspirated so it sits at 43.5psi or near as makes no difference all the time.



Aaaaaand the one you're all waiting for is on my work laptop, a naturally aspirated NB. I'll upload that asap. But you can see my referenced NA increases pressure with boost, where as the NB decreases. We've since added separate fuel pump relay powered directly off the battery, I would suggest doing that at a minimum @redursidae since you're probably only seeing 11-13 volts at the pump, vs. most likely 13.5-14 at the battery.

I wouldn't think that's normal behavior on a naturally aspirated NB. Either voltage at the pump is low, or pump is dying IMO.

 

Ooohhhh yeah! I’m very interested to see how the Link goes for you.

And yes I replaced the fuel filter last winter hoping it was the cause. I haven’t replaced or inspected the pump so maybe the suck is dirty, or the pump isn’t getting enough voltage as Curly said.

Thank you @curly ! This is what I was hoping to learn. Still interested to see the same data for the naturally aspirated NB when you get to it. I didn’t know voltage drop at the pump may be an issue in Miata’s but it is common in the DSMs. I’ll take a look at the voltages as you said, and go from there. Hopefully that’s the culprit

 

Yo, @redursidae could you hook me up? I went to fire my car up today on the link and I'm pretty sure my trigger setup was way off. I'm running the FM 36-2 wheel which looks pretty close, if not identical to the Supermiata wheel you're using.

Just curious what trigger offset you ended up using.

 

-8 and -10 on two "Mazda MX5 NB 36-2" tunes I'm looking at

 

The offset in mine is -22

 

Thanks @curly and @redursidae . Maybe I should start another thread on this, because it's still something that confuses me.

On my Speeduino, I had to set the trigger angle to the number of degrees between the tooth gap and the Crank sensor at TDC on piston 1 which was around 210 degrees. I'm assuming then that the Link's built in trigger pattern accounts for that. Speeduino was a generic missing tooth setup, so it would make sense that you would have to account for all of the trigger angle and not just fine tune it.

 

I'm not well versed in how to figure out offsets by hand, but my understanding is that Link's offset is based off the CAM tooth and Crank gap for the 36-2 setup. If you ask Vaughan or Adamw on the Link ECU forums they will tell you for sure. Maybe @curly has the answer as well

 

When I did the Speeduino offset I put cylinder 1 to TDC and looked at the number of teeth before the first tooth after the gap passed the CPS. I got 21 teeth and with 36 teeth on the wheel I figured each of those was 10 degrees. That was almost spot on.

That made sense to me when I figured it out and I assumed the Link would be the same way. However, I think since the Link already has a profile setup for the MX5 36-2, that the ECU already knows/accounts for that offset, and the trigger offset is just to make finer adjustments depending on your exact wheel, crank pulley, CPS positioning, etc..

And that also makes sense to me now, it just wasn't what I was expecting based on previous experience. Having said that, I think on the OEM trigger wheel it was also just selecting the preconfigured trigger setup and making fine adjustments as well, but I've mostly forgotten about that at this point.

 

Nothing has been happening with Scooter since the last trackday. I’ve been driving the Stealth and working on house stuff instead. I was planning to do some black Friday aero purchases but this showed up in marketplace and I had to jump on it





So aero parts will have to wait a while but I’m excited to finally have a trailer! I also jumped on a Garmin Catalyst on eBay that should be here next week and I look forward to see what I learn from it.

I still plan to grab some SM CHUBS and a set of Sphericals from Flyin Miata to install this winter. I’m just waiting to see if those go on sale.

@Fireindc has been instigating me to go e85 and I already have the sensor around, so that might also happen. Need to look around for information about on whether the stock fuel pump and regulator will be happy with it for short periods of time. The lines in the bay and injectors are compatible but I haven’t done work in the tank.

I uploaded the files for the battery mount to thingiverse if anyone is interested in printing their own: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:6843525