150 is really cold for oil. You want your oil to warm up enough to get any sort of condensation out of it. Do you have a thermostatic sandwich plate?

Agreed 150 is the bottom end, 200 is better. Interestingly enough the Audi 2.7t I have has an oil temp guage in it, it rarely gets above 160 deg and it takes the better part of 20min of driving to get there.

I do not have a thermostatic plate, wasn't going to chance running an eBay piece with moving parts and the quality pieces cost more than my whole cooler setup. If the temps don't come up when I get the water temps in the right range I'll consider adding it.

Got 6 PSI tuned enough to beat on it........things are going to get interesting quickly as I wratchet this thing up to full boogie.

Fun read - keep up the good work!

Finished up a few things and have been working out the bugs......and there have been a lot of them.

Just to name a few:
Blew coolant line off of turbo....water shot out of my hood vent all over the windshield blinding me and nearly crashing. Spent an hour looking for a leak in the radiator because it was soaked only to find the line on the turbo
Pulled a pin out of the TPS sensor
Found a wiring issue with the IAC (forgot to hook one wire to 12v)
Realized I forgot bias resistor on oil temp.....so that's why it hasn't been moving around
Replaced thermostat since the two holes I drilled were enough cool the car to 120 degrees
Adjusted the oil cooler and radiator ducting to get the nose piece to fit better

Then I could get back to finishing up the small things. The air filter was just hanging out in the fender.
https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...81befcaafe.jpg
Broke out the first class template materials again
https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...e086fc75af.jpg

Transfered it to the HDPE sheet
https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...b1d7933552.jpg
No more soaked air filter
https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...1f7b5021f5.jpg
This is what it looks like from the front with the nose piece off, the fog light feeds this area, while it's not sealed to build pressure I'm guaranteed to get ambient temperature air into the turbo.
https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...da78499a5c.jpg

I HATE body work, but it turned out pretty decent. The whole car is due for a vinyl wrap, flat black or gloss?
https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...ee77635d8b.jpg
https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...bbbd9c0c27.jpg


As a little side project I ordered up some parts to make a CO2 powered trackside tire filler.

https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...d8c6e0447e.jpg

Something to note if you're wanting to use HPDE sheeting like I have with it touching metal that is ~200 degrees. It does expand with heat and using rivets won't allow for this expansion so you get some buckling like you see here. It goes away as it cools. It still does it's job and it's not as noticeable as this picture makes it appear.
https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...a46200ecaf.jpg

Few more gratuitous shots in various states of undress
https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...f7551fc1ca.jpg
https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...6dde6d5800.jpg
https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...05a8ab623d.jpg

That is some impressive work...

The sad reality is that these bad boys will probably drop more time on an Auto-X course than all this fab work. I'm hoping I can actually use 1st gear again instead of just turning the tires into smoke.
https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...363d819c3c.jpg

Two steps forward and one back this weekend.

Finished up the exit ducting finally, ended up being more complicated than I thought with a relieve for the crank pulley, and some stiffening ribs.

https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...79487c5f00.jpg

Finished product.....
https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...8a1c0c3360.jpg
https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...65cc76abaa.jpg
I know this looks like it's choking off flow but you want to accelerate the air as you introduce it back into the air flowing over the car. It still follows the opening to heat exchanger rule of thumb.

Also took the time to make the switch panel for launch control, boost table select, traction control enable, and data log.
https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...a39b83be46.jpg


Then took a couple of steps back ........Had a small oil leak coming from the fittings on the egay sandwich plate and found the o-ring squished out from around the fitting. So I took the time to make some delrin washers on the lathe and when I went to tighten the fittings I twisted off the threads in the plate $^%&$*%. Out comes the aluminum glue gun.

https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...675c46b804.jpg

In china's defense I did enlarge the passages to 1/2" to allow for better flow which is what weakened the fitting.......but they should have had them full port with a larger diameter thread. For all the modifications I needed to make to the plate this was still probably the best route for me to take.

I got the oil temp working and was able to verity that I got up to 170 degrees in around 15 min of driving, I think it'll be ok in the long run but take a while to warm up.

I got the EBC plumbed correctly and it's now trying to control the boost......lots of tuning to do here yet but I got to see 12 psi for a pull or two and that's going to be fun.

TPS is on the fritz again......starting to think this connector is junk.

The coolant line I fixed once already decided to tear right under the worm gear clamp I installed to fix it the first time so I get to fix that again and burp the air out of the system for like the 5th time.

I'm loving all the pics, this has been fun to read.

Thanks for the encouragement!

Looking good! As much as I refuse to modify the look of the body of my car, you got me wanting to tube out the front of my car to redo my heat exchangers and do a setup similar to what you have done. I love the hood vent even though it does not look stock, it screams function.

Are you using a heat gun to mold that stuff? It looks pretty easy to work with (never touched the stuff before).

Propane torch, for long bends I'm using a harbor freight sheet metal brake. You can somewhat weld the stuff by heating a piece of metal and using it to smear the two pieces together. It's ugly but it works.

Yahtzeeeee!!!!

All the pieces have finally came together, TPS is fixed, all the coolant lines are fixed, fuel pump replaced and EBC is now functioning in a way I can actually control. It's made it over 25 miles now without shitting the bed.


Fuel pump.....boy did I get thrown for a loop. So I popped what I thought was a stock pump out of the tank and noticed the walbro stamp and part number on the old pump. A quick google of the part number reveals the little shit is a walbro 255 L/hr pump. The car had a jackson supercharger setup on it when I got it along with some janky band-aids so i guess this shouldn't surprise me I never put much stock in the 72 psi pressure readings I was getting with my fuel pressure sending unit. It's an el-cheapo ebay unit and I was really just looking for pressure drop at WOT, which was in the order of 12 psi to 60 psi. With the new 190 L/hr pump pressure settled in at 62 psi at idle and now only drops ~4 psi at full boogie, and is much more stable so I'm not getting wild swings when I punch the throttle like I was getting. This verifies to me that the 255 is in deed too much pump for the stock regulator while it may seem temping to just tune around the high pressure at low loads I can tell you the car is much more stable and throttle response is much crisper now that the pressure isn't taking a huge dive every time the injectors open up.. To cure the 4 psi drop I'm seeing I think a return style fuel system will be needed. I have a return style fuel rail off the JDM intake I may put into service if I feel frisky.
https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...5a5449baf9.jpg

I have no idea why the EBC has been giving me so much trouble but I just about ran out of talent with this. Finally figured out somewhere in the poke and hope of trying to adjust things I had set it up as inverted so once I got that fixed I started cranking up initial value tables until boost levels went above the 160kpa the wastegate was capable of. I have seen a few threads where guys end up with their PID settings in the 20/20/40 range or some times less at 15/10/30...... I'm up to 60/40/80 and it's still way too laggy to hold my desired kpa. At least now it's actually responding and I'm sure in another tuning session I'll get it nailed. 175kpa (11.5psi) feels really good, can't wait to hold that all the way to redline.

Now that the temperature has warmed up the worn out rivals are hooking better so I was able to get a clean 0-60 run in at 8psi with a somewhat crappy launch it was right at 5.0 seconds. That should be good for high 13's to low 14's in the quarter. I expect to see mid to low 4 second runs to 60 with the 245's and 12psi of boost. I'll probably need to get the traction control working to see those numbers though.

Another item of worry was the used clutch I had installed was slipping a bit on 3rd and 4th gear shifts, now that it's got some miles to break in it's holding much better and drags the RPM's down on a flat shift like my stock clutch did only with double the power. I kinda hope it doesn't get any grabier as I think it'll help the drivetrain live a longer life. It's a spec stg. 3 (sprung 6 puck) and other than a narrow engagement window it's very stock like.

I'll post another video once I get the boost dialed in.....then it's race time, first auto-x and then a track day when I have enough confidence that all the bugs are worked out.

That stinks. I HATE pulling the trans out to replace those.

I knew I was taking a gamble with used parts, but the cost savings were substantial, 250$ vs 700$ so it made it worth the risk. Like I said it seems to be coming around and gripping well so it may have worked out in my favor.

If the car survives the racing season a substantial rebuild including a new to me 6 speed (mine has a whine in 1st), forged bottom end and all new hubs/bearings is in order for preventative maintenance before I crank the knob up to 300+ whp numbers.

I'm hoping to end up the 300 range. FM says to get the 01 up 6spd and to be ready to replace transmissions as they don't hold up very well of course a 5spd is weaker according to them. Do you know if that is the norm on here?

Above 225 ft/lbs and the 6 speed is a necessity, 6 speeds stand up to 250 to 350 ft/lbs depending on how badly you abuse it.

A trans that's truly 300 HP+ capable is still an issue. There are folks trying to fit a T5 as well as another effort to make upgraded internals Neither option will be cheap

Did some tuning at lunch, and I've discovered some things...... not sure if they are unexpected or par for the course.
https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...ab674f5304.png

Observation 1:
So I finally got the EBC reacting how I would want it to, you can see the map peak out at 175kpa then slowly taper to 160kpa at redline. This is with the wastegate commanded full shut. This could be a few things, one I've maxed out the turbo......can I do that with a 2560 without scattering rods? I have boost leaks or the wastegate leaks. I am still running a 2.5" exhaust so this could be holding me back as well. I guess it could simply be that the intake restriction is so low on this motor that 10 psi equals more power than a lot of builds see.

Observation 2:
As you can see the Duty cycle is high, it's in the 95% range at redline but AFR's are good. You can also see the fuel pressure drops off to 56 psi which is still 46 once you account for the boost. The AFR's are fat and happy so this isn't really a concern other than I'm using all these injectors have to offer. Using calculators from here: Fuel Injector Calculator from WitchHunter Performance it shows the injectors are around 450cc at my pressure and that's good for 275 crank HP with a BSFC of .6 Am I really making that kind of power with "only" 10 psi up top? Yes a dyno will tell.

Observation 3:
Intake temps seem to be really laggy, you can see the steady climb to 90 degrees in this snapshot. It takes them about the same amount of time to come back down to ambient 70 degree temps. I have no real basis of experience to tell if this is "good" or "bad". 20 degrees over ambient after a 0-100 sprint doesn't seem bad but it'll be interesting to see what it does on a road course where I'll be on it much more frequently but the speeds are higher.


I guess my fear is that with the huge intake piping, decent intercooler and honda intake that I might actually be making quite a bit of power. Possibly over the limits of what the bottom end can take long term. I hate to back it off since it's intoxicating as it is, and I will most likely be racing it before I can get it on a dyno. Would the capacity of the RX8 injectors be a good limit to stay under to save the rods?

Maybe your ebc is reacting backwards to the numbers in the table.. Did you try to run at 0 and 100? A 2560 with a shut wastegate should fly to the moon and back and blow up your engine while doing so.

I verified the direction of the EBC through the trouble shooting process......twice. I did have it backwards and once the wastegate goes wide open the pressure dives.

It's common knowledge around here that the 2560 will blow up a stock block right? I grabbed the compressor map of the interwebs and had a look.

https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...47e52b03b0.jpg

If you use the link I posted earlier at 450cc of fuel at 6000 rpm plus I should be making ~275 flywheel HP which equates to 26-28 lb/min of air. I'm doing that at 10ish psi. which is 1.68 pressure ratio if you run those two numbers across this graph you hit the choke line of the graph on the right. This would explain the turbo "running out of breath" Now I'm just a nerd with a green belt in google foo, that's what the math tells me. I'll take real world results over napkin math any day but with the hodgepodge of parts I have I'm not sure there are too many people with the same setup, most have gone with a bigger turbo and shooting for 300hp plus. You can see at higher pressure ratio's the turbo flows more and you can bet your ass the rated 330hp that garrett uses is at the high end of this map with a 2.25 pressure ratio or better. Dyno would be great tool here, but I want to maximize my time on the dyno and rather not being chasing a boost leak or tooling around trying to figure out why my turbo won't make the expected boost.

I'm still not discounting a boost leak, a quick look last night showed all the clamps appear to be tight. I did find a couple of lower injector seals that look to be torn which would explain that wiff of fuel I get every now and then through the vents under boost. It's always dry when I check for leaks but I'm guessing a small amount of fuel is getting blown around these cut seals under positive manifold pressure. Now I'm about 90% sure there is no way enough air is leaking around these tiny cuts to effect pressure. I'll also going pull off the mistu BOV and rig up a way to test and see at what pressure it begins to leak through.

You could run a virtual dyno off of your log and see if you are in the ball park. Mine is well under 200hp with a 2554 at 10 psi with great flowing everything

Good suggestion, I'll have to do that when I get off the road next weekend.

Do you know your fuel flow is on your setup? AFR, Fuel pressure, duty cycle and RPM will let me figure out a rough estimation. Mega log viewer will do the math for you as well from a log.

virtual Dyno has me at 173HP and 155 torque on this log

Accurate weight is important for VD accuracy.

Another weekend and a few more steps forward. After doing more research I found that turbo's don't stop making air at the "choke" point, just the amount of heat created goes up exponentially. With that new found knowledge I kept digging and found that blowing open the wastegate flapper is a thing. Wastegate springs have a bottom end as well as a top end.....Good to know. I had a few threads left on the actuator arm so I pulled it off and shortened the female end a 1/8" and tightened it up. I went to far and would hit boost cut instantly. I part throttled the revs to 6k and tried it there and hit boost cut again so that confirms there is boost to be had at the top end. I was short on time this weekend so I was able to get it adjusted to get back to the peak of 11.5psi at low revs and tapering off to 9 to 10psi at redline. It still seems like the EBC isn't doing a whole lot so I'm starting to suspect a torn actuator diaphragm. I'll investigate further next weekend. I have an actuator off a 7.3 Ford that should work once I shortened the shaft so that's plan B.

In other news, I can now hook up first gear.
https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...7ad3839010.jpg

The rivals were starting to develop a tread splice.
https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...6df3d63355.jpg

What kind of BOV are you using? I've been filing the spring on mine to get it to open right. If it wasn't a Tial I'd toss it for something else.

It's a factory Mitsubishi unit off of I think an eclipse. Works like a champ. I've read it starts having issues between 17 and 20 PSI.

Mine leaked at lower boost. They are (were) sold new with BEGI kits, but are commonly replaced.

Hmmm, I'll look into that.

Been a while since the last update........one step forward......two back.

So the 6 speed in this car was abused by the prior owner and down right tortured by myself. It always had a whine in lower gears and a bit of gear whirl when in neutral with the clutch engaged at idle. It also had orange silicone at the case split lines so someone has been into it before.

Pulled into the garage and heard what I thought was a rod knock until I realized.......

Noise goes away when I push in the clutch. So out comes the trans:
https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...3961105c31.jpg

Oil drain shows the ford unicorn tears have a bit of sparkle
https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...a193358121.jpg

Luckily this happened before it's first auto-x so I didn't waste a trip. New 6 speed will be here this week.

Before the trans broke I was continuing to investigate why my boost control was not really working as intended. I could control the boost, but not well. My PID settings are 175/150/100 right now which is just crazy compared to others. I also confirmed that I was blowing open the factory wastegate controller so I ordered up a cheapy ebay dual port.
https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...510c72a6e7.jpg

This solved the waste gate getting blown open issue but was not any more responsive to commanded boost than before. The MS would progressively ramp up the duty cycle as boost dropped off as RPM's climbed but boost would still taper off 20 kpa from peak.

Next step is to move the pressure source for the wastegate from a manifold source (see's vaccume) to a port before the throttle body. I'll get back to testing this after the trans goes in.


Couple other things I found:
https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...d60b3ca1ab.jpg

Down pipe flange is sealing well with the shim gasket, and either I forgot to tighten the O2 sensor or it loosened up. Be interested to see if my AFR's richen up now that there isn't fresh air leaking around the threads.

I had to modify my cheapie eBay 2 port can to get the 2nd port to actually hold any pressure. It would blow out the shaft and bolt holes. I used the valve stem area of an old bike inner tube and a few o rings, lubed the shaft with faucet and valve grease. Holds 20psi no problem now.

Interesting, I'll have to hook up the air compressor and see what this one does.

You shouldn't need to relocate your boost pressure source with the EBC. If the boost duty is increasing and boost is falling off your gate is still blowing open.

Bronson says:
"Next step is to move the pressure source for the wastegate from a manifold source (see's vacuume sic)"

So he needs to relocate his boost source because it is in the worst possible place, AFTER the throttle.

For EBC or a system with boost creep: right at the compressor housing is best. For a system with boost droop, right before the throttle valve is best. After the throttle valve is never correct.

Well technically with EBC it'll function the same right before the throttle body as it would right after the turbo since the MAP sensor will compensate for any boost loss across the intake tract.

My research and observations show it actually still works post throttle body with a single port actuator since the vaccum at part throttle will just keep the wastegate closed. The downside is the actuator isn't designed for vaccum so it'll eventually fail and there are certain situations where you could be making big boost against a closed throttle plate.

The real reason I moved it is with a dual port and the EBC the vaccum will now be trying to open the wastegate at part throttle. I also think the 4' of 3/16" vaccum line is causing lag in the actuator response. There's also that whole thing where a lot of smart people said to move it with no real explanation as to why. It was an experiment, didn't work great and now I know why.

My bad I miss read where he was hooked up. Carry on.

Holy crap you weren't kidding, all the air I could squirt with an air chuck set at 20psi just blasted out from around the shaft. It was obvious this thing was not operating as a dual port and worse was leaking such a large volume of boost that it was easily outrunning the volume of air available via the 3/16" line I had ran to the manifold so it was no wonder this was not working any better than the single port. At this point I had enough with this lack of boost control so I jumped in with both feet.

I cut open the factory single port controller. Sure enough the diaphragm had a tear in it so that's why I had such limited control over this turd.
https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...c67fab614b.jpg


This thing looked pretty simple, I had some aluminum bar stock handy so I started whittling out my own dual port controller.......(Jeremy Clarkson voice) how hard could it be?

https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...2983536c5b.jpg

Aluminum machines so nice with a sharp bit.
https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...3ee2cab9ff.jpg


Using Sonofthehill's suggestion I cannibalized an old tire valve to make a shaft seal. This works really well and still allows for some misalignment of the shaft. With 20psi on the canister you could just feel a little air escaping around the seal. Should work great.
https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...3e6f4bb412.jpg


I then cut open the new "dual port" wastegate controller and found something interesting. The guts looked identical to the single port.....this isn't good because when you put pressure on the rod side of the piston it does nothing but push the bellow out of the way. So sonofthehill, even with your clever valve stem seal it's still not functioning as a dual port should.....very frustrating. You can also see the sorry excuse of a felt seal in this pic.

https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...40874135ca.jpg
I verified this fact by assembling the controller with the guts just as they came out of the stock can and sure enough there was no difference in resistance in pull strength with the air on and off, just spring pressure.

I fixed this by cutting the piston cup off the shaft, threading the end so i could sandwich the cup, bellow seal and a backup washer effectively sealing the bellows to the piston.
https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...76bd7ea82e.jpg
https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...a14d3636f1.jpg

I put the whole mess back together for 20th time and success! Air pressure on the rod side now exerts enough force to flex the bracket!. You can also see the ebay dual port controller had a heavier spring. I went with the lightest spring based on the theory that I should be able to get a wider range of control with a light spring. I was hoping to be able to easily have a spread of 6 to 15 psi with the table switching enabled.

https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...2e086c3bb5.jpg
https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...ee6cf9fbc8.jpg

I'm still waiting on my new to me trans to show up so no testing yet, hopefully I can get this turd back on the road next weekend.

In case you were wondering.....no I didn't make this to save a few bucks. It was really just an exercise for me to better understand how these things worked and to play around on the lathe. Spend the extra $$ and get a good quality dual port wastegate controller and move on with life.

:crx:

No wonder I have to add a spring:vash:

Thanks! I pulled my extra 2 port can apart, same thing. I am going to try to make something similar out of mine too.

No direct experience. However, I understand that the Turbosmart WGA use a larger diameter diaphragm. This means that, for the same waste-gate pressure setting, the spring force will be greater. This seems like another option to be able to run a higher % EBC vs wastegate pressure, without a dual port actuator.

Been doing some brain storming while I wait on my transmission. Doing a little measurement and math I was able to come up with graphs that show how and why a wastegate controller does what it does. These graphs may or may not explain it well, but take a look at the spreadsheet and play with the numbers some and you'll start to understand how spring pressure and boost pressure correlate to particular reaction by the controller.

Spreadsheet: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...sbeLcQ/pubhtml

https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...7f7a7f1ff6.jpg
So what you are looking at here is the force being applied to the wastegate flapper by the exhaust gas pressure in red graphed beside the force of the controller pulling on the rod in blue. The graphed scenario assumes we're in full boost mode with the EBC dumping off all the boost pressure off the top of both controllers. In the dual port example you have spring pressure and boost pressure forcing the actuator closed, so you can see the lines never cross so the wastegate would never open because as boost increases and exhaust gas pressure increases they are biased towards keeping the wastegate closed. The reason for this is that the controller piston is 1.4" in diameter and wastegate flapper is ~.905" depending how much you've ported the hole. Keep in mind that the exhaust pressure is normally 1.5 times higher than the intake pressure. Poor setups can approach 2 to 1. Playing with this ratio you can see that with the sizes I have I will still have a rate of rise that is equal or greater than the wastegate rise until a 2.4 pressure ratio. Clear as mud?

Using the EBC you could equalize the pressure top and bottom on the diaphragm defaulting to just spring pressure which in this example is only 2 lb's so I could run literally 1 psi of boost before the wastegate would start to open. So I litterally end up with an infinite range of boost pressures available at the click of a few key strokes.

On the single port example you're seeing the spring pressure only graphed at 15 lb's of force and you see the lines cross at just over 10.5 psi of boost. So this single port would open at that point and balance out a few PSI higher. The spring pressure's I've plugged into these calculations are just a swag to get and idea of "how" they work. The biggest take away I had from this is that with a single port you have to have a lot of spring pressure to keep the wastegate closed, but you may or may not have enough boost pressure available to open it so you end up with a limited range of boost available with an EBC.

Finally got the new trans in over the weekend and..........all that math was correct! I can now get "all the boost" and have some semblance of control over it. The bottom end of what the boost control can maintain is quite a bit higher than I would have thought, but that may just be a function of the internal waste gate not being big enough to bleed off enough exhaust to get all the way down below 150kpa. Just one round trip to work (~60) miles and I have it somewhat holding 175kpa all the way to redline. It's a little finicky yet, and it appears there is certainly a delay in when the EBC reacts to a boost mismatch, the controller reacts and the boost levels actually react. It's bad enough that the initial value tables are more important in 1st and 2nd gear than the PID parameters. In the upper gears the PID parameters do what they are supposed to and I was actually able to get it to oscillate from being too sensitive which is a welcome change from being lethargic.

I'm now firmly out of injector with the 440cc RX8 injectors with duty cycles north of 100% and the AFR's begining to lean out. I picked up some injector clinic 650's so I'll be tossing those in and re-tuning fuel. Not because I want to make more power, as I'm pretty darn sure I'm right on the ragged edge of what the rods can take.

Get FF injectors.

yeah yeah, everyone has a favorite brand. They all just lop off the diffuser plate and match them out of large batches of injectors. With sequential in the MS3 I can balance fueling based on the testing that FIC does on each injector.

These were used and cheap, which checked the boxes I was looking for.

A bit late to this but FF does not modify the injector in any way. They do match them from large batches. But for $300 you get PnP and ev14 technology and accurate data for setting them up out of a new unmolested injector.

FIC does modify injectors. And if you've ever dug around Injector Dynamics website you would never consider buying from them. Used and cheap, you get what you pay for.

Huh......it's funny how the car idles fine my duty cycles are down to 75% and I still have mone left in my pocket. Tell me again how I didn't get what I paid for? And what exactly on a spiffy website is supposed to be obvious to me? This site prides itself on data and facts but when it comes to injectors brand loyalty becomes a data point. NONE of these guys make these injectors, FIC provides individual injector test results in affect showing their work so there was nothing to hide and I know exactly how much fuel each cylinder is getting. With this data tuning took all of 50miles of my commute to true up the VE tables, idle and part throttle was surprisingly close. Obviously my WOT area was a hot mess because the RX8 injectors were static and fuel control was out the window.

The injectors Bronson has are from Fuel injector clinic. The company mentioned on IDs website is Fuel injector connection.

Common mistake.

Fuel injector clinic injectors are great. And work fine. IDs are just a step higher, and their price reflects that. I wouldn't hesitate to use fuel injector clinic injectors at all.

You stated that all brands modify the injector. It's a general statement, I know, but it is not the case with FF which I thought warranted stating.

And on ID's website there are articles with clear references to FIC's work. You can choose to read it and choose to believe it or not.

So instead of new, matched, ev14 injectors for $300 you got something that works just as well for much less. It's great that you got what you wanted and not what you paid for. Props to you. Personally I am not that frugal. The thought of getting a set of used injectors that I wouldn't feel safe with unless I sent them in for cleaning (which would be $100 likely) just doesn't add up to me. And since I am not as handy at tuning to be able to monitor individual cylinder AFR to adjust each injector, I will just rely on the average AFR and trust a matched set of injectors is still matched down the line.

And while my car is N/A I just had a totally different experience tuning my car with bigger injectors. They were at 90% dc though so I guess not quite static. Idle and midrange was lean but WOT was close.

Aidan, thanks for clearing that up. My mistake. Should have gone and checked ID's site again before saying it was Fuel Injector Clinic.

Umm I might have that backwards.

Maybe FIC is Fuel injector connection?

Who even knows at this point. Run whatever you want. Its your car.

Ok, the reason I like FF injectors is because Nigel is a cool guy and is local to me, sort of.

Anyway, he first figured out how to make the gt500 injectors work well with our cars. Back when everyone was wondering about them. He did a bunch of R&D with Savington, if I am not mistaken. He figured out that the connector pins were too short and that they needed small spacers for the rail.

Now he offers a competitive kit which I have been running for over 20k miles and can run 12's in the 1/4 mile with. Any time he learned something new, he sent me the updated parts, no charge.

Just sayin'

I finally got a chance to stretch her legs at an auto-x last weekend. The car did well with an 8th place overall out of 60 cars, my fun run times would have landed me in the top 5. It took a little getting used to the delay between throttle input and turbo spool up but I got the hang of it. On the street or track I don't think it'll be noticeable at all.
Number on the top right is MPH, Boost is directly below. 12psi is yellow, 13psi is red.

For comparison sake against my earlier video, here is an acceleration run at 12 psi. Well 12ish psi, it peaks at 13 for a second

I also got a chance to really flog on it on some glorious back roads to and from the auto-x and no matter how hard I tried I couldn't get it to warm up over 190deg. Intake temps never went about low 90's with 60 degree ambient temps.I did finally get the oil temps up to 195 degrees on the outlet of the cooler.

Cool build and the autocross videos looked like fun. Makes we want an NB. I need to read post 102 when it's not so late but there's some good info here. Cheers

God I'm a cheap ass.......picked these used puppies up for a song. Previous owner had bearing issues within the first few hundred miles of use. I'll have the rods checked out, may need a resize or replacement but the CP pistons are worth what I paid for the whole set. I'm not in a huge hurry to get these in, ideally the stock bottom end will make it through a few track days and another half dozen auto-x events and I can build the forged bottom end this winter.

https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...d472440dfd.jpg

On the single vs dual port wastegate thing, I switched over to one back in 2012 and it worked great in my problems of losing boost at high RPM.

Car would make target boost pressure and then as RPMs went past 6000s, boost would drop off as the wastegate got forced open by exhaust gas pressure. Switching to dual port completely stabilized everything. Power went all the way to 7500 rpm instead of dropping like a rock past 6000.

Basically dual port lets you run less wastegate spring pressure and still have good control over boost.

I'm heading to Summit Point on July 1st and 2nd.......so the panic set in. I put together a punch list of things to get the car ready and got to work.

First I needed a seat back brace for the passenger seat, it's a sparco sprint but long out of date, so a seat brace is needed to be fully kosher.
https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...ab3597005b.jpg

I was also having fuel starvation problems at less than a 1/4 tank, little research here showed the short fuel sock I installed most likely was the culprit so I replaced it with an OEM unit.
https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...d2a41b8216.jpg

I found a sloppy wheel bearing after the last auto-x so I just ordered a full set of hubs and bearings front and rear.
https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...4a28d4ee22.jpg

Those are dorman hubs, I wanted to press in ARP studs but luckily I found out here that the holes are not Miata spec. I drilled and reamed these to the proper size before pressing in the studs.

I also added some of the heat reflective insulation to the hood and master cylinder since I noticed the hood was getting mighty hot.
https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...d87bf3ba42.jpg

Finally I started worrying that the carbotechs wouldn't be enough for the power I was making with the puny stock size rotors. I fabricated some brake cooling ducts. You can read the full writeup here: https://www.miataturbo.net/suspensio...g-ducts-93718/

https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...df78f066ac.jpg


They'll be plenty of video of my track shenanigans....if any of you happen to be at the event stop by and say hi, I'll probably be fixing something and need a hand.

Success!!!! So my first track day was a great success. I was at Summit Point on the main circuit which has a good mix of miata tight technical sections and decent straits to stretch your legs as well. It was smoking hot (for the north east) at over 90 degrees ambient, asphalt temps were well north of 100 so it was great test for the cooling system. Believe it or not I'm a track newb....been wasting my time with auto-x for the last decade. I was in the green group so passing was limited to just the 3 straits with a point by. Luckily I still had some stiff "competition" in the group smattering of Miata, old beamers, GTI's, M3, M4, GT350, SS Camaro, and a pair of nearly fresh off the lot ZL1 camaro's. We were all learning our cars, the track, and generally how to drive fast. Kinda crazy to think I've been auto-xing for this long....and never really learned how to brake.

I tweaked the tune a bit before I went backing the boost down a smidgen to 11-12psi and pulling a few degrees of timing to be darned sure I kept detonation at bay. I also had a low boost table setup at 9-10psi on a switch in case I had heat issues. For some reason after the first session or two of the day the ECM switched to the low boost table, I'm guessing it has to do with the ground used for the switch input. I'm using a chassis ground, so I'll run a dedicated wire from the ECM. Past this, I had no problems with the car.

The results:

Engine Temp:
Absolutely amazing, the car never got above 200, and it wouldn't have even gotten that high if the thermostat would have been able to keep up with the temp swings. As you can see in this log the temps would swing up during the acceleration zones and the thermostat would open and the temps would dive into the low 180's. Plenty of cooling capacity, part of me wants a better way to regulate the water flow but I was watching some high lights of Dale Jr. crashing....again and I remembered it was very common in nascar to tape off the radiator inlet to balance temps with aero. I think I'll make a divider to guide more of the incoming air through the intercooler until the water temps stabilize.

https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...33ffba3187.jpg

Manifold air temp:
More good news here, I was only seeing 130 degree inlet temps at the peak when it was still boosting to 12 psi. It mainly hovered around 110-115 at 10psi and dropped much quicker than what I see on the street. With the divider to channel more of the air through through the intercooler I betcha I can improve on this quite a bit. Thoughts on these temps? Acceptable? should I have spent more than 80$ on this amazon special?

Oil Temps:
Happy here too, temps were steady in the low 200's peaking at 225 degrees. Keep in mind this is on the cooler outlet, some what regretting not putting the sensor on the inlet just to see how hot the oil actually gets so I'll know if I'm scorching it north of 300. I can't imagine I'm getting a 75 degree drop across the cooler.....we'll call this good.

Brakes:
They didn't fade......ducts worked great. I was a good 5 seconds off the spec miata track record but I was carrying way, way more speed than any miata should, and then slowing more than a spec miata would as well. I would say I was pretty hard on them. A more experienced friend blew through a set of DTC-70's in his vette over the two days, so the course was pretty hard on brakes. I was bleeding off speed from 125 to 45mph into turn one, and again from 100ish to 45 in 4. As a comparison a SM would be around 105-110 into 1 and maybe 80mph through 4. I did burn through ~40% of the carbotechs, unfortunately it was the last 40% of the pads so I was done with one session left. I had another set of pads, but I was burnt too, so I loaded it up while she was still in one piece.

The rest of the car performed well, the budget bilstein setup needed a bit more travel to cope with the mid corner bumps but they worked well with the RS4's and it was an unholy terror in the tight sections compared to some pretty serious hardware albeit with green hands at the wheel. I'll probably add some extended hats in the rear and raise the car slightly. Overall balance was great, I could make it push or loose at my will. Just need a little more stability over the bumps and it'll do well in the high speed sweepers.

Enough words, on to the video. This is one of my faster laps at 1:32, still quite a few mistakes here. I brake way to early for 1 and should carry another 10mph through 4 and possibly the same through 10....add in more boost and I think 1:28's aren't out of the question. Basically I need my balls to "clank" not "tink".

This video shows the speed differential to the other fella's in the group, this Blue ZL1 is the only car in the group that passed me and I was reeling him in pretty good before he had heat issues. He could only get ~20 min out of it before it got uncomfortably hot. My buddies GS vette had the same issue, so it wasn't just the blower. The car was quick, and I got quite a few visits from other drivers to see "what the fuck I had done to it" :)

Nicenicenicenicenice.

https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...589f86a168.jpg

Remember how I said I would get around to installing a brace on the intake manifold? Yeah should have done that...... Decided to do a boost leak check when I noticed my wastegate duty cycles were higher than they had been. Sure enough found a hairline crack in the heat affected zone right beside my welds on 3 of the runners. Interestingly enough they were all cracked on the bottom. I'll grind out the cracks and reweld, I'm in a hurry to prep the car before vacation and a track day when I get back so I may or may not get a brace fabricated. That would have sucked to have come apart in the first session.