Also stumbled across a cool pic from a few trackdays ago. This is before the skirts. Car is putting in work I'm pretty happy with how it looks on track from a form and function perspective.

 

Looks good!

Do you plan to run the IAT sensor in the end tank of the intercooler? I'm wondering about doing that myself as I'm seeing intake temps up to 20 C (~70 F) and it's near freezing around here right now. I have to imagine that's just the sensor heat soaking, but I didn't have that big of an issue on my old setup. Reminds me I need to try swapping back to my old sensor and see if that makes much of a difference.

 

Car is looking great!



this is gonna be my Sandia bumper. Im terrified of wrecking the GHO. 🫣

 

Totally, my last IC setup had it drilled/tapped and threaded into the end-tank, and I plan to do the same on this IC as well. Compared to other folks who I've seen run their IAT in different locations, it REALLY combats heat soak. Specifically put it on the cold-side end tank.

Thank you! It's coming along, splitter is next in the plans. And yeah.. good idea on the sacrificial bumper. It's part of the reason I've stayed with the stock one+lip, I've ran it into a tire wall and it didn't even get deformed. Super durable.. ha!

 

Looking good man! Anything you can do to scoot the IC back will help. And yeah, you'll want to do a full bumper beam delete, that crossflow is super efficient but it absolutely needs flow in order to work.

Also: I went to Baja over Christmas on a motorcycle trip. We stayed in this super remote bed and breakfast in a tiny town called Bahia Asuncion. And what did I find in my room?

A Taos, NM mug.

 

You get a good luck cat! Hahaha that's awesome.

 

I had the same thought, I'm hoping it's far enough back now. Not much I can do to get it further back without re-engineering the mounting tabs. It definitely looks better now than when I mocked it up using the suggested mounting holes - it basically was up against the bumper blocking all airflow.

And yeah, bumper beam delete it is, I'm in touch with Mat to get one since they are doing another batch. Consider it done.

And hold ****, that cup, hilarious. Considering Taos is a town of ~6500 people, that's friggin' wild, thanks for sharing

 

I have one of those bars for sale I purchased from Mat, if you haven't put in a deposit for the next batch it's all yours.

 

Oh hell yeah, let me get that! I'll shoot you a text.

Is your bumper beam intact?

 

Sounds good it's all yours. I cut my bumper beam up a few years ago, it helped a lot with airflow to the rad.

 

If he doesn't snag, I'm next.

 

Minor update. This new IC is way heavier than the old core, like 17lbs for the vibrant core vs 7 for the ebay core. However, fortunately I'm ditching my mess of steel IC piping for silicone which makes the upgrade cost only a few lbs in weight. Add to that the bumper bar delete and I'll end up lighter with the new setup. Pretty neat.

 

The FM silicone 1 pc piping didn't quite work with my turbo and IC setup. Just too far of a reach on the hotside. So I got a 45* pipe and it fits wonderfully. Pretty psyched on this, still a better routing than I had before, less bends, and less clamps. And less weight. Total win. I bead rolled the pipe too with my new bead roller tool.





The cold side 1 pc pipe worked out. I actually need to trim it a bit to tuck it up, but this is just a mockup. Totally works great. Nice job FM.




Amazon bead roller puts in work. Great tool, glad to have it.





Finally made the jump to cutting this bar. This was kinda difficult for me, as "racecar" as this car has become, it's still my first car and all original under the bumper. Anyways, who cares, let's make it cool better!




This part is almost definitely totally unnecessary, but back to me feeling bad about cutting the car up, this makes me feel better. And it's gotta add some structural integrity by re-boxing that part. I was concerned about using the tow hook and the lack of structure there. Also, it adds a very nice flat spot to tie my ducting to, I have plans for this, so stay tuned.






My boy @hentia.jp came through with the rad support bar. Even dropped it off for me, which is a good trip for him. So huge props to a good homie. Thanks again. After talking to him, and seeing this for myself, if you wanna run stock hood latch with one of these bars you GOTTA add a support for the bottom of the latch. Crazy how flexy that whole area is without it.

Repurposed old BMX handlebars:





Which made this hellla stiff. Like you move the whole car when trying to move the latch around. This is more than sufficient, fully rigid again.

And some rustoleum brush on over the bare metal. Look at how OPEN she is. Feels good.




All the old stuff, about ~15 lbs. New bar is about 10 lbs with the re-enforcement. Net loss is a win for me. This stuff is way lighter than you'd think, mazda really did a great job here.





Painted the bar. Looking good.






Look at that space. Damnnnn.



More to come, with some cool ideas for ducting, re-mounting the IC back in, oil cooler install, etc.

 

I'd give you two cats if I could for the use of handlebar tubing haha. Looks good! Once it's all ducted up, you might need a radiator blockoff for street driving on colder days. That front end is OPEN now.

Stoked to see what you do for ducting.

 

I was pretty sick last week so progress kinda stalled, but I hit it hard again this weekend trying to get this tedious job wrapped up.

I didn't like how the aluminum tabs on the IC weren't supported, even a big washer just seemed like it would deform the tabs against the chassis when torquing it down, so I spent a bit of time and made these tabs. Now it's rock solid. I definitely think this IC mounting adds structure back where the bumper beam was cut. Who knows, between this IC and the new bumper bar I might even be back to full strength, since it's triangulated now.



Next I built a "box" around the rad with aluminum angle iron. This box is mounted to the old A/C condenser mounting points, and is 100% sealed to the radiator via 1/2" adhesive backed weatherstripping foam. Super durable stuff, and it gives me a good point to build the ducting out from. I made the bottom beam unbolt, with rivnuts, for maintenance. The idea is that this ducting is easily removable for maintenance, so nothing is permanently affixed and can unbolt. I'm tired of my ducting being taped into place and not easy to R&R, so everything was approached with that in mind.



Foam also sealed the top of the rad right to the support beam:




Now that I had a nice box to build the ducting out from, I used a lot of CAD to come up with the pieces.




I had to build something off the bottom of the bumper to box it in. And again, I want the bumper easy to R&R, so I wanted a flat piece off the bottom that lined up with the ducting box, and I could optionally tape it to for better seal.

Old road sign:




This piece doubles as a nice bracket to bolt the lip on. Way nicer than the self tapers I was using.






Now for the sides, this was fun. Used the ole stick method to make a nice outline of the bumper shape.




The plan is to use the 1:3 ratio for inlet to heat exchanger, 100% sealed and ducted, to get optimal flow through it with less drag and all that. So there will be some endcaps like this.




Coming together nicely:










Then I basically taped all the seams, for 100% seal. There should be minimal pressure on these seams, so I think the tape will hold up indefinitely. I'm also using the way thicker foam backed tape which I've found holds up 100x better than the super thin aluminum stuff, which I don't recommend. I will also tape that bumper seam, once the bumper is back on for the season. I still gotta pull it off and use some 3/4" adhesive weather stripping on the bumper beam to seal the bumper to the bar.

The aero of course is weak under there, but the plan is to add a quick release splitter to fix that. I wanted the ducting to be 100% independent of the splitter for easy R&R.

 

I really like the top angled piece that goes to the top of the radiator! Nice alternative to the premade 'topside na hole covers'

I have that big *** vib intercooler too, w/o the fab9 mounts; that I need to install here shortly. Its def intimidating knowing how much airflow it blocks. Looks like very thorough ducting.

 

Very nicely done!!

 

Great work there Fire! I especially like how you addressed sealing the front garnish, that is a spot that can lead to much leakage if not well (or at all) addressed.

Agree about making the ducting independent of the splitter, I'd add the nose garnish as well (you may already have this in hand?). That is, rather than taping it, seal it with foam stuck to one surface so that the other seals against it when installed - it may not come off regularly, but it will make removal/reinstallation easy when it does have to come off, and cut down on/eliminate gaps due to misalignment/'manufacturing tolerances'.

 

Dang dude, good stuff! Not easy to make a ducting system that's fully sealed AND easily removable. Can't wait to hear what it does for your temps.

 

My only recommendation is to mount it as far back as possible, though I don't think you want it "butted" up against the rad by any means, my understanding is you want it further "in" the mouth so it doesn't block the opening. Hence why even with the fab9 mounts I brought it back as far as I could. I'd even have pulled it back another inch or two if I could have easily. I think it will work just fine where it is though.

The front garnish was a big concern of mine, it's super hard to seal up there, even with tape, my old ducting proved that to me and I had all kinds of wonky **** going on trying to seal that area. And what you said, is exactly what I'm doing. I have some 1"x1/4" weather stripping on order that I'll attach to the back of the bumper and get it to seal on the shroud without tape.

Thanks! It might not look like it, but it's been a pretty big project to get all of this stuff to come together. Really enjoyable though, and I should have the car running in time for the first local event of the season (weekend after next). Even though it will likely be without oil cooler or splitter.