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I did Navy ROTC in college, and had intended a career in the Navy, but things changed and I found a different path so I was never active duty. I was fortunate enough to spend a couple weeks at sea on the Missouri (BB-63) when she was recommissioned in '86 as part of my summer training. I was even more fortunate that particular week was gunnery qualifications so I was aboard for shooting all of the big guns, including a 15 gun broadside. Impressive stuff... 16" guns fired a 2300lb shell with a range of ~26 miles. Think in terms of throwing high explosive Miatas way over the horizon. The gunners bragged they could hit a phone booth at that distance, but I always figured the accuracy was more "Circle K". Close enough.
The Iowa class ships were 40 years old then, and pretty outdated compared to the 'modern' ships. Battleship trivia: all of the outside hatches had to be shut when firing the 16" guns because the concussion would damage the computers inside the ship. Sailors, however, were expendable, and allowed to be topside...
I've only heard great things about Shaftworks stuff so far. We have 3+ cars locally that run them, 2 of which have taken a podium or win at nationals. The owner of the company is a long time autocrosser and seems like he's pretty hands on with setup/support questions. I'm not sure how popular they are for track vs autocross, but I'd imagine they'd do really well all around.
Glad to hear it, man. I hadn't heard of them before speaking to said local dude about them, but the coilovers rode great and they seem to be receiving good reviews. Hands on support is great too, given I have only a vague idea of what I'm doing haha. I'll keep doing some research but they're high on my list, and the price tag is good compared to Xidas/Ohlins/other top tier suspension.
Originally Posted by Roda
I did Navy ROTC in college, and had intended a career in the Navy, but things changed and I found a different path so I was never active duty. I was fortunate enough to spend a couple weeks at sea on the Missouri (BB-63) when she was recommissioned in '86 as part of my summer training. I was even more fortunate that particular week was gunnery qualifications so I was aboard for shooting all of the big guns, including a 15 gun broadside. Impressive stuff... 16" guns fired a 2300lb shell with a range of ~26 miles. Think in terms of throwing high explosive Miatas way over the horizon. The gunners bragged they could hit a phone booth at that distance, but I always figured the accuracy was more "Circle K". Close enough.
The Iowa class ships were 40 years old then, and pretty outdated compared to the 'modern' ships. Battleship trivia: all of the outside hatches had to be shut when firing the 16" guns because the concussion would damage the computers inside the ship. Sailors, however, were expendable, and allowed to be topside...
Dude I would kill to witness any one of those guns being lit off, let alone fifteen at once haha! That's awesome, man. Circle K radius for a 20+ mile-lobbed shell is still very impressive. Great trivia.
I promised everyone that it was going to be a busy couple weeks, and I hope not to disappoint.
I got home last night and almost immediately ordered a set of 17x10 Konig Hypergrams from GoodWin Racing, as well as an ECUtek dongle/license/tune for my car from Fab9. I know I should be taking this leisurely and enjoying the process, and I am enjoying it, but I also enjoy having a fire lit under my *** and want to see what I can make this car capable of. I'm already signed up to hit the track Saturday and Sunday in two weekends, might as well see what this thing can do with a proper wheel/tire setup.
In all seriousness, I kinda ran into a conundrum with the wheel/tire setup that prompted me to grab the 17x10s. I'm currently on a 17x8 wheel and 235/40/17 300TW tires. I wanted to get some 200TW tires for this thing before the track day. However, 235s aren't really optimized for 17x8 wheels, 225s only come as 225/45/17 and are almost 3/4" larger in diameter than the 235s, and 215s are tiny and lame. I'm planning on running 255s on this car once it's making sufficient power, and am going to need some 10" wheels anyways. I considered grabbing some 17x9s in the interim, but I don't want to be buying wheels twice. We've got a couple guys around here who have ran 225s on 10" wheels while on a budget for non-competitive track days and had no problem, including the car I drove yesterday. I'm not going to go that stretched, but am planning on running 235s on the 17x10s for now. This might be a little much wheel/tire for the power the car's making currently, and result in a little stretch, but we'll see. I'm pretty confident I'll be satisfied with the setup. Lots of guys running 225/235s on 17x9s with completely stock power.
Grabbing the 17x10s will also allow me to keep the current wheels and tires mounted together so I can run them as a commute-only setup.
Higher, but not too high.
Sooooo in preparation for that, I went into work early and raised the car a bit today. It was a little on the low side previously and I was getting some minor rub on the fender liners and front shock towers. Ride heights were 12 5/8" front and 12 3/4" rear and I raised them to 13 1/4" front and 13 3/8" rear. Then I went to work on the alignment. Got the rear set up right where I wanted it but ended up maxing out the front camber at 2.6*. I was aware offset bushings would be needed to get over 3* of camber in the front but figured I'd at least get the rear dialed in and zero out toe so I could drive home without feeling bad for my current tires. Hopefully 949 Racing has their offset bushings in stock and I can grab a pair of them tomorrow.
I also got the harness install finished up this evening. Feels good to have a five point in the car again.
What else, what else... I guess that's it for now. Ordered a set of 235 NT05s (I know they're not the greatest 200TWs out there but got them cheap through work and I didn't have any major qualms with them on my NA. They should work fine as starter tires.) and those and the wheels should arrive tomorrow. The oil filter perch should show up later this week and I'll be able to mount my oil cooler after that. Saturday's looking like I'll be installing the offset bushings, aligning the front end, and getting the oil cooler mounted. Maybe I'll mount the oil cooler and lines sometime this week in preparation for the perch showing up. I think I can pull all that off. If not, at least you guys can laugh at me!
That's what I was thinking, but there's three or four guys around here running ~190whp NCs that put out similar times to what I was doing in my NA at higher power. The only track where I was running faster than those guys was WSIR, where an increase in power makes a substantial difference due to the super-high average speeds there. I believe a decent bit of the NC's ability to turn faster lap times with less power can be attributed to larger tire size and the more refined chassis. A lot of guys are running 200TW 255s and some are even on 265s. Also, a stripped NC isn't too much heavier than an NA/NB chassis. The dude who offered to let me drive his NC on Sunday just had it weighed at ~2390lb. Obviously there's going to be a delta between different scales, but if that's an accurate number it's pretty impressive. Again, though, maybe their cars aren't all faster than mine and it was my driving skills and car setup that were at fault lol. We'll see in the coming months.
Hmm NC's aren't too heavy then. I thought I read ~2600lbs, and I bet my NB after the turbo will probably be closer to 2400lbs. Regarding more tire, that makes a lot of sense. Tire makes all the difference when it comes to times, especially on tighter tracks. With a 2.5L I bet you have a fatter powerband, even if only 190whp peak. It'll be interesting to hear your thoughts going forward with the NC. With wide rubber very common these days, I bet the NC will be quick with some 265s. Riding in Mustangs and Camaros, the sheer grip is nuts with 305+ that it overcomes any weight issues.
At 220whp, I think you're going to have a ton of fun and the car's going to be properly reliable with all the support systems you have in place. I could've left my car at 210whp and been amped on it for years.
Hell, if I hadn't done the transmission swap and set a goal to make 400whp on the street, I'd probably still have the NA Ah well, I'm not regretful. This has all been an overall enjoyable experience and I'm not about to stop anytime soon lol.
Ha, don't jinx me! I hope so. My son's turning 9 next month and he loved his first time karting this year so I plan on keeping the Miata for a long time and doing some track days with him when he's older. With all the work I'm putting into my car I don't think I could ever sell it. That's good to hear you're having fun. At the end of the day that's all that matters.
That's a cool auto-x track at San Pedro. It's been years since I've been there but a cool spot to have an auto-x track.
Yesterday, 01:19 PM
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Ah well, I'm not regretful. This has all been an overall enjoyable experience and I'm not about to stop anytime soon lol.
