So this is what all the work all year has come down to. Randall Wilcox (on of my co drivers and resident hot shoe) Josh and I will be leaving on Thursday to head out to Lincoln for the Pro Finale and the SCCA Solo National Championships. The pointy end of SSM is VERY strong as usual. Carter Thompson has continued to get faster and now has what is arguably the best prepped SSM car in the country on top of being one of the best drivers in the country. Erik Strelnieks' 3 Rotor FD is always fast, Brian Johns will no doubt be fast in Dan Chadwick's FD and Jake's FD has been crazy fast this year. Then you have all the new comers. David DeRegt in his Whippled Miata, Martin Valent in his way cool MR2 and me in my lowly black car. I would say that the odds on favorite to win this class should be Carter. On top of being the best prepped car he probably is the best drivers in class to not have a Solo National Championship(he has won a total of 6 Pro Solo Championship 5 of which were back to back) so I know he is pretty hungry.

I have continued to make improvements to the car over this year. More power, better shocks, real aero, better brakes, significant weight reduction and a ton of other things. With all the upgrades I feel like Randall has a significant chance to make some noise in the class. My driving is NOWHERE near ready for this level of competition.

All that said I hope that I will have all my Miata brethren here at Miata Turbo.Net rooting me on (even though my car is a lowly Supercharged car). You will be able to listen to and watch the action live on Ustream.

SCCASolo on USTREAM: SCCA, Autocross, Solo, ProSolo, Autox, Racing, Sports Car Club of America.

The Pro Solo Finale is this coming Saturday and Sunday and we run Thursday / Friday at the Solo Championships in the first run group.

Here are a few pics of the latest upgrades to the car.

Here is the new intake Manifold


Here is the Dyno curve showing the new manifold vs the old one. The dotted lines are the old manifold and the solid line is the new one. The Yellow line represents boost. That elbow in the boost curve starting at @6200 RPM was what I was looking to get rid of with the new manifold and it worked. I gave up minimal power through the midrange but more than made up for it up top gaining as much as 20hp in some of the upper cells. Before you ask now I will not tell you what the peak power and hp numbers are....but they are A LOT I will toss you a bone and say that the car was making 225 ft/lbs of torque before 2500RPM.


Here are the new Headlights. I totally stole this idea from David DeRegt and it seems to have worked great. The rules require headlights but specifically allow for changing retractable headlights to fixed headlights. The rules state that the lights must be designed as the primary light source for driving on US highways....so you can just stick a single LED in there and they also state that you must retain low and high beams. SO here are a set of H1 Mini Projectors behind Lexan lenses. This mod resulted in a weight savings for me of just over 19lbs. More importantly that weight came off the nose and was up high.


So after it was all said and done I figured that I would finally get the car on a set of scales and corner balance it.


The static weights aren't great at all. So my big winter project will be moving static weight around in the car to get the distribution better. I was able to get the cross weights to 50.02% with me in the car, and with the weight reduction I am now only 6lbs over my class minimum of 2063lbs.

It's pretty clear that I need to move about 80lbs from the front of the car to the rear with most of that moving from the LF to the RR. I already have some pretty trick plans in the works. I hope it works out as well as some of the other things I have done this year.




So that is all for now. I really hope Randall is at least able to walk away with a Trophy, but if not I just hope the car stays together and runs well. we are leaving Thursday night so wish us luck.
All the best
Eric

 

Good luck. I'm going to try to make it out there next year so I can be the under-prepared car with the crappy driver.

 

For those of us that haven't followed Solo2 since Dennis Grant was organizing the old Street Mod mailing list... What's the basics on SSM? And where can I see more pictures of these FDs?

Mmmmm.... FDs.

 

SSM 2 seat sport car based. You can do whatever you want engine and drivetrain wise so long as you use a production block from that manufacturer. Minimum weight is determined from displacement, the highest minimum weight is like 3000 pounds (turbo 1.8 is like 2060pounds, turbo two rotor is like 2600 or 2800). You can do whatever you want for suspension as long as you dont change the pickup points on the chassis. Splitters that stick 6 inches out in front of the body work and can extend to the midpoint of the wheels, wing limited on area and endplate size, kenards (limited in size). Full interiors minus radios and air bags, any body panel thats not part of the unibody can be replaced. unlimited wheel sizing and choice of any DOT R-comps. SSM in a nutshell

 

Very nice saw your car at the DC Pro this year. Good luck.

 

Fixed

But seriously, good luck in Nebraska! A bunch of my friends are going, but they will mostly be in Corvettes.

 

Good luck man! I will try to watch some this weekend live.

 

We'll be there early Monday morning. Where are you guys going to be in paddock? Good luck at the Pro. BSP runs T/F as well, 2nd group, but opposite courses from you guys.

Wish we could make the MSM that light in BSP trim! LOL We're down to mid 2300s for now.

 

You get screwed by the "same line" requirement in the sp rules, else you could get under the ssm min weight.

 

Eric good luck! You and Randall both should trophy, you are a good driver! most of all be safe! Regret that I cant take the CSP car out there this year.

 

Exactly. Would love to be able to weight reduction like a CSP car does! UD/BD are great, if you can use them.

 

Awesome!!! I'll have to email David and Marten some good luck wishes as well.

Take the FDs DOWN!!!!!

 

You've come a long way man, good luck! Wish I could be there, co-driving, or even in my car lol.

 

Best of luck. I'll be heading there on Saturday even though XP doesn't run until Th/Fr this year. I'll be in the Orange nosed Silver Miata in XP, ie the 9mm bought to the artillery battle.

 

Hey Eric,

Sorry I missed you when you came down for the tune. We had an ultrasound that morning, and the doctor's office kind of bungled some things so the appointment ran long. I missed you by a few minutes.

How does the new tune feel with the new breathing mods?

Good luck at Nats!

 

Good luck. I will be camping, so won't be able to follow.

 

I live here about 15 minutes from the site. Heading to Canada for vacation 9/5 but if something Miata-specific dies before then or you need a shop to work in before 9/5 let me know. I have a pretty wide selection of parts. 402499 zero wun wun zero

 

Eric it was good to meet in Arkansas...I'll see you up there...we'll be there Monday morning for testing with the DM car and staying all week.

I"m doing some announcing but I forget what heat for

 

Thanks. This will be my first trip to Nationals. I'm just looking forward to the experience.

Thanks for the luck. The car has came a long way since DC. I unfortunately have not.

The whole arms race thing is kind of a true statement. It's not a call for those who are scared to commit.

Thanks man.

We are paddocked in Row 18 C12 Spots A and B. We are in the same row with Erik, Brian, Dan and Carter.

Thanks man. I'm just shooting to be mid pack. Randall has a real shot to trophy I think. That is if he can stay off the cones.

Thanks Marcus. You do need to come out and run a tour sometime. You will get hooked.

Come say hi. You will get to run against my car in XP. A buddy is going to run it in XP. A slow SSM car shouldn't be much threat in that class though.

Thanks Ben. I was wondering where you were that day. But it sounds like you had better things to do. The new tune feels great. The car really doesn't stop pulling like it used to. I have some more things in the works this winter so I should be down to see you all again before too long.

I might take you up on that. I have been looking for a spare set of axles just to have. If you happen to have a set on one piece axles I might come see you.

Yea. I enjoyed meeting you too. Stop by paddock and say hi.

 

Cool. We are on the inside end of R12 with all the other AR SCCA cars and a couple from neighboring regions that we are friends with.