Can you describe what you did to gut the e-brake mechanism? I've considered it, but seems to me like you'd still have to adjust the piston to position the pad right off the rotor, even with the cables gone, no?

 

I don't have the link to pics where I am at now but if you remove the piston (crank out adjuster all the way and then air pressure) you'll see a threaded dohicky inside the rear of the piston. Thread in a bolt (non standard threads so you only get a few to engage) and clamp the bolt in the vise. Tap piston with plastic hammer and the inner portion of the piston will come out. That will disable the adjuster bolt and you now have a standard caliper that does not have to be adjusted before each session. It will also retract better so no drag as well.

 

Awesome, thank you.

 

Speed determines how long the weight will be transferred as opposed to the amount of transfer. This takes more of the overall brake load off the rear. Add sticky tires and the fronts do even more work. That's the reason why guys like Bob, Sav and myself have no issues with solid rear rotors.

 

Listing removed...

 

Nooooooo, my favourite car.

I have run through all possible permutations and it just doesn't work to buy it & ship here. BUT if it was even close, I would be in.

Even thought about rolling chassis....

Love this car.

 

I broke the car out of mothballs earlier this year to sort through the various problems/upgrades. With the help of Son of the Hill, Trackspeed, 949 Racing and TFB I was able to get the car back to full fighting shape. It's been a great year! Last weekend I knocked off a 1:47 during testing at Sonoma and managed a 1:48.1 during the race Sunday. The car is capable of 1:41's as demonstrated by Dean and Tim. I just need to work my way up to that.

New Reverent MS3 Basic PNP, 1300cc Injector Dynamics and TrackSpeed custom tune. 297whp, dynojet
SadFab Delrin bushings in upper CA's, ICS Sphericals in Lower CA's and upper rear knuckes.
1000/550 Springs, 32mm RB hollow front and 15mm Solid Rear. (still tweaking setup)
949 15x10 S80 Hoosiers
11.75 Stoptech V8R/Sport Rears/1" Master/Sport Booster.

The current spring/sway bar combo is not optimized. We arrived at the current configuration by mistake. I started with 850/500 springs, 27mm solid front and 14mm solid rear sway. It bottomed out bad so I then swapped in 1000 fronts and kept the 500 rears. I then mistakenly swapped in the 15mm rear bar. I wanted to pull it out but Tim (TFB) pushed back against it. In that configuration you really had to drive it on it's nose and diamond the corners. It still bottomed out the front at 4.5" ride heights. We bumped it two more turns higher (4 5/8"?) and that seemed to keep things pretty happy. With the newer ride height I swapped in 550's and re-aligned at 3.6 degrees front and 2.6 degrees back, 1/8" toe out front and 1/16 toe in rear, 5.5 degrees castor. I played with compression and rebound settings and feel pretty good about the current setup. Still plan to try the 1100 fronts and maybe 550/600 rears.
All in all I am thrilled to be driving again this year! I am very much a racing noob but have a fair amount of DE time in my previous car. Each and every race I get better and gain more confidence and time.

 

Awesome write up thank you.

We have an adjustable rear sway bar...we figure it is 14 - 16 mm and I find the 15 is about right. The 16 was good (and fast) but every so often I would lose the rear on turn in......might try it again one day as it made the car REALLY pointy (which I tend to like) but as has been said here before, likely too much.

You are about the same place as us with setup...we need to try a step up in springs from the 800/500 on the Xidas. Interested to see how you get on.

Also interested to see what differences our movign to 350 - 400 Whp (from 260) does to the handing and suspension requirements.

Still massively green over your wide body and fast back

 

This was the race last Sunday. Notice the poorly driven 2017 Porsche Cup Car in front of me? I lost my composure a bit in my attempts to get around him. I should have planned the pass much better and gotten around him sooner. All in all it was a fun race. Still lots more to learn though. This was only my 5th race. I plan to get some coaching from the various local talent in order to become more proficient in the craft.

 

Nice, I love Sonoma!
Very cool to see how little your shifter moves despite having way more power than most track Miatas

 

I am running Blackbird drop motor mounts with 95 durometer bushings. The vibration increase over the previous AWR's with 70 durometer was minimal. Certainly not what it was like with the solid delrins I once had. Here's the odd thing. Once I swapped in the reinforced PPF the vibration got better. I expected it to get worse. I am also running delrin in the diff mounts. The drivetrain feels nice and firm without being overly stiff IMHO. The PPF was made by one of our members Matt Crowder.

 

Nice.
Until the last event I was running our drop mounts with the standard 70A duro Competition bushings and Delrin diff mounts.
I have a couple sets of bushings to play with the next event, going to test 88A and 95A bushings on Creampuff.

 

What was the original intended benefit/requirement of the strengthened PPF?

do you have frame rails as well?

 

Damn, that's really cool. Too bad I just scrapped a PPF.

 

I was looking to tighten up the drivetrain in anyway I could. When I stepped on the PPF one day I was surprised how much is flexed. I imagine the original engineers built a degree of spring into the PPF to account for some degree of flex. I also believe it was being over burdened at the current HP levels. Without any science I figured what the hell and went for it. Who knows the thing may crack from lack of twist.

I don't have frame rails. It's not allowed in my class. The PPF brace acts like a third rail IMHO. Again who really knows. It was cheap and it looks cool.

 

Could this be a ST2 car or is there a component I'm missing that puts it into STU? If it can, I think it could be really competitive, at least in TT2.

 

Tim knocking out a 1:41.5 during testing at Sonoma on 8-28-17. Start video at 3:45 for the money lap.
This was the second testing session of the day. We continued to tweak the setup further but never bested the lap time due to traffic and hot weather.

 

I want to make sure I am looking at the pictures correctly. You basically cut the edges off one PPF, then welded it directly onto another one? I have a few PPF's laying around. I almost want to give this a try.

 

Yes....Be aware you need a jig to keep from warping during welding. Also keep the donor real thin or you'll never get it installed. Mine was a tight squeeze. Does not take much to create a boxed effect.

With regards to this mod. I would not do this with softer engine or diff mounts. Those will need the deflection offered by factory PPF. IMHO the PPF acts like a vibration damper. Think of how a washer machine settles down when you rest your hand on it. I feel like the PPF does the same for the engine. The frequency in which the new one vibrates is different than the stock one. That was evident when I swapped em and noticed less vibration. Think of it as a torsional spring. I also believe the benefits go beyond the drive train. Since the entire drive line connects at the 4 outer corners and I now have strengthened the twisting motion front to rear that has to have some effect on chassis rigidity. Again who knows. Total key board engineering on my behalf.

 

Looks like your youtube link is from mobile, so it's not showing correctly. I was really curious about that lap in your car, so I did some light youtube stalking....