For more speed, add lightness

[— freedomgli —]

My inspiration
Road&Ster #1 to #58 by addlightness, on Flickr

[— freedomgli —]

The overall vibe I'm going for is a bit of a restomodified M2-1001. The purpose of the car is primarily to enjoy spirited drives along rural backroads with the occasional auto-x and track day thrown in for good measure. As such, the car will remain normally aspirated and the build will seek to enhance the original character and feel of the Miata without going overboard (no offense to those who like to go overboard). Ultimately I want more of a purists car that is relatively simple and light, both figuratively and literally. Think modern day Lotus Elan with Japanese reliability. No stereo, no power steering, skinny (albeit sticky) tires. Yet it will retain AC for comfort and stock seats for touring. Those seats will get swapped out for more aggressive race seats and harnesses for track days.

I may stick with my existing Panasport wheels and polished Runabout mirrors. Or I might go with M2-1001 correct 15x6 Panasport Pro Rally wheels. Or I might decide to go more modern with 16x7 Volk Racing CE28N and body color painted Runabout mirrors like Toshi80. I can't decide.

[— freedomgli —]

I haven't seen or touched the car for months. But to keep interest going, here's a new post. On my car I'm doing the M-tuned coolant reroute so I also decided to delete all the small coolant hoses and plug all the respective passageways. And since I was doing the timing belt anyways, I decided to plug the front coolant passage where the stock thermostat housing normally resides.


Rear small water outlet plugged and capped


Stock oil cooler lines deleted


Front view


Plug for mixing manifold

[— freedomgli —]

Check original base tune setting for CLT thermistor setting. So which is it, Mazda or RX-7 S4&S5?

So I read some old posts on Miataturbo.net and Braineack says several times to use RX-7 S4&S5. Every time I go to Tools --> Calibrate Thermistor Tables and set CLT to RX-7 S4&S5 and write it to the controller, when I open it back up again it shows that CLT is set to RX-7_AFM(S5 in AFM). Both Common Sensor Values share the same data tables so I'm thinking this is just a bug in Tuner Studio.

Figure out why MS3 is not reading NB cam sensor.

Fixed the harness. See previous post.

Once NB cam sensor is verified to be working, perform Composite Log to verify cam signal is syncing with crank signal. This is only necessary in the future if I switch to sequential fuel injection and/or VVT control. Right now the engine can run off the crank position signal alone as the software can then interpolate the cam position.

You can see there is only sync loss until the CKP reads the missing teeth in the FM 36-2 trigger wheel. And we are getting cam signal now. Uneven CKP spacing is due to the engine spinning up from 0 rpm to idle speed.


CMP and CKP are in sync at idle speed.


Here you can see the single nub and the pair of nubs on the cam gear that the CMP is reading with every revolution of the camshaft.

[— freedomgli —]

When even simple projects give you grief. This is why they invented impact drivers and bigger hammers. Got stubborn screw out but not before the gods of speed demanded their blood sacrifice. Good thing my tetanus shot is up to date. Damn metal filings are pokey!



Garage Star Delrin Door Bushings installed. They were a Christmas gift from my wife. Mine fit just fine and the doors close without any hindrance. After cleaning the door jamb I followed the directions of finger tight bolts, open/close the door 5 times, then final torque. Some have reported too tight fit even after multiple adjustments resulting in a door that is difficult to close. In that case I recommend sanding them down a bit for custom final fit. I know the KenAuto version is oversized for exactly this reason so each installation requires a custom fit. I debated using blue threadlock but my tube was old and viscosity was too thin even after shaking. Now that they're installed I'll probably just leave it.

Some guys are raving about this product, others report they were ineffective. I will report back once I've had a chance to test drive. Right now my car can't even move from the garage. I'm still working on the details of the engine tune.



Another Christmas gift from my wife. Subtle is the name of the game. Can you spot the difference? These RevLimiter Sharka HVAC Vent Rings in Satin Black are definitely subtle and understated, which is exactly what I wanted. Will get pics in better lighting once all 4 are installed.

[— freedomgli —]

We took the Miata out for its first drive under its own power since October 2014!



Finally got a chance to do some street tuning of the Miata with my dad behind the wheel and me in the passenger seat focused on the laptop computer. We started off slow just in the neighborhood and as we gained more confidence we ventured further away. Filled up with fresh 93 octane fuel. Did some auto tuning and tried to hit as many throttle position / rpm bins as we could, riding the brake to simulate loads when necessary.





Coolant temps were stable around 200F the whole time, with brief spikes to 215F immediately after a hot restart (when we filled up gas) and during a few wide open throttle runs, which seems reasonable. But my intake air temps (MAT) were much higher than desired, especially given it was a cool day (50F). I think this is due to the coolant return hard pipe that is routed right underneath my velocity stacks. I'll need to insulate this bare aluminum pipe with some fire sleeve and possibly fabricate a splash shield to go between the pipe and the air filter and insulate it with some of that gold foil stuff. I've got some ideas....

I'd say the tune is about 25% of the way there. I have some pesky sync loss errors that need to be addressed before I feel confident enough to spend the $ to book the dyno time to really get this thing dialed in. Not really sure where to begin fixing those, but I might just start by throwing new cam and crank angle sensors at it. I'm think I'm also going to revert to MS3 1.4.1 firmware as the developers of 1.5.0 paid no mind to Alpha-N users when they added the new "engine states" feature that uses different logic than before to determine when the engine is in overrun. Because I have no MAP sensor connected to my engine I have disabled the Overrun Fuel Cut feature for now.

We definitely need some acceleration enrichment to address the poor drivability immediately off idle. With ITBs, at very small throttle openings, very small changes in throttle position results in very large changes in the amount of air entering the motor. This can only be overcome with acceleration enrichment. The manual recommends tuning AE only once the main VE table is dialed in, but in this case I don't think I have much choice. I'll have to add some AE to address that one area and then retune. It's all iterative. Same thing with my after start enrichment (ASE) % and taper and warm up enrichment (WUE) settings. To get started I did what I had to do to keep the car running until it was up to operating temperature. But now that we've changed so many parameters on the VE1 table I need to go back and spend more time dialing in those settings.

[— freedomgli —]

But my intake air temps (MAT) were much higher than desired, especially given it was a cool day (50F). I think this is due to the coolant return hard pipe that is routed right underneath my velocity stacks. I'll need to insulate this bare aluminum pipe with some fire sleeve and possibly fabricate a splash shield to go between the pipe and the air filter and insulate it with some of that gold foil stuff. I've got some ideas....

I installed Heatshield Products Fire Shield Sleeve p/n 210048 (1.25" ID x 3') on the aluminum coolant return hard pipe. According to the manufacturer:

Heatshield Products Fire Shield Sleeve™ provides thermal and physical protection against excessive heat with its rugged silicone covering.This fuel line heat shield tubing starts with braided fiberglass yarns in a flexible substrate, then is coated with a high-grade silicone rubber. This rugged silicone coating makes the Fire Shield Sleeve™ resistant to most chemicals, including hydraulic fluids, oils and fuels. The coating also makes it resistant to abrasion and fraying. You can use Fire Shield Sleeve™ for brake lines, fuel lines, wiring harnesses and cables, making master rolls a must-have for any hot rod and race car shop. The rugged silicone coating also makes Fire Shield Sleeve™ ideal for protecting welding lines and cables. This oil line heat sleeve is designed to reduce and dissipate heat, and works great in harsh environments that require thermal protection and insulation. This heat sleeve fuel line withstands 500 degrees F continuous and brief intervals of 900 degrees F, and allows for the bundling of wires, hoses and cables.

So while it's meant primarily to protect fuel lines and such, insulation works in both directions (think of your cooler or thermos), so I'm hoping this insulation helps keep my intake air temps down when coolant temps go up. If not, I'll have to ditch the open element air filter and go to a custom carbon fiber cold air box sooner rather than later.

I secured the insulation to the hard pipe with the supplied heat shrink at the forward end, but I did not heat shrink the the other end as packaging was too tight in the back of the engine compartment and I didn't want to use my heat gun in confined space. Perhaps it would have looked cleaner if I'd butted the insulation right up against the silicone radiator hose and applied the heat shrink around both to seal the joint, but then it would not have been serviceable. I secured the coolant return hard pipe to my custom steel bracket with rubber isolated mount (basically a fat grommet) using a new 35mm 1.375" rubber insulated p-clamp to fit over the new larger OD.



The whole thing looks a little kludged together but it really does give me more certainty in where and how the coolant return is routed. It's a real PITA to use the M-tuned supplied rubber hose (or Gates #22436 hose or Dayco #E72380 hose) with internal coil spring, especially when you don't have the stock intake manifold anymore to secure it to with zip ties. If I was to do this all over again, I'd probably weld AN fittings onto the M-tuned adapter and my radiator to completely eliminate rubber hoses and hose clamps in that section. But I'd still use the hard pipe in the middle for more precise packaging. I'd also probably change the geometry somewhat, moving it closer to the engine with tighter routing between the ITBs and the alternator. This wasn't possible when I first designed this as the car was 400 miles away and the ITBs weren't yet fully installed with all fuel lines, vacuum hoses, etc. so we had to make some educated guesses.

Next I have to top off the coolant, burp the system and work on capturing a composite log of my many sync loss errors so I can come up with a plan to resolve those.

[OBD1 kenobi]

Very nice build. Can I ask you what kind of spoiler you have mounted in the trunk. I love those smaller lip spoilers.

[— freedomgli —]

Very nice build. Can I ask you what kind of spoiler you have mounted in the trunk. I love those smaller lip spoilers.

Trunk spoiler was made by the now defunct Your's Sports Car Club / Borgh in Japan. If I can somehow afford a Murakami Motors M2-1028 FRP trunk I may go that route. A fresh paint job is next year's project so I have until then to acquire all the necessary body parts.

[Hyper]

If I can somehow afford a Murakami Motors M2-1028 FRP trunk I may go that route..

perfect!!!

[— Phatmiata —]

perfect!!!

Hey what did you end up doing with the Murakami M2-1028 trunk lid I sold you Eli?

[Hyper]

Hey what did you end up doing with the Murakami M2-1028 trunk lid I sold you Eli?

When I made the transition from the Silverstone NA to NB I sold everything to CooperD. He paid for the whole interior including the Murakami trunk lid. I never heard from him again, at the time I began to focus on building the NB and getting parts for the NB. I remember I have done a window switch plate for the now discontinued Nielex Power window switch of which I included with the purchase of the complete interior. I think the Nielex switch ended up in some else's hands. Tim Allen maybe??

I can not find the thread where I sold the Murakami trunk lid tough.

[— freedomgli —]

So I'm thinking about swapping seats again. The MSM seats are fine and all. But the long term plan is to have comfy street seats for the street and safe race seats for the track all while keeping my psuedo-M2 theme going. Accordingly, I'm tempted to go back to the NA seats as I like how the seat back is a little bit narrower and the seat bottom cushion and thigh bolsters have a little bit more definition than the NB seat. 95M seats are too hard to find so forget those and I don't want the Euro NB seats, either. No one makes a decent cloth kit to restore the NA seats back to original, which leaves aftermarket leather and alcantara upholstery. A few minutes of Google searching turned up this nice car:

Dave's 1995 Montego V8 build


The color kinda reminds me of a poor man's M2-1001.




The alternative is just plain black leather, but I feel like that's playing it a bit too safe.

[— Phatmiata —]

Just get some of those M2 seats or the similar Esqueleto

[— freedomgli —]

Just get some of those M2 seats or the similar Esqueleto

The M2-1001 seats are too rich for my blood and too darn small. The Esqueleto are pretty but way too small also. Even if I hit the gym every day for a year I can't become a 5'5" tall 130lb Japanese man.