DSM Rally Beater - '90 Talon Build for SCCA RallyCross

I've been meaning to type up a build thread for this long overdue project as the goal for completion is 2020 and to compete in at least one SCCA rallycross event.

This was my first car and was given to me by my Uncle for helping him at his engine machine shop over the summers.  I'm not really quite sure about its history, though I know it must have received at least a cylinder head rebuild as it snapped the timing belt at some point in its life (a common problem for DSMs).  I drove the crap out of it through high school and it was probably more car than I needed, or deserved, at the time.  It was a good platform to learn wrenching on, as it basically needed constant attention. I learned how to change a clutch, rebuild a transmission, restore chassis parts, among other things.  I grew up watching WRC and playing Gran Turismo, so this pseudo-Evo was an absolute dream to own at the time.

Fatefully it died while driving on the highway around 2006.  No drama, just shut down and instantly lost compression.  A flatbed tow later and a couple hours of wrenching revealed a  dropped valve, but no bent timing belt.  To this day I'm not sure what exactly happened.  One of the rocker arms had exploded, which potentially could have jammed the valve open long enough to begin the death spiral of mechanical destruction.  Regardless of the culprit, the engine was toast.  I pulled it out and salvaged what I could, which at that point was really just the crankshaft.

Since that time I've been shuffling it around as I moved from dairy land Wisconsin to Detroit after graduating with an engineering degree, landing a job at one of the Big 3.  The resurrection project was put on hold as I struggled to find the point of getting it running again if all the roads in Michigan are straight or dirt!  Since that time I discovered SCCA Rallycross through the well managed Detroit Region, and have driven a few times recently with daily drivers, but never had a committed rallycross vehicle.  Now I'm ready to finish this 1G DSM with the intent of competing in more RallyCross events and keep it a street driven focus for now.  I don't have any delusions of grandeur to enter the stage rally scene, and this platform is so damn cheap it makes a compelling case for a fun entry in Prepared or Modified AWD class.

I'll be updating the thread with work that was done over the years and plans for the future.  Short list to start:

• Drivetrain: Evo8 Rear LSD, built transmission
• Engine: 2.0L 6-Bolt with 2G head
• Turbo: Billet 13G baby turbo for max spool
• DSMLink V3 running E85
• Evo8 Bilstein Struts converted to coilovers
• RallyX outfitting: braid wheels, skid plates, mud flaps, snow tires and UHP 200TW tires for dirt track events

High School driver trim, stock wheels, a 2.5" exhaust and homedepot boost controller.

Engine Carnage, dropped valve for unknown reason:

What was left of the valve, that I could find:

Drag racing at Byron, ran a low 15s time, not bad for 1st time out:

Some early days inspiration from Sport Compact Car!

As it sits now:

Cool! 

One of things I did when the engine was out was to paint the engine bay.  Simple approach using NAPA color matched spray paint, turned out very good for the effort involved.

Before

I also pulled the front and rear subframe, cleaned up and painted them, replaced bushings where possible.  At the same time I painted the fuel tank.

The factory rear trailing arms came with a flexible bushing that increased toe when the suspension is compressed, not ideal for autocross or rallycross.  A few companies offer a toe eliminator kit that consists of a heim joint and threaded insert that is welded into the factory trailing arm after the bushing is removed.  I ended up machining my own, and also fabricated an adjustable rear upper control arm.  Now both camber and toe are adjustable.

The front control arms were toast, so those were replaced and bushings replaced with polyurethane units.

I took the time to paint the wheel wells with Zero Rust (cheaper version of POR15) , turned out pretty good and shiny with clear coat applied (otherwise ZeroRust will fade from UV).

Fuel feed line was replaced with stainless hard line, and then AN "whips" connecting the hard line to the fuel sending unit and the fuel rail.

Rebuilt the driveshaft using new carrier bearings, another common failure point on these drivetrains.  Fun part of this, its cheaper to buy the transfer case recall kit (includes driveshaft yoke and u joints) than it is to buy u joints alone, there was a recall for leaking transfer  case seals and the yoke was to be replaced.

I do need to get it balanced before it goes back in the car.

Found a pretty good deal on a Fluidyne radiator from a local DSM drag racer. The stock fans flow excellently and have good shrouding, I replaced the A/C fan with a slimmer aftermarket unit with corruplast for shrouding, this makes more room to work on the turbo area.

Picked up some Braid wheels from Ron Zaras of Hoonigan, came from his Evo 9 that was wrecked awhile ago.   Also lucked out with some free Michelin X-Ice tires from a fellow RallyCrosser, not ideal for rallyX but good enough to get started on.

For street tires and for dirt track events which are dry and clay packed, a GRMer was selling some nice Kosei K1s in the right bolt pattern in 15" size. I used to have Kosei K1s on the car when it was running so it seemed like a great fit.  I'll be trying out Maxxis Victra VR-1 tires as they are cheap, long lasting, and came in the right size. 

I will need to make some center caps for both wheelsets, will be attempting those with 3D Printing.  I think it'll be fun to repllicate the OEM center caps for both wheelsets like so!

The stock seats are not ideal for bolstering and the leather was in rough shape.  The car came with grey leather and I wanted a rough match to this, Sparco R100 fit the bill and are very reasonably priced. Feels like they could use some more lumbar support, but sparco velcro on lumbar is available.

Sweeeet! More DSM stuff!  Let me know if you need any help with 3D printed stuff, I've done a few center caps before.

I dig it.  I had a Tsi AWD that looked exactly like this when I was about 20.  It had a 16g and a few other upgrades.  One day I was ripping some AWD donuts in a field.  ...until I found a concrete culvert hidden in some tall weeds.  Smashed the front, bent the frame and totaled the car :(

RacetruckRon said:

Sweeeet! More DSM stuff!  Let me know if you need any help with 3D printed stuff, I've done a few center caps before.

I may take you up on that! I don't have a printer, I just have friends that have printers. I guess that's kind of like the boat analogy, better to know a guy with the tool than own the tool!

Is there any trick to it?  I have to look at the wheel bore to see if they can just be press fit or if they need something to hold them captive.

Recently I've been working on getting a built motor together.  Simple build, nothing too extreme, but for the cost its hard to argue against building a new engine as opposed to buying used up stock 6 bolts.

Engine Build

• 2.0L 4G63 Block. Bored 0.040", align honed mains with ARP main studs.
• Stock 88mm crankshaft
• Balance shaft eliminated
• CP Pistons 9.0:1 CR, 22mm wrist pin
• Eagle Rods stock length
• 2G Cylinder Head. Valve job, light port and polishing. Supertech valves.  
• Stock 2G Cams (most overlap)
• Kiggly HLA, Kiggly Valve Springs and retainers in case I want to put a set of cams in it later.
  • This is a pretty trick part. It fixes the oiling issues the heads have from the factory, they over supply the lifters.
  • https://www.kigglyracing.com/product-page/hla-pressure-regulator-4g63

Neat!  I've always had at least a bit of an interest in DSMs, but have never really interacted with them so they represent a weird little gap in my automotive knowledge.  They seem cool, although the time of cheap ones is probably coming to an end.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ said:

Neat!  I've always had at least a bit of an interest in DSMs, but have never really interacted with them so they represent a weird little gap in my automotive knowledge.  They seem cool, although the time of cheap ones is probably coming to an end.

I wouldn't say that they are going up much in value. Even super low mile 1999 GSX havent gone over $10k yet ( I bought one with 80k miles Texas car on BringAtrailer for $8000, sold it for $9000 two years later) and the most mint 1G will still fetch less than $13k.  It is getting harder to find the cheap ones now, as most are rusted out or crushed, in the southern states they're still out there.

I think the biggest appeal is the abundance of aftermarket parts, and how cheap the used part market is.  However its better to go with a simple DSM build, a lot of guys shoot for the moon and end up parting out cars after disintegrating the driveline at the drag strip. 

engiekev said:

RacetruckRon said:

Sweeeet! More DSM stuff!  Let me know if you need any help with 3D printed stuff, I've done a few center caps before.

I may take you up on that! I don't have a printer, I just have friends that have printers. I guess that's kind of like the boat analogy, better to know a guy with the tool than own the tool!

Is there any trick to it?  I have to look at the wheel bore to see if they can just be press fit or if they need something to hold them captive.

I have a SLA resin machine is great for center caps since it has super high detail and nearly invisible layer lines. This is a centercap I did for a set of wheels I only had 3 centercaps for.  Sorry for the minor thread jack. More 4G63 content please.

Hmm, you may be getting an email soon. I think I have a solidworks model of the OEM center caps, but need to model up the caps to fit the Kosei and Braid wheels.

What printer do you have? My friend has a DIY one and wants to just buy a turn-key machine.

In reply to engiekev :

I have 6 total printers: 2 Ender3s, a Creality CR-10S, Creality CR-X, Tevo Little Monster and an Elegoo Mars (SLA).  I'm thinking about starting a large format SLA printer later this year after I have my truck running.

Definitely love seeing another rallycross build! Be careful with the X-Ice for summer events; they will wear away quickly.

Your engine rebuild plans put you squarely into MAWD, as does the billet turbo, E85 plan (if bigger injectors required) and maybe that toe eliminator.

I plan to swap out the XIce with cheater tires (Rally) at some point once I get the setup more dialed in. Detroit events are either 1) muddy mess or 2) dry and clay packed with loose dirt on infield. For 2) I will be using 200TW summer tires that have chunky tread out to the sidewalls and good siping, will see how it goes!

I did plan on doing a MAWD build from the start. Too many chassis shortcomings to stick in SAWD, and I'm not worried about being competitive, just want to have fun! E85 will require 1000cc injectors and a bigger fuel pump.

why is it that Detroit region has all the odd cars running rallycross?  

engiekev said:

Hmm, you may be getting an email soon. I think I have a solidworks model of the OEM center caps, but need to model up the caps to fit the Kosei and Braid wheels.

What printer do you have? My friend has a DIY one and wants to just buy a turn-key machine.

 

It's me. The friend is me and I hate my printer and I hate winter and I hate my life. 
 

wait no I got carried away but I do dislike my printer. Mostly because I don't have the patience to learn about it. To easily distracted by all the cool E36 M3 in my garage. 

MrChaos said:

why is it that Detroit region has all the odd cars running rallycross?  

Cuz there's a bunch of odd auto engineers in the area, and a lot of odd cars sold well here. 

engiekev said:

MrChaos said:

why is it that Detroit region has all the odd cars running rallycross?  

Cuz there's a bunch of odd auto engineers in the area, and a lot of odd cars sold well here. 

Though i do say that and then looking at ETR we have a 280z, a 4th gen Camaro, a w8 passat sedan, like 3 a4's.

Love the thread and documentation, keep up the awesome work!  I always had a soft spot for these cars.

Archer Racing used to run some 1G DSMs in the SCCA endurance challenges and did very well.  An acquaintance has bought up the old cars, I'm really pondering copying the livery with vinyl!  The paint on my car is not in good shape to begin with.