¯\_(ツ)_/¯ said:That cage looks like it's probably only a few tweaks away from being stage rally legal. Did it come with a logbook?
It did not come with a logbook as the car never got logbooked BUT.. yes you are correct, with some minor tweaks the cage will be good for stage rally. The car was built for it... Just never made it there.
Well. The black car has had all the rally-ish stuff removed from it that we can use on the red car and is now in South Florida with my buddy getting parted out. I'm excited to be able to recoup some funds from the black car and simultaneously keep other b13's on the road. I got some goodies for the red car that I will be getting on here soon as well as getting the starter issue figured out. The car sat for a long time. So I plan to get it over to my friend's shop, put it on a lift, and do a proper once-over.
So the red car work has really begun. The baseline platform of the car is great. I really can't believe how well built the car is. Here is my checklist so far:
1. All fluids changed, and figure out the issue with the starter. I do have two used OEM starters one should work
2. Swap out the suspension from the red car and install what was on the black car. (more on this later)
3. Thoroughly clean the car... it's filthy.
4. Install the Progress Rear sway bar and Unorthodox Pulleys
5. Check/Replace all roached bushings
6. Finalize the tire / wheel plan
7. Dyno the car? I'm just curious...
8. Install the roof scoop... its hot in FL and we need some airflow.
After being a shade tree mechanic for 10 years or so... it's been so great to have a garage. It's small and there isn't a ton of room to work on stuff with all my tools, camping gear and household items... but I'm grateful.
The car has full Lexan other than the windshield and all have been installed in ways that make it easy to remove. This is a game-changer with the cage when it's time to get to those rear struts.
The car came with a really great and kinda old-school rally light setup. That won't be needed for our RallyX events So two bolts removed and unplugging a 4 pin clip and we are lighter.
The front end of the car has been modified by the builder to really flow some air. Bigger radiator, dual electric fans, and some grill and bumper modifications make for a ton of cool. Chicken wire keeps the goods safe in the event a car ahead of us - on stage one day - goes all gravel machine gun on us... or we end up in the bushes.
So Suspension...
This has been the limiting factor for b13 rally cars over the years. The b13 is limited by wheel travel in general so not being able to find proper gravel spec coilovers is a bit of a bummer. Im now expert on this but here is what has been run in the past:
Jvab's - I know he built at least one set... and isn't anymore
Hotbits - Possible plan for me here...
Koni inserts and GC coilovers. Another option but isn't a ton better than what I have now.
Custom one off DMS no idea on this one...
Tom Morris? Cant find info but heard someone had them.
KYB AGX on stock springs. This is what Bubs (forum supporter) is running and has had success - this is similar to what I have now. But the AGX is discontinued so I'm running the excel g2
-----
My thoughts...
KSport has brand new and I have to say much better looking build spec gravel spec coilovers that at $1500 are interesting.
Bilstein b6 -I know people have built - and I have heard that the 30mm inserts fit in our stock strut tubes. But I'm not an engineer and figuring out the right b6's to run seems to be a out of my wheel house... but id like to try.
Hotbits - these aren't cheap but they aren't as expensive as Reigers or DMS etc. This is what the red car had on them originally and i have heard good things. Also Dexter runs them on his b13 car and its well done.
Subaru GC/GD - It looks like these could potentially work... the dimensions and even the bolt pattern seem to look similar and could work out of the box or with some minor fab... I have a front and a rear cheapo strut ordered from each model coming to my house to see what works... this could potentially be an interesting stock-ish setup and then help me with gravel spec down the road.
My current setup is working fine but it's definitely not going to work long term both for stage rally and as we get faster at the FIRM. I have KYB GR2's with HD Koni bump stops and stock SER springs. The red car has GR2s on ga16 springs. Rumor has it that the NX2000 automatic has .5in taller springs and slightly higher spring rates but I can't find info anywhere. I have some on the way... so we will see.
Factory Spring Rates:
GA16DE Sentra E F -112 R- 101
GA16DE Sentra XE, GXE F-112 R-90
SR20DE Sentra SE-R F-123 R- 112
So that is where we are at. I know that there is another forum supporter who is building a 240sx rallyX car and in his thread, he is trying to figure out similar stuff. So that's where I'm at too... trying to figure out what the long-term plan will be without breaking the bank.
If you want to DIY suspension stuff, another option is inverted Bilstein 40mm stuff. You can get a universal housing like this, weld some ears on, and stick an insert like this one in there for a pretty reasonable set of inexpensive rally dampers. I run this setup on the front of my BRZ, irish44j has something similar on his e30, and a number of other rally people run some configuration of that housing with either a Bilstein or AVO insert.
In reply to ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ :
This is an A+ recommendation. I haven't seen these specific inserts before and those universal housings are great too! Thanks for the recommendation. I have followed your BRZ build each step of the way. A+ job man. Thanks for taking the time to read my thread and make a suggestion.
The very first car I ever raced (autocross) was a B13 SE-R, I actually came really close to buying a rally prepped one too- let me know if you want me to try and fudge together some suspension numbers for you.
In reply to ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ :
That's awesome I have had a bunch of them. They are awesome cars. I will definitely hit you up for your math services when the time is here to build what I need. Thanks for the offer.
So I got a set of DMack Grippas with the purchase of my most recent rally car. I don't know how old they are but I do know that one of them was given to me ballooned up. I'm considering running two of them upfront for when its excessively slick and soft. My car is very light (about 2200lbs) and FWD. Should I be worried about these tires? Anything I should do or shouldn't do?
The others look to be in great condition. But again... I'm not a tire expert and I'm definitely not a gravel tire expert.
The tire question (above) has been answered... These tires are super old and shouldn't be run. Which is a bummer. But man are these gravel tires heavy. I mean HEAVY. Currently, the rallyX we are doing is as another guy explained it "RallyX Plus." Honestly what we do at The FIRM is closer to a true rally sprint than your typical scca rallyX. We have seen 80mph at times and I'm not going to risk it with these tires. I started a Rallycross Tire Conversation a while ago and got some great feedback. I have run a lot of different tires over the years but I always love to get feedback from other drives on what works well for them. Captdownshift (Forum Supporter) suggested a tire I found very interesting. The Kumho Solus Ha31. These are a Performance All Season tire. Our surfaces are super diverse out at the firm. There isn't a Perfect tire and frankly, its best to have a few different tire options depending on the course they lay out. The tires were delivered yesterday and look great. I'm pretty excited. The grooves are deep the sipes aren't all the way through and the compound is pretty soft. The thing I'm the most excited about is that the sidewall is VERY thick and firm. Much beefier than my Winterforces. They were $265 shipped to my front door. I plan to get a set of Falken Azenis still too as I have always felt those could be fast on some of the layouts at the firm. Ill report back on this soon.
I got the car out of the garage and gave it a deep clean. Im fairly certain it hasn't been clean since its last Rally. Based on the best info from the PO that was SCCA Nationals in 2018. Then the car was parked in various garages and fields in GA. There was enough dirt and clay to change the color of my entire driveway. I did about 10lbs of weight reduction.
The aluminum dash is falling apart at the moment. I'm going to remove it, recover it, and add a few other gauges. I'm not sure how or where but I'd really like to have oil, water temp, and oil pressure clearly where I can see them.
The Subaru struts I ordered get delivered tomorrow. I'm interested to see how this all pans out.
But as I stated earlier. I'm really leaning towards DIY like ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ built for the BRZ orrr Ill order HotBits gravel spec coilovers. Everyone who has run those on b13's have had great success.
Until Next Time... thanks for reading and go get busy living.
Got little bit done today. Not going to lie, I spent more time playing with my smoker than the rally car this weekend.
But I went to my buddy's shop and got the tires removed from the wheels. 1 set came with the red car the other set was off of the black car. They were pretty rough and gray so I decided to refinish them AND all rally cars have to have white wheels. So I gave them the old Rustoleum treatment with about 4 coats of clear coat in the hopes they hold up well in the conditions they will experience.
They turned out pretty good. Going to let them cure for 48 hours and then 4 will get the Solous tires mounted on them.
So word on the street - from a few different folks is that the only tweaks that need to be made to this cage are the door bars. These look BEEFY. But it sounds like they need to be cut out and changed. I looked over the ARA rules and I didn't see any pictures or an explanation as to why these door bars aren't proper. I know the guy who does most of the cages for Rally cars (Adam) but I know people blow him up all the time. I'm trying to avoid asking him for advice until I need him to come to fix the cage. Anyways. Just looking for insight here.
Wheels and tires are on the car. The 175/65/14 Kuhmos look so funny on the car because of how small they are -BUT- this size works and helps maximize the one thing this car lacks the most... Wheel Travel.
I would much rather be running all NX2000 wheels as they are an inch wider but these will do for now. I'm saving the NX wheels I have for the Falken RTKs I'm getting. I hope to be able to track down some more NX wheels soon.
Next on the list is to fix a minor exhaust issue. The started issue is fixed. Pulleys, sway bar and the new roof scoop go in next week. Making progress baby!
I see a couple things with that cage, assuming the tubing sizes are all to spec.
-What's going on in the middle of the door bars? Two separate tubes or is that an X junction?
-The A-pillar reinforcement bar looks to land too far away from the junction at the top and the cage foot at the bottom.
EDIT: It would be more constructive if I made a suggestion- my best guess here is that you'll wind up cutting the tubing out of the entire door opening, reinstalling stock non-gutted doors, and welding in new door bars and A-pillar reinforcement. Ideally it would be good to find a scrutineer for NASA or ARA who can confirm that plan before you do it.
In reply to ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ :
This is super helpful. Thanks.
So we had out first event in the car on Sunday. She is a ripper.
I didn't get a ton of pictures of all the upgrades I did but here is list:
1. unorthodox aluminum pulley install
2. Cut out the cat and horrible cherry bomb muffler. - added a 14in Magnaflow resonator instead
3. SS Brake lines
4. Added weather stripping on the trunk and Lexan windows to quiet down the ride. It was very loud and now its loud-ish
5. Got my hands on some 14x7 old school tsw wheels with 10-year-old 205 R888s. These were much better for our 50/50 course. The car definitely didn't pull out of the dirt sections as well as it could but it was wayyy faster around the course on the tarmac and hardpack clay.
Two days before we loaded the car I found a huge issue with our power steering. Ill spare you the details but we had to run without powersteering. Which in rally can be tough. especially with the way I normally do hairpin turns with the E-brake rip. We ran without the rear sway bar which was a mistake. The car didn't rotate well at all. I think if we had run it and had power steering we could have taken 1st and 2nd. My buddy and I finished 3 and 4th in class behind two 300HP for fiestas. I hope they will split our class for NA and Power adders soon. The car did great. Can't wait to get more photos back to show you all. The car jumped really well.
Here is some in-car video: https://youtu.be/1rsAhleOIO0
Got a lot of stuff coming down the line for the car.
So glad to see the car carrying on doing what it's supposed to do! What ended up being the issue with the starter?
The car was looking great out there on Sunday!
In reply to HoserRacing :
It actually wasn't the starter it was the key ignition. Got her all sorted.
In reply to Lof8 - Andy :
She did great! You were beast mode in the crown vic!!
Special Thanks to 717Media for taking great pictures out at the track as always! Funny enough.. they are all of my buddy who I co-own the car with. None of me driving.
So glad to see that car doing what I didn't have the time to do with it! Hope you enjoy it for a long time!
In reply to HoserRacing :
Thanks man! _ Also - I still haven't gotten the title in the mail from your buddy. Could you check on that for me?
Will do.
Ugh, how did I miss such a thread??? In for reading the whole thing after work!
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