Yeah, there's a lot of that going on in the racing world these days.
Yeah, there's a lot of that going on in the racing world these days.
theres so much win going on over on your website, my eyes actually caught fire for a moment just viewing it. I am not sure I can handle all the awesome - actually, just writing this, my bladder control failed momentarily and now my shorts have a little pee spot in them...thanks a lot
I'm... sorry? Thanks for the encouragement, though. We've got a lot to do yet on this car, but I guess that's how Challenge cars go.
Here's our heads on my kitchen table. 
Is that a cupcake pan? Nice!
"hey guys, why do these muffins taste like PB Blaster? How many times have I told you about putting retainers and keepers in my cookware...and why the hell is there a cam in my dishwasher...CMON GUYS seriously "
winsauce!
See, there's an advantage to a six. With a four or an eight, you always have cupcake holes left over.
The muffin pan is a tip I learned from a Star Mazda mechanic. Works surprisingly well. I'll probably buy a few more.
4cylndrfury wrote: "hey guys, why do these muffins taste like PB Blaster? How many times have I told you about putting retainers and keepers in my cookware...and why the hell is there a cam in my dishwasher...CMON GUYS *seriously* " winsauce!
That's just creepy. I actually had the cams and heads in the dishwasher yesterday. Didn't work out too well, I'm glad it's the apartment company's dishwasher.
Keith wrote: See, there's an advantage to a six. With a four or an eight, you always have cupcake holes left over.
My girlfriend: "Is that a muffin pan?"
Me: "...maybe..."
My girlfriend: "I'm never making you cupcakes again."
I really don't like cupcakes all that much, so it's no big loss.
Just saw your July 9th post - nice job getting that windshield out in one piece we (Wreck Racing Team, at GA Tech) had to replace one of ours the other day and it came out in about 300 pieces. PITA - literally.
Been there, done that. I've used a sawzall, hammer, chisel, screwdriver, pliers, all kinds of things to remove a windshield. (Most of them were used on Truckstiva).
Who'da thunk that a tool built for the task would be easiest?
Our good block has been cleaned and painted, and is waiting for the rotating assembly to be washed so it can be thrown back together with fresh rings.
Our heads have also been disassembled and cleaned in a questionable procedure that may or may not have involved a dishwasher, and are ready for some TLC with a Dremel.
We're hollowing out the stock 300ZX intake manifold, and will be doing a mild porting job, as well as relocating the throttle body to make it a little more useful in our compact chassis.
One of our more "creative" areas of the build is the exhaust manifolds. The flanges are from a VG30DE, simply because they're mild steel compared to the VG30E's cast manifolds. The bolt holes on the VG30DE flages required a little massaging, and the ports don't match up exactly, but reusing these flanges is still favorable compared to making new flanges. A cheap source of VG30E flanges is non-existent, and getting new ones cut is cost-prohibitive.
The tubular primaries of the VG30DE manifold have an oval cross-section, and are therefore all but unusuable for our odd purposes. Some scrounging around led to some galvanized fence pipe with a 1.65" OD and 1.5" ID, that we will be able to bend to our wishes. Stay tuned for our solution to preventing welder's fever.
Some time on an old 3-axis mill relegated to "fancy drill press" status with a hole saw gave us a decent rough cut. From there, we removed a tad more material with a carbide bit in the same mill to get the test section of pipe to fit smoothly. Little bit of time with the MIG welder, and it should fit rather nicely.
Decided to seam weld the chassis. Once again, Flyin' Miata came through in the clutch with some super-sexy drawings of where to weld.
unevolved wrote: Decided to seam weld the chassis. Once again, Flyin' Miata came through in the clutch with some super-sexy drawings of where to weld.
Out of all the countless really cool things going on with this build, I might be most interested to see pics and details of this process. I had noticed that the FM rally car has a seam welded chassis, and it may be relevant in my next car. Keep us updated, and good luck.
Here's what I'm going off of, more or less:
http://www.flyinmiata.com/tech/seamweld.php
Have to turn the welder way down, and the pinch welds are kind of hard to do, but it's nice to have that reference.
My new book (hitting the shelves in a couple of months!) has a better version of those diagrams as well. A coworker is actually in the middle of seam-welding his new project so I can get some pictures if you need any clarification.
Glad to hear they were helpful!
I'm glad to hear that I'm not the first one to stick parts in a dishwasher. Wife was none too happy with that one. She was expecting plates and silverware... and that was not what she got.
Keith, speaking of your books, I just bought and read your Se7en book and LOVED it. You've been a huge asset to our program. I'll be sure to pick up your next one when it comes out.
I think the dishwasher problems may or may not have had something to do with the water hardness down here. It's worked pretty well for some other people I know, but it really dirtied up the inside of the machine.
Look at your fence pipe. Now look at me. Now back at your fence pipe. Now back to me. The fence pipe is now a turbo manifold.
Love it.
You can get in trouble for heat-treating your header in the oven too. Weird.
A convection type oven as well, no wonder she was mad ;)
Sometimes its nice living with a bunch of car guys.
Hey, I degreased it first! Anyhow, enough of that. Back to the Nismospeed. Is the manifold done yet? Huh? Huh?
One question...why did you feel the need to melt this runner BEFORE it ever saw a turbo? The least you could do was melt it with honest boost heat...sheesh some people...
Keith wrote: Hey, I degreased it first! Anyhow, enough of that. Back to the Nismospeed. Is the manifold done yet? Huh? Huh?
It's getting there. Moving into a new house this weekend, so not much will get done, I imagine. That 90 degree section only took about 30 minutes, so the rest should come together rather nicely. Been working at a new performance shop that just opened up, so that's cutting into my free time as well.
And 4cylndrfury, that section was a threat. It was to show the rest of the manifold what we would do to it as punishment if it cracked.
Just wanted to reassure everyone this project isn't dead. We're going through a transition period in the organization now. We've had a change of leadership AND facilities. I'm no longer the project manager, I was elected president of the organization so Corbin (corbeybaby on here) is now the PM for our GRM team. I'm staying on as crew chief to see the Nismospeed Miata through to completion, though. We've moved into our new building, as some of you saw in the thread I made, and Corbin's starting to gather parts for the 2012 Challenge car we're starting.
Hopefully now that everything's somewhat stable we can hit the ground running. I feel like we're on the downhill side of this build.
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