AMS/NOS Energy Drink Pikes Peak International Hillclimb Car - 2009 Edition
 

With the 2009 PPIHC just under a month away, I thought it was time for a "what have we been up to" thread. I'm also hoping that with the race still a month out, some of you might decide to try and come out and spectate this year.

Race day this year is Sunday July 19th, but we will be there from tech inspection on Tuesday the 14th. There will be early morning practice sessions on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. Friday night downtown Colorado Springs will host a massive block party known as Fan Fest where many of the race cars will be on display. Check out www.ppihc.com for more details.

For anyone who missed the thread documenting the build up from 2 salvage evos last year, you can see all the details here.

I will be adding post containing info about mods to the car and what we've been doing all offseason to prepare for PPIHC 2009. To close out the first post, I'm attaching one of my favorite shots from last year.

Thanks for reading!

Dave

The first off-season modification to find its way onto the Evo was the MoTeC MDC. This is one of the programmers that allows you to modify the settings of the center differential unit. http://www.motec.com.au/mdc/mdcoverview/

Since its hard to quantify changes to the diff maps when you're not slipping, I headed into work...no seriously! :lol: Most of my weekends from Christmas thru the beginning of March are spent teaching ordinary folks how to drive safely on the snow and ice at the Bridgestone Winter Driving School in Steamboat Springs, Colorado. www.winterdrive.com Commuting from Denver to Steamboat (~3 hours in good weather) I get to put many of the skills we teach to use. We also teach rally driving techniques that really let you stretch your legs out on the purpose built ice tracks, but what's really fun is when you take your own car out there. Below is a video of the car in mid-February, and a shot one of the instructors grabbed of me full drift pinging the rev-limiter in 3rd gear.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CcZ7dyIdVo

I didn't have tons of time to mess around with the MDC before the snow melted, but I can say that its a night & day difference if you're a driver that likes to use left-foot braking on slippery surfaces.

Dave

Next up for the car was a trip to Las Vegas the first weekend in March to meet up with all of our teammates on the NOS Energy Drink squad. I finally got to meet up with some of the AMS Performance Crew (Martin, Eric J., and Rich), and ACP, Chris Forsberg, Kyle Busch, and Tommy P. were also in attendance.

Attached is a picture of the car sporting its new graphics, and a shot of me & the wife in the shiny new Momo racing suits. Note to self...work on 'serious look' some more. :lol:

Dave

With the Vegas trip in the books, I needed to have just a bit more fun with the car before letting the guys at AMS Performance tear into her, so I headed back out to the ice tracks in Steamboat for one more morning of fun. By the 2nd week in March, it normally gets too hot to use the tracks after noon, so any playing has to get done early.

First pic is a shot of the car in downtown Steamboat. Its nice to have a street legal race car, but unfortunately the police seem to take too much of an interest some times. No tickets to date...the cops all seem a bit dissappointed that I'm not an 18 year old trying to street race when they look at my license & registration.

One of the other BWDS instructors, Matt Johnson, also has a bit of a rally habit, and some of you might just recognize the car. He was running some Yokohama rally ice-specific tires that day, and it was pretty crazy how much more traction he was able to find vs. the worn out Green Diamonds I was using. The proper tires make a huge difference no matter what surface you're driving on.

Dave

Ill be there as usual

Next up was our trip out to AMS Performance in late-March for a serious round of upgrades. Check out this thread for all of the details and high quality pics.

The quick rundown of parts added and video:

AMS V-Band Turbo Kit with Garrett TR30R Turbocharger
AMS 2.3L High-Compression Stroker Motor
AMS F1-I Intake Manifold
AMS CNC Head
AMS Surge Tank
Tomei Poncams
Exedy Triple Carbon Clutch with AMS "Push-Style" Conversion
SparkTech Non-CDI Ingition System
Hollinger Dog-Box (rally gearing)
WaveTrac Front Diff in freshly rebuilt T-Case

With all the parts finding their way onto the car, I'd like to spend a couple lines thanking some people. First & foremost, I need to thank my wife Allison for dealing with this 'mild' obesssion of mine, and for actually encouraging me to make the car faster. :cool: Sometimes I'm not sure how she can sit in the passenger seat so calmly, but she's there every race calling out notes as if there weren't hundred plus foot drop-offs just inches from the edge of the car.

I'd like to thank the entire crew at AMS Performance for making sure all the parts work together and getting all the upgrades done in just one short week. I'm sure Martin's still sleep deprived from the tuning session, but I really appreciate the hard work & dedication that went into getting the car where it is today. 540 ft/lbs & 460 whp unrestricted, and 430 ft/lbs & 315 whp on the 34mm restrictor.

I would also like to thank SparkTech Ingitions, Exedy Racing Clutches, and AEM, for supplying some top notch parts that are going to be subjected to one hell of a beating. :lol:

My only complaint out of the whole week was that I didn't have great weather for doing a proper test-drive. :lol: I may enjoy driving/sliding in the snow, but I'm certainly not a fan of towing in the stuff.

Thanks for reading!

Dave

Bad ASS Dave!!!! I cant wait for Mid July :)

Eric

Awesome !!! I'll be out there spectating and visiting some friends... Can't wait.

Nice updates Dave {thumbup} I know you and I have been back and forth on some of the advanced parts you've been using, but this is the first i've seen you mention:

Hollinger Dog-Box (rally gearing)
WaveTrac Front Diff in freshly rebuilt T-Case


Care to elaborate on what they do for you, how they work, all that cool engineering/driver point of view? (not how a dog box or a front diff works, just why you chose these) I've recently started researching a "straight cut" style box where I can left foot brake and upshift/downshift without using the clutch :D or pm if you prefer not to clutter. Thanks man.

Hollinger Dog-Box - I had a dog-box in my Mazda 323 GTX and really liked the way it worked. In the mazda it was more of a preservation thing, with the factory gearboxes being made with duct tape and popsicle sticks. :lol: For the Evo, we knew we'd be getting close to the recommended limit on power for the stock gearbox (~425 ft/lbs), so I started looking around. It turned out that AMS just happened to have a freshly rebuilt Hollinger box taking up space in the back room, so I jumped on it. Gearing is similar to the IX box, but it has a much shorter 5th gear, meaning that the shift to 5th doesn't completely put you out of the powerband (1st-5th ratios: 2.714, 2.000, 1.474, 1.120, 0.808)

If I had won the lottery, I probably would have a box with gearing made specifically for PPIHC. If I were building the ultimate box for Pikes, I'd have 5th gear at redline work out to 125mph. I'd probably have 1st gear be a little bit shorter so that I could remain in the powerband around some of the tightest parts of the course, and then stack the gears pretty evenly between 1st & 5th.

On the Wavetrac front diff, it was also a matter of compromise. I was using Cusco RS diffs in the car last year, and had one fail and ran the remainder of the season on a used stock unit. I really really wanted to try out the Ralliart one, but they're crazy expensive, like $3500 each. :eek: I managed to score a deal on a slightly used one from TRE, but it got lost by FedEx. Thank god for insurance! With that diff no longer in my price range, TRE suggested looking into the WaveTrac. RRE has a long history of rally involvement, and even beat the crap out of some GTXs back in the day. They thought the WaveTrack would work well as a 'budget Ralliart' so I figured I'd give it a shot.

Unfortunately, with all of the new parts going onto the car at once, its really hard to give an impression of how one specific part changed things. When I built the car last year, I chose a 1.5 way front diff and a 2 way rear to help the car rotate under braking. Since the WaveTrac is more of a 1 way diff, I'll be changing out the rear to a 1.5 way (more details on that later in the thread). :)

Dave

Nice! I think Martin needs to "just so happen" himself a few more on his shelves! Were they going to use it on TA1 and decided it was too short of gearing or did you have the gears redone yourself?

It's bubble gum and popsicle sticks, that's what they show in the service manual. Owning a GTX rally car is an exercise constantly breaking rare parts. We had two complete Rally cars and two "street" parts car just to keep a single rally effort going. Now they all collect weeds and grass.

Looking forward to your results this year, it should be fun. Have you done any shake down runs at full power on the 30R yet? How much faster does it feel?

It's bubble gum and popsicle sticks, that's what they show in the service manual. Owning a GTX rally car is an exercise in constantly breaking rare parts. We had two complete Rally cars and two "street" parts cars just to keep a single rally effort going. Now they all collect weeds and grass.

Looking forward to your results this year, it should be fun. Have you done any shake down runs at full power on the 30R yet? How much faster does it feel?

:lol: Not too sure, but if my gear calculations & final drive on this box are correct, the box will do 158mph in 5th gear at 7,800rpm on stock sized tires. I think Paul G. clocked 170mph in TA-1 in one of the AMS videos. AMS recommends a 7,800rpm redline on thier standard 2.3L stroker for road race use, but not sure if TA-1 might've pushed their redline up a bit.

Dave

:lol: I owned a street GTX for exactly that reason. If I needed parts on a quick turaround, I could rob them of the commuter.

The TR30R is laggier than the stock turbo, but the mid range is much stronger. I think the only real direct comparison you could look at is our trap speeds. At the end of the 'straight' I think we trapped 104 last year and we were 109 this year. I did have to brake earlier though as the tires on the car this year didn't hook nearly as well as the ones I had last year, so the speed difference probably isn't as great as it would be under identical conditions. At the race we did manage to knock 2 seconds off our times from last year, but its hard to make an apples to apples comparison since the condition of the road was different (more 'dry slicked' this year.

The other thing to consider is that racing at altitude makes the turbo hit later, so the great torque curve we got in Chicago on the dyno isn't repeatable here in Colorado. We miss out on ~600rpm of that big power, so even though in Chicago the power was falling off by 4,500rpm, here in Colorado the car feels best being wound out to 6,000rpm. If we can get antilag up and running, we should solve that problem, but we haven't made much progress on that front yet.

Dave

Cool. Ya paul did that at VIR I think, didn't they have the RR 8500rpm motor at that point? Though, at your altitude, I'd be half willing to throw a NOS port on the runners and let that baby spool like nobody's business :lol: It'd last a few corners, right? :lol:

Great build! Good luck!!!

-Jalal

Some Video classic research for ya Dave, this is what we fully expect! ;){thumbup}

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TKgeCQGu_ug

^ Always loved that Video and all the other ones are great too in here {thumbup}

The week after the new parts were installed, we were scheduled to race in the Tumbleweed Express, a 30ish mile rally-sprint sanctioned by Rally America. Living in Colorado certainly has its benefits, but predictable springtime weather isn't one of them. The day before the event weather forcasters were calling for a massive blizzard, and many of the volunteer EMTs were called into work. With no safety crew, there's no event.

A few weeks after that was our first hillclimb of the year, Temple Canyon. Wanting to get in a good shakedown to make sure nothing was going to come loose, I headed out to our local test track, Colorado Off Road Extreme. The shakedown sessing went pretty well, with only one little issue. It turned out we had a bad 5-bar map sensor, but a quick change to a spare had us back up and in business. Here's a short video I put together with some of the footage I captured. The suction cups on my camera mount kept popping off on hard corners, so I didn't have much footage to work with. The high-speed run at the end had us topping out around 126 according to the ECU datalogs, but I think we're a bit lower than that b/c of the lower 5th gear that's in the car.

Dave

Bad ass looks like you've been havin fun with that sick EVO setup

Some of you with a sharp eye might notice something in the above pics...the hood not fitting quite as good as it used to When I first got the car back from Chicago, I was excited to take Allison out for a spin. Unfortunately I forgot to double check that the hood pins were closed, and they weren't. As we were getting on the highway, the hood came up and took out the windshield. It also broke the hood pretty good, but not so bad that it wasn't useable anymore. As a matter of fact, we've raced with it for 3 events now and not a hint of trouble...but it doesn't look too good.

So, the search was on for a replacement, and I figured, if I'm going to replace it, might as well upgrade, right? :lol: The old hood was made by VIS, and it was a bit of a tank, weighing in at 22 lbs, or so I'm told. AMS & Fiber Images to the rescue with a super clean 6 lb hood. :cool: While I was at it, I also ordered up a matching 6 lb trunk lid. Both parts have arrived, but I've yet to install them. Quality on the parts looks top notch, and I can say without a doubt, they're light!

I need to order two new hood brackets, as the ones on the car appear to be bent a bit. The old hood closed with them like that, but it was a bit of a struggle getting the pins to line up with the holes. With the new hood so light, I don't want to force it or tweak it to make it work. I'm hoping to find some time this weekend to get the new parts on the car and will snap pics then. If the 'as advertised' weights are correct, I'll be shedding more than 25 lbs from the car with these two parts.

Dave

Welcome to the friggin' club {thumbup}. It's happened to me twice. Once after working on the GTX rally car for two days straight and being excited to go for a quick test drive. Then the second time was working on the VW GTI rally car, same deal - just a quick test drive. The hood always went up when you hit the power in 2nd gear.

Good times :lol:

I'm guilty of making that mistake too. Imagine it happening while accelerating very hard in 2nd gear in a 1300 hp car!

Just got pics of the new wing element. :cool:

Other announcements coming soon!

Dave

I like that one a bit better then your current one {thumbup}., which I think a couple other people have. My concern from just looking, is how stiff are the CF sides that hold the wing up? Because they don't "look" like they can transmit 100+lbs of force like they need to...looks like they'd flex a bit before hand (even a few mm)?

The sideplates on this wing are just sideplates. This wing will actually attach to 12" tall supports somewhere along the wing element, rather than on the edges like the V1 wing. The supports will actually bolt to the car, not the trunk.

Hopefully David can chime in with all the pros & cons of this type of wing vs. the V1. The two that stuck out in my mind were:

more downforce
less drag

Dave

We have ended up mounting the wing via two vertical pieces of aluminum that is internally bonded to the wing. This piece sticks out the bottom of the wing, on David’s car they are 52" apart and the endplates are just that endplates.

The mounting we did on V1 through the endplates is by far the best aerodynamically but one of the worst structurally since the downforce tends to pull the wing away from the endplates / mounts.

From the Testing we did on the multi element wings we found a huge decrease in drag and quite a bit of downforce gain over the previous single element. We have the capabilities of doing this again with a 3 element wing but that design would have to be balanced with the rest of the cars aerodynamics.

David best of luck in PPIHC 2009 we are all pulling for you!

Crap! :crap: I knew there was "boost crack" to be aware of getting addicted to (and I have the addiction)...now there's "aerodynamic crack" too. :lol:

Thanks...but its more like you're pushing (down on the back end of the car that is). I can't wait to see it!

Dave

Nice Dave!

Very cool stuff. I'm trying to get a Bulletproof road trip together and be there for the 'climb this year.

DHP, is your test virtual or physical? Full-scale? On the car or in free stream? Nice to see some actual testing being done in any case.
-Patrick

Ah, I wasn't referring to the sideplates of v2, i was referring to the whole side/mount of V1 as he described. Sorry lol.

Hook us up with some pics once you get her on! DHP David, love your work and thanks for chiming in. I fully plan on getting aero from you for my Nasa super touring car one of these days when I have a spare dollar {thumbup}

BPAuto - Testing is Physical, full scale on chord length but scaled down width. We have a smaller windtunnel at a local college and have modified the designs for the elements and also the positioning of the second and third elements. This was done with the wing section only not with a car. Looking at putting the whole car with the V2 wing and V4 undertray this winter into a tunnel so we can fully confirm / tweak everything.

Balrok - Thanks for the kind words and look forward to working with you one day {thumbup}

Dave K - Think you will be really impressed with the downforce and how the drag is significantly reduced this year.

Do you guys have a tray that has naca ducts for brakes yet? Part of my plan is to use the pressure under the car in the tray as feed for the cooling ducts. Same story for the rear but the rear would be different - prolly some other form of scoop besides a naca.

Balrok - That is a simple addition wouldnt charge you much for that just price for Naca Ducts. Our design is used as a "template" and is then modiifed for each customers specifications.

Would be keen on some details on the Motec MDC. Especially on the tarmac. You said the changes were big. In what way?

Basic wise, Technically the aftermarket ADC ECU's all provide more "pressure" to the rear diff so it "locks" up more then it normally would. It's the same deal with TRE's rear diff service, he gives you bigger discs so it grabs more, sooner. However with ones like the MDC you can tune it to how much lock (pressure) you want.

Yeah, I uderstand how it works, I just was after some feedback from someone running Motec or similar on tarmac. You can see my factory ACD controller working on the white pressure gauge in the centre of my car here. Especially when I lock a wheel. But was curious how much better the aftermarket ones are. We were thinking of having a controller built that has two dials, one for adjustable pressure and one for speed. This would just override the factory controller.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_S7xKO2C7I

We had a rough weekend at our hillclimb in Buena Vista this weekend. Somewhere in our wiring harness we developed a short (along the sensor switched-power wires), and were unable to get the car running. I probably spent 10-12 hours bent over the engine bay troubleshooting, and had help from a bunch of other guys when they weren't racing.

I'm on the lookout for a clean IX wiring harness that can be FedEx'd out tonight, so if you know of one, please let me know.

Now, onto fun stuff:

As some of you may remember in 2008 we made a last minute decision to add a Forced Performance White turbocharger to the car to help replace some of the altitude induced boost drop in the upper revs. It was a good match for our stock engine. Now that we've got a fully built AMS stroker motor in the car, we need something a bit bigger, especially when looking to switch from the TR30R turbo that's currently under the hood. On Friday, Robert put a Forced Performance HTA 3582 into the mail, with a 0.63 TiAL v-band housing on it. :D

To handle the extra fueling, I've got a 2nd Walbro on the way to add to the AMS surge tank kit, and I'll be ordering some 1450cc injectors later today. If all goes well, the car will be hitting the rollers at Carz Performance a week from today.

Dave

Wow, Dave. That should probably be putting you somewhere along the 700 range, wouldn't it (between the stroked motor and the HTA 35)?

I'd guess that the setup is capable of numbers in that range, but for the actual race, we'll turn the boost down a bit. I'm guessing that the guys getting 700whp out of the HTA35 are spinning the turbo a bit harder than we will. My guess is that we'll settle in the 28-30psi range.

We'll have to see how the competition shapes up during the week to evaluate how hard we need to push the car on race day. With only one shot at the mountain per year, we have to keep in mind that "50 hp probably won't win me the race, but it can lose it if we ask too much."

Engine cooling is very difficult since the air is so thin. You make the turbo work extra hard (more heat), you're climbing steep grades constantly (more heat), we've added lots of aero (more drag) and the air is less dense so the radiator is less efficient (less heat gets pulled out of the system). All in all, PPIHC is the perfect torture chamber.

Dave

I haven't had a chance to run my car on tarmac yet, so I can only share my experiences with it on ice. I swapped from the stock to the MDC (using the pre-loaded programs), and just driving around didn't notice much of a difference. So much so, that I swapped the factory controller back in and went for another lap. I noticed that the car couldn't go as fast. So, while the perceived changes aren't that great, I'd expect the stop watch to show a distinct advantage. I think I'd pin the changes to something along the lines of, you'll quickly be back at the point where you're pushing the traction limits of the car, and it'll feel similar, but you'll be going faster.

Where I really noticed a difference was in situations where I was using left-foot-braking. The car would really just squat down and go. I'm guessing this meant that the ACD was cranking down to eek every little bit of traction from all 4 corners.

Dave

What are you doing with your 30R kit?

Keeping it. :D Only thing that needs to change is the first 90 degrees of the downpipe since the TR30R and TiAL housings have different outlet diameters.

Dave

So I never really put in an update regarding our first Rally Sprint in the car (think short stage rally on a closed course). We had to make the car Rally America legal for this event, so in went the 34mm restrictor. While not fun to neuter a car, the Evo's engine performed like a champ. With the altitude effecting spool, the powerband probably wasn't as nice as it was in Chicago, but we made due and managed to put the hurt on the subies...for a bit.

After the first 8 mile stage, we were leading the event by ~10 seconds. This was good news for us, as I usually take some time to get up to speed. Knowing we only had 32 miles of racing, I wanted to make sure I didn't put us at a disadvantage early on.

Stage two saw us charging harder until we passed the second place car on the side of the road changing a flat tire. We scaled it back a tic, but not quite enough, as we had a moment, popping the car up onto two wheels. A quick flick of the steering wheel had us back on the ground, but another team in a VW wouldn't be so lucky later in the afternoon. With stage two in the books, we headed into mid-day service with a lead of over a minute.

With only 2 stages to go, Allison and I had a quick strategy talk, and based on our near roll, we decided to back off considerably. About a quarter of the way thru the stage after a jump, I noticed that the pitch of the engine/gearbox changed, but wasn't sure what to do, so I just pushed on. Coming off an 85mph sweeper, heading into a 10mph right hander, I dropped down through the gears, and once I banged 1st, I took off. A horrible rumble came from the back of the car, but we were still moving. Press on, right...afterall, it is rally? Well, the car only moved under its power for another 50 yards and coasted to a stop off to the side of the course.

In the rally car with no sound deadening and a hard mounted diff, all driveline noise comes from the trunk, even a dying front diff. Fearing the worst (possibly a miss-shift and broken dog-box), we hopped and became spectators. During the break between cars, I started inspecting the car and couldn't find any fluids on the front skid plate, but could smell gear oil. A quick trip to the rear end showed copious amounds of Heavy Shockproof coating everything from the rear diff back. We ended up with a quarter sized hole in the back of the inspection cover and no teeth left on the pinion gear. Pics attached.

After the event, I pulled the diff and replaced it with the stock VIII sitting in the garage. The damaged one was sent to Shep, and I'm expecting it back any day now.

Dave

So after a gut wrenching DNF while leading an event, there has to be good news, right?

Two weeks later we had the car out at one of the local RallyCross events as part of the Colorado Rally Cup series. While we run based on the rallycross rules, our scores for the Colorado Rally Cup only pit us against other full blown stage rally cars.

Despite knocking down way too many cones, I was able to come away with the win. Several of the rallycross folks turned faster times after penalties were assessed, but if those pesky cones didn't count, I pulled FTD. :lol:

Dave

With a 2 week break before our next hillclimb, I decided to start in on some of the little projects I'd been meaning to do but never found time for.

First up was getting the ACD pump moved from its vulnerable position behind the front bumper to a safe location. After speaking with ACP and the head of Rally America's rules board, I decided to move it into the passenger compartment behind the passenger seat.

My friends at Salta Motorsports in Denver helped out with getting hydraulic lines made, and I took care of the wiring. With only half a dozen wires or so, you'd think I'd have gotten everything right. I went thru and de-pinned the ACD harness and re-pinned the wires that needed to be changed one at a time. Unfortunately, when working on the last wire, I dropped the plug from my hand, and thought I put the new wire in the right spot, but managed to plug it in wrong. After some troubleshooting help, we got everything hooked up and working well. I even switched back to the stock ACD ECU to confirm that no codes/faults were present.

The second thing I noticed when pulling the skid plate off was that there was some dried coolant on the top of the skid plate. Careful inspection showed that the IC piping and the radiator were making contact, and the IC piping won the battle, rubbing a hole in the radiator tank. While removing the radiator, we managed to knick the core, and so I decided it'd be best to just replace it. Now running short on time, I had to see what was available locally. Carz Performance in Lakewood stocks a few radiators, and I chose to go with the CBRD slim radiator, as having the outlet away from the turbo manifold is something I really like. It also gave me enough clearance to go back to my puller fan.

Thursday night rolled around and saw me put the finishing touches on the car, including a late night tire swap in the garage. On Friday afternoon I backed the car out of the garage and it stalled out. A quick check of the fuse box showed the 20 amp engine fuse had blown, but replacing proved difficult. Knowing I was heading to a race with a few mechanics, I figured we'd lick the problem in the pits that evening. With the help of some fellow competitors, we got the car started up.

Saturday morning rolled around and we hopped in the car and drove down to the start line. All the rally class guys were required to grow moustaches in honor of Juha Kankkunen. I have no idea where the idea came from, but I didn't want to face the $100 fine for not trying. I'm sure terrible pics will be floating around soon. :lol: Excited for a crack at the Open Comp cars (since this is a flatter event), we set out on run one, but it was not to be. As the flag and my throttle foot dropped, the engine cut out and wouldn't restart. Still in view of the start line officials, we coasted the car back downhill in reverse.

During the split in run groups, we managed to get the car towed back to the pits for another go at fixing the issue. Once again, we got the car fired up, but on run two, we only made it 50 yards from our pit space before the fuse blew again.

Over the course of the afternoon and early Sunday morning, we were able to locate the problem to a switched power wire for engine sensors (red w/yellow stripe) that was permanently grounded. Unable to easily pull the entire engine harness in a field, we packed it up for the weekend and once again became spectators.

Wiring issues are always tricky, and I think I may be able to trace this one back to the car build. I started with a salvage VIII and IX. The engine fuse box harness from the IX was broken in several spots and coated in battery acid, so I sourced another one. The second one was better, but still had a cracked fuse box. With rally cars seeing so much vibration, it may have just been a matter of time before a couple wires chafed through. I did blow that 20 amp engine fuse 2 or 3 times since I've owned the car, so that may have been a sign of impending trouble. From the pic, you can see we isolated the problem to the harness with the 3 relays in it that bolts to the fuse box.

I'd love to put a proper motorsports harness in the car, but with 12 days before I want to test the car in PPIHC configuration, and 7 days before hitting the dyno with our new turbo, I think replacing the stock harness is the only realistic option.

I would like to thank the folks who I hit up for phone diagnosis (Eric J. & Martin @ AMS), and Ron & other CHCA'ers for spending time in the hot sun helping to ping lots of wires. I've located a replacement IX harness and hope to have it in my hands later this week.

That'll do it for updates tonight...more tomorrow. Thanks for reading!

Dave

Got any pics of the pump placement, line connections, wires etc? Thinking of doing this myself {thumbup}

Dave, give the guys at Buschur a call. They just called me the other day with a brand new EVO IX wiring harness they were trying to get rid of. Ask for Nick.

Eric

No pics yet, but I will try to get some in the next couple of days.


D'oh. I just found one on eBay from a good running car in Florida and am having it overnighted. If I see any suspicious areas in the harness, I may try to pick up another one. Thanks for the heads up Eric! :)

Dave

So Tuesday night I finally went out to unload the truck. Such a shame to be unloading fresh rally tires. :crap:

Just now finishing up an epic day/night in the garage. Spent most of the day getting the new Fiber Images hood and trunk on the car and lined up for hood pins and terry springs. I also pulled off the stock fenders, side skirts and front bumper in preparation for the PPIHC specific parts.

Most importantly, it appears we've licked the wiring issues we encountered. Huge thanks goes out to Mike for giving up his evening to help me chase miles of wire around the car. Final diagnosis was that the wires for the Evap system were grounding out on the chassis, causing the engine fuse to trip. I had wrapped them all up and wire tied them together, but didn't think any were still live, so I didn't do a great job of insulating them. :crap: So...if you're removing emissions equipment (or anything else), remember to de-pin things. {pcfreak}

I'll try to rip around in the car a bit tomorrow before we get ready for the next parts install. Quite a few new parts already here or about to be, but I'll wait till I can post pics to spill the details.

Dave

I took a vacation day on Thursday and had today off, so I was able to make some good progress. A bunch of parts landed at Salta Motorsports today, but I didn't get to see those as I was working on my car at home in the garage. Those guys are busy prepping a car for "Cowboy Kenny" to take to the FIA event in Mexico. Here's a quick shot of the car up in the air. You can see the rally-style pin stands, which get the car nice & high, and give you plenty of room to crawl underneath.

I finally got around to installing the new superlightweigt Fiber Images Hood & Trunk on the car. Fitment looks pretty good, but my car's been banged up a bit. Best part, old hood = 22 lbs, new hood 6 lbs. Old trunk 22 lbs, new trunk 5 lbs. :eek: Both parts have full under bracing so they are still reasonably stiff.

Next up was the Seibon widebody carbon fenders. Not sure what's up with fitment on these, but I had to push out the fenders mid-way down the wheel arch so the doors would open and not rub. These were used, but in pretty good shape, so not sure if I had issues because the car's been jumped.

Next up was the mods to the "new" front bumper. I scored it from a friend, and it had already been hit pretty hard on the bottom edge. The guy who wrapped my first one complained it was pretty hard to wrap because of all the angles in it. I figured why not try to seal up a bunch of the bumper to make the car a bit smoother thru the air. If it works for the drag race guys, why wouldn't it work for PPIHC...afterall, PPIHC is just 156 corners with drag races in between. :lol:

Keep in mind I've moved the ACD pump to the passenger compartment, and I've sourced a Mocal oil/water cooler, so my air/oil cooler is soon to be history.

Dave

So cool. I wish I could drive up to see it run.

d

I'd like to put a big THANKS out to the two newest sponsors on the team, Forced Performance and TiAL Sport. :D Big appreciation on my end goes out to Robert @ FP and Jake @ TiAL for getting parts to me on a tight deadline. I was up in the air about staying with our current setup (TR30R Garrett), but teething issues with rally style antilag made me think the 6000rpm choke point on the turbo made it less than ideal with spool being hurt by the altitude. The turbo made great torque numbers, but its a bit weird driving a turbo car that's peaking so early, and I found myself often hold gears too long. The new powerband should feel a bit mroe 'normal.'

The NOS/AMS Evo is now fitted a brand spanking new Forced Performance HTA 3582 on the car, and in conjunction with the AMS V-banded turbo kit, we're now running with a TiAL 0.63 stainless steel housing, completing the TiAL trifecta (BOV, 44mm wastegate, & exhaust housing). :lol: New parts only look shiny for a little while on a car that races in dirt.

With the help of my friends at Salta Motorsports we were able to wing the new turbo on the car, in just about two hours from driving in to driving out. Thanks to Brian & Steve for giving up their Sunday afternoon! First thing Monday morning, I towed the car over to Carz Performance in Lakewood for some time on their SuperFlow dyno. I wasn't able to find time to get a 2nd fuel pump put on the car, so our dyno session was a bit uneventful, as we simply ran out of fuel in the 25-26psi range. I'm still trying to decide if/when I can fit another walbro under the car and try for more boost. With a week and exactly 5 hours before the first PPIHC practice run of 2009, time isn't on my side anymore.

Still plenty to do before my first tarmac track day in the car on Friday, and I'll try to find time to snap more pictures. We'll see how big of a dent I can put into my personal best at PMI, 1:45.1...in a blown miata back in 2004 or 2005.

Dave

Sounds good! good luck and remember to have fun, huh?

i need a nos energy drink

I'm continuing to make steady progress on the car. Last night I took the car out for a quick spin around the block, just to see what the new power felt like, and all I can say is WOW! Spool isn't quite as quick as I'd like, but I guess that's always the case. :lol: The nice thing about the power band is its very smooth, so I'm hopeful it'll feel very controllable when out on course. Allison had a 'holy crap' moment when I got onto the throttle for the first time, so I guess that's a good sign.

Here's what I knocked out so far:

-Picked up new front bumper from Summit Graphics with fresh wrap so now it matches the car.

-Swapped back to Brembos & PF-01 pads.

-Started installation of AMS brake ducting kit.

-Test fitting done on the new DHP Composites rear wing but still need to drill holes & trim trunk.

-Test fitting of the new 275-40-17 tires & 17x9.5 ET38 rims. Front fitment is no problem once I put in the spacer in. Seibon wide fenders mean there's plenty of room to space the wheel out...not sure about implications with fender liner, as it was removed. Rears are a bit more complicated. With no spacer they hit the spring coil. With a 5mm spacer, they clear the spring coil by ~4mm, but there is still a slight rub on the front suspension link. If I could add some more negative camber back there, I think I'd be ok, but not sure if that's possible. I think I'm at about -1.5 degrees.

Dave

Dave - you are just like me with the changes right up til race time.

What are you currently running for a fuel system? You're on E85 correct? If you do the 2nd pump I'd use a Hobbs switch to make things easy. I fought with trying to get both pumps running full time and getting idle fuel pressure low enough. You don't have time for that!

It's almost go time!!!

They don't call it an Evolution for nothing! :lol:

I'm running E85. I have a somewhat local station that blends their own, and its the same blend year round.

Fuel System:

high output Walbro 255 in tank
AMS Surge Tank
in-line high output Walbro 255 (mounted to surge tank)
-6 feed fuel line to the rail (routed inside the car)
Aeromotive fuel rail
Aeromotive FPR
-4 return fuel line (routed inside the car)

I'm actually looking at using the two pumps in series (one feeding the other), but "safe" space under the car is hard to come by. I have to keep in mind that the car will eventually see stage rallies, so I need to make sure that an errant rock to a fuel pump won't take me out of a race.

I beleive the 'normal' way people add the 2nd pump is in parallel, which will yield a larger volume of fuel. Since I only need a touch more fuel pressure at the higer revs, Martin thinks plumbing them in series makes more sense for me...and it should be a simpler install too.

Dave

What do you have your current base fuel pressure at? Is the return line routed to the main tank or surge tank?

Come now, right now you only need a little more fuel. In three weeks you'll want more power and need even more fuel.

I'd run them in parallel.

Seems like you could add a second pump in parallel on the exterior of the surge tank. You'd just need to make sure the single feed pump could keep the surge tank full. But I believe AMS does this already. BUT, if you wanted to add the second pump in series you could add it inside the car after the surge tank.

I have an extra high-flow "Y" fitting if you want to do the parallel setup. They are hard to find...

Quick update (more details tomorrow):

Had the car out to PMI this afternoon. Recorded my highest speed in a car ever at ~150mph. :D Car ran well, but had some brake issues with the facory Brembos not liking excessive LFB'ing. Temps track side were ~100, and the car was the only one out there not having major overheating issues.

Dave

If you don't mind, heres my 2 cents worth.

1.5mm camber rear is plenty. I am told too much will cause snap oversteer which is what I had at 2.5 deg. The rear guards pump out reasonably easy. I am running 18x9 ET25 with a 5mm spacer and 1.5 deg and they sit in ok.

Brakes - if you are overheating the fronts, check the rears. A couple of race cars over here running the same brake compound all round have set the fronts on fire! We fitted a softer rear pad and they were fine. The problem was that the rears were getting no heat therefore making the fronts over work. Not saying its your problem but something to keep in mind. Brake paint will tell you the answer.

Fuel pump - I am no expert on this, Infact I am not really an expert on anything :crap:. I am sure there was a race car over here that had inline fuel pumps but when one packed up it restricted the flow to the other causing a DNF. May be something to consider

Dave,

how do you like the radiator?

that is our thinnest radiator... proving what we say...in regards to rads, thicker isnt always better.

cb

Im still shocked out of everybody out there that you were the only one who didn't overheat! Especially with that badass CBRD radiator! being so thin I thought for sure your evo would see some high temps! E-85 + CBRD Radiator FTW!

ps im proud of your new Brownbows you created on the track HAHA :)

Dave,

please give me some feedback when you can...

this is the smallest of the 3 rads... so im curious on how you felt it performed...

the double pass would do even better.

cb

Chad - this was my first time with the Evo on the track so I don't have much to compare to. I had intended on datalogging all my sessions, but somehow I forgot to charge up the laptop before heading out to the track and didn't bring the power cord. :crap:

Ambient temps were ~95-100, with track temp probably a bit higher. I was driving more in 'time attack style,' only going out for 3ish laps at a time. On the first session we saw temps as high as 185, and on the second session we saw temps climb to 195. That was all we were able to log. On my last session of the day, I did see the needle on the dash move upwards just a tick past 9-o'clock, but I don't know what that corresponds to temp wise.

All in all, the radiator seems to work well, and if you're getting questions from people about its suitability for DD use on a high HP car (since its thinner than OEM), I'd say you've got nothing to worry about. :D

Any word on the double pass?
Dave

Dave,

working on that now (core supply issues )

cb

Dave - What's happening at the hill?

http://www.ppihc.com/big/Jayb1586.jpg

I saw posts looking for Mivec solenoids. You always break something there, last year it was a transfer case or something {thumbdwn}

Make sure you put enough VTEC fluid in that thing.

http://www.ppihc.com/big/jayb1615.jpg

http://www.ppihc.com/big/jayb1619.jpg

http://www.ppihc.com/big/jayb1621.jpg

http://www.ppihc.com/big/jayb1672.jpg

http://www.ppihc.com/big/jayb1693.jpg

http://www.ppihc.com/big/jayb1688.jpg

http://www.ppihc.com/big/jayb1682.jpg

http://www.ppihc.com/big/jayb1716.jpg

http://www.ppihc.com/big/jayb1778.jpg

http://www.ppihc.com/big/jayb1827.jpg

http://www.ppihc.com/big/jayb1869.jpg

http://www.ppihc.com/big/jayb1916.jpg

http://www.ppihc.com/big/jayb1999.jpg

http://www.ppihc.com/big/jayb1863.jpg

http://www.ppihc.com/big/jayb1850.jpg

http://www.ppihc.com/big/jayb1835.jpg

http://www.ppihc.com/big/jayb2071.jpg

http://www.ppihc.com/big/jayb2098.jpg

At the beginning of your post I was thinking....wonder how that new ford did. Answer received.

There's more than one Fiesta...Gronholm's driving one. Looks lke the crashed one is Andreas Eriksson's car

They said the damage was mostly body work. I believe they are getting it fixed and they'll be running again. I also heard they are having tuning issues due to the elevation. Gronholm said they have no power under 5000K.

Dave K said the 35R he put on is laggy coming out of the corners on the steep grades, but when the power hits it's serious. I guess he fixed the mivec issue, but found a boost leak and 3rd gear was a little weird feeling. Twitter is lame, but uses for this type of stuff :lol:

Go get em Dave.

Gotta get that anti-lag workin :beer:

Cant wait for sunday. Hopefully they get that second fiesta back up and running, and good luck Dave!

Looks like dave came in 2nd behind the yellow EVO.

Some good practice footage.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ai75qcXvZ4I

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXDtOcTKvHo

I need to stop watching footage. The wheels are turning in my head, and I don't need to be building a Pikes Peak car...

More photos before the rain moved in up top: http://www.rallybuzz.com/ppihc-race-photos/

wow. just opinion I guess but looked like the evo took that section faster than the ford factory car!!

congrats to both daves on a close race!

Everyone was very quick for the conditions. Congrats Dave on the nice finish, may not be 1st but thats the nature of PPIHC! I have a vid of you at the Playground, Ill upload it and post it.

Heres the crappy vid I shot with a digicam. May still be processing

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WLZmm7yZnWo

For your viewing pleasure, for usage and pricing contact me direct!

http://kevinhahnphotography.com/2009/PPIHC2009D2/
http://kevinhahnphotography.com/2009/PPIHC2009D3/
http://kevinhahnphotography.com/2009/PPIHC2009RD/

I'll post more detailed updates later, but the quick rundown was:

1) dogbox problems with 3rd gear on days 2 & 3, had to hold it in gear or it would pop out.
2) we opted to start last in class to allow the road more time to dry from quick downpour during the Time Attack class.
3) PPO car stalled/crashed on course causing start delay.
4) rain moved back in for the two Evo's, requiring wipers on high for the first 1/2 of the course.
5) blew/loosened coupler launching the car at the startline, leaving max boost at 8psi tapering to 5psi by the summit. We had been running 26-30psi all week, so it was quite a power drop.
6) smoke filling car when moving slowly (like under braking),

I'm happy with the result considering all the things that worked against us at the last minute, but that's life up on the hill. We had some good results on practice days, taking top spot on 2 of 3 days, including qualifying. We did make it to the top, so I'm now 3 for 3, which is alot better than it could've been. :)

Huge thanks goes out to all the sponsors in my signature, without your support this effort wouldn't have been possible. :D

Dave

Tuesday July 14th - Final Pre Race Preparations
 

Edit: going to start a new thread with results, will leave this one for pics of car build up and such.

Wednesday July 15th - Practice Day 1
 

Edit: going to start a new thread with results, will leave this one for pics of car build up and such.

Thursday July 16th - Practice Day 2
 

Edit: going to start a new thread with results, will leave this one for pics of car build up and such.

Friday July 17th - Practice Day 3
 

Edit: going to start a new thread with results, will leave this one for pics of car build up and such.

Friday July 17th - Fan Fest
 

Edit: going to start a new thread with results, will leave this one for pics of car build up and such.

Saturday July 18th - "Rest Day"
 

Edit: going to start a new thread with results, will leave this one for pics of car build up and such.