Last weekend's auto-x

Same auto-x, hero run, stayed in the throttle on a big slide.

And on the way home I heard a horrible, oscillating, gear/bearing noise in 3rd-5th gears. I've needed to drop the rear diff for a while so that's where I'm starting and I'll be working through everything until I find it. The noise seems to be independent of gear selection but we'll see.

 

That second run looked FUN!

I'll be interested to see what's going on with your car. I've had a few noises that I've traced down that had interesting results. I had a starter bolt back out and the starter was vibrating the small metal cover behind the flywheel.

Hope it's nothing major (ie, expensive).

Good luck!

 

Get any work done?

 

I got the rear diff out last weekend and finally cracked it open today. Nothing visually wrong anywhere besides one of the plates getting scored. I'm so unhappy I don't have a smoking gun in the diff it's not cool. I'm not looking forward to keeping on troubleshooting this noise as it's only going to get more expensive. At this point I am not confident in the rear diff and the Weir kit installed in it. I'm going to try to get a hold of TRE to go through it so I can be 100% with it. I'll post some pictures tomorrow.

 

Pics of plates and a wear patterns.

 

Haven't updated in a while and for good reason. Car has been on jackstands but I finally have something worth posting. My diff is finally done and on its way back to me from TRE. Got the 12-plate, HD Ninja side cover, and sight glass mod done. I haven't even bothered contacting Weir about the plates as it's a bad design and I will not recommend anyone go down that path. Separately from the Weir kit my pinion bearings were toasted to the point that the pinion fell out as soon as the nut was removed. I had "possibly the worst contact pattern" Jon has ever seen and my side cover bearing was spinning on the stub and eating itself alive. Have I mentioned that I don't even launch my car properly to save on driveline stresses?

I've been hesitant to spend any money on the car as I didn't know how much this issue might end up costing me. I'm fairly confident that this will fix my issues and let me get back on the mod bus (aka wheels and A6s). Only time will tell but I'm eager to get my diff back and get everything back together to confirm. Hopefully I'm back on course (pun intended).

 

Got the TRE diff in a few weeks ago and finally had an event on it. It did step out a little earlier than it did before IIRC. Other than that, nothing special to report on it. I put the rear bar on medium and had sort of written off the day as a learning day due to the diff and the bar change. The car still handled very well and was as predictable as ever. I ended up 11th/110 in raw time only losing to extremely fast cars/drivers (FP, XP, etc). I was not upset in the least that I could hop back in after a few months and run how I did. Especially since I still am on 255 ZII* that are a year old.

 

Well, it's time to bump this thread. I haven't raced the car in over a year due to some knocking in the steering, brakes that needed to be rebuilt, and suspension that needed to be rebuilt. I've had a pile of parts at my house but was hesitant to rip into the car as I was looking for a job which would have required moving. I didn't really want to have to move a car that was on jackstands so I just held off. In March of this year the company I work for was sold and as part of that the management team was changed up quite a bit. One big change was that I went from Sr. Manufacturing Engineer to Director of Manufacturing Engineering. My initial thoughts were to rip the car apart and get to work on it but with the new role came a lot of extra work.

I finally got off my *** a couple months ago and ripped some of the car apart. I sent the suspension off to be rebuilt and a friend rebuilt and powdercoated my calipers for me. The car has been sitting untouched for a couple months now due to a shoulder injury but I'm finally feeling like I can use it again so it's time to get a better SM build underway and be ready for 2017. My current mods are in my signature but my local competition is rather fierce for a half-assed SM car. That local competition is Eric Hyman's GTR and Troy Dudley's GTR which are both on 345 A7s. So, in an effort to step up my game the mods for this round are:

Engine/Fuel
- E85 fuel pump and rewire
- FIC High Z injectors (undecided on 1100 or 1650)
- E85 tune (maybe even FlexFuel)
- Kiggly HLA
- AC removal
- Innovate oil pressure/temp gauge
- recirculating catch can setup
- FP exhaust manifold (replacing JMFab)

Suspension/Brakes/Wheels
- Whiteline steering precision kit
- Girodisc caliper rebuild and powdercoat
- Girodisc titanium shims
- Brake ducting (all of my dust boots were melted)
- Girodisc 2-pc rotors all around
- ARP extended studs
- Muteki SR48s
- 18x10.5 +30 NT03+M
- 285/30-18 A7s

Other
- motor mounts
- driveshaft bushings
- rear seat & belts removal
- radio & speaker removal
- DIY splitter

Progress will probably be slow due to time constraints but I'm sick of not driving this thing. I'm hoping that the continuation of this thread will work as a social contract to keep me motivated. Here's some pictures of how she currently sits, the parts room, and her former glory.

 

Well I actually worked on the car this last weekend, here's what's accomplished:
- wheel studs removed, need to make a collar at work to draw ARPs in
- radio and speakers removed
- drilled and tapped oil drain plug for temp sensor
- test fitted new caster/camber plates; they're ready for powdercoating
- Whiteline steering precision kit installed
- stripped a swaybar mount nut in the subframe but used a longer bolt and nut from bottom side to fix

And I ordered more parts:
- new plugs
- Torque Solutions motor mounts
- Torque Solutions exhaust mounts
- Torque Solutions driveshaft bushings
- AC removal belt and firewall plug

 

Just looking through some of your built parts, the 1100cc injectors are perfect for AutoX power as long as you feed them with more pump than a 255. Flow is everything though so you'll get a lot more out of your pump going with a -6an line and fuel rail. According to MrFreds testing the stock setup had a huge amount of pressure drop in the 450hp range on E85.

With a 340lph pump and 1100s with E85 we see about 85% duty cycle at high boost making somewhere around 500hp.

 

Getting serious, I like it! Do you have a target weight in mind or are you just removing unnecessary stuff and seeing where it sits?

 

Honestly, the fuel system is one of the least researched areas of my car. It was easy on 93 to just go with a 255 and 880s. Now that I'm going to do E85 I realize I have some forum reading to do. I know a 255 won't cut it but don't know what 340lph pump to get and couple with the STM rewire kit. I also don't know if a -6AN line is required as I'm only shooting for ~400whp on E85.

Getting more serious, yes, and thanks. I don't have a target weight in mind and honestly need to go through the SCCA rulebook to make sure I don't break any rules in doing what I am and have previously done. For instance, I removed the intercooler sprayer bottle to make way for a cold air duct to the filter but I don't know if that's a no-no or not. I've also deleted EGR and EVAP and am worried I'll have to put that back on. I know seats, speakers, belts, etc are cool but I'm grey on a lot of the other stuff.

 

400hp on a 255 w/E85 is no problem with 1100s. You pretty dont need anything else.

Once you start getting closer to 500hp the flow needed causes more pressure drop so combined with higher boost is just more restriction for the pump to overcome. At that point an Aeromotive 340 helped drop my duty cycles from 100% down to just under 90% since I could now keep full pressure at the injectors. No rewire or anything, just installed the pump (required soldering a connector but its just two wires).

This is with a 2.3l, Blouch 1.0XTR, ~27-28psi.

 

Well the going is slow but I've got some more done. Torque Solutions motor mounts are installed, as are the driveshaft bushings. Fought the exhaust hanger on the muffler section for a while before I realized it's a different height than the factory one and there were only two 12mm hangers, which means both needed to be used on the downpipe. So, I'm going to order a new factory hanger for the muffler and use the other three on the rear subframe and downpipe hangers. Still waiting on the camber plates which is not letting me install the wheel studs up front. I did get a fender roller as well as some quick latches for the front bumper. I'm going to end up making a front fender spacer/quick release bumper mount out of aluminum at work. I've already made one spacer that bends the front of the fender in so there's barely any headlight gap so I'll just make a bigger version to mount the quick release stud. Finally, I received a set of take-off 285/30-18 A6s from Jon Berget Racing Tire so I need to get those mounted, put wheel studs in the rear, and start rolling some fender. Everything's better with pictures so here's all I've got to show for the last month of procrastinating and being lazy...

 

Glad you got to do some work! I have something fun to install this weekend, too.