did I mention I love this car? I came up on a newer 3 series Beemer tonight, he had it floored at an on ramp and I blew his doors off like he was absolutely standing still, this car RIPS in this cold weather, I'm seeing 4 C charge temps! I need to get to a dyno, I must have at least 370 at the wheels

 

Yeah it was 40F (lol cali cold) the other night and the car was definitely at one of its memorable peaks.

 

it literally feels like the car has another 80 hp

 

Cold weather is only fun IF you can get traction!!


=Ben

 

I just realized that 4C IS 40F hah! but im not sure how cold my charge temp was.. tad bit higher I'm sure, but after the FMIC... I can definitely feel it.

 

Make sure you are properly tuned for the cold weather. If you are not and your fuel goes lean than say bye bye to that engine.

 

good point, I've been eyeing my AFRs and actually tweaked the Aeromotive FPR to keep it in the 11.5 range at full boost

 

i was gonna mention that same thing twisted. be careful man i have some horror stories about cold air and pushing it. way back when i was on the stock twins and cold winter nights, the stock twins really seem to scream in the cold air or at least i thought. man i miss that smooth spooling sound.

 

Your running lean.

 

That is why I clicked on this thread, but he seems to be watching it.

 

Does anybody else have trouble keeping traction in cold weather? Not sure if it's the cool charge or the cold tires, but it's hard to keep in a straight line under full throttle when the temps dip (for LA, at least).

2007 ZX-10: Where are you measuring your charge temps?

 

yeah, tires have less traction in cold weather. below about 50F they start to get crappier, and below 30F many summer tires become basically useless.

 

ha, i agree 100% with this thread. I had the car out all last week while i was home in chicago for thanksgiving and DEF on saturday night it was into the 20s. Man that was the fastest the car has felt in a lonnng time. Absolutely no traction in 1st.....2nd was iffy

BUT!........man I was lucky enough to know what the hell i'm doing with the car because I probably would have blown the motor. I have a manual boost controller and normally I'm ok with higher gear boost in 2ndary. But in the cold weather I was EASILY gonna hit 13-14psi if i didn't let out. That only happen thankfully for a split second because I was staring at the boost gauge. That meant my night was really only just some fun 2nd gear pulls. I basically had to open the controller completely up in order to not really overboost...but i didn't want to chance anything so I resisted anymore highway pulls. Now the car is in hibernation for the season.


for reference my mods are: street port,stock twins, stock ecu, hf cat, dp, rb duals catback, upgraded SMIC, manual boost set to 10 or lower

I realize i'm really pushing the limit but the car has been running strong for the last 5years and I ALWAYS have the controller to 10 psi...most of the time its like 8-9 psi

Most likely i'm gunna port the wastegate when I'm home for winter break. I'm waiting to graduate and get a nice job to pay for a PFC and some tuning. But yea, cold weather at least has some ups

 

He is running 15 psi.

 

This time of year you see two different posts. 1) I spun out and hit something (cold pavement/traction related) and 2) I over-boosted and blew my motor (Nice dense cold air). Watch out people, the best thing to do is park that beautiful car before something unfortunate happens...

 

Better be careful, you'll haul *** right around a telephone pole ! It's a known fact - cold weather = poor hookup and ice proves even worse.




Later

 

Is the third gen computer such a suck fest that it can't compensate for weather changes??

 

^ ummm, what?

The only reason why it can't compensate for the density of the air is because its a MAF system as opposed to a MAP based system like a Supra which can compensate for exhaust, intake etc mods and with an Rx7 you have a 3 mod rule before you have to upgrade your ecu.

On another note, I did drive my Rx7 at the beginning of winter, but not hard because I was always having to watch the coolant. For some reason it drinks coolant in cold temps, but not in summer. All that meant though for me is that I couldnt get carried away with the colder temps, maybe a Mazda installed safety option? hahahaha

 

You're incorrect sir. Our generation is equipped with a map sensor. This is not related to the reasons that we have boost spiking issues either. That's wastegate related. The main problem with driving this car in the winter is related to traction. People typically have high performance tires for the summer. Come wintertime the pavement does not make a very good match and we have people making threads with stupid unrelated excuses...

 

Mark, what wheels are those on your FD?

 

Hell yeah, cold weather makes for tons o' fun I tuned my car last winter when it was max cold where I live, and the car feels like it's making another 20+ hp when it's chilly out. But 4C charge temp? That's pretty friggen cold. Coldest I've ever had mine was 25C on a 40F day Have fun and don't crash that pretty car!!!!

 

No you don't. Keep the boost at 10psi and you can add as many bolt-ons as you like.

I don't know why this 'rule' is making a comeback - it has long been discounted.

 

The stock ECU runs so rich that the car is unlikely to run lean in the coldest of weather (assuming stock boost levels). However, with some mods and/or an aggressively tuned ECU, problems can arise.

 

oh sorry, my bad guys, I was just refering to a thread on here about possibly converting it to a MAP system, I just assumed that these cars were completely MAF based. About the wastegate, your right about that too, so just completely forget what I said.

 

I totally agree with this. I had an AEM UEGO hooked up w/ the mods that I have now (minus the FMIC, it was a SMIC), the car at WOT was in the 10's. I forgot where exactly but I posted in a thread long ago that that 3 mod stuff w/ our cars running out of fuel is crap. Just gotta control that boost!! I think I'll port my waste gate this month, even though I'm not seeing a spike of 11 psi and its not even often at all.