David, The car looks good.
There's a standing 1/2 mile event in ocala end of January if you are interested.
I did the Georgia event last month, it was a lot of fun.

wannaGOFAST - High-Speed Racing - Florida 1/2 Mile Private Runway Shootout

 

^ That would be something I'd like to do, given the car being back together and ready to go. My guess is I'd need to do one later in the year.

 

The Georgia 1/2 is in September.

Clayton isnt far from Asheville
wannaGOFAST - High-Speed Racing - Georgia 1/2 Mile Private Runway Shootout

 

David,

Did you ever get an results from the guys that make engine ice? are you running it in your cooling system?

 

^
What he said, GATO did some nice work looks good... Did you move the block further back? I've got a 4" gap from the rear upper mani to the firewall. Yours looks closer?

 

Not yet as the car hasn't started in over 1 year. We are going to test the Engine Ice by first putting in regular coolant and then swapping over to the Engine Ice. I will post up the results.

Nope, the block hasn't been moved back. It's in the regular position with the RXSpecialities subframe.

 

Looking good David! Too bad it wont be ready for the 1/2 mile event in Jan in Ocala

 

^ Yep, that sounds like something I need to do. Don't want to 1/4 mile drag race, but the 1/2 mile event would be fun.

 

Its alot of fun, you can easy it out of the hole since E/T doesn't matter its all about the trap speed

 

Quick update, no pics.

Stopped by Kilo's last week and they are making good progress on the car. Swapped around the oil coolers so the fittings are on the top versus the old bottom setup (the fittings would scrap on occasion - not good). Busy rewiring the car, including the engine harness and then the Haltech loom portions. Changing out all the AN fittings to black versus the collection of red and blue ones for a more consistent look and feel.

All in all, good progress and should now be a month or two away from startup and dyno tuning.

Happy New Year to everyone!

 

What's an update without pics! Come on man..you come to FL to see the car and don't take out your fancy phone and take pics!!!!! We want pics ahhahahahahahjah. Good to see that you I'll have the car home just in time for great driving weather. Enjoy it hen it gets home.

 

^ Paps speaks the truth. My fancy iPhone 6 stayed in my pocket. Probably mostly a factor of how I was feeling physically - had the "crud" as they call it here in Asheville when I visited Kilo and just wasn't motivated to take pics. I will do better next time. Car does look pretty though. If only someone took pics

I'd like to think everything will be buttoned back up this month and we can get the car out of his shop by February/March. We shall see. The wiring in the car is pretty messed up and I don't know how long that will take to straighten out.

How's it going with your truck? Everything good? Any plans for bringing it up this way?

 

Thats awesome to hear man , wish you had taken pictures though! like stated above haha . But who cares soon I bet this thread will be nothing but pictures from the first time it wakes up , till the first drive , till the first boost , till the first burnout , till the first canyon drive , till the first speeding ticket <-- lets hope we dont get that far!

 

^ Yes, I messed up. Will most certainly take lots of pics and videos, especially of the dyno tuning sessions and then afterwards. One of our goals during dyno tuning is to illustrate the effects on performance (spool up and WHP) of different turbo ARs. The goal here is to help others with understanding how turbos work and how to select the best turbo for the given application. I know I could have used that knowledge so the Borg Warner turbo guys are going to attend the tuning session and we will swap out the AR side with 3 different sizes and then we post up the dyno results.

As for the canyon drive vids, how about some mountain roads ones instead? And the speeding ticket vids, I already had one of those posted a few years ago at DGRR

 

Everything is good...having a naging problem with the REPU but i'm sure i will soon have it sorted out..in the meantime, i got myself a rx-4 to help combat ROTARY WITHDRAW

once you post the vids and the numbers all the haters will chime in and tell you how you should make more power and how their turbo and their set up would have made 1500HP more than yours might want to leave you phone in your pocket during the tuning session ahahahahahhah

 

Look forward to seeing it in person. Love how it is turning out. An RX-4? Very cool. Going completely old school are you? You should bring it to Roebling Raceway and track it

[quote}once you post the vids and the numbers all the haters will chime in and tell you how you should make more power and how their turbo and their set up would have made 1500HP more than yours might want to leave you phone in your pocket during the tuning session ahahahahahhah[/QUOTE]

Yep, that will happen for sure. Building it for me and my goals, which is a streetable car that I can take to the track and have some fun. I've learned so much along the way with this build and one thing I know for sure is I am not chasing big numbers up top. Not to say the car won't do 700 WHP at 18 PSI or so, but nowadays, that isn't the biggest out there. And for my mid-level track skills, 550 WHP or so is plenty fine for me.

I want to do the videos as it will be fun, and more importantly, to illustrate the effects of different AR housings on turbos. Think others will benefit from that was much as me.

Awesome news Gordon. Glad the car is back and you are having fun. No envy here, nope none at all Once I get the car back, I'd too like to get something going with an event, preferably a track one like we tried to do. I'd love to invite a number of 3 rotor guys and V8 builds as well as anyone else that would like to attend.

 

Ahem....ok guys, we've been talking about this FOREVER!! Maybe Sevenstock 18 November 2015? You could get a two car hauler and have them both shipped, or drive the hauler. Would LOVE to see you both later this year! Maybe Trey will bring his back out again as well. Think about it!!!

 

Edited it for ya

DO-IT, I'll see you on the West-coast. I'm planning to do a cross country trip in the FD for SS2015.... probably the first and last time ill have my car in Cali -_-

 

^ "Benny" should have been the first on the list, not the last. Of course, this means we have to have actual running cars and I don't think the two of us have been on the road at the same time in what, 5 years?

Tim and Gordon, I don't think SS2015 can happen for me this year. It's going to be the month before our house lawsuit goes to trail so I think I will be pretty swamped with that unfortunately.

On a car note, if anyone has or knows someone with an excellent shape front wiring harness, let me know. Kilo wants to replace the one on the car. I am going to call Ray this am but I don't know if you can get one new anymore.

 

If ray can't hook you up I know cam has a pile of those at pettit if you are willing to deal with them.

 

Sorry to hear about SS, but understand. Check with Fritz as another possibility!

Oops... sorry. Do you mean an FD harness, or OEM 3-rotor? Probably the latter, huh?

 

Yea I plan on returning this year again. I wont be driving it there like last year. Planning on buying a new Ecodiesel Ram 1500 and aluminum trailer in the next couple months. Tim you where right... I should be traveling in comfort.

Definetly wanna try to make an Fd testing event also.

 

^ FD harness, the one that wraps around the wheel wells and across the front bumper. That is the one that is hacked up.

I've got a pm into Fritz and will call Pettit and Ray today. Just ran out of time yesterday.

As for SS, it's on my bucket list and I will attend, just not this year unless there is some major early break through with the lawsuit. It's been my experience though, over the past two years, insurance lawyers never do anything early.

 

Things are progressing and should accelerate quickly now.

The parts (most of them) have been coated with a thermal dispersant material. The powder coater ran out about 3/4 ths of the way thru the process so there are a few pieces that have to be finished but that will be done this coming week.

Here are a few pics of how thermal dispersant looks:





It has an interesting, almost sand blasted look to it. The first pic is of the radiator which was polished aluminum and the second, of the front of the RE Medy water pump.

In any event, the thermal dispersant will be applied to all of the v mount components, including the intercooler, piping, radiator, and the ac condenser. As you might recall, I am using an RX8 condenser with the built in dryer unit. The brackets that hold the v mount on the car were powder coated a shiny black for contrast.

A somewhat current (and dark) pic of the state of the engine bay:



The front half of the turbo and modified piping is coated with the thermal dispersant. The oil cooler work is done and Kilo is spending a lot of time on the wiring. He's tracing down faulty connections and wires that are no longer needed. Trying to get it right this time so there are no more electrical gremlins.

The Tial 60mm wastage showed up so it will replace my awesome Synapse 50mm unit. Kilo's a Tial guy and really wanted to use one on the car so I acquiesced and out goes the Synapse wastage. If anyone is in need of what I think is a better wastage (Synapse), shoot me a pm.

Speaking of electrical things, you know I can't stand still on the LED front so here is a quick mockup of some COB LED rings I am testing in the 99 spec turn signals:



The COB rings are by far the brightest and best "angel eye" LED rings I have ever seen. Wicked bright and that really surprised me. As an alternative, I am working on my Audi style curved LED DRLs to improve the brightness of them (by using in each side 20 50 lumen Nichia LEDs behind an OEM diffuser material) so we will see what wins out. I am thinking seriously of just using two of the COB LED rings (one the smaller 60MM rings on the inside and a bit larger 70/80mm ring on the outside) and calling it a day. I've also played around with using a slightly smoked lens in the setup so when the lights are not on, they have more of a stealth look. Want to get them (the LEDs) to turn off when I activate the turn signals, so if any of you know how to do this shoot me a pm or post it up here. I'd appreciate it. I know I can tap into the turn signal power feed with a relay but am wondering if this will just cause the LEDs to blink (opposite the turn signals)? Might be okay but I'd rather have the LEDs off while the turn signal is on.

Bigger updates coming soon

 

^ Thanks for the comments Gordon. I try to be as factory as I can with my LED work. I think I hit the mark more often than not. That is why I am taking so long on improving what I had in the turn signals. I want it to look right and am torn between the LED circles (will match the 99 spec ring design in the taillights) versus the curvy Audi style look that is a bitch to put together. We will see.

As for the ceramic thermal dispersant coating, you missed the drama in the thread on this about one year ago. Go back a few pages for more details as they are posted up. In short, a thermal dispersant ceramic coating allows heat to dissipate more rapidly than uncoated surfaces. The claimed improvement in heat transfer is up to 20%. I've spoken to a few coatings experts that have personally seen the improvements so I decided to give the product a shot. I can't do before and after testing as I didn't want to wait that long (to test uncoated, pull everything apart and have coated, reassemble and then test again) but the end result should be improved heat temp controlling. And yes, I've always chased temp problems on the car, especially when tracking so I wanted to fix this once and for all. The v-mount setup should give me the most bang for the buck but the thermal dispersant is extra added insurance. Plus, as you point out, it adds to the all black look of the engine bay. Curiously, I am adding in a bit of red in the engine bay to complement the red stripes on the wheels.

As an aside, the guy doing my powder/thermal dispersant coatings is a rotary person and he's testing different types of coatings on rotary engines. He's used both ceramic heat barriers and thermal dispersants on his 3 rotor and is now testing them. Here is a pic of a thermal barrier coated rotor with a micro-slick coating to reduce friction:



Piston guys use these types of coatings all the time and they are becoming more popular on OEM applications. The thought is performance (HP) will be improved through better heat management as well as longevity through friction reducing materials. I'd bet they will work well.