So I finally got around to pulling apart my 12A that's been in my 85 GS, and so far the results are promising. Everything looks great aside from carbon buildup on the rotors, and there's no signs of wear or anything bad. I did lose one of the small triangle bits off one of my apex seals though, so that sucked. I've been mulling over what I want to do with it and I think I've decided I'm going to go ahead with my original idea for a semi-peripheral port intake.

I'll have a standalone ECU for controlling where the intake is inputting, so I can keep my low end power from the side ports, and on the top end the peripherals will kick in. I was wondering if anyone had any recommendations on what apex seals I should be gunning for, as I can't seem to find much that explains why I should use specific materials or not. I was planning on setting the rev limiter to 11k for racing, and turning it down for weekend driving to the regular limit of 8.5k. I'm not sure if the Atkins cryo seals are enough, and finding carbon or ceramic is both difficult and I can't find much information on which are the better seals.

I don't particularly plan on running it in official races within a class, more just as a fun car or in open class so I don't have to work within restrictions. I am going to build it as a rally car, taking after some of the group b cars. I've come to terms that I'm going to need to fabricate some parts myself, like the fog lights for the nose cone and new fiberglass doors to replace my damaged stock ones. I'm doing a complete restoration, with plans to buy a rotisserie to make life easier. Money isn't really a deterrent for me, as I don't want to cheap out and have it blow up on me due to bad parts.

Thanks in advance to any responses, I'll try my best to check here often but sometimes I forget this site exists, and I don't return for a while.

 

Nice to see another rally first gen being built! Progress on mine has been slow recently but I will have more free time shortly. On the issue of seals, one of the main reasons I went with a 13b instead of a 12a for mine is the smaller 2mm apex seals are less likely to chatter at high rpm, and I didn’t have to spend $$$$ on race specific seals. A 13b 6 port will also give you more of an opportunity to control port timing, with the 5th/6th port being controllable electronically with a kit from Jaffa engineering. Just my 2 cents, I look forward to seeing this build

 

Yeah. after looking around for Peripheral port services, I think I might swap to a 13B. I can order semi pp housings from billet rotary for 1400, which is just a bit more than the cost of having the service done to the housings I already have. plus 13b parts are way more available than 12a bits. I still want to make sure that I can hit the high revs on race days without blowing up though. I looked into that Jafa kit, and it looks like they're working on a semi pp 13b manifold, which is perfect.

I'll do my best to keep it documented, but as of now any pictures are going to look bad. I have the fenders, doors, and front clip pulled off, its on jack stands, and My lights in my storage shed are non functional, so its dark (not to mention the stack of playboys behind the car lol). I've been trying and failing to find a FC subframe and rear end I can use to get 5 lug spindles/axles on it, but I'm keeping an eye out anyways.

Once I get the fiberglass molds for the fogs and possibly the body kit too, I can see about glassing up some ones for you too. I used to work in fiberglass, so once the mold is done, gel coating and chopping the parts together is cake. Theoretically, I can just pull a mold off the parts I get, and have them refabricated when they get damaged beyond repair. The fogs will be from scratch, but I plan on trying again and again until I think its perfect. I was looking at the Mode 1 kit from rotary engineering as a start, and flaring the bottom out a bit more on the front and rear, as well as a more pronounced side skirt. Same deal with the IMSA spoiler, but I kinda want to make it true to the group B with a cut for cooling in the wing. Also, the headlight covers are way heavier than needed, plus the NACA duct ones from black tie look awesome, but it's just the right side, so a left side one would be nice to match.

Sorry, went on a bit of a tangent there. Best of luck to you too, I'll try and be active with my build progress on here.

 

to be clear are we talking stage rally or rallycross?

 

Was planning on stage rally, but gotta start somewhere, and that somewhere is probably going to be autocross or gambler. I plan on running with a co driver, since on familiar roads I'm pretty good, but not so much on roads I've only driven once. Having the pacenotes helps a lot

 

Good news, there are actually two rally people that lurk this forum. I'm one of them. So, if you want to run stage rally, the rules are quite specific. Regarding the doors:

"Driver and co-driver doors must be structurally unaltered with the following exceptions. If the original structure has been removed or altered, either: a) A door panel that is compliant with FIA drawing 255-14 must be installed or b) the safety cage must include a sill bar plus 2 continuous door bars containing four vertical studs. Homologated roll cages may not be modified. All sharp edges must be protected by a door panel, edge guard, or similar"

Basically, keep the stock doors else you likely wont pass tech.