fidelity101

iTrader: (11)

Sort of... but that's not done yet but its a bit of WIP at the moment since that need will be more focused on the replacement of this engine, which latest dyno shows, it still has a lot of fight left in it @90 psi compression:


This car desperately needed a new exhaust so this was going to happen anyways.

I need to 3D scan the t2 insert and then make a few plastic mockups to fine tune the model/fitment then do final print out of inconel, like I did with this. Mazdatrix sells a titanium sleeve but I think this is a poor choice of material for this application, it will oxidize each heat cycle and can't withstand the temperatures as inconel does.

You still want the exhaust to be overflush to the port to aid as an anti-reversion lip, tidying up the insert would help out but its a bit further down the pecking order right now.

fidelity101

iTrader: (11)

I forgot to post the finished parts!



almost done!

fidelity101

iTrader: (11)

some more views:A little side by side comparison, out with the old and in with the new!


















and with the ceramic coating







and onto the suspension and differential stuff!

fidelity101

iTrader: (11)

I got busy on doing some pre-race season maintenance, pretty much overhaul the whole car. front end/body work/lights (front and rear), suspension, sub frame attachment points, bushings... quite a lot actually.







pretty much everything....





needed to fix some of the damage from CUPR and re-attach the upper mounts for the oil cooler:


also these fixed headlights have been in shambles for quite some time now and have been more problematic than anything so I am going back to fixed pop ups given that 4x6 or 7" round LED headlamps have become so cheap and effective over the last 10 years so I don't need to resort to this patchwork garbage of neatness (J30 headlamp housings, stock J30 high beam, low beam was retrofitted with S550 Europe Mustang bi-function HIDs, so yes I had 2 high beams) but the old plastic housings could not take the abuse and they were barely hanging on in there so they needed to go.

still a lot of work left to do there cleaning up wiring and bolting on the popup structures but meanwhile in the front I have to overhaul the front shocks, they are sticking and I never serviced them over the several rallies I did on them (bad idea) so these need attention:



I have no idea how to overhaul these but I've heard they are pretty easy.

also to rebuild the strut tops:



Got these overhauled nicely and reinstalled ready to rock!


so moving onto the rear, the diff needed to come out and be inspected because it was mostly and open diff after a few corners and found this:







this diff was put together in the fall of 2015 so I think it had a good run but I'm sure ive been on an "open diff" for the past few years.

so with some of the LSD rebuild parts being NLA I opted for a rally tailored 1.5 clutch type diff, cusco doesn't make one and the KAAZ units in rally I have heard don't do well (from fiesta to Subaru and then some...) so I opted for a nice clutch type from OS Giken which has great reviews. The problem is that with my Non turbo rear end/7" ring gear there isn't a lot of options but you can order a 94+ 1.8L miata diff and swap it in, I use my rx7 ring gear and ta da! Even the bearings are the same part number between the two...





easiest way to remove the diff in this car is to lower the subframe, so I went to town cleaning many pounds of mud/sand/silt/rocks from within the crossmember and ontop of the diff,. I am also using this time to freshen up anything that needs attention.

I had these spare control arms a while back that got powdercoated with a batch of wheels and I forgot about them until I accidently found them looking for other parts so these will get the bushings replaced and re-installed:





after that I found an rx7 in the junkyard that is surprisingly rust free and mostly picked over but I did manage to grab some more NLA parts and unique hardware!





the bolt on the right came off my differential and was purchased new in 2015 from Mazda, the one in the middle was off of the unknown mileage junk car, even the camber adjuster hardware came out effortless! Usually these seize in the bushings and need to be forcefully removed... with force.

fidelity101

iTrader: (11)

needed to fix some rust areas and also spent the time cleaning inside the fender areas and prepped for some stich welding and seam welding in the front areas.









its not total but I got some areas that are known to be weak in this chassis but I have seen no signs of cracking or anything, metal welded up pretty okay too.



car is back together, the to do list is nearly done.



reinforced the subframe heavily.. by sacrificing another subframe with cutting it up and grafting it to the one I use.



and put the old control arms that got reconditioned (Powdercoating, new bushings, spherical bearing delete) and then just spray painted the others because replacing the boots was too hard of a task...






TA DA!






I also got my spares re-bearinged and had the axles rebuilt by a local shop which included my spares.





but is cosmetic and legal side of things I was able to freshen up the lighting and the front bumper after cleaning up and seam welding the under side of the frame below the fenders.







going back to pop ups and no more HID jank J30 headlight debochary I did years ago, off the shelf LED tech has become quite nice so this was an easy solution.



but I also did the tail lights too

Whizbang

I sold the SA rally car project 😢

fidelity101

iTrader: (11)

sad news

peejay

fidelity101

iTrader: (11)

id say all that prep worked out pretty good:

anyways here is the in car from the jump at 100acre wood rally.

youtube was ruining the quality
[img][img]
​I'll get an exterior collage up as well.

fidelity101

iTrader: (11)

long time no update but a new engine has been built and is in the middle of break in, also I 3d printed the intake manifold and I am using an EFI technologies throttlebody PRO RACE setup which has a beautiful induction noise;




rx8 rotating assembly (franken wankel #2 uses the e-shaft currently as a drop in swap but this goes a bit further) utilizing titanium hardware (the ti hardware is stupid I know, but I was going this far so I said F it...) and the whole assembly is rebalanced within 1 gram. There isn't much lightening you can do here outside of the racing beat pulley shown and the rx8 shaft (1/2lb lighter than the rx7 e-shaft)

so I had to find other areas to reduce mass:



rx8 rotors have been modified... extensively





to the untrained eye this just looks like some cool light weighting and some poor machning marks but what we have here is:

• Rx8 Rotors
  • rx8 rotors are ~110g lighter than the rx7 rotor
  • compression bump from 9.7:1 to 10.1:1
  • can open intake ports earlier given side seals are more outboard than rx7 rotors, allows for more porting
• Rx8 Rotors Lightened
  • further lightened by about another 100g each
• Rotor scalloping added (more port timing)
  • rx8s already have a minor scallop but its not on every face because it would mess with the side port style of a renesis, however in a wankel I don't have that problem and then these rotors become unhanded which is nice for assembly.
  • its not huge in comparison to what you may find on the internet, rx8 side seals are more outboard on the rotor
• Apex seal grooves wire EDM cut for Rx7 apex seals
• Each rotor is balanced within 1 gram of each other (roughly 9lb rotor)
• Rotors have been clearanced (look towards the tip of the apex's)
  • at high rpm rotors tend to wobble and crash into the side plate causing wear
  • this step omits that possibility by removing a tiny bit of material
  • you can see the horizontal lines as you approach the apex seal

well we can't just do all this fun work and not let it breathe better can we? hell no! The stock intake is far too heavy and cumbersome so its time to drop some weight and increase the filtering and let some of these ponies breathe,


​​​​​​
(motor shown with S5 housings, eventually those get ditched)


pre assembly





trimmed a few areas to make it easier to install and all good for the most part.





I managed to save 16.5lbs off the stock intake as well so thats good news.



total intake system now weighs 14.55lbs - not too shabby.


added new FD housings instead of my S5 NA ones.


I do hate tearing into new housings was tempted to run them as is but nahhhh.



this is better suited for my non turbo application and doesn't really change the port opening but increases the duration for more overlap. Here is the port marked on the FD rotor housing.

EGR port is welded up too and is using the 3d printed inconel718 exhaust inserts that got polished up.


Plug the hole and tap the hole for m6 thread to use set screws instead of rollpins. good with and without the printed inserts.



these came out much better than the other housings.






​​​​

fidelity101

iTrader: (11)

this is no longer a frankenwankel - its truly a dankenwankel now.






Renesis Rotating, fully cut
rx8 stat gears
1 Piece dowels, hollow - pineapple racing
Custom streetport
Cosmo 13B RE front/rear irons
20B center iron
FD housings w/ printed inserts (Inconel 718)
Printed metal intake/exhaust manifolds
Haltech elite 1000
EFI Hardware ITBs

​​​​​​​

fidelity101

iTrader: (11)

cut up a perfectly good aluminum hood:



adding venting


then add stripes!


I may ultimately print a cowl specifically for this as the roof scoop is a bit bulky, anyone handy with CAD let me know!

need-a-t2

iTrader: (9)

Absolutly love the 3d printed intake. Where did you get it printed?

I'm pretty handy with CAD if you need something modeled up.

fidelity101

iTrader: (11)

yeah sounds good!, PM me your email address and I'll sketch up something in powerpoint. I need basically like an oval with flanges on the inside for a certain profile, just need to check with some flat stock on the hood if that will work or if a curvature needs to be added which would be harder to measure. I got access to a variety of printers but not any ability to 3d model lol


full motor build/details here:
https://www.rx7club.com/naturally-as...el-na-1152669/

dyno coming mid september to compare.

need-a-t2

iTrader: (9)

soooo....do you take on metal 3d printing government jobs for friends?

fidelity101

iTrader: (11)

unfortunately no, I changed jobs so I lost access to those ones but I can still use plastic ones with decent size.

NikkiEnkei

My friends saw you at the Lake Superior rally! Wish I could have made it, kicking myself for not going

fidelity101

iTrader: (11)

oh man it was a blast! I hope he got some cool pictures:
1st in class
2nd in 2wd overall
2nd in regional
12th overall, all classes combined (68 teams started)

here is an onboard from our favorite stage of the rally:

Narfle

iTrader: (16)

Great video!

fidelity101

iTrader: (11)

we were 14th overall on this stage, 2nd in 2wd by a good 25 seconds but that guy is quite the talented driver and has twice the horsepower than us, so I managed to beat him on that stage when we re-ran it at night as the conditions worsened

some action shots:



@mack_press





@mack_press



@thewreccecrew


plenty of blue as you can see on decel events.

fidelity101

iTrader: (11)

Some more work done since the last race and it takes us back to Summer of 2019 where I originally went down this brake upgrade idea ( I got this piece designed and fabricated by epicenter design (grand rapids MI area) to utilize the vacant dust shield holes on the rear hub to help mount the new brake caliper (Z32 fixed dual, very similar to the subaru 2 pots, the backside piece is a different casting but the front is the same).



the original bracket uses only 2 m8 bolts for the brake caliper so I don't feel too worried about this setup, strong hardware and ship it!



this setup took so long that the open market solved this issue but the parts shop max uses a 2 bolt aluminum bracket ( mine is steel) to use a hydro e-brake so I got a set for my backup hubs but I like this more robust version for my application. Rockauto no longer sells the Z32 rear calipers anymore either so unfortunately my only solution is parts shop max for their calipers re-pops which actually look very nice and no noticeable tooling marks on the castings so these HPDC pieces are likely off of new or newer molds so thats good. Lets hope the aluminum isn't too soft as I will likely need to add a wheel scraper to protect these or make these calipers as consumables.





pedal is a little softer but I think I still have some air in the lines as these pistons are slightly larger than the ones its replacing. I may be able to go down in master cylinder size if needed but likely not required.



big brake kits for these cars are focused on track cars or people using later model rx7 brakes for larger wheels, I needed this to fit under 15" wheels as all rally tires are 15s

Brrraaap

I think the schools decision to give us all computers was the worst thing they could do for my productivity. I love the build, I always thought rally was cool but i could never bring myself to do this to a car i own.

fidelity101

iTrader: (11)

​ had some fun and took the studs out at the rally farm for an official test day.



this video is without the studs but I was playing with camera(s) and had issues later on but here is what it takes on the studs, the tires took a beating that day but man they are a blast and they aren't even WRC spec...



kold kutters!



inside of the tire uses hardened washers and nylon locknuts to keep the studs from ejecting themselves:





end result: many sharp studs for ice bitey fun




​

fidelity101

iTrader: (11)

And for my next trick, I'm getting fatter and older and I'm tired of inuring a hand/elbow/wrist or hearing me breathe heavily out of my mouth on recordings so I have decided instead of working out/eating healthier or learn to drive smoother/better instead I opted to just modify the car better. Introduce the EPAS:


I got it already modified with a quick release hub instead of running a series of adapters and spacers like whats currently on there.





this unit is a saturn vue/equinox for those wondering the prius ones are non adjustible, this bolt in kit gave me a dial as part of the steering ECU. Should be fun to test out on the ice!

WondrousBread

This is interesting, I'd like to see how the EPAS pans out.

From a few electronic power steering systems I've driven, I can safely say I don't like it. I'm wondering if that's inherent to the technology itself though, or just the implementation on the particular cars I've driven.