Castrol Canadian Touring Car Race This Weekend
08-30-07, 08:26 AM
#1
Rotary Freak
Thread Starter
Castrol Canadian Touring Car Race This Weekend
We think we have the bugs worked out of the #23 FC RX7 and will be out this weekend as well as the Mazdee's FD car, the Can-Saf FD, the Dolan FD car (out of Ottawa), the Viera peri port FC and my pig. I will only be out on Sunday as I have some work commitments for Saturday. We changed the mapping system over to the incredibly less sophisticated Alpha-N type of control and the car seems to be working very well, but we will see how it goes on track. I am planning to run both the CCTCC 40 minute and the GT Sprints races on Sunday, soooo that means over 100 minutes of racing action on Sunday alone. As always, Dave and I could use an extra body to help out, at least with refueling and tire/ brake temps and pressures.
For anybody who is interested in Rotary Cars racing at the highest levels, there are only 3 weekends left before we are deemed too old! The CCTCC is rumoured to be implementing a 10 year age rule and if it goes through ......, back to bracket racing (what's the breakout time for GT-B????).
So come out over the next few weekends and let the people know how much you appreciate RX7's racing.
Now, hmmmmm.....how much can I get a newer Civic or Golf shell for, LOL.
Eric
For anybody who is interested in Rotary Cars racing at the highest levels, there are only 3 weekends left before we are deemed too old! The CCTCC is rumoured to be implementing a 10 year age rule and if it goes through ......, back to bracket racing (what's the breakout time for GT-B????).
So come out over the next few weekends and let the people know how much you appreciate RX7's racing.
Now, hmmmmm.....how much can I get a newer Civic or Golf shell for, LOL.
Eric
08-30-07, 01:31 PM
#4
Go Hard....or Go Home
Wow I may even be there on Sunday, however running in the G70 or Ontario Challenge Cup classes. I dont think all the rotary powered cars have been there all together this year!
08-31-07, 11:02 AM
#6
Rotary Freak
Thread Starter
Found a New Class for My Car.
Hooray, hooray, looks like I found a class to race my car in next year with only 2 changes. SCCA has a D/Prepared class that goes back to 1990 and my car slots into it. Changes required is a single 33mm inlet restrictor, about 100 lbs of ballast and a fuel cell. No biggies as I was planning on a cell anyways. The class was developed as a home for ex-WC cars and thats where I fit in. HP limit is 250 HP and base weight is 2700 lbs with driver. No issues at all and the best thing is that the car gets to run against other similar cars for a class win and no break outs.
I will still do some CASC Regionals in the Sprints Class, but I will run Mosport with the SCCA and run Watkins Glen and Mid Ohio as well. This gives me enough runs to qualify for the Nationals in Topeka if it is invited to attend. ITS would never allow my to run.
Oh happy happy days, LOL.
I will still do some CASC Regionals in the Sprints Class, but I will run Mosport with the SCCA and run Watkins Glen and Mid Ohio as well. This gives me enough runs to qualify for the Nationals in Topeka if it is invited to attend. ITS would never allow my to run.
Oh happy happy days, LOL.
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08-31-07, 11:23 AM
#8
Go Hard....or Go Home
All I hope is that my car runs this weekend and doesnt break anything else! I dont even care what lap times it runs at this point! (lol) This is the 1st run on the BFG tires, my MX7 transmission new rear spring perches/spring rates etc!
09-03-07, 03:40 PM
#18
Yes, a great weekend!
Sun, racing, beer and more beer, more sun then more beer and racing, followed by beer and sunburn.
Hats off to Ted and Mike who both drove great. The new rear wing has made a big difference on the car. On Sunday, Ted disected the field to finish 6th after starting 19th. He had a great battle for lap after lap with Dave in the Mazdees FD. Ted was a little stronger under braking that Diedrick (which made me feel good after we had to redo my botched blake-bleeding job from the morning warmup), but the sequential gearbox in the Mazdees car always gave him a few car lenghts coming out of 5B, making it very hard to catch up before the end of the back straight. Ted passed Dave on the 2nd last lap, only to hit a patch of oil and fly off the track. He managed to recover and finish the race!!
Best Lap was 1:32.072.
Sun, racing, beer and more beer, more sun then more beer and racing, followed by beer and sunburn.
Hats off to Ted and Mike who both drove great. The new rear wing has made a big difference on the car. On Sunday, Ted disected the field to finish 6th after starting 19th. He had a great battle for lap after lap with Dave in the Mazdees FD. Ted was a little stronger under braking that Diedrick (which made me feel good after we had to redo my botched blake-bleeding job from the morning warmup), but the sequential gearbox in the Mazdees car always gave him a few car lenghts coming out of 5B, making it very hard to catch up before the end of the back straight. Ted passed Dave on the 2nd last lap, only to hit a patch of oil and fly off the track. He managed to recover and finish the race!!
Best Lap was 1:32.072.
09-04-07, 09:41 AM
#19
Rotary Freak
Thread Starter
GAAACK, I am Ready to Shoot the Pig!!!!!
Okay, so the weekend sucked again, but the good news is we have finally figured out the major problem.
Now the break down. Dave and I went testing on Saturday to make sure that the new Alpha N mapping was going to work. We went to his plant in Mississauga and ran the car for about an hour. Just a couple of lower RPM bin trimming and we were there. The car went like stink, but due to space constraints we had to struggle to get it slowed down. The car would spin the rear tires a bit until 5000 rpm, then just go nuts until 9000. I packed up the car and was licking my chops for the races on Sunday.
We arrived at the track Sunday morning, unloaded and fired up the car warming it up. It ran just as we thought it would and I was "READY" to get out on track and let it rip. Burbled out into pit lane for first warm up and I was a bit apprehensive as every other time I nailed it coming out of the pits, the car died and started stumbling. When the car crossed the pit exit line I punched it and HOLY SCHNICKEYS the car launched like a rocket up into 2. It even spun its tires a bit in second. As I got into 2 the car started to slide sideways and I could see the track all shiny from Perry Ianuzzi's Nissan dumping oil all over the track down into and around Turn 3.
I just feather footed the car around turn 3 and when the oil cleared I hit it again. It took a bit to clear up (mental note, lean out the mid range partial throttle bins) and the car just flew through 4 and into 5. Coming out of 5B I whacked the throttle, the car stuttered for a second and then hammered up the back straight in second gear. Shifted to third and spun the tires for a second and I was mentally fist pumping. Halfway through 3rd the car started to detonate, I quickly lifted and the knocking went away, short shifted to fourth and drove into Turn 8 at about 4000 rpm in fourth.
Coming out of 10 I thought I would try to hit it again for 1 lap to see if it did it again. The car ran strong down the front straight, but the temps were up to over 210 degrees, so I lifted and floated around Turn 1 and through 2, 3 and 4. Came out of 5B I whacked the throttle again and the car screamed up through second, into third and it didn't spin the tires this time, but the car was up to temp. Again halfway through 3rd it started knocking again. F#&%, the water was red hot 220, oil at about 200 and I idled into the pits and pointed to Dave to take the car behind the wall.
We de-briefed and I told Dave what was happening. The Air Fuels showed okay. We felt the timing was off as it was giving every symptom of retarded timing. So we checked the timing and it was okay. I asked around for advice as it was nothing obvious to us and the car was running strong other than the car running hot and the detonation only on the back straight. In checking everything out we found that in all of our timing changes the Megasquirt programming had moved our 0 split to a -1 split. Huge eyes all around (thanks for all the caring and help goes out to the Ottawa crew). We changed the split and felt that we must have had it fixed. We idled the car for a while and the temps stayed very low and we were good. Joe from RPM had showed up and I really wanted to do well in the CCTCC race.
Started dead last as we hadn't really even run a lap hard yet and we burbled around. As soon as we started rolling, the water temps started climbing. WTF!!!!!! I am only at 3000 rpm in second gear and my temps are already over 200. Air fuels look good, in fact rich, so that can't be the issue and we changed nothing since last year in hard parts that would make the car run hot, when last year we were struggling to keep it warm enough.
Anyways came down and got the green. Accelerated with the Can-Saf car up the front straight, so the car is making good power, but my water temps were already over 210. So I lifted again and tried everything we could think of to get the car cooler. So I came in and Dave advanced the timing by 10 degrees. I love computor mapping. Went out agian and the car was still red hot. Tried to run semi hard up the back straight and it detonated again. Came in again and Dave retarded the timing across the board by 20 degrees. No difference other than the fact that the car was a slug. It still detonated.
I came in and drove straight back to the pit area. Took off my helmet and struggled to control the impulse to drive the helmet through the front windshield.
Dave came up and we scratched our heads and I took a lot of deep breaths as the car cooled. We down loaded the ecu logging and analyzed the data from the session. IT HIT US LIKE A TON OF BRICKS.........
What was happening is that while the Air Fuels were good on the gauge, its sampling rate was slower than the logging system sampling rate. The car was running out of fuel under sustained hard throttle runs and leaning right out. I was hearing or feeling the drop off in power and lifting just as the car started to go hyper lean due to basically running out of gas. After I got off the throttle for a moment, the pressure would build back up and be okay again. The other thing we found out was that the temp rise was based on vehicle speed, not engine speed. This means it is an aero issue based on the new nose and the hood scoop. I think we are pushing more air in through the scoop, than we are through the nose and creating a zone of no airflow around the rad.
So now I need to put a 255 LPH pump in the tank as we need that much capacity in fuel pressure. It is sorta good news as it means we are making a ton more power. We need to work out the airflow and water flow issues through the engine compartment to make sure the car stays cool.
Going to get it fixed and go to a dyno and load it up and run the car hard in second third and fourth to make sure it all works well before we go out on track again. I have 2 weeks before the next race.
Finally, with the amount of detonation the engine experienced, combined with the red hot temps and the fact that the engine still runs strong, say a ton about RPM's ability to build a strong motor and the Mazda pieces.
Till next time, thanks for the help and reading these stories.
Eric
Now the break down. Dave and I went testing on Saturday to make sure that the new Alpha N mapping was going to work. We went to his plant in Mississauga and ran the car for about an hour. Just a couple of lower RPM bin trimming and we were there. The car went like stink, but due to space constraints we had to struggle to get it slowed down. The car would spin the rear tires a bit until 5000 rpm, then just go nuts until 9000. I packed up the car and was licking my chops for the races on Sunday.
We arrived at the track Sunday morning, unloaded and fired up the car warming it up. It ran just as we thought it would and I was "READY" to get out on track and let it rip. Burbled out into pit lane for first warm up and I was a bit apprehensive as every other time I nailed it coming out of the pits, the car died and started stumbling. When the car crossed the pit exit line I punched it and HOLY SCHNICKEYS the car launched like a rocket up into 2. It even spun its tires a bit in second. As I got into 2 the car started to slide sideways and I could see the track all shiny from Perry Ianuzzi's Nissan dumping oil all over the track down into and around Turn 3.
I just feather footed the car around turn 3 and when the oil cleared I hit it again. It took a bit to clear up (mental note, lean out the mid range partial throttle bins) and the car just flew through 4 and into 5. Coming out of 5B I whacked the throttle, the car stuttered for a second and then hammered up the back straight in second gear. Shifted to third and spun the tires for a second and I was mentally fist pumping. Halfway through 3rd the car started to detonate, I quickly lifted and the knocking went away, short shifted to fourth and drove into Turn 8 at about 4000 rpm in fourth.
Coming out of 10 I thought I would try to hit it again for 1 lap to see if it did it again. The car ran strong down the front straight, but the temps were up to over 210 degrees, so I lifted and floated around Turn 1 and through 2, 3 and 4. Came out of 5B I whacked the throttle again and the car screamed up through second, into third and it didn't spin the tires this time, but the car was up to temp. Again halfway through 3rd it started knocking again. F#&%, the water was red hot 220, oil at about 200 and I idled into the pits and pointed to Dave to take the car behind the wall.
We de-briefed and I told Dave what was happening. The Air Fuels showed okay. We felt the timing was off as it was giving every symptom of retarded timing. So we checked the timing and it was okay. I asked around for advice as it was nothing obvious to us and the car was running strong other than the car running hot and the detonation only on the back straight. In checking everything out we found that in all of our timing changes the Megasquirt programming had moved our 0 split to a -1 split. Huge eyes all around (thanks for all the caring and help goes out to the Ottawa crew). We changed the split and felt that we must have had it fixed. We idled the car for a while and the temps stayed very low and we were good. Joe from RPM had showed up and I really wanted to do well in the CCTCC race.
Started dead last as we hadn't really even run a lap hard yet and we burbled around. As soon as we started rolling, the water temps started climbing. WTF!!!!!! I am only at 3000 rpm in second gear and my temps are already over 200. Air fuels look good, in fact rich, so that can't be the issue and we changed nothing since last year in hard parts that would make the car run hot, when last year we were struggling to keep it warm enough.
Anyways came down and got the green. Accelerated with the Can-Saf car up the front straight, so the car is making good power, but my water temps were already over 210. So I lifted again and tried everything we could think of to get the car cooler. So I came in and Dave advanced the timing by 10 degrees. I love computor mapping. Went out agian and the car was still red hot. Tried to run semi hard up the back straight and it detonated again. Came in again and Dave retarded the timing across the board by 20 degrees. No difference other than the fact that the car was a slug. It still detonated.
I came in and drove straight back to the pit area. Took off my helmet and struggled to control the impulse to drive the helmet through the front windshield.
Dave came up and we scratched our heads and I took a lot of deep breaths as the car cooled. We down loaded the ecu logging and analyzed the data from the session. IT HIT US LIKE A TON OF BRICKS.........
What was happening is that while the Air Fuels were good on the gauge, its sampling rate was slower than the logging system sampling rate. The car was running out of fuel under sustained hard throttle runs and leaning right out. I was hearing or feeling the drop off in power and lifting just as the car started to go hyper lean due to basically running out of gas. After I got off the throttle for a moment, the pressure would build back up and be okay again. The other thing we found out was that the temp rise was based on vehicle speed, not engine speed. This means it is an aero issue based on the new nose and the hood scoop. I think we are pushing more air in through the scoop, than we are through the nose and creating a zone of no airflow around the rad.
So now I need to put a 255 LPH pump in the tank as we need that much capacity in fuel pressure. It is sorta good news as it means we are making a ton more power. We need to work out the airflow and water flow issues through the engine compartment to make sure the car stays cool.
Going to get it fixed and go to a dyno and load it up and run the car hard in second third and fourth to make sure it all works well before we go out on track again. I have 2 weeks before the next race.
Finally, with the amount of detonation the engine experienced, combined with the red hot temps and the fact that the engine still runs strong, say a ton about RPM's ability to build a strong motor and the Mazda pieces.
Till next time, thanks for the help and reading these stories.
Eric
09-04-07, 01:31 PM
#20
Eats, Sleeps, Dreams Rotary
iTrader: (4)
Good to see the computer download comes in handy! It's a better thing nothing serious happened to the engine!!
The craziest things happen at the track.
Hopefully you'll get her sorted out so you can be ready in 2 weeks.
The craziest things happen at the track.
Hopefully you'll get her sorted out so you can be ready in 2 weeks.
09-04-07, 04:07 PM
#21
Rotary Enthusiast
Eric,
Sorry to hear about your troubles on the track. Do you have access to a chassis dyno? Maybe some of those issues could be sorted out before the "rubber hits the road". Also, if fuel systems continue to be in question, you may want to add a fuel pressure transducer to the system, and hook it up to a spare MegaSquirt analog input. That way you can keep a close eye on things to verify proper pump and regulator operation. You can never have too much data! Was it the MS runtime datalog that indicated the lean operation?
Sorry to hear about your troubles on the track. Do you have access to a chassis dyno? Maybe some of those issues could be sorted out before the "rubber hits the road". Also, if fuel systems continue to be in question, you may want to add a fuel pressure transducer to the system, and hook it up to a spare MegaSquirt analog input. That way you can keep a close eye on things to verify proper pump and regulator operation. You can never have too much data! Was it the MS runtime datalog that indicated the lean operation?
09-05-07, 03:40 PM
#22
Rotary Freak
Thread Starter
I Need Deep Emotional Help!!!!!!
Roger, it is a very difficult situation and I don't know if I should move this to the Megasquirt section. I went through the complete data trace, second by second, last night with Dave to see what the heck was going on. The data gave me a ton of information but didn't show anything that was obviously wrong.
In a nutshell, the Air/Fuels stayed rich (with a few random spikes off the charts lean which could be sampling errors. They ranged from 10:1 to about 14.5:1. Where the car started to knock the car was in the 11:1 range. The timing stayed between 18 and 21 degrees. The rest of the data was normal.
The car would pull hard out of 5B and run cleanly to 9,000 rpm in second. I would shift to 3rd and pull hard to about 6500 and the car would start to knock. The sound was a very loud rattle (sorta like a bad rod bearing). I would lift, shift to 4th and as soon as I got on the throttle it would knock again. I would then coast to Turn 8 and the car would handle full throttle in 4th or a shift down to 3rd and pull through the corner fine. It would also pull 3rd down the front straight with no issues. There were other places on the track where it would pull hard or burble rich, but I am okay with that as it just means that I have to lean out some bins.
If it was a feul pump issue I don't understand why it will take a hard 3rd gear run down the front straight, but not on the slightly uphill back straight. Is it the incline, the difference in fuel requirements by the uphill, some weird timing scatter or a weak coil. I don't want to go to a dyno until I get this issue dealt with.
Gotta figure it out as this is a tough one. Any advice or help by anybody would be appreciated.
Regards
Eric
In a nutshell, the Air/Fuels stayed rich (with a few random spikes off the charts lean which could be sampling errors. They ranged from 10:1 to about 14.5:1. Where the car started to knock the car was in the 11:1 range. The timing stayed between 18 and 21 degrees. The rest of the data was normal.
The car would pull hard out of 5B and run cleanly to 9,000 rpm in second. I would shift to 3rd and pull hard to about 6500 and the car would start to knock. The sound was a very loud rattle (sorta like a bad rod bearing). I would lift, shift to 4th and as soon as I got on the throttle it would knock again. I would then coast to Turn 8 and the car would handle full throttle in 4th or a shift down to 3rd and pull through the corner fine. It would also pull 3rd down the front straight with no issues. There were other places on the track where it would pull hard or burble rich, but I am okay with that as it just means that I have to lean out some bins.
If it was a feul pump issue I don't understand why it will take a hard 3rd gear run down the front straight, but not on the slightly uphill back straight. Is it the incline, the difference in fuel requirements by the uphill, some weird timing scatter or a weak coil. I don't want to go to a dyno until I get this issue dealt with.
Gotta figure it out as this is a tough one. Any advice or help by anybody would be appreciated.
Regards
Eric
09-05-07, 06:49 PM
#24
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Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: Pakenham, Ontario
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What you need is a Nik. The man is an electronic wizard and a damn good wrench too. He's put together a fine crew of workers, without whose help Ted could not have caught up to Mazdee's on Sunday. Thanks to all the crew for a great weekend.