Phenolic Spacers
 

You know, I'm surprised I dont' see these made for more cars. For those of you who don't know, phenolic spacers go in place of the intake manifold gasket, and insulate the intake from hear from the block itself. These were available to my last car(Probe GT) and are available for all KL and FS series engines, as well as B series honda engines.

http://www.outlaw-engineering.com/

Is there anyone at all who makes these for rotaries? These really do work, they help out a lot, and I think we could all benfit from them. They've been dyno proven on the cars they're available for, and have seen results of 5-7hp, and 10-11tq.

These spacers are 1/4" thick.

So does anybody make these at all? And does anyone think this would be a worthwhile thing to look into?

These run around $100 for complete spacers, including TB spacers as well for the ones they already make. I'm sure they would be close to that, or less if they made them for us.

A friend of mine just bought a sheet of that and used a dremel to cut one for his DSM. He says the intake mainfold stays much cooler but I havent been able to check it out for myself. I believe that stuff is what PCB's are made from right?

I'm not exactly sure, but I'm interested in finding out where he got sheet of it. I'd like to do that and make a gasket for my 13B cause I'll have it all torn apart before too long.

I'm sur eon turbo cars you'd see an even better gain.

http://www.outlaw-engineering.com/Results.htm

Here's the page showing their results.

Interesting. If you do find those pieces of PCB or whatever they are please post a link:)

I know the S5 had some plastic spacer between the UIM and the TB but I think it had a different use rather than for cooling. My Cosmo doesn't have any spacers.

I know the spacer you're talking about. The TB spacer alone though won't help near as much, as the air would get just as hot right after it entered the intake mani anyway. The best spacer to get is between the block and manifold. I'd love to see someone make one for these, they're cheap, and they work.

I wish I knew where to get the material. :(

Re: Phenolic Spacers
 

Not all, I work in a machine shop and make those spacers for Moroso, 2 and 4bbl, and some of theres r 1/2" to 1" thick.

But which would be better, spacer between engine/intake or between intake/throtle body?

Re: Re: Phenolic Spacers
 

The ones Outlaw Engineering makes are 1/4"


I would go with both if it was me, but I htink the engine/intake spacer would be best, seeing as how the engine is the original source of the heat, and if the intake cooles down, so would the TB.

I have been thinking about this also. Since our motors have UIM/LIm and the LIM is close to the turbos/exhaust and gets quite cooked I'll bet. I was thinking that having a phenolic spacer between UIM/LIM would help stop the heat transfer to the UIM. I see 3rd gen owners talking uim intake temp and they are always hot, I'll bet a lot of it is LIM heat being conducted to UIM. Phenolic spacer and a thermal blanket on the UIM and I'll bet you would see a nice reduction of intake temps.
Jay

Right, and that would be a good improvement, especially on a turbo'd car like an FD. I'd like to see them made for all rotaries, as I think they can all benfit from them.

Does mazdatrix make the gaskets they sell themselves? Or do they get them from Mazda? If they already make the regular gaskets, all they'd need to do would be switch to the phenolic material.

I'm looking into contaced both outlaw engineering and mazdatrix. But I need to see some support on this. If a moderator could make this a sticky, or better yet, a sticky at the top of each gen specific forum, that'd be great. I want to see what kind of support we have for this. I'd love to get these made. thanks.

OK, I'm still thinign about this, and I've contected Outlaw engineering. But I thought of a problem.


On the 6 port engines, adding a spacer this thick will make the rods that connect to the sleeves not long enough to reach the sleeves correct? So this creates a major problem. I'm going to have to look into this further. If anything, we can get upper IM and TB spacers still, which will still produce nice gains, even though the air's last few inches of travel will be though the uninsilated lower IM, it's still not much time for the air to heat up again.

If you all like this idea, please show some support. Getting a company to make a product for your car takes proof to them that it is worth them doing the R&D on it and going in production.

http://www.mcmaster.com/

Just make your own. Buy a gasket for the pattern and get the material from the company listed above.

It's not quite that simple, like I said, actuator rods will probalby come up short, as will intake studs. Read my posts in each gen specific forum, and it will show what Outlaw Engineering will provide.

Put the spacer between the upper and lower intake. No need to re-engineer the actuators. You still might see some benefits from it.

On some weber carb and throttle body setups, spacers are used to lower the torque peak. I believe there is some info on the Mazdatrix site in the racing section. I don't think it would change much using a stock intake but I could be wrong.

True, but you still would end up needing longer studs.

Oldest revival ever award?
Anyway, these work extremely well in the Subaru world. You can literally drive like hell, then pop the hood and rest your hand on the IM. I have a sheet of .157" (5/32", 4mm) G7 Garolite on the way. I'm going to make a LIM-UIM spacer and TB-UIM spacer and test it out. IDK about the LIM to engine one, with the excessive heat and fitment issues that may just not be possible. Once I get it in and set up I'll post some results, if it works maybe I can make a business out of it.

pretty close! the forum was hacked a couple of times, not sure it goes back much further than that.

anyways, people tried these, and the lower intake to block ones had mixed results. i think they used to warp and or leak.

since it was so long ago, one has to wonder if they used the right materials, and if they were just over torquing the crap out of the things. Mazda would have used some sleeves, so it was tight, but you weren't smashing the thing

Phenolic spacers have a terrible reputation for leaking, especially in the Honda world. I wouldn’t waste my time with them, unless there’s been some sort of improvement over the last few years.

I had a set on my WRX, made by Grimmspeed. No leaks ever, at 19lbs of boost. Though the Boxer has the IM on completely opposite sides of the block as the exhaust, But there was a huge difference in IM temp. Those were made with a lower grade phenolic (resin impregnated paper) than the G7 I'm using, which is a silicone/glass mix, rated to over 500F. I'm probably not doing the LIM-block as that's a LOT of heat to deal with, but I do have enough material to try it. I'm almost done making the UIM-LIM one, the Dremel makes quick work of it. Wear a mask if you decide to do it yourself! I'm probably gonna sandwich it between 2 gaskets to get a seal, that's what Grimmspeed recommends for the Subarus, but like I said I didn't use gaskets on that and had no leaks.

How did the results go?
Is there anyone that makes these thermal gaskets for the FD UIM/LIM currently?

I have the first set made, turbo inlets, y-pipe, UIM-LIM, and LIM-block. Havent tested em yet as I need a new ECU to fire up the car. If someone wants to team up with me in testing we may be able to get going on it.

Oh awesome! I definitely would, if you feel like sending some to sunny Sydney :P

Lol. I'll send em that far if you can get the MCM guys in on it!

Who's MCM? Happy to pay for postage or could even buy them off you if you want.
I think I may have just become one of the most powerful stock twins cars in the country on the weekend with 345whp through the stock auto box, so getting close to 400whp if it was manual, so should be a good guinea pig for it :)