Engine near death - oil analysis tells the tale
Oil pressure on the engine has been low since purchase. Despite some trips to Oregon and a full season of autocrossing the pressure has not seemed to drop much until very recently.
After an oil change and new filter it's above where it was when the car was purchased last year. One of the steps in any oil change I perform is sending a sample of the oil out for analysis. This is helpful for identifying potentional problems such as poorly performing air filters, excessive engine wear etc.
The analysis just came back on the Miata's 178,000 mile old engine and the news is not very good at all.
DAVID: Does this engine still have oil pressure? Unless you are using some sort of additive, the copper and lead are from bearings, and they show very poor wear. Universal averages show typical wear from this type of engine after a 3,685 mile oil use run. Copper and lead are clearly abnormal. The upper cylinder metals were at above average levels, but not too awfully high considering the maturity of the engine. Silicon was high so we suggest checking the air filtration. Running this engine at full throttle may cause a catastrophic failure.
I'm thinking I need to source a low mileage 1.6L engine for a swap. My co-driver is excited about performing an engine swap (neither of us have done one in decades) plus without any event commitments we can take our sweet time and do it all up just right.
For ref, there are the totals for copper and lead. It's beyond excessive, amazing to me that a connecting rod has not exited the block yet.
Copper Average: 4 Measured: 1287
Lead Average: 1 Measured: 913
I'm also running one of those ricer cone intakes so it looks like it's totally worthless too. That's a nice data point *shrug*. I guess I could find a K&N and slap it on there for a little improvement with another engine.
Once I am able to re-charge the racing budget I'll be purchasing another engine. Likely a good low-milage donor engine since decent 1.6L engines appear to be easier to source (and a lot cheaper) than trying to rebuild even a very good core.
More news as this develops, based on this brrreeeport.
Wow.. what a great racing season it's been! The weather was pretty nasty when I arrived on site at 7:30am. Not very surprising this time of year in Bremerton. Thankfuly it was not cold and the rain was not horizontal.
Must to my surprise there were already quite a few racers there swapping to the rain compounds despite the early hour. The upside of the rain is that it tends to reduce the advantage the big horsepower cars have over the little ones (such as mine). It's all good fun but there is always an air of competition even if it's not very serious for most of the participants.
Two friends of mine came by and ended up racing as well. Marc (basically my co-driver and mentor) was there along with our friend Mary, who brought a nice looking Acura RSX to play with. Both entered in the afernoon session.
It was Mary's first autocross and she looked a bit nervous getting her helmet on, studying her map (the one she drew of the course herself) and wondering what she was getting herself into. But, as you can see after the first run it looked like she was hooked!
Mark on the other hand has been doing this sort of thing for quite some time, and despite running in a low power (about 100 HP) car that is not quite on par with others in the class (such as the Corvette's, WRX's and other monster HP machines) he seems to really enjoy it and puts down some very impressive times (I can be assured he's at least 12 seconds faster than me in the same car on any given day). Here he is taking the 'Team Car' thought the course.
Here is a shot of the afternoon session grid. Small compared to most events but I'm sure the weather had a lot to do with that, and the fact the SCCA Solo 2 nationals were over and a fair number of drivers were done testing at the local autocrosses for the seaon.
Of course some of the regulars show rain or shine and give the cars (and themselves) a really good workout. Here is a club regular exiting the last half of the figure 8 heading for the finish line.
The complete set of photos can be seen here:
BSCC Round 7Final results are not in yet but it looks like I finished 3rd for the day and placed well for the season (I very well could be brining home a trophy). Waiting very impatiently for the final official results to be posted.
Seat updates for the car.
The stock seats at 175,000+ miles where simply shot. Driver's side bolsters had collapsed and the passenger seat wobbled in a rather peculiar way. After removing it I think that there is some structural damage to the seat so I'm glad I replaced it. Having a seat fail in a crash can be fatal.
The replacements arrived just in time for installation before the
season's final event (Round 7) on Sunday October 9th. Getting them into the car was a bit of a challenge so I brought one home at a time.
Installation was a bear. A number of modifications had to be made to the seat to get the head/helmet height safely below the roll bar. As you can see a lot of foam had to be removed from the seat pan area to get the fit and height I desired.
I somehow lucked out and was able to re-fit the stock sliders to the new seats instead of having to fabricate brackets which I feel would be negated and saftey benefit to replacing the seats as the brackets might have failed themselves. Instead the factory hardware bolted to the bottom of the seats.
Some persuasion was required to get the bolts and holes lined up but thankfuly nothing extreme and no holes had to be modified or added.
Here is a comparison shot of the old seat and replacement (this is driver's side if you care). As you can see the replacement seats are quite a bit larger in both height and width than the stock seats, which are already a tight fit. But, with some work they did fit!
Final results. Although they look like they have room they are a really tight fit in the car but I'm glad I put in the effort. They support they offer is excellent and they are plenty comfortable. A road trip is in the works to test out the seats, I just need to decided
WHERE.
Despite the cosmetic nature of this modification I feel that it's really a performance modification since it will provide a lot more support while driving the car in competitive events.
Finally, after nearly 2 months of waiting we had our clubs next event. Ready to hit the track with that latest upgrades to the car I was (was, being the operative here) hoping to really pull off some great times. Except I ran into some problems. :(
Again I shot video of the even with my new camera mount. This one is much more stable than the lost since it's bolted to the new roll bar cross-brace and is on a shorter arm than the last mounting system (picture, stage left).
It's a good thing it's mounted well too since the club is really getting serious about in-car saftey and all cameras must be fixed, nobody hand-holding cameras in the car (I did do that once while riding passenger.. fun but really was a worthless batch of tape other than the sounds of me and the driver laughing as well skidded around the course on really cheap tires).
Again the 2002 Corvette came to school me on the proper use of (cash?) horsepower. But on his second run he ran off course into the weeds and did some damage to a rear tire bead and retired for the remainder of the day. But his one good run was enough for another first plance in Novice class. Arg.. :(
By the end of the morning sessions first group I was in 3rd place for Novice. Not too bad considering how poorly I ran. However, many other competitors came to the event that day. And in the end I placed 7th in class. :( Not what I needed to do to boost my points lead. Not at all.
The results for the event are linked in the blog title but here they are again long with the current season points totals (you have to add my 4th and 26th place points to get my real possition.. I'm trying to get it fixed but so far not much luck - it's a small all volunteer club so.. people get to it when they get to it).
BSCC Event 6 ResultsBSCC 2005 Season StandingsFor those interested in what it looks like to run and autocross, I have an 8 min. video that I did up on Monday night. It's fat (at 46 MB) but.. it sort of gives a feel for what this sort of racing is about.
Autocross Video - 46 MB. 8 min.
Off the the races so to speak. New camera mount tested out quite nicely last night. I'm not going to upload the entire 100MB video... no. But I will upload any good runs I make today, and maybe some from event #5 way back when.
Hoping I don't blow the engine, burn the clutch or break the tranny.... having typed that I'm doomed for sure.. :(
Autopower Rollbar - Install phase III - *done*
Installation and finish trimming is finally done. I'm happy with the results on many levels. One of the first things I noticed is how much stiffer the car felt. A number of little rattles I would get on the local roads are gone. There is a side effect that is less than desirable though and that's the 65 MPH shimmy seems to be amplified due to the added stiffness of the car. I HAVE to get the resolved. I dn't know if it's the tires, wheels or just a bad balancing job by the local shop but I never had the shimmy with my stock alloy wheels and used-up Azenis Sports.
Here is the final result. Everything bolted down, padding, backing and carpet trimmed, seats re-installed, roof down, window unzipped. Ah I'm sure you get the point! When I ordered the bar I wanted the crossbrace and the person at Autopower said that I might have some issues with the rear window due to the crossbar. I told them the window was a soft window and that it should be OK, I'll take my chances. Glad I did. I think the cross bar adds some needed stiffness, it's legal for harnesses and it's just fine with the window unzipped.
One of my concerns was trimming of the plastic around the seat belt. Basically I'm not all that handy at cutting straight lines in anything much less plastic that will be readily visible. I was apprehensive. But with some care and the use of a jigsaw/sabersaw I was able to get a very nice and tight fitting trim piece on the first try! Yeah.. so I guess I'm sort of proud of how that part of it turned out. Good thing that does not look like the sheetmetal trimming and bending I had to do under the carpet or I'd be ordering some new (or slightly used) parts. Looks pretty good, I think!
Finally a side view to illustrage how the height of the bar ccompars to the hight of the windshield. One
Miata.net member noted that his was about equal to the front windshield. Not sure what year/model his car was but there with the bar I have installed that does not appear to be the case for mine. In fact I'm quite concerned that it's too short to pass the 2" inspection requirement when I am in the seat with my helmet on. Might have to pass on the racing seats and harnesses for now and decided if the bar stays. It wouls stink to have to replace it but I'll do what I need to do so it's meets saftey requirements. This is the STREET bar version so.. perhaps that was my error in ordering. Live and learn?
Monday will be the first test of the car with the near bar, springs, coil-overs, brakes, competion pads, header, new catalytic converter and.. sheesh.. who knows what else I did since the last race! Looking forward to it for sure!
Autopower Rollbar - Install phase II
After jacking up the car and removing the inner fender well access to the body where the rear supports bolt down was very good. The cover is easy to remove with only 4 10mm bolts and no wrestling required to remove it.
This is the drive side after drilling from the bottom and bolting together with the backing plate. Access with the drill was a little frustrating with the brake lines below the area where I was drilling but it was not a really big deal. Just be careful not to nick a brake line with the drill motor!
Arg. This side sucked. It turned out the one of the three holes drilled in the mounting plate aligned perfectly with the edge of a wirin harness hole! As you can see I had to cut the corner out of the backing plate and then drill a new hole (from the bottom, not enough access inside the car) into the backing plate on the rollbar. I didn't want to install it with only two of the three bolts. It has three holes, must be a reason for that, best not take a shortcut on saftey equipment! It bolted down nice and tight once I was done wrecking two drill bits to make the hole (what is that bar made of!??!).
Inside the trunk with the spare tire removed. That's the wiring harness that comes out right at the mounting point of the rollbar's passenger rear pad. That aside, once I trimmed the edges of the metal above that area it dropped right in. Alignment in the seat belt towers was dead-on! Perfect. No drilling is required in the seat-belt tower. All the hols match up with factory holes in the body.
Bar installed. Trimming the package deck was pretty easy but it did take me 4 times to trim it to final clearances. It's not yet bolted in because I plan to add a backing plate under the front-center of the cover to give me a more solid mounting point for my in-car camera mount.
Clearance with the top is close but there is no binding or issues with putting up the soft top. Seems to be a pretty close fit.
Next step is to trim the plastic body panels and get those installed and finally to trim the carpet on the rear deck. Some time down the road I'll likely take the carpet out and have it professionaly edged for a more 'factory' look. Of course I might butcher up the plastic to the point the edging on the carpet would be putting lipstick on a pig. I'll see how it goes.
Autopower Rollbar - Install phase I
Bar unwrapped from shipping and ready for test fitting in the car. There is also a package of hardware (not shown) that includes backing plates for bolting the bar down to the rear deck of the car.
This is a little strange! I removed the seat belt upper mounts and found this stack of what looks like spacers (three of them in two different sizes). They look like a factory type of spacer but NOT what you would expect on a seatbelt. I don't know if this was done to conform to a Canadian requirement or not. The seat belt also bolts to the seat tunnel. I'm not sure if all American NA's are like this or not. I recall that some years this is bolted to the frame of the seat. This stack will of course need to be removed when the belt is re-installed with the bar.
Seats and interior trim moved out of the way, rear deck cover removed but rear carpet left in place. It does not need to be removed to install the bar but I'm not sure if I'll need to pull it out to make final trimming of the carpet and backing material.
First test-fit of the bar. There is some sheetmetal that needed to be drimmed and hammered down on the edges to allow it to slide into possition. It's a pretty snug fit.
In this picture you can see a pad that is double-side taped to the bottom of the lower deckplate. It's easy to remove and I have to have it out to install the bar to the car's metal body. There is also a wiring harnes (cannot see it in this pic, I'll take another when I start drilling in Phase II) right near the rear mount plate. I'm concerned that I could drill into a wiring harness. Great care will need to be taken.
First dry fit. No holes drilled but the bar is in it's final possition. A test of raising and lowering the top was successful. Zipping and unzipping the rear window will now be and even bigger pain in the butt however I'd rather have to fuddile with the rear window than have my head/heck smashed should I flip the car during a competition. I will also need to get padding for the bar. It's unsafe to have a steel pole that close to your head unless you are wearing a helmet or it's padded!
Yee ha! Autopower rollbar finally here!
The big brown truck of fun just left and in it's wake I found a nice (heavy) bunch of steel tubes bent and weled together and wrapped in plastic. I'm of course assuming it's the rollbar I ordered about 3 weeks ago (they said it would take that long to get mine built and sent, had the optional cross-brace added to it but I wanted it welded in). Looking forward to getting it installed.
I had thought about painting it red to (at least closely) match the car but not sure if I am going to take the time to do that. I will start ripping the car apart tonight though and get it ready for the install. Downside is that I'll have to come up with a new camera mount because I'm pretty sure this will interfer with the one I have on there right now.. :(
More pics just cause I can...
Took the car out for a scrub-in of the new tires and my littlest one wanted to go for a ride so it seemed the perfect opportunity to combine the activites. :)
Dewatto, WA
Looking west over the Hood Canal with the Olympic National Park in the background.
Dewatto, WA
A.J. offers his review of spending the afternoon with Dad in the Miata.
West of Gold Mountain on Gold Run Road looking back up the road towards the mountain.
Again West of Gold Mountain on the side of Gold Run Road. Taking a break, listening to the stream just off the road and smelling the fine fresh forest air.
Tires and Wheels mounted !
It's been a long weekend. Re-organized the motorcycle shop and started to get my outside office back in order (it's only been 24 months.. but that's another sorted tail). Wife is still recovering from some surgery so I'm getting in project work where I can. Yesterday I managed to get the tires mounted on the wheels (Thanks Discount Tire for mounted them and getting the direction CORRECT even without the car there). They look pretty sweet an the best part is I saved weight:
NEW: Konig Helium 15x6.5 + 205/50R15 Hankook Z212 =
28 lbs.OLD: Mazda 14x5.5 + 195/60R14 Falkek Azenis Sport =
31.5 lbs.Today will be spent scrubbing them in and finding some good starting tire pressures. Members of Miata.net suggested starting around 32/31 and adjusting as needed. Time to go PLAY!!
Reorganized shop. That was a lot of work yesterday and it's maybe 1/2 way done. Going out there is still a little freaky. It was so much work in the
heat (OK, for here it was HOT!) it's just a blur. A little bit like an out-of-body short reorg experience. I'm liking it though! I just hope all 4 sleds fit in there come Aug 22nd!
Striped! - local sign shop does good
Been thinking about getting this done for quite some time and finally took the plunge. The cost of the automotive vinyl was not much at all (about $45.00). Taking the time off work to do it would have been expesnive so I just paid them to do the whole thing.
In then it was under $200 for the vinyl, install plus 2 sets of magnetic door numbers for autocrossing (no pics of the numbers right now). So, aside from the fact it's sorty funny to some for racing stripes to be put on a little Miata (well I do race it after all) I think it's sorta neat.
My daughter (age 6) exclaimed "Wow Daddy! That's cool!" as we arrived at the sign shop to pick it up. The wife.. she just laughed and shook her head. Mission accomplished!
Now it's off to the tire shop to get the tires and wheels mounted up.
UPS - not sucking quite so much (New Hankooks here!)
I was just about to call Discount Tire Direct and find out if they could give me a tracking number and tell me who they shipped the tires with this morning when my dog goes berzerk (WTH?). It's UPS with.. TIRES! Shock of shocks (did some driver read me rantings). Well there they were and now I have them (see picture).
Now what I find interesting is that I did not see the valve stems taped to the tires so I asked if there was more stuff. He started digging and said. "Hey, you have another huge package in here (burried at the bottom of the truck). Hm. I don't recall ordering anything else big. We finally dig it out and it's a new top for my BBQ that I ordered bout 4 months ago and had long forogotten about (that sort of stuff happens in my brain - if you wait long enough I'll probably forget I bought something from you..).
At any rate it looks like it's been in the bottom of the truck for month (look at this pic of the thing!).
Well.. regardless, new tires are here and it's time to get the wheels out of the boxes and get things ready to be mounted. Now I just need to find a tire shop that won't try to screw me for not buying the tires or wheels from them. Watch for that post in the next couple of days.
New tires selected - Hankook Ventus Z212
WAYNE, NEW JERSEY (April 12, 2005)— Hankook Tire`s Ventus R-S2 Z212 Z-Rated Ultra-High Performance Street Tire has taken sanctioned racing to new levels of performance.
At the SCCA National Tour April 9-10 at Gwinnet County Fairgrounds in Atlanta with just two cars competing on the Ventus R-S2 Z212, all eyes were on drivers Tom Hoppe of Marietta, GA in STX and Andy Hollis of Austin, TX in STS. Hollis had the fastest run in the class on Saturday and backed it up Sunday to win by a total of 0.353 seconds.
In the highly competitive STX class, Hoppe had a commanding lead of 0.646 seconds after day one, and extended it to a tremendous 1.410 seconds on Sunday. His teammate Michael Sinn of Youngsville, NC finished sixth.
These classes require cars to compete on street legal tires having a minimum U.T.Q.G. of 140. Dominated in the past by the Falken Azenis Sport, the auspicious debut of the Ventus R-S2 Z212 marks the beginning of a change..
My current plans are to finish out the life of the Azenis Sports on the 14" wheels while scrubbing in the Hankooks on the street. Most of the comments I have read indicated that they need a little time to come into thier own and I don't want to be breaking them in during competion. Besides the Azenis are still working just fine for me right now.
Checking out the new wheels..
Pics say it all. Under 11 lb. for these 15x6.5" wheels. Not insane light (Motegi Trac Lite at around 9.5 comes to mind) but 3 lbs. lighter than my factory 14" alloys and in a size much easier to get tires for (even if they are bit more pricey).
Need to get some new skins tossed on and give them a try. Fun stuff!!!!
