BlinkerFluid's 96 Eclipse GSX *Long read, well worth the time*

[BlinkerFluid]

Alright, I realized I met a few of you guys at the dyno day a few weeks ago and that I haven't updated this in ages. I'll copy and paste from my site in order.

Let the fun begin.

Plans for the car when I return home.

1. Fix the drive belt issue, it likes to intermittantly toss the waterpump belt at over 9500RPM. The belt allows too much stretch and there is too much of a portion of it not in contact with any pullies, so when it grows, it makes its way off the PS pump easily. The PS pump bracket may also be flexing. I have a good idea in my head how to fix this without too much trouble.

1a. Repair what breaks.

2. Brakes, the powerslot front rotors are heat cracked pretty bad. I may replace them with stock sized rotors or upgrade, we'll see.

2a. Repair what breaks.

3. New version of DSMLink, though I find it hard to switch out the old version because right now the car runs so good.

3a. Fix crankwalk.

4. Safety equipment. I have 3/4ths of a cage in my storage shed ready to go, I just have to install it. Along with that, I need to add a harness, window net, chute, and I really want to add an on board fire extinguishing system. Then I need to buy a fire jacket, pants, shoes, and gloves. I'm gonna have $3K wrapped up in this stuff and I need it if I ever want to go anywhere other than Beaver Springs and be anymore than a one pass wonder.

4a. Fix what breaks.

5. More boost on E85 until I max out the injectors. I'm thinking I should be able to get 36-38psi. That should net mid-upper 150MPH going off of my previous runs depending on the track. The goal is still 9.99 on all season radials and E85. I'm gonna try like hell to do it and I think it's possible.

5a. Re-weld FMIC endtank after it blows apart again.

6. Slicks, C16, 45psi (or more), and a puckered asshole the whole time the throttle is on the floor. Kill mode, enough said.

6a. Replace destroyed transfer case with an upgraded unit and an aluminum driveshaft.

[BlinkerFluid]

New wheels are on.

The belt issue is also fixed, I think, I won't know until I run it out a bit. Thanks again John.





I fixed the belt issue using a Honda B series AC belt tensioner arm, I made a screw adjuster that is built entirely on an 1/8" thick fender washer. The lead screw is a 3/8"x16 bolt, the screw body is a barrell nut (used for connecting all-thread together) and the rest is scrap from around the garage.

It's pretty damn trick and works perfectly, I should have taken pictures of it. It's nice to know I haven't lost my touch.



Went for a spirited drive last night. Partial throttle drivability is perfect though it's a slug WOT at 27psi and no timing.

I did test out the belt tensioner with a good 3 second wrap off the 9750RPM limiter when a shift cable had an issue and didn't properly place the transmission in 2nd gear. It would have surely thrown the belt with the previous setup.

Shift cable is fixed and the car is currently getting a coat of wax.

13 years old and still lookin' good.



New studs are installed, torqued, and cooling down on the first heat cycle now.

I made some nice brackets and relocated the ignition coils to a better spot and moved a few other things around a bit.

There also may be a new line or two since the last time all of you have peeked under the hood. ;)

[BlinkerFluid]

New brakes are installed. I drove the car 120 miles tonight and they work great!

Here is the DIY thread.

Pictures.

Old.


New.


On to the next project.

[BlinkerFluid]

Well, after a weekend of working our rear ends off, Brian and I have the cage fully installed in the car. I need to cut the front door bars and assemble the swing out kits yet, then paint it and reinstall tne interior.

I must say, even though we were on a tight schedule, it fits very nicely and is surely a professional job.

The next trick is going to be getting the dash back in.

[BlinkerFluid]

The swingouts are installed, I just need to finish up the bars now. I also finished painting the cage.

A package from Summit just showed up too. That means my harness, cauge cups, bar padding, and fittings to finish off the N2O fuel lines are here.

Breaking for lunch then back to start installing the interior.


I got the dash installed, tested the wiring and have most of the interior installed. I just got the carpet in. I need to finsih the driver's side trim and carpet, then install the seats. From there I can install the new roll cage mount gauge pods, padding, and harness.

I'm excited.

[BlinkerFluid]

Alright, she's essentially done. I'll put a coat of wax on it tomorrow and head out to the DSM meet in Lancaster.

I also installed a Stewart Warner shift light gauge thingy that should help a lot. All of the factory interior fit except for the sun visors, but I'll eventually mount them from the cage itself. I also had to relocate the rear view mirror a few inches lower on the windshield and you can see in the pictures the pillar gauge pod wouldn't fit so I picked up a few of the pods that bolt right to the cage bars.

I have to say it is one of the cleanest full cage installs I have ever seen in a 2G DSM. I'm very happy with it.

Thanks again for the help Brian.

Enjoy the pictures.

[BlinkerFluid]

40psi gives me wood for the record. Here are a few photos I snapped while and after Jesse finshed waxing it before heading to a failboat meet. Sonic made up for it



















noise ftl

[BlinkerFluid]

Alright, it's been a while and some things have changed.

First, as mentioned above, I turned the boost up to 40psi. This pushed injector duty cycle to over 120% on my 1600s, which were effectively 1800s with the base pressure I was running. I knew what the problem was, but wanted to try the injectors first. The new ID2000 injectors claimed superb drivability, controlability, atomization, and 2200cc/min flow rate at 43.5psi.

I installed the new injectors and went on to working out the scaling. I believe I was one of the first to try these in a DSM. I know of only one other before me for sure. They work excellent, exactly as advertised. Now I realize how bad the driveability really was on the 1600s even on E85.

I had to fool around with my fuel rail spacers to get them to fit how I liked, but that didn't take long. No leaks and a good fit.

Now out for some tuning. I knew the fuel pumps were at their limit, but I wanted to try lower base pressure and more injector duty cycle. No pie for me on this one as to get enough fuel to the engine for 40psi of boost was still taking 115% injector duty. I bit the bullet and decided to rework the fuel system... again.

I ordered a FueLab 42401 fuel pump, one of their large -10 inline filters with a 75 micron stainless element to use as an inlet filter, a bunch of necissary fittings and line. I chose to go with -10 pushlock to the engine compartment and -10 braided from the firewall to the fuel rail. I could have used -8 but now if I ever see the need for an engine driven fuel pump, the line is 98% done.

The FueLab pump is designed to be an inline pump that is to work with a sumped tank. The instructions mention it can be mounted in tank, which is the approach I decided to take. I chose this pump for its flow capacity at pressure, and the fact that it has built in speed control. A power or ground will switch it from high to low speed and I can easily supply this signal through my ECU.

I built a fuel pickup foot from a 6 bolt oil pickup screen. I cut the tube from it and changed the bends around to suit my needs, then welded a -10 bung on it. The two pushlock fittings you will see in the pictures with clamps are cut short and only one barb remains, that's why they are clamped. Fuel then travels into the inlet filter and into the pump.

I used the factory fuel pump hanger and added a -10 bulkhead and a -6 bulkhead for pressure and return respectively. I found a large loop of the -10 pushlock hose let me easily install and remove the hanger with the hose ends connected.

The fuel pump is secured to the factory swirl tank mounting block with a stainless bracket. Mounted like this the pickup foot is in the very back of the tank, towards the center of the car, right up against the hump for driveshaft clearance. It works perfectly and during acceleration, fuel will slosh to the pickup, not away from it as before. During testing of the pickup, I found I can pump out within 1 gallon of the amount of fuel I put in the tank.

Wiring is 10ga. with a 18ga. wire for the pump speed control. I used multiple feeds through the factory power connector, and the pump hanger itself as a ground. I haven't had a fuel sender for fuel level for years, I just use the low fuel light and have never had an issue. I set up ECMLink to supply a signal to a relay to keep the pump on low speed when engine RPM is less than 6500, throttle position is less than 90% and load factor is less than 2.0. I expect this will be enough to let the fuel pump change speed before boost, and fuel demand get up there too much, but keep the pump from switching to high speed when it is unneeded. Also, the way this system is wired, if there is a failure in my speed control system, the pump will default to high speed.

The rest is simple, the same FIC fuel rail with upside down lettering I've had for years, along with my Aeromotive AFPR. All return likes are -6 braided that I had reused, they were my feed lines before this change.

I don't have the exact flow numbers in front of me but this pump pushes a staggering amount of fuel at 100psi. My injector duty cycle came down to the mid to high 80% range with a 55psi base pressure. I have fuel!

Onto the pictures.

Old injectors


1600 vs. ID2000


ID2000 installed



New pump


Pickup and inlet filter




Modified stock pump hanger


Hanger outlet


Feed line


Regulator and return line


I'll have two more posts to add to this later tonight. One of broken parts, and another that illustrating the fix so it doesn't happen again.

[assault187]

lookin good! You got pretty clever in there. Im sure we'll see you out next season. You plan on rolling in on the track rental we spoke about at the dyno day with Tort?

[BlinkerFluid]

Now to my first issue in a while. As always with this car, it was caused directly by me.

At the track day I made one full pass. The car spun through first, after an easy shift to second, lit the tires up again when boost came on and turned sideways, (the uprise in the video) third gear had another bout of wheelspin at the top and got a tad sideways again, and it either spun in fourth or the clutch slipped. It was an 11.4@139 with a 1.9 60', not too bad for my first pass in almost 2.5 years.

The second pass is what got me. First went well, second hooked up great, and then first again. 11,433RPM later as the datalog showed me, the car still had power. The radiator cap was spun to the stop from vibration, and there was a hole in the valve cover with a rocker stuck in it. That was the end of the day, though it still went 14.6@75 with power through 2 gears.

I got the car home, removed the valve cover and found a smashed lifter ball, rocker with a rough spot in the roller, and no other apparent damage. I dug out a new 3G lifter and an old rocker from my parts supply and tossed them into the engine. A compression and leakdown test later showed values exactly the same as the week before. I also cut the oil filter open looking for metal, I found a few small chips but not enough to be concerned about.

I got my hands on another valve cover and put some time into painting it up nice. Silver metallic raised lettering, red raised "2000", and black metallic base. It came out pretty good I think.

I also decided to rework the shift linkage and such as I noticed some slop. Turns out I still had the factory bushings in the bracket that holds the shift cables onto the transmission and they were loose. I picked up a new set of shift cables, pressed in roller skate bearings and installed them. I made a few aluminum bushings for the bracket to eliminate the slop at that end.

I had also had bent a shift cable at one time it was shifting into second gear. Looking at how the factory stuff works, the only stop is inside the transmission, so if you bang second or fourth, all that force after the stop in the transmission goes into the cable. I built a stop to physically prevent the shifter from putting force on the cable after the stop inside the transmission is contacted. It seems to work perfectly when stationary, but I tried to start the car to go for a test drive, my FueLab pump with all of less than 10 hours on it failed.

I removed the pump and sent it back to FueLab, they identified an issue, replaced the controller board, and shipped it back to me in about a weeks time. Now the pump sounds different on startup so I think something was wrong with it out of the box. The car runs now and I just need to drive it.

Pics.

Holy valve cover


Busted parts with a new lifter




New valve cover



Bracket bushings, new shift cables, skate bearings

[BlinkerFluid]

Whew! That was almost a workout.

That's everything up to date. I'm currently working out the clutch issue and have a good lead on a Tilton carbon/carbon. I'm not pleased with the way the car drives with the PTT. I'm sold on carbon clutches because of the triple disc I have in the G35, hopefully this goes through and I get my hands on it.

I'll add the video of my pass here shortly.

Enjoy!

[TalonTsi97]

I saw your car at the dyno day but i'm pretty sure i never talked to you while there. I can't wait to see the car in action in the spring, I enjoy seeing the progress you make on it.

[gtsiawd96]

Geeeez man. I want to see this car! What dyno meet were you at?

I had no idea about that brake setup. It looks terrific. I still working on my CTS-V setup. I wish I had seen this earlier I would have went this direction.

Cage looks awesome too. 11,500 is no joke. I blew up my first 7 bolt that way. 1st , 2nd , 3rd , 2nd....... rod knock.

[BlinkerFluid]

Thanks guys.

I was at the dyno day at PSIProformance a few weeks ago. I didn't have the red car though, I was in my silver G35 TT. I met and talked to a few people but I'm terrible with names and faces.

[screamingdsm]

I was at the dyno day also. I got the idea for my setup off of you. We spoke a few times threw pms on dsmtalk about the downpipe setup. It would have been cool to acually meet.

[11secdsm]

Good stuff Jesse. Glad you're making good progress with the car!

[assault187]

Are your wheels 16's or 17's?

[Got Insulin?]

I read through your DIY on patuned, and it was very enlightening. Quick question though, if you were adapting for a 1G, couldn't you just use stainless lines to avoid the need to swap over to the 2G lines? or are the ID and OD different between the two?

[sleeperSL2]

Just read through everything..i dig it!

and maybe i missed it, what wheels are those?

[BlinkerFluid]

Thanks for the compliments!

Originally Posted by assault187

Are your wheels 16's or 17's?

17X7.5 I picked them up off of a friend with an EVO who was in a bind for cash. The offset is a little off, but they're ok.

Originally Posted by Got Insulin?

I read through your DIY on patuned, and it was very enlightening. Quick question though, if you were adapting for a 1G, couldn't you just use stainless lines to avoid the need to swap over to the 2G lines? or are the ID and OD different between the two?

I expect you are talking about the brake lines. I don't know what the difference is as it has been a while since I've had my hands on a 1G. I think it may have to do with the length of the line though.

Originally Posted by sleeperSL2

Just read through everything..i dig it!

and maybe i missed it, what wheels are those?

Rota Torque.