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Such a great build!!
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Thanks Dave! I'm really impressed by the platform. Not quite as refined as the ND, but it's 10 years older and a lot of development happened in the meantime
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Amy did well in the RX-8 at NNJR's second event too, 7th in STX with a really competitive time in a HUGE field!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fbAJ8mAoESo |
A good event! Great weather, lots of runs, and a simple but fun course. I took first in PAX with Amy not very far behind in 16th.
Here's my video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LX5P65s-qhA Here's Amy's video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ANEjymVFwuo |
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I think the meadowlands has an event tomorrow, and I always tell myself I will at least go and watch for an hour, but never end up making it. |
Yep, my codriver had my ND up there on Saturday!
I totally understand the time thing, it sucks. |
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Amy did a great job this weekend in the RX-8! Solidly midpack in a *stacked* field at NNJR and battled for the win at Philly!
Amy's fastest NNJR run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aiusxEeUnaQ Amy's fastest Philly run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f09EoN2_OP8 |
Went and got my car dyno'd... I've had weak/sluggish starts for a couple of weeks. Looks like one or more of my coils died. BHR D585, so I upgraded to the new BHR OEM direct fit coils and all good now. Just a waste of a dyno session, haha.
Ignition coil failure shows itself worst after the 6th ports open at ~6400 RPM (the dip seen on the dyno plot, that's normal) and essentially just totally kills the top end. The car is noticeably quicker everywhere with new coils but mostly up top. https://i.postimg.cc/zBf4Kkj0/image.png |
Amy ran the RX-8 and had the same issues with the Nankang CR-1 behavior, except they seemed to move around even more on the RX-8 with its extra weight.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xFjga5dDlVE https://i.postimg.cc/8cHHpy4g/image.png |
More Nankang CR-1 testing, this time at Pocono! Amy's first real experience using third gear on course and we sorted out the feel of the Nankangs!
Amy's fastest run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbvUfFQqjzs My fastest run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m2I-exr5JCo |
2021 Finger Lakes Champ Tour:
Meanwhile, Amy didn't get to do the Test N Tune and arrived on site Saturday not having had the chance to walk course yet, so we quickly did some course walks and got the RX-8 ready. She killed it and was quickly fighting for trophies once she was up to speed. Only half a second or so outside the trophies with no real chance to warm up and try car setup things. Here's Amy's fastest Saturday run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=49h7Lcx8JaA On Sunday Amy was much more quickly up to speed but had to clean up a cone after her first run but she recovered well and was only thousandths behind the podium on day two! Here's Amy's fastest Sunday run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sNLNfr0sJHo |
Amy & I drove the RX-8, tons of fun and we got to ride with each other which was fantastic. Great learning experience. Sorry about the audio, the microphone fell out of its mounting clip and was buzzing around inside the trunk. Amy finished 2nd in STX and in the top quarter of PAX too! I ended up first in PAX which was nice because we were on the slower Nankangs.
Amy's fastest run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FEELWr42idI My fastest run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sKkOlIqAbBk |
A really fun day of autocross on Sunday with Philly SCCA. We were at Ripken stadium in Aberdeen, MD for the first time in a long time for Philly. The site has some terrain features that make it difficult to make a super technical course, but we got a solid 45 second course with plenty of sweeping corners. Fun and simple and safe! Both cars were on the Nankang CR-1s again doing more testing/conserving tires for nationals... They seemed to work pretty well, grip is up to about what I'd expect from the Yokohama A052s finally after some minor car changes.
Amy ran the RX-8 with Eric Simmons and they took home first and second in STX. Amy's second fastest run thanks to some GoPro issues: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oRg1ove8j3I Simmons' fastest run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gNSQeoE_rd8 |
Audio is wind noise because the GoPro external microphone adapter is stupid. Ran a 1:33.6 last night at NJMP Thunderbolt during TNiA. Running Nankang CR-1s instead of Yoko A052s, but no setup changes from autocross. Stock brake pads and all!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qFpco5Yd43s |
Man this car really seems to be delivering all the fun. I really need to get mine together.
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Amy drove the RX-8 all weekend and had a fantastic battle for the podium for the weekend in STX. She drove great and is really finding a bunch of time and learning every event. Super proud of her! Amy also had two different codrivers this weekend. Sam on Saturday and Nick on Sunday. Nick is a longtime rotary enthusiast and Sam I think has been converted, haha. Everyone gave great feedback on the RX-8 setup and I've got some minor changes incoming to help that! Big thanks to Shaftworks USA for the setup help so far!
Amy's Saturday run (fastest didn't get recorded): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DmBZHvmVlNs Amy's Sunday run (again, her fastest run didn't get recorded): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ab1o_OGi9lY Sam's Saturday run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QunrSvwOYX0 Nick's Sunday run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lqCxUk4h84g |
I whipped up an intake that stays STX/DSP legal. Fairly cheap and should really help get hot air out of the radiator. Unfortunately still dumps into the fairly enclosed series 2 engine bay, but it is what it is. The series 2 undertray really seems to limit airflow out of the engine bay.
https://i.postimg.cc/Df9WxhsQ/image.png https://i.postimg.cc/432yVRs9/image.png https://i.postimg.cc/JnBrXypf/image.png |
I have warched quite a few videos on intake design limiting power, and have been shocked at how big a different a proper/improper intake can make. Two that come to mind are the Gears&Gasoline Kseries and the MCM LS3 E30.
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Yep, proper intake design is HUGE. I bet this doesn't gain anything power wise, like nothing really does on the RX-8. Stock is fantastic... it just blocks all of the airflow out of the radiator :(
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Intake did nothing for coolant temps at autocross.. As I expected :(
I coned away 2nd in PAX/STX win and Amy pulled off 5th in STX. Lots of distractions with bad course workers not getting out of the way or grossly misplacing cones so we had some re-runs. It was tough to keep the Nankangs cool in those conditions with a lot of hot laps, but oh well! Amy keeps finding little things to improve and she's finding a ton of pace, I'm looking forward to cheering her on at nats! My fastest coned run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVV1v3Ow7jU Amy's fastest run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9O9_jQgLXo |
Back onto the Yokohamas on both cars, hurray! SUPER close results. 40th in PAX was only 1.2 seconds off of first, wild.
Amy's fastest, good for 4th in STX and 40th in PAX: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9LUNes_EDuM Simmons' fastest, good for 3rd in STX and 27th in PAX: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ePx0BJ_rf6Y |
My fiancée Amy was codriving with Eric Simmons to get ready for nats too! Simmons pulled off the win in STX with Amy not far behind in third. RX-8 is well sorted now too. We're looking forward to killing it at nats!
Amy's fastest run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8isUMT0_KOw Simmons' fastest run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ibv2InCd64k |
Another super competitive class. Good luck in Nebraska. Looks like the team is ready.
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Unfortunately Amy & Simmons had issues with cameras/tablet and only really got data from the Pro Finale. No videos to share, sorry! Amy & Simmons both had issues with the christmas tree lights, car setup, and mistakes. Simmons redlit away 2nd place, just not a great event.
Amy and Simmons had a better nats, but had to make car setup changes often too. So weird that the ProSolo setups that worked well were terrible for nats! Simmons finished just outside of the trophies after really struggling with the car setup while Amy finished up second in STXL! Amy worked hard and had a huge back and forth battle with the winner and it was a ton of fun to watch. Amy was leading on day 1 and every run would take the lead back on day 2, but just missed out at the end. She still got a huge trophy and had a ton of fun! Amy's second fastest West side run (camera issues again): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tdz4j6CM4Ks Amy's fastest East side run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lk7P9-yexoI No video for Simmons (yet more camera issues...) |
Saturday, NNJR SCCA had an autocross at MetLife stadium. I had a lot of fun but never *quite* got a run I was happy with. Still, third in PAX so I can't complain! I think I wrapped up the NNJR Driver of the Year too!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uDY14bhTN7o Philly SCCA had an event at Ripken Stadium in Aberdeen. I designed and set up the course... and then took top PAX by over half a second. Only tiny mistakes keeping me from having a perfect run, but I'm pretty happy with the result! Need another good one next weekend to clinch the Philly SCCA DOTY honors again! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_JzYGoMeY9w Matt Meyer codrove and did well, coned away 2nd in PAX with this run! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKGSBVgW_os Unfortunately in the meantime, I've got a transmission to replace. It's a little crunchy and 6th gear synchro completely died on the way to nats... and now I have a CEL for the rear O2 sensor heater circuit. UGH. |
Great to be back to Warminster with Philly SCCA! A little different format, but still really fun. I ended up wrapping up Philly SCCA's Driver of the Year honors this weekend. Amy ended up third in STX for the year too, really good weekend for both of us.
My second fastest dirty run (weird data issues after having to stop for a downed cone on my first run that set the finish in the wrong spot in SoloStorm): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3xGQiUZ-wM My fastest clean run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=slCd0c-NbJA Amy's fastest dirty run (I don't have a clue which run was her fast clean run due to both of us getting reruns due to poor course working): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECJi0UiO4_o |
https://i.postimg.cc/MGDYYdR2/image.png
Got the water pump underdrive pulley installed easily, just bolted on like stock. I've done some logging too, good temps while cruising around (180F stable with AC on, as usual) and temps so far are better at autocross. They still recover super quickly too and I'm not seeing as wild high temps. I used to see 217F at the end of autocross runs, I've done one event and I'm only seeing 205F as a peak on course even with a lot more rev limiter action at 9800 RPM. No more autocross events planned this year for me, sadly. Might get to do a track day or autocross, unsure though! Big thanks to Dennis at HGB Motorsports for the pulley and hand delivery at nats! |
I made a spring rate change from 672/448 lbs/in to 800/600 lbs/in (front/rear) after the last Philly event. It was a huge improvement in ease of driving the car, so much easier to place the car now and it even rides better on the street. I need a little bit more front bar, it was pretty loose (especially on exit!) and my front bar is maxed with the rear disconnected. I'm upgrading from Hotchkis RX-8 front bar to Progress Tech, the bar rate change should mean I'll be towards the bottom of adjustment on the Progress Tech so I may add a little bit of rake to balance it
Yoks were really BALD but we did well. Fastest STX car and just about fastest <400hp car at NNJR. John V's car dominated PAX with Evan Schickel at the wheel. Clearly his changes have worked well too, haha. https://i.postimg.cc/fTJKB42c/image.png My fastest run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJZ2Trp6vSo Talha's fastest run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DsW1rTbM008 Interesting side by side comparison of us. I made a bit of time on the first two sweepers then Talha made it back in the big slalom. I was a little bit out of position for the sweeper after the big slalom putting me out of position for the final turnaround but it wasn't worth more than a couple of tenths. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgdRxMrlMME |
Upgraded to a stiffer front swaybar, Progress Tech's RX-8 swaybar.
https://i.postimg.cc/bYRfK9KM/image.png Cleaned the air filter and added a filter sock to keep water out of it when it rains. If the car was parked and sat in a longer rain storm, enough water would drip on the air filter past the hood seal that it would mess with MAF readings and run poorly until it dried out enough. Annoying! https://i.postimg.cc/MKrNSPts/image.png |
I'm lazy and hadn't updated this thread... I sold the RX-8 in January 2021, my wife bought it back a month ago :)
https://i.postimg.cc/cL3tYZjQ/PXL-20...-213628269.jpg |
We did the Charlotte national tour!
Conditions were awesome Saturday. Sunday not so much, haha. 101 runs on our tires, amazed we didn't just hydroplane everywhere considering the tread depth. https://i.postimg.cc/g26xZGyk/PXL-20...0259052-MP.jpg https://i.postimg.cc/zGLgFCNN/PXL-20...-182724699.jpg https://i.postimg.cc/CKGdcJ63/PXL-20...-174518493.jpg https://i.postimg.cc/Hnxxsmsm/PXL-20...-183323810.jpg Here's our videos from Charlotte. Sadly various issues with data and video (long story for both) lead to not having Amy's fastest runs either day, but I uploaded hers as well. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_h2-hf2W_Q https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wClBHkTJl5k https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMqJtxJMCC8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JtYyV69RhZY |
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