It’s hard to believe I haven’t posted on my blog since November. Everyone who likes Sideways Life on Facebook is still up to date though, I’ve been posting pictures and words on there to make up for the lack of big blog posts here.
Things slowed right down when I sent my engine away; it took far longer than I hoped it would. When I finally got it back, everything moved quite fast as I was really just doing stuff I had done before.
I think I might go back and write about some of the things that have happened that didn’t make it to Facebook; but for now I’ll skip to the last few days.
I don’t have many pictures from this weekend, so prepare to read. I took Friday off to get the car tuned. I had a tune booked for 1pm with Matt Spry at PITS. I originally chose him because a few friends have had success with him and his tuning abilities have a good reputation.
Before that though, I needed to get a few things fixed. I went down to Fabrication 81 and Andy repaired my broken exhaust mount. Previously, he had welded one of the mounts to my gearbox crossmember. In an attempt to get the exhaust off the crossmember, one of my friends managed to snap the welds. The new bracket is much stronger and bolts-on instead of being a more permanent weld.
I also got him to quickly fix up my throttle cable bracket. It works perfectly but is a bit of an eye-sore. I might try painting it, or maybe I’ll just get it made again. He basically cut it, welded it and bent it until it worked. It would do the job for the tune anyway.
So after that, I headed off to PITS.
I turned up at 12:45, but Matt was running behind; he had to wire in an ethanol sensor on the previous guy’s WRX which put him 2 hours behind. So, I left my car sitting outside and went to grab a coffee from McDonalds. About an hour later I came back and fiddled with my Haltech dash. I set up the warning lights and a few other things.
I watched the WRX finish its tune by making 400hp with 65% E85 (35% 98 RON) and the non-twinscroll version of my GTX3071R. Then it was my turn.
It was a pain getting my car on the dyno last time, and this time was no exception. My exhaust needs to be fixed to tuck a bit higher at the back. It hits this bar Matt’s dyno has at the back, so I have to take the rear section off, and then tie it up with wire to stop it hitting the roller. That time costs money unfortunately.
The first thing Matt did was get it to start and idle better. After that, he did a run to see where we were at. “20-30 HP less than last time” was the result. This could have been anything so we just pushed on.
After a while the room filled with the smell of clutch. He didn’t notice any bad feeling with the clutch so we checked the brakes; burning brakes smell the same as burning clutches. The ambient temperature around the rear brakes was about 60 degrees. The rotors had heated up to about 115-130. The foot-brake caliper was also hot; the handbrake one wasn’t that hot. They cooled down quickly but consistently heated up to the same temperature, even when then brakes weren’t used at all. The brakes being on a little bit (for some unknown reason) could easily be the source of a power loss. We pushed on anyway as the smell went away, and they weren’t getting any hotter.
The next problem, cooler pipe leaks. The t-bolt clamps I was told (by the business selling them) would be the right size, were not. They couldn’t clamp enough. A pressure test confirmed the leaks and we replaced the offending clamps with cheap worm-drive ones.
More problems. My Haltech boost controller is really sensitive. Apparently adjusting it by 1% changes the boost by 1 PSI. This is weird but not a huge concern. What was a concern was that the tyres on the wheels I borrowed were falling apart. At the end of the night, the walls, the floor, the inside of my boot, and the rear of my car were covered in little bits of tyre. I guess it was slipping a little.
Last problem, the passenger side drive shaft exploded. It didn’t break but it shot goo everywhere behind the wheel. I think I have another one though.
The end result is that the dyno says it made 336 HP on a little less than 20 PSI. Here's a video of a random run.
Matt said the dyno, brakes, tyres and goo could have affected the power reading, but that I should be happy with it.
I’m not really. It didn't blow up, but I need to know what it actually made if it's a different number. I expected more, everyone did.
Saturday morning I handed it over to Dan at Redline EFI. They have a hub dyno instead of the usual ones with rollers. I think they’re the only one on the coast with one. Basically it bolts onto your hubs in place of your wheels, and works from there.
I hadn't met him before, but Dan seems like a really nice and smart guy. He drove the car into their workshop where it’s going to sit until Monday when they can play with it. During this drive he noticed what he considers to be low fuel pressure (30 PSI on idle). As far as I remember, 35 or 40 PSI is standard, so I’m not sure why Matt set it lower. Dan is going to look at my fuel pressure and brakes, then do some power runs.
So I’m still holding my breath, waiting.
