Sam's build thread

[sambb]

Hmm makes perfect sense how they want it. I definitely don't need that for L2S sprints/hillclimbs in the class I'm in. Its not even mandated that I have even just a basic isolator but I think its a good idea. eg for maintenance, refuelling etc. When first I put the second hand 4 bar FPR in the car it pissed fuel out everywhere once I put the fuel pump fuse back in and opened the door because the lower o ring was old I guess and had shrunk. I needed to shut it down asap and obviously an isolator would have helped. Got me thinking that I should get on it. thanks - ill look into it more.

[sambb]

Hey Andrew I was over at Pete's tonight and asked about his historic rego. He has the new conditional historic reg that they are trialling. He said he basically needed a blue slip and a signature from the club. He said that granted yes the blue slip guy was a friend of a friend, but the car needed no engineering or testing - just a regulation blue slip once over. The blue slip was his main worry ie by surrendering his normal rego it put him into no mans land in a pretty modified car if they then gave him a hard time for the blue slip, but in the end he said it was just like paaing a normal rego inspection. Might be worth looking into for yours yeah?

[Sydneykid]

The CAMS type battery isolator does 2 things, it cuts the +'ve battery lead and earths the ignition coil(s) so that the engine cuts out. Then you attach a cable to the key and poke it out somewhere on the body - when the firey pulls the cable, the key turns and everything shuts off

We wire the the isolator such that it cuts the voltage from the alternator (rather than a coil killer). When the engine is running, cutting off the battery supply alone won't stop it, it keeps running on the alternator power.


Cheers
Gary

[metalhead]

Hey Andrew I was over at Pete's tonight and asked about his historic rego. He has the new conditional historic reg that they are trialling. He said he basically needed a blue slip and a signature from the club. He said that granted yes the blue slip guy was a friend of a friend, but the car needed no engineering or testing - just a regulation blue slip once over. The blue slip was his main worry ie by surrendering his normal rego it put him into no mans land in a pretty modified car if they then gave him a hard time for the blue slip, but in the end he said it was just like paaing a normal rego inspection. Might be worth looking into for yours yeah?

Sounds good... Yeh, the other factor for me is how much I can drive it too. I have been seriously considering putting two of my cars on historic/classic rego once I get the Midget up and running. All 3 of my cars ('79 Ford F250, '79 Corvette and '72 MG Midget) will be eligible for historic/classic rego, and if I stick two of them onto historic then if the third vehicle is laid up I still have 120 days of use between the other two.

[sambb]

or just keep getting more historic cars so you can go 365 days, and it'll still probably cost the same as fully registering/insuring one car!

[simon k]

Hey Andrew I was over at Pete's tonight and asked about his historic rego. He has the new conditional historic reg that they are trialling. He said he basically needed a blue slip and a signature from the club. He said that granted yes the blue slip guy was a friend of a friend, but the car needed no engineering or testing - just a regulation blue slip once over. The blue slip was his main worry ie by surrendering his normal rego it put him into no mans land in a pretty modified car if they then gave him a hard time for the blue slip, but in the end he said it was just like paaing a normal rego inspection. Might be worth looking into for yours yeah?

That's the same setup as Vic has now, getting the permit initially requires a proper RWC inspection - when they first launched it, there wasn't a formal Vicroads inspection required. There were literally over 1000 car clubs created overnight, mostly just by a handful of people so they could drive their hotted up VB commodores. There were even people who set up a club and charged a substantial initial "membership & inspection" of $500 or more so people could put their non-engineered cars on the road.

There are a lot of cars getting around that should be engineered but aren't. Vicroads tightened the requirements a 3 or so years ago, the horse has bolted for a lot of those cars, but eventually the police will defect them out of the system. There is now an 'M' (modified) plate along with the 'H' (historic) plate.

It's still a little bit too subjective, it's up to the RWC inspector to interpret the vehicle standards and whether the car needs certification, but that's the same as full reg.

My local club requires a yearly inspection, but most clubs don't...

[sambb]

3in MAF setup installed. Spewing - the work of art bellmouth into the MAF housing throat that I was so proud of didn't bloody fit. It was hitting the inside of the filter material. So I had to waste about an hour carving all the silicon off. So I hope you're right Gary, its just an open ended MAF breathing from inside the filter. Once the tune gets pumped up more as we go i'll ask the tuner to lok at the MAF readings to make sure they are smooth and if so I'll be satisfied.
Old 315cc injectors out and new bosch EV14 550cc with connector adapters in. If anyone is doing this run all the fuel out of it by pulling fuse 41 while its idling. Try to start it a couple of times after it konks out to make sure there is zero fuel pressure. You have to unclip the cam position sensor, throttle body sensor and inlet air temp sensor (also at te throttle body). Then unknit those looms till the y are above the plenum and you can get the rail up and out of the way without having to disconnect any fuel lines,
The base tune for the new hardware is in and did some starting logs today so we'll see where it ends up eh!

[sambb]

GM Debuts New Architecture, DOHC 4.2L 550hp Twin-Turbo V8

Finally GM is putting cams at the top of a V8! The LS is dead?!

Might be a future cheaper source of water to air intercoolers (than M5 ones at least).

[metalhead]

What a wasteful, needlessly complex, oversized, top heavy and over weight solution, pushrod v8s forever! Nah, just kidding, that's pretty cool, interesting how they swapped the intake and exhaust sides too. Still, I suspect it may suffer from most of the same packaging problems (I.e. width/size up around the heads) that most other dohc v8s do when it comes to popularity for engine conversions/swaps, as well as the additional costs and complexity for power upgrades. Pretty cool bit of engineering though.

[sambb]

I read somewhere else that its lighter and smaller than the LS but even if thats true (maybe not including all the inlet pipe work and IC's etc) its hard to believe it would have a lower CoG than an LS. With no headers in the way theyll be sticking them in 86/BRZ's left right and centre. At least the turbo hot sides are easily accessible so the dumps/cats etc can be easily binned. I wonder how long the bonnets paint lasts for with the cats sitting 10mm under the skin?

[sambb]

hey Andrew, just stumbled across a Kempsey hillclimb vid. How'd it go?

[metalhead]

I read somewhere else that its lighter and smaller than the LS but even if thats true (maybe not including all the inlet pipe work and IC's etc) its hard to believe it would have a lower CoG than an LS. With no headers in the way theyll be sticking them in 86/BRZ's left right and centre. At least the turbo hot sides are easily accessible so the dumps/cats etc can be easily binned. I wonder how long the bonnets paint lasts for with the cats sitting 10mm under the skin?

Be interesting to see. With the intake wrapping around the outside of overhead cam heads I would have expected it to be very wide at the top (I.e strut tower clearance), but you're right that it may well be better down lower, for chassis rail clearance. And yeh, they better have some sort of pretty effective heat shielding, or bonnets will be toast! CoG would have to be worse you'd think, especially with all that plumbing up high.

hey Andrew, just stumbled across a Kempsey hillclimb vid. How'd it go?

It was good! Had a great time, ran ok, I've posted a video up of my last run. The patchy surface makes clear a pretty big difference between me and the more modern cars that make up the rest of the class, particularly when it comes to abs and braking into the hairpin - the surface is a bit loose and drops away on the inside, I had a pretty big inside front lockup on pretty much every run. I mentioned it when talking with some of the other guys; "Oh yeh, not really a problem, but I noticed my abs light working a bit through there." Bastards! Car was working pretty well though, I was quicker than Rob at the start of the day, but he had me beat by the end. Liam and Will had me beat by a bit over a second all day. Looking at the in car, I could have pushed a little harder through the chicane, and might have actually been better to brake a little later into the hairpin - the car may have been better settled. Very challenging and unforgiving little track, good fun! It's actually very involving for its short length - the changing surfaces and camber keep you on your toes big time, I really like it. The last corner tightens and goes off camber right at the end, and then you have to pull up pretty quickly after the finish. Just a shame that there's so little actual track time.

I'm going to run at Ringwood this weekend, which will finally give me some good data on how these Nankangs compare to my street Contis. You gonna make it up for a run?

[sambb]

Sounds good. Everyone seems to like the Kempsey run because of the surface changes etc - like a tarmac rally stage. Did Liam take out the class? No wont be going to Ringwood. Only two logs into the cars re tune so definitely not ready for a track. !0 days to go till the VW Nats so fingers crossed its dialled in for that or i'll have to just go 9/10th's.

[metalhead]

Yep, Liam took out the class. He had made a few changes to his car since Canberra, seems to have worked well for him. Rob was a in a different car entirely - another Commodore, but a ve or vf (I dunno which) Calais. Good luck with the tuning!

[metalhead]

Had a bit of a look at the Grafton track after putting in my entry today - now that looks like a fun, tight, and technical track where I (or you) may be in with a shot at a good result! Have you been up there before, and/or are you planning to go this year? It's the long weekend which makes the travel easier...