build diary
<< | show individual entries | >>October 30, 2006:
Another autocross.
The Red Rock Racers were out on the weekend again. The events are held in the parking lot for a ski area at a fair elevation (9000' or so) and there was certainly some worry about the weather. Lucky for us, it turned out to be sunny and warm. Well, sunny and not cold anyhow. It was another fairly small group but a good one with a fair mix of cars. We all managed to get a dozen runs in.
For some reason, I was having difficulty putting down a good clean run at first. The biggest problem was a 270 degree corner that I had suggested. Going in too fast meant loads of understeer, and while I could break the back end free with power that was a little risky because it was tough to line up the exit smoothly. Naturally, you had to do it twice per run. There was one section of the course that was quite quick - at least, it was for me. Apparently I was far faster through there than anyone else. It sure was hectic with a fairly smooth but narrow line available. At one point, I messed up my braking, got into a little tank-slapper and managed to collect two adjacent cones with opposite sides of the car! Whoops. My typical times were around 1:14, which was a second faster than my (much smoother) friend Mark in his Miata. Then finally, I got it right on one run. The guys in the timing booth thought something had gone wrong with the timing gear - I'd pulled 3 seconds off my time! I did manage to back it up a little slower on subsequent runs, but it left me with another FTD by a fair margin. I'll have to work on those 270s, tight slow corners are my weakest point. I have to admit that it was crazy fun letting the rear end just smear across the pavement. There were a few spots on the course that were well suited to walking the back end around with the throttle. It's the part I miss the most about driving a FWD.
We're closing on the new house today. There will be much chaos and hard work ahead for the next couple of weeks. Very little of it will have to do with the Seven.
entry 1302
The latest autocross.
Luckily, the snowballs were kept to a minumum. The pavement was cold but clean and the air was warm. What a great way to end the season!
entry 1303
It's fun watching the different cars at an autocross.
The Isuzu was surprisingly agile around the cones, able to move the back end around without the crushing understeer you usually see on econoboxes. The Miata was up to the usual Miata antics, the MINI Cooper S driver was a neophyte and simply trying to figure out where the course went, the WRX driver was quick and of course there's the noisy little orange thing.
entry 1304
November 3, 2006:
The new site is up!
Okay, so maybe it's not a big exciting event for many people. But the pictures and text are now integrated much better (right back to the beginning!). I'll soon have the option of going to a certain date, a better search, etc. Please be patient, and I think I set things up so regular readers won't find themselves losing their place. I hope so, anyhow...
entry 1305
November 10, 2006:
Much excitement!
The Westfield showed up at Flyin' Miata today. Wow, it's a beautiful piece of work. As it should be, given that this kit cost around four times as much as mine did. But it's easy to see why. The rear suspension is a work of art, and I'm seriously considering cutting the back of my chassis off and duplicating it. It's going to be a lot of fun building this critter. If you want to follow it, watch the FM Westfield website.
Meanwhile, I continue with the move into my new garage...
entry 1306
November 21, 2006:
I'm working on a Seven, just not mine!
The FM Westfield build has been taking up time at work. It's a little frustrating. Why? Because I have to do other things and I can't spend all of my time on the Westie! Argh. One of my coworkers has been gone for over two weeks and I'm trying to keep our salvage operation running as well as my own work. It means that I spend more time poking around the Westfield than I do working on it. I'd wanted to be elbow deep in the entire project and that's just not working out.
It has been interesting stuff, though. This is the first LHD version of this particular car, so we have a little trouble-shooting to do. The manual isn't finished so there's also some work in trying to reverse-engineer the ideas of the Westfield guys. Sounds a little familiar, doesn't it? Well, not to the same extent as my build! But it is fun. I hadn't realised how much I'd enjoyed the problem-solving aspect of the build and the Westie provides just enough of that to keep me hooked. I think I'm being useful as well - having been through the whole thing before, I have a really good idea of how it's all going to fit together. It's also really cool being paid to do things like this.
Meanwhile, the work at home continues. The Seven is now living in its new garage, although it's more a case of having a little burrow for the car inside the collection of boxes that still rule the space. The weather is cool enough to discourage me from driving it to work. I might do that next week just to prove I can. With a good jacket on.
entry 1307
November 26, 2006: 
It's no wonder I'm not working on the Seven right now.
Here's the state of the garage. Sure, a bunch of the boxes are empty, but that's still not helping. The car in the foreground is a completely stripped Miata shell. The good news is that I'll have loads of room as soon as I get this all cleared out.
entry 1308
December 3, 2006:
A few thoughts.
I received an email recently that made a comment about how much free time and money I have. That's been bouncing around my head for a while.
Free time. This one seems tough - none of us has the free time we want. But it's really a matter of priorities. According to the AC Nielson company, the average American spends more than 4 hours a day in front of the television. Ouch. Replace TV time with garage time and I'm still way below average. I am lucky that I have a very understanding girlfriend who's been around since the whole Seven saga started (and in a further burst of understanding or possibly a tragic misunderstanding, she is now my fiancee) and no kids. But still, four hours a day? Even an hour a day is enough to get a lot done in the garage.
So what about the money? Let's pretend the Seven is a real car. I started by paying about $3000 on the frame. Over the next three years, I've spent an average of $194/month on the car if we're going to use the $10,000 budget that appeared Car and Driver. That budget is at retail, which is less than my actual cost. But still, I think the car would easily sell for $10,000 as it sits now. Think of that in terms of financing a car. $3000 down and $194/month for 36 months. I just checked, and I can't even get a base Kia Rio for those numbers if I could find 0% financing - and I doubt a three-year-old Kia has 100% resale value. I'm also pretty sure a Rio won't set lap records or outbrake a Carrera GT. To be fair, it probably has a roof.
On top of that, my daily driver is a 1988 Mazda 323 GTX. A cool little turbocharged AWD critter that's the predecessor of the WRX and EVOs. The difference? I paid $800 for mine. So I don't have to worry about car payments even though I drive a fun car to work. Maybe my vehicular choices aren't so expensive after all.
There's also the educational value - how much would it cost me to learn what I've learned?
Enough of that rambling. Any news? Yes! After chatting with Dennis from DPcars.net about his use of motorcycle mufflers in over-powerful applications, I'm going to try fitting a Hayabusa muffler to the Seven. I chose the Busa because it's a very powerful bike and thus should have a free-flowing muffler, and also because the muffler attaches with a nice three-bolt flange. It didn't hurt that I found a used one for sale for $10 on eBay. If it works out, maybe I'll spring for one of those cool carbon cans.
I'm also going to try out some new upper front control arms (the best of my control arms, but never mind that) from Kinetic. I'm even eying the very cool race seats from Westfield after learning that they'll fit. Waterproof, light and very supportive. Also worth two "payments" each, ouch. Hmm...
entry 1309
December 8, 2006:
The Hayabusa muffler arrived yesterday.
It's a neat piece. I hope it'll work well without being restrictive. According to the information stamped on the side, it will keep a 'Busa down to 80 dB. Well, it and a friend for the other two cylinders. It has a nice big 2.5" inlet but the actual pipe that goes into said inlet is actually only 1.5" ID. Boo! That's not a big problem, I can easily enough use just the flange and make it work nicely. I'm going to keep my eyes open for a single aftermarket unit as well. You'd think that guys would be throwing these bikes down the road with some regularity and so there would be scratched and orphaned mufflers around, but I haven't found them yet. No worries, I'll do the fitting with this one. Imagine, I might be able to have different mufflers that simply bolt on for different noise levels. That would be cool. As well as my "SuperTipp" setup works, I'd be happy to lose it.
Of course, right after I received this, I discovered that a Triumph Daytona uses a single can - and the Daytona 955 made 147 hp. So maybe I should have bought one of those. Hmm...
entry 1310
The stock Hayabusa muffler and pipe.
This is what $10 on eBay will get you.
entry 1311
The dirty secret of Hayabusa riders.
Their exhausts look like big fat 2.5" pipes, when really the ID is 1.5". Compensation or heatshielding?
entry 1312
December 11, 2006:
I've been having some fun on eBay.
On a tip from a motorcyclist, I decided to look for ZX-10R mufflers. They're a 162 hp bike with a single muffler - and it only weighs 375 lbs dry! Yikes. Turns out they have a similar flange on the back of the muffler as the Busa. I picked up an "experienced" version for $23.50. I might have a Triumph 955 muffler before too long as well.
I also won a suede 12" kart steering wheel. I have a 13" wheel on the car now and I'm curious about how the 12" will feel. I can make a simple adaptor to try it on the existing column. For $26, it was a really cheap way to get slightly quicker steering. You can never have enough steering wheels.
entry 1313
December 14, 2006:
More mufflers!
Okay, not any new ones. But the Kawasaki ZX-10R unit showed up. It's very similar on first inspection to the Busa one, but not so much once you get the input pipe removed.
First, the inlet is quite a bit smaller. I haven't measured it yet, but I think it's 2" instead of 2.5". However, the ID of the pipe going into it is significantly bigger than the Busa unit because it's a single-wall setup instead of double-wall. That's a bit of a shame for me, I have a 2.5" ID exhaust.
The internal construction of the mufflers is quite different. The Busa unit is what I'd expect from a chambered design but the Kawasaki piece looks almost like a catalytic converter. It's not like that all the way though because I can't see any light through there as with a cat. I wonder which will be lower restriction? I think it's time for a little comparison test!
A coworker asked me why I was messing with mufflers again. He thinks the car sounds great. Well, I wouldn't mind a bit of a volume drop at WOT but it also gives me something to do while it's cold outside and my garage is still jammed full of boxes...
entry 1314
Comparing the two motorcycle mufflers.
The Kawasaki unit is on the right and the Hayabusa on the left. A very interesting comparison of internal design.
entry 1315
December 20, 2006: 
I picked up this steering wheel to try out.
It's a 12" piece, 1" smaller than my current wheel. I had been thinking of making an adapter to put it on the existing setup, but now I'm all distracted and considering building a new piece from the steering column back. Hmm. Regardless, it's a nice little suede wheel that only needs one small piece of repair and it only cost me about $26. It's time to stop messing around on eBay.
entry 1316
December 23, 2006:
Instead of working on cleaning out the garage, I spent some time poking around with the website.
About three years too late, I've added an RSS feed to the site. Let me know if you have any problems with it, like everything else on the site it's homebrew. I've also tweaked some formatting to make the display better for Internet Explorer users. The Search has already been turbocharged. Soon I'll also add the ability to start reading at a certain date. If anyone has comments about the navigation of the site, I'm interested in hearing it.
entry 1317
January 1, 2007: 
Happy new year!
This is how I celebrated - by taking the Seven out for a short spin. I can't say the race tires grip all that well on an icy driveway, but the roads were just fine other than the usual sand and gravel. It's nice to get back behind the wheel and play with the car again.
entry 1318
During the holidays, I managed to make a dent in the pile of stuff in the garage.
It's still not exactly finished, but there's enough room to park some more of the cars inside. I've never had a garage that was attached to the house before, and I just love the way this innocuous door in the basement opens up to reveal the toys. There's a Miata under construction in front of the Seven and room for the blue Miata and the Jeep behind it. It's a big garage.
entry 1319
January 7, 2007:
I've been really busy.
But not on the Seven, unfortunately. I have a pile of things to try out but thanks to a book deadline, no time to try them. The book has to be done in the next week or so, after which I'll catch up on all the work.
There's some travel in the future. I'm heading to San Francisco on Friday to take part in the Bay Area Miata Club tech day. They've asked me to come out a few times in the past, but this year it worked. I'll know more in a couple of days, but it's also likely that I'll turn around and head back to California a few days after returning to attend a testing session at the Streets of Willow. And yes, the presence of the Seven has been requested. I hope this works out, it's going to be a really interesting day if it does. More details will follow once I know if this is going to happen or not. But it may mean a week of frantic work checking the car over to make sure it's ready for another high-profile test...
entry 1320
January 17, 2007:
Lots of snow on the ground, so the Seven is stuck in the garage.
Quite possibly literally stuck - I haven't dared try it yet.
The long drought of no-car-time is over. I handed over the final photographs and manuscript of another book, so now it's time to start making things again. I have heard from the owner of another CMC Miata frame who has found extensive cracking in the welds of his rear control arms. This is a car that sees exclusively track use on big slicks, but I'm definitely going to investigate that. The rear end of the car is certainly going to get some close examination. This is just one more reason to amputate the CMC geometry in the rear and replace it with something else.
Unfortunately, the trip to California this weekend looks as if it's not going to happen. I think it's going to be postponed for a similar event in Oklahoma in early March. I should know more later this week. Time to get cracking then.
entry 1321
January 18, 2007:
Okay, it's time to kick a new project into high gear.
The Targa Newfoundland is only 8 months off. I'm about to start work on the third chassis, as the first two just didn't work out. With the new book and the move, not much happened on that car. That's going to change soon. It's going to be a totally different sort of build than the Seven although I'm not sure there will be any less welding :) It took about 7 months for the Seven to hit the track the first time. I have less time than that so hopefully I can put this thing together in a hurry. Wish me luck. And don't worry, the Seven won't be completely neglected.