The Frankenprotege rallycar worklog

[Mazda_Powered]

oh the joys of modifying cars so you can beat the piss out of them lol.

Coming along great though Jay, looks almost too clean for a rally car haha.

[bomdoutscort]

I hope you beat the piss out of it for making you have to wait 2 years to drive it again.

[KaleoXtreme]

Nice! Will you be using an EGT lower rad hose?

[jay]

I'll look into it. So far it looks like we can use the stock hose without twisting it too bad. But dammit, looks like life's getting in the way and it won't be coming home tomorrow.. more like Monday. Olympus is looking pretty unlikely now.

[jay]

Here's the beechin downpipe. It looksa nice. We'll wrap it up real good before installing the skidplate. We're finishing up the rest of the welding and such under the car, all that's left is tabs on the rear subframe to locate brakelines, and the rest of the exhaust. Once that's done, the car's coming home. We've lost out on running Olympus, but there's still either Oregon Trail or Idaho...

[SgtRauksauff]

I'm grinnin'. I can't wait!

[JPmotorsports]

Your almost there---keep to the code...

[bomdoutscort]

Nice route around the gearbox

[jay]

Another milestone day. John got the exhaust mostly done today, so I towed it home. All that's left under the car is stuff I can do here on jackstands, things like wrap the downpipe and weld in an O2 sensor bung and make a bracket to locate it and install the skidplate and put new rotors on and such. Everything else that needs doing I think I can do here, and it should get done much faster now that I don't have to spend 4 hours a day commuting to where the car is. Check out this python of an exhaust setup. 2.5" hotside back through a short piece o' flex, back to the rearmount (gets it outta the rockspray) cat, where it goes to 3", cuz well that 3" cat was on sale, then out the back with a ridiculous 3.5" dump pipe, cuz we sorta had a chunk of that stuff laying about already bent the right way, so what the hell....

PS just BTW when I was down at Bill Scribner Welding getting my lower rad outlet relocated, there were a set of drag car headers there that Bill installed EGT bungs on for each runner. Nice hardware, stainless, purty. Couldn't help but notice the runners collected into what was at the very least a 5" (!) pipe, and each runner was the same diameter as my downpipe.
Golly. Dude made mention that the engine those headers were gonna get bolted to put out 2000HP when the nitrous was opened up. So I guess, if each cylinder is doing 250 hp like my whole damn engine roughly does, then I guess each cylinder needs a bloody 2.5 in. runner... Impressive; them dragster boys operate from a different set o' rules than us rallyistas.

[Mazda_Powered]

looks like it'll work real nice! Just to verify, that's the cat converter at the very end of the exhaust system? lol

[jay]

Yep, waaaay out back. They do light back there, you can see a nice orange glow from the car in front of you at stage start, but for what we're doing it really is the best place to put it. Bang a rock into your cat, break the matrix, clog the exhaust, and lose the engine before you get back to service.
Today I hope to get the oil and trans coolers in, IC plumbed, and bumper assy reinstalled. We shall see...

[Mazda_Powered]

that makes sense to me, clogged cats are a real pain in the ass lol. So I guess rules state "install a cat converter somewhere in your exhaust" and you said "fine, no muffler it is "

Intercooler plumbing doesn't look too far off OEM tho, you said the engine was moved 1" forward, correct?

[jay]

Roughly. And some bit higher up as well.
Tech rules on cat state there must be a functioning cat in the exhaust, doesn't say where, and the car can't be too loud. It didn't have a muffler before this gearbox swap. Turbo does a surprising job of (comparitively) quieting things down so yah use cat as muffler and call it good.

[808]

Dude... If Doug Heredos' old RX-7 is quiet enough to pass... most everything is.

[jay]

Wot? I can't hear you. I think Doug's car is idling.

Got the DP wrapped up and the O2 bung welded in, gotta finish making the bracket to bolt it to the trans. Then I'll go after putting the front of the car back on.