GRM $2008 Feisty Festy MS Thread

[gorgonheimer]

awesome. i also got my bp mounted in this past week. looks good. great to hear it finally started

[dok33]

Been a while since an update... Yanked the engine out last week to prep for the manual swap. Couldn't find flywheel bolts (damn 12x1.0mm crap) anywhere locally so we got delayed waiting for some off ebay to arrive.

Our $30 Mitsubishi Eclipse turbo is mounted to the (pretty) miata manifold flanged for a Nissan T25 thanks to a custom adapter Jimmy whipped up:


The turbo oil drain is also done but that's about all that's gone right thus far...


We tried in vain to make an oil feed line for the turbo out of brake lines/fittings (after eating at Jardin Corona of course) and ended up just splurging the $40 for a braided stainless line that will bolt right on. We also failed at installing the clutch pilot bearing and later found out that it actually goes in the flywheel on this motor instead of the crankshaft like everything else any of us has worked on (thanks Jon).

Next up is mounting our $25 flywheel and hodgepodge $75 clutch so we can bolt the tranny on and try to figure out the mounts, which looks to be the hardest part of the project... Stay tuned

[gorgonheimer]

cool. looks good. i used a clutch pressure plate for the protege and the disc from a probe gt v6. fits in awsome and gives 3/8 in more clutch diameter. it works awsome so far. i havent got the turbo on yet but i dont have a huge budget. lol u hope it kicks serious but. what size injectors are you going to use?

[dok33]

Have some 440cc Supra injectors in there right now.

[FE3-323]

awesome to see some improovement!! keep up the good work

[dok33]

Long overdue update! We had some issues come up and weren't able to make the $2008 Challenge so we've set our sights on 2009! I'm happy to say there's been much progress made in the past couple of months and the Festy is close to moving under it's own power!!

Continuing our trend of not meeting goals, we blew on past February and March with no engine or trans mounted. Weddings and personal projects took priority and we finally jumped back on full force after a lazy spring. The mounts took a few months longer than we had planned at our slow pace, we were also not drinking as heavily as before, which definitely slowed progress.

We scored some deals on parts along the way, including an SRT-4 intercooler for $30 that fits perfectly and minimizes IC pipe routing:


We spent most of May and June fabricating and brainstorming (and by “we” we mean Andy) as well as telepathically finding Fox body Mustang steering rack bushings that cost $5 and fit perfectly in our home-built mounts alongside a “Help!” rubber freeze plug cut in half. Without further ado, on to the pics!

Mounts Etc.
Frame notched and boxed for trans:






A little wood goes a long way (that’s what she said):




Top trans mount:


Front trans mount:


Passenger’s side motor mount:


Final mount pics, from left to right: front lower trans (crossmember side), driver side frame mount, front upper trans mount, top trans mount, rear lower trans mount:






Fits like a frickin’ glove:




Shifter extension/rotation, using what we have (box tubing):


Fab pics and general tomfoolery
Busch light tastes best through a welding helmet


Cardboard grinding shield


Jimmy’s welding sweater, later to be found flammable


Jimmy using his legs as a vise as usual


Practicing our motto of safety first


No words to describe these…

[dok33]

With the mounts complete and the motor back in it was time to start buttoning things up and get ‘er running with the new manual transmission.

First step was to get the turbo and manifold bolted back on and oil feed/drain lines connected. Luckily someone also pointed out that our aluminum flange adapter probably wouldn’t last long at the EGTs we’d be looking at (oops), so Andy fabbed up a new one out of steel:




We used a pre-fab Goodridge line and restrictor out of a Honda oil line kit for the feed and made a drain out of a Home Depot fitting and some used pushlock hose and fittings scored off ebay for <$20. We also bolted up the stock T25 O2 elbow that we’ll eventually make a downpipe for that dumps under the car:




Next up was mounting the intercooler. We had a bunch of box tubing that seemed like overkill, but we had it and it was scored for cheap so why not?? That said we present you with the world’s first intercooler/bumper with the beefiest mounts known to man:




Once the intercooler was mounted the next task was fitting the $10 set of MKIII Supra intercooler pipes we had. To our surprise we were able to find a clean piping route using the stock pieces with almost no modification!








We also spent some time making the radiator hoses play nicely with the IC piping, not much space in that little engine bay!




With all that sorted it was time to tackle the wiring. Our initial wiring job was just to get the car running and included lots of wire nuts and electrical tape:


The battery was also located externally to the car, so we installed our $10 Summit battery box in the hatch area:


Since we want the car to run more than 5 mins and not catch on fire, we’re in the process of cleanly routing the engine harness and soldering and heat shrinking all of the connections. We will also be tackling the headlight/signal harness to clean it up and make the car challenge legal:

[dok33]

More progress this week, after who knows how long the Festy moved under it's own power tonight!! It hauls ass even with a rough tune, pissed off some of my neighbors spinning the tires thru 2nd in my neighborhood We'll be doing some more tuning tomorrow night with the slicks so we can actually do some pulls with traction

Pics:
Hacked front bumper complete with zip ties


Radiator/fan cutout


Wiring cleanup


"Finished" bay


Elbow with IAT and BOV installed


Interior stripped and back together

[mx-3_4evr]

Nice! I like projects like these! I want videos now!

[dok33]

Hopefully get some video tonight!!

[dok33]

Here's a log of a pull I did last night at 8psi, it seems a little lean to me, thoughts?



Not sure why the CLT goes wacky whenever it accels either...

[mx-3_4evr]

It seems like your injectors are getting static. Try to wrap the signal wires in tin foil tape, then ground that tape

[dok33]

We've got the power wires to the Alt running near the fuel injector wiring, could this have something to do with it?

We're also running low imp injectors, could this be the flyback issue I've been reading about?

[dok33]

Tonight was test night, we had a blast for about 20mins until the cops showed up We tried to be polite and explain what we were up to and for the most part they were understanding especially when they saw the tow dolly and realized we hadn't driven the car there without registration inspection etc.

In the end they cited us for no insurance (failure to prove financial responsibility). The upside is it's not a moving violation, downside is the fine is $250 plus $250/yr for 3 years

Enough of that...
Datalog screenshot, guess it'll be good enough since we apparently can't drive it anywhere to tune (any input is greatly appreciated!):


Hittin the drag strip Saturday night and an autocross Sunday, more pics and vids to come!!

[gorgonheimer]

do you have insurance on another car in the state of texas? i have gotten out of a ticket by showing that i have a policy in texas. i live in conroe. i want to see that car. i am willing to drive the 3 hours or so to see it. you have a pm wit my number