LOF's LS1 FC track car build

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No cage yet, just an autopower 4 point roll bar.

[atli126]

Do you think that 4 point roll bar helped?

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It had to have added a bit of stiffness, and certainly some safety. It has been in the car since before the engine swap and the car was nowhere near as fast or stiff then. The best feature is being able to use it as a harness bar and camera mount.

[1320king]

unless needed I wouldn't put a lexan rear hatch. I was going to go that route but realized the extra weight out back helped with weight distribution and I wouldn't have to add weight for traction (drag car)

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Back at the track finally!!

Unfortunately I made no changes to the car over the summer, I was having too much fun boating. I pretty much pulled the car out from where I parked it in June after the last track day, gave everything a once over, threw the good tires on it, and put gas in it.

Temps were very similar to last June (90+ degree day). This was the second outing on the Maxxis RC-1 tires. I am now very close to getting the understeer dialed out of the car. I made a rear shock adjustment, and some tire pressure changes. The car is still not quite where I want it, but it is pretty close. I ran a 1:33.6 which is just a few tenths off my personal best. I hope to be in the low 1:31/high 1:30 area with perfect conditions.

I have compared the GPS data from my best lap ever with the NT01s to my best lap yesterday and it looks very promising that a 2-3 second pickup is possible with cooler track temps. I picked up about 2 seconds a lap with the NT01s going from 90+degree temps to 60 degree temps, so I expect similar gains from the Maxxis tires, which are said to be really good with cooler track temps.

I do need to duct my oil cooler before the next event as I am seeing oil temps of over 250. I verified the accuracy of the gauge by using a temp gun on the oil pan after a run. Coolant temps are really solid, only 225 degrees or so even in the worst conditions.

[AKINA FC]

Nice!  Glad the adjustments are doing what you need, no rear bar still? Have you thought about going back to the stiffer rear springs now with the stickier tires? 2 sec pick up is awesome! I really need to get some data equipment this winter, you make me jealous haha
Ducting will help you a bunch, is your radiator ducted/sealed completely as well, like all edges/gaps taped off? That will make a big difference there too.

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Nice!  Glad the adjustments are doing what you need, no rear bar still? Have you thought about going back to the stiffer rear springs now with the stickier tires? 2 sec pick up is awesome! I really need to get some data equipment this winter, you make me jealous haha
Ducting will help you a bunch, is your radiator ducted/sealed completely as well, like all edges/gaps taped off? That will make a big difference there too.

No rear bar still. I can't go too much stiffer with the springs in back.. the rear was hopping around badly on bumpy sections, and the car was faster with the softer rear springs being the only change.

I may go up 25 lbs on the rear springs if I can't get the bit of understeer I still have to go away. I think I was just running the front tires 2 lbs too low. Next time I'm going to run the tires at 36 hot all around and see what it does.

The car is a lot easier to drive now, but the Maxxis tires don't like to slide. You can't slightly overdrive the car and maintain time like you can with NT01s.

I do not have my radiator ducting run all the way to the bumper, it is ducted to the front of the core support. My plan was to finish that when I installed the splitter. My coolant temps are great, the car only gets to 220 F or so even when it is 100+ outside. Because my oil cooler is set back, I think too much air is getting around it. It is a 34 row cooler, so I think it is plenty big enough however it is square in shape, so I believe I need to get more air to the top portion of the cooler.

For $400 an AIM Solo is a great bang for the buck for data acquisition/lap timing system. It will make you faster for sure.

[Bowtie7]

Back at the track finally!!

Unfortunately I made no changes to the car over the summer, I was having too much fun boating. I pretty much pulled the car out from where I parked it in June after the last track day, gave everything a once over, threw the good tires on it, and put gas in it.

Temps were very similar to last June (90+ degree day). This was the second outing on the Maxxis RC-1 tires. I am now very close to getting the understeer dialed out of the car. I made a rear shock adjustment, and some tire pressure changes. The car is still not quite where I want it, but it is pretty close. I ran a 1:33.6 which is just a few tenths off my personal best. I hope to be in the low 1:31/high 1:30 area with perfect conditions.

I have compared the GPS data from my best lap ever with the NT01s to my best lap yesterday and it looks very promising that a 2-3 second pickup is possible with cooler track temps. I picked up about 2 seconds a lap with the NT01s going from 90+degree temps to 60 degree temps, so I expect similar gains from the Maxxis tires, which are said to be really good with cooler track temps.

I do need to duct my oil cooler before the next event as I am seeing oil temps of over 250. I verified the accuracy of the gauge by using a temp gun on the oil pan after a run. Coolant temps are really solid, only 225 degrees or so even in the worst conditions.

Hi Ash, sounds like a blast! One thing that can definitely help temps is to remove the grill from the bumper cover. It is restrictive and your temps will drop a good bit without it. We run Russ's car without it and although temps are never a problem, we now have almost half of the oil cooler taped up and water temps never see over 210 in August at Road Atlanta. SCCA won't let ITS cars cut the grill but early on we did and it made a great difference on the rotary cars. When they made us go back to stock the temps went back up and we had to figure out better ways to cool the hot rotaries down.

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Thanks Charlie, that is a great tip. I remember you posting that before. 

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Also I was analyzing the data between myself and my co driver and I might be able to pick up a chunk of time (between half a second and a second) through turns 3-5 at Willow Springs. My co driver gains on me by a second in that area, so I am going to try his line through there next time to see if it works.

I was tentative in that area before because the car would want to step out, but with the new setup I can be more agressive.

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Pulled the car out today to get it ready for 2 track events next week. One at Willow Springs and another at Auto Club Speedway. I found the clutch master cylinder to be empty and it turns out that the wilwood reservoir developed a crack near the clamp. I ordered another one today.

After almost 2 years my front rotors were about dead. I run the Ronin Front BBK and I decided to modify the front hubs to accept off the shelf 350z rotors, instead of modifying the hub bore on the rotors this time. This should cut down on the cost and complexity of the consumables. Centric High Carbon blanks are only $50 each, and have proven very durable, so I do not see a need to go to 2 piece rotors at this time.

With this new set of hubs I used EZ Off oven cleaner to clean them. I sprayed them down and let them sit about 10 minutes before rinsing off the oven cleaner. Quickly hit them with a scrub brush and rinsed again and they were pretty clean after that. I used the oven method to remove the bearings this time. I put the hubs in the oven at 350 for about 20 minutes. I pulled them out and wacked the hubs on a block of wood and the races fell right out.. Easy.

The last set of hubs I ground notches in to knock out the bearing races easily. It works well, but the oven method is less effort.

You can see the OE hubs here compared to the new modified ones. The large step the OE hubs was turned down to accept the 350z rotor. The hub face was also turned to take out any runout and trued to the bearing bore.


New hubs installed, with new ARP studs, bearings repacked, assembled and ready to go.


 

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In preparation for painting the hood and front fenders to match I began removing the protective layer of oxidation  from the original paint. To my suprise, the paint is shining up pretty well. The rear quarter was repainted due to a fender bender and was oxidized horribly, even worse than the rest of the car. You can see a before and after here. The horizontal line is where they feathered in the paint repair. The vertical is where I polished across the transition.
I also did a spot on the back of the car. These spots came out so promising I bought a Harbor Freight DA polisher.. It is like magic! I have done about half the car with compound now.

[AKINA FC]

Looking good, gonna be nice all one color again.
Yeah i cut my hubs to eliminate that same problem, no more turning rotors to make them fit. 

[scuter83]

Your polishing photos are giving me inspiration.  My buddy that has been into Mazdas forever told me my paint would come back with some simple polishing because it is single stage paint they used.  I didn't want to put in the time polishing can take, but now I might have to do it and see if I can get some shine back.

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This is the first time I've ever used a DA on a car. Go buy some Meguiars Ultimate Compound. It's around $10 a bottle and very user friendly. It is very hard if impossible to screw up with it. It will also remove haze from headlights. It will clear up the FC front high beam lenses, and other hazy plastic lenses. I even used it on my kitchen table with excellent results. It takes scuffs out of paint very effectively as well. The pictures are what I did by hand in a couple minutes. The Harbor freight 6 inch DA was $48 with a 20% off coupon. I also just grabbed 2 HF Orange foam pads.. I'm still in the first one and it is holding up well. I'm using the DA at lower speeds and keeping it moving. I taped off the black door trim, as the buffer will polish the black trim if you go over it.