Weekend Projects

[Diehonda]

Finally! Here are a few photos.

This image was taken by another Miata enthusiast before we had lunch at a Cracker Barrel in Lexington. It seems the parking lot made a nice backdrop for it.

This image gives a nice rear and side shot. It looks great having no dents and dings in the car. The luggage rack gives it the sleeper touch. The twin exhausts give a subtle hint to something being different.



How about an interior shot? In this one, you can see the recovered seats, some bling, and my old floor mats. I use those for daily driving. A new set is used for shows.

Another side shot. Here, you can see the new gas cap cover, the wheels that finally have the caps in place, the new doorsills, etc.



And, for those who just can't stand it, here is the engine, again.

Amazing!!

Installed an Aeroforce Interceptor Scan Gauge in a vent pod today.



Out with the stocker

Lookin good!!

 

[DaleNixon]

Nice Scangauge! Do you have a warning light set up for KR? Does it only plug into the OBDII port, or do you have to provide it with power as well?

 

[08cosmic3]

It gets it's power through the OBDII port, plug and play. I have the warning lights set up at 5500 rpm as a shift light but you can set it for many different parameters. I made many hard pulls today and the highest my KR went was 0.3 and that was only when I loaded the boost up at lower RPM's. I have one step colder plugs which is said to help with KR.

It's basically a dash hawk but in a round gauge and you can't hook it up to a PC and get graphs. It does have a record and playback through the gauge. I have the two displays set up for boost and A/F, but you can toggle to other parameters on the fly with a tough of a button or you can set it to scan up to 4 sets of two parameters and rotate at a set time frame. It has alot more features that I will have to learn how to use. It is somewhat hard to see in sunlight because the angle of the vent pod is not the best. I may get another pod mount and mount it to the column where it is straight on. I will probably get a prosport boost gauge to put in the vent, they don't cost much and look good.

 

[DaleNixon]

I'm thinking of getting 3 scangauges to fit in a CP-E pod. Some day. Have you checked out your LTFT and STFT values with that gauge? I'd be interested to see what numbers you're seeing as we pretty much had the same setup before I took my Cobb intake off.

 

[08cosmic3]

I have not look at those yet. What would be the normal range on those and what were your numbers?

 

[DaleNixon]

Well 0 is perfect, but even with the stock box I often saw LTFT's from +3.9 to -3.9.

You'll notice the car has several fuel trim modes. There's a certain number at idle, one at partial throtte, hard throttle, full throttle, etc.

With the Cobb I was getting about +10 at idle, +8.6 or so when cruising, and around +14.1 at WOT. LTFTs are safe once stable, but the STFT number shows how much the car is currently adjusting even with the LTFT number. With the Cobb my STFTs went crazy. I think the highest I saw it spike was around +25 which I believe is the upper threshold.

I could easily make it spike to +25 by engine braking at low speeds with the Cobb. I started getting nervous about my ECU adjusting fuel to such an extreme degree, so I went back to my HKS SRI. With the HKS, the numbers are much lower and more stable.

 

[Moultese]

Loving the scan gauge. That's my plan as soon as I have the money.

 

[jmsj578]

Little Red got its first win of the season, today. We didn't win anything in Georgetown, the other day; but, we brought home Top Foreign in Mt. Vernon, today. It was a well attended event with many nice cars. I felt fortunate to bring home a trophy that is probably taller than the car. (yippy)

 

[jmsj578]

I couldn't stand the rock pocked windshield in our Miata, anymore. I ordered a new one for it. After 19 years of damage, I couldn't make the windshield look clean, no matter how I tried. That's not good for a show car. It should be installed, this week.

 

[jmsj578]

The windshield was finally installed, yesterday. No matter what I did to clean the car, it looked dirty because of the ugly windshield. Now, the car looks great! The top is the only thing I have left to do to the car; but, it's in good enough shape that I can hold off doing that for quite a while. I have the top down for shows, anyway. The only thing really wrong with it is the plastic window that I can live with. Here is a photo of the two show cars in action at Richmond, the other day.

 

[Moultese]

Just ordered my Aeroforce Scan gauge. Tomorrow the car is going in for some window tint. Woot for first modifications!

 

[08cosmic3]

Just ordered my Aeroforce Scan gauge. Tomorrow the car is going in for some window tint. Woot for first modifications!

Did you get the $219 shipped price from group buy on M3F? What color combo did you choose?

 

[Moultese]

Did you get the $219 shipped price from group buy on M3F? What color combo did you choose?

What? No. I just ordered through their website. I didn't know there was a GB.

I got the black face w/ black trim and red lights.

 

[08cosmic3]

It's still good, it would have saved you $20. Post some pics when you get it installed. I leave mine on boost and A/F most of the time. I monitored fuel pressure and knock retard at firsts and found that I have no knock retard and my fuel pressure was good as well. I was looking at HP today on the way home from work and it hit 300 in 3rd at full throttle and 297 in 4th at full throttle. I don't know how accurate that it is but it is the car computer providing the info. It is possible to have 300 with my mods. I have read that an intake alone can give you 25 extra HP and a race pipe 5-8 HP, so I guess it's possible. I did not look at boost during this run but the day before the boost held at 16.2 psi instead of dropping to the normal 15.6 psi after spiking at 17 psi. The HP reading would be at the crank and not the wheels.

I use 93 octane gas and have 1 step colder plugs which might be the reason I have no knock retard to speak of. If you look at KR and it's high, I would get the Denso IVT22 1 step colder plugs. These are already gapped.

 

[Moultese]

Cool. I got the single read out, so I'll just monitor boost and probably program a shift light into it.

 

[08cosmic3]

Single read? The Aeroforce will display two parameters of your chose. You can choose to have 4 sets of 2 readings rotate at a set time frame. I just toggle between what I want to see at a given time. I have my warning lights set up as a shift light also. I had it set for 5500 rpm but found that by the time the car read the rpm, the light came on and I reacted to it, the car had already started to drop off. I have it set for 5300 now. I still have not used or explored everything this gauge will do. Attached is the User Manual.

 

[DaleNixon]

Did you set up a warning light for knock retard? Mine sits at 0 99% of the time, but every now and then the warning on my Dashhawk goes apeshit and it momentarily jumps.

 

[08cosmic3]

My KR is at 0, 100% of the time also and the only time I've seen it move it went to 0.3 when I loaded the boost up at low rpm and it only flashed 0.3 for just a second. I've set the gauge to read KR and taken the car balls to the wall and it stayed on 0.0. I'm very happy that my car is seeing no KR after reading about so many with high KR's. I've never set a warning light up for KR because I have not seen any.

 

[08cosmic3]

Cool. I got the single read out, so I'll just monitor boost and probably program a shift light into it.

I know what you are saying now about single read. The double is TWO gauges that you can connect together to read more parameters simotaniously. The video on their site shows a SRT4 neon with dual gauges mounted in pillar pods.

The one you ordered will be just like mine. It will read two parameters plus a warning light.

 

[Moultese]

I know what you are saying now about single read. The double is TWO gauges that you can connect together to read more parameters simotaniously. The video on their site shows a SRT4 neon with dual gauges mounted in pillar pods.

The one you ordered will be just like mine. It will read two parameters plus a warning light.

Yeah, that's what I meant. Sorry for the confusion.