Megan the Merlot M edition

[SlimKlim]

I think you made a good choice. Ultra sticky tires are great and all, but a higher grip threshold comes with a more severe punishment for getting it wrong. For us mere mortal drivers, having the tires start talking to you before the car is sideways is a very nice thing.

[ScottyB]

For us mere mortal drivers, having the tires start talking to you before the car is sideways is a very nice thing.

i agree a lot on this...on a street car with mediocre power (and i don't mean that insultingly) a "normal" grip-level tire seems like such a logical choice to me. enjoy being able to explore the traction circle without putting yourself in real harm...getting the tires talking and slipping around a bit is how you learn. its also a nice bonus that tires like that are cheaper and last longer while netting you better mileage too (again, real world stuff).

i had 300+ wear Kumho all-seasons on my RS for my first track day, and i wouldn't have wanted it any other way. they howled like animals the entire weekend and moved all over the place at the limit but it was 100% helpful to find those limits at lower thresholds and still tons of fun.

[Senor_Taylor]

I'm glad to hear that from both of you. As much as I'd like to imagine I do, I really don't know "how" to drive yet. I'm still very new to driving cars. It's only been a year since I started driving something that wasn't a pickup.

Sent from my SM-G900R4 using Tapatalk

[Senor_Taylor]

Yes, I did swap the only 2 BBS center caps I have around to each side for each photo.

[ScottyB]

perfecting the drive by wink may need to be your next mod if you want to be a true miata owner

[Senor_Taylor]

I've thought about it. I can make them wink without the mod if I "Warm her up" a little

I'm impressed by how often I get and give the wink. Usually once a week.

[Senor_Taylor]

For the past month or two, I've had a really bad exhaust rattle that would get worse after driving it for a while. I tried to find it, but never could. I started to believe it was actually pinging, but I've never heard pinging in person, so I wasn't sure. Colton rode with me and asked me if the car was pinging, so I decided to grab a timing light from Alex. Before I could get there, I developed another really bad noise. I pulled in and looked to see that my power steering pump was barely held on and the bolt had backed out and was rubbing on the back of the pulley. So I got a new nut and put it all back together in the rain. I figured that was probably the "Rattle" I had heard, so I drove it a little more. It still made the noise, but it was more quiet, so I decided to tackle it on Sunday morning in during one of the worst hangovers ever. I threw the timing light on and it was at least 10-15 degrees off. Rotated the CAS and got it timed at 10 degrees BTDC.

In doing so, I effectively raised my peak torque a few hundred RPM and you can really feel the difference. Very noticeable on the cruise we took on my birthday. Overall, I'm really happy I caught off this before I destroyed my engine and it runs better than ever. It's kind of irritating trying to fix everything the PO had done wrong.

[ScottyB]

so the CAS was loose? usually on a normally operating car, pinging isn't something that just appears unless you get a bad tank of gas or you advance the timing way past normal without upping your octane accordingly.

if you're having trouble identifying pinging, it sounds like random popping/hammering from the engine, a bit like a metallic rattle but not consistent like a vibration. pinging happens under load as cylinder pressures increase, usually as revs rise, so just revving it and listening isn't going to do it. it will also get worse with hotter ambient temps. a good test is just holding a gear and putting your foot in it up a long incline (think afton mountain on 64)...increasing that load will exacerbate pinging if you want to get it to rear its head. fix pinging with either more/better fuel or less timing.

[Senor_Taylor]

The CAS was not loose, it was misaligned. I changed the o ring on it when I fixed my valve timing and I scratched it to mark where it was. I made sure to realign those marks, but the original timing must not have been correct.

It only pinged under heavy throttle in high gears; so under heavy load. So exactly what you just said. Cylinder 1 was firing at like 20-30 degrees before top dead center. I set it back to 10 as it should be.

[ScottyB]

got it. yeah sounds like you found the problem...that's a lot of advance over factory. good thing miata engines are supposedly pretty tough.

[Senor_Taylor]

The more I think about it, it makes sense. When the PO had the cams all misaligned, I'm sure the CAS alignment was correct, since it aligned with the exhaust cam. When I corrected where the exhaust cam was aligned, it changed the CAS alignment compared to the crank.

[Senor_Taylor]

So, I went to the autocross in Verona today and took a freshmen, got him some ride-alongs, and even taught him to drive stick. Listening to those Miatas there with nice exhausts, then hearing mine so much over the course of the day made me realize my dire need for better sound. A CAI is out of the question because it knocks me out of the Street class, and an exhaust was out of the question because I'm trying not to spend money this year so I can continue to actually have days off of work, so I invited some MM'ers over to drink beer and help me make bad decisions. I told them "I want to do hood rat stuff with my friends" and before you know it, we had 5 dudes in the parking lot in front of my house helping me take the exhaust off of my car. It turns out that NA6's (some) have a removable axle back, and so do NB's, but NA8's don't for some odd reason. You have to pull off the entire muffler, mid pipe, resonator, and cats all the way basically up to the headers... so we did.

[youtube]7s2LmIMwvEM[/youtube]

Doing so immediately caused everyone on the street to come outside and ask what the hell was going on. I decided against the pleas of my companions that this was too loud, so I drank some more beer, walked inside and grabbed my sawzall.



The results: Not bad, but also not good, but fun enough to have us laughing our asses off while bombing down 33 for a second.

No, I don't plan to leave it like this, but it's really not as bad as I thought it would be. Either I'm delusional, or some people really manage to fuck up Miata exhausts, because it still has decent tone with just a cat and resonator, it's just loud. Also it rattled against the diff and/or frame rail, so we tied it to the PPF with a coat hanger.

[ViPER1313]

Where is it dumping out, next to the gas tank?

[Senor_Taylor]

Where is it dumping out, next to the gas tank?

It dumps after the gas tank. Only thing I'm concerned about is how hot the bumper gets now. I'll get something welded in there soon.

[ViPER1313]

A couple bucks for a turn down and a clamp should do nicely. I miss random exhaust takeoffs. Still sad that the video of me disconnecting the SHOs exhaust and revving off at cows went missing.

[Senor_Taylor]

A couple bucks for a turn down and a clamp should do nicely. I miss random exhaust takeoffs. Still sad that the video of me disconnecting the SHOs exhaust and revving off at cows went missing.

That's a great idea! Thank you!

Yeah, I don't really think I've ever done something this ghetto and stupid, but it was fun!

Especially when a girl down the street starting screaming at us to stop revving, then Greg in his Turbo RX7 came by and downshifted with a huge fireball out the back sounding like a bomb going off.

[D_Eclipse9916]

A couple bucks for a turn down and a clamp should do nicely. I miss random exhaust takeoffs. Still sad that the video of me disconnecting the SHOs exhaust and revving off at cows went missing.

That's a great idea! Thank you!

Yeah, I don't really think I've ever done something this ghetto and stupid, but it was fun!

Especially when a girl down the street starting screaming at us to stop revving, then Greg in his Turbo RX7 came by and downshifted with a huge fireball out the back sounding like a bomb going off.

At first I was like :evileye: , then I was like :lol: as I remembered all the dumb shit we did in College. Keep on keeping on. :thumbup:

[V1GiLaNtE]

Paging Jake/Joey. Where are all those sweet exhaust vids we did of the "Busch Blue" e30 and the FZR?

[SlimKlim]

Paging Jake/Joey. Where are all those sweet exhaust vids we did of the "Busch Blue" e30 and the FZR?

INCOMING.

[youtube]HGT-kZyXZc8[/youtube]

Goddammit I miss motorcycles.

[V1GiLaNtE]

Paging Jake/Joey. Where are all those sweet exhaust vids we did of the "Busch Blue" e30 and the FZR?

INCOMING.

[youtube]HGT-kZyXZc8[/youtube]

Goddammit I miss motorcycles.

Delivered. God that thing sounded absolutely wicked.