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Silvr's boosted 420a

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I run with a local autox club here. It's not affiliated with the scca but they follow the same rules for the most part. Most of the events are fairly small, 50 to 100 entries. The cost is half of what my local scca events are and I get twice the runs. The only downside is the lot size. Both are on the small size unfortunately.

And even the 16g in a 6cm housing has to much lag
 
Unfortunately the first event which was scheduled for tomorrow (3/31) has been cancelled, and the rest are on hold until this situation starts improving. The car is pretty much ready at this point, had the wife out in the garage helping align the car. That came out great. This is what I settled on for now.

Front camber = did not measure
Rear camber = -1.1 deg
Rear toe = 1/8" toe out
Front toe = 5/32" toe out

New tires are mounted and on the car. I drove the car some yesterday to put a few hard miles on it. Everything felt good and solid. I am excited to get it back on the track this year.

I changed my wastegate spring some to get the boost lower in 1st so it doesn't spin so bad. Low boost can go down to 8psi, and I set high boost down to 18psi. Megasquirt controls the EBC which is great, but the issue I'm seeing is the boost response. When the car is targeting high boost, the wastegate is opening early and the car is slowly creeping up to 18psi by 5k. I'm going to make some changes in MS that should take care of that issue.

I also looked at why launch control no longer works. It's a pain trying to go back and figure out how I wired this ECU. Luckily I made this binder as I was going along, which was helpful. Launch control and flat shift are now working again. But the stock clutch switch is to low on the pedal so I'm going to try and move or replace that with something different.

I have decided that the brake pads I am running are not ideal for autox use. I did a few hard stops from about 70mph, I could put the brake pedal on the floor and not lock up the tires. Not only that the car just didn't feel like it was stopping that quick. After 3 of these stops, they got some heat in them and they were great. Good initial bite and plenty of stopping power. I'll do some more testing on this later. I'm currently running stoptechs 309 pads.

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The first event is exactly 3 weeks away. I have been slowly chipping away at my to do list. I had to pull all of the suspension back off and change some of the spacers under the new top hats to get the ride where I wanted it. Kind of a crude way to change the ride height without coilovers. But I got that all squared away.

New tires are on the way and will be here by the end of the week. I'll get those put on the new Evo wheels next week.

I've been working on setting up the alignment the last few days. I have been trying to come up with a way to set rear camber. My best thought was to use shims to make the floor level. I used a machinist level to get it as close as I could. Then hung a string from the fender and measured to the wheel. From there I can calculate camber. I tried to use a digital level at first, but I wasn't able to get repeatable results. So I thought this would be a little more accurate.
Does anyone else try to align their own car the diy way?

The alignment specs I plan on starting out with:
Front camber - Not adjustable
Front toe - 1/8" toe out
Rear camber - negative 1.25 deg
Rear toe - 1/8" toe out

View attachment 593302 View attachment 593303
The best way to set this is doing the chassis method! Get a digital angle finder like a wixey and level it on the subframe at the top which is chassis level and then on each setup attach it to the brake rotor! This gives you 100% chassis camber for static and works very well! I started doing this a while ago and had it check out on a hunter system and its bang on, this way also means if your on an angle surface your specs are always measured to chassis and not floor.

Just an idea for you to trial. I do this alot on the front also if i cannot get a level surface and it does pretty good for me so just passing on the idea to you to help assist. It might help speed up and take out any errors in string etc
 
@ec17pse I started out trying to use a digital angle finder but I didn't gain much confidence with it. It wasn't a cheap unit either, it's accuracy was suppose to be 0.05deg but I was seeing a few tenths difference depending on which side of the gauge I used.

My string method hopefully has me pretty close. I'm just happy the car drives straight and I don't have to set up my string box again.
 
Now that all of the races are getting cancelled. I had some free time to fix something that has bugged me for a long time. I have launch control and NLTS set up in megasquirt, but the switch at the end of the pedal is deactivating before the clutch even starts to grab. The car ends up way above the launch limit by the time the clutch grabs. I pulled the clutch pedal off and added a micro switch to the top of the pedal. I have the new switch wired in but haven't tested it out yet. I'll hopefully see how it goes this weekend.

IMG_20200402_174659.jpg
 
Just been playing around with the car some over the last week. Not much else to do, most of the races I attend are tighter slower tracks and I end up spending a lot of time around the 2- 4k rpm range fighting to keep the boost up. I swapped between the E316g and 14b, tested 7cm and the 6cm housing to see what the spool difference was between all of these combination. I only tested spool in 2nd gear getting on the throttle at 2k. Strange enough all of the combinations show very similar results. Plotting rpm vs boost pressure they all had very similar trends. If you look at how fast the car pulled through the rpm range, from say, 2.2k to 3.6k, there was only a tenth or so difference. I'll post the graphs when I turn my computer back on.

I also noticed today that the rear right tire has been scrubbing a little on the fender. The picture makes it look worse than it is, that line rubs off, it's paint from the fender. But Ill need to roll them or something to get some clearance. I may pull the shocks and move the tire up and down and make sure it clears.

IMG_20200417_165905.jpg


In other garage news, I have been using a 60gal oil less compressor bc it was free, but it snaps rods ab once a year. I think the crank is bent a little causing them to fail. Either way, the rods now aren't available as cheap as before so I wanted to upgrade to something a little better. I found this compressor on FB for 100. Guy said it didn't run, but figured I would give it a shot. Got it home, wired it up and it runs perfect. Not sure what the guy was doing before but I got a steal on it.

Still have some more cleanup to do on it, and change the oil on it, but should have it hooked up and running by the end of the weekend.

IMG_20200417_194150.jpg

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Compressor update: I started cleaning the tank up and found a small hole in the bottom. I decided that the best option was to reuse my old 60 gal tank since it was still good. I cut the mounting plate off of the busted tank, cleaned it up and welded it to the old tank mounting plate. Tried to match the paint the best I could. Had to make a copper discharge tube to route the compressor to the tank check valve. Its all working good now.

Back to the car: I bought a cheapo fender roller from Amazon for about $42, I don't know how they can sell this so cheap. It's cheap, but it's really not bad for the price. Had to grind on it a little bit to free up the roller, but everything else seems to be pretty solid.

The rear is a total pain in the ass to roll. The control arm could not be more in the way. After fighting this for a while I was able to start working that inner lip up away from the tire. I think I'm about half way there, but still have some more to go.

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Both fenders are now rolled. The cheap tool worked out great. I read a few different comments about rolling the rear fenders in these cars before I started. Some said you can do, others said it was impossible even with the tool. I bet most of the difficulty is because of how in the way the upper control arm is. I found out that it is possible but there are a few tricks to it. One thing that really helped was to have the strut out of the car and a jack under the knuckle. This allowed me to move the hub up/down and get as much clearance as possible for the roller. As you angle the roller to bend the lip further up, you can raise the knuckle to push the control arm up into the body.

It took about 2 hours per side. It could be done much quicker the second time around. I had no issues with paint cracking. I didn't use heat either, it was a nice warm day here so maybe that helped. It did tear all of the seam sealer off of that joint. That will be an easy fix.

I still plan on pulling the rear springs back off the struts and seeing where the bump stops stop the car. My rear stops are pretty chewed up so I may need to replace them.

The first pic is the left side of the car before being rolled. The next pic is after on the right side.

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IMG_20200503_163818.jpg
 
If all goes well, the next scheduled Autox event is June 9th, and it hasn't been cancelled as of yet. Hoping that we can start this season up soon.

I've been messing around in the garage some more check tire clearance after rolling the fenders. The rear tires clear but the bump stops are so worn down from previous damage that the tire tucks more than I want it to. So I ordered 4 new bump stops to just replace them all. I also checked the front and found out at full compression the front tires can touch the fenders. Not a good thing, but hopefully new bump stops that aren't cut will fix this.

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Here is the front.

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Now for the bad news... While removing the shock, the washer and lock washer popped out of my hand.. I found the washer, but the other is still missing. I'm thinking it may have fallen into the timing belt. If I can't find it, looks like I'll be tearing into the timing belt to either find it or make sure it's not in there.

IMG_20200520_204902.jpg
 
Luck must be on my side today! I ended up finding the missing washer. Unfortunately for us 420a people, the outer timing cover is all 1 piece. So either you cut it like I did, or you never access your cam gears without taking everything apart. It's been like that for about 13 years with no issues. Maybe I should work on some type of cover.

Pic of the missing washer.
IMG_20200521_125155.jpg


Also, the new bump stops arrived today, so I should be able to get the suspension back together this weekend.

IMG_20200521_134626.jpg
 
Race season has finally began for us in the southeast. First event was 6/9. I was really excited to see how the car was going to perform with all of the changes made.

The night before I checked the car over good, made sure nothing was loose and all of the fluid levels were good. Drained the catch can from the last few events. This car really likes to shoot oil out of the valve cover vents when on the throttle during a turn.

IMG_20200609_122419.jpg


I should have taken more pictures of the event but it just slipped my mind. I only got 1 of the car right as I was leaving. This was a Tuesday night event, so started about 530 and ended at 11pm. Because of the virus situation, the event was capped at 60 cars, meaning we each got 8 runs in. The event did not count for point, so basically a test and tune.

IMG_20200609_223621.jpg


The car ran perfect, had no issues with it whatsoever. Using launch control off the line worked out really well. The car launched hard for a FWD and not lifting for the shift to second kept the car pulling hard. Handling wise, the car felt pretty good. My driving wasn't the best, I made some poor line choices that really cost me a lot of time. One of my friends was also running the event and was recording video and GPS so it was good to compare our runs. He is a better driver than I am so maybe I can pick up some pointers. I picked up a 10hz GPS over the winter in hopes to get some useful data from it. I thought I had it all worked out, but it was a huge failure during the event. I had it paired to the trackaddict app to record the run, and also to megasquirt to record position. And I think that was the issue. Both logs show GPS signal totally dropping out throughout the whole run. All of the data it collected was useless. I'll get that sorted out before the next event on 6/30. This one is also not for points.

This is what 1 of my runs looked like, it missed the whole first section and then cut through the tree line.

Screenshot_20200623-100817.png


Here is the video of my fastest run. Ended up 1st in class out of 2. But mid pack overall. I spun the car going into the first slalom on my second run, the rear just didn't have enough heat in it yet, and it made me a little nervous on that off camber sweeper, so I babied the car some in that section. They run this same course all year on the night series, so I'll get another shot at it. This is actually the same course as last year to.

Comments and tips are always welcome.

 
Last edited:
That was a pretty wide open, high speed course. Looks like fun.

It's a small lot, but they make the best of it. I was getting to about 48mph before the first slalom, and after the tight 180 coming back up the hill I was at about 53. Very fast for the lot size.
 
The long overdue update. The 2020 season was pretty much a bust for me. Between events being cancelled and my schedule, I was only able to make it out to 1 more event late in the summer. I am sitting in grid and start the car to let it warm back up to prepare for my first run.. and the alternator decides to go out. I had no idea how the tune would be running at such a low voltage, so I just packed it up and had the car towed back home. AAA free towing has paid off once again. I put a new alternator in the car and all was well again. This pretty much ends 2020 as the car just sat for the rest of the year.

This was taken at the last 2020 event.

IMG_20200804_190033.jpg


2021 has brought a new autox season and hopefully some good racing. The first event for us started March 9. I had a short list I needed to complete before the car was ready. The passenger side compression arm bushing was trashed, this arm was replaced years ago but not with an OEM part, I think it was dorman, and the bushing was just a POS. However, I did find that you can buy just the bushing for these arms. I settled on a Moog part, pressed out the old bushing and put the new one in.

IMG_20200914_181654.jpg


PXL_20210218_211415481.jpg


PXL_20210224_010557521.jpg



I also changed the oil, checked the alignment, boost leak tested the car. The throttle body shaft has a pretty bad leak, but I didn't have time to fix that. Its a speed density car so it doesn't hurt the tune any. The night before the event I was packing up the car and doing my normal bolt check to make sure everything was tight. I found a turbo to manifold bolt that was loose, I tried to tighten it, but what really happened was the threads were so bad in the housing that it was just spinning. So out came the welder to just weld the stud in the housing. This didn't work out well as the weld just popped as I tried to tighten the nut back up. No exhaust was leaking so I just decided to send it with only 3 bolts holding it together. Thankfully this ended up being good enough for the event and I'll just pull the turbo and helicoil the housing.

The first event turned out great, weather was a little cool, around 50F, but the car ran flawless. The course setup was really good and played into the strengths of the car. I normally have issues getting down to low in 2nd and it takes forever for the car to pull back out of it. This course I was able to leave it in first to get past all of the slow corners, then the course opened up some and I was able to keep the speed up enough to keep the turbo spooling fast. The video is below, its dark and hard to see, but its better than no video. I ended up 1st in SMF and placed 16 out of 70 cars raw time, which I was really happy about.

When I was reviewing the videos, you can see the oil pressure gauge drop on just about every right handed turn (middle gauge on the pillar). Its hard to see how low its going, maybe down to about 20psi. I'm really not sure how long this has been going on since I always ran the video outside the car, but it is something I need to work on. I plan on pulling the pan and adding some baffles to try and keep the oil around the pickup more.

 
Race season has finally began for us in the southeast. First event was 6/9. I was really excited to see how the car was going to perform with all of the changes made.

The night before I checked the car over good, made sure nothing was loose and all of the fluid levels were good. Drained the catch can from the last few events. This car really likes to shoot oil out of the valve cover vents when on the throttle during a turn.

View attachment 603778

I should have taken more pictures of the event but it just slipped my mind. I only got 1 of the car right as I was leaving. This was a Tuesday night event, so started about 530 and ended at 11pm. Because of the virus situation, the event was capped at 60 cars, meaning we each got 8 runs in. The event did not count for point, so basically a test and tune.

View attachment 603779

The car ran perfect, had no issues with it whatsoever. Using launch control off the line worked out really well. The car launched hard for a FWD and not lifting for the shift to second kept the car pulling hard. Handling wise, the car felt pretty good. My driving wasn't the best, I made some poor line choices that really cost me a lot of time. One of my friends was also running the event and was recording video and GPS so it was good to compare our runs. He is a better driver than I am so maybe I can pick up some pointers. I picked up a 10hz GPS over the winter in hopes to get some useful data from it. I thought I had it all worked out, but it was a huge failure during the event. I had it paired to the trackaddict app to record the run, and also to megasquirt to record position. And I think that was the issue. Both logs show GPS signal totally dropping out throughout the whole run. All of the data it collected was useless. I'll get that sorted out before the next event on 6/30. This one is also not for points.

This is what 1 of my runs looked like, it missed the whole first section and then cut through the tree line.

View attachment 603794

Here is the video of my fastest run. Ended up 1st in class out of 2. But mid pack overall. I spun the car going into the first slalom on my second run, the rear just didn't have enough heat in it yet, and it made me a little nervous on that off camber sweeper, so I babied the car some in that section. They run this same course all year on the night series, so I'll get another shot at it. This is actually the same course as last year to.

Comments and tips are always welcome.


Awesome video!
 
The long overdue update. The 2020 season was pretty much a bust for me. Between events being cancelled and my schedule, I was only able to make it out to 1 more event late in the summer. I am sitting in grid and start the car to let it warm back up to prepare for my first run.. and the alternator decides to go out. I had no idea how the tune would be running at such a low voltage, so I just packed it up and had the car towed back home. AAA free towing has paid off once again. I put a new alternator in the car and all was well again. This pretty much ends 2020 as the car just sat for the rest of the year.

This was taken at the last 2020 event.

View attachment 624436

2021 has brought a new autox season and hopefully some good racing. The first event for us started March 9. I had a short list I needed to complete before the car was ready. The passenger side compression arm bushing was trashed, this arm was replaced years ago but not with an OEM part, I think it was dorman, and the bushing was just a POS. However, I did find that you can buy just the bushing for these arms. I settled on a Moog part, pressed out the old bushing and put the new one in.

View attachment 624437

View attachment 624438

View attachment 624439


I also changed the oil, checked the alignment, boost leak tested the car. The throttle body shaft has a pretty bad leak, but I didn't have time to fix that. Its a speed density car so it doesn't hurt the tune any. The night before the event I was packing up the car and doing my normal bolt check to make sure everything was tight. I found a turbo to manifold bolt that was loose, I tried to tighten it, but what really happened was the threads were so bad in the housing that it was just spinning. So out came the welder to just weld the stud in the housing. This didn't work out well as the weld just popped as I tried to tighten the nut back up. No exhaust was leaking so I just decided to send it with only 3 bolts holding it together. Thankfully this ended up being good enough for the event and I'll just pull the turbo and helicoil the housing.

The first event turned out great, weather was a little cool, around 50F, but the car ran flawless. The course setup was really good and played into the strengths of the car. I normally have issues getting down to low in 2nd and it takes forever for the car to pull back out of it. This course I was able to leave it in first to get past all of the slow corners, then the course opened up some and I was able to keep the speed up enough to keep the turbo spooling fast. The video is below, its dark and hard to see, but its better than no video. I ended up 1st in SMF and placed 16 out of 70 cars raw time, which I was really happy about.

When I was reviewing the videos, you can see the oil pressure gauge drop on just about every right handed turn (middle gauge on the pillar). Its hard to see how low its going, maybe down to about 20psi. I'm really not sure how long this has been going on since I always ran the video outside the car, but it is something I need to work on. I plan on pulling the pan and adding some baffles to try and keep the oil around the pickup more.


Holy crap - never done an autocross at night. That looks challenging, and wildly entertaining! I bet it's a rush. Good for you.

Hopefully the low oil pressure isn't anything bad.
 
The oil pressure issue is quite odd. I've turned so hard the wheels lifted but never seen low oil pressure because of it.

Here's an idea. I've noticed that some 420a heads have much smaller oil/coolant holes than others, it's just a casting issue. Maybe some oil is getting trapped in your cylinder head an can't return to the pan fast enough? Just a thought. I considered polishing my oil gallies for extra assurance. But instead I used a head that appeared to have larger gallies.
 
Holy crap - never done an autocross at night. That looks challenging, and wildly entertaining! I bet it's a rush. Good for you.

Hopefully the low oil pressure isn't anything bad.

Its challenging for sure. Its even harder to look ahead at where you want to go when the headlights aren't lighting up that area. The lot has a few lights, but could use a few more. I'll be pulling the pan soon and probably the rod caps just to check on the bearings, but the reality is, this has probably been going on for years.

@BLACK'98DSM The car loves to shoot oil out of the valve cover breathers. I drain my catch can after every few events and I get about 6-8oz of oil out of it. If I am on the throttle in the sweeper I know oil is going into the catch can. Crappy VC baffling I suppose.

But for the oil pressure dips, its only on right hand turns which makes me think that the oil is moving away from the pickup.
 
@BLACK'98DSM The car loves to shoot oil out of the valve cover breathers. I drain my catch can after every few events and I get about 6-8oz of oil out of it. If I am on the throttle in the sweeper I know oil is going into the catch can. Crappy VC baffling I suppose.
You might want to look at buying or making a vented oil cap then. I'm glad I did.
 
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