The 16g Drag Race Discussion Thread

[biglady112]

What ecu is currently in the car?

 

[Kevin Jewer]

1g ecu with Ecmlink.

 

[Kevin Jewer]

Well, lots of progress, but not on the ET slip. At this point in the year it's too hard to get enough grip in the track without spending way more time and money that it's worth.

I've had an incurable intermittent misfire since August. It eventually killed that 2 liter engine. So it had that on two engines/heads/cams, two ECUs, two coil setups, two sets of cam and crank sensors, 3 or 4 sets of injectors, and so on. Nothing in any of the data to give any idea what it was most of the time, though the individual cylinder O2 sensors were pretty useful in at least knowing which cylinder it was. I believe I had at least two, possibly three, overlapping issues, which was making troubleshooting impossible. For example, at one point I had a lean cylinder 4, swapped injectors 3 and 4 and the lean cylinder followed to #3. But that was not the main issue. Went down a lot of rabbit holes on this one. I finally gave up and swapped in my Holley ECU and engine harness. The problem has not returned. I did in that process find that my MSD CDI box failed. But that affected 2 cylinders, as it should, not one. It also misfired on the ARC2 box from our 2g. Now it's just on stock coil, . At any rate, the problem seems to be gone now.

I did change out the stator in the converter for one that is two steps tighter than the previous one. It knocks the tires off much more easily, so I'm hoping it makes the car quicker when it hooks. Lots of other little changes and improvements, too many to list.

So the car is running very strong now, and I'm just waiting on somewhere to run it. I'm tempted to drag it down to FL in two weeks for a random IFO. I don't know if the air will be there for a 9 second pass, but the track should be. It's been a while since I ran in the outlaw class with a 16g.

 

[biglady112]

I mean wouldn’t mph show progress or regress even though the ground is cold?

 

[Kevin Jewer]

It blows the tires clean off and I lift before I crash the POS. Not much MPH to be seen. The bare pavement in the second half of the track has decent grip, but the old, cold rubber is doomed without some money poured into it, it's as slick as ice. It's peeling pretty bad too. Time has just run out on me.

 

[Kevin Jewer]

I've pulled this POS out for a test pass a number of times this year with no luck. Constant issues with clogging injectors it seems. I bought a cheap injector cleaning machine so I can do it here, which helps. But I get a clean burnout, then it won't make a pass, . Time to throw the whole fuel system in the trash and start over. The thrust plates in the mechanical fuel pump are rusting and that is the source of the trouble. That needs to go back to waterman for a rebuild. I don't know how old the pump is, I bought it used in 2012 and have been running it on ethanol/methanol year round ever since.

The M&W CDI box I bought from Nick Stack has replaced the dead MSD box, so that problem is long gone.

It's on the Holley HP ECU, I made that switch over the winter when I had time. It does make tuning on non-IC methanol easier. I use the custom tables to correct the IAT to what it really is, not what the sensor reads, and fueling is dead on.

The turbo thrust bearing is smoked again. I did lower back pressure by putting a few psi boost to the WG's side port, but too late. Thinking back I'm pretty sure this compressor wheel already rubbed the housing before the last rebuild. I meant to replace the wheel and forgot all about it. I may send it to FP this time for a real rebuild, rather than my usual replace thrust bearing and send it routine.

The good DA is gone for the year so I think, while the fuel system is down, it's time to swap a better engine in and the compound turbos as well. I'll get back to this again in the fall.

 

[biglady112]

I kept having the same issue with my Magnafuel hex drive pump. Rust and continually losing pressure. It was shot and they only thing they could reuse was the housing when I sent it in. Apparently you are suppose to send them in every 1-2 years to be freshened up when running alcohol. They asked me how long I ran mine. I told them since 2010.
I guess 9-10 years is far outside the normal to run a pump like that.

looks like you and I are boneheads just the same. Way outside the norm.

 

[Kevin Jewer]

Lol, sounds like we're in the same boat. I opened this one up some time ago and it looked really good, aside from the thrust plates, so I'm hoping it's not all bad news. I asked waterman if I could get the thrust plates but their guy said they're sized/clearanced to the pump gears so it has to go back in for that. I suppose it's earned it.

 

[Kevin Jewer]

I think I've missed some updates here. Sometime over the winter I reset the no nitrous record to 9.92 at 126. It has gone 137 I think for a best MPH, I don't remember why I lifted there. 60 foot was a 1.33, which blows my mind a bit (this was still no prep in the winter).

I then put a new thrust bearing in that poor old turbo (it needs a turbine wheel too after it ate a plug strap but that'll have to wait). The first pass on nitrous boost control didn't work quite the way I expected so it immediately smoked that new thrust bearing. Can't have nice things. We had a REALLY hard time keeping both the motor and bottle warm in 30-40 degree temps and 25 mph winds. So every pass was a compromise. But, on a totally botched pass it went 9.30 at 131 mph. That was the only one I turned the timing system for and by then I had had enough of the weather. That was a 1.25 sixty foot, also no prep (PYOP with Blue Collar Brew, my favorite). It had put up some impressive numbers on the dragy on other better passes, so I'm pretty confident it'll do what I want.

My dynoshaft shit the bed again, but I got a lot of runs with the 16g on it. I've quoted a few numbers from it, but I think the fairest estimate for no nitrous 16g power is around 475 hp dynojet. It's been a long time since I compared it to my hub dyno and virtually no one runs these. But this puts me at 11 hp per lb/min airflow, which I'm happy with. It took me a long time to break the 10x curse so that's progress.

Another interesting finding on this combo, with the M&W ignition box that has two power levels, 320 mJ was not enough for non-intercooled methanol on a 16g, it needs the 500 mJ high setting. I can NOT believe the difference that made. The old MSD box was 170 mJ (ARC2 is 189 for reference) so no wonder I had issues with that. Not all mJ are measured equally, but it's the best reference we have for relative ignition energy.


I need to change out all the injector baskets and attempt the nitrous passes in some warmer weather. In that cold weather it was hard to get even 80 hp through a 200 hp jet. I keep thinking this will be soon, but track work just eats up all of my time.

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[CrackedDSM]

I think I've missed some updates here. Sometime over the winter I reset the no nitrous record to 9.92 at 126. It has gone 137 I think for a best MPH, I don't remember why I lifted there. 60 foot was a 1.33, which blows my mind a bit (this was still no prep in the winter).

I then put a new thrust bearing in that poor old turbo (it needs a turbine wheel too after it ate a plug strap but that'll have to wait). The first pass on nitrous boost control didn't work quite the way I expected so it immediately smoked that new thrust bearing. Can't have nice things. We had a REALLY hard time keeping both the motor and bottle warm in 30-40 degree temps and 25 mph winds. So every pass was a compromise. But, on a totally botched pass it went 9.30 at 131 mph. That was the only one I turned the timing system for and by then I had had enough of the weather. That was a 1.25 sixty foot, also no prep (PYOP with Blue Collar Brew, my favorite). It had put up some impressive numbers on the dragy on other better passes, so I'm pretty confident it'll do what I want.

My dynoshaft shit the bed again, but I got a lot of runs with the 16g on it. I've quoted a few numbers from it, but I think the fairest estimate for no nitrous 16g power is around 475 hp dynojet. It's been a long time since I compared it to my hub dyno and virtually no one runs these. But this puts me at 11 hp per lb/min airflow, which I'm happy with. It took me a long time to break the 10x curse so that's progress.

Another interesting finding on this combo, with the M&W ignition box that has two power levels, 320 mJ was not enough for non-intercooled methanol on a 16g, it needs the 500 mJ high setting. I can NOT believe the difference that made. The old MSD box was 170 mJ (ARC2 is 189 for reference) so no wonder I had issues with that. Not all mJ are measured equally, but it's the best reference we have for relative ignition energy.


I need to change out all the injector baskets and attempt the nitrous passes in some warmer weather. In that cold weather it was hard to get even 80 hp through a 200 hp jet. I keep thinking this will be soon, but track work just eats up all of my time.

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[import solutions]

Im stay tuned for the 8s .
You will !
You never left to impress me master

 

[Kevin Jewer]

16G is back on the car! I missed how easily this thing spools. Even at 3000' DA, which is good for my current location, it comes up to 30 psi on the transbrake in a touch under 2 seconds.

The car has come a long way since I last ran this turbo in 2021, where it ran the 9.92 without nitrous and a botched 9.30 pass with it. But alas! the first outing didn't go that well. Had a number of issues with secondary injectors randomly not coming on, but that's an ongoing problem unrelated to the turbo. Luckily this little guy doesn't need them so I just shut the secondaries off. But no matter what I improved and got working better, it was stuck in the 6.60s. On the 9.92 pass it ran a 6.25. I know the air is not nearly as good, and I'm on M1 (clear methanol) not M5, but I still expected better somehow. Story of our lives...

With the DA likely gone to shit for the rest of the summer, I'll probably just spray my own DA and go for a good nitrous pass, see how that does.

 

[Ludachris]

16G is back on the car! I missed how easily this thing spools. Even at 3000' DA, which is good for my current location, it comes up to 30 psi on the transbrake in a touch under 2 seconds.

The car has come a long way since I last ran this turbo in 2021, where it ran the 9.92 without nitrous and a botched 9.30 pass with it. But alas! the first outing didn't go that well. Had a number of issues with secondary injectors randomly not coming on, but that's an ongoing problem unrelated to the turbo. Luckily this little guy doesn't need them so I just shut the secondaries off. But no matter what I improved and got working better, it was stuck in the 6.60s. On the 9.92 pass it ran a 6.25. I know the air is not nearly as good, and I'm on M1 (clear methanol) not M5, but I still expected better somehow. Story of our lives...

With the DA likely gone to shit for the rest of the summer, I'll probably just spray my own DA and go for a good nitrous pass, see how that does.

Funny how in our quest for more power, we take the spool for granted. I know I should have stuck with the 16g setup when I was running on the road course, but I wasn't doing anything near as impressive as what you're doing with your setup.

 

[Kevin Jewer]

Took the old unit out for some nitrous testing.

The problem with the secondary injectors not coming on at random is solved, I just went back to the FIC 1650H injectors. It's not that the billet atomizers don't injector well, they just put the EV1 connector in a shitty spot and I'm assuming when boost pushes up on the injector it hits the connector and randomly loses connection. No other way to explain it.

While swapping injectors I got a hair up me arse to set up dual fuel. When I moved from the 1 gallon fuel cell to the 3 gallon cell (1 gallon starts to not be enough for quarter mile runs around 1100 hp on methanol), I mounted it on the opposite side of the engine bay, for this reason. It was easy to put the 1 gallon fuel cell back in. I repurposed the electric primer pump to gasoline electric pump with a slight change in logic in the ECU. So all I had to add was a small regulator for the gasoline system and reroute/remake some lines. Now it starts, warms up, idles, cruises, and shuts down on gasoline. In boost it's 100% methanol by about 20 psi. Took some fiddling but the Holley ECU gives amazing flexibility to do stupid shit like this. Works great. Made 7 passes and didn't even have to refuel!

In 4000 feet DA it ran 6.5x at 106 on just the turbo (by my math that jives with the previous best of 6.25 at about sea level DA 5 years ago). On the 100 shot it ran 6.02 twice at 115. And adding the 50 shot to the 100 shot it went 5.98 and 5.94 at 117 but they were not clean passes. I had some safeties set a little too tight (thanks to those previous secondaries torching heads and pistons and making me pucker up) and they were constantly shutting the nitrous off and retarding timing. Total timing was only 2-3 degrees the whole pass, which is obviously way too low.

Gotta try to get out for a night time test and tune, maybe get down to 3000 feet DA, and try it again with the safeties sorted out better. I don't know how much it will pick up over the 5.94 pass with double the timing and the nitrous staying on the whole pass, but 5.85 is my previous number to beat at sea level, and 5.7x should go 8s pretty comfortably.

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[Ludachris]

Took the old unit out for some nitrous testing.

The problem with the secondary injectors not coming on at random is solved, I just went back to the FIC 1650H injectors. It's not that the billet atomizers don't injector well, they just put the EV1 connector in a shitty spot and I'm assuming when boost pushes up on the injector it hits the connector and randomly loses connection. No other way to explain it.

While swapping injectors I got a hair up me arse to set up dual fuel. When I moved from the 1 gallon fuel cell to the 3 gallon cell (1 gallon starts to not be enough for quarter mile runs around 1100 hp on methanol), I mounted it on the opposite side of the engine bay, for this reason. It was easy to put the 1 gallon fuel cell back in. I repurposed the electric primer pump to gasoline electric pump with a slight change in logic in the ECU. So all I had to add was a small regulator for the gasoline system and reroute/remake some lines. Now it starts, warms up, idles, cruises, and shuts down on gasoline. In boost it's 100% methanol by about 20 psi. Took some fiddling but the Holley ECU gives amazing flexibility to do stupid shit like this. Works great. Made 7 passes and didn't even have to refuel!

In 4000 feet DA it ran 6.5x at 106 on just the turbo (by my math that jives with the previous best of 6.25 at about sea level DA 5 years ago). On the 100 shot it ran 6.02 twice at 115. And adding the 50 shot to the 100 shot it went 5.98 and 5.94 at 117 but they were not clean passes. I had some safeties set a little too tight (thanks to those previous secondaries torching heads and pistons and making me pucker up) and they were constantly shutting the nitrous off and retarding timing. Total timing was only 2-3 degrees the whole pass, which is obviously way too low.

Gotta try to get out for a night time test and tune, maybe get down to 3000 feet DA, and try it again with the safeties sorted out better. I don't know how much it will pick up over the 5.94 pass with double the timing and the nitrous staying on the whole pass, but 5.85 is my previous number to beat at sea level, and 5.7x should go 8s pretty comfortably.

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Switching fuel type like that is pretty bad ass. Are you prepping for any particular events this year Kevin, or is the plan to just use this season to test and iron things out?

 

[Kevin Jewer]

Nah, not a whole lot of actual racing. I actually hate racing. I did intend to run a local series (Titans of 10.5) in the Limited 275 class, which also runs about once a month at the local track I used to own. I think that will let me aggravate everyone sufficiently if I can get down to say 4.60s. Finally got the right tires for it and I just don't have another "good" engine until I build another. Gonna be a while on that, trying to start yet another business. I've had this car 17 years now I think, and it always go through cycles. Some years race hardcore, other years take time to rebuild or make other life changes.

 

[Ludachris]

Gonna be a while on that, trying to start yet another business.

That's the problem I keep running into. Putting any extra money I have into business ventures instead of cars. Not that I have had extra lately, but yeah.

 

[Kevin Jewer]

New 8th mile best on the 16g, this is very nearly enough to run 8s. Conditions were terrible but still good progress was made. Tune changes worked out great and final kinks worked out from this data I believe (we'll see next time out). The car wouldn't go to the 60 foot the first two passes, but a shock change sorted that out well enough to get it moving.

This is on normal "M1" clear methanol with a 100 and a 50 shot. The nitrous did shut off for about 1 second around the gear change but it wouldn't have affected ET a ton. Next time out I'll try a little more nitrous, or M5, or both.

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[CrackedDSM]

That is so wild. Coasted to a damn 9.8. On a 16G.

 

[Kevin Jewer]

That was lifting and braking right at the 8th too since the shutdown was still wet, had to get the bulk of the slowing down done early just in case. Usually somewhere in the 5.70s you can break into the 8s on a full pass.

I've got some advanced tables in the ECU that are helping to limit back pressure even on the nitrous so I've managed to not hurt the turbo in a long time. I think with some more nitrous and spicier fuel it might be able to go pretty quick and still be reliable. We'll see!

 

[Ludachris]

That was lifting and braking right at the 8th too since the shutdown was still wet, had to get the bulk of the slowing down done early just in case. Usually somewhere in the 5.70s you can break into the 8s on a full pass.

I've got some advanced tables in the ECU that are helping to limit back pressure even on the nitrous so I've managed to not hurt the turbo in a long time. I think with some more nitrous and spicier fuel it might be able to go pretty quick and still be reliable. We'll see!

That's bad ass Kevin. You're gonna hit it for sure.

 

[1qkfwd]

@Kevin Jewer out there doing Gods work on the 16g!!

 

[Kevin Jewer]

Already looking forward to getting back after it. I never did get a full pass with all of the enhancements running at the same time, the shootout was a nightmare for some reason. Luckily, there's always next year.

 

[Ludachris]

Already looking forward to getting back after it. I never did get a full pass with all of the enhancements running at the same time, the shootout was a nightmare for some reason. Luckily, there's always next year.

Let's hope that's the case for many years to come.