Month: August 2020

If it was a bit challenging to muscle the muffler into place, then you could say hooking those hot pipes up to the head was going to be daunting. Fortunately, today this turned out not to be the case. If the anticipated level of difficulty was 7; it turned out to be closer to 4, thanks to a generous application of Nutz Off, PB Blaster, and good old WD-40. To be honest, removing the strut bar beforehand was the biggest inconvenience. For the most part, every nut and bolt backed out like should, except for one stubborn stud protruding from the head. Luckily turning the stud into a screw seemed to do.

Pro tip – buy a new O2 sensor before you start, that thin little 20-30-year-old wire will break just as you get everything into place. Twisting the new header into place from above took some creativity, and getting the thicker flange to pass between the trans and tunnel was the hardest part. We were working alone, and if memory serves correct, at one point a floor jack was brought in to make a little extra space underneath the car so the header could swing up into place.

Once installed, quite a few moments were taken to admire the new tubes emerging from beneath the polished valve cover. The blue break-in heat from the previous owner really pops with that JDM bling. There were a set of $1,000 hand made high-rise headers that were oh so tempting, but you know what, these are pretty damn nice for the price. The CLM has never sounded this good, and the butt dyno shows noticeable gains above 4,000 RPM. Anyone know a good SMOG shop?

Continue reading “Beating some Race into the Craigslist Miata’s Engine Bay”

It feels like this moment has been coming for quite some time. Once we found the missing link that brought our exhaust together, it was only a matter of time before we pulled the trigger. Laying out the pieces is was very tempting to bolt the straight pipe to the test pipe and see how raspy the Miata could be, but for the sake of our neighbors and the environment, we went with the resonator and kept the cat in place.

Being the lazy parts installers that we are, instead of dropping the Cannon brace that ties the rear suspension together and encompasses the one-piece factory cat-back, we chose to employ the hacksaw method. Hopefully, the cut was straight enough and in a place where it can be put back together easily if needed. Everything looked good laid out on the floor, with a little tease of the Butterfly brace that will one day reside up in the underside of the Craigslist Miata.

Continue reading “Hand Me the Hacksaw We’ve Got an Exhaust to Install”

“Even if it’s only an additional 10 HP; that’s a 10% gain when you’re only making 100 HP.” –CLM mechanic

Ever since an old coworker gave me a new muffler for Christmas a few years back I have been on the lookout for a connecting pipe to bring spent gasses from the catalytic converter all the way back to the rear box. So it was incredible when we came across someone selling not only a 4-to-1 header as well as every type of connecting pipe Racing Beat sold for the 1.6L Miata. A deal was arranged and a trip south to San Diego was negotiated. New noises to come.

Continue reading “Hello Ten Horsepower”

That is currently the case with the hardened bushings in our rear suspension. Having purchased the previously owned polyurethane bits complete with the arms they came in meant not having to play with fire, a job that I am not averse to but really don’t want to hear about the smell of burning rubber from the neighbors. However, it did lead to problems like missing washers, an issue that arose after an evening of pounding one of the lower control arm bushings back into place as it split and slipped over the head of the bolt holding it in place between runs at Irwindale.

Ever since installing the swaybars, there has been a distinct sound emanating from the right rear. At first, it sounded like good old fashion tire rub, but after some additional grease applied to the rear stiffener, it went away if only for a moment. However, with the new rear poly bushings installed the car is quieter than ever on the highway, let’s hope it stays that way. I always heard people say to beware of poly bushings because they squeak, I just wonder what the mice they listen to look like.

Continue reading “Sometimes Doing Things the Easy Way Means Doing Them Again the Right Way Later”

Two very important lessons were learned at the last autocross. One, it isn’t the best idea to top off your fuel tank before a run; and two, that a modified Doorman gas cap from PepBoys is a bad idea. You know, it smelled a bit like hydrocarbons during one of the runs, and after looking at the photos I can see why. Thank goodness for that hardtop; OE cap is on order immediately.

Ever since seeing GRC cars fly through the salty San Pedro sea air with a battleship for a backdrop I have been scheming a way to get past the gates guarding Berth 46 and have some fun behind the wheel. The beautiful thing about this track (aside from the views) is that it is the complete opposite of El Toro. Whereas what remains of the old airstrip dictates that we start off with a slalom, which leads into a 180-degree turn, which leads to another set of spread out slaloms, which then sets up another 180-degree change in direction (in the same direction); and then there might be a quick little left-right chicane before the finish line.

Ever since losing the T-section of the runway a couple of years ago, the layouts are essentially elongated courses that push the top of second gear an uncomfortable amount and favors the straight-line ability of the Porsches. However not this time. Today we would be dodging cones on a patch of asphalt marked by slippery surface changes as well as a bit of elevation and as a bonus, there were even a couple off-camber curves. Being a track day in the time of Covid all we had to go on was an in-car video of the course emailed to us the night before. On the morning of, the track walk was helpful as always, but over way too quickly and any instruction is done from too far a distance to be beneficial.

I never thought that simply sitting in the sun for a couple of hours would raise the air pressure in the tires by over five PSI, on only one side of the car. So with one side bled, the gloves feeling good, and the chinstrap tight; that we set out to feel our way around the unfamiliar course. The cones came up so quickly that it was hard to keep your head up and eyes ahead. After pussyfooting around during the practice laps it was time to turn things up for the timed trial. The right foot redline was raised, we got close to the cones and of course and there was plenty of tire scrubbing oversteer. A few times we were able to squirt out of the initial right-hander at the absolute top of first in an attempt to point the car, but that turned out to not be the fastest method. In the end, it was a matter of slowing down to go fast(er) and trying to remember which series of turns were really long sweepers that helped bring our time between the lights into the forty-second range.

Continue reading “AutoX POC @ San Pedro 8/9/20”

Being close enough to its 3,500 mile interval mark, it was time to cycle the dinosaur juice. However, this time it would be like no other; unless you count that one time I forgot to put back the crush washer. Due to “oil change specials” it is often more affordable to pick up a 5 qt. jug and just return the cheap filter at a later date than it is to purchase the units individually. Normally I fill the one quart container three times and then do some math to measure out the last 0.6 qt. and what’s left gets put away for the future.

Except for this time when all was said and done, there was only a tiny bit of oil left in the big jug. Now I know what you’re thinking, and if your Common Core is up to date: The CLM takes 3.6 quarts of oil and if we start out with 5 quarts of oil and then take away one quart of oil three times and then take away another six-tenths of a quart; we should have way more than just one quart remaining.

With an autocross coming tomorrow, and after driving a few miles to see how bad it sounded we read somewhere on the internet how Spec-Miata racers run half a quart low because “racecar”. In the end, one of the bigger containers was sacrificed in the event the oil was to be reused and my hands ended up covered in oil (at least it was clean[ish]), and the Miata now benefits from a fresh partial oil flush.

Continue reading “This is What Happens When You “Like Working on Cars” or The Benefits of Flushing Your Oil”

100% by chance; went to the bank, stepped out the car, looked down and saw this …