My Mars Red Mk1 - Thread REBOOT- P82

I haven't driven it since last year

Although there is light at the end of the driveway!

 

Tying up loose ends

The turbo upgrade had resulted in the removal of part of the strut brace which now needed to be re-fabricated. This also meant the relocation of the brake reservoirs.




Tube profiling is always a little tricky to get right with and angle grinder and it took a couple of goes before it fit.








Clean off paint and get welding.




I couldn't quite see under the brace so a mirror and some careful torch control let me weld underneath the pipework for a full weld.




A bit of prep for paint, drop the top mount and mask up.




Fresh paint always looks so nice.




Looks as though the brace was never touched!




Next up was the reservoir relocate. With a little poking about, I found a new place for the bottles.








As you can see the bottles are snug under the brace but I assure you that they can be opened and filled in situ.


The oil return was also looking a little worse for wear. I was using a braided nitrile rubber hose for the drain but this was starting to fatigue with heat being so close to the manifold. No surprise given the 100 degrees centigrade the hose was rated at. I replaced this with ptfe braided hose instead with a 232 degrees centigrade rating and put some fire-sleeve over it for good measure. Fire-sleeve can cope with over 1000 degrees centigrade for short periods of time so will give more than adequate protection for what I am using it for.








The engine bay is finally starting to look complete with boost hoses and the intercooler back in place.




Getting very close to being up and running again now.

Gurds

 

Are the reservoirs much higher than the master cylinders?

 

Hi Tristan,

Yes they are. My master cylinders are at base pedal height level with my ankles.

Gurds

 

I've just read through the thread from start to finish - I have to commend your commitment! Your hard work looks to be paying off!

Have you managed to finish all the odds and ends off and get the car remapped to suit?

Would love to see this in the flesh - let us all know when you next plan to go to Brands Hatch - will have to try and see you there!

Mandip

 

Thank you very much Mandip. It certainly has been an interesting journery and have managed to learn loads during it.

As usual lots has changed since the last post and really need to update the thread. The car is due back at the dyno very soon and I am actually due to be at Brands Hatch for Deutsche Fest on the 16th June for the day so please feel free to come see me.

Gurds

 

Gurds, time to update the thread ?

 

Yes it is Mike, Reboot! Tinkering has continued at the usual rate but updating threads hasn't I'll pick up where I left off and summarise progress.

I was never happy with the flexi hose being used between the turbo and air filter as movement would cause the hose to break down and let in dirt. As my ally TIG skills were not up to scratch I used some old stainless pipe left over from my exhaust build.

Sectioned into pie cuts, I used them to work my way through the tight space between the cam cover and chassis leg.



The TIG work was of an acceptable standard for a first go.



The pipework snaked through the gap and positions the air filter quite comfortably. I never got on with foam filters as they ALWAYS break down so a cotton one from JR does a much better job.





Boost Control

I'd pretty much had enough of the stand alone boost controller not being able to sense the RPM signal so decided to switch to using the Megasquirt 2 ECU to do the job instead. Unlike MS1, MS2 does a great job of closed loop boost control.

Along with this switch, there were a couple of other worthy changes that would help the engine response. Turbosmart sell an upgrade actuator and diverter valve for my turbo which allows my to use a much wider range of boost pressures which much quicker throttle response too. It also eliminates boost creep and wastegate spring strength issues normally associated with internal wastegates. Basically the setup now behaves like a proper external setup without any of the added pipework or heat.

Dual port actuator




Plumbing was neatened later



A massive thank you to Tim aka MOFF from
https://www.tmsmotorsport.co.uk/ for sorting out the Turbosmart goodies at a brilliant price! :thumb: He sells a wide range of track and motorsport related car parts so give him a buzz if you need something for your toy.

 

Wahey , Gurds is back !

 

Bad Vibes

There was notable vibration coming from the engine bay and while inspecting it was noted the engine had excess movement. Eventually found that the front engine mount had sheared across a bend. IMO the design of this mount wasn't up to the job so I decided to modify it to suit.



Another excuse to use my TIG welder.



Suitable plating beefed the mount up.




Unfortunately that wasn't the end of the problems. I had previously welded up the manifold V-Band as it was no longer needed but a stress riser resulted in cracking the weld around the circumference.



So the manifold came off and was welded back up with some fillets to relieve the joint of side loading.



That should do it! Oh wait.....


I had been chasing oil burning for a little while, seems as worn exhaust guides were the culprit. You can see the tell tail oil trail coming from the exhaust guides out to the edge of the head.



A job for later though as a Cadwell Park trackday with friends was coming soon so the manifold and turbo was refitted for now.

 

Cadwell Park Trackday

It's Oct 2017, me and some friends decided to join Nige for a late year trackday at Cadwell Park for a bit of fun. We geared up and headed up for a couple of days of fun. In preparation, I thought it was finally time to try out the set of Dunlop slicks I had sitting in the garage.

Apprehensive as being 225 wide meant getting them up to temp might be tricky, especially on the rear.



I was going to rent a trailer for the trip but a very good condition Brian James came up for sale for the right price and was located in the same village as Cadwell Park!!! Must be a sign.



So a deal was made and I collected the trailer upon arrival.



Put the Golf on it. Fits perfectly.



The lads were ready for what turned out to be a brilliant day.



The trackday was brilliant with everyone having a problem free day. My worries about the slicks were quickly dispelled and found that they came up to temp very quickly. They really took the car to the next level and did everything you'd expect a slick to do. I ran the car on 1 bar boost all day circa 330bhp and it performed faultlessly.

Nige and I had a lot of close laps and enjoyed the day thoroughly. So much so that we swapped keys and drove each others cars. An account of it can be read here:

http://www.northloop.co.uk/forum/sh...on-June-2018&p=1022283&viewfull=1#post1022283





This video sums up the kind of day we had!

[video=youtube;8qJtoccbd0I]

Till the next one.

 

Post trackday, winter setting in, it was time to reflect on the year and work through that list of off season jobs that inevitably comes together with time. Highest priority job on the list was a head refurbishment.

Head Ache

I tend to build my car to be easy to service and access so removal of the head was methodical and stress free. Also the regular revisits to various components means that it all comes apart with minimum fuss.

Off with your head!



The cylinder head was dismantled and sent to CTM in Essex for an inspection and refurbishment. Thanks to Eddie (Toyotec) for facilitating and transporting it. Eddie has a good rapport with CTM so ensured my request was fulfilled.

CTM came back with what I expected, the valve guides were worn past the limits and needed replacing. With the head being in pieces, I also decided to have the head worked on to make it more efficient for turbo duties. CTM delivered!





It's quite satisfying assembling clean parts.



Those exhaust ports will never look this clean again.



The head did need some welding of water ways as they had excessively corroded. No biggie though. Should see the train wrecks CTM has managed to repair!



Back home where it belongs.




Another issue that needed improvement was the intercooler. Now the Mitsi Evo intercooler had done well upto the limits of the old GT2860 but this new EFR6258 would be capable of more. Even the 1 bar plots so far from Cadwell was showing temps into the 50deg celcius range on cool days so a call was made to my good friends at Serck to make it better.

I supplied dims of available space and then waited.......

This was the result. This picture shows the new IC in black sandwiched between the rad and Evo IC. As you can see it is much larger.



It also has flow guidance on the inlet side to help distribute gasflow more evenly through the cores.



Here it is slotted in place.



I took the opportunity to clean up the boost pipe between the turbo and IC at the same time.

Finished off with some blanking to force air through the cores than escaping around them.

Did it work? Oh yes! Now inlet temps are in the mid 30 range even with the boost up at 1.4 bar! The IC temps actually drop as the RPM rises! Well worth it.

 

Dashing!

The speedo in my car has not worked for years! To boot the RPM gauge was also 500rpm short of what my rev limiter was set to also. Sub optimal. I started to explore the options of race dash systems, data loggers and app based displays.

I started with using GPS speedo apps to get me by then I came across an app called Real Dash.

http://realdash.net/index.php

This app talks directly to my ECU, amongst others, via bluetooth serial and has many features and skins.

I fashioned a temporary mount to test the app with an old phone.





After some testing, the initial feedback was good so I upgraded the phone to a tablet and took it to a trackday. La-Ferrari skin added too which switches to a laptimer when Race mode is activated.



I tested it at the recent Cadwell Park trackday. This is where I hit some snags. The app is very heavy on graphics and animation so I soon found that the battery would die very quickly whilst in use, even with a power source. I also found the lap timing to be inaccurate! This was going to be an issue especially once some sunshine heated the screen and could overheat it.

I had even started rebuilding the dash with sections of CF to take a screen.



It was then i stumbled across a completely new plan which I just had to try.



Yes, I was going to build my own Raspberry Pi dash instead using their own 7" touchscreen.

The screen neatly holds the Pi securely to the back and has a tidy bezel allowing for neat mounting solutions. The software itself is TunerStudio which I use to map Megasquirt but the software has an added feature of being able to switch to a full screen customisable dash!



Software was tested on my laptop before replicating on the Pi.





It's a lot more colourful than the pictures show and testing in direct sunshine proved to give a fully legible display at all times. With a 30sec autoboot time from off to running app it was more than acceptable for a track car. Being part of my tuning software means that the dash also automatically logs my ecu for every session I drive!

The final piece of the puzzle was power handling. With the uncontrolled nature of vehicle power, just running off USB was never going to be stable. I found a UPS power supply from one of the Pi vendors which solved the abrupt power cut offs.

Final fit along with so extra instrumentation.



And a sun shade to reduce reflections.



Next time you see me at circuit, come take a look if your interested!

 

Love it Gurds. Is this something you need electronic and/or programming knowledge for, or something the average , reasonably competent non IT type could replicate?

 

Cheers Tris. You need to be a little tech savvy and comfortable playing with config files. If you can build a PC then you can do this too. It's easier than build/mapping Megasquirt for instance.

 

A breath of fresh air

The catch can location has been a compromise far from ideal. Positioned on the firewall lower than the cam cover itself means that a siphoning effect was possible if oil started to breath through the hoses. This did occur from time to time. To move the can higher required fabrication of a new box to sit up higher. TIG welding ally was improving with practice on scraps so building a new one was finally on the cards.

Practice welds



I created a template out of cardboard which I then cut ally up to suite. Welding in a baffle and AN fittings before finally welding shut.





It might not be the prettiest welding ever seen but it's my first ally piece and doesn't leak. Will do nicely.

It sit's nicely in the scuttle with a constant upwards gradient from engine outlets.






Strong Flange

The upgrade to mk2 uprights had proven to be a worthy upgrade with both outer CV and flanges holding up to abuse much better than the smaller mk1 variants I ran. With the view to increase torque delivery further I took the hubs up a further step.

Alastair campaigns his mk1 in a race series with sticky slicks all the time and he pretty much broke either the hubs or CVs at every event when he was running mk2 parts. He then upgraded to VR6 CVs and hubs and since has not had a single failure. So I followed suit.
Not simple though as it involves redrilling a 5x100 hub to be a 4x100. As accuracy on a pillar drill was never going to be good enough, I got my friendly machinist to do the job on the CNC.



I then pressed in some studs.



And assembled back into the leg.



New SKF bearings were treated to Redline CV2 grease as per Nige's guide.

http://pinderwagen.com/build-topics/repack-an-skf-wheel-bearing-with-high-temperature-grease/

All refitted back onto the car.



This upgrade has held up beautifully to some serious stick, how much stick is soon to be revealed....

 

Always enjoy reading about this car. So glad you didn’t sell it Gurds and I didn’t buy it either. Was so tempted but it would have never got to this level. Truly epic.

 

Faded Dreams

Having owned the Flying Tomato since 2006, the focus of the build has always been performance first. But for those of you who know me a little better will know I like my cars to look presentable too. The paintwork was starting to show signs of tiredness with splats of rubber from constant track abuse taking it's toll. Long time brother from another mother Sahib, was disheartened at the lack of attention the paint had received and offered to give the coachwork a thorough good clean up. So I agreed.

Sahib started with a foam wash and decontamination of the paint before rubbing down the paint with clay bars.



To Sahib's amazement, this took the best part of the day! He described the paint feeling like fine sandpaper!

Then the cutting started. Given that most of the paint on the car is original from 1983, he decided to be cautious and only cut enough to give a good finish rather than try to polish out all the deeper scratches.



By that point, we'd run out of daylight so opted to carry on the next day.



The next day Sahib now used a finer polish with the buffer before applying a wax final finish. The results speak for themselves! I had people asking if that was even the same paint. Anyone who has owned Mars red knows it fades to an orange rather than pink. The car was back to being a radiant deep red now. Thank you very much to Sahib for his efforts!









Now with the paint looking fresh, I gave the polycarbonate a quick buff too however the front door windows were worse for wear. I opted to replace them but ditched the sliders as they rattle relentlessly and give next to no airflow anyway.

 

Stop and Go!

Since upgrading my brakes in 2015, I've not said much about them again. And that's because they have been fantastic! I have been running AP 304x28mm discs along with Pagid RSL-1 endurance pads and they have been the same set since I fitted them! Yes you read that right, since 2015 I have done countless trackdays including multiple visits to Brands Hatch, Curborough, The Nurburgring twice, Spa, and the list goes on.

So what's the wear like?

Well discs are down from 28mm to 27.5mm.

Pads New vs Old.



Old pads still had 4mm friction material left.



New pads have 10mm friction material to begin with.



Pagid RSL-1 pads are not cheap but they have more than paid for themselves in the long term.

Some of the switches can be a bit difficult to reach when fully strapped in so I used a bit of CF to make a nifty plate to place them close to hand.




The most common question I get asked after a few sessions of track is how much power does my car make? To be honest, I've only been able to give an estimate as I really didn't know. With all mapping done on the road for best response and feel and enough experience to carry on mapping myself, an RR session has never been priority. However, recently I had wound the boost up to a moderate 1.4 bar and I was keen to see the results. Up until recently a safe 1 bar had been my high boost setting of choice.

With 1 bar the car is still very tractable on the road as well as on track but with the extra headroom available, it would be rude not to turn the wick up. This resulted in an undrivable car on the road with 1st to 4th lighting up as soon as the loud pedal was given a bootfull. Experience though taught me what was too aggressive on the road usually worked on warmed tyres on circuit.

Surrey Rolling Road was the venue of choice with a Dyno Dynamics RR setup being used for a power run day, I signed up.

Note: The wiggle in the highest power run is wheelspin.



The visit had the intention of getting power figures so no tuning was to be conducted. I ran 3 different settings and got the following results!



Well I'm happy with that!

Actuator pressure of 0.5 bar gave 235bhp.

1bar pressure gave 330bhp. This is the most commonly used setting including the recent Cadwell Park day.

1.35bar pressure gave 395bhp! This setting was recently used on my trip to the Ring for DN20 (report to follow) and worked flawlessly!!

Good news is there is still more left in reserve. I will be exploring the limits of the turbo soon but not important right now.

 

What did you think the bhp was going to be, Gurdip?