Open track day and parts runner build

[blake4591]

I use a short wooden table leg that I bought at home depot. It is the best festiva fender rolling tool I've found and I have an actual fender roller. Lol. The Festiva has small awkwardly shaped fenders and the metal is easy to shape. I prefer the feel of a manual tool and the wood slides nicely on the metal. The different shapes and diameters of the turned table leg work well to shape the steel lip.

I have a spare piece of closet hanger rod. It's about a foot and a half long and 1.5" diameter. Works pretty good. I've rolled fenders before without heat guns and have had pretty good luck with no to very minimal cracking. I did borrow a 1700 watt heat gun from work to do mine this weekend it just lets you go a bit faster when you heat them.

On a side note can anyone confirm the correct wire to ground to check the timing. I have a no power on throttle issue and double checking with the timing light revealed that the timing was still moving when I thought I had it locked. I had grounded the single yellow and green wire with the black spade connector by the coil. I know it's grounded because the check engine light will come on for 10 seconds after start up and then go out showing no engine codes. But if I check the timing with that wire grounded it will move when the engine is revved? Everything I see says that is the correct wire to ground to set timing.

If I can't get the timing to ground to set base time does anyone know how much advance the ECU will put in for a hot engine at idle? I have an adjustable timing light but I have no idea what timing the ECU is going to be putting in.

[bhazard]

Blake come roll my fenders bro

[blake4591]

Well I drove the car to work today seems to be good so far.

Last bit of fab work was making a front exhaust hanger to keep weight off of the flex pipe.
Start with 3/8" steel rod.


Bend to shape


Run weld bead around each end


Grind bevels on the ends


Install and weld to exhaust making sure that it is actually supporting the pipe and not just along for the ride.


I pulled the car out of the garage and washed it.




I used my spare blue hood that is sort of junk since I ended up having to cut out some of the bracing to clear the intake. I rattle canned it flat red really quick to match the strips but I'm not super sure I like it now. It's not going anywhere anytime soon so maybe it'll grow on me.


Just as a follow up to the timing issue. I basically timed the motor off of feel and sound so I have no idea what my actual timing is. Does anyone know if the engine will run with the spout unplugged from the ignition module? If the module has a fail safe that will fire the coil without being told to by the ECU I may be able to set timing that way but it's a little bit of a pain to take the connector apart if it wont work.

[Advancedynamix]

I set mine around 10-12 degrees at 1000rpm without grounding the diag plug. I fiddle with it a bit from there by feel.

Pedro is over 10:1 compression and can be a bit fussy on pump gas in the summer here, so I back my timing off in the hot months.

Also, I don't trust the balancer pulley to be clocked right on these engines. The outer ring slips on the rubber. I time mine with the notch in the lower timing belt pulley. You have to do it with the covers removed and yes it's a pain in the butt.

[fastivaca]

I set mine around 10-12 degrees at 1000rpm without grounding the diag plug. I fiddle with it a bit from there by feel.

Pedro is over 10:1 compression and can be a bit fussy on pump gas in the summer here, so I back my timing off in the hot months.

Also, I don't trust the balancer pulley to be clocked right on these engines. The outer ring slips on the rubber. I time mine with the notch in the lower timing belt pulley. You have to do it with the covers removed and yes it's a pain in the butt.

Thanks for this Charlie. What about the vacuum to the distributor on the B6T, should that be unhooked when setting the timing? I'm wondering if the timing is an issue on mine. I'm only getting about 25 miles per US gallon with conservative driving.

[blake4591]

Yeah at this point I'm basically giving up with putting a timing light on it. I've been adding timing every time I drive it and it seems to want a couple more degrees because it still as an idle to WOT hesitation. I can watch it take out timing because the vacuum goes away but the base timing isn't quite enough to get it to rev up quickly. I'm guessing it only needs a couple degrees because it feels good when you roll in to it or once it is above about 2500 rpm. I already maxed out the BP distributor though so I'll have to file out the adjustment slots to get the last couple degrees.

Yeah I'm thinking the mark on the V belt pulley is wrong. Based off of it I have about 36 to 40 degrees total at idle which seems high for it to still want more. If it was happy right now I would consider that possibly right but I don't think it should want more than 40 at idle or at last it would be really weird.

I'm guessing the 10 to 12 is with the vacuum advance disconnected? I tried 12 without the plug grounded and it could barely rev with no load. haha

[Advancedynamix]

Your pulley is spun. 40 degrees base timing advance would be some sort of setting to run it on the moon or something, lol.

I set it with everthing hooked up and idling at 1000rpm (gotta keep messing with the idle to get it right after adding or removing timing.) The b6t likes 14 degrees set up like that. My b6d will knock if I run that much base timing, so it's at 12ish.

[blake4591]

Yeah I'm just going to put the timing light away and keep putting timing in until I get to a little denotation and then back off a couple degrees. I'll mess with it a little tonight and see how far I get.

I had the first real problem yesterday. I noticed that it was leaking a little trans fluid when I left work and assumed that my cheap/ laziness had got me and the trans output seals that I didn't replace were bad. I had looked at the seals and shafts when I made the choice not to replace them and didn't notice anything that would cause a leak so I thought it was a little odd. After I got home and took a closer look it turns out the driver side half shaft had pulled out of the trans. I'm hoping this is a one time deal since I put the trans as close to the drivers side as possible without cutting the frame rail. I know it's a little off center but I didn't think it was bad enough to cause a half shaft to pull out. I did hit a couple of speed bumps and speed ditches harder than I wanted to yesterday because I'm used to driving my subaru and generally just ripping over all that stuff.

Also I think I'm going to order some 160 lb springs for the front I have 180lb springs on there now and I think I can go a little softer without getting much more body roll.

[Advancedynamix]

I'd go even softer than 160. Remember, you can get a 200lb rate with a 120lb spring, just add preload, but you can never get a 120lb rate from a 160lb spring. Also, the rate rise of a heavier spring will be more aggressive and it'll have a tendency to bounce more.

[blake4591]

Also I think I'm going to order some 160 lb springs for the front I have 180lb springs on there now and I think I can go a little softer without getting much more body roll.

I double checked, I actually have 200 lb springs and I'm going to get a set of 150lb springs.

[Advancedynamix]

That will be a good rate.

[blake4591]

I ordered springs and got the timing to what I think is good last night. I ended up putting the B3 distributor back on since I had already filed out the adjustment slots on it.

I have some more investigating to do on the BP distributor and I'm going to try to get it back on the car sooner rather than later since I can only use one bolt to sort of hold the B3 dizzy on.

[william]

Shave the cap over the disty and use the 2 bolts to lock it down. Then you don't need the disty mounting slots.

[blake4591]

I took the car to an autocross on Sunday. Overall performance was pretty good I ended up about 6 seconds behind the fastest time of the day (59.1 sec vs. 52.6 sec) I figure about half of that is just in tires. I just had the ATR-K ECONOMIST that I drove there and back on. While the fastest cars were running Hoosier A7s and Falken RT615Ks. I also think the car could have gone at least a couple seconds faster with some improvement in my driving. I haven't autocrossed in years and my lines were still pretty sloppy even in the runs that were the fastest. I also have to build some more confidence in the capability of the car. In a couple of places I thought I was going as fast as the car would in the morning and by the afternoon was going through a lot faster with just as much control. It should get a lot better once I get some more time driving the car at the limit.

I did find three mechanical problems. The fan doesn't work, I'm assuming it has to be the relay, I need to find a overflow tank that fits and get that mounted somehow and the starter seems to heat soak and then struggle to start the car. None of it is super important but it all needs to get corrected in the next few days.

[blake4591]

I did find three mechanical problems. The fan doesn't work, I'm assuming it has to be the relay, I need to find a overflow tank that fits and get that mounted somehow and the starter seems to heat soak and then struggle to start the car. None of it is super important but it all needs to get corrected in the next few days.

I figured out the fan issue. The connector for the fan had some corrosion in it and wasn't making good contact. I cleaned it up and packed it with dielectric grease and it seems to be ok. I'm going to pick up a weather pack connector to replace the open one with if it gives me anymore problems. I'm really looking forward to redoing the wiring and getting rid of all these open connectors in the engine bay because this is at least the third one that has been corroded enough to need fixed. I ordered some heat wrap for the starter and a catch can that should be here in a couple days. I also have my new springs but I'm not sure exactly when I'll get them swapped in. It probably won't be for a couple weeks.