Hi all,

Long time lurker and sponger of all the FI knowledge! Always been a bit afraid to post/comment due to the infamous newbie bashing but since I'll inevitably need a helping hand at some point soon *hint hint*, I figure I might as well start posting now

Brief introduction:
>I hail from the UK
>I am on my 4th RX-8 but I never should have sold the first one
>I am rapidly approaching the second round of tuning for my Greddy turbo kit build but the lack of experience with boosted '8s over here makes everything more challenging
>I have a habit of not finishing ambitious projects but am determined to follow through with this one even if it costs me my sanity (and most of my take home pay!)
>My long-term goal is to have one of (if not the) most reliably boosted turbo '8s in the country

So anyway... 'sup!

 

Welcome to the turbo Mazdaspeed club. Post pics or GTFO.

 

Welcome to the forum . Who is doing your tuning ?

 

lol@9k

Welcome to the club.
Looking forward to seeing pics of your setup

 

Camera skills: Potato

MAF has since had a flange welded to the pipe going to the throttle body and is attached correctly now

Pictures aren't 100% up to date

All pipe-work was custom made by hand - no, not by me I'm afraid

Edit: better pictures are on the agenda but I am incredibly lazy...

 

Hi mate and thanks. I've heard good things about you from my buddy Gary aka Flameshades :D

Regarding tuning, I am going to be using Pip Gardner of WGT Auto Developments

 

Cheers for that . Have not heard of WGT Auto . I hope they have already had success with tuning an FI 8 because if you are their first .... It might not go well .
What tuning software are they using ?

 

Thanks for the pics!

 

Pip is a UK rotary tuning expert with 30 years experience with Rotary engines and 15 of that is tuning. He's done about a dozen turbo 8s but they are very uncommon over here.

I run an Adaptronic Select so he will be tuning with WARI

 

Ah good ... sounds like you are in good hands !

 

No problem chap. I will eventually get round to more with a better quality camera and once I can create one in the forced induction section - look out for a project thread

 

Fingers crossed! I must admit, I felt a lot better when I saw a Mazda 757 LeMans car worth 6 figures at his shop :P

I may have to pick the brains of some of you more experienced folk in due time but luckily, I am quite adept at using the search button already

 

That is one hell of a catch can bracket,

 

What can I say? It does the job and recyles a spare bracket that was going wanting... and it matches :D

 

The pipework looks well done . Is the Greddy stock or upgraded ?

 

Completely stock for now. I am intrigued to see what I can get out of it before looking to rebuild for higher flow

RE the pipework - the stuff that the kit came with when I bought the car was mis-matched and cobbled together out of different bits of pipework - really shoddily done imo. Alan at Solid Fabrications really takes pride in his work and I was suitably impressed with the end result

 

It's good practice to either close off or deactivate the APV if the turbo is stock . Otherwise the turbo overspools and runs too far outside it's efficiency island.

 

Even with the Adaptronic's ability to control the APV?

 

yep ... use Adaptronics to disable it .

 

I appreciate the heads up. What's the impact in terms of power output?

 

Any power you lose from doing it you can get back by increasing the boost

 

Right, sounds like a plan then. The APV has been a bit of a grey area for me so thanks for the clarification.

My aim is to have a decent/constant level of boost from 3k to as close to redline as possible. Decent doesnt mean high but enough so that the power is there and the car stays very driveable as I use it frequently. I was originally thinking 7psi but with blanking the APV and combining with yellow/blue/blue injectors and an updated fuel pump, is 9 likely to be achievable consistently on the stock Greddy snail?

First power run was without the MAF and I believe the Mazda ECU was pulling back the throttle due to no reading from the MAF as I witnessed a significant lack of power (190hp peak at 4 psi) and it completely dived at the top end even though boost stayed consistent throughout. The MAF has since been plumbed back in right before the throttle body but I am not ready to take it back to the tuner yet (see above fueling mods)

 

Maybe ..... might not quite hold 9 to redline . But plan is sound. You don't really need to touch the injectors with a stock greddy turbo .

No idea what is going on here .............. your tuner should know if he has done this before .......

 

After having a conflab with another rotary tuner I hold in high regard, he also agrees that stock injectors shouldn't be an issue for 9psi but heat around the greddy manifold and subsequently the rear rotor, turbo and exhaust temps could be an issue. I have to get the turbo out to investigate a slight oil leak near the oil return line so I think getting the manifold and turbo intake pipe heat-wrapped sounds like a good plan. Ideally I'd go ceramic coating but $$$$!

Hmmm... I don't disagree there! Tbf, he has seen around a dozen in his time and all have been set up differently (different turbo kits, top/low mount, different ecus) so it's understandable. I was genuinely surprised about just how much the lack of MAF sensor affected the power though, barely made 180hp at 4psi...

Another grey area - I've heard something mentioned about some sort of dongle which fools an O2 sensor? Is this something that was part of the emangle or is it something different entirely?


EDIT: Can a mod move this to the S1 FI section please now that I'm past 10 posts and can actually post there? Thanks!

 

For ceramic coating. I played with the spray on ceramic paint. If forget the name, but there is only one. I wanted to keep the exhaust cool and quit baking my transmission. When done, I had good results.

Thread is here. https://www.rx8club.com/series-i-tec...-paint-251326/

Last post is maybe more applicable... Good follow on data.