Yep - the days of 515 lift and 302 duration sure was fun. :)

I'm following your work, so take good notes on this. My cruising coolant temp is 179F at 70 MPH on crusie control Interstate traffic. Goes to 180ish in town, and I have seen it hit 208F before cooling back down. I'm worried about it.

What do you have in mind for mounting those gauges?

For those looking for an easy place to mount guages - use the A-pillar. The Air bag for the window only ties in at the very top of the pillar. My guages are mounted lower down.

Jay Goldfarb

the couple of A-pillar pods I have seen looked to have poor fit, and the couple that I have seen just stuck on without some sort of housing, looked really cheap. How did you mount yours, and do you have any pictures you can share?

Jay I thought about the a piller and you are right it would ease the installation but I just really like a center pod mount.
Nemesis-- so you played with the good ole cam lope that i useD to do around the Dairy Queen? Nothing like a big block with a high lift cam, high compression, good heads and good set of headers etc to give you that sound! My front end on my 55 chev would be bouncing so much riding in thAT car ATAT IDLE would feel like riding a wild horse!

Nemesis8

Are you using your A/C during any of those times that you are watching your temps? I have a feeling by using the A/C the engine temps are really affected. Especially in slow driving situations.
Have you also felt a loss of power when the car's engine really gets hot? ie--both cooling fans on etc?
Hopefully my gauges will be almost installed by the end of this w/e. Waiting on RB oil/water things and other chores around the house have to be done.
Blue - I am hopeing I can recess the pods some in the space that the Nav screen would normally take. By looking only at the manuel it appears that it can be. I may have to get some inserts fabricated to dress up what has to be removed in order to do this but I alreay have a local interior man looking . Maybe could even modify the Nav tray with a custom honeycombed aluminum insert and mount to that. Have not decided. I have to tear her down first (start on that Friday night) 1st thought is I would want the same material as the dash but you never know what old men will do!
olddragger

I would be super interested to see what you figure out, and maybe I can figure out if I can use it for my application

x2

No A/C with those street temps - and have not felt a loss of power yet.

Would the RE-Amemiya .9bar radiator caps help us? Vivid has them for $50

How?

(in a Singporian accent) Since it looks more fie-r-ace... people will scare a-way, right? :lol:

LOL - it will add bling that's for sure.

Actually using the AC drops my temps considerably. The AC brings those fans on much sooner and as soon as they kick on the temps quickly fall.

Good point rkostolni--i have read that corvette owners report the same thing--earier the fans come on the better in regard to temps.
more support for modified fan ativation on our cars.
olddragger

currently I have set my temp warnings for my defi gauges as follows
oil pressure, 1 bar
oil temp, 100 degree C
water temp, 100 degree C
I will probably adjust the water temp a little higher (106 degree C?)
I am still learning the temperature swings

darnellm

Jay - - get a camera :rolleyes:

I am studying using a Nav Tray like mod to mount my mechanical gauges.
Most resources I have read and talked to say when the coolant(normal mixture) gets to around 230F then start watching REAL close
oil temps I would be ok with at 250F using a 30wgt oil
oil pressure-- i dont know yet.
olddragger

Well got my dash torn apart and the center pod is now in the trunk, Plenty of room to mount the gauges and the position to drill the firewall is not going to be a problem. Many areas to choose from. I have 6ft of line to work with from the water and oil temp gauges(more for the oil pressure). Pondering on ways to utilize the nav tray space(its a lot). Stay tuned.
Oh by the way if you havent changed your interior air filter you ought to check it--mine had bird feathers in it for Gods sake.
olddragger

You're not up the creek w/o a paddle. You can mix water/glycol with Evans coolant, you just lose all the benefit of having it and to get it back you have to go through the whole flush/drain procedure again. The pressure cap is no longer important so if you have a small leak or defective cap it's not going to boil over on you. If water & the water-wetter products were sufficient nobody would be using the expensive Evans coolant and then there is the winter freezing concern for some people. The issue has always been the NPG viscosity prevented it from working well in small passage heat exchangers. This is no longer an issue with their newest version; NPG-R.

BTW, the factory cap is 0.9 ATM. If you want to increase the temp rating with glycol you need to go higher, some people are running 1.3 ATM on the RX-8, but this is added stress for a blowout or leak. Evans recommends only a 0.5 ATM cap for the NPG-R, though it's no issue to run the higher factory one. I understand the concern though. It's not for everyone and I wouldn't recommend it for most people. I didn't consider OD to be most people though :)


.

Learn something everyday--Thanks Team. I am too old to be like most!:). Somedays it feels like every organ in my body has been customized and it needs a good tuner.
I agree Evans is good stuff but for now I am looking at ways to make the car run as cool as I can with regular glycol/water 65/35 mix(one good reason to live in the South). Even though Evans can tolerate the heat and keep you going just fine (I have heard people finishing races with the radiators completly clogged with mud (on dirt tracks)while running this stuff---amazing). I was only going to experiment with the Water wetter stuff.
I also agree with you about the cap pressure --staying stock there. Dont want increase in risk.
I haven't totally given up on the electric water pump idea -coupled with a better radiator--but that is resting in the corner right now until I get some more data. Evans may work out very well with an electric water pump also.
1st gauges to be installed--I have figued out how I want them--done the preliminary work--waiting on RB oil and water units(should be here this week). Then its time to some gather baseline temps and go from there.
Real interested in what you are doing--your car is looking good. Surprised about the A/C weight. Thought it would be more.
To hijack my own thread , have to seen the tire caps that automatically adjusts your tire pressure as they heat up on the track? What do you think? Dont know if I would trust that.
Olddragger

Gauges should be completed by this w/e. Fabrication takes time. Days in Ga now in the mid to upper 80's. I will be on the track at Roebling the end of next month and will see what those temps are.
olddragger

Is there any chance that opening up the front grill woud help lower temps with more airflow? Or in doing so, will we lose any downforce that the grill adds by directing air up over the hood?

Keep up the good work

The mazdaspeed front clip does provide better airflow, but it has a much bigger area. To open up our OEM grill would be a big job. I do seem to remember reading that is certain areas of the country that req a front plate--it did affect the cooling some. If my temps are compatable with what I have been reading about(probably will be) then i am going to look at better fan control first.
olddragger

pics!

I have the mazda speed front nose and on the track with 20-50 Valvaline racing I can see 250 degree temps. I also opened up the lower portion of the fender liner to let more air out.

Jay Goldfarb

Jay --we think a lot alike. I too--have added to vents in the fender liner.
Got my AUto meter MECHANICAL liquid filled gauges installed today. It was a heck of a feat of engineering to get them like I wanted. I did not us the NAv Tray it was as anothe forum member suggested--too deep. I added a cross member to the nav tray space and positioned it so that my 3 gauges are almost riding on the top of the center pod. Yes I did cut a notch out of the center pod for this. My son took pics --now if he will only show me how to send them to all --i will do so.
I first test run was only approx 7miles long on low traffic 55mph roads--stop and go. it was approx 84F today. I am running RB sensor mounts so my water temp is at the heater hose and my oil temps/pressure are at the oil fileter.
Water temp never got over 180F and oil temp never got over 160F. Now the interesting part is when the car was running steady at 160-170 I would downshift to 3nd and full throttle for a short way and the water temp would jump 20 degress. Oil temp didnt move(as expected). I was not running the A/C.
My oil pressure surprised me. I am running royal purple 5/20 at present. After the car is warmed up the idle oil pressure is less than 20. Max's out at about 70 at high rpm and average road speed it is about 48-50 or so. I thought it would have a higher idle pressure than that.
ANyway the monitoring is just starting here. ALso I wonder if my temp sensors are picking correctly. The gauge came with a 1/2 inch flange fitting and the RB mounts have a 3/8 --so I have to buy an adapter. this caused the temp probe to not be as far inserted as it would have without the adaptor. It still has good contact about a inch or so showing where as without the adaptor it woul be about 2 inches. Would that affect anything?
olddragger