/\ ok - sorry for the wild goose chase . It just seemed like a high probability .

 

It's ok, I appreciate all the help anyone is willing to give

I am taking the car to the mechanic who did my cooling system upgrade (Kyle Rusert a former employee of Rotary Performance) on Tuesday and hopefully I can get the car in proper working order finally.

 

Where was the leak ?

 

So I am apparently inept and you were right all along.

I could have sworn I traced the line from the IC pipe behind the alternator down to the LIM area on the side above the turbo. I guess I traced it wrong since I was informed this hose actually went to the injector area and had blown clean off. He also found the uncapped nipple on the BOV I read should not leak under boost was leaking when he pressurized the system.

Kyle confirmed the car is very quick now, startlingly so, but as a tease I don't get to pick it up until Monday since he finished up so late tonight.

 

I would make him meet you on saturday!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

That's good news . Your tune may actually be ok now once the LTFT's settle down .

 

Would it be a good idea to reset the ECU and let it relearn rather than recover from constantly correcting from the vacuum leak?

 

Straight After fixing it ..... definately Sounds like it's too late for that now though .

 

So it's been a while but I thought I'd give some updates. Ever since my boost leak was fixed my peak g/s have been down from 400ish to 355 to 378 g/s but the power has been way up (which makes sense).

I've accumulated more parts which should close out the turbo build until the inevitable happens addressing all the remaining issues I see.

Volk GT-7 Rims: 19x8.5 front 19x9.5 rear. 245/35/19 and 275/30/19 Conti's are on there atm. Staggered wouldn't be my first choice but the price was great and I love the look of the GT-7s. This should address my traction issues.

Tanabe GFs: To prevent the car from looking like a lifted truck after the rims are on.

GReddy E-01: The AEM TruBoost is no good as a boost controller so I will be using this instead to smooth out the boost curve and prevent it from falling off as much in the high end. I'm going to approach this slowly since from what I can see from Garret's site the with the largest trim GT3071R I am right up on the edge on the amount of air it flows.

TurboXS Exhaust + racepipe: After 7700RPM or so the car chokes big time and I'm pretty sure it is due to the restrictive stock catback. I will be welding in a BHR resonator and 100CPI Mil.Spec cat. In the Evo community it is the highest flowing cat, I talked to them and they think it will hold up to the rotary turbo abuse and if it doesn't at least there is a year warranty (though I will probably try a DaveSport instead at that point).

 

In the interest of comparison how the OBX racepipe with no cat and stock catback compares to the TurboXS racepipe + catback + mil.spec cat I did some data logging at two temperature points.

In one of the first crisp mornings since summer started (low humidity in the low 60s F) I finally saw a pull of 378 g/s peak and the car felt like a beast.

Later on that same day it went up to the mid to high 80s F and the power was down into the high 350 g/s averages with one peaking at 360.

Graphs and cvs files attached as well as some lip measurements on the rims

 

Man...can't wait to see the final product.

 

Dyno!

 

Heh, dyno will have to wait until later giving me enough time to install this stuff and hammer out any issues but we'll see. As you can tell, my mod progress moves pretty slowly since finding time to work the car is few and far between. I may do a compression test around the same time just to get the full picture. Since the tune won't change (I'm well outside my 6 month window) once there is a dyno graph to correlate air flow to power all the logs I take from that point should give me a good idea on the power it makes under different situations. I'll also try to take note of the temps and humidity at each logging point.

The GReddy E-01 allows for logging of boost and one aux input (which I will be using for A/F ratio) so I can tie that into the results. I'm having the hardest time finding the aux input adapter for the E-01 (even GReddy Japan doesn't seem to have it) so that is one other thing I need to wrap up before dyno time since I'd rather not pay $35 for the optional tailpipe sensor if I can just log it myself.

 

What do you mean by "largest trim" ? I can only find a 56 trim on their site ?

 

Hm... you're right, I don't know where I was looking before. The island on that compressor map ended right around 50 lbs/min. I honestly have no clue what the actual specs on my turbo are except the housing is stamped "M12" and has a 0.50 A/R . I know in the past Jeff had hinted that these are not normal GT3071Rs... I have no idea but based on the compressor map I should be off the efficiency island at 378g/s.

Edit: Added compressor map from Garrett's site.

 

You may have been looking at the GTX3071R map which flows quite a bit more .

Till you dyno it will be very hard to correlate back to that map as MAF calibration plays a huge role in measured g/s.

Why MM has always been so guarded about what he supplied is one of the great mysteries of our time . If I had one I would have measured the compressor wheel to see what was up with it.

 

My MIL.SPEC 100 CPI metal substrate cat came today.

Evo dyno comparison.

Just waiting the BHR resonator now then the exhaust can go in

 

I installed my TurboXS exhaust and gathered some logs for a comparison from stock CBE with no cat vs TurboXS no cat vs TurboXS with MIL.SPEC cat + BHR resonator welded into the TurboXS midpipe (TurboXS resonator removed).

Without the cat the TurboXS was not as loud as I expected it to be, but still more drony than I'd like when cruising. The car pulled very hard once it was installed but I had to cut the logging short since I was getting some very nasty boost creep up top even after lowering the duty cycle considerably.

After getting the cat welded in the car feels noticeably slower ... I guess that is the price I have to pay to not have it smell (wife hates it). I only got a few decent runs in after getting the car back from having the resonator and cat welded in since I had gotten a carwash earlier in the day and was getting some strange behavior in 3rd gear high RPMs with the g/s pegging 459 g/s, the AEM sock was probably still soaked. Even when it was behaving in 2nd gear it still feels like the engine is choking big time after around 7000rpm so that is why the lines all end there (with the exception of TurboXS + no cat since it was boost creeping and pulling really hard I didn't want to blow the engine since I had minimal time to mess around with it due to the car being dropped off at the shop the following morning). It does sound very nice now however, deep and throaty without much drone at all when cruising yet still screams at WOT.

The stock CBE vs turboXS no cat logs were done on the same evening when around 70 degrees with low humidity. TurboXS with cat was done when it was 59 degrees and low humidity. All logging was done at around 12psi, still haven't installed my E-01 so of coarse it's all over the place at 13-14 mid range then dropping off at the top end.

 

Also, since I will be installing my springs and rims next I figured I'd finally post some pictures of the actual car in its current state.

 

More pics, the underside one is blurry since I was using my phone camera and it was getting dark out. It does remind me of one more point I don't like about the TurboXS exhaust though: it hangs really low in the back right before the mufflers. I am a bit concerned about how it will fair on speedbumps after the car is lowered.

 

I get boost creep too with my full turboxs setup.... Havent seen it go above 9 or so though. Good to hear lol that she quiets down a bit.... The sound and smell (fresh air ac/defrost unusable) is certainly taking its toll here... I see a bhr pipe in my future.... Just annoyed its only $90 cheaper than the complete xs solution.

 

Wow - great test there Iron . Really shows what a huge difference running without the cat and with a free flowing exhaust can make.

If your OEM 02 sensor is pegged - I would suggest videoing your AFR gauge(if you have one) and calling out revs as you do it . That will tell you if it is running too rich up top . Which is what is happening from the sounds of it .


Also :
https://www.rx8club.com/showpost.php...6&postcount=86

 

Duly noted. Maybe it is because I haven't tracked it yet but I have zero issues with overheating. Even with the Evan's NPG-R which supposedly runs hotter, the ECT is almost always in the 190ish F range after warming up regardless of what I'm doing. In the summer with 100F days the car always stays below 210F which is less than stock with only an AP monitoring (stock tune) where I was seeing it creep up as high as 216F. So for now it doesn't bother me. Also the pics are a bit deceptive but there is about 2 to 2.25 inches of clearance underneath the IC which is mounted as high as possible sitting right up against the crash bar.

Actually, oil-wise, the car is still running too cold all the time. Keeping it above 160F at the oil filter only happens when the car is idling for prolonged periods, any moderate amount of movement causes the oil temp to drop rapidly especially on sub-70 degree days. I really want to address it somehow before winter hits but I'm not sure what I should do. I still need to verify the accuracy of the oil temp readings but since they almost always match the ambient temps when I turn the car on it seems unlikely it is off completely. I know there are thermostats in the oil coolers but they don't seem to be doing a very good job at all. Last year I blocked off the opening as well as the back vents on both coolers and had trouble keeping the temps above 110F some days.

Edit: After a bit more research it looks like the stock oil cooler's thermostats are always at least partially open. After coming across 9krpmrx8's post I think I may have to pick up a MOCAL thermostat and get my temps to where they should be.

 

That doesnt sound right at all. My 4 port with 2nd oil cooler and greddy pan cruises with oil at about 180. After a nice spool up it pegs at about 220 and holds until I lighten my lead foot. In cooler weather, like 50ish, it cruises no lower than 165.

Something is up with your sender. Mine too is at the filter.

 

That cat converter is far from being the best flowing, 100 cpi is only part of the equation, the amount of flow area is another. It is barely larger than the 3" inlet/outlet so that is a dead giveaway compared to a 100 cpi cat that is almost 6" in diameter. The steep angle transition In and out restricts it further still.