Dedicated Track Car Progress Thread

[trublustu]

Well I had to get the lower inlet manifold bolts and throttle cable on by touch as I was losing light fast...
But the car runs a treat. Its not had a shakedown run yet, but when I opened the throttle fully from tickover it span up noticeably faster than previously.
I gotta put my new rear beam bolts in tomorrow, swap the front suspension bolts too and stick its new pads in.
Then I'll let it see some road and report back..

 

[trublustu]

I learned something new yesterday, regarding re-setting the ecu.

I`ve had my battery off several times and never really bothered going through the process of resetting the ecu, by letting it tick over, revving and letting it settle etc.
Now, when I first fitted the new TB the car started and ran ok, but the idle was rough and the engine was hunting between 1-2k revs.
So I disconnected the battery for a while. Then, I let the car tick over for a few mins, revved to 4k for a minute or so then let it idle again for a few minutes.

The result, tickover steady as a rock.. :thumbs:

Have I followed the correct procedure? or is there more to this?

 

[Frank]

Have I followed the correct procedure? or is there more to this?

Bit more, but not much.

You let it idle for 3 minutes, then when the engine is warm you rev it to 1200rpm and hold it there for 2 minutes. Finally, you go for a 5 - 10 drive and I like to give it some stick on the last mile or two, just so the ECU gets the message to expect some of this in the future.

Incidentally, what the ECU instructions don't tell you is this - after you've done your 3 minute idle, there is no other way of getting the engine warmed up prior to doing the 2 minutes of 1200rpm, other than letting it, er, idle some more. So, in practise, you sit around not doing much for a while.

Does work though, my car ran ( read - kangarooed up the road for half a mile) really badly the first time I had the battery disconnected/connected and just drove off afterwards. After that, I made it a point to find out about this stuff.

 

[Ziggy]

Disconnecting the battery eventually resets the KAM (Keep Alive memory) in the ECU, this stores amongst other things various tables for the ECUs adaptive fuel control and idle air strategies.

EECV is an evolution of the EECIV - http://www.veryuseful.com/mustang/tech/engine/EECIVInnerWorkings/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

 

[trublustu]

Next Saturday is my first trackday of the year :grin:

So today way the day for final tweeks.
It`s had a set of pads and a quick pressure bleed.
My trip to Blyton in November just about saw off the ones I`d used last year.
They did me about 4-5 trackdays. The pads were generic ebay stuff I threw on to set the calipers up. They just refused to die!!
Brembos now in place and a set of Green Stuff on order..

I also took the chance to sort out a squeak which was getting to bug me.
It was on the aux belt so I wasn`t overly worried and a replacement alternator has sorted it out.

By the time I get to Oulton Park on Saturday I should have in my possession, a TAPE ecu, with a FRP map on it

So, in order to see the difference back to back. I have added a wire to the requisite pin on the ecu plug and opened the wiring up so, I can swap ecu, and join one wire and I`m off. I`ll be videoing both sets of HotLaps in order to time the difference

It should settle a few debates once and for all (FRP -vs- Bluefin maps)

watch this space...

 

[kenner2002]

Good luck dude, looking forward to watching the videos

 

[trublustu]

Well I had an excellent day on track at Oulton Park today
I had taken with me a remapped (FRP) TAPE ecu and swapped ecu`s at lunch,
I will process a video comparing the cats performance before and after.

Trust me it was more than noticable. The swap took 5 seconds (YES FIVE WHOLE SECONDS) of my lap times
I lapped late morning average 2.25 in the after noon 2.20. best lap I`ve timed so far is 2.18 not sure how good that is, but I felt comfortably quick. I`ll knock up a YouTube video comparing laps with both set-ups..

Then this happened
http://youtu.be/X2WaEGiIbTw" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Ho-Hum..

Gives me something to concentrate on before Cadwell in March..

 

[TGPlayer1]

Buggeration.

What happened there man?

 

[trublustu]

Hi Tom..
Basically I ran out of luck with that particular engine..
Putting the frp map on gave me a higher rev limit which I used with gusto. plus it upped the power the engine was producing.
It must have just been too much for a 130k engine which had had god knows what kind of neglect over the last 15 years..

So I`m on the lookout for a low mileage rusty MOT failure, owned by a vicar would be good, or simply low mileage.
That or actually BUY an engine!!!

 

[The Arch Bishop]

I can remember when I was helping out at the 2CV endurance races, if the car suddenly started lapping suspiciously quickly, we'd start digging out a spare engine. They'd start letting go and throwing oil around meaning the engine would have less friction. Then a few laps later they'd pop and we'd be ready with another!

 

[grayfox]

Oh mate I really feel for you (although you don't seem to fussed :grin: ) thats the worst sight I'd like to see, if it were me I'll just stare at the smoke until it disappeared and pretend (somehow) it hadn't happened ... then later cry once everyone had gone home

130k is a good fair amount mind.

 

[aaron86]

Wounded! Hope you get it sorted for Cadwell

 

[trublustu]

Hi Aaron.
Im picking up a 93k donor car tomorrow and will be doing the swap next weekend.
I spent a good while picking a track car.
One of the Puma`s endearing features was the plentiful supply of spares, which I figured would be handy in situations like this...

 

[Lord B]

Gutting, but a hazard of trackdays, part of my philosophy on ragging well maintained standard guise, or mapping well within safe limits, its to easy to get a few extra RPM, a little more torque, and use every last drop of it

My T4 went from

to

that was from the 'Just one more lap' mentality about 8 times as I approached the pits.

 

[trublustu]

Well I whipped my (very) poorly engine out today..
Oh boy, what a sight

I can actually see THROUGH the engine!!
Its thrown a rod (good and proper)
I now have a banana shaped con rod poking out of the front of my engine (it took the starter motor out!), the big end is sticking out beneath the oil filter and theres a 3" hole in the back of the block..
I`m not sure if this engine will run properly again :lol:

So tomorrow the donor car will be giving up its motor to go on my shiny new engine stand, to get a working over with the `go faster stick`

 

[trublustu]

Here`s some photos of my `ventilated` block

con rod escape route

Exploded engine 1

• trublustu
• Mar 8, 2015

big end escape route

Exploded engine 2

• trublustu
• Mar 8, 2015

extra hole just to spew oil onto the exhaust

Exploded engine 3

• trublustu
• Mar 8, 2015

I couldnt quite show it, but you really can see right through!!
The curved metal bar inside the top pic is a con rod, god only knows where the piston is..
I`ll be opening this motor up before it goes off to the firey furnace just to see what happened in there!

As for my new motor, I`d actually forgotten how much cleaning and revamping I did on the old one. Boy its filthy..

 

[trublustu]

I`ve had a little progress since my Epic engine fail at Oulton.
I have swapped a pile of goodies onto the `new` motor including my FRP cams,
with any luck I should be comfortably putting out 140 bhp :lol:

Two thing reared their heads in this little transition,

They are, that the plastic gasket/spacer between the inlet manifold and the cylinder head is a shocking weak spot on the Puma.
Once again (I`ve seen this on every other Puma I`ve had apart) the gasket cracked apart and sucked the seals out . The inlet tracts in the cylinder head in this engine were crusty with the same black sludge as found on the front of the engine.

New gasket fitted and ports cleaned out with petrol

The other is that before the engine was removed I drained the oil. It then sat on an engine stand for about 3 days untill I tilted the engine. I was surprised that a good slurp of oil came out of the dipstick hole. I drained about 3/4 of a cup out of the sump and thought, thats interesting. Today TEN days after I first drained the oil I removed the sump plug again and drained a further 1/4 of a cup of crappy black oil!!

If I`d done an oil change the same day I drained it i`d have @100-150ml of contaminated oil in with my lovely new fully synth.. :?

Mental note. Leave empty after draining for a few days to REALLY change the oil

Anyway tomorrow will see the moment of truth in whether I have fitted these cams in this engine ok.

Cadwell Park in 9 days...

 

[kenner2002]

no pressure on yourself then stu to get it all right and ready. I am liking the thread so keep it up.

 

[PumaJay]

No pressure then!

Im on the hunt for some cams now!

 

[trublustu]

I was in the same position last time I went to Cadwell in October :grin:

It`ll be right..