Ade's Road and Track Toy

[Ade 517]

Now that i've met some of you I though I would share some of my modifications and finding with those of you that haven't seen my mod thread on the other side. 

Old Pic from 2012 when I had just taken delivery

Few track days

Current list of modifications which I will update as I progress

Engine

Defi Oil Pressure Gauge

Custom Mocal Laminova

0W30 Miller CFS Nanodrive Oil

Cosworth Stage 2 Supercharger

Cosworth Air Filter

Cosworth Low Temp thermostat

Cosworth Cat Back 3 Inch Exhaust

 

Suspension, Steering

Whiteline Steering rack bushes

Whiteline Subframe inserts

Ohlins DFV Coilovers with custom 400lb/in rear springs

 

Wheels, Tires, Brakes

Motul RBF600 Brake Fluid

Project mu Clubracer pads

 

 

 

 

 

[Ade 517]

Even the box is lovely 








Bumper off


Intake manifold removed, rerouted wiring looms, add fuel line banjo and removed breathers


Manifold ready to fit to car with injectors, thottle body and EVAP fitted. It took ages becuause I was cleaning all the green goo off which Subaru went to town with. 



And fitted in car:

Finished

 

On to the exhaust

I bought this system for a few reasons:

1) Sounds amazing  
2) Very well made with V band bandclamps
3) 3inch diameter means that if I want to go full stage 3 350+HP in the future the cat back supports this kind of power.
4) I can use the Cosworth stage 2.1 calibration with the SC kit.



Some sexy welds: 




 

and a short soud clip  

 

 

[Ade 517]

Oil Cooler

So decided that my oil-to-air cooler wasn’t the best solution for my car as I do some shorter journeys. Even though I had a 99C thermostatic plate there was still some flow though the radiator at lower temperatures.  This led to the oil to take longer to warm up, which for my shorter journeys meant that I had to go for a hoon to warm the oil up to >80C

An option I had previously considered was the use of the Forester DIT oil cooler, which his basically an oil-to-water cooler which sandwiches between the oil filter and engine block.

You basically splice a couple coolant lines to pass the coolant though the cooler. As the coolant warms up quicker, this has the added benefit that it heats the oil up quicker and cools it once it starts getting hotter than the coolant. Our cars have a large coolant radiator and it is well controlled by the thermostat with plenty of headroom so the extra heat from the oil is compensated for by the thermostat allow more flow through the coolant radiator.

After looking through the ft86club it appears that the forester cooler struggles on cars with force induction and very hot days.

One of my work colleagues mentioned that his car has a Mocal Laminova which might give more thermal capacity than the forester cooler.  So I had a look and found a post on the ft86club where someone has sliced one into the coolant pipe going from the block to the radiator.

For anyone interested there is more info here: http://www.mocal.co.uk/FAQ.html

 

Installation

Here you can see the outlet on the engine and the inlet on the radiator:

Here’s the original pipe and the Mocal Laminova next to it:

and spliced into the pipe:

Using the original Mocal sandwich plate was not desirable as it has the thermostat, but also with very little clearance it was difficult to route the oil pipes down to the cooler. It can be done though, but I wanted something tidy.

I found that mocal do a sandwhich plate with M18 banjo fittings, but I was concerned about oil pressure loss through a small ports turning right angles. Then I found the Mishimoto sandwich plate with M22 fittings which looked more appealing. They also provided pressure drop data for the Subaru WRX cooler (similar to the GT86 one) which showed 5psi in 90psi drop through the two banjo fitting and the radiator.

 

So here it is all fitted:

I have to say the Mishimoto item is very nicely finished with nice smooth machining.

 

While I was at it, I added a sandwich plate with a few 1/8npt sensor ports and moved the pressure gauge sensor. This will give me pressure reading after the cooler.

 

All done:

While it was at it I gave the bay a clean and #becausecosworth J

Testing

While at Bedford yesterday I had my tablet plugged in displaying/logging some temperature data.

Here the first session. I was taking it easy learning the circuit.

Unfortunately I left the tablet on and the charging cable didn't work very well so I only got data from the morning session.

 

Here's the last session where I was up to pace:

 

 

Quite impressed that oil stayed below 110C. I will have to see what temperatures look like in hotter conditions, but if the temps stay below 120C I may consider going back to 0W20 oil as my oil pressure was about  7Bar (100PSI) which might be unnecessarily high.

 

Also note that Intake temps hovered around +15C over ambient for the whole 32 minutes. The dip in the middle is where I started short shifting to let the brakes cool down a bit.   

Air flow is my friend. I noticed intake temps went up a few deg C when following the Golf R32 down the back straight. 

[Ade 517]

Ohlins Install

 

Obligatory pics

 

Front strut. These have approx. 85mm free travel + ~12mm bumpstop giving approx. 26mm bump travel at the wheel under the cars weight. (I probably have +20kg from the SC install)

 

 

Rear shock. These have approx. 60mm free travel and ~12mm bumpstop giving approx. 28mm bump travel + bumpstop travel. (note this is with 400lb/inch rear springs).

 

Front strut mounted up

 

I forgot to take pictures of the rear dampers mounted up before putting the wheel back on 

 

I didn't have any difficulty getting off the front drop links at all. They were a bit rusty but a good wire brush, soaking in WD40 and one turn anti, half a turn clockwise did the trick. It lives in a garage so perhaps hasn't seen as much salt as most cars. I can certainly see how they could be difficult, all other bolts were still shiny compared to the drop link threads.

 

Pretty happy with these. They do have limited travel over large stuff but if you can stay within the available bump travel they are very nicely damped on any setting. 8 clicks is my preferred setting at the moment.

 

[Ade 517]

Car Setup Northampton Motorsport

 

Having had the Ohlins on the car for about 6 weeks, I was looking for somewhere to get the car setup properly. I heard about Northampton motorsport and noticed on their web they have a hunter laser alignment setup, so I called them and got the car booked in.

 

 

Chris Robinson is the setup guy who deals with setup and alignment. He's a very approachable guy and answered me with a friendly tone when I was questioning his actions. They have helped setup anything from Renault Cilo's to Formula open wheel race cars. It was good to see they appreciate good suspension too 

 

I had a clear idea of what I wanted to try first but Chris was able to explain the pro's and cons of different suspension bushes and setups. It was really informal stuff, and I have a good idea what bits I might want to change in the future.

 

We also talk a bit about the Cosworth SC kit too and it turns out its not the first time they've had a Cosworth GT86 in there as Cosworth is right around the corner 

 

First thing was to get the car corner weighted. Here's the car on the scales with half a tank of fuel. 1255kg is not too shabby. 58% over the front wheels.

 

The aim is to get the cross LF/RR to have 50% of the car weight over them, with me in the car seat.

 

We managed to get it within 0.2%

 

 

Next we moved onto alignment.

 

It appears the front struts have been setup to toe out slight as they compress as I had a lot of toe out, nearly half a degree. I decided to got with a slight toe out as it seems to give a bit more feel on turn-in.

 

Front camber was set to 2.5 degrees and we'll see what the tyre temp spread looks like and adjust from there.

 

The rears do the opposite, they toe in as they compress, so I had a bit of toe in but within spec. We reduced it slightly.

 

Rear camber was, predictably, half a degree out from side to side, so I have 2 degrees negative camber one side and only 1.5 the other side. We discussed using the whiteline upper arm bushes to sort this out.

 

We also discussed the pro and con of adding Castor to the front so I might go with the white caster bushes too. We'll see on that one.

 

Here the Alignment Sheet:

 

Car feels a bit more stable, steering's a bit lighter. I'll see how I feel with this setup after a few track days and take it from there.

 

On the rig

 

[Ade 517]

So just before xmas, after coming to the conclusion a bigger disc is required, I picked up a used AP racing kit from a Subaru Imprezza:



Test fitting:


OEM 295x24mm disc vs 355x32mm AP disc


I havent weighed it but it felt to me like the AP discs are lighter than the OEM disc. The calipers also felt a little lighter. 

All the Aluminium bits are going off to be anodised and the calipers are getting rebuilt (with the bleeders swapped over) with new hardware and painted.

For the rear brakes I have ordered the RR racing sport rears which is a wilwood 4 pot caliper on the brembo 316mm discs.

More to follow once its all fitted

[Ade 517]

Reserved for wheels tyres

[Ade 517]

Trackday preparation

• Checked Coolant and topped up after refilling and bleeding last weekend (I'm now using Millers Alpine Red Coolant which his much cheaper and meet all the specifications).
• Topped up oil to just above the top dip stick. Still using Millers CFS 0W30
• Bled the Cosworth intercooler to make sure there was no air in the system.
• Installed tablet and setup torque to monitor Oil, Coolant and Intake (post SC) temps and fuel rail pressure.
• Swapped club racer pads in.
• Lowered tyre pressure to 30PSI

You'll know when I arrive as these babys squeal like nothing on earth.

 

 

Tablet install

 

[Lauren 2259]

Wow, some serious work there! Looks like a good spec to me.

So, what wheels and tyres are you going for? You'll see some improvement from decent tyres and lighter wheels. 

[Ade 517]

24 minutes ago, Lauren said:

Wow, some serious work there! Looks like a good spec to me.

So, what wheels and tyres are you going for? You'll see some improvement from decent tyres and lighter wheels. 

Thanks. Yes the primacies were over sprung with the Ohlins fitted. Steeps seemed to think I was cornering faster than a stock car on primacies, but I don't think it was very significant. Perhaps though the chicans where the spring rate help faster weight transfer. 

I ordered a set of 720form GTF2 from Canada last December. I am still waiting for the container to reach the UK.

http://www.720form.com/

I've gone for the 18x9 et 35 and at 18.5lb (8.4kg) they a really light for a 9" rim.

Regarding tyres, I cant make my mind up whether to go for the road friendly Mitchellin Pilot Super Sports in 245/35 or something a little more tracky, but less street friendly like the AD08R in 255/35 or the Mitchelin Pilot Sport Cup 2s in 245/35

[GT86Jay 202]

Let me know if you're ever at Snetterton again.

That's my local so i'll pop down and see you. 

Car looks very good! And I like the latest oil cooler work you've done! Good to go a different way and try these things. 

Nice work! 

[Ade 517]

23 minutes ago, GT86Jay said:

Let me know if you're ever at Snetterton again.

That's my local so i'll pop down and see you. 

Car looks very good! And I like the latest oil cooler work you've done! Good to go a different way and try these things. 

Nice work! 

Hopefully it'll look better with the new wheels fitted. The stock wheels with primacies and 2.5degrees of negative camber really tucks them under the arches.

I always liked the forester Oil cooler, but it doesn't cool enough for a car with forced induction and extended track runs. I do like to be out for 30mins+

I will deffo be at Snetterton again, maybe this year. Love the 3 mile circuit. 

 

[Keethos 842]

Wow, awesome work Ade and great chatting with you at Bedford, hope to catch up with you again sometime soon!

[mike-p 116]

Snetterton would be good for me too, Jay and I haven't had the chance to back to back our cars yet, adding another Cossie would make it most interesting!

[DanJ 374]

Thinking about doing the Javelin day with some chaps from work on Thursday 27th April. Be great to have some other Toyobarus there if anyone else is up for it?

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[Ade 517]

Thinking about doing the Javelin day with some chaps from work on Thursday 27th April. Be great to have some other Toyobarus there if anyone else is up for it?

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

Quite possibly. Bargain £139

[Ade 517]

I should have wheels and brakes sorted by then too :-)

[DanJ 374]

Should be an interesting collection of other cars of they all come along, stripped out Mk1 Clio, caged and slicks with Clio 182 engine, VX220 Turbo, VX220 with a Rotrex and a late 80s Corvette with nitrous :-)

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

[Lauren 2259]

I would guess the big tyres will add weight, but yes, not bad for such a big wheel in terms of lightness. That'll be a lot of grip if you go for sticky tyres I reckon! 

[DanJ 374]

I'm on 18x8 Ultraleggeras and 225/40 R18 Pilot Super Sports. That saved half a kilo per corner over stock, but I still noticed the extra rotational inertia - there's definitely more momentum to reign in when braking from having the wheel rim out at a larger diameter.

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[Rich 378]

I might be up for Snetterton in April, I'll have to check dates. I have relatives out that way which makes accommodation cheaper.

[Ade 517]

13 hours ago, Lauren said:

I would guess the big tyres will add weight, but yes, not bad for such a big wheel in terms of lightness. That'll be a lot of grip if you go for sticky tyres I reckon! 

 

11 hours ago, DanJ said:

 

I'm on 18x8 Ultraleggeras and 225/40 R18 Pilot Super Sports. That saved half a kilo per corner over stock, but I still noticed the extra rotational inertia - there's definitely more momentum to reign in when braking from having the wheel rim out at a larger diameter.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

Pilot Super Sports in 245/35 R18 weigh ~10.5kg so the wheel and tyre combo will be 18.9kg which is pretty much the same as the stock combo. As Dan says, the rotational inertia will be higher though and that's a trade off I made to be able to fit over the AP Racing CP7040 caliper with 355mm disc.

If I didn't have the supercharger i'd have gone for a 17x8" rim with 225s as there is plenty of evidence on the ft86club that the faster cornering is not enough to make up for the extra drag from the 245s with an N/A car at the track. But with the FI guys, it appears they can benefit from a wider tyre, probably because they can get more power down out of the corners. Something I had a lot of trouble with at Bedford on primacies 

The 720form GTF1 17x8 are 7kg

 

[Ade 517]

Fitted the Whiteline Subframe inserts before the car went to Northampton Motorsport for corner weight and setup.

 

I find really hard to judge these subtle modifications as there are so many positive reviews and often placebo can play a part. 

I feel with these subframe inserts that the steering is noticeably sharper with small steering inputs and the back end has a little more grip. I noticed that I had more confidence in the corners in the wet.

 

 

[Ade 517]

Another nice little subtle mod was installing the Whiteline steering rack bushs.


These help reduce the dead spot in the center of the steering with no obvious increase in NVH when driving normally. 

[Ade 517]

 

I've got to say these project mu club racer pads are very impressive. I didn't get any fade all day even on a 32min run which is impressive since I had +50% power this time. These remain the only pads I've tried and not had any fade. They are the only proper racer compound I have tried though and I suspect performance friction or Ferodo ect racer pads to be just as decent in terms of fade performance. 

Nice bit of surface cracking on the discs. Note the high quality 300C foliatec caliper paint has gone from black to a nice matt grey