hughdogz's 1982 280ZX-T

[hughdogz]

Time for another update.

 

I've been removing the stock FI harness now that I know the Wolf is up and running. I got the main harness to come out without cutting a single wire!!

 

I still have a couple more circuits to remove, but I want to wait and make sure all gages and lights are still functional when driving it before I do any more removing, and I still need to hook up the Tach and engine temp gage.

 

Next is installing the LMA-3 datalogger. Innovate says it has to be mounted within 3 degrees of horizontal for the accelerometer to function properly. I was planning on mounting it vertically where the old ECU used to be, but that doesn't sound like an option anymore.

 

There is no place that I've found so far under the passenger dash for it either. So it looks as though I may have to mount it in the glovebox! What a pain because I'm already wired up where the OEM ECU used to be.

 

As soon as I have that figured out and wired up, I'll do another "sanity check" with the timing, fuel pressure, and finding the correct current to drive the injectors. They are low-impedance RX-7 (Bosch) units, so I think they should be taking less current than 4 A open and 1 A hold.

 

Bo (KTM) gave me so much help and advice with learning how to tune!! He answered a LOT of my questions (and explained even more) on how to use the Innovate system and the Wolf (thanks Bo!! ). When I become more familiar with Logworks2, I'll be able to set up the parameters, start driving and collecting data for tuning.

 

Man, it has been a fun ride so far. I'll post another vid soon...I've even had a request or two.

 

Later!

[hughdogz]

[hughdogz]

Whoo hoo! Second page...I was wondering when I would get here..

 

Just to let you know what I've been up to...the car drives smooth now around town and on the freeway, despite the fact that I've only corrected a small portion of the map. I used no boost controller except the stock wastegate since I knew it would stop at ~6.9 psi. I still have a long way to go to finish the map using the stock turbo.

 

I ended up using the tedious spreadsheet method to calculate the corrected injector opening time. Bo gave me some safe target AFR's for a few load ranges up to 15 psi boost. I have only tuned it to 4750 rpm at 7psi (8th-9th row of load cells?). This was a freeway pull in 4th gear, with cold ambient air temperature.

 

At zero to low load, I'm already maxing out to 1 ms minimum open time while my AFR's are still on the rich side (I hear this can be a common problem).

 

Also, I'm having trouble cold starting with less than 6-7 cranks. I tried increasing the starting injector opening time from 6 -> 7 ms, but it didn't seem to make much of a difference.

 

It is strange that the CHTS sensor still causes the CHT to climb to 101 C (sometimes). But it only stays there for a short time and cools back down once the thermostat opens. This only happens when I let it get to operating temperature idling. The coolant temp gauge is only 1/8 of the way up at this time. I don't think it has hurt anything so far...I wonder if it had this characteristic in stock form.

 

Now I think I'm brave enough to take it to ~5500 RPM. But first I'll try to tune the PWM boost controller aiming at 3psi to start. This approach should be pretty safe as long as I keep my foot out of it before I reach 7psi.

 

I'm planning to take it to the late night drags @ PIR this Saturday (weather permitting) to datalog heavier loads and higher RPM's. It's difficult to tune on the street with all the traffic and paranoia of cops...

 

I've been taking advantage of the rain by installing some new gages too. New boost / vac gage, and a Nordskog wideband AFR running from the LM1. The hardest part was wiring so that the LED lighting would be dim enough at night.

 

Otherwise, I think it is going relatively smooth. I believe I can have it tuned it in time for MSA. I don't want to break the bank buying too much fuel if I'm running rich. I need to configure the injector cutout a closed throttle above say 1700 rpm.

 

Thanks for reading this,

 

Best regards, -hughdogz

[hughdogz]

Well I finally did it. I found a deal that I couldn't pass up! I'll be sportin' these new wheels soon.

 

No more Honda rims for me!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

They barely fit in front, there is maybe a 1/4" space between the inside edge of the rim to the strut tube. I need to be careful selecting tire section widths to minimize any rubbing issues.

 

I would like to have a stiff sidewall, but not a stretched look. I would like as wide of a tread as possible, but minimze sidewall deflection or rubbing in front.

 

I'm thinking of going with some Kumho Ecsta SPT's. 205-50-R17 in front for the 7" wide rim, and 225-45-R17's for the 8" rears. I think these sizes might fit the best going by their spec chart...but I could be wrong. Using different profiles will give 25" and 25.1" diameter wheels. If I go with the 45 series on both, it would be 24.6" and 25".

 

Here is a cool little Youtube about their manufacturing process.

[hughdogz]

Okay gang, here we go with some test fitment pics!

 

This is what the P.O. had installed on the Z. Enkei 17x7.5" (+38? offset). They have 5.75" backspacing so that is why they needed 1.25" (32mm) wheel adapters. The tires are Falken Ziex 512's 215-50-R17. They come within about 1/4->3/8" from hitting the strut tube and it looks like the tire has rubbed some on the strut tube already.

 

 

 

 

 

So with the adapters, the Enkei's are 4.5" backspacing and mounting face to outside is 4".

 

Now the Volks in front are 7" with +44 offset. That would give them (7"+1")/2 +44mm - 32mm adapter => 4" + 12 mm => ~4.5" backspace. From mounting face to outside is 3.5". That makes it stick out 1/2 inch less than my current setup. The same holds true for the rear.

 

Hmm...I could go with a 1.75" (44 mm) adapters, but I'm not going to sweat it for now.

 

Test mounted:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cheers, -hughdogz

[hughdogz]

I've been busy but I don't seem to be getting very far. All I can think about is getting ready for the cruise to SoCal for MSA 2008!

 

There has only been a few dry days in the past month or so for me to street tune. I still have a long way to go in troubleshooting / configuration / tuning before I'll be happy with going on a long road trip. I bet it would make it down there as-is, but it wouldn't be sipping the gas...

• Tires are on order, hopefully I'll have the wheels mounted this week
  
• Installing the LC1 didn't go too bad, except they forgot to include a 2.5mm patch cable, so I can't hook up to the LMA-3 yet. D'oh!
  
• I connected a type-k quick response thermocouple to the LMA-3, but I haven't mounted it in the exhaust yet. I still have to figure out if I want to ditch my Autometer EGT gage and go with an Innovate XD-1 (expensive), or could I mount two probes when I install a spacer & the new turbo...hmm.
  
• Silicone vacuum lines near the hot turbine / exhaust manifold have been covered in Taylor 1200 degree F sheathing
  
• Bought a Garmin GPS navigation unit that will give me accurate highway speeds. I also have a 16GB SD flash memory card so I can play a few MP3's along the way

Well, here are some pics so you know what I'm talking about...

 

LC1 installed:

 

Here is a switch (with LED indicator) I assembled used for triggering a free air calibration of the Bosch LSU 4.2 wideband O2 sensor:

 

Here are my sensor connectors that I have disconnected. Normally, they are hidden behind all the intercooler piping.

(Clockwise from bottom left: Intake air temp sensor, throttle position sensor, crank angle sensor, coolant temp (dash gage), idle air controller.

 

Here's that high temp Taylor sheathing I had to use since the silicone might melt if the turbo gets red-hot:

 

See what I mean?

 

I'm also still having trouble with noise in the crank angle sensor above 4500 RPM. I already tried shielding the wires, drilling a new chopper wheel for the hall-effect optical sensor, but no improvement. Maybe I'll have to try better shielding than aluminum foil and a jumper wire!

 

There's a ton more wiring now behind the glove box, since I added the LC1 without an XD-1. I'll take more pics later when I get my hands on a patch cable to finish the job! :rolleyesg:icon50:

 

-hughdogz

[hughdogz]

[hughdogz]

I am using a '82 280ZXT distributor's optical sensor as the CAS for the Wolf. It requires that you create a slit after one of the six slits to signal two complete crank revolutions.

 

I found that you can have your trigger sync hole too close to the reference slit.

 

I couldn't figure out why my WolfV500 would report trigger sync errors above 4500 RPM (lower right corner):

 

I got another wheel with the hole further away and it worked!!! I can now rev to 6k easily, without any errors.

 

The wheel on the left actually worked fine up to ~4500 RPM. The wheel on the right is the one drilled with a 0.100" hole a fair distance away by comparison:

 

 

The sync hole in the right wheel didn't start out that large and elongated. I originally had drilled a 1/16" (0.0625") size hole approximately 1 "slit-width" away (which also worked to ~4500 RPM). I guess that was too close.

 

Now I have to figure out how to set the rev limiter!

[hughdogz]

The road trip went pretty well overall. I had no real problems with the ZXT.

 

We caravan-ed back with a new Hyundai Accent rental that a friend had, and the ZXT mileage was almost on par! (e.g. I would burn through twelve gallons while they would burn through eleven). I used about 2.5 tanks of gas to get from PDX to LAX.

 

Some things worth mentioning that happened, or that I need to change:

• The 130 MPH speedometer I purchased from Ebay, installed in place of the 85 MPH isn't working well. The needle would bounce all over the place after ~80 MPH
  
  
• The Autometer EGT gauge failed. At one point, I pegged it over 1600 degrees F and it never came back! It is supposed to re-zero when it's power turned off, then back on. It does that but immediately pegs to 1600 again.
  
• The wideband sensor overheated when we spent over an hour idling in LA traffic Sunday afternoon. I thought I burned up another sensor, but it magically started working again the next day. I think one reason is that I'm still using the stock downpipe (the bung location is too close to the turbo exhaust housing). I used one of Innovate's heat sink bung extenders, but I probably should have also used a copper heat shield as well.
  
  
• You guys were right. I had heat soak problems in the fuel rail / intake manifold at low load after startup (due to not running heat shields). I get high AFR's until I increase the load. The heat soak problem disappears after a few minutes of cruising.

No brake caliper bolt fell out this year for me, but one fell out of my buddie's ZXT as soon as we arrived in Anaheim. The LA freeways tend to shake apart our Z's.

 

Future plans for the next year:

 

Mechanical:

• Start designing and piecing together a 3" exhaust system, with an electronically controlled cutout
  
• T3/T04E turbo & ATP internal wastegate (and port the wastegate outlet too?)
  
• Gasket match the intake and exhaust manifolds (and port the exhaust)
  
  
• Get manifolds, downpipe, etc. thermal coated
  
• Figure out how to get my KAAZ 1.5-way LSD installed
  
• Head work (unshroud valves, gasket match, radius intake runners, 5-angle valve job and cam install from Rusch Motorsports)
  
• oil cooler from a SAAB
  
• Centerforce clutch
  

Exterior:

• Design a belly-pan and possibly a splitter
  
• Beta Motorsports carbon fiber hood
  
• Rear diffuser or at least fix the "scoop" in the rear valance

Of course there is also tuning the Wolf V500 EMS. I still haven't figured out the PWM boost controller, my fuel map is still incomplete and rough in some places. I haven't even started touching the timing map yet. (thanks again Bo for the base maps, they are working great!!)

 

It was excellent to finally meet and talk to some of you Guys at the events!!

 

I really enjoyed meeting Bo (KTM), Frank280ZX, Tony D, X64V, John Coffey, Brian Blake, Jeff P, etc. just to mention a few.

 

What an awesome weekend!!

[hughdogz]

I've been frustrated using Logworks2. I tried to create user charts to calculate corrected injector opening times based on current injector opening times, target AFR and Actual AFR.

 

My problem was, after I would create all the charts, enter the formulas, save settings, blah, blah, I couldn't figure out why my settings weren't saving! Ugh!

 

I went on Innovate's forum and discovered that they have a Logworks3 Beta_2 available for download. :-PI didn't even have to uninstall my Logworks2.

 

What I noticed first off is an enhanced user interface:

• Different skins
  
• Max / min markers on gauges
  
• Common commands are added as toolbuttons
  
• And get this, a Template Manager!!

Now I can finally save my user defined charts. I was using Logworks2, MS-Excel and the Wolf3D interface to tune my fuel map charts. Now at least I don't need Excel.

 

Here are some screen captures so you know what I'm talking about:

 

 

 

Template Manager:

 

Here are some of my user charts that use formulas to calculate other user charts (this is the actual AFR table shown):

 

What is really nice about the user-defined formulas (macros?) is that you can add a qualifer. Say that you only want calculations if the number of data points is greater than 20. This will ignore those "oddball" data points!!

 

I'm still pretty rough in my maps, but here are some chart examples:

 

(current inj open time when AFR's were recorded)

 

My target AFR map:

 

Corrected (automatically calculated by formula) injector open time:

 

Just for kicks, I wanted to see how far off I was in milliseconds for injector open time:

 

Here is the same chart as above, only in percentage difference:

 

Some other useful charts that you can create that haven't changed much from Logworks2:

 

 

 

There's still a few bugs in LW3 that I noticed (not all user defined formulas show up). In general, I like it MUCH better than LW2.

 

Cheers, -hughdogz

[hughdogz]

I finally got going on making my 3" downpipe!

 

Here is a mockup, it is looking pretty promising so far.

 

 

 

[hughdogz]

Progress pics

 

 

 

 

[hughdogz]

Some pics...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[hughdogz]

 

 

[hughdogz]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[hughdogz]

Got the Turbo head back from the Machine Shop!!

 

Actually, it was a long time ago. I've been fighting a flu all weekend, so I thought I'd update since I'm not able to do much else

 

Pics (of course)

 

Did my own valve unshrouding, ported and radius'ed the runners, widened the bowls, and removed guide "lumps". Then I drilled and tapped above #5&6 for better coolant removal. All done at home achieving ~1cc tolerance between combustion chambers!!

 

BRAAP installed new seats with 4/5 angle valve job, installed shortened valve guides, set up the valve train with new lash pads, new seals, etc. He CC'ed the chambers twice to set the valve seat height to achieve a final 1/4 cc tolerance between combustion chambers

 

(not bad for my first try...thanks again to Paul at Rusch Motorsports He taught me how to do it!

 

With the head porting, exhaust manifold porting, ultimate internal wastegate, 3" mandrel downpipe, 3" exhaust, T3/T04E turbo, etc. my ZXT should flow pretty well.

[hughdogz]

Here's what I've been up to lately. I decided to wrap my exhaust with Thermo-Tech "Cool-it" header wrap. They also sell 2000 degree F high temp paint to seal the deal. I also want to wrap and coat the Borla muffler, once I find some ties long enough. Here I welded the mild steel V-band flange to the stainless steel muffler using mild steel MIG wire. Then I welded SS to SS for the muffler to the tip using mild steel mig wire:

 

(please excuse the mess, I'm still single )

 

 

 

The copper looking wrap is their new "TCT Technology" stuff that has copper particles in it...it is supposed to be ~30% more efficient than their normal stuff. However, it is 50% more expensive! So I went with their old stuff to finish the job.

 

Exhaust in a box!

 

I got bored, so I thought I'd pretty up the thermostat housings, coolant inlet / heater fitting, and front cover while I have the engine apart.

 

I still need to get a -6AN bung to weld into the upper thermostat housing to run the head coolant lines...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(I'm not quite finished with this yet, it is a real PITA to do by hand.)

 

 

 

And finally, I ordered a 240mm SPEC aluminum flywheel from Tim at S&T motorsport!! He is really great to talk to and also gave me some free advice on installing the KAAZ LSD way back when:

 

[hughdogz]

I thought I'd post up some exterior pics from last summer!

 

 

 

 

 

[hughdogz]

I made a little progress this weekend. I've mostly spent days cleaning grease off my oil pan, engine mounts, engine bay, etc. after pulling the motor out.

 

The paint on the inside of the oil pan started flaking off like crazy when it dried. Not sure if it was caused by the solvents I used...is this common? Anyway, I'll have to repaint it, since it would most likely clog the oil pickup screen.

 

Here is my block painted. I had to clean it with engine degreaser, then B-12 Chemtool and finally rubbing alcohol.

 

I think it turned out pretty nice. First I sprayed it with two coats Thermo-Tec "cool-it" 1200-1800 degreee paint. It looks like chrome, I almost wanted to keep it this way! Then I sprayed it with 1.5 cans of Dupli-Color paint to match the body paint (2000 Acura Electron Blue Pearl).

 

 

 

 

 

It may not look like much progress, but Man did it take a lot of time and loss of braincells.

 

Now back to fighting the "rust wars" / bubbling paint in the engine bay!

[hughdogz]

More progress pics...

 

Here is my painted oil pan. What a saga!

 

I cleaned the slude out of the inside of it using a little bit of Gunk engine brite. I'm not sure if it was from the solvent, but the paint on the inside started flaking off when it dried. For sure it would clog the screen in the oil pickup tube. I cleaned off all I could, and a week later it started flaking more!! I had to get it hot-tanked, then I painted it with two coats of etching primer, then 3-4 coats of 500 degree gloss black engine enamel (no way I was going to paint the inside again).

 

 

Here you can see I finished polishing the front timing cover. I must have spent ~20 hours on it.

 

 

 

Since the turbo I'm installing needs a spacer, the stock oil drain line isn't long enough. So I had Oil Filter Service here in P-town braze on a -10 AN bung:

 

 

 

Then I had to repair some bubbling paint on the brake booster from brake fluid leaking out of the master cylinder. Then I had to remove rust on the driver's side frame rail since the brake fluid leaked all over that paint too!