rodan

Any luck on the clutch, Chris?

It is. It's actually a wrap... the orange looks great with the Tungsten 6ULs... imagine that!

Ran a few numbers this morning... Set of 4 6ULs with RS4 tires for Miata: $1288 Set of 4 6ULs with RS4 tires for Mustang: $2644

I was actually looking at those last night...

Heater cores in Miatas suck. It's just a shitty job, and the design sucks. At least you did it the easy way... there's some lunatics on the Miata forums that insist you can do it without pulling the dash. I think I would rather just set the car on fire. As to the tach wiring... that signal comes in through one of the two harnesses that plug into the instrument cluster. Did the tach work post swap, but pre heater core? It probably just got jostled around and whatever was wire in got disconnected. Did he keep a wiring diagram from the swap? You can check a diagram online for the stock wiring and at least figure out the wire out of the instrument cluster and trace it back.

You got a ninja edit in after I replied... It is my wife's daily, as was the NC Miata before it. She tracked the NC and will be tracking the Mustang at some point. I'm a lucky guy. Next month I get to play pit crew while she takes a two day race school at Willow Springs in our NA. I planned that well... didn't even know we were buying a Mustang when I signed her up.

It is.

Yeah... I know... I'm actually pretty good with not going crazy with the wife's daily drivers... Her NC Miata just had springs, shocks, sways and an axleback. Now, our NA is a completely different matter... Couple of gratuitous Mustang pics since I washed it the other day....

I've not even had the chance to take it on a spirited drive yet, so I can't really give an assessment yet. I was impressed with the basic competence on the test drive, which included a couple of local roundabouts. I'll post up some impressions after I get a chance to really drive it. One thing I've been impressed by is the aftermarket support direct from Ford. I can buy a CAI/throttle body/tune combo that makes 20+hp, and good torque gains, is CARB certified, and retains warranty for $800. They also have a complete suspension package for ~$1300 that has been getting decent reviews as a dual duty upgrade. So, about $2k plus brake pads, and maybe wheels, and I should be done modding this thing.

Thanks. We looked at Camaros a while back. The 1LE SS is an amazing car, and without question faster than our Mustang. We just didn't like the high waistline and lack of visibility. Feels like you're sitting in a bathtub. Mustang is far nicer for daily driving. And our poor experience with our C6 Vette has left us with a bad taste for GM.

That's not bad. Cat back for GT is ~$1k...

With what exhaust systems cost these days, I'm quite happy! I thought the LGT stuff was stupid expensive and that was over a decade ago!

I got around to looking underneath the Mustang today and was pleasantly surprised to find it already has a Magnaflow cat back. I thought it sounded a little too good to be stock, but it's pretty quiet (perfect, actually) so I wasn't sure. One less thing to do...

I do like the Chargers, and that one was a 392/SRT/whatever... didn't like the color, and it was a LOT more $$$... I could easily see myself nosing around used Hellcat Chargers in around 5 years... or maybe Trackhawks.

So, with a significant amount of sadness, the NC is gone... We've had a lot of great experiences, but my wife's commute got a lot longer about a year and a half ago, and the shortcomings of a Miata as a DD were starting to wear. We'd been thinking for a while about a little more comfort and room, a little more quiet on the highway, and more power. Yesterday, I stopped at the local Dodge dealer to make an oil change appointment for our truck... and there it was... '17, 6 speed manual, performance pack (Brembos!), only 4500 miles... and THAT COLOR!! Probably the most impulsive auto purchase we've ever made, but this thing rocks... We'd driven a '16 GT Convertible about a year ago, and weren't impressed at all... slow, soft, sluggish. This thing is a completely different animal... Now, I just need to stay the hell away from any Cars & Coffees...

Video is finally up... 3 laps from session two. Sorry about the quality... YT's compression always seems to screw it up. If you look closely, you can watch the white ZL1 Camaro doing a tank slapper in the mirror...

I do actually like the Ampliform... of course it doesn't come in 15s... Even the Dekagrams are only 15x8s...

This afternoon, I've been going through some data... seems that's going to be part of my track day experience now. LOL Anyway, at MRLS in October the transponder I paid for crapped out because nobody apparently charged them before the event... In desperation, I downloaded an app to my phone called Race Chrono. It uses the gps receiver in the phone for lap timing. Unfortunately, I only got the last session, where I spun off on the 3rd lap. As a result, I hadn't really looked at what the app could do. Fast forward to yesterday. I used the same app for lap times at AZ Motorsports Park, which was also mapped in the app. Turns out it does a lot more than just lap times. It also records lateral G, longitudinal G, and speed and allows you to 'play back' a lap and look at graphed data, while showing the car position on the map. It also records splits, and can give a predicted "possible" lap based on your best sector times. Pretty cool! Here's an example of a screenshot I grabbed off Google: So, anyway, looking at the data tells me that even though the Rivals felt really loose, their best lap was only .2 slower than the NT01s best. However the best 'possible' lap for the NT01s was .75 sec faster. That said, the pyrometer readings tell me I have yet to optimize the pressures for either tire, but I expect I was closer with the NT01s. Interesting stuff! I only got one session on video before my GoPro battery died, and I'm working on that now. Hope to have an upload to YT in the next couple of days. I did compare back to video of a lap from 2013. That's how I came up with the improvement in lap times. It's a little approximate, 'cause stopwatching a video isn't very precise.... but it's between 10-12 seconds. In 2013 it had the 1.6, VMaxx suspension and 205 NT01s, so lots of changes. Terminal speed on the fastest straight went from ~78 mph to 97 mph! Pics and video to come...

Great day at the track today... 75* and sunny in Phoenix. Last time at this track was almost 5 years ago... the car has changed a LOT since then. Lap times were ~ 12sec quicker! I hope to get some action shots from the track photog in a few days...

Interesting... I've always heard Motorcraft for 5sp, MTL for 6spd. I've got the Motorcraft in both NA and NB, and it works fine. Haven't done a back to back with MTL though. I do think M.netters tend to be a little over the top on their 'magical' solutions sometimes...

I had to top off the fuel in the NA today, so I mounted up the S1/Rival combo... I'm planning to run these for a couple of sessions this weekend to get some heat cycles on them. I also got a new toy for evaluating those heat cycles... Now I just have to figure out how to use it!

I didn't say there was...

I would argue it combines the worst of both... less accurate, usually dirtier ammo with the gas impingement system of the AR.

Y'know... stock NB wheels look pretty good on a black car. I've got a polished set that came with mine, and I almost like them better than the Rota RBs. Just wish they were 7" wide. I finally got a pic of the finished gauge install... ignore the AFR, dead cold idle. Yesterday, my S1s showed up so I got the Rivals mounted, and this afternoon cleaned off the mounting spooge. They seem a bit narrower in section than the NT01s on the car. Hopefully I can get some back to back times next weekend. We're attending several events this year that wanted car numbers, so I ordered up some vinyl. Putting on vinyl in a 50* garage sucks... I'll probably have a gazillion bubbles this summer. And I've pretty much decided a DiY wrap on the NB is NOT happening...

Got the gauge wired up and installed. Pic from testing before panel was bolted down: In the above pic, it's set to display coolant temp (top) and voltage (bottom). I set up alarms for both. For coolant temp over 210*, the outer LEDs flash red, quickly. For battery voltage under 11.8V, the outer LEDs flash green, slowly. Colors for text and LEDs are all configurable, and I have up to 4 other warnings I can program. There are a number of other configurable display screens I'll fiddle with when I have some time, but this is primarily what I wanted for the track in the car's current configuration. This thing is pretty cool, but there are a few parameters that are not programmable to the degree I would like... hopefully future firmware upgrades will change that. I also got the onboard datalogging set up and working for the MS3. Still need to make a label for the button.