Sgt.Gator

There is a value in the Cobb AP datalogger for TD Boost Error (PSI). It logs when there is too much or too little boost given the other engine values. In other words if the map is calling for 16 psi, but only generating 12 psi, or is generating 20 psi, it logs the difference. I need to figure out what the value should be to set off an alarm without random noise causing alarms, and how to communicate that alarm to a light on the dash. Once the light goes off I would know to check a boost gauge for verification. I'll talk to Cobb about how that could be done.

ROFL! That should be in your forum signature!

I'm not exactly sure. By the time I got back to the paddock he was loaded in the trailer and leaving. I heard a story, but I never talked to the driver himself. But it got a bit crunched. Not terribly crunched, luckily. BTW, If you look at it's driver "cockpit", notice the four gauges and alarm lights right in front of the driver. I'm a big believer in those alarm lights. My experience above shows I need a little software program that sets off an alarm for boost not at expected/mapped level. Maybe I could do a little Arduino box that does that. The logic would be something like setting an expected boost level, say 14psi, and anytime the boost level gets to 8 psi the Arduino looks for it to go to 14 psi within the next 2 mins, and if it does not it flashes an alarm....I'll have to ask the electronics guys at our new High Desert Maker Mill. http://makermill.org/

Sorry, yes there's a write up here: http://legacygt.com/forums/showthread.php/cool-article-05-scca-wagons-floating-around-still-73859p26.html And yes, having LGT forum members drop by was very cool!

There are no AOS systems on the race car, it's got the stock PCV system. And data logging shows no oil pressure problems until the engine went POP. Meaning, the engine quit running, so the oil pressure alarm went off because the engine was "on", but no oil pressure. But something happened to put a small amount of oil on top of the cylinder head. Blown head gasket? Blown seal?

This will be a long update. Lots of stuff happened. First I want to thank all the LGT Forum members who stopped by the paddock and watched the races at Pacific this weekend, it was great meeting all you in person. Even you Mr. Tris! The first bit of good news was the sandpapered hose barb worked, no more fuel hose blow offs. Saturday Sprint 1 Qualifying Saturday started off the 1st Sprint race qualifying. The car was working well and I just started to get up to speed when the qualifying was cut short. On Lap 2 I noticed that two of the fastest cars in the group, the Orange Pratt&Miller Camaro and one of the incredible BMWs were still taking it very easy. So I took it easy too. A NASCAR ground pounder in front of us did not. As he exited Turn 9 the cold and damp pavement got him. He went into the grass, up in the air, and straight across the track head on into the wall. By the time the cleanup was done there were just a few laps left for qualifying, but at least my fuel hose stayed on. Next was the Enduro qualifying, my co-driver Brian Bogdan ran it because he's never driven the Silver Eagle and this would be the only chance before the actual race. No issues! He set his personal best of a 1:37 at Pacific in the LGT Wagon, a fact which I now never let him forget because he races against me in the ST class in a Mustang FR500. His car wasn't racing this weekend because he's repairing it from an engine fire, but he did have it at the track. The interesting history is that both these cars were raced by Dave Rosenblum of ICY Racing (Inner City Youth). http://www.phoenixperformance.net/icy_phoenix-subaru_road_racing_team_focused_on_home_event.html Saturday ST Race The Group 4 - ST Race went very well. I got into a long battle with a Spec E46, we traded places several times. We were having a blast because we aren't in the same class so neither of us made any moves to block the other car from passing, which made for a LOT of side by side action. When I talked with the driver later we had the same idea, this is great practice for close racing so why not! On the last lap he was in front of me but over-drove a corner and dropped a wheel off. He had to let up for just a second on the throttle and I got by him and held on for a 1/2 lap to take the checkered flag. In the course of the adrenaline rush I set a personal best lap of 1:35.569. Awesome Fun! Saturday Enduro Race Looking back at my data logging this where things start to go wrong. In the ME0 class since I'm racing against a variety of ultra fast cars I can play by the rules of any of the classes in our group: AP, SPO, SPM, SPU, GT1, GT2, GT3, ITE, ST. So I loaded up the 18 psi map. I noticed during the race that cars I should be able to pass on the long straight even with my 14 psi map, I cannot. I thought at the time it was because I started with a full tank of gas. But as things went on and the fuel load dropped I still couldn't pass them. At the driver change Brian took over but only lasted 4 laps. Subaru in 2006 had put STI pedal covers on the car because STI was a sponsor. I ditched the clutch and brake covers, putting Sparco on, but left the STI accelerator cover. During the race the tiny bolt and nut worked loose, jamming the cover under the throttle. Brian kicked it free but by then the jam had caused a Throttle Sensor out of Range code, and the car went into limp mode. Brian made it to a spot to stop, but didn't know he could shut the engine off and restart it to clear limp mode. Dang! Anybody want a STI pedal cover? You pay the shipping, it's yours! Or maybe I should keep it in my Lessons Learned trophy cabinet. It turned out that was disappointing but not the major issue. Now that I look back on the data logs I see that lap 1 was 18 psi, lap 2: 16psi, lap 3: 14 psi, and lap 4 on was 11-12 psi boost. However I didn't pull the data at the time, so I didn't know I was losing boost. Sunday Sprint Qualifying To test the effectiveness of the rear wing I took it off entirely. It makes a BIG difference. What I might have gained in top speed I lost in overall lap time, and then some. The beautiful Porsche that I paddocked next to last year (pics of it a year ago in this thread) had passed me and was about 5 seconds ahead going out of Turn 8, a long 160 degree turn when either his 3 pc wheel came apart or his tire popped off the rim which caused the 3 pc wheel to come apart, but either way he went into a spin and landed in the very center of the track, right where I was about to be. There was no time for the corner worker to get a yellow flag out when I suddenly found him in the middle of my racing line, facing right at me. I don't know who was more scared $hitle$$ !! I cranked the wheel over and went by him. A few seconds later two SpecE46s came thru the curve (yellow flags out now) next to each other and split going around him, one on each side. That caused a full course black flag. Luckily for him this occurred in Turn 8, and not the end of the front straight where he is going 170 mph. Sunday Sprint Race I put the rear wing back on. A good start and a fun race for a few laps. Even running 12 psi (unknowingly) I set my second fastest lap of a 1:35:989 on lap 4. Lap 8, POP, No Oil Pressure, almost complete loss of power. I stopped in a safe spot in Turn 6 and watched the remainder of the race from the corner worker stand. Amazingly there was no massive oil spill on the track, which could have been very dangerous in the turn 4-5-6 curves. In fact there was no oil at all on the track or where I parked. Back in the paddock I found a little oil on top of the driver's side cylinder head. But nothing like I was expecting given the instant loss of oil pressure. The car is now at my sponsor, Subaru of Bend, for evaluation. I'm disappointed to say the least. This year the race season is heavily weighted in May and I'll miss this coming weekend at ORP and probably the next week at PIR. Conclusion and Go Forward My fastest laps were with the rear wing. It moved my lateral Gs up from 1.3 to over 1.5 . Many other Subaru racers consider 1.5g to be the safe limit of the Subaru oiling system. And that was with just the rear wing, the front splitter should add even more down force. Next step may have to be going dry sump. The Element Tuning dry sump system looks like the most effective solution. Whether oiling played a part in this failure is yet to be determined. A review of my data logs show no knock events. No high engine oil or water temps. The only thing out of whack was the low boost pressure from expected values. I already have a new EJ257 OEM shortblock ready to go in the box that was supposed to go in the Spec B. I might use it for the race car, or I might get a race built short block. But now I have to get the engine out of the Spec B asap, I want to use the ported heads from it in whatever block I put in the race car. Maybe the headers too. Feel free to speculate on what happened, I hope to see inside the engine by Friday. And I always remind myself how blessed I am to be doing this at all, and how much worse things could have been. For those of you who walked the paddock, you saw this car: An absolutely gorgeous "Challenger". It only had 15 laps on it since new.Well he left in a slightly crunched up state. I'll make up a video highlights and post the link here this week.

For those of you coming out this weekend here's my track times: Saturday 9:28 to 9:43 Sprint Qualifying 11:46 to Noon, Enduro Qualifying. My co-driver will probably do this. 1:36 to 1:56 Sprint Race 4:45 5:45 Enduro Race Sunday 9:35 to 9:55 Sprint Qualifying 1:40 to 2:10 Sprint Race Mr Tris is coming, OMG! My trailer/pit is at the far end, the next to the last row of trailers, near the Proformance building. Hope to see ya'll out there!

Today was another frustrating day at the track. First I was in a rush to get on track and forgot to clip in the two support rods that run from the front of the splitter to the bumper. On my first lap at 100mph the splitter bent down and caught on the track. The support structure that holds the splitter to the frame was damaged beyond what I can fix at the track. The splitter does have a knife edge now and I know it works! I removed the damaged splitter and went back out next session. 6 laps into it at WOT, total loss of power, towed in again. I knew what it was the moment it happened. Back in the pits I confirmed the fuel hose had popped off the hose barb inside the fuel cell. I ran up to Fred Meyer and bought some 100 grit sandpaper, removed the plate and scratched up the barb. It now has nice concentric rings around the barb. I got it all put back together for the final Test & Tune session. This time it stayed on! I had a good session staying with a BMW Spec E46 and a BMW that's either in Spec E46 or ST. We had fun for several laps. And boy is the car faster with the new turbo and the rear wing! My best lap was 4 seconds faster than my best lap last year and I'm sure I can cut off a couple more once I get confident with the new brakes and get my shift points adjusted and consistent. The gearing is way different from the 5 speed and I haven't quite got it figured out what gear I should be in at what point here yet. Saturday will be practice/ Sprint race qualifying/ Enduro race qualifying/ Sprint race/ Enduro race. I'll be co-driving with my friend Brian Bogdan in the LGT Wagon. Then Sunday it's practice/qualifying/Sprint race. Hoping the dang fuel hose stays connected. I think now the long term repair will be to go with an external fuel pump, swirl pot, and all AN fittings from the plate to the engine. The hose in the fuel cell will just be suction so should not have this problem blowing off the barb. Looking forward to seeing some of the Pac NW guys this weekend!

Cool, see you soon.

I'm racing this weekend at Pacific Raceways in Kent WA. May 15-16-17 2015. Anyone from the LGT Forum who drops my paddock space by this weekend gets a free gift! I have prototypes of a tool I'm giving away to folks willing to beta test it.

Thanks! Anyone from the LGT Forum who drops my paddock space by this weekend gets a free gift! I have prototypes of a tool I'm giving away to folks willing to beta test it.

I've been too busy with the race car and other projects to finish pulling the engine out of the Spec B. If nothing happens this weekend at Pacific Raceways that requires a bunch of attention I should be able to pull it out and have close look next week. Did you get that Chevy SS? If not the Subaru STI BRZ is coming ...there was guy at PIR last week with a turbo charged BRZ, 400HP. In a couple of years we will see lots of them on race tracks as they get old enough to attract race builders. http://www.autonews.com/apps/pbcsi.dll/storyimage/CA/20150418/OEM03/304209936/AR/0/AR-304209936.jpg&MaxW=700&cci_ts=20150421074734 http://www.autonews.com/article/20150418/OEM03/304209936/subaru-aims-to-expand-sti-performance-line Next Race: This weekend at Pacific Raceways, Kent WA. It might even rain. (PLEASE!!) I painted the stripes and got my numbers on the new heat extractor hood, I think it looks great:

The car is running again! There were two independent problems: 1) The dang fuel line popped off the plate again inside the fuel cell. That's what caused the engine to die in the race. We took the plate off, cut the end of the hose off and put on a new FI Hose Clamp. I have new submersible fuel hose and more FI clamps on order. If this happens again during the season, and for sure next winter during rebuild downtime, I will replace the fuel hose from the pump to the plate and at the same time use some med grit sandpaper to rough up the hose barb so it has better grip. 2) The OBD2 connector had a wire pulled out. Mine is relocated to under the glove box and is not held tight by a bracket. Over the course of plugging and unplugging from it the wire got strained and finally came out of the connector. My race buddy Subaru Tech, Kenny, soldered up a new piece of wire and we are back in business! He says most OBD2 brackets are plastic, but a few models of Subarus use a metal one. He's going to figure out which model/year uses the metal one and we'll permanently attach the connector port to the frame or roll cage so it's under no strain. So back to all the other stuff to get done. Paint the blue stripes on the hood. Get my number in nice graphics on the hood. Go over the brakes, I may need new rear pads, and bleed them....all the routine pre-race stuff. I hope to see some of you at Pacific Raceways next weekend.

If they can't fix it next stop will be Cobb Surgline OTW Pacific Raceways next week. I DO need to talk to Roger about how to use the AIM. I attneded his class at the Ridge and know I'm missing a LOT.

Not yet. They probably won't get to it until tomorrow. I'm a charity case!

I forgot to update about the new brakes! The brakes worked flawlessly at Portland International Raceway this last weekend. (Something I can't say about the rest of the car.) The brakes were especially taxed to the max because this was a Non-Chicane race, which at PIR means we use the entire "old" front straight, a distance that got me up to 141mph before the brake zone. The Ferodo pads worked well but are a bit of a process to bed in properly. I'll probably be switching to Essex's CL RC 8-6-5 Sintered pads for the long run. The CL pads last longer, the bedding in is a non issue, they have extreme high temp tolerance, and they brake good when cold too.

Thanks for the link. The NASCAR truck in my pic has a lot of stuff going on on the bed like the Syclone truck. Next time I'll get some pics of that. The diesel truck style vertical exhaust is functional and shoots flames too!

A couple of more shots taken by fans I grabbed off Facebook. I talked with several Subaru enthusiasts who were walking the paddock. And the car everyone was in awe of, the former Stevenson -Pratt- Miller Grand Am car that was the smoking hot fastest car on the track. I would look in my mirror and see a distant orange speck, a second later he would go by like he had made the jump to lightspeed.

The first race of the season was disappointing. Lots of gremlins that required fixing popped up that ultimately took me out of the race. The Friday test &tune was no real problems. The issues revolved around getting the AIM data-logger to work with my RPM...Speed..and the Non Chicane version of the track. By the end of the day they were all working harmoniously. Saturday the practice went fine. The car was hauling some major speed on the front straight since this was a Non Chicane race. I haven't driven PIR in the nin-chicane version since I was a cop and we did our driver training there. It was a real pucker factor. Then in qualifying I was doing great, a 1:18 without really pushing it. The new splitter and rear wing were proving their worth. The car brakes rock solid from 140 mph to 70. The extra down-force was sweet! Then 5 laps in, cough, cough, and no power. I can tell it's a fuel pressure issue. After being towed back to the paddock I can see in the AIM data that the fuel pressure was doing great, then suddenly went to zero. After running the Enduro in my old Acura I started working from the engine backwards to figure out why no fuel pressure was getting thru. Non, zero, nada at the fuel rail; took the filter apart it's clean, no gas; back to fuel cell, the pump runs in the cell but nothing coming out. Now it becomes a pain because I take the fuel cell firewall and plate off. There's the problem, the hose that runs from the Bosch 044 pump to the Outlet plate hose barb inside the fuel cell has popped off the barb! It has a special clamp that's supposed to stop that from happening. So I reuse the clamp and add a HF hose clamp too, everything works fine again. Sunday I go out for qualifying, I'm doing great when suddenly at WOT on the front straight, huge power loss, I get going again, and again power goes away. I limp around to the paddock and again the AIM data logger reveals the problem. My boost is working fine until the last lap when suddenly it goes from a nice flat top at 18 psi to 25 psi! Each time the fail safe kicks in and cuts the ignition. I look close at the turbo and see one of the hoses to the wastegate controller is dangling! The banjo bolt has come unscrewed! That caused the waste-gate to go wide open and only the ignition cut saved my engine. (Stock OEM Internals). Luckily the banjo bolt is still inside the hose fitting so all I need to do is put it back on with some Locktite this time. Then I discover the second hose is loose too! LEARNING POINT: USE LOCKTITE ON YOUR WASTEGATE HOSE FITTINGS!! Then I notice my Cobb AP is not connecting. Blank Screen. UH -OH. But the engine starts and idles fine. With a few friends helping button up the car I get into my race suit and make it to the grid on time. OTW the grid my AIM data-logger says something about how it can't connect to the slaves on the network. UH-OH.. We leave the grid and on the second lap......complete loss of power. Engine is dead. I spend the race watching from a corner worker turn station. Something has gone goofy with the OBD2/CAN system (I THINK*). The car is at Subaru of Bend now since I know nothing about tracing down that kind of problem. Other interesting stuff: I was paddocked with some super fast NASCAR cars and a truck, who also run with me in my run group. This truck is very cool, and very fast: Notice they don't have problems with their hubs! But the best part is the blower in his brake duct. He said all the NASCAR ground pounders run blowers in their brake ducts. He turns on the blower as he leaves the grid and leaves it for the entire race. He says it keeps the brakes much cooler. His is a Roush Yates blower, but I can do the same thing with a marine bilge blower. My next mod! Next race is in 2 weeks at Pacific Raceways in Kent WA. Hope the Pac NW guys can come down and help me fix the next series of things that go wrong!

In a way you are right...Adopting a Paleo lifestyle was BY FAR the best 30 LBS I ever took out of my race car! The health community I participate in: http://www.marksdailyapple.com/ Click the Success Stories Tab, someday I'll be putting mine up there.

Since several of ya'll have asked about brake ducts, here's a pic of the brake duct mounting plate. ..

Oh Lordy! Do you know what happened after you did my gear check last week at the Ridge????? I was in the grid for the start of the race, Bob the race steward comes over and tells me I can't start because my gear has not been Tech'd! I had to get out and go thru a gear check, meanwhile holding up the race. Your name was mentioned a few times... I think you owe me an easy annual!!!!

I got the AP Racing Brakes installed last night. There is an install thread in the Walkthroughs: http://legacygt.com/forums/showthread.php/ap-racing-brake-install-240152.html?p=5130132#post5130132 Next race May 1-2-3 at Portland International Raceway, I'll post up a brake update.

I ordered 10 of them, but they are on backorder for 2 weeks. When they come in I'll post up here and will be glad to mail one or two to anyone at my cost plus a small handling fee. I'm guessing about $6 each should cover it. I'll stop by my local fluid connections dealer too, but I doubt they will have them.

A hook accessory snout like the Motiv Power filler would be very handy for filling diffs.