Steve-O

No i left them standard as from what i have read people said they were adequate, however based on my last two track days with the Meisters on i still felt like the car was leaning too much. The first weak spot was the seats which has now been sorted with the Recaros but i still want to address the ARB situation. I just prefer a more flatter handling car so i wont be putting them on max stiffness just the first notch will do for now and work from there. I have a 2nd set of 5 spokes in the garage and contemplating getting those powercoated and throwing on some more grippy rubber as well so that will only make the situation even more apparent!

Drove the car into work 25 miles this morning and it started and drove well. I think i need to firm up the coilovers - not sure why but now they feel overly soft. Maybe thats me craving something more hardcore since i have been away from it for a while i also forgot speedhumps have to be traversed with care. I might even raise it a touch more when it goes in for Joe to fit the ARBs.

You'd have to be a spider nut for those i think. I dont mind spiders but even thats putting me on edge!

If you have the relevant sensors working there is enough in the AutoTune suite to get the car up and running and driving about. It might even be suitable for more on the fly performance related tuning to a degree but to be honest having a person tune your car that can read between the lines is still the way to go especially when boost is involved. Its amazing as a backup for the enthusiast like me though. There is potential however to be completely self sufficient if you know what you are doing. All elements of the tune can be edited in TunerStudio manually so you really have to know what you are doing and what the consequences will be - you could throw a rod out the block otherwise. The areas i have been looking into are exclusively the cold start settings, otherwise i use it for Gauges on a Nexus tablet that connects via bluetooth, Useful especially on track days and keeps an element of stealth with no gauges inside. Saying that the car doesnt look particularly stock any more

They dont make them like they used to!! Thats impressive, what a tank.

So the last couple of weeks i have begin to bring the car out of hibernation. Its the first time i have left a car over winter but since its my toy now and had the body work sorted i thought it deserved to be kept away from all the nasty salt on the roads. When i noticed upon charging the battery back up was that she was difficult to start on very cold mornings to the point that i gave up and begin looking into why this might be happening. To cut a long story short : Although there is a setting called 'Cranking Pulse Widths' i can adjust in TunerStudio that helps with the cold starts, there was something else going on that needed to be investigated. The IAT (Intake Air Temperature) sensor was reading 21 degrees constantly when it was 5 degrees.I swapped the sensor out - no change. Then i traced the wiring back checking the earth and soldered joints and there were no issues, up until the point where is started looking at the piggyback wiring for the megasquirt that hooks into the standard ECU loom : Two wires for some reason had broken free from the DB37 connector which caused my sensor to switch to a default reading of 21. The grey wire i think is one of several grounds. Seeing this also loose explains another issue that crept in over the hibernation : I had to click the ignition on twice before it would crank. I was massively relieved when i found the 2nd wire and realised this was the cause of the ignition gremlin. I thought it was the standard immobilser at fault and was beginning to contemplate ripping the standard ECU out and getting the thing completely remapped again! So i soldered these wires back in carefully and recalibrated the IAT sensor and we were looking in better shape. Ignition was working first time, air temp was correct but it was still struggling to catch and idle without repeated attempts. I'd done some reading by this stage and realised there is a stage in the engine start sequence called 'Warmup enrichment' (WUE) which is the stage just after cranking where the engine begins to idle and warm up. I suspected this needed some work. Luckily in TunerStudio there is a superb utility called AutoTune which you can use for various aspects of the cars map, including Warmup Enrichment! Using AutoTune for WUE requires 2 passes with the engine as cold as possible. Since it was mild i went ahead knowing i need to run this again later. You start the AutoTune, and then start the engine. TunerStudio analyses whats going on with the engine and adjust the fuelling etc to optimise the WUE stage so that it carries on running and also doesnt use too much fuel and idles steadily. I ran two passes of this today and even after the first one - the car fired up first time like a dream. Very impressed with the TunerStudio software. The real test will be once i have run a couple of passes in really cold conditions at that point it should be set and no further adjustment required. Below is the results of the first 2 passes in mild (10 degrees) weather : The Blue line is what TunerStudio has suggested i run, and the Grey dashed line is what i was running on the first pass. As you can see its changed it somewhat! So with that out the way now i am going to drive the car for a bit and blow the cobwebs away I had a quick blast over this weekend and shes back on form. Missed that charger noise! Next up : service time and some uprated whiteline anti roll bars via WIM then a track day and another trip to Le Mans in June.

If Its not the brakes it's got to be the rubber or maybe some kind of slop in the wishbones?

Part of this could be a seized/binding caliper so check the temps with your hand near each corner. The rears are notorious for seizing I have gone through 2/3 so far but could be a front issue also.

My insurance is about £280 Cambelt is every 5 years or so but they are non interference so it won't lunch itself if it goes

Make it yours and drive the wheels off it. Nothing on these cost big money if it breaks. So... Trackday in March /April

As I said before you should look at it as a hobby/passion stop trying to look at things at what you will get when you sell it. You won't get your money back at best if you take them off to sell you might get half. Just enjoy them it's not like you spend loads on anything else

Seems like the perfect fit to be acknowledged by coilover manufacturers as an approved installer? I think you've been around long enough to have proven yourselves

Hehe - I bought my BC's from Apex back in the day - they used to be big on 200sx's not sure if they are more broad now. i think i got them VERY cheap as well. Like £350 or something. Jerrick was very helpful when i was looking into the tech details with the meisters which sold it for me.

Quite possibly Best suspension i have had on any car.

Yes mate there really is not much between the BC and Meisters. I woudnt be surprised if the same manufacturer was involved - but to ever so slightly specs.. The Specification of the Zeta-S Coilovers: *Aluminium Top Mount with Harden Rubber Bushing *Extended Rear Aluminum Top Mount *Monotube damper with 32 stage damping adjustment (Compression and Rebound Combined) *Linear Rate SAE9254 Chrome Silicon Steel Springs *Lengthen Heavy Duty Rubber Boot and Bump Stop *Aluminium Spring Perch, Locking Collar, and Lower Bracket *Dual Perch Coilovers Construction (Independent Ride Height and Spring Tension Adjustments) NA / NB MX5 Spring Rate: Front: 6.0 kg/mm Rear: 5.0 kg/mm not sure how that compares to the BC. Either way both decent coilovers. I've had BC before on my old 200sx (i dont know if you will remember but you aligned it back at kipling when i rolled in with them freshly fitted and i had some then unusual non-centric adjustable camber bushes? The only problem i had with them back then was the rear coilovers had aluminium bushes in the topmounts at the rear. What that meant was on cold days they would contract and knock a bit. I was very careful to make sure the ones going on to the mx5 had rubber I miss that car a bit - was great

They didnt feel hugely bad pre adjustment just on those larger bumps at sounded like there was no travel. I can fully imagine they ride just like the meisters now. Tbh i have up until now been adjusting mine at all four corners the same and been happy with the handling. I am running 5 clicks all round off full soft and it feels good. On full softs it feels positively wafty which i actually love. Its better than standard and glides over the bumps. So you should like that as well. On track : set to full hard all round. Traction out of hairpins and full throttle was absurd. Zero slippage. I think thats what started my std clutch slipping at the end of the day hehe : Also you might want to look at one of these if its the same as the mk1 : I have one of these on the rear left. It allows you to adjust the damper without taking off the metalwork shielding the fuel filler pipework. I can get to the other side anyway as i lose the spare on track days

thats right - once the preload is set you can adjust the height independently - so you can have it low as hell and still have a good ride

Normally the preload is already set out of the box i think these days? I had a feeling the ride height wouldn't be part of the problem as all the adjustment on height is down on the lower part of the shock thats twisted up/down as necessary and doesnt affect the spring perch/collars. If i recall when i was doing it i got the tape measure out and i tightened the preload collars just enough to hold them in place and not rattle around and made a note of that measurement. Then from there i might have given them another turn or so if i noticed any chatter fom the springs when driven. I basically went for the least amount of preload possible. This could be the wrong way of doing it but it seemed to work ok from a DIY perspective (the handling didnt kill me)

Mine are 6kg front and 5kg rear. I am running them about 5/6 clicks off full soft (all round) and i find them decent. on full soft they are perfect for what i want. No complaints. If you look in my blog when they first were fitted joe decked it and it was too low (despite looking great) so its gone up 10-20mm but tbh it made no difference to the ride quality. The whole point of these are you set the springs and you can adjust the height with no effect on the ride. I used to have to mess around with spring preload on my old coilovers when i adjusted the ride height and it complicated matters a bit.

Sounds like the spring rates might me a touch higher the the Meisters. What are they like on full soft? Mine rides better than standard. That said on full hard they are maybe not as hard as I'd like but it's a compromise I suppose.

Fire wood anyone ?

Not on here, we're all awesome DIYers....... Oh yeah what was i thinking! to be fair i am not bad. My curtains and shelves are still on the wall and i haven't flooded the house or electricuted anyone yet so i must be doing something right!

well he was going for them, banked sharply to miss them and put it across the bridge and into the water. i'd say that was a last minute intervention by the pilot?

Flying is generally safer but i can't help feeling when it does go wrong it goes wrong in a big way... That pilot done well to not plant it on the bridge.

I think Tales of woe might be more suitable