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Absolutely phenomenal car! We are glad to have been able to help on the cluster. We would love to share some of the pics, especially the before and after of the dash. Would that be ok? If not, no worries!
Take care and let us know if you ever need anything again in the future. Just call us if so, and tell them you are the race car driver from the forum. We will take great care of you!
great thread and build. I am about to embark on a very similar build with a 5 speed SC300. thanks for all the weight info! let us know how your car holds up to the abuse!
Looks killer! Any reason why you cut the airbag out instead of just removing the whole thing?
Because I wanted to have fun setting the airbag off by launching something stupid into the air. Gotta have fun somehow right? And I did remove it, set it off by launching a 55 gal drum into the air, then cut out the remaining loose stuff and put it back in so I could still have a horn to push.
Absolutely phenomenal car! We are glad to have been able to help on the cluster. We would love to share some of the pics, especially the before and after of the dash. Would that be ok? If not, no worries!
Take care and let us know if you ever need anything again in the future. Just call us if so, and tell them you are the race car driver from the forum. We will take great care of you!
So yes post pictures as needed. Send me some stickers and I'll put them on the car.
Just for reference, for the chump car I decided to go back with oem lights instead of led's because they will dim more. I was afraid that racing at night at a place like VIR would need to dim the interior as much as possible. I did led's in the daily driver because they look really cool.
This car was not built for 24 hours of Lemons, but they were hosting a race at my local track so I entered the car in it for a good shakedown. Plus, we always run this race since it's local and the guys at Lemons put on a great event.
Went thru tech with no issues, other than they wanted duct tape around the door where I had cut it out for the nascar bars on the roll cage. Made a lot of sense to do so. The Lemons BS tech however was not so smooth. I suspected it would happen and was prepared for that eventuality. They wanted to know how I got the car to $500. I had a list of interior parts, seats, tail lights, door lock ecu, etc etc of stuff I sold off to get to their value but they wouldn't hear any of it. Typical for a first time car that shows up and looks like a competitor, they just don't want a car like that to win. Plus, they know us and they know we could have won the last 2 years with our 944 if we wouldn't have done stupid stuff along the way but finished in the top 5 both years. So they gave us 28 penalty laps.
Starting a race 28 laps down is tough, but we battled from 82nd place in dead last and brought the car to 12th overall. Not bad to pass 70 cars 28 times in 2 days (14 1/2 hours) of racing. The car was flawless, unlike the drivers, which weren't too bad but made one mistake in the pits that cost us a couple of laps. I had to slow the car down the last 30-45 minutes. Unfortunately, I was tagged with about 30 min to go in the race by a guy in an E36 that I finally put behind me about 20 min earlier. I backed down due to front wheel bearings going out, saw him coming, pointed him to the inside of a turn and he just overcooked the turn and hit me from behind. First battle wound. If I had not backed down he would not have seen me let alone hit me. Until then we were running exactly 28 laps down to the leader, the initial penalty, which would have put us on the lead lap without the penalty. So, the car is a winner in the future, in spite of the fact I still have more weight to remove.
I made a huge mistake by inadvertently disconnecting the variable intake runner which cost me low end torque. I have to research what it takes to get that back on and working properly. I got home and took the daily out just to confirm that when that kicks in about 4000 it pulls. I missed that in this race, but will have it before the next race.
Car is a phenomenal platform to build on. I am ready to make the few adjustments I need to make and keep competing.
First battle wound on the new race car.
Last edited by RXRodger; 02-08-16 at 07:53 PM.
Reason: Add battle wound pic
sounds like you built a winner! and good call on replacing the stock tails with LEDs. A bummer to see that mod pan out so quickly...
Are you planning on running coilovers or any other improvements?
Coilovers but they have to be non adjustable. The options on non adjustable coilovers is very small. But I plan to order a set before the next race and see how they do. I was pleasantly surprised at how well the car handled with just fresh KYB shocks and the Tein lowering springs. Not enough spring rate but better than expected.
And here is some looking out the rear. (Note this video hangs just after starting. Just slide the progress a few seconds and it will proceed. I need to re upload this one)
What great videos and driving. Talk about good morivation for me to get started.
If you are looking for a custom set of springs i have used a place called "cannon race craft" in the past for motorcycle springs. I imagine they also do automotive, might be worth a shot. A custom moto spring was about $100 from them.
You can find just about anything you need on springs from Hypercoil or other similar. Problem is finding a shock that matches the spring rate in this case.
Originally Posted by jza707
What great videos and driving. Talk about good morivation for me to get started.
If you are looking for a custom set of springs i have used a place called "cannon race craft" in the past for motorcycle springs. I imagine they also do automotive, might be worth a shot. A custom moto spring was about $100 from them.
awesome progress, I know a ton about the variable intake system so shoot me any questions you have.
if you removed the plastic air tank under the intake and all the vsv's which normally turns it on the stock way...
to get it to work the shortcut way just remove all that stuff and connect a vac line from the intake manifold directly to that valve.
That will make it long runner whenever in vacuum (giving more torque down low), and then when you floor it and the vac drops it will go to short runner for top end power.
the only downside of connecting it like that is you get long runners in cruising situations which could cost you a few mpg's, but I Can tell you the throttle response "snap" from coming off cruise is much stronger going back into the powerband.
most people aren't concerned with mpg's on these cars but since you are racing for like 12+ hours it might be a concern for you.
to have it work perfectly though in all situations you will need to reinstall the vacuum tank under the intake as well as the vsv's.
basically the vsv cuts the vacuum off in cruise conditions, and the tank stores extra vac which helps it work a little better but its not necessary to have all of it.
I don't even think there is a huge hit in cruise mpg's but through researching it I learnt that is why they installed the tank and vsv's cause toyota overthinks everything.
I did pull all of the vacuum tank, hoses, etc out when I did this. I left the vsv's in place hooked up electrically and tied them up because I read they will throw a check engine light if you disconnect them. Now I need to figure out which one goes where since I have 2 vsv's tied up in this area. I think I will remote mount the vacuum tank so I can leave that area cleaned up where it came from. I have room where the battery was.
So do you think there is a chance this thing being disconnected would throw a #1 knock sensor cel code? I replaced the ks, cleared the code, it came right back. I put the old one back on, came right back. It was not doing this before I deleted all this vacuum stuff and did the egr delete.
Here is another question for you that maybe you will know. In the same area, just above the starter and below the firewall end of the intake manifold (near the 2 vsv's mentioned), there is a third 6 or 8 pin gray plug hanging not plugged in to anything. It has a very short run back into the harness, so it had to be right there somewhere. Maybe egr related? I don't remember unplugging it when I did the egr delete however. I can not find out what it was plugged in to.
Thanks again for the help.
Originally Posted by Ali SC3
awesome progress, I know a ton about the variable intake system so shoot me any questions you have.
if you removed the plastic air tank under the intake and all the vsv's which normally turns it on the stock way...
to get it to work the shortcut way just remove all that stuff and connect a vac line from the intake manifold directly to that valve.
That will make it long runner whenever in vacuum (giving more torque down low), and then when you floor it and the vac drops it will go to short runner for top end power.
the only downside of connecting it like that is you get long runners in cruising situations which could cost you a few mpg's, but I Can tell you the throttle response "snap" from coming off cruise is much stronger going back into the powerband.
most people aren't concerned with mpg's on these cars but since you are racing for like 12+ hours it might be a concern for you.
to have it work perfectly though in all situations you will need to reinstall the vacuum tank under the intake as well as the vsv's.
basically the vsv cuts the vacuum off in cruise conditions, and the tank stores extra vac which helps it work a little better but its not necessary to have all of it.
I don't even think there is a huge hit in cruise mpg's but through researching it I learnt that is why they installed the tank and vsv's cause toyota overthinks everything.
I can't remember if our ecu's even throw a code for having the vsv's disconnected. it might not but best bet for a non turbo car is to use the tank and vsv's and keep it like it was stock so you get the extra power and save gas.
I don't think it would affect the knock sensor at all, but I can tell you I had the same thing happen once with a harness I bought from someone else and it was the wire going into the knock sensor connector was loose. after a little wire repair it was good to go. those clips can be hard to get off or some people just pull on the wire to remove the clips and it basically destroys it, sometimes its just on its last leg, or sometimes its just the connector that has a hairline crack that messes up the connection. the knock sensors themselves don't go bad too often so if you replaced it and still the code after a reset (pull negative terminal for a few seconds), then my money is on the wiring or the connector.
Can't think of what connector you talking about, post a picture and someone will probably know.
egr just has the 2 pin grey connector for the temp sensor on that metal pipe (which you removed). rest of egr is vacuum operated and there is one vsv (2 pin).
there is an oil level sensor down there should be 1 or 2 pin, and the starter plugs which I am sure you have plugged in right cause you are driving around.
only other plugs in that area that would have that many pins would be the plugs for an auto transmission, and if it is an auto harness on a manual swapped car they would be just hanging out there, with probably 2 wires sticking in one of the plugs for the reverse lights.
also a little more towards the power steering rack some SC's (not mine) have a big grey connector that plugs into the rack. all the racks have the connector, but if your car has a manual harness it probably wont have the connector on the harness. some auto's had it.
I was going from memory that it was 6 or 8 pin. That would make sense. All the other possibilities I was already aware of and its not any of those.
The wire for the knock sensor is in terrible shape, I had to replace the connector with one from driftmotion. But the insulation is all gone to where it goes back into the harness so I used liquid tape to tape it up. If I remember correctly these were some of the first models to use the soy based insulation which turned out to be crap. More than likely the wire is where my issue is as you suggest. I may run a new wire all the way back to the ecu. Do you know if this wire is supposed to be shielded? I don't see any shielding wire but it may be gone.
Originally Posted by Ali SC3
I can't remember if our ecu's even throw a code for having the vsv's disconnected. it might not but best bet for a non turbo car is to use the tank and vsv's and keep it like it was stock so you get the extra power and save gas.
I don't think it would affect the knock sensor at all, but I can tell you I had the same thing happen once with a harness I bought from someone else and it was the wire going into the knock sensor connector was loose. after a little wire repair it was good to go. those clips can be hard to get off or some people just pull on the wire to remove the clips and it basically destroys it, sometimes its just on its last leg, or sometimes its just the connector that has a hairline crack that messes up the connection. the knock sensors themselves don't go bad too often so if you replaced it and still the code after a reset (pull negative terminal for a few seconds), then my money is on the wiring or the connector.
Can't think of what connector you talking about, post a picture and someone will probably know.
egr just has the 2 pin grey connector for the temp sensor on that metal pipe (which you removed). rest of egr is vacuum operated and there is one vsv (2 pin).
there is an oil level sensor down there should be 1 or 2 pin, and the starter plugs which I am sure you have plugged in right cause you are driving around.
only other plugs in that area that would have that many pins would be the plugs for an auto transmission, and if it is an auto harness on a manual swapped car they would be just hanging out there, with probably 2 wires sticking in one of the plugs for the reverse lights.
also a little more towards the power steering rack some SC's (not mine) have a big grey connector that plugs into the rack. all the racks have the connector, but if your car has a manual harness it probably wont have the connector on the harness. some auto's had it.
02-02-16, 06:18 AM
