Clive's 400 BHP Super GT RX-8 Race Car

[re japi]

Any news?

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[clive]

Just for a change so I don't get bored, I'm screwing together a fresh engine !

[rote8]

I would have avoided the word "screwing' as too many engines before have ended up screwed unfortunately. Even with your vast experience each engine rebuild is revealing some very unusual reasons for failure, but with the car showing such potential it's a credit to your perseverance when most of us would have given up by now. We all so want this car to be a success.

I can't be much practical help, but if moral support can help then rest assured I'm behind you all the way.

[clive]

I would have avoided the word "screwing' as too many engines before have ended up screwed unfortunately.

That made me smile Ray, could do with a smile

OK lets term it as a new engine is being "assembled" 

Thanks for your support, appreciated.

[re japi]

I would have avoided the word "screwing' as too many engines before have ended up screwed unfortunately. Even with your vast experience each engine rebuild is revealing some very unusual reasons for failure, but with the car showing such potential it's a credit to your perseverance when most of us would have given up by now. We all so want this car to be a success.

I can't be much practical help, but if moral support can help then rest assured I'm behind you all the way.

I couldnt agree more

[clive]

OK I suppose its about time we had an update on the race car in case people think I had given up 

After my last outing at brands where I lost a Rotor Bearing Much has happen to "Christine" and till this weekend the damn thing still threw problems at me that you just could not make up.

1st and main issue  /

I found why the engine was killing side seals and cost two engines and five rebuilds /  the ignition map was set on reluctor rather than digital and despite many mappers from here America and even Australia  missing a simple tick in a box, Pip@WGT picked up the fault on the cars first visit , indeed before discovering the cause he would not run the car over 3000 revs !.

Essentially I had "ignition scatter" resulting in high chamber temps which was killing engines

2nd issue /

I had a safe low boost now but not much horsepower but now the engine was consuming bearings, so another two rebuilds ensued with the first making the engine block so hot it caught the car alight hence the car now being called Christine after the cult film about a  possessed car !

First thought for bearing failure was a poor oil pick up on track but while the engine was apart it turned out that the shaft and rotor assembly was out of balance due to the previous owner fitting the wrong weight front counter balance weight in the assembly, a chance conversation with Carl Hayward picked this up when I commented on how heavy the front weight was. Turned out a super rare and useless to me Turbo 1 weight was fitted putting the engine out of balance.

3rd issue /

Now built up with  new FD Rotors (thank you Ben@RR ) a new shaft and weights we was up n running back to Pips for a fresh map as I now had a different compression Ratio, and guess what that turned into a wasted ten hour round trip, damn you Christine!

This time we put it on the Dyno and as the car revved it had a "reverse" spike in the map. I then spent the two weeks rewiring etc till I ran out of ideas as I had no codes or anything to indicate anything wrong !!!!!!!!! Then came Jon "Boosted" with a bright idea 

He immediately thought back to Scalextric hand controllers that worked and then would go again. Thank you Jon as this put me back on the road to a cure for this issue. After putting a Snap On OBD reader on which we set to trace the throttle, it turned out that at 62% throttle the throttle had a dead spot till 70%. You would never find this unless you was on a Dyno as the throttle " seemed" to work ok but the needle on the rev counter dropped at 6200rpm.

Talking to the many traders I deal with most have seen pedal issues but the car normally just won't rev up ! but our Christine decides to do something no body else has ever had happen 

4th and hopefully last issue 

  Off we go to Pips on Friday night for mapping on Saturday morning and my possessed car throws something else at me ------------------- Got the car on the Dyno and the communication from the ECU to the lap top can't be found, so no Mapping again.

Turns out the port in the ECU had been used so many times it had snapped off the computer board, arrrrrgggg . However Pip knew a man that could repair the ECU and after another two hours of rushing across to the computer guy we had an ECU that was programmable again and program it did, and thanks to Pip I now have a nice map in the car that should give me  race car that I can finally find out how fast or slow it really is 

Huge thanks go to all the people who have supported this project along the way, god its been a painful journey,

Looking forward now to seeing you all at Brands on the 2nd for the annual Rotary track day with hopefully an RX-8 that is now de-possessed 
     

[boosted]

Woohoo. Bet you cant wait for Brands!

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[re japi]

Wow. Just wow. Thats a... umm... I´m speechless But thanks for update, I was a bit worried allready...

1st. Can you explain that ignition scatter thing? I dont get it

2nd. I thought that engine was fully balanced with counter weight? Cause what I have heard and found out is that all rotary engines arent that well balanced, stock tolerances are really big. With little work you can make it much better. So, cause your car is "endurance" car, I thought that you have done that. Altough I dont know toleranses in Renny rotors and e shaft, but I assume that they are quite big too. Anyhow, it doesent matter if counterweight is really weird

3rd. Jon is a frickin´ genious! What would we do without him But what caused that flat spot?

4th. What? How that is even possible? 

But hopefully everything is ok now, and you can finally enjoy that beast!

You know, all my years following racing, rallying and car builds, I have found out that race cars and high tech electronics dont match! I mean, there is so much that can and will go wrong and back tracing problems can be very difficult. For examble, usually when rallycross car dont run or missfires, problem is in trickerwheel and sensor. They shake so much during race that they simply move and causes ecu to act wrong. Many people dont understand that and they dont even realize to check their sensors position

[clive]

Here we go,

1st. Can you explain that ignition scatter thing? I dont get it / By being on the wrong setting in the ECU, The effect was the same as high voltage inter-fearing with the pulses from the eccentric shaft sensor and confusing the signal.

2nd. I thought that engine was fully balanced with counter weight? / As I am not using high revs, a matched at the factory shaft/rotor/ balance weight assembly should have been fine and for what ever reason somebody bolted the wrong weight onto the engine before I got my hands on it 


3rd. Jon is a frickin´ genious! What would we do without him But what caused that flat spot? / Yes Jon's a star,  The fly by wire pedal assembly was found to be worn and had a dead spot like an old Scalextric hand controller



4th. What? How that is even possible?  /  Don't forget it was possessed  

[boosted]

4th: procure some holy water from a church altar and give Christine a liberal soaking to finally exercise the demon.

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[re japi]

1st. Oh, I see.
2nd. Ok. For some reason I thought that your engine was balanced. Funny how that little lump in the other end of the shaft can throw all out of balance... :/
3rd. Pedal assembly? You got to be joking? I thought that problems was somewhere in throttle body... Are you using 8´s throttlebody? Cause I just broke mine just for fun, and I have to say that I wouldnt trust that component
4th. Oh, I forgot that. But does that mean then that Jon is a bishop?

[Casey]

Really looking forward to seeing the car running at Brands next week 

[C J R]

EPIC !

[exiled-viking]

whens Brands meeting on sorry not been keeping up with events I would love to pop over and see the car again ho and you as well clive LOl

[clive]

whens Brands meeting on sorry not been keeping up with events I would love to pop over and see the car again ho and you as well clive LOl

Tony its this coming Friday