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Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Getting Ready for Miatas at MRLS

Not much chance we'll get the OGK running in time but that won't stop us from trying. As a back up, we'll bring the rental. It's still a ton of fun to drive and give rides in but not the showstopper the OGK will be. To spice up the rental, we have added an AEM and non USDM "square top" 01-05 intake manifold. Even with the stock ECU feeding it 12.0:1 at the fuel cut, the rental was still making peak power right at the fuel cut so I'm pretty sure we'll find at least another 12whp with the manifold and ECU.

Saturday, March 20, 2010

New digs

As some of you may know, we were planning on moving to a new shop in February. Our lease was actually up at the end of January but we're hanging around until we find just the right place. Due to the soft commercial real estate market in south OC, our building owner is more than willing to let us stay month to month without any premium. The vacancies around here are disturbing. Lots of businesses folding. Sad state of affairs. Meanwhile we have been seeing phenomenal growth every quarter since we started back in January 2006. I can just barely keep up these days. Which lead to me bringing my first employee on last year, Mike Dandan.

Help!
In the past when I said we, it had always been just me and who ever else helped out from time to time. Mike is full time now and quite indispensable. Ships out about 95% of the orders, works on the website, keeps all the cars running and just generally does whatever needs to be done. Thanks bro!

Room for toys
So the shop we are looking at is about twice the size as our current place. Conveniently, it's just across the street. Nice yard we can fence in, better floor plan so we can easily add a 4 post lift in addition to the 2 poster we have now. Room to store a model 4000 Dynapack dyno when and if we can make that happen. So many projects come to a crawl because we don't have a loading dyno nearby. We'll fill the allotted parking spaces pretty quickly with all the cars we have floating around so I see some 4 post parking hoists in our future. Or we can just sell some of the excess cars. Anyway, haven't pulled the trigger on it yet. Just have to finalize the changes we need to make to the office area and get our gate/fence approved. Then there is the Go Kart track in the warehouse. Just kidding. I wish! We hope to start moving in during April and be all dialed by May. Not looking forward to all the extra work when we are slammed busy, but I am looking forward to the newer, bigger, plusher building. Oh yeah, we're specifying checkerboard vinyl floors throughout. No more carpet. Yay.

Speaking of toys..
I'm actually back down to 3 Miatas again, just sold the 2000SE and '90. Just the OGK, the 99 rental and a 95 R Package. Think I'm going to drop a JDM BP-Z3 motor into the 95 with one of DP Tunes programmable 01-05 ECU's. Splice the harnesses together and voila. I think we can make about 150whp with a quiet exhaust and the nice JDM 4:2:1 OEM header . That would be a fun and stealth DD eh?


I can't help it though. It's an addiction. Craigslist. Mike and I both have he bug. Some we keep, some we flip. Constantly rotating through the inventory.


T25
I go to sleep these days dreaming about racing the OGK in enduros. TT's are fun but it's low key. Going fast for two laps is fun but it's just too easy.BTDT. I've sort of lost interest in Redline and SLB. Even if I were to go out and win the series in class, I'm not sure I would really care. Still, they are a fun diversion but not worth focusing on for me. The Miata Challenge is different because A) We don't take our selves too seriously.  B) It's more the camaraderie than glory.
Building a car that can be raced hard for 25 hours straight is monumental. That's my Everest.

Tuesday, March 16, 2010

Focus shift

I knew this would happen. Got to thinking well, why not? It might mean I don't have it ready for MRLS April 10-11 but that's OK. So instead of the mostly stock head with modest BP5A intake cam we are doing this:
 
Integral R1 race cams, .458 lift, 283°
+1mm Supertech valves
Supertech valve springs with Ti retainers
Mazda Comp Shim under Bucket lifters


I think this motor will make an honest 190whp on race gas, without the Rotrex. Should be easily capable of 325whp force fed. Perfect for enduros where we can simply short shift to control boost / fuel consumption, tire wear and general wear. Can't wait to hear this thing.