373 replies to this topic

[Caveman-kwebb99]

I really dont understand this whole topic????  As for the tq under 5000 rpm or whatever...  How do you fix that issue without adding over all performace to the car???  If you increase performace overall on the 1.6 any noticable level you then need  a rp...  Once you have a rp you will be right back to square one after lossing the torq you gained before the rp...

 

All cars will never be equal, this is why the choice of car is tough!  Youmust find what suites you!  The fastest 1.6 driver down there in florida is IMO having less success with his new 2001+ car then he did with the 1.6.  Pick what suits your driving style...  

[Bruce Wilson]

That's just wrong Kyle.  Pick a 99+ if your style is winning races???

 

Jeez guys, just don't read the thread if you don't get it, or don't give a shit

[Caveman-kwebb99]

That's just wrong Kyle.  Pick a 99+ if your style is winning races???

 

Jeez guys, just don't read the thread if you don't get it, or don't give a shit

 

Ok Dewhurst Jr! 

 

the 01+ won plenty of big races last year including the ARRC, I happen to have a 99, have driven the 97 and it was nearly a winning day for me, but mistakes held me back not the model year.  Been plenty of wins by the 1.6 in my region even agasint some of the the best 99 and 01+ cars.

 

a few years back nasa cut the balls off the 99 to bring out all these 1.6's that are hiding out in the garage, I dont remember seeing any cars mysteriously showing up from mars to race.

 

If you are an overbraker chose the 01+ if you are not a big overbraker but dont possess wild car control skills choose a 99, If you dont need brakes and have mucho car control skills and like being sideways like Danny St. then get a 1.6...

 

The problem with the 1.6ers is that you cant seem to get a majority of drivers all supporting the same position.  Help has been offered yet it always gets submarined by crb letters against. 

 

So I propose you all upgrade to either 99 or 01 engines wireharnesses and computers and run the same weight as the 99 at 2400 and we call it a day and then we wont need any more of these threads, let those that want to change subframes to the 99+ do so if they want.  

this proposal of mine costs money unfortunatly but I keep hearing the 1.6 ers saying they want to spend money to upgrade to be on a level playing field. 

 

I actually do give a shit Bruce!  but if you want same you need to have the same, not different!

[Bruce Wilson]

Yeah, I know the problems of the past Kyle.  But the past is the past.  SCCA should do the right thing and figure it out.  I'm not going to band together and form a f-ing 1.6 union, I'm just going to park my car for now and go race something else.  Here's some data for everyone, 1.6 cars don't win races and it's not because top cars don't exist with top drivers (Sutherland, Schultz, Linse, etc. etc. etc).  It's because those cars are parked, and that's a damned shame.  When I write my letters to SCCA/Mazda I try to always say that the Miata is arguably the best production racecar ever and deserves better than what we've done here.

 

btw, I'm all for the upgrade option.  Somebody just needs to put it in the rules.  The reason this is so hard is that we don't have the benevolent dictator that SRF enjoys -- they sure make us look silly

[SaulSpeedwell]

Not surprisingly, the two arrive and very different answers (% gain).

 

What numbers did you run?  I got less than 1% difference between the two.  I used 120HP, 9.4 old CR, 9.9 new CR.

[SaulSpeedwell]

I read what I read and when I read and when there is 1.930 more square inch opening, I'm thinking it's doing something someplace. In this case the guys numbers say the Miata OEM AFM potentially allows 13 CFM less air flow and he says, it's doing more above 6,000 rpm. Untill tested on Dyno, I'll buy in. To bad no improvement below 5,500 rpm.

 

Well, I've flowed and dyno'd both, and I'll say it again: a "tuned" Miata AFM flows more (MUCH more) than the RX AFM, which means it flows more than most 1.6 headers and heads.  Stock versus stock, the RX AFM dynos better, but only because it runs leaner when put on a Miata. 

 

Keep in mind, Randy never ran a tuned Miata AFM, and never ran a class where, if you didn't kill your Mom and burn the GCR for 2 HP, you would qualify 10th instead of 1st.

 

By all means, don't take my word for it, - go to the dyno with an AFM with the lid off, mark (or video) how far it opens, and go flow it at that door angle.

 

Especially when you are talking the inlet or outlet of the system, the flow and cross section only matter if it is the chokepoint to begin with.  The AFM is a pain re: mixture, but it ain't the chokepoint once you get a "tuned" one from any of the reputable sources.

[Bench Racer]

Ok, good enough for me, thanks.

[SaulSpeedwell]

The problem with the 1.6ers is that you cant seem to get a majority of drivers all supporting the same position. 

 

I agree.  The #1 reason not to build a 1.6 is that the "Union" isn't unified.  If the 1.6ers were unified, they could get whatever they wanted.  They could have squashed the '99 the year it came into being.  Of the two people that wrote letters asking the '99 be added to SM, one has passed away (RIP Harry), and the other has yet to ever show up in an SM except when we ran a Nelson enduro together (Daughtery). 

[Steve Scheifler]

What numbers did you run? I got less than 1% difference between the two. I used 120HP, 9.4 old CR, 9.9 new CR.

One point or one percent diiference? I used the exact same inputs, the first link yields +2hp, the second 0.88hp. That's just over one point but more than 100%.

[Mike Babcock]

Back to the original topic of cool air intake...

 

Took my 1.6 to a combined SCCA/NASA regional event this weekend to burn off the left-over Hoosiers from the RunOffs.  I ran in PT-E... as did Steve Powers in his 99.  Steve is typically about a second per mile quicker than I am, most every track we've run over the past couple years.  This weekend was a little 1.25 mile track, and Saturday's qualifying times had him about 8 tenths quicker.  Pretty much as expected.

 

Unfortunately, Steve's car had a cam sensor issue on Saturday... plus spitting rain, so throw that one out.  But on Sunday, since NASA PT-E doesn't care if I have turn signals in place, I thought I'd pull the left one out to see what happened.  I qualified a tenth behind, we raced nose to tail nearly the entire time, and our fastest lap times were less than a tenth apart.  Good stuff!

 

So, that's one data point.  Wondering if any 1.6 guys out there might be willing to give this a shot on your next practice session, or some such "non-official" session where you won't get yourself in trouble.  See what kind of impact it has on your lap times, relative to the NB guys.  2 minutes of your time, and zero dollars to test this out.  Based on my experience this weekend, I'm pretty impressed.

[Bruce Wilson]

Sorry Mike, but lap times isn't the issue.  You actually should be faster than a 99 in your 1.6 in qualifying or open track, e.g. not behind a NB.

[Steve Scheifler]

Not so fast Bruce. Once (if) people accept that there is no magic torque bullet then the goal is equivalent, not exactly equal. Performance drop-off during a race is one of the things that makes them more different and distorts much of the other data. Specifically, a 1.6 may qualify well and turn a fast early lap making it appear competitive, then fall back in the race due to higher IATs. If possible that needs to be fixed regardless of anything else, and this first little experiment is exactly the place to start.

Good work Mike. What were ambient temps? How did lap times look as the race progressed, and can you explain them based on traffic, defensive driving, drafting, etc?

[Bench Racer]

My head hurts a bunch whenever I read about these magic bullets. My legal intake air temp at the filter is 90* on an 80* day.

[Tom Hampton]

Bench-

You make me want to sell my 1.6 just to prevent people from thinking I agree with you.

[Bruce Wilson]

Steve, you need to go race a 1.6  Come to Oregon.  We'll put you in a top 100% legal 1.6 that doesn't drop off anymore than any NB.  I've shared my this year's Majors lap times (@ 90 degrees f) and you can go look on mylaps too.  Look, there are a group of Majors/National winning drivers here that have been racing 1.6s for a dozen years.  I talk to them quite often and nobody thinks this is going to work in any way.  Mark B.  No disrespect, but we have MANY more collective years experience building top 1.6s here.  We have many hundreds (thousands?) hours of dyno time and have tried every possible configuration of pretty much anything anybody can think of.  But don't listen to the experts   

[Steve Scheifler]

Bruce, I own one VVT but have never raced SM in anything but a 1.6. A couple of times I monitored intake temps and while the difference to ambient was not as great as Mark's friend has seen, it was enough to make a meaningful difference. There simply can be no doubt that higher IATs result in less power, and considering the value we place on every HP even a 10 degree delta is meaningfull. Whether from that or a combination of IATs and other "heat soak" I observe a power drop at times later in the race, as do others.

But I'll accept your word that you have largely overcome whatever ails many of us. There are no doubt things we were missing in our testing, and soon after we were in a position to have unlimited dyno time we stopped racing. Unfortunately if what you know remains closely held secrets then the majority of 1.6 drivers will remain at a disadvantage, and it doesn't really matter why.

I'm trying to get the cars back together now and already pressed for time, but I hope to pretty much wear out a spare engine just trying things on the dyno to supplement what we can learn at the track. Any hints you might offer would be most welcome.

[Mike Babcock]

Temp on Sunday's race was 70 deg, 38% humidity.  Really not much traffic to speak of... everything cleaned up after a lap or two, and it was just Steve and I.  Lap times seem to have vanished from Race Monitor, and I don't see them up on MyLaps yet... but from memory, we were both running 1:07's throughout, with no upward trend.  I'll post them once they become available.

 

I'm not claiming this as a "magic bullet" by any stretch.  This is simply me, sharing a real-world observation that made a difference in this particular instance.  This is also a zero-dollar, minimal-effort thing that any 1.6 driver can try... and hopefully share your findings (good, bad, or otherwise) with this group.  Most importantly, you'll have a tangible experience upon which to draw your own conclusions.

 

It's painfully obvious that there's very little agreement on this forum about what the 1.6 needs to make it more competitive... including the "experts".  Some claim it's worth something, some claim it's completely worthless.  All I'm saying is maybe it's time you guys get out there and see for yourselves.  Seriously... what have you got to lose?

[OctaneNation]

Has anyone logged what the AFM intake temp sensor is reading during a race? And what about a separate standalone sensor? I'm wondering if the air temps aren't climbing as much as the sensor thinks, and the ECU is then overcompensating.

On a related note, has anyone managed to log 'commanded' ignition timing on a 1.6L while *not* on a dyno?

[Bench Racer]

Saul Speedwell and Steve Scheifler have more data than I have. Per my previous post this thread, last summer one race day the ambient temp was 89* and at my filter located at the master cylinder the intake air was 90*. A few weeks ago on a 55-60* ambient air day my intake was IIRC 83*. This Sunday at the same track my intent is to first record temp at filter and at throttle body second session and at throttle body during thirty minute race. 

[38bfast]

You have my attention