Charlie Brown's NC

[CoffeeBoss]

Matt, I'm unsure what your query is.
If it's about power across the rev range, the dyno graph laid new output over old and showed a consistent increase from around 3,000rpm.

Yeah, that's what I was looking for - I mean, too often dyno results are expressed in changes to peak power, but if there's less power further down and more up top, the whole dynamic is changed, the car is only faster at WOT.
If you are seeing more power at a given rpm from 3000rpm all the way up, that's great, because effectively there's significantly (for the changes being made) more 'area under the graph' then you had before.
So the car will feel faster more of the time.

• The fly-by-wire throttle lag is gone, any throttle change is instant.

Oh wow, - to my mind, that's a massive bonus!

[Charlie Brown]

This is the “report back” on the Deckspeed flash after running the June Club Track Day at Wakefield.

The biggest plus?
Being able to pull to the new 7,300 redline exiting corners and therefore not upsetting the balance of the car through some of the corners.
I still need to either bounce it off the rev limiter in 3rd at T3 and before the Fish Hook or do a quick change into 4th, it’s just that I’m arriving at those corners 300 rpm faster.

Improvement in times on the track?
It’s been a long time since I set my previous PB at Wakefield, way back in October 2010 with a 1:10.68. Last year the best was a 1:10.80 and this year at a Supersprint in April, a 1:11.28, so I was slowing down. With the flash yesterday I managed a 1:10.33, which I’m extremely happy with given that I had limited laps to really get into the groove as the car was intermittently missing due to a cracked or broken harness wire connecting to #4 cylinder COPS. The car need 2 – 3 laps to warm the wire enough to expand and get the connection and stop the misfire.
So I’d say with everything working at 100% the flash is worth about ¾ second a lap, which is impressive.

Next target. – Get a road registered NC into the 1:09’s. A big call I know but I think it can be done. Ralph is likely to be the first as his driving is outstanding at the moment but I think with the right conditions, the flash might just get the car there.

Any drawbacks?
The only one at the moment, it needs a remap of the throttle response. I want it backed off a little as it’s too touchy for day to day driving. It’s very hard to drive it smoothly on a neutral, just on / off throttle.

Would I recommend it?
Yes, it’s cheaper than fitting a 4.1 diff and you get a similar performance result and you’ll love that extra power.

[deanb90]

awesome news mate, well done.

[Charlie Brown]

What I didn't report after the last track day was that I cracked both front rotors. They were the DBA slotted street version, bought back in 2009 and had done numerous track days, 5 sets of track pads, one machine job and around 56,000 kilometres on the road, so I suppose it was to be expected.

On Saturday I fitted a set of front DBA Club Spec T3’s rotors and some Techna-Fit SS braided brake hoses bought from the US as they were over $50 less than buying them here and they were delivered to my door with a set of pads and the SS lines included in the transport cost. It’s crazy that we sell our products overseas for less than we sell them here.

At yesterday’s Supersprint event at Sydney Motorsport Park (read Eastern Creek), I was very impressed with the way they worked. I could confidentially go just past the 100 metre mark and brake for the T2 turn. I should have done the SS lines years ago.

[Charlie Brown]

Another modification for the NC, done just before the FoSC event at Sydney Motorsport Park South Circuit held on 28th September.
It was the first race event to be held at the circuit with 160 cars entered. A State Supersprint event was held there two weeks earlier but this was the first “nose to tail” race day.

I don’t really treat the brakes lightly on the track so I did a dodgy modification with some high temperature ducting (2 metres long from eBay in the UK) to help cool the front rotors.

I removed the fog lights, cut a hole in the under guard, reshaped the backing plate slightly and drill 4 x 3mm holes in it so I was able to wire the duct to the backing plate. Then using 1 metre of duct I attached it with zip ties to the fog light housing, to the under guard, the sway bar and with wire to the backing plate. I did a check with the 16 x 8 rims to ensure that everything cleared on full lock.

Did it work? I think so, not as much dust on the rims but I found the new Hawk Blue pads still had all the paint burnt off them when I swapped back to my street pads.

Here’s a couple of shots of the job and the car at the FoSC event. There were 26 cars on the circuit at one time for my “regularity” event that made it hard to get a clear run. We have a 5 lap practice session then three events of 4 laps, not enough to really learn the best way around the circuit. Still I managed a 1:05.0467 which was the second fastest time in the regularity group behind a PRB Clubman.

The inlet mount:


Ducting coming through the under guard to the backing plate:

[Charlie Brown]

Time for an update.
As you may have previously read I had a Dynotronics tune installed on my car about 6 months ago. Power went up but there were a few problems with the tune. Hunting on constant throttle and after a dyno check at Ricol, it appeared that the fuel / air ratio needed some work as it was lean up top in the revs. Power output at Ricol was 105.3kW with the stock muffler fitted.

Today I headed out to Deckspeed to have this tune removed and a new one installed. Rather than have the stock muffler, I fitted my race muffler to have the tune done.

Daniel has a hub dyno so we did the first pull with the old tune on it pulled 108.5kW / 192.4Nm.

The new Deckspeed tune was downloaded and another pull done. The air / fuel was out a little so some adjustments were made and a new run done. The result. 112.2kW and 195.4Nm. now for Wakefield.

[PaulF]

Not a huge power gain, but does it cruise more smoothly now?

[Charlie Brown]

Just some more details and photos from yesterday.

First up the dyno sheet. It's a bit hard to see but the lower plot line in red is the old Dynotronics tune . The middle plot line is the initially loaded Deckspeed EcuTeK.
The top plot line is a “tweeked” version where some changes were made to the air/fuel mixture up top to give a little more fuel.



The connecter bolted to the hub.



On the hub dyno.

Not a huge power gain, but does it cruise more smoothly now?

No not a huge power gain on the previous tune, mostly above 4,500rpm, but compared to the stock figure of 91KW, it represents a 23% increase and now I don't have to worry about 14.7:1 A/F at 3 - 4,000rpm and high 13's at 7,000rpm.
To gain an accurate A/F reading Daniel added another bung hole in the mid pipe to attach the O2 sensor for the dyno rather than using the exhaust tip sensor.

As for a smooth cruise, I'm yet to try that out.

For the NA & NB guys, this is not a piggy back or an aftermarket stand-alone ECU tune. This is the OEM Mazda unit, retuned to suit the changes I have made to the exhaust and intake, so there is no effect to any other component controlled by the ECU.

[Guran]

Great info Phil! What's the story with the wobbly torque curve below 3000rpm? Is that there in the stock tune too?

[Charlie Brown]

Great info Phil! What's the story with the wobbly torque curve below 3000rpm? Is that there in the stock tune too?

I think it's because the car didn’t like to start in fourth gear, so it moved around a bit (read: jump up and down about 50mm) as the revs built and everything smoothed out.

This is the first time I’ve seen a modern hub dyno in operation. Some of the information feed into the computer before starting was; car weight, wheel diameter, gear and diff ratio’s, etc. The car isn’t tied down, just hooked to the dyno which just sits on four caster wheels on the garage floor with the weight of the car on it.

After the first EcuTeK tune was loaded and a run done, there were numerous tuning graphs and sheets produced that were way too complicated for me to understand, yet Daniel pointed out the spark advance/retard/pull, fuel mix, etc, etc, which were effecting the results and adjusted them to improve the output while keeping the tune to my requests that it be on the safe side of the scale, which was why we dropped the rev limiter from the previous 7,500 down to a safer level.

Deckspeed is the only workshop in the country at this time that offers immediate, in house tuning and adjustment. No waiting while overseas operators analise your data and then send it back to you to load up and then hope that they got it right the first time and you don't need to repeat the process because you have an Aussie ECU and Aussie fuel.

[Charlie Brown]

Wooo Hooo!!!!

Wakefield Park 20 January 2013

Fastest Lap 1:09.65

The first registered Mazda MX-5 NC to go under the 1 min:10 sec barrier. And some say NC's are barges

Thought I’d start with a bit of adrenalin charged exhilaration. I'm wrapped with the result that I've been trying to achieve on the last few outings at the track.

The difference from previous events I put down to a Sparco race seat, bought from Guy, that let me steer the car rather than holding on to the wheel to stop moving around on the leather seats and steer at the same time. I also tried out later braking and earlier throttle application, as in the Bryan Shedden “Throw Caution to the Wind Racing School” style, though it did get me into trouble a few times with off track adventures at T2, T5 (twice) and T10.

Hayden’s SP breaking a wheel in front of me at T3/T4 was quite entertaining also, a video will follow after editing.

[Regie]

Wow. Awesome phill. Great time. I have some catching up to do!!

[Hjt]

Hayden’s SP breaking a wheel in front of me at T3/T4 was quite entertaining also, a video will follow after editing.

Hey mate when your video is edited post it up, i'll push the data across to my other thread and would like to send it to 949 racing.

Very impressed with your new PB. It was looking to be a great day

[Sailor]

Great work Phil.....I know the silent one will be working hard to catch up asap

[Charlie Brown]

Great work Phil.....I know the silent one will be working hard to catch up asap

Yes, the Silent Assassin won’t take it lightly. He was very gracious after that lap and another one where I slipped under his old record. I’m sure he’s plotting something for next time, as I did when I struggled to hold him off. He has the uncanny ability of doing the best time in the last session of the day.

I really enjoy the close competition though and the fun ribbing that goes on. I have a video from yesterday where I chased and caught him and then could sit back and see where he was faster. His 4.1 diff pulled a car length out of the Fish Hook and again out of T10. Straight line speed was pretty even when I had the tow.
We had different lines through some corners and it was interesting to see his front inside wheel coming off the road through the tight corners. To bad the video doesn’t really show it.

To be able to drive at 9.999/10ths behind someone knowing their skill level is a great buzz. Really there's nothing between us, it just comes down to who's "on" for the day.