Hellmun's NB8B

[Alex]

Awesome write up, nearly motivates me enough to get my car out for some track days

[bootz]

As an NB8B noob, I think you could advise on this mod to improve torque. Works on NA and Guran says it works on NB8A. But would this timing mod work on the NB8B with the VVT head. Already using premium because of the 10-1 compression.

...... tweak your ignition timing. It's free! 14 degrees gives optimum power output. 18 degrees gives optimum mid range torque - though you may need to use 98 RON fuel to avoid pinging.

[Guran]

As an NB8B noob, I think you could advise on this mod to improve torque. Works on NA and Guran says it works on NB8A. But would this timing mod work on the NB8B with the VVT head. Already using premium because of the 10-1 compression.

...... tweak your ignition timing. It's free! 14 degrees gives optimum power output. 18 degrees gives optimum mid range torque - though you may need to use 98 RON fuel to avoid pinging.

No I didn't! I said it works on NA8. I have no idea if it's possible to advance the timing in the same way on an NB.

[marcusus]

You can do it on a NB8A, but it requires cutting of a rubber stopper/flange/something so that you can actually move the bolt that does the timing adjust. Not particularly hard, but just requires a bit of knowing which bit to take out and cut.

[bootz]

As an NB8B noob, I think you could advise on this mod to improve torque. Works on NA and Guran says it works on NB8A. But would this timing mod work on the NB8B with the VVT head. Already using premium because of the 10-1 compression.

...... tweak your ignition timing. It's free! 14 degrees gives optimum power output. 18 degrees gives optimum mid range torque - though you may need to use 98 RON fuel to avoid pinging.

No I didn't! I said it works on NA8. I have no idea if it's possible to advance the timing in the same way on an NB.

Sorry Guran, I thought the NA8 and the NB8A had the same engines, excuse me if I am wrong about that.

Both 1800 but different?

My question is will it work on NB8B 2001?

[Hellmun]

With an NA you have timing adjustment out of the box. The NB8A and 8B require some drilling to reorientate the CAS which is pretty dodgy. Much safer to run an aftermarket ECU to do it. Remember that there is no knock sensor so it's dangerous if you tune it too close to the limit and you hit a really hot day. What's the reason for specifically wanting torque? The SVT already gives you extra midrange and in addition 4:2:1 headers and a long intake tract are more biased to midrange than topend.

[bootz]

Okay if its a bit dodgey, it wouldn't seem practical for our cars. It's just that Guran's advice I might be able to use.

"tweak your ignition timing. It's free! 14 degrees gives optimum power output. 18 degrees gives optimum mid range torque - though you may need to use 98 RON fuel to avoid pinging."

Mind you I am already using 98 Ron!

I am looking for the NB8B stock torque curve graphed. Might also be nice to have it compared with stock NB8A. Can't seem to find them anywhere.

[Guran]

Thought you might like a memento of this moment Mark.


IMG_1084 by Guran5, on Flickr

[broady]

Hey Mark just thought you may be interested in my recent dyno results. Simply by inserting the silencer in my exhaust, sucked 6rwkw...! Good luck with the muffler mods

[Hellmun]

Sneaky Bryan...I didn't even hear you take that with the iphone!

Well I will start off and say that while the clutch is completely different to a standard one it did work. It also appears I didn't ruin anything afterall during the clutch install process which is a bit of a miracle. I could definitely change a clutch significantly faster now too. I also managed to give the car a clean, new set of cheap chinese tyres to keep it off the ground between trackdays and it was good for a safe trip down south of the border for the interstate challenge.



So with that out of the way I packed up, tied down the tarp and hooked up the trailor saturday morning. Then headed out to Albion Park Macca's to meet up with Bryan. Incredibly I actually arrived first 15 minutes early which was probaly a system shock for Guran. While the clutch made the car much harder to get off the line, especially with the trailor the car was managable. So we headed off and without issue for about 2.5-3 hours before I started running low on petrol. With my 4.1:1 diff, old school mania ECU and countless other mods my car isnt the most economical at the best of times. Lugging 600kg behind it exacerbated things quite dramatically. Unfortunately along the coast road towns 98 octane is a bit of a rarity. I had taken one emergency 20 litre container just incase I got stuck and that wound up being used almost immediately to coast to another town..then another. Eventually I gave up and filled the car up with some Shell premium 95 octane and figured I'd just take it easy if I heard pinging.

Unfortunately within about 30 minutes of getting that petrol the car started mis-firing and it would no longer coast. Car initially lost about the first %5 of the throttle and this gradually got worse. After about another 1-2 hours we pulled in past Batemans Bay and I filled up again on 95 in a United petrol station and this time I ran a botton of Nulan boost and clean. I also checked the electrical connections all over the car (TPS, Cam Angle sensor, Crank angle sensor, MAP, MAT etc) and found nothing loose. I also reset the ECU incase it had learnt something bad while Bryan got a burger. After all that the car worked for approximately 2 minutes before it was worse than before and I'd lost about %15 of the throttle. At this point I just lived with it and constantly sped up, slowed down as I caught up and repeated. I believe about 5-6 hours later we arrived at Phillip Island about 6:30pm and the car was still being terrible. When we arrived at the Inn I tried a trick Irwin had used when he had CAS issues. I wire-tied the sensor connectors so they were really tight.... this did absolutely nothing and the car was missing all the way to and from the dinner at the RSL so I was really panicking I wasn't going to be able to run on the trackday. Was also really starting to feel the effects of my new golden brown Truckers arm...which was rapidly becoming very red and sore . One of the consequences of no a/c though is you need to improvise to keep cool...well flailing my arm out the window in an attempted to channel air in had the done the job but at quite a cost!

Dinner with the Victorians was nice and it was great to put a lot of faces to names. Plus get a lot of knowledge shared about the track. I'd watched a few video's but hadn't really noticed just how much camber was on the track itself. About 9-10pm we retired back to the Inn and I took the bottom bunk. By this time it had started raining down pretty lightly and Me, Bryan and Phil went to bed. With the heavy rain and bush noises I think I woke up about 5 times during the night. Looked like it was going to be an incredibly wet trackday.

By 7am we all got up, had brekkie and headed off to the island. It wasn't raining anymore but the ground was soaked and the weather was incredibly cold and Windy. The car amazingly worked the entire 5 minute drive to PI without issue. When we arrived at PI we joined a massive line waiting to be let in and I hid away in the car shivering(I only brought 2 shirts and 2 pairs of shorts). Eventually we got in, I rushed straight into my Race suit to keep warm and started unpacking.

My luck pretty much continued on as expected at this point. In my toolbox I had a bottle of coolant, engine oil, gearbox oil and diff oil. Plus a can of degreaser and WD40. This was all packed in with 2 rags to protect them which was apparently grossly insufficient. The trailor had also just been used before I picked it up to carry a lot of tree offcuts. So the Degreaser and the coolant had both burst on the trip down, which then mixed with the remnant tree sap creating an incredibly slippery mess through the entire trailor. This meant the jack, my cleaning rags and the race tyres were all covered in this mess. Awesome start to the day... I think it took me about an hour to clean out the toolbox, tyres and jack between runs to a tap. Then wash up and start putting numbers, battery triangle, cleaning out the car etc... which made me late for scrutineering as usual.

Eventually though I got put in group 5 with the other first timers. Then for the practice sessions Russel Garner took me out and showed me around track which was much appreciated. Car seemed to be poorly geared for Honda and MG but otherwise the track seemed awesome. The speed and flow of Phillip island is unlike any other track I've been on.

So then while the weather turned for the worse Groups 1-4 managed to get out there with barely a drizzle of rain even though the sky looked terrible. I managed to get myself out there in position 1 for the first run and my first ever lap was a 1:59:37 which was an instant first goal achievement . Then I started hitting traffic already as some of the cars were doing over 2:40+ a lap and I had kinda gunned it as soon as the pace car left the track.

After 2 laps the rain came down enough to really slow everything down. I immediately tried too hard to overtake someone at Honda and wound up about 50 metres down the off-shoot road which is extremely conveniently placed. After the session I asked around and got myself escalated up to Group 1. For the rest of the day my lines and speed got much better but the weather warmed up and dried up. Then by the end of the day I was finding that even with better entry speed to the straight I was changing to 6th later and later. I managed to get myself down to a 1:58:23 in the last session which even included a mis-shift to 5th instead of 3rd gear. The car feels like it can go so much faster round the island I really want to try it again ASAP. Especially before I go down the turbo route as I'd love to see the car do a 1:56 or lower which I'm confident it can too if I can get more practice.

After the last sessions I rushed to clear out the garage I ended up in. Started packing the trailer and was almost finished by the time me and Russell got kicked out about 6pm. I then took a wrong turn out of PI so I could finish tying the tarp down. Then I hooked up the GPS and within 300metres the tarp ripped. So I pulled over... re-tied it and then started following the GPS...which immediately sent me to a random dirt road in the middle of nowhere . Bryan/Phil called up to find out where I was and guide me back to the Inn. Then we immediately rushed over to Princey's place for good little BBQ and relaxed for the evening in some great company.

That night I had a better sleep and in the morning we started setting back to NSW. Within about 40 minutes though I struck trouble when we filled up with Petrol and suddenly my diff started locking up crazily. I had noticed the day before there was a little oil on the diff but thought the leak was minimal and I had filled up the diff only a fews before in preparation for leaving. Turns out I'd lost a lot and I had to pull over in a back-street, jack the car up with a scissor jack and refill the diff. This entailed burning my hand repeatedly on the muffler. Bryan stuck with me though and Ray, Pam , Greg and Lesa stopped by and made sure we were ok. After that my Diff was chattering loudly for about 1.5 hours and suddenly went silent...which was a combination of a pleasant change in luck with a frightening...frightening afterthought of it being on death row. I was just hoping the oil had gotten hot enough to start separate clutch plates but there was really no way to tell and still a LONG way to go home. Following Bryan's GPS we did some dirt roads and lots of back country roads until finally hitting the highway. At this point the tarp immediately blew off and warranted another stop. We were right outside Currowa so we fixed up the tarp and headed in for some petrol and lunch. Enroute though we managed to hit a locust swarm which was a nice touch to the day. No A/C, really hot day and I didn't dare keep the windows open after being smacked in the head with one already...which was now quite unconscious sitting in the door card.

We arrived in Currowa after about 20-30 minutes and managed to not find 98 octane yet again. Thankfully I'd filled up my Jerry can again at PI so I just used that again until we got back to the expressway. After a thorough search of Currowa we eventually found the bakery (read walking up and down the street 3 times and narrowly missing it the first time ) which was well worth it. Really nice little town other than the locusts everywhere. After that we headed back to the expressway and thankfully the rest of the trip was pretty uneventful. Me and Bryan parted ways when we arrived at Albion Park about 6pm. There I unpacked the trailor for the last time and settled back upstairs to relax... where within 5 minutes of turning the PC and starting to copy the PI video the power supply popped... so I picked up a book to read. Then the fluorescent bulb in my room went out..and 6pm seemed like an excellent time to have a shower and go to bed at that point!

Thankfully the power supply was a quick fix with no after effects...however the diff is quite angry now. I decided to take the car for a drive on thursday... I needed to pull over within 5 minutes because the diff was locking and whining loudly... so hopefully it's just lost a bearing as it only happens when turning one way but just maybe I'll be up for a new centre as well. I'll find out after new Years when I take it apart as I've spent more than enough time the last 3 weeks on the car so I'm having a break. In the end we also think it wasn't a sensor but a bad batch of fuel which clogged up either the filter sock on the fuel pump or the inline filter. Both of those are on the plans to get replaced before my next trackday.

Now that the PC is back up and working I encoded all my PI laps. Here's the fastest session of the day.


I hope the fact I'm going back to PI ASAP impresses on people how much fun that circuit is to drive after all the incredible luck I had on this trip. Also thanks a lot to Phil for letting me stay with him. Plus Bryan for putting up with issue...after issue...after issue. I believe I used 110 litres of petrol getting to PI, 90 litres on the way back without the throttle issues and 45 litres on the track. Assuming I did as many km's as Bryan my car managed 1930km on 245 litres. Which puts me at a bout 12.8l/100km. A little higher than little reddy......

Thus ends what would be one of the busiest 3 weeks I've had in a long while!

[bootz]

With my 4.1:1 diff, old school mania ECU and countless other mods my car isnt the most economical at the best of times.

I know that your car is set up for track but I am wondering how you find the 4.1 on the highway at 110+ KM/hr. The sixth gear is not the best with the 4.1 for cruising. Do you feel it is a bit buzzy and tiring at over 3500rpm or do you get used to it? I know this is a subjective opinion.

A sweet little engine but the stock diff is all wrong for a n/a car. I am torn between a 4.1 for the oomph and a 3.9 for the (slightly) more flexible highway use.


I am finding your adventures a great read.

[Hellmun]

There's a lot more to it than just the diff by itself, on a relatively stock car you'll only notice the minor increase in fuel consumption and barely any noise. My car was already way worse than usual. I have the mazdaspeed engine mounts, diff brace , aftermarket intake, headers and a full exhaust. So I think it's a little more amplified than a relatively stock car and I live with it fine on some pretty long journeys. Headphones make the trip much...much nicer though. With the in-ear ones I can barely hear the car at all.

[greenMachine]

Great write-up Mark!

PI is just the greatest fun, and you have done a great time there too! Quicker than me too . I need to get my act together and do a bit of re-prioritising ...

PI is known for its weather, wet weather that is, but on both my visits it was fine all day, though it did start bucketing down as we packed up on one occasion. I would not try to be the hero in the wet there (not suggesting you were), on my first visit it was a week or so after a Golf driver was killed at Honda when he went off onto the wet grass ...

I ran the 4.1 in my 6-speed NB8A, had no problem on the highway but my car was not quite as hardcore as yours. Even with the 6-speed/4.1 and bags of Kws, it was nowhere near redline in top down Conrod - on that gearing 8000 revs was 240 kmh, and I don't think I got to 220 (might have, but I had other things on my mind around the Chase ... )

Mark, with better entry speed to the straight I was changing to 6th later and later do you mean earlier?

[Guran]

Mark, with better entry speed to the straight I was changing to 6th later and later do you mean earlier?

Nope. I had the same thing as Mark. There seemed to be more of a headwind in the afternoon, such that regardless of getting a better run out of the last turn, I too was changing into top gear further down the straight. In the morning I was into 5th before the finish line. In the afternoon I was holding 4th across the line and changing at the crest. It improved in the late afternoon, and that's when most of the Vics did their best times.

[Hellmun]

Exactly as Bryan said. I was getting more speed with worse entry down the straight in the first few sessions just due to the temperature combined with the wind. Little more practice and a nice dry cold day and I think I could do atleast 1:56 confidently..probaly even less. I definitely intend to find out hopefully later in the year. The Victorians can expect a visit during the normal track season