Lachstock and Four Turbo Charged Cylinders ['04 NB SE]

[ManiacLachy]

Yay weekend! I have time to get the car up on jack stands and sort this exhaust out! While the vibrations haven't been constant, the do occur regularly and can ruin the otherwise harmonious sounds coming from the exhaust. It was getting on my nerves. And it just so happened that the friend I visited in Bundaberg last weekend, who helped me with the install, or should I say I helped him, is down visiting me this weekend - we're off to the Formula 3 at Queensland Raceway tomorrow - so, up she went!



Clearly not as easy as using a hoist, we had to crab around on our backs, we removed all the bracing and shielding again, though probably not all of it was actually necessary. We had previously attached the midpipe using Dann's supplied U bracket to a bolt that attaches the heat shield to the car, Dann advised that this was wrong, and obviously the cause of the vibrations, the bracket should mount to a bolt on the gearbox!

So we undid the bracket and started hunting for likely candidates on the 'box. Didn't take long to work out which bolt to use and the orientation of the bracket. On it went, then back went the bracing and shielding. All up the job was quite quick Which was a massive relief because I wasn't loving crawling around on the ground. We dropped the car back down and went for a quick test drive to pick up some beer



I'm happy to report that a complete success! We found the beer we were looking for, some Grolsch swing top bottles!

Oh yeah, the fix was also a complete success, no more annoying rattles Just sweet sweet exhaust burble.

I'm definitely going to enjoy my daily commute a lot more next week! Now, time for those beers

[Roadrunner]

Glad you got it all sorted!
You'll never get tired of the exhaust note ;)

[track_addict]

You know, when I first started looking for SEs, I wasn't sold on the Sunlight Silvers, probably because of how many awesome Titanium cars are up here on the forum from MINX, Lokiel, Crapweasel and Nevyn. But this colour has really grown on me, I love it. This car is mine, no others will be like it

Yeah silver was my LEAST favourite colour. I wasn't to fond on titanium grey either and was set on a velocity red SE. But there was only 1 forsale when I was looking and it didn't fit the bill for me. The silver looks great though. Especially when its nice and clean! That's what modifying cars is all about. Making it your own!

My exhaust is going on on Saturday with the help of my mechanic. It will be a good day!

[ManiacLachy]

My exhaust is going on on Saturday with the help of my mechanic. It will be a good day!

Let us know how you get on with it, and your thoughts once its in

[ManiacLachy]

Last weekend I installed my NitroDann intake, I will do a propper write up soon, but the short version is that I was confused a few times, stupid a few times , but got the job done! (except it's not fully secured with a bracket yet). The end result is a lot of whistling and farting as the turbo spools and the BOV recerciculates, and the butt dyno says the car pulls much more strongly. The sound took a little getting used to, though after a week I'm happy.

Here's the engine bay as of now:


Alls been good, though until this morning I hadn't had a chance to wind it out into the uppper RPM band, but this morning on the way to work I took the Motorway, and it's got a nice long on ramp off the street before it does a hairpin to join up with the motorway propper, great place to put your foot down.

I think I was in 3rd or 4th, very near the redline when I heard a "pop", and power dropped. My thinking was a hose clamp gave out, and I was no longer connected to the turbo somewhere. I down shifted and slowed down, no where to stop on the on ramp, went through the hairpin and joined the motorway, power was still coming on when I pressed the throttle, I could still hear the turbo and BOV, the idiot light oil and water guages didn't move ... All seemed normal.

I carried on to work, through some stop/start traffing (the Gateway is a POS), and free flowing normal freeway driving (~100km/h), up over the Bridge (steep), all in all some vaired conditions that would test the car is working properly. No problems anywhere, though I didn't push it much above 4k RPM. The car sounded normal, responded normally to inputs. I pulled into a cafe for a breakfast roll and coffee and popped the hood to check connections, all the hoses were still in place. I picked up my breaky, drove the final 1km into the office, gave it a little bit of beans to overtake some traffic (still <6k RPM) and no problems.

So the qustion is, what did I hear? What happened? I really thought I broke something!

[Dweezle]

Sounds like over boost to me.
Fuel cut kicked in and power was cut.


Sent from my SM-N9005 using Tapatalk

[ManiacLachy]

That thought occured to me too, Dweezle, and you could be right. I've never experienced it before, scared me a little! Anyone else agree/have another thought?

[kenson]

Yep it's the infamous boost-cut. All SE owners will get it when they start tinkering/upgrading.
It usually happens when you start improving breath-ability (intake and exhaust).

You can bypass it: http://www.mazda-speed.com/forum2/index.php?topic=11873.0 but probably not a good idea

Even with a manual boost controller (Turbosmart) I would still creep to boost cut sometimes if it was colder.

Safe solution is aftermarket ECU.

[Lokiel]

Yep it's the infamous boost-cut. All SE owners will get it when they start tinkering/upgrading.
It usually happens when you start improving breath-ability (intake and exhaust).

You can bypass it: http://www.mazda-speed.com/forum2/index.php?topic=11873.0 but probably not a good idea

Even with a manual boost controller (Turbosmart) I would still creep to boost cut sometimes if it was colder.

Safe solution is aftermarket ECU.

Prior to my Adaptronic ECU, I installed the boost cut mod and FM O2 mod - it sorted out this issue but is really only a "band-aid mod" (woth doing until you get an aftermarket ECU).

[ManiacLachy]

Cool, thanks all! So, is it safe to hit boost cut? Or should I be wary of it?

ECU and boost controller are in the pipeline, but a little ways off just yet.

[ManiacLachy]

Alright, I better write up this NitroDann CAI install before I forget stuff!

Last Sunday I was feeling a little restless, and I could hear the leftover parts calling to me from my garage shelf, I went out to just see if I could work out how this whole thing would go together, and next minute -


My there's a hole in my engine bay, and my stock intake is sitting on the ground. Take a look at it, is it any wonder that replacing this mess improves performance? Mazda really did strangle this car out of the factory. I know MCM did a test on intakes and reckon they don't do much, I say it depends on the car you're working on!


The removal really is straight forward. I recommend downloading and printing off the AEM intake instructions, regardless of where you get you SE CAI from, it's well detailed, lots of pictures, and will help you work out what goes where on your kit.

I ran into one issue after the removal as I started test fitting Dann's bits and pieces. I couldn't work out how the hell it was all going to fit, and what went where. Nothing seemed to fit up to the turbo inlet. I was starting to panic! I had to have the car back on the road by the end of the day, I needed it to get to work on Monday! I PM'd Dann, but I don't think he comes online on Sundays, must want a day off or something. I PM'd Lokiel and tried to bribe him to pay me a visit, but he was otherwise occupied and didn't get my message until later that night.

Then I realised I hadn't removed the stock rubber elbow from the turbo inlet! The one everyone complains is a real PIA to remove. Anyway, after a few slices with a Stanley knife - there really is no way to remove this thing without cutting, it's fused tight and you can't get to the back of it to insert something to separate the rubber from the metal - I had it off and things made a lot more sense!

After a few test fits of the pieces and some deep thinking on what hoses go where, I had it sorted out and was ready to clamp it all down! All done, except one thing, the rig wasn't bracketed anywhere! Dann supplied a piece of metal, that would bolt on to the car under the MAF, but I couldn't see where it would connect to on the intake, or how! I thought maybe the intake just rested on it?


I couldn't work it out, and just figured I would have to drive it as is. So I went for a quick test run for a couple of Ks. Now I can hear the turbo spooling! Now I can hear the blow off valve! Now I've got some real pace! The end result:


Note Dann's solution leaves the relay bracket where it is in the stock configuration. Also, I should have removed that brass bracket the stock airbox bolted on to, and now have. The hose from the BOV into the turbo that runs around the back of the engine will need to be rerouted. There's nothing really wrong with it currently, just it doesn't look nice Probably run it along the front when I get a chance.

Well that was as far as I got Sunday. Drove the car without a hitch until Yesterday when I hit boost cut and scared the crap out of myself thinking I'd broken something! I'm loving the extra power. At first I wasn't too sure about the noises coming from under the hood, but I have gotten used to them. That said, I would like to look in to building an isolation/hush box around it at some point.

I've now got all 3 "essential" improvements to the power train sorted, all from NitroDann. If anyone else gets his kit and has questions, please feel free to PM and I'll do my best to help.

A slight update to come from today's work

[ManiacLachy]

During the week I had a bit of a back and forth chat with Lokiel, and we arranged to meet this morning at Automotive Plus before heading back to his place to see if we couldn't sort out this bracket issue. And I finally got to see Gina in the flesh, beautiful car, and that engine bay! Also, who did we see in reception? None other than Crapweasel! It was like an unoffical meeting of the Brisbane SE owners

Back at Lokiel's we decided to fabricate a bracke that would bolt to the body of the car, and use the two holes on the side of the MAF to secure the intake into position. Lokiel is an ace at this stuff, and taught me a lot. In no time he'd mocked up a bracket in cardboard, cut, bent and drilled a piece of aluminium, and secured the intake. BAM!



Then we decided to move those relays anyway Lokiel did his magic once again, and we had another bracket setup behind the intake holding all 3 relays, and looking pretty damn good.



Lokiel really is quite a pro at this. All the brackets are secure, and he cut a little rubber foot pad for each bolt that connects to the car's body, giving a little bit of a cushion, and prevents the car from being scratched up. I owe him many thanks for his work today I really enjoy meeting other MX5 owners, you really are the best, and Lokiel went above and beyond in helping me. I hope one day to pay it forward

Final engine bay as it is right now - looks pretty good I think :

[Nevyn72]

Nice work!..... and kudos to Lokiel for helping out another forum member in need.

But please stop now, you're in danger of overtaking me in terms of doing mods to your car......

[Crapweasel]

Car looks (and sounds) fantastic Lachy!

Great to see you & Simon today, I think we need to do a SE photoshoot - it's been many years since the Great Triplets shoot of 2009. (Minx, BitRusty & Crapweasel SE1)

[Nevyn72]

Great to see you & Simon today, I think we need to do a SE photoshoot - it's been many years since the Great Triplets shoot of 2009. (Minx, BitRusty & Crapweasel SE1)

Yeah, but Lokiel's got to get Gina running again first!