MBS206

Mark, as you're keeping the big SS monster, which you can use for longer trips etc, and you're wanting something with the ModCons, and some sporty zip, have you considered an EV? Depending on how many KMs you do a year, from now to the 70 year old Mark, it may work out cheaper to go a new EV. I presently drive the Kona EV, and now in my mid 30s, I prefer driving it in traffic over any car I have access to. To the point, unless I want to go for a spirited drive, I'd rather drive it over even the missus Liberty GT-B, which is a car I quite enjoy. It handles pretty nicely (Especially for a small SUV style car). I guess have a really low center of gravity really helps it. On the rare occasion I actually press the brake pedal, I nearly headbutt the front window. But in general, I use regen braking nearly everywhere. But you want to go quick, just push the quiet pedal, and it gets up and zips off and away! Has all the mod cons of the AC, the cruise, the safety bells and whistles (Some of which I've personally switched off, but they might be good to keep a soon to be 70 year old safe ) Oh, also runs a 500KM range, in winter as I'm smashing both heater and AC, and the fan pretty hard, my range drops to about 400 usable KMs. But in summer, I'm legit getting 500KM range, and that is using AC too. Using the regen braking, and smooth (not slow, just smooth) acceleration really helps. Oh, and at current electricity prices, it's under $3/100km to put electricity in it. If your SS is anything like my VT SS was, you're using around 18L/100km easily around town... At $2/L, the SS would be costing about $36 / 100KM to run... So the EV really does save it. But that being said, you need to spend a bit more to buy it up front due to the batteries (Sort of pre-paying for fuel). Hence my comment on depending how many KMs you do. But realistically, you could drive from Sydney to Goulburn, shove it on the slow charger when you get down there (Normal power point) for 5 hours, and get back to Sydney again and still have 50KM left over. Stop off at a fast charger (I'm expecting Goulburn has one by now) for lunch, and you'd be fully charged and back on the road by the time lunch finishes, so you'd be back in sydney with 200KM of range still available. Park it back in your garage (Or just outside it) on the charger overnight, come back out and you're good to go. Want more freedom than that for a trip down randomly, well, you've still got the dinosaur eating V8 tucked away Note: It may not fit your situation depending how enjoyable you find it to drive, or the number of KMs you do a day, or even how often you want to take the daily on long trips vs the commodore when you hit retirement, but I find being able to sit side by side with most of the "fast kids" in their P Plate cars pretty funny, especially since you don't need to shift gears or worry about the launch, so they actually get pissed off when the EV goes past them Depending on the KMs you do daily, and how many you expect to keep doing daily running around in retirement, a decent EV would be a good daily driver, especially once you hit retirement. (DVA Gold gets you a good discount on electricity doesn't it?)

Nek minnit, Mark is selling the SS for an N spec Hyundai...

My current daily drive has no cat converter. My previous daily driver has no cat converter. Granted, previous one is old school Diesel. Current one is an EV

Not an RB, but our EJ25T has been on the same set of plugs for over 100k KMs... No idea what's in the motor cause screw changing shit on a daily if it's not needed!!!

Maybe you got your radiator and header tank so quick as they forgot to weld it together fully

It will when they line up preparing to ban petrol vehicles outright...

Also, still waiting on diagnosis as to what let the coolant out... I'm presuming you only filled, and werent pressure testing, so worst case is something like Welch plug not in correctly or missing... However, I suspect something more normal, like, someone forgot to connect a heater hose to the heater box properly, or missed one of the many random lines under the plenum. And that's making Brett consider just selling the whole thing rather than trying to get back under the plenum in a GTR to fix a fiddly hose

In 10 years time, own anything that runs on petrol and you'll be fisted by the EPA, PETA, and the Greens

Just turn VLSD into a Stick Locker... Least then you know it'll spin both...

I would start with a complete bleed of the brake system too with fresh brake fluid. Most fade people get on the street is either from pads not suited to the driving, or old fluid that isn't happy anymore.

Watching both videos, at least T2 and T3, his mate drives a different line on T2. Added to this, at the apex he's about 5kmh slower than Dose is. By being slower, it gives him the ability to get on the throttle sooner, so by corner exit, he's already faster speed wise than Dose is. This equates to being quite a bit faster at the braking marker of the next turn. It also sounds like he's giving smoother and more subtle inputs on the steering wheel. T2 sounded like it was a huge rip in on the wheel, and then some wood saw action to regain front end traction. I'd recommend adding a GoPro setup to film your steering wheel work, and one down to film your pedals if you really want to start to analyse and improve your track driving.

Funnily enough the person who would want it runs Motec. And I myself spend a shit tonne of my working time doing reverse engineering of CANBUS, and Electronics Engineering ha ha. Just no time left to take on more projects (I have enough already right now ) Keep me in the loop on what you're doing

Got link to the specific device you're using? I know someone who may be interested in one for his production race car.

Where did you buy all the rubbers for around the doors etc?

Is that an IR setup to get a reading across the tyre, not just a single temperature per wheel?

Adz, is you're issue the steering column shaft going past the starter? Some of the Barra guys grab a GTS4 or GTR rack. Moves rack to column point further away from motor.

When you say full hard on the rear and soft on the front, what do you mean exactly? Spring stiffness? Or shock bound / rebound?

Raising front to rear is wayyyyyyyyyyy more complicated than weight transfer. It changes all of your suspension geometry, and one of the main things it will change is how the car rolls in a corner. Typically, ass up moves the rear roll point higher, and will make the car be more responsive, and too much up, can cause it to become unstable and want to snap about. Front up typically will make it want to do the opposite and be "more stable". However, just having the rear X higher than the front, doesn't guarantee this. Changing the height of the vehicle overall, also affects where the roll centres sit, and how the roll centres move as the suspension cycles. (Remember all that bump steer kind of stuff, yep, it all comes into play). At the same time, it will shift the centre of gravity in the car, typically mildly forward. But it'll be a pretty darn small movement, that driving on the street, I doubt anyone would notice that change in weight transfer as affecting traction. Interestingly too when you look at traction for acceleration, vs turning, a 50/50 weight balance (and the more you get to it) is best for turning. However, for drag racing, while you do want weight on the rear wheels for getting off the mark, having the weight as far forward of the rear wheels in terms of bias, is actually better, and you also want it as low as possible too. Want it to hook better, soften the rear springs up as much as possible, while keeping front roll point low. Go to a larger profile tyre and smaller rim size. Also check out what the suspension is doing on take off, commodores are atrocious that as they squat, they'll dial in quite a few degrees extra camber. It's why all those lowered commodores have epic camber until they fit a "camber kit" which still doesn't properly help dynamic camber issues.

You know they make an LS to Patrol gearbox bellhousing? At least then you'd have some Nissan back in your garage

So, life decided to fill my weekends up a fair bit and I've only just been managing little minutes here and there. I had been slowly working through the full centre panel for mounting switches, as well as a panel for mounting the fuse panel and relay holders to. After a few CAD (Cardboarded Aided Designs), I transferred everything to real CAD, and then pushed it through CAM and spent Sunday evening with the CNC Laser cutter. I had built a couple of months back an Acrylic Bender for this project specifically, and tonight I took the chance to bend the panel up as needed, and mock mount most of it. Hopefully my spare time, and my body hold up on the weekend, and I'll get this actually in properly. There is two small little bits still to draw and cut for the fuse panel, but they're just as added strength for it, as well as additional mounting points for the relays.

Hey, Sorry, didn't see this message. I don't recall any issues with it off the top of my head. I remember it was tight back there between motor, firewall, and inner guard area to get exhaust through.

Well, that saves Mark from needing to research further! I've not looked at the strategy fully of the VZ, got any links for brief read on its strategy and why it's not a proper torque based ECU?

On the topic of throttle reduction, typically that is something a modern ECU will do later on if skip doesn't reduce. Cutting a cylinder is an instantaneous loss of torque to X degree. Adjusting throttle position has a time delay associated with it, as it takes time to start to get the butterfly to rotate even with a good motor on the butterfly. It's a physical item that needs moving, and there is also a bit of a time delay for power to drop away once the throttle has moved due to physics of moving things, such as the air through the runners. Killing an injector stops torque on that cylinder immediately, while closing the throttle might take 5 to 10 more revolutions depending on a lot of variable factors (rpm of engine, inlet design, blah blah blah). I know the Ford Falcon ECU it has a plethora of strategies to reduce torque for TCS, starting with injector cut, and all the way through to closing the throttle (depending on the Barra motor, and my memory it also does things like altering cam advance as this will affect torque too). They have a pretty cool complicated setup in them to do so. It's all tuneable on the Barra ECU

Hey Mark @The Bogan The VX SS ECU, it's a cable throttle isn't it? From memory one of the LS1 engines (VY I think) is DBW, and the ECU uses a torque management tune, rather than matching fuel to air. Possibly able to swap from VX to VY ECU and DBW easily, and then with HPTuners, part of the torque management strategy will be speed, you just reduce torque requested based on speed and TPS.

Just to add to this, it can also save on the old money shifts that happen. Eg 5th back to 2nd can no longer happen. 6th back to 3rd cant happen. And yes, those shifts have occured, and destroyed engines. I'm sure everyone has also had a mis shift like 2nd to 5th at least once while giving a H pattern some fun.