Project Scope Creep

Started by moca2cv, October 8, 2020, 09:49

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moca2cv

Quote from: puma2 on October  7, 2022, 07:11:) brilliant end result 8)
must have stomach  turning and bag of nerves when you look at your 2  when damage >:(  >:(
just such a horrible feeling for you. :(  :(

Hopeful your mate helped you out big time from this :(  :(

i bet your mum and you had a great time and what quality time together will never be forgotten 8)  8)

now enjoy your 2 all looking spot on and ready for its next outing  :)  :)

think it may to good looking now to use on the trac :))  :))     
 

Thanks! No ill will towards my friend, he's a good mate who made a mistake, it's just a car :) I was more worried for him than the car if I'm honest, fortunately a reverse entry into a tyre wall is fairly kind on the body. Heartbreaking to see someone so gutted about something.

Mum had a great time and is keen to have another go, I'll get her out at Brands if I can, although that's a slightly scarier track!

Car is definitely a 10 footer, but it'll look good out on track 😁

moca2cv

So my daughter wanted to bring the race car in to school for show and tell, and it's this Friday 😬 so I was forced to pull my finger out and get some sh*t done. I've also booked an alignment and corner weighting the following Monday, so had to get even more sh*t done.

First up: battery relocation. The Innovative mount has no proper mounting point for the OEM battery tray, so in the bin that goes. I considered my options and decided to go for the frunk. Reasons being: I'm adding a fair bit of weight over the rear with some bracing, and moving the battery to the front means I can take the spare wheel out and hopefully end up with a net zero weight loss/gain and not upset the balance.
I started with the engine end - a junction box connected the OEM +ve cables to the extension cable, which I ran down under the car and along the tunnel with the coolant hoses. No A/C so loads of room. The box was then bolted to the strut tower. Earth cable - battery terminal straightened out and looped round to secure on strut tower. Additional earth cable run from gearbox to under the car along with +ve, probably overkill but can't hurt. So much room for activities now.
At the other end, I decided to put the battery in the bin. I like having the storage space, it's useful! I found that the smaller battery I had actually fitted under the spare wheel!!! Which means I have a spare when out and about, and a gazebo weight at the track, too. Handy! Bolted in my battery tray, and secured the battery. Now because the bin needs to be removed for some jobs, I wanted to make it as easy to remove as possible, so rather than design it so that it requires a huge amount of dismantling, I installed a cut off switch for the -ve (it's only to save the battery, I won't be able to disconnect it while driving), and a battery fuse for the +ve, and run cables to each. I just need to disconnect an Earth point and the fuse and I can lift the whole bin and battery out in one piece. Nifty! See my Instagram for a tour 😉 Thankfully my crimps and wiring were good enough as the car started. Big relief!!!

As I've got corner weighting booked, I needed to get the braces in. Better to have those all fitted as I don't want to have to do it too often!
In between coats of rust converter and black paint for my second hand FL front brace, I fitted a Snelbaard RMB and TAB (Rear Member Brace and Toe Arm Brace). The RMB comes in three parts - a main X brace between subframe and fuel tank mounts, and a trailing arm brace either side. The hardest bit about this job was getting the suspension arm nut off. My impact wrench ran out of juice so I had to resort to muscle, and there's just not a lot of room to swing a breaker bar on axles stands, plus I'm a bit of a weed 😂 Once they were off, I stuck a jack under the fuel tank, and whipped out the two bolts there.
A little bit of jiggling was required - I suspect having a tyre wall bump has knocked everything out ever so slightly, I was expecting a lot worse! - but I was able to jimmy it in to place ok.
I tackled the TAB next to give myself a break, and the Ed impact wrench had power at this point, so that took all of 5 minutes.
The trailing arm braces were a bit of a d*ck as I couldn't get the impact wrench on the bolts, so had to use ratchets, and, again, I am a weed. Wheels off really helped speed things up as it meant I didn't need to crawl under from the back. I made this job harder for myself as I wanted the nuts on top of the brace, which made it fiddly, but there's nothing I hate more than bolts sticking out at the floor, even if there's loads of clearance... you won't see any on my car 😁 Braces look great, super happy with them! 11/10 would recommend for ease of fitting and quality, tap up Boris on here or IG.

On to the front FL brace. I had originally ordered (and paid for) a Megillian front brace. But despite the car going to their shop for a half cage and other braces, I didn't get this one. I eventually gave up hope of ever seeing it and started shopping for a different one. Boris was the first port of call - sexy AF braces - but I'd also found an undertray that bolts straight to the FL front brace made by some company that went out of business, this was unfitted and not silly money so I went for the FL brace! The fancy aftermarket ones are probably no stiffer anyway, and with the undertray it's bound to be even stiffer.
As mentioned, the brace got a few liberal coats of rust converter after a good wire brush, and some black paint to finish it off (worst job ever, I suck at painting and I ran out of paint 😂). The original PFL braces came out ok, no drama there. I tried putting all the separate arms in one by one, as having a centre brace pushes the rear mating surface inwards, but that meant I couldn't get a nut on to secure the tray... so I had to assemble off the car and then lift in in one piece. The holes on the tray weren't slotted, but very accurate. A few love taps with a hammer to bend the rear mounts inwards a mm and the whole lot went in great. Looks the business but I am worried about it drumming... time will tell.

Other jobs I had to do include putting a grill on the front bumper. It came with some aftermarket aluminium mesh but it looks tired so quickly. I went for some ABS honeycomb instead, and I'm glad I did - it looks great. Fitting was a doddle - I started with a rectangle bigger than the opening, secured it all down, then trimmed off the excess. I did have to trim the fog light screw posts to make the honeycomb sit flush with the opening, but since I won't be spending big bucks on the fogs for this bumper I attacked them with a Stanley knife. Some of the OEM mounting tabs needed a trim, too, to get the honeycomb to line up, but I was surprised how close it was from the off.
I did both sides, just need to figure out if it's worth doing the centre top vent. I'll probably leave it for now, it's an awkward shape and angle for the honeycomb.
Tomorrow I'm going to slap some at the back so I have something to put a number plate on. I've placed an order for a fibreglass TTE copy infill which will look spot on with the short plates, but that won't be ready for show and tell.

All in all a very productive weekend! I'm hoping to be able to take the new wheels and tyres (I went for 888s) to the tyre shop tomorrow, and also get those last few bits finished off, then I think apart from some tidying up here and there it'll be good to go for a track day on 26th November!

Some pics:




moca2cv

Spent lunchtime finishing off the last few bits:

Fitted honeycomb mesh to the upper bumper vent - fiddly but worthwhile, looks great.

Was about to put bumper on when I suddenly had a brainwave to check the lights worked first! Glad I did, the side light on the nearside wasn't working. But then it was. Then it wasn't. The legs had relocated to the side so not making a good connection, easy fix :)

Bumper back on and lined up best I can.

Tow hooks on front and rear. Put the rear on the offside as that leg hasn't been smacked. Don't need a tow doing more damage...

Rear number plate plinth. Screwed the plate to my old shortened plinth (cut the middle out to make it overall the same length as the opening), then screwed that to the side trim pieces. Looks a bit... cobbled together, but will do until I get a TTE infill.

Happy with how it looks! Dropped the new wheels and tyres at the tyre shop this morning so hoping they'll be ready today or tomorrow. Fingers crossed!






Topdownman

I'm sure the kids will be impressed by your hover car!
"Racing" tax disc holder (binned), Poundland air freshener, (ran out), Annoying cylinder deficiency,  (sorted),
Winner of the Numb bum award 2017
Readers Ride

06 not V6 readers ride

moca2cv

Quote from: Topdownman on November 15, 2022, 16:10I'm sure the kids will be impressed by your hover car!

😂😂😂 it's an MR2 Skyster at the moment 😂😂😂

moca2cv

Got the wheels on, wiped it down, did the show and tell. The kids loved it, and my daughter's teacher was something of a petrolhead when she was younger as it turns out! Used to own an RSturbo... Explains why it got approved 😂




Hammond

Love the colour! The graft has paid off, looking really smart now.
05' silver

moca2cv

Quote from: Hammond on November 29, 2022, 19:03Love the colour! The graft has paid off, looking really smart now.

Thanks! But hold that thought...

In preparation for my upcoming trackday at Brands Hatch, I booked myself in for an alignment and corner weighting. Well on arrival I unfortunately found out that the poor chap had Covid! So that didn't happen. As I was going to be chilling at a mate's nearby anyway I just hung out there, and he suggested we pop down to the place he uses for alignments, so we did. The guys took their time and got some decent numbers, but they didn't quite tally up with what my eyes were seeing. But it's a hunter, right? I was in a hurry to get back for a call so left it at that.

A few days later I was just eyeballing the car and it was obvious something was wrong with the rear toe - it looked like it was crabbing! So I tweaked that until it looked right. I trust my eyes, I managed to align a Caterham perfectly with no equipment before and I figured anything would be better than how it was. I also tweaked the front camber a bit, too.

I packed up the car for the track day, along with all the tools to tweak settings as necessary.

The track day started well - arrived in plenty of time, signed on, car unloaded, sighting laps done. It was cold and the track damp, but should be no issue for the 888s. The track then opened, and I gave it the customary 10 minutes to let the heroes go out for a bit and calm down (I'd already had a civic overtaking on the sighting laps!) and then joined the queue to go out.

I pootled round Paddock, dilly-dallied around Druids, then fed in some power then WEEEEEE the car span so quickly I had no idea what was happening. On to the grass and slowly bumped the tyre wall square on. F**K.

The car had stalled on impact and I just waited there for a moment stunned that I'd lasted an entire 30 seconds before ruining my car. Again. Then I came to, restarted the car, and managed to turn around on the wet grass and rejoin the track, heading slowly back to the pits.

At this point I had no idea what the damage was, and my passenger remarked that no one we drove past was grimacing so it can't be that bad. He was right - the bumper had lost a couple more mounting points, lost a bit of paint, and gained a crack, and the tow hook bracket was a little bent. The crash bar hadn't even been touched, the bonnet was fine, and so were the lights. Result!

We whipped off the bumper, removed some clumps of grass, straightened out the tow hook, got the bumper back on with the help of a couple of zip ties, and we were good to go again. The chap from MSV came over to check in on us, and we had a good chat, then I chilled for a bit to mull over what happened.

It didn't take long to figure out that driver error was not the only factor at play... You might remember that I'd recently fitted the 888s to the new wheels. Well, not only were they not scrubbed in yet, but in my excitement to be back on track I hadn't checked the pressures after fitting... they were all at around 40 psi 😭 Basically Fisher Price wheels. I am a total idiot.

I consulted with some friends on pressures, went for 24/26 cold to start with, then went out to try to find my confidence again. It took a while but by the end of the day, I was having a great time again. Phew.

Did some measuring using the Dragy Lap Timer, and recorded a 1:03.23 as my best time. I was hoping for sun-1:05 (roughly what I did in the dry last year) so was really happy with that! I have a few more kgs to lose and a lot more skill to acquire so fingers crossed for a sub-1:00 next year! I know the car can do it, just a question of whether I can.














puma2

 :-* sounds like you did just kiss that tyre wall luckily :)
is all a learning curve for next time and back to basic checks having said that all the excitement to just get out on trac i can understand :)

most important thing is your safe and so little work needed on the 2  :)

so get back out to what the 2 does best witch is put the fun into a drive even more so when set up for the trac.

get out there and enjoy that a order :))  :))  :))

moca2cv

Oh man have I neglected this thread. And the car...

So what's happened since last year? Not a lot really. I've barely driven the thing. I've been extremely busy organising Formula G and also had a baby (our second) in January, so life has been a bit full on.

I organised a novice day for Formula G, and my brother in law borrowed the car for it. Turns out the MR2 is not a bad little platform for gymkhana. It wasn't the only MR2 there, either!

Prep for that was basically throw some tools in the car and hope it'll be fine. I didn't even check the oil. Only one issue all day and that was the steering wheel nut loosening itself - easy fix. But I'd be lying if I said it wasn't a bit odd watching everyone enjoy my car but me :(

Looked good going round at least.

Fast forward a few weeks and I heard about a new car show local to me, so decided to support it and have a stand for Formula G there. To make it stand out, I thought I'd stick the MR2 on the stand, but that meant I needed to sort my bumper. My friend persuaded me to DIY (I've never done bodywork) and I honestly found it incredibly painful. The finish isn't great, the match isn't great, and the bumper doesn't fit all that well anymore either having been bumped. Better than it was though I guess.

The stand was a success, lots of kids enjoyed jumping in the car, and we set up the lights too so people could test their reaction times.

Now rounds 1 & 2 at Santa Pod are looming this week - I've been flat out and completely neglected the car. I've got a track day at Llandow on 8 July, so will do an oil change before if I can, I also want to bleed the brakes. I did manage to fit a JDM airbag cubby, but apart from the stickers I have been remiss...












image ru

moca2cv

Replaced my brake booster yesterday as I was getting a better brake pedal when shutting off the throttle at higher rpms than low rpm. Figured it might be to do with the increased vacuum at high rpm/0% throttle. Was very grateful for putting in the effort to make the front bin easy to remove! Shoved the MC to one side, swapped them over, job done.
The nuts holding the booster... what a pain 😂

moca2cv

Is it really track day prep if it's not just before the track day? 😁

Off to Llandow for our annual all the boys trackday on Saturday, so figured I should actually check a few things.

Popped the car up on stands, whipped the wheels off. Then I got distracted and dremelled the frunk bin to fit a strap for securing the spare tyre (the battery is in the way of the usual bolt). Works ok, feel much happier about having the wheel in there. Must remember to put the wheel nuts in the tool bag!

Back to business. I started with a power steering fluid change(ish), sucking the old black fluid out of the reservoir, adding new, cycling it a few times, and repeating. Did this four times and it's now looking fairly clear. Will see if that improves things.

Next I did a spanner check on all the main fixings, methodically went around ticking off the ones I checked and torqued to spec. Managed to do a righty-loosey conversion on one of the Whiteline camber bolts at the rear, fortunately kept the old ones so whacked that back in and went for max camber - hoping it's close to the other side, so will tweak the other side to match if I can.

Gave all the poly bushes their annual spray with grease, and did the UJ and ARBs too.

Fitted my fancy carbon engine cover I snagged on FB, used wing nuts, so fancy.

Then it chucked it down so called it a day, and will do oil and brake fluid tomorrow. Then if I have time get the toe sorted on Thursday. Let's see how it goes!







moca2cv

Attempted bleeding the brakes on my own yesterday, wasn't happy so a friend came over today to help and managed to get a big bubble out of the front left caliper. Glad we caught that.
Oil change done, couldn't do the filter as the 2ZZ filter is too long with a sandwich plate and Snelbaard's brace fitted, so as the old one is only 2k miles old I left it on. I'll get another K&N, it fits.
Topped up coolant as it was on the min mark, tightened up a few hardtop bolts, made some good progress.
Tweaked the camber by eye, got it good enough, then off to the tyre shop to get the tracking sorted. Was a bit of a challenge with a couple seized nuts but got it good enough. Camber measurements showed my eyes were good enough :)
Just about ready now I think!

moca2cv

Llandow was great! Was so nice to be really gelling with the car and felt like it was flying! Not really in reality, my best time I recorded was 52.8s, so not the speediest thing out there, but I've come a long way at least.
I am very happy with the car 🥰




Alex Knight

Glad you had a great day!

Llandow is a nice fun, short circuit, though not ideal for the 2ZZ to stretch its legs.

I managed a 49.11 lap with a passenger and some suspect RE002 tyres, so a bit to find if you feel like being competitive!


moca2cv

Quote from: Alex Knight on July 11, 2023, 07:54Glad you had a great day!

Llandow is a nice fun, short circuit, though not ideal for the 2ZZ to stretch its legs.

I managed a 49.11 lap with a passenger and some suspect RE002 tyres, so a bit to find if you feel like being competitive!



Very nice! I'm only 1ZZ so even though the straights are short I lose a lot of time there, but I know I can go faster round Gluepot, if I didn't have last year playing on my mind 😂

Alex Knight

Ah, I thought you were 2ZZ.

In that case, great going!

moca2cv

Quote from: Alex Knight on July 12, 2023, 08:30Ah, I thought you were 2ZZ.

In that case, great going!

#1zz4lyfe 😁

Thanks! I actually really like the 1ZZ, it's a good little motor and plenty of poke to have lots of fun. Plus I don't have to worry too much about it grenading 😁

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