Most liked posts in thread: Hit a milestone and still making changes.

So, good w/e & not so good w/e, hub got to me Thurs. and I did get the wheel installed:



But wait, where's the button panel? Thats the not so good part, (not really bad, just gonna take a lot more than I had hoped) when I got everything apart & started to look at the wiring and circuit boards for the cruise & radio controls, it was not as I had hoped. I was hoping that the boards & toggles were just that, a simple toggle feature mounted to a circuit board that transmitted a signal to a controller for the specific function, but their not, the boards have the controller cuircitry built in and the wires simply transmit a completed command to the individual item. (Radio / Cruise)

So, for anyone else thinking about this, it basicly leaves 3 options:
1. Move the entire controller, board & toggle pad, somewhere else, like Nate did, having his moved to his dash.
2. Build a panel like I did, and figure out the schematics of the circuit board and how to tap into it.
3. Forget about the cruise & radio controls all together.

I'm actually going to take some time & look into option # 2, just because it's a challange and I'd like to see if I can figure it out. But if not I may actually do nothing, honestly it was more about the challange of doing it than anything, I'll bet I've prob. only used my cruise a total of 5 different times since I bought the car, just something I'm used to not using, plus I get better milage ib the pedal than on the cruise

As far as the wheel itself, I like the feel of it, but it's going to take some getting used too, and some experimenting as far as height adjustment, since it's slightly smaller in diameter and I have the chrono pack, it does obstruct the Speedo & Tach a little bit, and I'm going to have to see if I can really get used to it, but the buttin position for the Nitrous feels perfect.

The other good thing is that now that the wheel's in, all I have to do is connect the wire for the push button to the Nitrous controller and the system is finally ready. (I had to wait to do this because the WOT pedal switching works off the voltage of the Throttle Position Sensor, and since current flow for this matters, the wiring really had to be completed in the form it is going to be used, without any changes in wiring that may effect current/voltage levels) Hopefully I can get that & the bottle filled this week, so I can start using & tuning it.

 

It's a 320mm, I like the feel & size, but with the chrono & the gauges mounted off the right side of it I can only put the wheel up so far, with this smaller wheel I may look into swapping my Z bracket for my gauge cups so that they're upside down & use the lower mounting position, that way the Z bracket on the right side won't hit the dash pad & I could put the column all the way up, one of the reasons I didn't do that earlier was steering wheel obstruction.

 

I agree, I really like the size & feel of it, hell half of my driving is feel, thats why I always prefered more solid mounts & bushings, I like to feel whats going on, it's sort of amazing the natural feedback you get by feeling all the bumps & hearing everything thats going on, I'd rather have that than "cush", anyday, hell unless I'm on a long trip I don't even turn on the radio anymore.

I didn't have time to move the gauges today, but looking it all over, should be just enough to be able to see everything well enough again, plus, there's no obstruction on the left side, so if I decide I dont like the NOS/Fuel psi gauges low, I can always buy another left side bracket & put them back up, the AFR & future W/M gauge won't bother me low.

Hope to get the bottle filled Fri. & last electrical connection done over the w/e so I can "finally" start the experimenting & tuning. Had to wait for the wheel to be installed in order to do the final electrical connection, the WOT throttle controller built into the Nitrous Management units works off of a learned voltage level from the Throttle Position Sensor, so all the wiring (push button too) had to be complete for the system to learn the correct voltage level.

Here's the toggles for stage 1 & 2 that I added to my switch panel, with the red led's on my left gauge pod acting as the indicators to what's armed.
Upper led = Main System Armed
Center led = Controller 1 Armed (35 Shot)
Lower led = Controller 2 Armed (65 Shot)

As for the Switch panel itself:
Stage 1&2 Toggles
W/M
Nitrous Main Power
Nirrous Bottle Heater
Nitrous Purge
Nitrous Remote Bottle Opener (future)



And of course that gives me a total of 100 with both at the same time, at this point though I think I'll just do the 65 at most, with the extra strain of the Nitrous & age of the motor, I'm going to hold off on doing any more than that until after MOTD, I really want to have the car there & it's now way to late to get the motor rebuilt in time for the festivities.

 

Yup, thats the plan, no rebuild till it "needs" it. At this point I really want to see whats possible.

 

Well, it's been a while but I was finally able to get something done this past w/e, between other stuff & Mother Nature, really hadn't been able to do much in the past 4 or 5 weekends.

The new steering wheel diameter allowed me to re-mount the column gauges to the lower position, I like them a lot better, they're not so "in your face". Here's a before & after look.
Before:

After:

It's a real difference driving, much better.

Finally got the wiring for the WOT switching figured out & finished, all seems to be working as it should. Testing should finally start this w/e, looks like we're finally done with winter here. :fingerscrossed:

Just for S**ts & Giggles I figure I throw in a pic of one of the things I did while the weather was bad, it gave me time to finish what I jokingly call my "Wall-O-Tools" :lol: 39 Drawers, 80x60.
A man's gotta have his Toys......I mean Tools.....

 

:lol: I never said I wasn't a little "off".

 

Not much progress over the w/e but what was done was all in the right direction.
So, bottle progress, everything is ready but I've decided to wait for one more thing, my bottle heater, (should be to me on Thurs, along with Zex's new usage gauge, wich gives you an approximation of the fill level of your bottle) and here's why.

(Thanks so much to my Nitrous Sensei Thumper for all of this good info! And this will also explain the desire for the gauge) When I charged the system I only got 750psi, and of course I immediately thought, low pressure=low level & my bottle actually hadn't been filled all the way, well not true, with Nitrous, pressure isn't associated with volume it's associated with temperature. Basiclly temperature = pressure = power, so consistant temp., gives you consistant pressure, gives you consistancy in power output for tuning purposes. Sooo, bottle heater is on the way, and I'm doing the gauge just to be able to help with the bottle volume level without having to weigh it so often.

Also I'm ordering another set of "colder" plugs to have on hand for the Nitrous usage, should be nice this w/e so we'll see.

 

Yup, considering it's condition & the fact I've been feeding it almost 20psi for the last 14k or so, I knew it prob. wouldn't be long, just didn't know how long.

 

Oh, and as a side note to all of this, I was looking forward to also seeing how long my original clutch would last, but there's no way I'm putting it back together without a new one.

 

First step on the road to recovery, save money, well sometimes you have to spend it to save it.
With the Mini down for awhile the only thing I had to drive was my beater conversion van, just won't cut it, 1990, 177,000 miles & 10mpg, with a 75 mile per day commute it worked out to be about $500 a month in gas alone, and thats if it held up. (great for when you needed to use it, not so great to have to actually depend on it)

So, new DD:



Gas and payment work out to $100 less a month than gas alone in the van, plus nothing to worry about or have money to fix.
So far, it's OK, but it's wierd, I'm so used to getting a "charge" out of driving and with this it's just back to "transportation", don't get me wrong, it's fun & quirky enough, but it's nowhere near the same.

Teardown on the Mini should start in June.

 

Well, after having to live down the shame of last year's premature announcement, I've been really apprehensive about posting my progress, but some pre-MOTD news has all but solidified the final piece of the puzzle for mid to late June (my clutch). Most everything else is done, bought and ready, the only thing I lack is my clutch and W/M kit.
Here's where I stand now:
Motor is done, transmission is cleaned up and ready for mating, all associated parts, gaskets and misc. items are bought and ready for install....(including, new idler pulley, clutch slave cylinder, updated Sprintex tensioner and vented filler bolt, New timing chain, Thumper extended chain tensioner bolt, Amsoil JCW Air Filter, seals and gaskets and other cosmetic goodies) Here's some of the details for those interested.

Motor came out a couple of months ago, besides all the piston squirters being snapped off, the bottom end was in phenomena condition, I'll be honest, had I not wanted to rebuild the motor anyway and looked closer at the head (I didn't even bother because I wanted to rebuild and just assumed the age of the motor was to blame for the loss in compression), I probably could have repaired the head, replaced the squirters and put it back together as is. I honestly feel like I probably could have gotten to at least 300k+ on that bottom end, it was that good.... And maybe even on the same clutch since this is what it liked like when it came out.

Original, OEM w/ 212k miles.




But no sense in crying about it now...lol, I'm really happy with what I've got.

Motor Specs:
Block Bored for a 77.5mm Piston
CP Pistons (77.5mm - 8.3:1)
Crower I-Beam Rods w/ ARP Bolts
King Rod & Main bearings
Balanced
Crank Polished
Mellings H/P Oil Pump
Block Decked .004
TPR Adjusted Cam Gear
TPR2rT Cylinder Head
Sprintex S/C w/ 60mm pulley

Here's the motor as it is now sitting in a cradle I made, I've since put it inside to fight the humidity while I wait for my clutch.





A little Head Pron for you:
Thanks Thumper!



Exhaust ports are matched to my header.



Intake ports are opened up and intake is matched.



Transmission was cleaned up and painted, with new seals all the way around.





Clutch will be the OS Giken Blue and W/M will be the Aquamist HFS-3.

Once I get the clutch, everything will go back together and we'll do the appropriate tuning, then I'll add the W/M and start playing with the bottle

But in the meantime there will be some other things I want to try and get done like a rear seat delete and moving my bottle into the cabin of the car, so should be some more new postings soon.

Thanks Again for looking....