The CR-X

[butter]

Ah the infamous dirty IACV. What a pain in the arse that would have been to clean it again.

It sounds like its going to be a similar journey, as when the morning after I put the last piece of my K24 together, I drove up to Sydney for WTAC too.
The first few hours was very nerve racking, constantly listening for anything that could go wrong. But if I managed to get up and back in one piece (actually forgot to tighten my front swap bar end links!), im sure you'll be doing some awesome stuff out on the track.

Can't wait to see how you go

[mnc]

amazing!

[eskimo_firefighter]

Good luck this weekend Tom! #worldtomattack

[wongy]

Looked good out there today Tom goodluck for tomorrow!

[Shakeel]

Like Nate said, good luck tomorrow Tom!

Will be cheering you on from the grandstand!

[ChargeR]

As most probably know, I got the car together, tested it, drove to WTAC and made it back without incident. Thanks to everyone for their support. Will update the thread with my adventures soon!

Picture on track through T1 at SMSP thanks to Ying Bot:

[ievaq8]

awesome news man...

[ChargeR]

Time to continue the story. I've skipped over a few parts as in my haste to get ready for WTAC I had no time to take any photos or keep track of what I was doing on the car.

Going back to the week before WTAC, starting on October the 8th I had the car running as per the previous video, but there were still many parts of the car to tidy up. At this stage had only driven the car about 2km at most. During that week I picked up a couple more mandrel bends from Fabraications and finished up the rear section of the aluminium exhaust:



Then it was time to put the interior into a driveable state, with the battery mounted, wiring taped and cable tied partly into place:



I fitted up my very inconspicuous personalised number plates:



By this stage the engine bay was pretty much complete. I'd fitted a Mazda 323 coolant reservoir that Grant was kind enough to pick up from the wreckers for me. Due to the limited space in the bay I had to weld the in-line radiator filler I'd planned on using to the cooling housing that bolts to the head. Dan provided an EK throttle cable which fit perfectly luckily. Upper radiator hose is standard CL9 Accord Euro, and the lower hose is simply 2 approx 90° bends cut out of the CL9 lower hose, with a length of 1 1/4" aluminium tubing with some beads of weld at each end to give the hose clamps purchase:



On Saturday the 10th I had an early morning wheel alignment done, spent the middle of the day of tidying up the car in the hopes of passing scrutineering, then a late night oil change and a 3rd gear pull down the street to do some quick A/F tuning. Then after a couple of hours sleep off to Winton for testing with the BMW Car Club at their driver training day:



I managed to get the car to my home and then up to the track without any issues, and after fitting my windscreen wipers and taping up a bunch of holes to prevent my feet and ECU from getting a bath I was quite nervously out on to the track:





I only ran 3 sessions for the day, and the track was quite wet initially which did nothing to improve my comfort levels. The learning curve was pretty steep, after nearly half a decade driving the Micra (RIP) and the Civic, I didn't adjust well to the 150% greater power the CR-X offers with a much more tail happy suspension setup. End result of this was two very rude but spectacular spins in front of two other cars, and a new experience!:



Yep, I was black flagged for driving like an idiot at a non-timed driver training day and given a firm talking to. Appropriately chastised I went out and ran a couple more 80% pace dry laps, setting my PB for the day with a 1:40.98. Very slow in the corners and cautious under brakes, but the potential is there.

Times for that session (Racechrono):
1:44.61
1:49.62
1:55.14
3:12.99
1:53.46
1:40.98
1:41.25

Comments for the day:

Good:
- Straight line speed exceeds my expectations, even now the car is nearly 20km/h faster at the end of the straight compared to the DC5R, and I should be able to push up toward 190km/h once the tune and gearing is sorted. Maximum speed logged at the end of the main straight was 182km/h
- Handling balance and brakes are great out of the box with good turn in and mid corner balance. The car can be trail braked without fear of it swapping ends, and the oversteer very easily balanced with the throttle. Power on understeer is not as bad as I expected, it actually gets out of the corners surprisingly well.
- Driving position is good, I just need to lower the clutch pedal slightly and move the shift knob rearward a bit.
- Gearbox works perfectly, which I was a bit concerned about given I rebuilt the thing myself.
- The car is very stable on the straights and under brakes, only getting slightly unsettled over the hump in the main straight. Much less torque steer and tramlining/steering kickback than the DC5R.
- Nothing broke or fell off!

Bad:
- It's too loud with only the single Burns muffler
- Gears are a too close together with the standard DC5R ratios, so I'll be looking to bump up the rev limit a little so I can avoid a shift in a couple of sections. This will allow me to avoid shifting to 6th down the main straight, and stay off the limiter between turns 3-4. Depending on future tyre choices and engine modifications I may swap to a lower final drive, or try some alternative ratios for 4th, 5th and 6th.
- Front tyres are too small, the weight on the front end and the power are too much for them to maintain consistent temperature and performance for more than a lap or two. This issue can be greatly minimised with some setup and driving changes, but staggered tyres are definitely in this cars future.

After that I packed it up ready for a relaxing drive home. It didn't go quite to plan though, after getting caught in a rain storm I discovered that heaters are pretty useful for demisting windscreens and driving without one with plenty of holes in the car and firewall is asking for trouble. I was forced to stop on the side of the freeway and hope that no-one rear ended me, until I could wipe down the windscreen enough to crawl down the road to a service station and wait out the rain:



More updates to follow. Thanks to Ying Bot for all the photos above, along with Grant/itsu-san, DCW and all the other guys, couldn't have won that steak without you.

[eskimo_firefighter]

Great update ChargeR! Really looking forward to the next few updates. Still can't get over the top speed you achieved at Winton already and this is only the beginning!

[Apu]

Another car with an aluminum exhaust! Good work Tom! I did see the car at WTAC but you guys appeared quite busy at the time so decided not to intrude.

[tinkerbell]

i remember when i was explaining to someone how i'd removed my A/C system, and they said, "but you left the heater core?!?!?"

i replied "i have my reasons..."

[ChargeR]

It's time to get this thread up to date before the track events start for this year! When I last posted I'd successfully made it to Winton for testing, and then returned back to the workshop without getting caught by the constabulary, which is a big deal with a 3" aluminium exhaust.

After testing the car at Winton I had a plentiful 48 hours to finish preparing the car for WTAC. The list of jobs to do:

- Fabricate a harness bar and mount my harnesses
- Tidy up the wiring a bit more
- Tape up some more holes in the car
- Mount the Voltex rear wing
- Contrive some sort of silencer for my exhaust
- Bunch of other stuff that I've forgotten
- Weigh the car just to be sure I'm not below the WTAC minimum weight
- Tighten up the right side radius rod jamb nut, as I'd incorrectly aligned the rod end in the clevis so it must have run out of travel and loosened off

This is how the weight turned out, with around 1/2 a tank of fuel in full WTAC spec:



878kg is not bad, but there's still some more weight to lose within the Clubsprint rules. I'd like to get 5kg or so from a new bonnet. Here's the weight on the front wheels, a fairly chubby 66.7%:



After that I finished off the rest of the jobs above and then after a much anticipated good nights rest I was all packed up ready to go on the Wednesday morning:



Avert your eyes from the heinous bonnet as usual.

Scouting out a spare motor:



We headed up to Sydney in a small convoy, travelling in numbers is a good thing since I wasn't at all confident my car wouldn't break down. Mugsee was even foolish enough to ride with me. The trip was uneventful arrived up there in time to drop of the cars at the track. There was some confusion when Ying had to explain to the fellow at the gate that the competitors car we were dropping off was the non-descript black hatchback behind them.

The first day of the event was the official Thursday WTAC practice, which was the most enjoyable day of the event. It had a relaxed atmosphere, still plenty of interesting machinery about and with fewer people around it was much easier to get a good look at the cars. The event started off well for me, with no reliability issues and I managed to get down to a 1:53 without trying too hard, faster than I went in the DC5R many years ago.

Practice day times:

2:00.05
2:26.28
1:56.83
2:02.52
2:07.52
1:56.19
1:55.37
2:44.20
1:54.74
1:56.41
1:53.47
2:11.61
1:53.15
2:45.51

Then after an interlude of beer, meat and sleep, we were into the main event on the Friday and Saturday. On the Friday I improved my times a bit more, getting down to a 1:51. Much more traffic on these days and it was challenging to get a clean lap, between letting faster cars past and getting blocked by some slower cars. The only issue for the day was a minor split in one of the CV boots, nothing a bit of Sikaflex from Bunnings couldn't fix, and I bled my brakes with some fresh Motul RBF600 under recommendations from my tribologist Mugsee from Autosphere. The ATE fluid that I had in there was working just fine though, which is impressive for an inexpensive fluid with my small standard brakes. I left my tyre pressures at 34psi hot for the entire event, as without much testing or experience with the car or tyres I decided consistency would serve me better than trying to eke more grip out of the tyres by tuning the pressures.

WTAC times (seems like some are missing):

1:53.9540
1:53.9910
1:51.8340
1:52.9320
1:53.4630
1:50.3850
1:50.1190
2:30.3140
1:59.7060

Here's few photos of the car On track thanks to Ying:





After the shots above under instructions from my manager I had the tyres flipped on my wheels to put the silver pair of wheels on the left, as it was apparently more photogenic.



All good things come to an end though, and after the first session on the Saturday I came in to the garage celebrating my PB of 1:50.1 and walked around the passenger side of my car to see that a much larger split had opened up in the outer CV boot and the hot grease from the CV had mostly drained out onto the inside of the wheel. Not ideal.

The problem:



So using the previously acquired boot repair kit, I patched it up a bit and called it a day. I could have had a new boot put on the axle and tried to crack a 48 or 49, but after a pretty exhausting lead up to the event I decided to not risk the freshly assembled car any further, particularly with free steak on the line:



The rest of the day was spent with the car over at the show and shine, again at my managers insistence, talking crap, and having a pleasant wander around the pits and show area. Here's a photo of the team, note the excellent T shirts. Thanks for all the support guys:



As the event came to a close I packed up all my gear and we headed off to our accomodation:





Overall the event was a great time, and I'll be looking to enter again this year to hopefully push in to the mid 1:40s at SMSP with the goal of being the fastest NA car in Clubsprint. Thanks to Ying especially for all the photos above, the tops T shirt, and support along the way, along with Grant, Dan and all the other guys, couldn't have won that steak without you.

Thanks to Mugsee from Autosphere for providing all the fluids for the car.

Check out Ying's blog here too, for a more interesting account of our WTAC adventures: LINK.

[Nathannnnn]

Awesome stuff! Will you be coming to Winton on Labour day? Track has just been resurfaced

[eskimo_firefighter]

Good to see an update from this. Well done again on winning the steak guy. Well deserved.

Awaiting the Wakefield update and more hopefully.

[felixR]

Nice read as usual Tom!

Good chatting to you that day.