Penguin Mobile: "Jesus Built my Hotrod"

I clean, grease, and power bleed my brakes everytime I switch pads/rotors. I dont shortcut anything unless I absolutely have to. I think the yellows were a little more to my liking than the reds, because at least the yellows had a hard bite when they got hot. I cant seem to get a good bite out of the reds, at least not as hard as I would personally like.

I'm cheap too, the wife and I are currently saving up for a house so money is getting managed properly.

The MZR engine is not bad, I am just tired of turbos and FWD. FWD becuz every reason in the book, turbos because of all the damn complexity. This project should help, since I have further plans for engine bay pressure evacuation, and going TMIC should simplify all the boost leak possibilities.

 

Hopefully the R6 does it for you. I can definitely attest to the fact that a pad with poor initial bite sucks. I often miss my HP+ because you’d tap the brakes and have instant tear your face off bite.

are you using slotted rotors? They do help with initial bite, they also help prevent glazing of the pad. They will cause the pads to wear quicker though.

 

No slots, I've got solid face rotors.

 

Just a thought for you if initial bite is something you’re after.

 

Been busy the last couple of weeks with home, health, and work stuff.

I received the G-Loc R6 pads from Damond, these things have a ton of meat on them compared to most pads I've seen. Admittedly I am quite excited to try these out.

While I was swapping all the new OEM panels and smiley grill, I went to work on a leak I've had at the downpipe/catback flange. What I thought was the leak getting progressively worse, ended up being a second leak at the flex section. Thought about having it fixed, but after weighing pro's and con's I went ahead and ordered a new downpipe. Unfortunately there are no longer a ton of options for long downpipes. The Cobb pipe is great but it only comes catted, ATP doesn't offer a catless option anymore, Full Race has that nice two piece design but its too rich even for my taste, so that only left me with CPe. I am not a huge supporter of CPe, but I have always heard nice things about their downpipe. So CPe it is...

Downpipe came in, its the V3 version which has 3 O2 bungs at the bellmouth (because fitment issues with their own ExhManifold LOL), and some notches around the stud/nut areas to help fit wrenches when installing. Well... going through the packing list I am missing one of the two plugs for the spare O2 bungs, dumb issue but not a problem I have spares. I was told by a buddy that its supposed to have a thin gasket for the catback, but there is no mention of it in the packing list or instructions.

Over the last couple of weeks I realized that I do miss the roll resistance of the whiteline FSB. Eventhough it stiffened up the steering wheel a bit too much, it kept the car glued to the ground. I've taken the car around highway and city driving trying to get a feel for what has changed since the sealing of the front end, or rather restoring of the front end. I have taken measurements with the magnehelic gauge, but I am not going to post them yet. I have some more sealing to do, and some questions about Mazda engineering. It's obvious that they put effort into streamlining the chassis to reduce drag, but I think I found some grave errors as far as engine bay sealing.

Next week I have 2 days off back to back, the to do list is as follows...

Top Priority
-swap downpipe
-swap FSB
-seal timing cover leak
-front end alignment
Secondary
-swap brake pads
-further seal up engine bay

 

I always found it interesting that people would do upgraded fsb on these, or any fwd car for that matter. Standard is to do the rsb of course, to promote a more neutral handling car, help promote oversteer and dial out understeer.

Does adding a stiffer fsb not reduce the effectiveness of adding a stiffer rsb? Always thought about this. I know there are other benefits aside from helping with oversteer/under steer when it comes to sway bars but...I’m curious?

 

Mmmm.....

I'm going to speak from my experience, and my experience only. There are people on this forum that have more experience, and a couple of mongrols that read and repeat what others say without actually driving.

Sway bars are definitely a crude way of reducing roll, and changing steering characteristics on a chassis.

The effects of a FSB upgrade on this car will reduce roll on the front end, which is nice because it keeps the front end planted to the ground. This reduction of roll also adds stability at high speeds, or reduces the likelihood of tramlining. Also from a drivers perspective, it firms up the steering wheel by reducing the rate at which the front control arms move in opposite directions. With that being said, the downsides to upgrading a FSB... yes you do get understeer. With our cars it introduces a larger bar into an already cramped/busy front end suspension. The firmness of the steering wheel can sometimes be too much based on driver preference. Also when making U turns or any kind of sharp turn, the steering wheel will feel more snappy when centering itself again after the turn. This is all assuming that you maintain the same alignment, damper, spring rates, ride height, and only change the front bar.

Right now I miss the roll resistance, and the steering wheel is too loose for my liking. Right now the front is too floppy and the car is prone to oversteer and almost a loose feeling rear end. I prefer neutral steering or even a hair of understeer. If you need more oversteer you can always throttle out of a turn. But I do not autocross which is where oversteer is always more welcome.

Another thing that I want to return to, is running less negative camber, or more positive camber. With a stiffer FSB I could dial in flatter camber and have more tire contact while driving straight and also while taking a tight turn. Yes the steering wheel was a little too stiff because of how damn hard the Whiteline bar is, but you do get used to it. The only time the stiff steering wheel was a challenge, was when I would flip my manual SWAS kill switch. If I could find a bar with a rate in between the OEM and the lightest setting on the Whiteline, it would be perfect on this car.

I am going to play with different endlink lengths to make it fit better in the front end. I'll get used to the stiff steering again now that I fixed my "torque steer" issues. I am going to drop the subframe to swap downpipes anyway, so it'll just be a few minutes to swap sway bars.

It should be noted that right now I am running KW v3's with 500lb Hypercoil springs on all 4 corners, Corksport camber plates, and the JBR RSB on the lightest setting. When I install the FSB I will change the JBR setting to its stiffest setting in order to balance the bars again. (How I previously had it.)

I have been adjusting ride height to restore roll center, and while I do have modified front control arms with mustang/taller ball joints in a box, I feel uneasy about running 1 off parts on this car since it is still street driven. Something about assholes crashing my car and not being able to replace said 1 off parts that disappoints me. Besides I have SuperPro bushings ready to replace the damn hydrobushings. After driving Raiders car with his bushing upgrade, you realize that our cars can definitely benefit from faster and more precise steering response than from massive oversteer.

So..... would I recommend a FSB upgrade to someone just learning the in/out characteristics of this car? No. I WOULD still recommend it to people, but I would put it all the way down as the last thing on the modification list. There is more to gain from better dampers, springs, alignment, and replacing those damn hydrobushings before you go into a FSB.

 

Well that definitely makes sense. Thanks for the info I was genuinely curious.
I’m unsure of how I feel about adding a fsb to my setup but maybe something to consider moving forward. The white line rsb is pretty aggressive even on the soft setting, even with my super soft rear spring rate. We’ll see how this changes when my b16’s go on. Bringing the rear rate up from 250lbs to 400lb should be significant.

as for bushing upgrades I feel like I’ve searched and am unable to find anything useful for the front end? I’ve done bushings in other cars with a ton of success and I’ve been dying to find something for this car. I’ve found for non speed mazda 3’s but I believe they’re different? I don’t think I looked into super pro yet. Now I’m curious what they offer for us.

 

Yes, all the bushings are the same between the regular Mazda3 and the MS3. The only exception is the front control arms have a wider diameter ball joint, so the knuckle and control arm part numbers will be different.

Search for SuperPro and they list all the bushings for our cars. This is the one that I bought. I purchased spare bushings from Rock Auto in order to have a spare outer sleeve on case I fuck one up during surgery. SuperPro does offer offset bushings also, but I went with a regular centered one.


SPF3368K


The only bushings really worth upgrading on this car right away are the HydroBushings. The front bushings on the front control arms are pretty rigid, but the rear HydroBushings are God awful. And no, the whiteline antilift kit for the gen1 does not fit the gen2. I have them in a box too, they dont fit...

The rear is a different story, they need to move in all sorts of different axis. So poly bushings in the rear....I wouldn't bother unless you are 100% race car and ready to grease bushings up before every race.

 

Thanks for this info. Really wanting to upgrade front bushings. Will order the part number you have there and give it a go.

Also purchased the white line anti lift kit and it doesn’t work. That was annoying

 

Overdue update....

The last month and a half has been stupid busy, amongst all the Covid-19 caution going on.

The wife and I will be moving back down to South Florida in a month. I've made some great friends here in Jacksonville, but unfortunately its never felt like home to me. We have had family on both sides fall on hard times (unrelated to Covid-19), so we are moving back in order to help them. Kind of a hell of a time to move, apartment hunting has been all "virtual." Luckily we are both getting work transfers and we have a few bucks saved up to hopefully buy a house next year.

Besides the move/work transfer, I've been working a lot on the Pu. CPe downpipe went on without a problem. The downpipe is very nice quality and fitment was very good on the pipe itself, but I had to bend the hangers a bit so they wouldn't rub the subframe hangers and rattle. Meh, no big deal. I don't think this downpipe is anymore difficult to install than any other stock flange downpipe. (That Corksport divorced pipe is the worst. For anyone wondering, yes you can faintly hear the chain mail portion of the flex section rub/vibrate on the pipe but only for a few seconds at startup. Other than that I am very happy with it.





Between sealing the front end and swapping the downpipe, LTFT's started running rich so I contacted Rob to revise my tune thinking it was from the DP leak. LTFT kept getting worse week by week, to a point where they were -20 off boost. Long story short my oil started REALLY smelling like fuel, it turns out the screw seals on my HPFP were worn out (for reference the Car/Engine/HPFP only have 66k miles). Picked up a replacement HPFP to test and keep as an emergency spare, and bought all the seals needed from McMaster Carr in order to rebuild my current pump. Once the cleaning/seal replacement was done, the car drove great again and LTFT were well within 8% again.




I did continue to seal the front end, which has been an ongoing project. I will include a few pics of what I have done, but I don't want to bore anyone with too many pics. For the couple of you following this thread, you may remember me posting that I returned everything to stock first. Stock made the front end more stable, but even at stock level, the front end leaves SO MANY HOLES!!!! There are leaks everywhere, huge leaks that Mazda probably didn't realize because of all the stupid front end grills they made for all the sub models. (IE: Skyactiv, GT, MS3, etc) Here are some pics...


Bottom corners of our smiley. This is a big offender. The Skyactiv model actually has panels to cover these holes, otherwise they flood the fenders with air.

Some cheap covers I made for the time being. I intend on purchasing the Skyactiv panels and trimming them to fit our smiley.


Cheap panels I made to fit between the bottom tray and the side air baffles.

Before

After


Before: The fog lights had about 2mm of gap that will also fill the fender with air.

Some careful trimming of the mounts and their fins

After: No gap


Bottom radiator tray, notice the small drip holes made to drain water build up. These are worthless.

Some careful strips of foil tape seal the holes.


OEM crashbar, this is the BIGGEST offender. The whole crashbar is hollow. Any air pressure in front of the radiator, bleeds out through the crashbar holes, and exits the sides to the fenders. I placed my flashlight on the crashbar end to illustrate the path where the air goes.

Same thing with the crumble zone slots

Sealed up crashbar. Some plastic and screws to cover the big holes, and foil tape to cover the small slots.

Finished crashbar, and foil tape to cover the small holes in the front. No plastic needed as the front of the crashbar will be sandwiched between the foam bumper support.


So what does this all do or mean? Well, lets look at some data.... everything was measured under hood in in/H20

FMIC w/aftermarket crash bar
Ambient Pressure= 0.2 in/H20
40mph= .40-.50 in/H20
60mph= .75-.85 in/H20
80mph= 1.00-1.25 in/H20

Stock set up, TMIC
Ambient Pressure= 0.2 in/H20
40mph= .40 in/H20
60mph= .75 in/H20
80mph= 1.25 in/H20

TMIC w/further sealing
Ambient Pressure= 0.25 in/H20
40mph= .50 in/H20
60mph= .80 in/H20
80mph= 1.10 in/H20

So the data shows barely any change in engine bay pressure, which may seem disappointing at first glance. However the results don't lie, the car felt a heck of a lot more stable. Less nose dive while braking, the steering stayed firm throughout every speed, and significantly less "torque steer" when at WOT. When looking at the readings from the original FMIC set up, you will see the readings are at a range. The readings from the sealing project are dead set. The magnehelic gauge was more stable and easier to read now at speeds, where originally the pressure was so turbulent w/ the FMIC that it was damn near impossible to get a good solid measurement. Unfortunately it was now that it dawned on me to measure pressure in front of the radiator, something I neglected to do with the stock set up (second set of measurements) F*CK!!!. Here is the comparison after further sealing, both measurements were done on the same day and all units are in in/H20. The fitting was facing the radiator so it measured any air pressure that was bouncing back off of the radiator/ac condenser.

TMIC w/further sealing
Ambient Pressure= 0.25 in/H20
Speed= Engine bay pressure (Radiator front pressure)
40mph= 0.50 (0.90)
60mph= 0.80 (1.60)
80mph= 1.10 (2.50)

RESULTS!!! That is a nice delta from before and after the radiator, this lets me know that I am getting better airflow through the radiator/condenser instead of just around it. This is great, and it lets me know that I am going in the right direction. This project is not over though, as the current positive pressure in the engine bay could still be evacuated. The TMIC/hood scoop duct lets a lot of stray air out of the sides and back. This is to vent heat at stop and go traffic, but lets a ton of stray air into the engine bay once the car starts moving. This does two negative things, 1) it adds to the lift problem that this platform clearly has, and 2) it ruins the efficiency of the TMIC. Next step will be sealing the TMIC duct, and installing separate hood vents. This will involve a few hood measurements to ensure maximum vacuum, stay tuned...


​

 

Updates coming soon...

Moving sucks, especially into a significantly smaller apartment/garage.

Also... Covid-19 sucks a fat dick.

In the meantime, enjoy some tunes...

 

I didn't enjoy any of those tunes

 

Would you have his babies?

 

You are more of a James Taylor kind of guy?

 

Sure but really just being a dick, I didn't listen to any of them

 

Oh I figured that, I just enjoy your sarcasm.

 

Most of thread is confirmation bias for why I just upgraded the TMIC. I was really on the fence about putting in a FMIC 9 years ago when I bought and started modifying my car.

If I ever decide to flip my balls out and go for broke I'll put an FMIC in, but it never seemed to be worth the hassle at under 400 hp.

BTW this is a great read.

 

Update time...

Progress has been very slow. I haven't stopped working during Covid except for the 2 weeks we took off to move. My current garage is about 18" narrower than my old garage. This may not sound like a lot, but it makes a huge difference when setting everything up on jackstands. Yes I use jackstands, I am not rich enough to get a quick lift. I have had to change the location of everything in order to park the cars inside and still have work room, and even then I don't feel comfortable parking an entire car inside. This has really slowed me down... Also my new boss is kind of a ball buster, and is really making my job difficult. That added stress really drains a lot of energy out of me, so garage days have been less frequent. I will more than likely switch jobs or maybe even start my own business, but that wont be until the pandemic ends, whenever the hell that is...

Enough personal rambling....

I installed the G-Loc R6 pads, these things are nice! There is a bit of pedal travel for brake modulation, and they have a nice hard bite that doesn't take a lot of effort to reach. These things are much better than the EBC pads. There is still squish in the pedal from the firewall flex. Brake set ups are similar between the Pu and Mustang, except for 1) pad choice (G-Loc R6 vs Stoptech Street Performance), and 2) the mustang has a master cylinder brace. I will be looking into making some kind of Master Cylinder brace in order to finish tightening up the brake pedal.



For anyone looking into these pads... You may have to bend the pad bracket inward for the front pads (mine were too wide and wouldn't seat in the caliper piston). The rear pads have a flat face and do not have any of those Inner/Outer tabs. They do take a while to bed, so allow yourself enough mileage for it.

I have some kind of tiny Vac leak somewhere which is giving my car a bit of the shakes. In the meantime until I can get to it, I swapped out my DM PMM, and installed an OEM PMM with modifications. (Thanks again for the mount @Raider ) I sold my original PMM ages ago, this one had a few miles on it. Not sure if its gen1 or gen 2, but either way upon inspection one side had a much larger gap than the other. OEM is a floating hydrobushing, so in order to tighten it up I used some scrap aluminum plate to tighten up the gap. I drilled and bolted it in and cut out almost 3mm of slop on the one side, now both sides have about a 2-2.5mm gap. This should reduce the flex of the bushing for less engine movement and better shifting, while still allowing the hydrobushing to absorb NVH. For those wondering, yes I do notice a difference in shifting, but it is not noticeable unless you shift above 5k rpms.

Gaps...


Fix...


I have been extremely eager to swap the powerflex bushings I have for the front and rear. More on that later once I get a bushing press next week. Once that is done, I am going to re-evaluate my spring rates. I am definitely running out of spring travel in the front with the 6" Hypercoils, so I will upgrade to 7" Swift springs. I am not sure if I should keep the front at 500lbs or step down to 400lbs, I will wait until after the bushing slop is taken care of. I am definitely going to step down the rear and aim for more "flat ride." The 500lb square set up I have now is too much for the rear and really unsettles the car when going over large bumps or road debris, plus having the rear so stiff reduces the "passive steering" that Mazda engineered into our IRS. I will be revisiting all of this later.

Penguin, lets talk about those cool looking hood scoops! Sure! These are top priority right now. The biggest thing to worry about is location, location, location... Our hood is convexed in order to make room for the TMIC so its not like you can cut anywhere. I used 2" painters tape and started from the front of the hood and all the way back. I took Vac measurements along the hood and found the best location to be about 8" from the front of the hood, and roughly 11.5" from the rear of the hood (measured from center of curve). This clears the top radiator shroud and the battery, and places the vent right next to the TMIC. I have more perforated aluminum sheeting that I will cut and bolt on from underneath the hood, this will slow down any heavy rain from reaching critical components when the car is parked. I will make a battery/ECU cover using the top of my OEM battery box. The relay box I pictured earlier is some random unit from Amazon I got cheap. It will be for my SP63 fan controller, HID relays, and other electrical components. I may just cut the box a bit and lay everything flat inside, or I could do the proper thing and wire the cables and relays into the box assuming they have the same flange. I'll cross that bridge when I get there.



Unfortunately my shoe box of a garage is not insulated, and my neighbors have already complained once when I was grinding some metal down a few weeks back. I will need to get a couple of days off in order to cut the holes at another location, install the vents, seal the TMIC duct, and tidy up everything.

Last thing, my driver side visor has taken a shit and doesn't want to stay up. The light on the visor has also stopped working, so a wire is pinched somewhere which might explain some weird screen issues I am having on the dashboard. A replacement is ordered and on the way.

So...
Projects in order of priority...
1) -Hood Vents
-Hood Vent provisions/Seal TMIC
-Investigate Visor issue
2) -Swap Injectors/Seals
-Fix Vac Leak
3) -Install Aquamist kit/Failsafe
-Get Meth Tune from Rob
4) -Install Powerflex Bushings
-Order/Install Swift coilover springs

 

Tell your neighbors to suck a fat one. Progress is looking good. Clever idea with the mount.