My new car!

[speedjunkie]

I will be working on mine too, and I'll be helping Zico and Simon on theirs too, but since she won't be in the picture anymore I should still have plenty of time to make it up there.

Yeah it's a crock man. She is REALLY heartless right now. I mean, it's crazy. I still haven't posted the thread about it, but I'm going to.

Oh yeah, about the new commander. There is a group buy either on 7club or RCC (I think it's RCC) to get one for about $300 IIRC.

[chickenwafer]

So, I have an itch to buy these:



They are OEM Recaro's Mazda put in the Japan-only Type-RZ and Spirit R. The Type-RZ got black and the Spirit-R got red. The ones I'm eyeballing are from a 2001 Type-RZ so they are black, not red as pictured. Here are black ones:



They are a carbon fiber/kevlar shell, fire retardant fabric, and bolt in because they are OEM. My main concern is fitting in them, since I'm 6'6" and a shade under 300lbs, I sport a 38" waist, and from what I can gather the general consensus is a 36" waist is the biggest these seats will allow. The benefit here, besides having ultra-rare and cool race seats that bolt-in, is they will also provide more head room, which I desperately need so I can squeeze in with a helmet.

It's just a lot of coin for a pair of seats ($2600 bucks), and for that much money I can get an even more rare Knightsports V-Mount kit. Ahhhhh!

[Ranger]

If those bolt in, I can't imagine them giving much more head room, unless they come with seat rails. The FD's floor pan looks pretty flat...personally I was thinking of just bolting in a side-mount racing seat, using L brackets and big washers to reinforce the floorpan. Did that for the 944 and it passed a NASA race tech.

[chickenwafer]

Yes, they have rails. Remember, they are an OEM Mazda product, so they really and truly bolt-in.

Honestly, I can't really justify the price. If I had the opportunity to sit in them and test them out in the car, I would. But I can't drop that much coin not knowing if I can fit in them or not, especially the head room part.

Instead, there is an ultra-rare Knightsports V Mount kit up for sale I'm going to try and grab.

[iani1.1]

damn a knightsports vmount. talk about baller parts. now all you need is a panspeed titanium exhaust just those 2 parts are almost as much as the car lol

[speedjunkie]

I know who's selling the Vmount kit LOL.

[chickenwafer]

LOL yeah it's Carol "Imstillonjava" or something. Her car has the Shine replica FEED kit and is on their site, a dark metallic purple with blue CE20N's. Teh Sex!

It's in stellar condition, I'm just hoping she takes me offer. If not, I'll be making my own v-mount this winter probably. I just want to have baller parts lol!

[chickenwafer]

Well looks like the Knightsports v-mount is out. The seller and I have just have two different dollar figures for what the kit is worth. Really, the seller is unwilling to come down on price, and I can't justify spending that much coin on a USED v-mount kit, no matter how rare. For what she wants, I could buy a brand new Rotary Extreme v-mount and still have money left over!

So now I'm back to debating between an FMIC or custom fabricating my own v-mount. Making my own v-mount won't be too difficult, I can buy a v-mount-ready Koyo aluminum rad already modified for v-mount that bolts in for pretty cheap. Then I can have Spearco make a custom intercooler core with end tanks, then I just need the GReddy elbow, 3" aluminum piping, misc couplers, t-bolt clamps, a TiAL BOV, and have a shop weld it all up. I would weld it myself, but I don't have a TIG and my MIG sucks at aluminum, and I want it to look and perform good haha.

If I made my own, I would model it after this guys custom made v-mount (he even shared with me all the dimensions on the custom Spearco IC), which is modeled after the rare Japan-only Famspeed v-mount:

[speedjunkie]

Yeah she was asking like $2500 or something right? I'd make one man, although the mounting brackets alone are worth buying the kit haha. That is a good looking IC but I want end tanks that are smoother flowing, the ones on that Spearco are like the ones I have right now. It probably doesn't make much difference but it's a project for when I run out of other projects haha.

Carol's car is gorgeous though!!

[Chance]

I wish people would figure out to straight shot the hot pipe, sit the intercooler so the configuration is a true v, and use a bigger overall core on v-mount kits.....I have no interest or desire to make enough of them to justify putting the time and money into it though haha

[chickenwafer]

^Well the one I posted has the intercooler in a "true V". I don't think the end tank design will make much of a difference. Air under pressure changes direction with little persuasion.

You don't need a giant core because of the efficiency of the design. While it's true I could get a larger core with an FMIC, I want the cooling capacity of the v-mount, although I haven't ruled-out an FMIC yet either LOL. I also want to keep a full size battery up front, so that limits the size of the core.

[speedjunkie]

Yeah I think my core is a bit large too, that's why I want to do a custom one, with a bit smaller core.

[Chance]

These guys know what they are doing, it would be way cooler to make your car have an awesome v-mount than breaking down and buying one that just works

[chickenwafer]

LOL I'm confused by your "breaking down and buying one that just works" statement? Why wouldn't I want I a v-mount that "just works"?

By the way, the kit I want is a genuine Knightsports v-mount kit (still potentially in the works), and I'm pretty sure KS knows what they're doing. It would also be about 1 of 5 kits in the country.

Those cars you pictured are also full blown Time Attack race cars, and my car is a street car. I don't want to deviate away from that too far because I still want to enjoy driving my car on the street. Hence me wanting to keep a full size battery up front for reliability, which means I must use a smaller core...

I am also contemplating an Air-to-Water intercooler setup. It would keep the charge piping very short (as short as OEM piping), use a very efficient core with an incredibly small pressure drop, and I would mount the heat exchanger in the second oil cooler location, so the radiator would receive fresh air with nothing in front or behind it to impede flow. I could also add ice into the system to drop IATs below ambient.

The drawbacks are A2W intercoolers heat soak easily, and they are more complex (more stuff to break/go wrong). The other benefit to an A2W setup I could make my own is it would cost less than the ETS FMIC or even making my own V-Mount.

[Chance]

I am talking about the width and pipe routing


I can't stand the pipes that hug the alternator, to me it just seems lazy haha