Lets talk about cars/motorsports

I don't have the link immediately handy, but shortly after "Cash for Clunkers" went into effect, there was a video of a late 90s/early 2K Grand Cherokee that was being run through the destruction process (part of C4C's requirements was to trash the traded-in car so it couldn't be returned to the road, even if it was still in good condition at the time of the trade), where the important part is running what's basically liquid sandpaper through the engine's lubrication system after replacing the normal oil. The GC ran for a good 4-5 minutes with that stuff running through it before it died in a cloud of smoke.

(What I think of the whole C4C program is beyond the scope of this thread, so other than noting my dislike for it I'll not say anything.)

This one lasted two minutes, which is a lot longer than most.

This one grenaded a cylinder and kept going.

Yeah, pretty stout little engine. Inline sixes are superior to V6 engines in a lot of ways.

Dang, that thing's tough.

My BMW 128i has an inline six and it's pretty awesome. Not that I know why inlines are better than V6 engines, though.

Part of it has to do with the layout of the fuel management system, but I don't know the details off-hand.

With six cylinders, you have a very even firing rate, one cylinder firing every 120 crank degrees, so that all six fire with every 720 crank degrees (two full rotations). More importantly, the balancing of the crankshaft means that the crank can be built lighter, and you don't need a counter-shaft. You'll get better throttle response. The problem with inlines, is that they're long, so they don't fit in a lot of engine bays, unless you have a nice long hood, or a small enough engine that you can transverse mount it (otherwise known as Wrong Wheel Drive - real cars have power delivered to the rear wheels).

Since they run nice and smooth, they're favored for luxury cars - who wants a V6 that runs roughter than a corn cob, in their luxury or executive car? No one. My car has a roughter than hell V6. Sure, makes enough power, but I would much rather have it where it is, than between the fenders of a luxury automobile.

A crisper throttle response means more spirited perfomrance, and historically, inline six engines seem to be overengineered. One of the best of these is the Mopar Slant Six, originally designed to be made out of aluminum. They changed it at the last minute to cast iron, but kept the dimensions the same - so it was very strong for it's size, having originally intended to be made out of a weaker lighter metal.

You used to have loads of I6 engines in American cars, until efforts to shrink cars made them impractical to fit into the vehicles. Hence, V6 engines. They hvae a smaller and more compact form factor, while still displacing similiar volumes and making comparable power. You used to be able to get an I6 for your Camaro, Firebird (with overhead cam versus pushrods, even), Mustang, Valiant, Dart, and all over the truck segment. Still sees use in diesel engines.

V12's, being two Inline sixes graftted together (basically), share the same advantages that the I6 does, although it's a lot bulkier.

The F1 season started last season and Jenson Button won the first race with Vettel and Hamilton second and third. The second race is this weekend in Malaysia.

They using those obnoxious-sounding engines, still? They sounded so much cooler with V12's.

Sound? Not the biggest problem this year — have you seen the look of the cars due to this years' Regulations?

...and the Sky / BBC viewing deal, which means I haven't actually seen the first Grand Prix.

edited 22nd Mar '12 3:28:07 PM by Greenmantle

Green are you on about the so called Platypus nose?

Or Step-Beak, as Leo Parente calls it.

Speaking of Parente:

Yes, that.

It doesn't really bother me. Sure, it looks ugly in closeups, but when the things are moving, it's not so noticeable.

Anyway, compared to the hideous appearance of the high nose with dropped front wing that's been the standard for the last five years at least, the 'step' is a minor annoyance.

edited 23rd Mar '12 2:02:43 AM by AndrewGPaul

Automotive god Carroll Shelby passes away.

RIP, Carroll.

On the upside, all that white fluffiness in heaven could use the contrast of some black streaks of rubber from the tires of his 389 Cobra (his favorite Cobra, according to Car and Driver).

The F1 series takes yet another twist, with Hamilton being stripped of Pole on a technicality, and Williams (via Maldonaldo) winning the race from pole instead. It was the once proud Williams team's first win in 8 years - though the celebrations were muted by a pit fire caused by a Kers unit that injured several people (including at least one from another team, Force India).

Vettel leads on results difference, being level on points with Alonso, who was second today. It's a bit of a crazy season so far!

Hope no-one here made book on this year's F1 season.

It's been a while since anyone has posted here, so I'd like to use to make a little progress report.

My 1992 Toyota MR 2 (Mk II SW 20 2.2-liter NA) is in the shop right now. After selling the Tiburon GT, I've finally gathered the time and money to make repairs. Originally, I had the MR 2 up for sale, but I only had one buyer lined up over the past two months. Other people were probably worried that the car's age and mechanical issues were too much trouble, and the state of the economy is making potential buyers wary in general. So, it's going to be my daily driver for the time being.

And Project Nuke Aprilla's Bank Account has commenced.

Without turning this post into a wall of text, it bears mentioning that the MR 2, while a cool machine, is showing its age. It's also showing how poorly it was maintained by its previous owner because he probably wasn't the brightest crayon in the box. Many of the repairs made so far have been my attempt to rectify negligence and sub-par fixes that were clearly lazy alternatives to proper and more expensive repairs.

The car has a fairly serious oil leak, so I'm going to have my friend replace the oil pump seal, the valve cover gasket, the crank seal, the cam seal, the corresponding O-ring, and the timing belt. Since the car has a non-interference motor, it's not the end of the world if the current timing belt isn't pristine, but with all of the other lovely surprises I've received courtesy of the previous owner(s), we're likely going to replace it anyway just be on the safe side.

The old spark plugs have been replaced with Denso double platinums, and the plug wires will need to be replaced before too long. They're definitely worn. I've got one bad tire (rear driver's side knot) and three good ones, but the Voxx wheels on the car aren't hub-centric and have therefore caused the lugs to be out of line. So, that's new wheels and tires on the list, as well. Tire rack does a free balance and rotation with a set of 4 wheels and tires, so I'll just have to bolt the new wheels on after I get the money for the whole ordeal.

The absolutely god-awful suspension has been replaced with Megan Racing Street Performance coilovers, so the MR 2 handles like a go-cart now. I'll be installing a Megan Racing short throw shifter because the current shifter linkage is sloppy and flaccid. I might do this tomorrow.

More work to come. The MR 2 has potential, but I have to correct several mistakes made by the person who thought it would be okay to half-way maintain what could have been a pristine vehicle. Considering what I got for it, I suppose I shouldn't complain too much, but in retrospect, I should have talked him down. Then again, I think most people look at older cars that way. Such is life.

edited 5th Oct '12 4:57:02 PM by Aprilla

That was a nice wall of text. Will you have to remove the coolant pump to get at the timing chain? If so, might be worth it to replace that since you're already there, and since you have to remove the pump, might as well replace the upper and lower radiator hoses.

Did my brakes on the TTA. 1800 dollars later, I have replaced everything but the brake lines and the front calipers, but they did get rebuilt.

Next on my list is to install the Scanmaster, gauge pod and some rust repair. Then I might dive into suspension stuff, like replacing the rear-end stuff and torque arm.

My vehicle is old enough to vote, should I be getting a new one before it can drink?

The mechanic took a look at it today and noticed that the pump had been recently replaced, so it's not a problem. I want to take a second look at the radiator hoses to make sure they haven't dry rotted. Speaking of which, I also need to replace the coolant temperature sensor because I'm not getting anything on the gauge. One thing to bear in mind is that there are two sensors related to the cooling system: one for the gauge and one for the computer. I'm hoping its the gauge sensor since I already have that part, and I can reach out and touch it easily.

Here's the tough part. With the MR 2 being a mid-ship, the guys are going to have to lift it and work in the lower quarters of the engine to access all of the parts I mentioned in the previous post. Very hard and very expensive, but it has to be done because we found out last night that the engine is dangerously low on oil and will continue to lose oil every time it runs if it's not fixed. I might also have a possible exhaust leak to deal with, but that can come later.

I downloaded a Toyota PDF, and it looks like there are just four bolts directly on the lower right of the engine if you're facing the rear of the car. That shouldn't be so bad, but the crank and cam seals are going to suck. MR 2 parts are relatively cheap. It's just eating my wallet because the car is over 20 years old, and the previous owner didn't quite know what kind of car he had.

By the way, I'm pretty sure my SW 20 uses a timing belt, not a chain. I think some of the new Spyders (Mk III) use a timing chain, and some of the older Celicas might have, as well. My Google-fu is a little weak right now, the but the Toyota forum folks seem to agree that it's a chain on the newer ones.

Did you get steel braided brake lines or just OE replacements? Or did your year model Trans Am come stock with those? I can't remember what performance package that generation had.

edited 5th Oct '12 9:49:14 PM by Aprilla

@Pvt: I assume the TTA uses an antiquated suspension setup?

@Aprilla: Surprised that so much has to be done on that MR2. I'm pretty sure that Toyota and other Japanese companies had a reputation for reliability, though I guess that matters less when it's around 2 decades after the fact.

edited 5th Oct '12 10:10:51 PM by RocketDude

Toyota has some great cars, and the MR 2 is an awesome performance vehicle. However, the import tuner craze is heavily dominated by younger people who aren't financially prepared or mechanically savvy enough to make substantial repairs to a lot of the popular cars from the 90's. I'll admit that I've made some mistakes in the past with Nissan S 13s and S 14s, but I never did anything really stupid with them like cutting springs to lower the car, making engine swaps that are more trouble than what they're worth, or any other dangerous or wildly unnecessary modifications.

I'd rate my MR 2 a 6 out of 10 just for age and repairs, but I try to remind myself that they're somewhat rare cars with a good reputation for reliability and longevity. They don't give mechanics aneurisms, and you can tell that Toyota designed these cars to be at least moderately intuitive. This is partly a matter of conjecture, but Roger Becker, an engineer with Lotus, played a part in the development of the MR 2. Many MR 2 owners apparently flirt with the idea that they're basically driving a poor man's version of the Lotus Elise, and this actually makes sense when you realize that the newer Elise (2008 and up) has a motor that was designed by Toyota. The early concept of Lotus mid-ship roadsters also resembles Toyota's original AW 11 design concept, especially in terms of suspension and power-weight ratio.

Really decent import sports cars are becoming harder and harder to find because people just keep doing silly things with them. I've owned three 240SXs - two S 13 coupes and one S 14.5 with a KA turbo. Both of the S 13s were garbage, and I didn't realize they would be more trouble than what they were worth until after the purchase. The S 14 was a nice car for the price, but the previous owner, while competent and well-meaning, made changes to the car that just made it far worse than it should have been. The Silva Kouki front end conversion was gorgeous, but the car as a whole badly needed essential repairs. It was a mean, powerful beast, but it was a mean and powerful beast with unstable handling and faulty electronics due to someone fiddling with fuses and whatnot.

One thing that drives me up a wall is welded differentials. Or really just any quick-fix modification used to make a car drift. I've noticed that this trend has died down a bit over the past seven or eight years, and I think people are starting to realize that drifting, while a great spectacle, isn't much more than that. It's a great skill to have and a lot of fun to watch, but its importance and relevance in motor sports is grossly exaggerated.

edited 5th Oct '12 10:55:59 PM by Aprilla

Oh, yeah, you may or may not want to watch Matt Farah's "Tuned" show on the Drive channel on You Tube, because he has driven some modded Japanese cars, though he's critical of the ones that aren't so daily-driveable and usually drives cars tuned by more notable firms (he's driven two Switzer-tuned Nissan GT-R R35s, one with ~900 HP running on E85 and the other making 1100 HP on pump gas, and he's driven a 700 HP turbo Supra by Titan Motorsport and mentioned driving a less-street-friendly 1000 HP Supra).

Also, as for drifting, the Scion FR-S might provide drift-friendly antics in an OEM package.

edited 6th Oct '12 1:30:34 AM by RocketDude

The Nissan Silvia is a great drifter car.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nissan_Silvia