kws

So uh, things escalated slightly.

Since the engine was in limbo, waiting on parts and machine work, I started to hunt to find all the rust and fix it. The first place to start was to get the car in the air and have a good look under it. I knew there was rust in the LH front sill area, so I started there. This is the hole I poked in the sill at the auction when checking it over. The jacking point has also been flattened. Moving backwards to another common spot, the rear floor pans were thankfully very solid As is the "trans" tunnel. This bracket has some paint flaking from it, but otherwise is good The shifter assembly and rods are pretty manky, but I have new bushes on order for this. A quick paint will make it look spiffy The boot floor is good There is a bunch of surface rust on/around the fuel tank. Nothing a wire brush and some rust treatment can't fix. I need to drop the tank and see what state the inside is. I hope it's not rusty. Even better, another rust area I was worried about, the rear spring mounts, were perfect A loose bolt on the fuel tank. It's OK, not like it needs to be properly secured or anything... Moving to the driver's side, the floor was a bit on the thin side here too There were some definite holes, which later got the poky poky screwdriver treatment to see how big they were Finally, the rear tailgate seal lip is very crusty on the bottom. This has been leaking water into the boot when the car was washed, so thankfully, it's been stored indoors for its recent life. So in conclusion, the body is surprisingly solid. There is a fair bit of surface rust under the car, which will need to be brushed back, treated and painted/undersealed, but mostly it's actually just covered in mud under there; It needs a darn good clean. All the troublesome rust I need to fix is in the floors, one of the sills, the boot lip, and there is a small amount in the bonnet. The next logical course of action was to lift the carpets and see what was to be seen from the inside. To do this, I unbolted the seats and tipped them back into the boot, on the folded-down rear seat The carpet has a bit of a smell. The previous owner cleaned things like the seats and steering wheel, but I don't think he cleaned the carpets. I will give it a wet-vac before reassembly. The seats came out easily enough. With the seats removed, the carpet comes up easily enough. I needed to unbolt the lower seatbelt anchors as they go through the carpet, and there was a surprise screw under the LH side of the rear seat base (which was a pain to access with the front seats on the back seat...). The dead pedal was a pain too; I thought I could just unbolt it, but it turns out it's bolted in a million places under the carpet and not possible to do, so I carefully stretched the carpet around it to get it out. This gave me the first glimpse of the floors and inner sills The rear, as suspected from seeing the underside, was solid. Dirty, but solid. Yes, that is a massive nail... The fronts were hiding their rust In the photo below, you can see one of the other common rust spots - the seam sealer where the A pillar meets the inner sill. In this case, it's actually bursting out. I knew about this fairly early on, as I checked it when I got the car after watching the videos of when Garage Kei was pulling his Alto apart. Also visible in that photo was a reason for my potential death had I not lifted the carpet... What's that, I hear you ask? Well, it goes here It's the fricken clevis pin from the brake pedal. Instead of firmly pushing the brakes, the clevis just slid up and down the pedal. This definitely was not on top of the carpet, so I can only presume that when they had the pedal box out, the pin slipped down behind the carpet and wasn't seen again until now. I quickly grabbed a new split pin and refitted it how it should be. I also found the circlip on the end of the pivot for the clutch pedal was too big and fell off when I touched it. Needless to say, it is all going to get a thorough going over. Anyway, back to rust hunting. The driver's floor doesn't look too bad, just the one hole (for now) and the rust is doing its best Alien chestburster impression So, out with the big screwdriver and start poking Onto the other side. Thankfully, the pillar/sill, although showing some surface rust under the sealer, was solid There were a couple of holes in the floor here I got out old mate paint pen, and started marking them out Moving back under the car, I had a look at the LH front sill I started by using some big grips, a hammer and dolly, and straightening out the jacking point. To check how far the rust hole in the sill went, I had to remove the sill cover. Thankfully, with some gentle persuasion with the impact screwdriver, all the screws came out without too much issue. Other than the obvious rust hole, the sill and bottom of the guard are actually in good shape I also straightened the driver's side jacking point while I was at it Around the back, after some investigation, the seal lip was looking pretty substandard I'm not particularly looking forward to working out how to fix that, but it's gotta be done. The bonnet didn't escape some poking and paint pen That was all the excitement for that day, other than quickly whipping up a blanking panel on the 3D printer for the hole in the firewall where the old Auto shifter cable went I used the old dirty finger on paper method to trace out the hole I then imported this into Fusion, and traced around it After extruding it, sending it to my printer and printing it in PETG to withstand heat, this is what I had I'll get some nicer bolts and sealant to seal it in place, but otherwise it should do nicely. Moving on to last weekend, it was time to deal with the rust. I dug the welder out from the dungeon under the house, found my trusty grinder, body saw and finger sander, and set to work. I started on the passenger's side, and of no surprise, the scope crept once the abrasives touched the metal Until I ended up with a much bigger hole I cleaned up the edges, and zapped some nice new steel in place Despite good penetration, I decided to weld the underside too, just to make it nice, strong and tight. As close to seamless as I could It was hard to get a photo because it was so shiny, but the holes in the sill got the same treatment It still needs to be seam sealed, but I coated it in epoxy primer to protect it. It's not pretty because I don't like completely grinding down welds if I don't have to, as it can make them weaker or introduce pinholes, but the seam sealer will cover it all anyway. Moving to the other side, the holes got a lot bigger here I zinged this patch in with a few plug welds to tie the sill and A pillar sections together, since it's an overlapping intersection of panels. I cut back through just the sill, so there was exposed A pillar metal to weld to. The holes in the floor were next Once all the holes were filled with new metal, I epoxy primed them and then hit them with a coat of zinc-rich primer over top. I also sprayed this into the sills wherever I could access The next day, it was time to finalise all the work. I started by seam sealing everything, making sure there were no gaps or holes. This side was a little different. On one side of the pinch weld is the floor, the other is the sill. On the floor, I seam sealed it, on the sill I used some body filler to smooth it out The filler was sanded and then primed. I wasn't aiming for perfection, just to smooth out a couple of low points from grinding the welds back. Once the seam sealer had cured, it was all covered with an epoxy top coat. This will seal and protect it all. The majority is either under the car, hidden by the carpet, or under the side sill cover. Only a small section will be visible. This is the same basic treatment the Marina got, and I'm happy with how that's holding up. I still need to tackle the boot lip and the big hole in the bonnet, but I need to get the seats out of the boot before I can work around there. All this messy work needs to be done and dusted before I can even consider building an engine in the garage, so with parts starting to arrive, I need to sort it soon.

After the huge disappointment that was the first track outing, I made some changes and gave it another go. Per my last update, the BRZ was now running damper adjustable Cusco shocks all round, 1.5 deg front camber, STI subframe stoppers, and Endless brake pads. I didn't grab a lot of photos this time, but we had an absolute cracker of a day Blue car squad rolling again We started the day with the training sessions, and already I could feel the car was more playful and giving me a bit more leeway before pulling back on the fun. Once out in the actual track sessions though, is where the changes really shone. The biggest difference was the brakes. The Endless pads are 100% a better option than the Dixcels. I was leaning very hard on them all day, with lots of late braking, and not once did they overheat, smoke or give me a firm pedal. A night and day difference from what I was having to put up with last time. This made a huge difference in my confidence. The other change was the VSC unit, taken from a 2017 car, which was definitely giving me more freedom and not pulling power when coming out of corners like the 2012 VSC unit was. Even in standard mode it was better, but Track Mode gave me the freedom I was looking for last time. It did still catch me at one point though, when my tyres weren't as warm as they should've been, and I got a lump of liftoff oversteer before the hairpin (some upper Muppet messed with his phone settings, so no telemetry on the videos this time ) The Cusco shocks honestly didn't excite me that much. Yes, if you dial them up high they get fairly firm, and it's unpleasant on the road, but the difference on the track didnt seem to be that big. I suspect if you used anything other than stock springs with them, it might make a positive difference, but I am unable to lower the car due to my driveway. On the street I run them about 15 clicks from softest (out of 40) and on the track I was running 30/35 front/rear. In saying that, the camber bolts set to maximum 1.5 degree negative did give a sharper turn in, I would recommend these. My fastest time on the day was a solid 1:30.58, a huge decrease over my previous PB. A long way from my first track day in the Jazz where I got a 1:50.33 Annoyingly, there were some glitches in Racechrono (like the 153-127kph on the back straight) but the times were consistent. Compared to my fastest last time, 1:32.21, I was now braking way later and carrying more speed on the straights (a byproduct of the VSC unit not cutting power anymore). Last time, it looks like I had more speed in a couple of corners, since the only way to go fast was to carry as much speed around the corner as I could. If I could combine the cornering speed of having bad brakes, and the rest of the later sessions, I would've been pretty rapid. Here were the two fastest laps, a 1:30.74 followed by the 1:30.58. I did have to slow down after these though as the oil temps were getting too high (it briefly peaked at 130c before dropping - Oil pressure was holding strong considering). One mod I would recommend for regular trackday users, would be a proper air-air oil cooler as the heat exchanger does a good job getting the oil to temp quickly, keeping it stable and dropping it quickly once you back off, it just cant keep the over all temps down enough. Over all, I had a blast. The first outing was disappointing since the brakes let me down, but this time there were no issues, just me and the car going corner to corner. Sadly, I decided this would be the last time I track the car. I have taken it to where I wanted to, experienced what I wanted, and had my fun, so the car is for sale. Even if I still own it in January when the next trackday is, I'll be taking the Honda instead to give that it's turn.

The old girl passed her first yearly WOF today, clean sheet and all. The inspector loved it, complementing it on how well and smooth it drove and how cool it is. Took advantage of the WOF and sun to go for a quick run around the back roads. The rear suspension changes have made a positive improvement, being firmer and more controlled now.

So, I've had the car just over a week now, and it's been a busy old time. The more I dig into the engine that came with the Alto, the more dire it becomes. I'll go into detail as I go, but I'm starting to think the $10k quote the previous owner got for the rebuild might not have actually been that far off, considering almost nothing is reusable. In a huge turn of luck, I was very fortunate to be offered a Suzuki Cappuccino engine by a friend in the local Kei group. It was a spare for his race Cappo, but had been a good running engine when it came out of the donor. I never thought I would be able to source a donor, let alone it being local. So of course I jumped in the parts hauling Honda, and loaded it up I got it home and with the help of my wife we unloaded it, and I managed to rig the engine stand to work on the tiny little engine. It's pretty much at the limits of the stock stand. It had been stored in a workshop, so is pretty dirty externally, but before I bought it we stuck a borescope down the cylinders and checked them out. We couldn't see much because the cylinders are so small, but they didn't appear rusty. The timing cover came with it, thankfully, as mine had been cut in half for some reason The exhaust manifold has cracked and been welded, which is better than my current one which is still badly cracked Interestingly, the Cappo runs a 90 degree adapter on the oil filter, whilst the Alto runs the filter straight into the block via a cooler I wasted no time in starting to strip the donor engine down. First was removing the oil filter adapter. Three bolts and it pops off Next was the exhaust manifold, which has two nuts and two bolts holding it on. One of the bolts is hidden up under the turbo flange Came off suspiciously easy Next was the intake manifold. There are a couple of other things to remove first, like this long guy coolant neck I tried to get the small hose to the intake manifold off without damaging it, but in the end it wouldn't give up, so got chopped The intake manifold is held on with a series of 9 little nuts. This was made a little easier by the injectors and fuel rail having already been removed by the previous owner Fairly easy to remove, really Instead of the massive thermostat block the Alto has, this engine just had a small block off plate with a coolant temp sensor in the middle of it The engine was looking pretty small with the manifolds removed Whilst the tub of Cappo parts was filling up. Note the ziplock bags, labelled, with bolts in them... something the engine rebuilder that stripped the Alto engine was lacking. The next day I started on the actual tear down. My plan is to completely rebuild this engine from the bottom up, so it's all new, and will last. I probably could've run this engine as is, but I didn't want to risk it (with good reason, as I later found out) Removing the timing belt was the first thing I needed to do, so using the manual, I set the timing at TDC, making sure the cams weren't 180 out Next, I removed the spring and bolt from the tensioner. This was a real prick to remove, as the little pin it pivots on was seized in the front cover. I had to tap it with a hammer back and forth to get it to move and then slowly wiggle it out Once the belt was removed, before progressing further, I set the crank to a certain position as per the manual. As it says, this sets the pistons in a certain height to prevent the pistons hitting the valves. I could then remove the cam pulleys and rear timing cover The cams on the F6A engine aren't actually in the head, they are in cam boxes on top of the head. Annoyingly, it means if you have a "valve cover" leak, you have to remove the camshafts (and timing belt) to change the gaskets. After removing all the screws, I carefully lifted off the cam boxes This gave me clear access to the head, with the rocker arms and hydraulic lash adjusters (lifters) I carefully removed the rocker arms in their pairs, and placed them in an organiser The lifters just slide up out of their bore. I started with some needle nose pliers and a rag, but in the end just pulled them out with my bare fingers Intake side done A good reminder to limit how much sealant you use. This orange RTV was all over the place, and in the case of this lifter, inside it too The Alto reconditioner didn't seem that concerned, since they dumped all the rockers and lifters from that engine together into a container with no care but in my case I'm keeping everything labelled and organised Next was to remove the head, which caused a slight issue... my hex socket was too big to fit between the valve springs. Nothing a visit to the bench grinder couldn't fix though Head bolts removed. They always have a very distinctive burnt oil smell Head removed Finally, the treasures inside have been revealed. Stock/OEM style head gasket present The bores looked good, considering the unknown ks Number two has some slight marking in the walls. Cant pick it up with a fingernail though. Hopefully a hone will clean it up The pistons were looking good too, quite clean, with no missing bits As you can see in the photos above though, the coolant passages were a bit crusty... so when I removed the water pump... it was nasty. I gave it a clean up, and I will have the block cleaned by the reconditioners, so it should be fine. Flipping the engine over, it was time to remove the sump and gain access to the rotating assembly Looked pretty good inside. Nice and clean, no real burnt on sludge. I suspect this engine was looked after I removed the oil pickup Now it was time to remove the pistons. One by one, I undid the conrod nuts, removed the cap and pushed the piston down and out The bearings have some wear, but were fine. Most important was that they were consistent It's bloody hard to show, since it's so shiny, but the crank also looked great The main bearing caps needed to be removed next. Once again, bearings looked pretty good (darkness on bearings is just old oil) Crank also showing no signs of damage And compared to the thrust bearings I removed from my last Alto, which were almost completely worn out, these are great I got a little stuck here thanks to a rear main seal housing that didn't want to come free, so moved onto testing the head overnight. With the head upside down I poured some coolant into the chamber on the head. It didn't immediately leak through the valves, so that was a good sign The theory is that if the valves are sealing, as they should, there should be no coolant leaking past them. Leaving it overnight showed that two valves had a slight seepage You could trace the line of coolant from which valve it was I marked the valves for future checking. I'm sure it'll just be some carbon on the valve seat So, back to the stupid rear main seal housing. It is held in place with a handful of bolts, and two philips head screws. Dumb idea. I managed to round one off by trying to use my rattle gun to shake it free (which I have had success with before), so for the other one, I used the recommended impact screwdriver After a few good whacks, it came right out My only option was to drill the head off and hope the rest came out without too much of a fight. I used progressively bigger drill bits until the head popped off Which meant I could finally remove the crank The remains of the screw did just wind out easily The main goal here was to thoroughly clean all the gasket surfaces, and measure the bores and pistons before the block and head have a date with the engine reconditioner this week. Cleaning the sump flange on the block gave a nice half and half After much scraping, and some wire brushing, I moved onto checking the bores. There was no point in sending it out for machine work if the bores were over spec Its not the best way to do it, and certainly not the quickest, but I bought a micrometer and set of T gauges It was a pretty steep learning curve getting the T gauges to measure properly, centered in the bore and not reading too high or too low. The manual calls for four measurements per cylinder. Two at 50mm from the top and two more 90mm from the top; two inline with the crank and two perpendicular. I marked the two depths on the T gauge since I was sick of using a ruler each time The trick was to line the gauge up in the cylinder, and then locking and unlocking it whilst gently wiggling it around to center it first, followed by unlocking it, tipping it so one side goes down into the bore further, locking it and then tilting it up straight again (which pushes the gauge slightly closed, accurately measuring the bore) and lifting it out to be measured You can see from the sheet I made that it took a few tries before I got repeatable results. I started with cylinder 1, so had to go back and redo it once I had refined my skills a bit The last measurement I wanted to do was checking the piston skirt. To do this I had to remove the conrod. This is where my first real surprise came about. I began with piston 3, which I had noticed was a little stiff to move when wiggling the conrod back and forth, unlike the others which were smooth. I used a pick to remove the retaining clip And then using a short extension bar, I carefully hammered out the pin. Piston 3 took a bit of force to hammer out This was why. It turns out the gudeon pin is cracked end to end, right through to the center Unfortunately this has also damaged the little end of the conrod, marking it up Thankfully all the others came out fine, but I will need to buy a single new conrod, which ain't cheap. Moving on to measuring them, this was a bit of a pain once again, until my technique got better. All pistons were within spec I had a quick idea to use one of the conrods that came with the Alto, so I grabbed the best looking one and stripped it down I don't know what kinda of horrible pain and suffering this engine went through, but the two good rods both suffered from massive heat in the little end. Both pins were discoloured from heat, as were the top of the conrods. I decided not to risk running them, so back in their box they went. Speaking of a hard life, check out the skirt wear on the Alto piston vs the Cappo one Interestingly the bigend bearings in the Alto were non-original, so I'm guessing it was bearing slapped at some point before it all fell to bits Cappo bearing left, Alto bearing right With the block stripped, I did a quick comparison against the Alto block. Other than the bolt-ons, they are the same block. The only real difference noticed is that the Cappo block is drilled and tapped for the oil filter adaptor, whilst the Alto one isn't. The Alto oil cooler seal should still be on the outside of the holes. Alto left, Cappo right Why I'm not using the Alto block, its badly pitted The last job I needed to do this weekend was to strip the head so that can also be skimmed. This means valves out, springs out, stem seals out It was a bit awkward to do with my cheap new spring compressor, but it did the job pretty easily A small magnet on a stick was used to fish out the collets Again, the previous rebuilder didn't care But I do The last few valves being removed Job done, I removed the seals with some pliers I will send it all out to be cleaned and skimmed/honed this week. I'm still a little while off having all the parts I need, but at least I wont be relying on anyone else to do their bit once the parts do arrive. As a bonus, I wanted to quickly pop the front bumper back on the Alto, just to keep it safe. This required refitting the slam panel and bumper support It turns out having all the bolts in your slam panel is for chumps, broken off bolts are where the cool kids play. I'm a chump though, and not cool, so I drilled out and tapped the broken bolt There is shockingly little in the front of an old Kei car. To be fair, I don't believe late model ones are much better, certainly the HA36S Alto wasn't. With the frame in place, I juggled the bumper a bit and fitted it It's got its little face again, likely for the first time in a year or two I know it'll need to come off again to refit the engine, but that's a future me problem.

interestingly, it seems that according to Carjam it had a readable engine number when it came into the country, 13B-4321141. Its amazing it doesnt just say "RUSTED" like usual.

After selling the Alto Works, there was a tiny little nugget shaped hole in my life, so I had no choice but to fill it with another Kei car. If you were following the previous Alto from the start, you might remember this one from here. Long story short, there was an auction (maybe an estate sale? Can't recall) a couple of hours north of where I live, and when browsing through the list of what was going to be available, there happened to be a Suzuki Alto Works listed. Weird thing to have in a barn, I thought, but hey I'm keen. I went up to view and bid on the car, and as soon as I saw it, I fell for the little nugget. Who couldnt love that little face. It'd been off the road for 11 years at that point, and had been sitting the whole time. The interior was foul The exterior was also filthy, top to bottom, so it was hard to get a good gauge on the condition. Poking around with my torch though, I found a couple of spots that needed attention The front of each sill, where the jacking points should be, had some rust, including this hole on the passenger's side. The boot lip had been trapping moisture under the seal too, and rusted along there (and causing a leak into the boot) The only real damage to the exterior, other than a couple of small dings, was this dent in the front guard. I suspect since the door hinges are bent, that the door over extended forward, damaging both But otherwise it appeared fairly solid, and most importantly, mostly complete No one knew if it had run, when it last ran, or if it was previously a good runner. I found the keys on the keyring in the car next to it, so moved them to the Alto, but otherwise it was all an unknown. The auction rolled around, I did my best but ultimately got outbid. For me, the risk of the unknowns at that point were just too great, so I kept my top bid reasonable. Fast-forward almost two years, and I get a message from a friend saying, "I put out looking to buy a Kei car, and got offered a car I read about on your very blog. It's too much of a project for me, but do you want me to put you in touch?" Heck yeah I do! So he passed my email on and the owner dropped me a line "Hi, I have a Suzuki Alto Works for sale, would you be interested in a project" Of course, I held back my excitement and asked for more details He came back with a couple more details, but more importantly a couple of photos Undeniably the same car, car club sticker and all. Unfortunately, he also mentioned the engine was rust seized, and had been sent off to a rebuilder to be stripped and assessed, which resulted in it being declared completely kaput (and a "$10K" quote to rebuild it). I replied asking for more information about the engine damage and condition of the car and heard nothing but crickets. Me, being me, couldnt leave it well enough alone. The damn thing was rattling around rent-free in my head, so 7 months after I heard nothing back, I flicked him a quick email asking how he was getting on with the Alto. "Good timing, I was just thinking I should do something with the car or get rid of it" After a lot of back and forth, the stars aligned and on my way to the track in the BRZ the other weekend I detoured an hour or so out of my way and went to look at the little nugget. It was pretty well as expected; the front of the car was all in bits, the engine was spread across a few shelves, and the car was looking a bit sorry for itself. On the plus side, he had cleaned the car inside and out, and honestly, the interior clean alone was worth having him win the car in the first place instead of me The engine was pretty dire, but we'll get back to that later. Anyway, it all checked out, everything was there, the rego was still on hold, and after going away and doing some more research into what on earth I was doing, I made an offer. We settled on something in between what both of us were thinking, and a friend of his was roped in to bring the car and multiple tubs of parts down to me. Yesterday the car arrived. Here is my latest project, Nuggie, the 1990 Suzuki Alto Works RS-X CN21S I had been super anxious all morning, but actually seeing the car roll up on the trailer, looking ridiculously small, just wiped all the anxiety away and replaced it with excitement. Whilst discussing the transport with the transporter beforehand, we had been coming up with plans to get the car off the trailer and down into my garage, since my driveway, although short, is very steep. I think in the end it was going to be a case of using the winch on the van to winch the car down into the garage. But thankfully that didnt matter. As it turns out, not only does the handbrake work, but so do the service brakes. So with a little push, the Alto was off the trailer and I gently guide it down into the garage using the handbrake to control it. We unload all the parts, and after bidding farewell, I stand back and see the Alto in its new (temporary) home Theres a couple more spots of rust than I could see at the auction (one of them is the front edge of the bonnet in the above photo, seems to be a common spot), and the paint is flat as anything, but it will hopefully polish up nicely. I won't do that yet, I want a good before and after in the sun. I couldnt help but check out a couple of the cool little things about the early cars. One of them is visible in the photos above; the vertical door handles. These were only on the early cars, as they later replaced them with normal boring handles when they decided safety was more important than being cool and added side intrusion bars. This even necessitated changing the quarter panels since they have cutouts for your hand on the vertical handle cars. Cool handles Boring normal handles and "safe" doors. The front seats are pretty wild too. Such late 80's vibes You can actually quickly remove and flip the shoulder support on the backrest, for either higher or lower support Another early feature I'm a big fan of is the super retro dash and the gauge cluster, both of which got "modernised" in 1991. Moving on, spread across the tubs were all the engine components, and now that I had time to have a decent look at them, it was grim The main journals on the crank are very unhappy There are a couple of less than happy valves too. I suspect even if the engine didnt drink a bunch of water that it wouldnt have run very well with a burnt valve But the block is the least happy I'm looking into options currently, and have a potential lead on a complete engine that would be a better base to rebuild, otherwise I could bore this block out and use oversize forged pistons. We'll see. Either way, I want it running fairly quickly (without compromising too much, I want it done properly), so have a roughly 6-month plan to be back on the road, and I want it out of the garage within a month or two as I'm very limited on garage space. Parts have already been ordered, and I'll be making a start on the rust soon. Plenty more to come. Keep on moving.

Last trackday was so I could try the car out as close to stock as I could handle. Now that was done, it was time to throw some more bits I had been holding onto, onto the car. The first to go were the front brake pads. I quickly found the limits of the Dixcel ES pads at the last track day, with them turning my friction material into smoke and not a heck of a lot of stopping power. I took the RH side pads out first and although certainly glazed and shiny, they didnt look too bad I was interested to note that the fancy copper brake grease the pads came with was all gone, leaving just a hard clump of gunk I had to scrape off the clips the pads are meant to slide on After much research, the general consensus for 86/BRZ owners that track their cars much harder and faster than I will, was to use Endless MX72 Plus pads, so I grabbed a set from Japan. On paper, the specs arent that different to the Dixcels, other than being able to go up to 750c instead of 600c. Little did I know the two are worlds apart. Annoyingly, the Endless pads do not come with shims, so unless I wanted to risk them squealing and being annoying, I needed to steal some shims from other pads - in this case, the Dixcels. I fit them with plenty of the ceramic grease the RDA pads come with, and made sure the sliders were still greased and moving freely The left-hand side is where it gets a bit more interesting. This is the side that was smoking hard after every session. I'm guessing due to the circuit being a lot of right-hand turns, the left front brake is having to take more weight and force. It had gotten hot enough to cook the coating on the shim Again, all the brake paste was cooked into hard sludge. Removing the pads showed that I had well and truly overheated them What was shocking to me was that just using my finger, I could crumble the edges of the friction material like it was made of plaster. Compared to the other side, the pad surface was very rough and crumbly. Nice clean and new Endless friction material Fitted to the car with some new ceramic paste, and some shims I stole from the pads that came in the car when I got it (since the Dixcel ones were cooked on this side). The rear pads were fine, with plenty of meat and the grease still present With the brakes all set to go, I moved onto the suspension. I got lucky on Facebook Marketplace shortly after buying the car, and ended up with a cheap set of Cusco Touring-A damper adjustable shocks. Designed as OE replacements, but giving 40 steps of adjustment from soft to firm, I wanted to give them a try and see if I could tune the suspension a bit. I started with the fronts. The shocks I got had a pair of fronts already assembled with OE springs, so I could build them up on the bench with the new STI top mounts I bought, and not have to disassemble the stock ones on the car at all. One of the main reasons to change the shocks out was that my front top mounts wouldn't pass a WOF due to extensive cracking It turned out the replacement shocks also had cracks in the top mounts, albeit not as bad I had purchased a set of STI reinforced top mounts to replace them regardless, so it wasnt an issue I removed the old top mount Fit the new mount, and it was ready to fit to the car Removal and fitting was pretty simple. Undo the lower bolts on the knuckle, undo the sawybar link, disconnect the brake hose and ABS wire from the strut, and then its three nuts on the top mount to make it drop out. I use a bungee cord to hold the knuckle/hub back and stop it flopping down. The replacement just bolts in, including another small upgrade, a Whiteline camber bolt, set to maximum negative camber (1.5 degrees, as confirmed by the alignment afterwards) Whilst in the general area, it was also quite easy to swap the front subframe bolts out for the uprated "TS" (Tuned by STI) bolts. Two on each side The new bolts have a thicker flange on the head, but otherwise appear the same. I probably wouldn't bother with these Old on top, new on bottom I swapped them one and at a time, torquing them to spec as I went, so as not to disturb the subframe alignment. With one side done, I repeated the same work on the other side, subframe bolts and all Once done, I moved to the rear. These were bare shocks, so I had to remove the old ones first. I first removed the boot lining so I could access the top mounts for the rear shocks To drop the shock out, you need to lower the arm by disconnecting the inner bolt where it mounts to the subframe The LH side has the added bonus of the headlight adjuster link, make sure to disconnect this Undo the subframe bolt, the swaybar link, and the bolt from the bottom of the shock and let the arm swing down. You do not need to disconnect the bolt on the hub end of the arm, leave that in and use it as a pivot (I removed it because I'm a fool) With the shock removed, I disassembled the strut and swapped the spring and top mount to the Cusco shock It helps to take note of the alignment of the spring and top mount when moving it from the old one to the new shock, so you know which way to reinstall the strut. It helps to use a jack to lift the inner end of the arm up whilst you wrangle the shock into place, and then again to lift the hub so you can torque everything at ride height. I also used uprated bolts for the lower shock mount. Once again, thicker flange but otherwise the same. The adjuster for the damper sticks a fair way into the boot I cut a small slot in the lining on each side for the adjuster to poke through, so that I could still access the adjuster knob on the top Finally, I installed the front STI upper and lower rear subframe stoppers. Normally, there is a big gap between the subframe and the body of the car, which allows the subframe to move up and down when power/torque is applied. The stoppers fill that gap with polyurethane rings, to reduce movement without increasing the NVH too much. For the top ones, I removed the bolt and slipped the top plate out. The stopper goes between the bush/subframe and the plate The lower one goes between the subframe and the lower brace After an alignment, the car was feeling very good on the road, so all that was left to do was take it to the track. Parts Used Endless MX72 Plus Front Brake Pads - EP386MXPL Cusco Touring-A Front Shock - 965 65T F Cusco Touring-A Rear Shock - 965 65T R STI Front Strut Mount - ST2031055001 x2 TS Front Subframe Bolts - SU003-05212 x4 TS Rear Lower Shock Bolt - SU003-05213 x2 TS Rear Lower Shock Nut - SU003-05235 x2 STI Upper Stopper - ST20176AS000 x2 STI Lower Stopper - ST20176AS010 x2 Please note, these parts are specific to my car and may vary. Please check before ordering.

As part of my prep for the next trackday and to remedy an issue I had in the last one, I chose to upgrade my VSC control module to a newer one from a 2017+ GT86/BRZ. It's well known on the earlier cars like mine, that the VSC, even in track mode, is far too intrusive. This was very apparent to me on the track when it was constantly cutting power when trying to exit corners, and it really reined in any fun (hence me trying to turn it off, and ending up spinning). The swap is well documented over on the FT86 forum, but since that forum is dying and only works half the time, I thought I would cover my experience with it. Toyota released some good info when the facelifted 2017+ cars came out, which clarifies the changes to the VSC unit and the change from SPORT mode to TRACK mode. My original unit, being the ~16MY blue dot in the above diagram, shows how much more slip the MY17 unit allows, both in Normal and Track modes. Toyota also clarified what the different modes are and the differences between the new and old modes. I spent all my time on the track (except for the one time I tried Mode 5) in Mode 3, which is pressing the SPORT button and having both lights come on. I couldnt get Mode 4 to work, though, as TRC kept re-enabling when turned off. The good news is the swap is pretty easy. Only the electronics unit on the ABS pump needs to be swapped, so no fluid is lost or needs to be bled, and other than having to swap two wires on the early cars like mine, it's plug and play. 2015+ cars may not need to be rewired, so double check that first. I went on Yahoo Auctions Japan and hunted out a unit that met my criteria; it needed to be from a manual car, and have a production date after 2016. The manual car thing I had to check with the chassis number of the car the part was removed from, and photos of the unit indicated the build date This number is the important one. Always check on the black plastic control unit (as this is the part we need), not just the alloy ABS unit, as it is possible to swap an older module onto a later ABS pump. You can also check the part number on the ABS unit. 27536CA030 is one of the confirmed units that work (from the list on the FT86 forum), the 16 also indicates it's a later 2016 unit and matches the 16 date on the VSC module. Now, to the actual job. This is the ABS pump with VSC unit on it, in the front LH corner of the engine bay Plenty of space to work Disconnect the battery before beginning work, just in case. Start by removing the connector from the unit. This has a big latching mech on it, and you need to press in this little button before you can lift the lever up The lever should lift up, push the connector away from the unit and then click into place up the top once it's fully unlatched The back shell needs to be removed next. Cut the white zip tie holding the wiring, and then using a small pick or screwdriver pop the two clips on the harness end of the back shell, it then lifts up from that end and unhooks and comes away. Once that is removed, you have access to the back of the wires. Before you can remove the two we need to move, you need to unlock the retaining clip inside the connector. This is the little pink tabs you can see inside the connector (when looking at the pin side) It needs to be slid to the right of the connector in the photo (to the harness side of the plug) with a small pick or screwdriver the below photo is unlocked, notice the gap above Pin 34 Now, using a small thin flat pin removal tool, you need to move the pink wire in slot 27 (top row, LH side) to pin 9 (labelled CLSE) and the white pin from slot 32 (top row in the middle) and move it to slot 8 Slots 8 and 9 are both filled with little white rubber plugs, which need to be removed. I used a pin from the front of the connector to poke it out a little bit and then finished pulling it out the back with tweezers, so I didnt loose it (and can reuse it in the now empty slots of pins 27 and 32) I slid the wires into place, making sure they locked into place Thats the wiring done. Slide the pink lock back, refit the rear shell, add a new zip tie to the wiring and put the connector aside. The actual module itself is easy to swap. The screws are e-Torx E5 and there are four to remove I didn't take any photos of the actual swap because I didnt want to risk any contamination, but this is what the inside of the old unit looks like Remove the screws, carefully remove the old module, and then carefully and gently slide the new one into place, making sure all the sticking out bits go where they need to go. It looks no different with the replacement unit fitted... but I know it's there. To make sure that I walked the walk, I also grabbed an MY17 TRACK button from Japan. I couldn't be seen pressing SPORT like a peasant This is easy to swap, just gently reach into the shifter boot and tug up on the front (near the radio) of the shift surround, and it will unclip and allow access to the back of it. You have to lift the front first, as the buttons actually hook under the centre console and need to be slid forward. There is one big plug in the button pack, which is unplugged here Remove the two screws, swap the buttons over, screw them back in, plug them in and refit the surround Much nicer than the old SPORT button The only catch here is that the 2013 cluster doesnt have a TRACK light, so it will still light up SPORT when the button is pressed. With the VSC unit securely in place, the connector refitted, and the buttons swapped, I reconnected the battery and immediately got a series of ABS and traction control warning lights on the dash. Dont worry, go for a quick drive and they should clear themselves. I havent been able to test the TRACK mode yet, since my next trackday isnt until later this month, but the giveaway that it's working is (other than no warning lights on the dash) that the SPORT light in the dash no longer comes on with a short press of the TRACK button, it now needs a 1 or 2 second hold of the button to activate. The other benefit, one that I havent had a chance to activate yet, is allegedly you can enable Hill Start Assist, to hold on hills, which might be handy if I'm feeling too lazy to use a handbrake. Details on turning it on in 2017+ cars is here, as it's off by default. I look forward to seeing how it reacts on track now, and will update with my thoughts when I can. I'm really hoping I will see some improvement in my lap times if it will stop killing my corner exists.

Thats a shame, it'd be an awesome project to inject the old E series engine but not worth having to cert for it. Guess I'll whack the twin carbs on and make dorts instead. I did wonder why they outlawed the conversion, and thats clears it up. Too many people using the wrong hose/pipes/filters to handle the higher fuel pressure, I guess.

I know the answer (no), but there is no way to skirt the cert requirement for carb to EFI conversion is there? IE: If i went from SU carb to a basic injection setup, on the same engine, with no other changes (other than the required supporting mods to fuel system etc)

I went with the MX72 Plus as this is what a few others use in their tracked (but not raced) Toybarus, and they were a sharp price out of RHD. Im not a particularly fast driver, so im surprised I outdrove the Dixcels TBH. Regarding the torque dip, I believe the majority of the issue is the header design/cat, so replacing that fixes most of it, but its recommended to run a tune with new headers. A tune alone might help, but wont fix it. I would buy another DC2R in a heartbeat, if i could afford one I think they should've released a small, low boost turbo. Not really for power, but more for that shove in the back feeling to make it more exciting. As it is the engine just feels lifeless. A K24 would be awesome and a good match to the chassis, but i do quite like the whole boxer thing.

The Patton Machine setup looks real tidy, albeit not as hidden as some others as it removes the dashpot. https://fiddlingwithzcars.wordpress.com/fuel-injection-patton-machine/

The day finally came, it was the BRZs turn on the track. I've been holding out for this trackday, since it was the first one in the BRZ and I wanted to keep it as stock as possible (except for driveline bushes and things to freshen it up), to experience the car "as it should be" from the factory. This was meant to be in June, to give me ample time before the WOF expires, but thanks to some bad weather it got called off and shifted to July instead, giving me literally a couple of days before the WOF expires. We drove up to Feilding the day before, and the next morning we emerged into a very chilly subzero morning, warmed the car up, melted the ice off the screen and cruised around to the track to get the usual pit. The blue car squad was completed by my friends in their mostly stock ZC33S Swift Sport (which is still faster than me in the BRZ). A stunning, albeit cold, morning After the driver briefing, we did a few laps of the track to warm the cars up and familiarise ourselves with the conditions and layout, and then we were unleashed in groups of either "slow" or "fast". I feel there should've been a "mid" range group, as there were some fast cars/drivers hanging out in the slow class, causing some grief. The first session was BUSY It was hard to string a good lap together with all the traffic, but the car was showing some promise. It gripped well, and hung on in the corners, but it did quickly show up one issue; the brakes sucked. Coming down the front straight on the third lap of the first session, I get hard on the brakes for turn one and suddenly the pedal feels... weird. It's not soft, it doesn't go to the floor, but it feels wooden, like I'm pressing on a block of wood instead of a brake pedal. I've cooked the pads. Damn. I was pulling decent laps already though, my second lap, before the brakes turns bad, was a 1:36.55, already faster than the fastest I went in the Alto at 1:36.91 The next laps were slower, as I wasn't sure at this point what was going on, so I was feeling out the brakes to see if they were still going to work or not. I found there was almost no pedal feel, and it was taking a lot more pressure on the pedal to actually slow the car, and it was a fine line from having that stopping force, to kicking in ABS. You can see from this video the first couple of corners I really have to jump on the pedal to cut the speed. Coming into the pits after the session and it was immediately obvious what had happened, from all the smoke pouring off the front brakes The smell of fried brakes was the smell of the day, for sure. Every session was followed by plumes of smoke like that, from both sides. I was pretty disheartened from that. The brakes were rubbish, and the car felt underpowered. It turned and handled pretty well, considering it's still on stock suspension, but it was leaving me feeling a bit cold compared to how much fun the Alto was. Not to be deterred, I pushed on and went out for another session. After the first flying lap, I decided the brakes weren't going to completely fail, and I just had to work with what I had. So on the second lap, I did this The fastest lap of the day, a 1:32.21. Even though it was the fastest I went all day, I was very consistent in my times, hovering around the 1:32 mark most of the day. BRZ Comparing that to the fastest I went in the Alto, even though the BRZ never really felt "fast", it smashed the Altos corner speeds in most corners, plus some added speed on the straights. You can really see in the BRZ how early I was braking though by the red shading before the corner. Alto 1:36.91 Unfortunately later in the day I decided to go out without the camera running, and did something a bit silly I had been getting a bit cocky with the car, pushing it more and more and getting some little slides out of it here and there. I had been running it in "sport" mode, which reduces the interference from the traction and stability control systems, but for this session I wanted to see if I could reduce it a little more. What I didnt realise, was that in trying to turn off traction control, but leave stability on, I had actually turned the whole lot off. I was on my own. I went into the hairpin fine, carrying a bit of speed, got on the throttle to exit and suddenly in a cloud of tyre smoke I was A: looking at the front of the car that was behind me, through my windscreen, and B: being flung from one side of the track, to the other. Thankfully the car avoided me, and other than my rear wheels just going on the grass, I wasn't stuck and didn't hit anything. It was an impressive 360 though. The car fired back into life after a bit of cranking (I forgot to clutch in) and I sheepishly cruised back to the pits, no harm, no foul. After that excitement I sat out the next session, but the last one for the day I went out and ended up having some fun with an old Holden Commodore race car. I could get right up his backside in the corners, but just didnt have the straight line grunt to catch him. In the end, I backed off a bit for a lap to give myself some clean space later on, as he was actually holding me up and killing my lap times. It was a good battle though, even if he had no idea I was there. It's quite apparent to me in the videos that the traction and stability control are really fighting me on exit speeds. You can see I go 100% throttle but the speed doesnt increase until I straighten the car (and sometimes you can just catch the little yellow lights flashing their heads off). I have a future mod that will hopefully fix this, without me having to turn the whole lot off and end up going backwards again. Because this trackday was run by a different group, there was a pro photographer there, so enjoy some nice looking speedy shots Blue car squad Over all, other than user error, the car behaved well. The oil temps were getting a tad high later in the day after some of the harder sessions, but generally stayed below 120c and cooled off quick when I backed off. Oil pressure was good even with the higher temps, generally holding the recommended 10psi/1000rpm. I would love to get rid of the mid-range torque dip, as that really dulls the feel of the engine. It reminds me a lot of the old twin turbo Legacy and the Valley Of Death between the turbos, where if you shift into a specific RPM range, there is just nothing there, and it falls flat on its face. To fix that though means spending more money, and to be honest in not sure how much of a Kelvinator car this is. I love how it looks, but it's not as fun to drive as I wanted. It's a damn nice car to drive, though. Next track day will tell. Before the next track day, which is late next month, I have a bunch of things to go into the car to hopefully sharpen up the handling, and some new Endless front pads to get rid of the shite Dixcel ones.

In my experience wifi ones suck and are a bit limited in what apps works. I have used the small blue ones heaps with no issues. Keep in mind they're only for generic OBD2, not OEM software.