KwS's Small Car Shenanigans. Making Altos work.

[shrike]

14 minutes ago, kws said:

 

Got ya that makes more sense 

Yes if you had a ring with 60mm OD that was the thickness of the Brake Disc/Rotor and an ID of the Hub at that height that would center it fine

If you have to make something you could make it so you could also center the wheels on them as well so it would be 

56.1mm od for wheels to 60mm od for Rotor bore and Inner ID of 56.1mm?

But if your happy with the wheels being studcentric no reason to complicate it

[kws]

40 minutes ago, shrike said:

But if your happy with the wheels being studcentric no reason to complicate it

Not 100% happy >_< one of the reasons its back on the drawing board. I'm sure there is a better way to do it without resorting to making anything. When I do revisit it, it might end up just being 3mm spacers behind the rotors as that should keep the rotors just centric on the hub, and allow wheels to also be hubcentric, the only issue is that the rotor won't be centered in the caliper bracket anymore. I'm think the main issue with the rotor not being centred would be that new pads may not fit on one side, the difference shouldn't be enough that a pad could fall out or anything

I could also have the center bore machined out of a pair of Cynos rotors....

[fuel]

Is there enough meat on the backside of the hub flange that you could machine the hub so it's just a constant 54mm to suit the Toyota rotors & wheels? ie eliminate the step

[kws]

3 hours ago, fuel said:

Is there enough meat on the backside of the hub flange that you could machine the hub so it's just a constant 54mm to suit the Toyota rotors & wheels? ie eliminate the step

I briefly considered that but I won't be altering the car to make it work, the plan was for a bolt on setup. I presume there's a reason for the step too, Suzuki didn't waste money or weight where they didn't need to on the Alto.

[fuel]

could you find another pair of hubs to modify, or retain as originals if putting back to stock? given the rotors are more of a consumable, and you're already altering the braking system already, you could modify another pair of hubs for a more 'bolt on' solution where you don't need to keep modifying rotors should you need to replace them again in future.

[kws]

I could, but by the time I buy some hubs, put new bearings in them, and buy some new rotors I'll be in it for as much as a Silkroad bolt on kit 

[Hyperblade]

10 hours ago, kws said:

Not 100% happy >_< one of the reasons its back on the drawing board. I'm sure there is a better way to do it without resorting to making anything. When I do revisit it, it might end up just being 3mm spacers behind the rotors as that should keep the rotors just centric on the hub, and allow wheels to also be hubcentric, the only issue is that the rotor won't be centered in the caliper bracket anymore. I'm think the main issue with the rotor not being centred would be that new pads may not fit on one side, the difference shouldn't be enough that a pad could fall out or anything

I could also have the center bore machined out of a pair of Cynos rotors....

You definitely want the rotors and wheels to be hub centric, you track the car occasionally and that puts additional load on everything, and vibrations are a great way to suck any fun out of the day.

[kws]

18 minutes ago, Hyperblade said:

You definitely want the rotors and wheels to be hub centric, you track the car occasionally and that puts additional load on everything, and vibrations are a great way to suck any fun out of the day.

I was more worried about weakening it and losing a wheel or something, but yeah vibrations are a no go. 

[kws]

It's been a big weekend of work on the Alto, but before I detail the main lot of work, today I did some upgrades in the interior.

One upgrade I had been looking forward to was the seatbelt extenders. Since lowering the seats I noticed that the seatbelt, since it cannot be height adjusted, cuts across the base of my neck which can be uncomfortable. I would've just lived with it, but when my wife commented on it, I knew I should fix it. Happy wife and all that.

It's a common thing in Altos, so the hard work had been done already and it's well known that you can use a Honda part to bring the belt out slightly. P/N 81415-SH3-004

I bought a pair. They are only for one side, since I guess in the Honda they're from (Old Civics and CRX) they're only fitted to the passengers side, but I used a heat gun to gently bend the drivers side one back the other way (in hindsight, I may order another one and try it flipped upside down instead).

The belt cuts quite high up

Remove this bolt

The hole in the Honda part is smaller, so use a step drill to open it up so the bolt slides freely through (but not so loose it rattles around)

And refit with the extender between the belt bracket and the B pillar. Slip the belt through, and you're done.

I repeated on the drivers side too

I bent it to change the angle. I'm not 100% happy with the fit on this side as the belt rubs the arm as it recoils. You can clearly see the change in angle of the belt though.

The difference was immediate. The belt now comes up just by my shoulder and doesn't cut along my neck anymore. A+ would do again.

Next on my upgrades list was to downgrade my interior trim. The Works comes with this nice glossy black plastic around the heater controls. Probably looks nice when it's new, but when your car has had a life, it starts to look real shitey.

Mmm fingerprints and scratches

I hate glossy black plastic in interiors anyway, so I was stoked when I found a lower-spec trim on Yahoo Japan, with digital climate control (rare, lower-spec cars often have manual controls). This is an unpainted textured plastic instead of gloss. It actually matches the dash pocket better.

Removing the trim is easy, it's just clipped in around the perimeter. I stuck a finger in one of the many holes cut out of my dash pocket and just pulled it free.

There is a wire harness plugged in behind the climate control, so disconnect that. There is also a white tube for the climate control This was dangling free on my car, so I don't know where it's meant to sit, but I disconnected it from the back of the unit. It's just a "fresh air" intake so the climate control knows the interior temp, it won't actually connect to anything on the other end. I also had to remove the EVC unit since the wire went through the opening for the dash pocket.

I'm still finding random pockets of panel beater dust from when it went through compliance. The inside of the dash was covered in it. I gave it a quick wipe out with some APC.

I swapped the dash pocket over to the new trim, and refitted it to the dash. Nice.

Looks much better from the drivers seat. All the climate control options worked out of the box too, so I didn't even need to swap that unit over. Winning.

Next up was the main job. The clutch switch canceller.

Now, I had originally rejected this idea as the risk of starting the car by accident, whilst its in gear, was too great. I park the car in gear on my drive, so I couldn't risk it backing its way up the drive and across the road into a fence.

In modern cars, instead of turning a key two times to turn the car to "on", you press the start button twice. If you have your foot on the clutch (or the switch bypassed), pressing it twice will start the car instead. See the problem?

I still wanted to see what could be done though. I hate the idea of starting the car cold, with no oil pressure, and having my foot planted firmly on the clutch and all that force on my newly replaced crank thrust bearings.

While surfing Yahoo Auctions Japan I came across a kit that added a toggle switch to disable the clutch switch. This was still a big no-go. If the switch was left in the "disable" position, instead of getting the "on" position when pressing the start button twice, it would start the car.

Thinking more on it though, if there is a switch, it could be replaced with a button. So I went shopping.

On the left is a new genuine dash switch blank, so I can mount the button in it, in the middle is the wiring kit and toggle switch from Yahoo, and on the right is my JDMYO momentary push button.

Using a momentary button means it does not lock in place and resets once you release it. This means I can hold the button down and press the start button and the car will start, otherwise it reverts to the normal state of either pressing the clutch down to start, or going to the "on" position with two presses. Perfect.

I broke out all the reinforcing from the back of the switch blank and drilled a hole through it for the button.

The button had just wires out of the back of it, so I cut them shorter and added terminals

The clutch switches (there are two, one for pedal up, one for pedal down) are an absolute arse to get to. I contorted myself up under the dash for ages trying to get to them, but the power steering motor was always in the way and my hands were too big. They live up here, right up the top

Then I had a brain wave. Drop the column. Two bolts at the front

and one at the back supporting the motor

and the column will drop down. You might need to unclip the harness from the dash bar first

And there they are, the two switches. Real easy to get to now!

I used a tiny screwdriver to pop the black and white plugs out, and connected the harness up between the plugs. The wires just go inline with the plugs. I then ran the wiring up over the dash frame to the other side.

Where I pulled it through the hole and connected it to the button

I reinstalled the column, and pressed the button to test. The little green "LETS GOOO" start indicator lit up on the dash

So after checking I wasn't in gear, I held the button down, and pressed the start button at the same time. The engine fired into life. Great success.

It's quite easy to press both with one hand too. Because the red button is pronounced and has a large contact area, I could probably just palm the button as I press the start button too. Science to be done.

That angle showed me just how horrible the cluster looked too, so many scratches.

I preempted this and had bought a new cluster lens from Suzuki. I pulled the surround off and carefully removed the plastic lens. This is held on with a series of clips around the perimeter that I just used my finger to push down as I pulled the lens rearwards.

the new lens just clipped into place. And wow what a difference!

It's crazy how a little change like that makes such a difference. The cluster looks brighter now and like new.

The old one was pretty had it

Finally, as a bonus, I replaced the column shrouds. They didn't fit together well, and had a couple of extra holes drilled in them for functions no longer present on the car (IC water spray and rear window wiper canceller)

Fresh

That wraps up the changes to the interior for now. I still need to remove and wrap the steering wheel, but otherwise it's pretty well where I want it.

A big update is coming soon regarding the suspension repairs, I just want to align the car first and get some decent photos. I can't wait to drive it again, it's been a month!

[kws]

The handling getting extra murdery prompted me to open my wallet and replace some more parts.

I know I have mentioned it before, "Murdery Handling", but this is both part of the nature of the car, something I was used to, and something I didn't like when it got worse.

Due to the super aggressive plate LSD, when on power, the LSD will lock and the Alto will want to turn both wheels together at the same speed. This goes against what the wheels want to do when going around a corner, where normally the inside and outside wheels turn at slightly different speeds.

This causes "murdery handling" as when taking a corner, if you come off the throttle and the LSD suddenly unlocks and allows the differential in speed that the wheels want to have, the car will instantly dart to the inside of the corner, which is usually pushing you towards the centerline and oncoming traffic. This is great for when you want to hit them apexes hard, but not so great when just tootling to work and back.

It's a feature that the Japanese owner made note of after installing the LSD, and one that I was getting reasonably used to, until the other day.

It's not possible with a 1.5-way, but the tuck-in that occurs when you release the accelerator in a corner that is unique to FF cars with a 1-way system works well.
The traction from zero start is 4WD-like acceleration, and you can drive safely even in the rain.

Japanese Previous Owner

I was driving back from work and suddenly noticed that even the slightest throttle caused the car to want to go towards the outside of the corner, and when you came off throttle the steering would suddenly react like the steering wheel was joined to the rack by a rubberband. This wasn't the usual murdery handing, this was something more concerning.

When I made it safely home I jacked the car up and had a look for anything wrong. It didn't take long. Everything seemed nice and tight until I grabbed the front springs and wiggled. The whole front struts were loose, with the LH in particular moving a lot. The top mounts were no longer holding the struts in place and they were moving about. This was likely causing a change in alignment when coming on and off throttle and then turning.

I don't know why it suddenly got worse, but I needed to fix it. The first plan was to just replace the top mounts and reuse the rest of the suspension. I already have some Tanabe lowering springs to fit, and decided that since the shocks weren't original to the car (they're from a donor Works that had 50,000km more than my car as I didn't want to deal with the adjustable suspension this car had when it was imported) and they visibly looked pretty average, I would replace them too as I didn't want to find they were blown when I fit the new springs, and have to do the job twice.

It all snowballed from there. If I'm replacing the shocks, I may as well do the lower arm bushes too. But bushes won't get me a new balljoint, so that means new arms. If I'm doing the arms I should do Ignis arms to get more camber. I don't want to fit new standard mounts, I'll get some uprated ones. Oh, the price of a pair of genuine shocks is about that of a full set of aftermarket uprated KYB shocks, well Man-Maths says I should do the set then.

This led to a whole lot of new parts being shipped from Japan. It all arrived the other day, so I got cracking.

I brought the Alto in out of the cold. It had been a long month of not driving it.

The tape measure was brought out to give me a baseline for ride height

Front - 62.5cm

Rear - 63.3CM

The QuickJacks were slid under and up we went

I started with the lower arms as I wanted to be able to remove the shocks and not have to remove the knuckles, or pull the axles out. I removed the wheels and started by popping the outer balljoint. I removed the clip, took off the nut and using a hammer hit the knuckle on the side, which popped the joint out. The arm won't drop down so check it's popped by pushing the arm down with a pry bar.

I then removed the two inner bolts from the arm and removed it. Do note, that the rear bush actually slides into a C-shaped slot, so needs to be removed and fitted from the front, sliding the arm backwards into place.

Excuse the blur...

During my hours upon hours of research I came across a piece of information that was interesting to me; The lower arms from a current shape Ignis are the same as the Altos, but are 10mm longer, pushing the ball joint out slightly. This results in an extra 1 degree of negative camber, without having to mess with camber bolts.

Part Numbers 45201-62R00 and 45202-62R00

These bolted straight up with no issues

I used my bottle jack to lift the knuckle to ride height, so I could torque the bolts up to spec

This process was then repeated on the other side

Next up was the main job, the front struts. These looked rough, with surface rust peeling the paint off, and the rubber boots falling to bits. The car they were from had obviously been undersealed at some point, as the shocks were covered in overspray.

I used some bungee cords to hold the hub in place so it wouldn't drop down and pull the axle out of the gearbox. This is looped around the subframe mount.

The top nuts had been soaked in WD40 to make sure I had no issues removing them. These top nuts only hold the mount together and the strut in the car, it's safe to undo them as they aren't compressing the spring (that nut is below this one). You really do need an offset ring spanner for these as the shock shaft needs to be held with a hex key too.

With the top nut removed, the brake hose, ABS wiring and swaybar link removed from the strut, the two lower bolts were removed and the strut can be wiggled free

This is the big nut that has all the spring tension on it

And this big rubber thing on the top is what has compressed and no longer holds the strut in place

On this strut, the top nut was so loose I could undo it by spinning the top mount rubber. This nut should be about 50NM, so that wasn't right.

As there is still a bit of tension on the spring, I employed a single compressor to let me safely remove the nut (by hand with no tools...)

And the bare shock. As it turns out, the shocks aren't that bad. They still rebound when compressed, albeit a bit lazily. I was expecting them to be dead, like the rears I replaced previously.

The only reason to strip the shock down was to remove the top spring plate, which I forgot to order replacements for. A bit of a waste of time, but hey.

This is all the new goodies going in.

R's Racing Service Reinforced top mounts (P/N S36-120)

KYB New SR MS (Works spec - P/N MS-5628BZ1267Z)

Tanabe FunToRide springs (P/N HA36SFK)

Oh and of course, the Project Mu stainless braided brake hoses (P/N BLS-020AG)

All other parts were genuine Suzuki items, which for interests sake, all superseded to Type 2 parts, which have small changes over the Type 1 parts from my car.

I put the two top mounts side by side and you can see just how compressed the old one on the right is compared to the new one

I had read that when lowering an Alto you should cut the bump stop down accordingly, so I whacked the bottom off it

The beautiful new shocks were then built up

The blue is such a nice colour

The newly built strut was then refitted to the car, including the new top mounts and plates.

Part of the Type 2 changes was the difference in the top plate for the mount. It's been completely redesigned. Type 2 on the left.

They're also fitted with cute little caps that the car was previously missing

Before wrapping this side up I also did the brake hose. The clips are a real pain, but a small pry bar managed to get them out.

The banjo fitting in the brake caliper was a surprise to me. I haven't seen this style before. The bolt is solid, but has these ridges down the side that allow fluid to travel along its length.

The new stainless hose fit perfectly. I'm glad I went with the iconic teal instead of a boring colour.

Yes, the ABS wire should be in front of the strut, I corrected this later

The LH side is more of the same, with one small difference, the ECU needs to be moved out of the way. There are two bolts on the front edge of the ECU that allow you to slide the ECU off its mounting pin on the firewall, and rotate it up and away

Of course the bracket is still in the way to swinging spanners, so remove the two bolts holding that in place

Just as crusty as the other side (featuring correctly routed ABS wire)

All fresh newness

Hidden by the ECU

And again, nice fresh blue shock with teal hose

Both sides also got new tie rod ends, since I had to get the car aligned anyway, it was just a smart thing to do

They took a bit of tweaking. The change in camber had upset the toe, so when I first put the car on the ground again both wheels were pointing outwards. A quick eyelignment got them pointing somewhat straight again.

That was all the excitement for the front, so I moved to the back where I promptly removed my nice clean 2000km old genuine shocks

and springs

And fit new pretty new shocks and springs. I covered rear suspension replacement in a previous post.

It is a shame to be replacing the genuine parts since they're brand new, but needs must

The rear brake hoses got replaced too. It turns out that the rears were still fitted with the previous owners Navic stainless hoses

It's gotta be a matching set though

My wife gave me a hand to bleed the brakes and that was all the undercar work done.

Before lowering the car down, there were a couple of quick jobs I wanted to complete. The first was replacing the ZC33S Swift Sport coils with some "High Spark" coils. I've had a slight surge under boost since I got the car, and wanted to eliminate the coils, and a few people in Japan are running these High Spark coils with success (and to be fair, plenty run the ZC33S coils too).

I whipped the ZC33S coils out

I also removed a plug to check and all looked pretty good there

The High Spark coils bolt straight in

And lastly, I had a Blitz BOV that I finally wanted to fit

I got it cheap from Yahoo Japan because it's missing the trumpet. I'm not bothered by that

The Japanese owner deleted the stock BOV when he had the CADCARS tune loaded, using an Rs Racing Service blank, as the standard BOV can't handle more than the stock boost before leaking.

This worked, there are no leaks, and the turbo compressor surge noise it makes sounds great, but I'm both a child and want whooshy noises, and concerned about the longevity of the turbo.

The instructions say to remove the bumper to fit the BOV. I'm lazy, so I did keyhole surgery through the TakeOff vent

I ran a new genuine hose from the BOV to the intake

The solenoids had already been modified when the blank was fitted, so it wasn't too hard to plumb in the vacuum line

This solenoid has to be moved from the turbo outlet pipe, to here, with the bracket that comes in the kit. This solenoid is left connected to power but has no vac lines going to it

So, with the BOV fitted, it was finally time to drop the car to the ground.

Immediately, I loved it.

It looks incredible. Dropping the height has really pumped up the attitude; it looks so tough now.

Can't miss the extra camber in the front either

I tweaked the alignment so the wheels were straight, and then took it for a quick shakedown drive

 

The BOV sounds great, a good solid PSSSHHHH. It's like having a 90s turbo car again. I'm in my mid-30s, I shouldn't find it so amusing to drive around going psshhh psssh.

Upon returning home, I checked the heights again

Front - Now 60cm

Rear- now 60.5cm

So we've lost about 30mm all around, give or take. It's right in the middle of the 25-35mm spec Tanabe lists, which to my eyes is bang on perfect.

To wrap the job up I had an alignment done. My eyelignment wasn't too bad, it was a lot closer than when I first got the car and had it aligned.

It was amusing though, the guy that did the alignment pulled me aside when I went to pick the car up and was concerned that maybe the car had really bad CV joints or axles as the car knocked and shook when taking corners slowly "nah, that's normal, it has an overly aggressive plate LSD and the oil is cold". He also mentioned that the camber is out of spec and that they can fit camber bolts to bring it back in, but I let him know I added that camber intentionally. I commend them for their thoroughness though.

All that was left to do was take the car to work today.

I didn't get a clean run around the fun twisty bits, but did my best. So far I'm really happy with the suspension.

The ride is nicer than with the OEM suspension. It's less harsh on bumps (a point that often comes up when others replace the stock suspension), but is stiffer so there is less roll. It rides really well, so I'd say the Tanabe springs and KYB shocks are really well matched.

Most importantly though, we're back to normal levels of murdery handling, and if anything it's more controllable in corners as it feels more stable. I can't wait to see what it does at the next track day; I'm expecting to smash those times.

I'm not sure if the coils fixed the surge under boost, I need to test that more and do some logging.

I can't get over how the Alto looks now though, cutting the wheel arch gap down really improves its looks a lot.

Before

After

Before

After

And finally, a couple of photos I took on lunch today

The new cluster lens and center console trim really helped to bring the level of the interior up too

The seatbelt extenders are a game changer for lowered seats. I guess I didn't realise how annoying it was to have the belt rub the side of your neck, but now it's gone it's much more comfortable.

Right, now I can finally get some more Ks on the car. I've really missed driving the silly little thing. It's such a good laugh to drive.

[Nominal]

Thanks for the great write-ups and photos @kws, I really enjoy your threads.

[kws]

I can't leave anything well enough alone, so the Alto once again popped into the garage for some quick upgrades.

The first thing I did in the garage was adjust the Blow Off Valve. Since fitting it I had suspected I may have had a boost leak. There was occasionally a fluttering noise under boost, and when a fellow Alto owner took my car for a run up the road the other day it wouldn't reach 18psi and felt flat.

There were also the obvious noises the BOV was making. It would "blow off" a lot, even when barely on boost, and if you eased off the throttle when on boost you could make it stay open and venting with a long woooooooooooooosh.

To make adjustments to the preload on the internal spring you need to back off the lock nut on top and screw in the grub screw. It's not exactly easy to access on the Alto... completely obscured by the slam panel

You can see the adjustment screw on top here

The lock nut was easy to access with a 10mm spanner, but to do the actual adjustment I had to use a ball-end allen key, through the hole in the slam panel to the right of the BOV, on a really tight angle. I backed the lock nut off a few turns and wound the grub screw in. I also replaced the O ring on the vacuum fitting as this was a really loose fit.

A quick test drive shows this may have solved the boost issue, as giving it a couple of quick squirts on the open road I saw at least 17psi on the boost gauge, and it feels a bit more nippy. I'll need to do some more driving to confirm if it's resolved or not. The BOV only opens at full boost or high load now, and snaps shut quickly, a much better solution.

While under the bonnet there was another small change I needed to do. When I got the car I noticed the negative terminal was loose where it connects to the ground cable, and if you tried to tighten the nut further the whole stud would spin. I jammed a screwdriver in to hold the stud in place and managed to get it tight, but it wasn't ideal.

I ordered a replacement

I had a battle to get the nut undone and ended up jamming some random metal into the fitting to stop the stud from turning long enough to remove the nut. Going by the random copper strands around the stud, I suspect it's been messed with in the past to wire up something else, audio maybe.

The replacement fit nicely and tightened up with no issue. I used some copper grease to hopefully stop the nut from seizing to the stud.

Moving inside, I replaced the interior rear vision mirror. The Alto is so billy basic, that the mirror doesn't have a dipping function. As you can imagine, having a lowered car, with lowered seats, driving in the dark with a mirror that doesn't dip, well yeah, it gets annoying quick. Everything is like having a pair of suns behind you.

Thankfully Suzuki used a similar mirror in a few different models, which does allow dipping; P/N 84703-81A14-6GS. There is also a small rubber vibration dampener 84782-76G00.

The mirror is quite easy to remove. Pop the lamp lens off

Remove the two screws and disconnect the wire behind the light (pulls free, no clip)

The replacement mirror bolts right on into the same place. Just connect the wiring first and slip the rubber vibration doodad in too

Another bonus of this mirror is that it moves slightly towards the front of the car, further out of the drivers eye line.

Now I'll be able to drive in the dark, and Rangers won't be able to blind me anymore. Ha, take that.

Another interior job, while I was here, was to replace the drivers seatbelt extender. I cocked up last time by bending one the other way, but this made it all go wrong. The belt was binding on the extender and wouldn't recoil properly.

Another genuine Honda part was ordered

I drilled the hole out to suit the bolt, and fit it upside down, like others had. It worked 100% better in this configuration.

Finally, the last job in the interior was to replace the throttle pedal mount with an aftermarket one which changes the angle of the pedal so it's more comfortable for lowered seat rails. I had noticed my ankle was less than happy sometimes when cruising, so hopefully this helps.

I ordered a cheap generic brand from Yahoo Auctions, it had an uh, interesting brand name... LSEX-F

Using a deep 12mm socket I removed the two nuts holding the pedal to the bracket

And then the three holding the bracket to the car.

Reassembly was just the reverse. Mount the bracket, and screw the pedal to it. Easy. Don't forget to plug the pedal back in if you unplugged it. It doesn't need to be removed or even unplugged, you can just move it aside.

In the quick drive I did it was noticeably more comfortable, but I'll need to take it for a longer drive to see how effective it is.

Moving outside, I had a pair of Cusco front mud flaps to fit. I had noticed since replacing the suspension and adding more camber to the front, that I was now hearing stones and dirt hitting the doors as the front tyres are more exposed now.

I will say they're probably fairly expensive for what they are, just two bits of laser-cut plastic, but the fitment was spot on.

They have two height settings and are slotted so you can move them inboard or outboard.

They're easy to fit. Remove two clips

Line up the holes for the desired option, and reinsert the clips through the mudflap

I set mine to the higher setting, and as far outboard as they go

I think they look quite good. The back of them has a nice textured finish, whilst the "dirty" side is glossy.

It looks like it covers the tread nicely, so should significantly reduce the amount of stones hitting the doors.

And last but not least, I fitted some snake oil.

There's a lot out there about these "door stabilizers", originally made by Aisin and marketed by TRD, so they can't be all bad. Whether they actually do anything, or if they are more of a placebo, we're yet to see.

The theory behind them is that the car is a box with big holes in the side that are filled with doors, but these doors, although latching on the back edge, don't really jam up against the frame, so they offer little to no rigidity. The stabilizers work to jam the door against the frame, adding that rigidity back in.

This little diagram is from Aisin. I think the effects are a tad over-exaggerated, but gets the idea across

They're quite easy to fit. The Alto requires replacement screws for the strikers (or removing the star washers from the existing screws), but all you do is remove the striker

And replace it with the stabilizer striker

This has a spring-loaded wedge thing on it, hiding the screws

The other half of the deal goes on the door itself. You need to remove two screws from the catch

and fit this little bracket

And these little plastic wedges slide onto it

The doors do have a slightly more reassuring "thud" when closing, and coming in and out of my driveway the body seems to creak a little less, but time will tell if I can notice any difference when driving. They're probably just a gimmick, but I'm willing to give them a fair try. Other HA36S owners in Japan have sworn there are good results when fitting these, so who knows.

That's all for now. A new SWK intercooler is on the way, so that, and reinstating the IC water spray, are probably next on the list of things to do.

[tortron]

21 minutes ago, kws said:

They're probably just a gimmick

You could tie some string front and back and in an X inside the car, then go take some hard corners and see if any droop during the turn

[kws]

I'm not saying the door stabilizers aren't a placebo, but I swear I felt them on the drive into work this morning. The body felt tighter in corners, and less creaking.

[kws]

Many months ago, back in January, I upgraded the small stock intercooler to a big Greddy one. I'm changing this again.

The Greddy intercooler was good. It has a massive core and low restriction

After changing from the tiny standard intercooler I could almost immediately feel an increase in low-end power, particularly when climbing hills. Clearly the Greddy IC flows more air than the stock IC.

On the track in Jan, it did its best to keep intake temps down. 25c+ ambient temps meant that I was seeing 50-60c IAT on 8psi and over 70c on 15psi boost. The temps would drop quickly off boost as the Greddy IC could shed that heat easily, but it seemed to struggle a bit to keep the temps in check when on boost. I suspect this is because I'm working the little turbo quite hard and since the IC flows so well it doesn't have time to grab that heat from the air. I believe either running stock boost, or a higher flow turbo that's making less heat would work better with this IC. The other thing that could help would be reinstalling the IC water spray the previous owner had in Japan...

So that's where I decided to move the Greddy IC onto a new owner, who is running a stock setup that would benefit more from how well it flows, and get a particular new IC that is a different design.

In the meantime, I decided to remove the Greddy IC and swap back to the stock one for now, and start to reinstall the water spray. I didn't want to install the water spray on the Greddy IC because I would have to drill into the shroud to install jets, which I wasn't going to do, and the stock shroud had jets fitted already.

The Greddy core is a monster, with huge tubes

In contrast, the stock IC is a tiny wee thing

You'll note there that I had temporarily installed a catch can too. I wanted to see how the blowby was, so threw this in. I was pleasantly surprised to note that the hoses and catch can were completely dry of any oil after a couple of hundred ks, so ended up removing it and reverting to stock.

This gave me a little more room to play with in terms of the IC water spray hoses. I tidied up the hoses that came with the car and reinstalled them.

The black hose currently runs through the firewall grommet and is looped in the glovebox. This will eventually be run to the boot of the car, where a 5l tank and washer pump are located. This bottle fits almost perfectly, except the cap was a few mm too tall, so I used some heat to squish the top of the bottle down and lower the cap. It'll lower the capacity too, but there should be plenty still, and I can top up between sessions.

It was interesting to note that as soon as I refit the stock IC again the car felt slower, so it wasn't a placebo, the Greddy IC is good.

After a few weeks of running the stock intercooler, my nice new one arrived. Meet the Suzuki Works Kurume Sports Intercooler.

It's a really nice bit of kit. The Greddy IC was all welded sheets of Alu, which was nicely made, but this SWK is next level with cast aluminium end tanks.

Compared to the stock IC the overall dimensions are basically the same, except the core is slightly taller

The difference is the thickness. This thing is a thicc boi.

Alto for scale

The protective cardboard shows how much taller the SWK core is

Being legit JDM gear, it bolted right in with no fitment issues.

Now I just needed a shroud.

The SWK intercooler comes with adhesive foam strips to stick to the shroud and close up the stock gaps

And with the shroud fitted

You can barely tell from the top, just the little silver end tank gives it away. From the side though, it is a beast

The main thing here for me is that it means I can run the stock shroud, including the water spray jets. It should also drop temps over the stock IC due to the taller and thicker core.

I haven't really logged temps since fitting it, and the big test will be the next track day which will hopefully be next month. I want to be running 15psi all day and keeping temps under control.

It's hard at this point to say if it's had the same boost in power that the Greddy IC did since I've done some tweaking to the boost controller at the same time. I've had an "issue" where when on 15psi the turbo just makes boost too easily, and it can lead to some surging when driving as it comes on and off boost at the slightest twitch of my foot.

To counter this, I finally set up the RPM and TPS settings on the HKS EVC

This allowed me to set an offset map. It may need tweaking as I drive it more, but at the moment this is what I have (this is page 1 of 4, the other pages are 60-100% TPS, and 5000rpm-9000rpm).

Long story short, the vertical axis is the throttle position, and the horizontal is the engine RPM. At low throttle position or low RPM, it makes less boost, increasing as the RPM and/or throttle position increases. This is a percentage of the total target boost, so at 0%/2000rpm it makes 35% of the 15psi target.

The hope is that when I'm cruising at high rpm (ie 4000rpm on the open road) but have a lower throttle position, it won't be so eager to make 15psi with a twitch of the throttle now. It should also be a bit nicer on my engine at low RPM, where it probably doesn't love life having 15psi shoved into it when it's barely spinning.

So far my testing shows it's pretty effective. The car feels a bit less frantic to drive but is far more manageable to drive smoothly when you aren't trying to beat everything from the lights.

I've only set this up for the 15psi setting, as it's not been an issue on 8psi. 18psi may get a map, but I don't tend to use that as 15psi is plenty fast.

This car is pretty much where it needs to be now. I need to finish the IC spray, but otherwise it's ready to hit the track again and see if I can demolish my previous times now that it can go around corners.

[kws]

I like turbo cars a lot. You open the intake up, and they make great noises. I wanted more noise from the Alto, but didn't want to pay much.

So what does one do if they want to try a cheap intake, and not import a brand name one from Japan? Hello Supercheap.

The stock intake setup is surprisingly open, with a duct taking air from under the bonnet lip, feeding it through a (currently duct tape) pipe to the top of the airbox, where I have a Greddy panel filter. It goes through this filter, through a pipe and down into the intake of the turbo. Nothing in the way, no real restrictions.

But I wanted more noise. Since removing the leaking BOV, I'm back to a quiet little chooo when changing gears and almost no intake noise. In contrast, I have a friend with an S660 fitted with an HKS intake and that thing makes all the good noises.

So, I went out and bought some bits. A pod filter on clearance, a 76mm 45 degree alloy pipe, and a 51mm-76mm reducer hose.

I started by removing the airbox. This is pretty straightforward by disconnecting the intake pipe and breather, and removing the two bolts

Then with some fiddling, I jammed the new contraption into place

The filter is massive. Not even kidding, it's almost as big as the engine itself.

It took a lot of stuffing around, and a couple of different revisions of the mounting bracket, to get to this point, where the filter had some clearance from the strut brace

This was not enough clearance though...

What I hadn't really accounted for was just how much the engine moves under load. Normal driving was fine, but under boost or high loads the engine must tip back a bit more and suddenly the filter was banging its life out on the strut brace, sounding like the car was coming to pieces.

So, other than that, was it worth it? No. I swear the car felt less responsive down low, and the noises were disappointing. The turbo discharge noise on gear changes was excellent, almost as loud as the BOV was, but the actual intake sucking noises really didn't... suck.

Under boost, or load, when you think it would be sucking the most air and real loud, it made no noise. When you were at a steady speed, around 100kph, with minimal throttle, the damn thing would emit a loud sucking noise. You could induce it with certain throttle positions, but it never really made noises when I wanted it to. I got fairly sick of the noise on the open road at cruise.

So, back to the stock intake I went, glad I didn't waste money importing an intake from Japan. I'll find another use for this filter at some point.

[kws]

When I get an idea in my head, it's very hard to make it go away without giving it a satisfying conclusion.

I wasn't happy with how close I was last time, but ultimately failed at upgrading my brakes.

Let's recap, the HA36S Alto Works and Turbo RS have dinky little 230mm rotors.

These are the same size as the previous model Alto Works back in 1998, when they were smaller and lighter. The Kei Works, about the same size and weight as an HA36S, was gifted the bigger 14V caliper brackets, and 257mm rotors from the Swift/Ignis shopping basket.

230mm is probably fine for stock power, and how you'd normally drive an Alto, but when you add more power and want to drive it hard, particularly on a fast track like my local one, the little standard brakes leave something to be desired.

There are a couple of suppliers out of Japan for bolt-on big brake kits, but after shipping we're talking $500+NZD, which is madness. Silkroad makes the cheapest one, with a 255mm rotor and custom-designed bracket with joined bridge. You would also be limited to sourcing the replacement rotors from Silkroad in future.

The 14V brackets from a HT51S Swift/Ignis are a bolt on to the Alto, using the existing Alto calipers. These space the caliper out in order to use the bigger rotor.

This would all be nice and easy, except the Kei/Swift/Ignis rotors all have a different 49mm hat height, which pushes the rotor backward toward the strut. The causes unhappiness with the clearance for the caliper bracket.

You cannot alter the position of the caliper bracket since it's mounted to the front of the knuckle. The solution is to either space the rotor out from the hub, use rotors from some Toyota (Cynos iirc) and machine the center bore out to the required 60mm (thanks to the weird stepped center bore on the hub), or find a pair of rotors that actually fit (an easier job said than done).

I hated the spaced-out rotor idea, everything became studcentric, including the rotors.

So the Suzuki rotors were a no-go. There was some discussion about centering rings and things, but it all became too complex.

The Toyota rotor option was also a no-go, I don't like the idea of having to machine consumable items in order to fit.

All I was left with then, other than buying the Silkroad kit from Japan, was to find a rotor that met the criteria. This led to many hours of trawling through every single rotor catalogue and website I could find.

Eventually, finally, I had a breakthrough on some random website in Europe. Enter, the Chery J1 from China.

By some bizarre miracle, this horrible little shopping box of dubious quality was reported as having the perfect rotors. 257mm diameter, 17mm thickness, 60mm CB, 4x100 PCD and a 44mm hat height. The height is 1mm different from the Alto brakes, but otherwise everything else is perfect.

Had I found the secret sauce?

For future reference, the OE part number was S21-3501075. Apparently it's also used on some Mercedes, I don't know what though. After some more digging, I found RDA in Aus actually makes rotors for these too, using the P/N RDA8423. I'm sure other suppliers are out there, the EU sites have a few options.

Anyway, thanks to the help of a great chap on the Oldschool forum, I managed to get my hands on a pair of front rotors from a Chery J1, from Pick A Part, spiders and all.

Half a can of fly spray later, the spiders left me alone

They were used, and rusty, but were barely worn, didn't have a lip and still measured the full 17mm thickness.

I pulled the Alto in, jacked one side up and got to work fitting the Chery rotor and 14V bracket.

Promising. How does the centering look?

Perfect. No clearance issues, the rotor is centered, and it's all hubcentric.

The next task, now that I knew it fit, was to have the rotors skimmed by a local company. They came back looking very good. The guy did audibly shudder when he asked what they were off and I answered Chery J1... He didn't ask further questions when I said not to worry since they weren't going back on one. Probably already wrote me off as a wrong'un.

The surface rust is already returning...

Before I could fit them I had to prep and paint the 14V brackets. The Alto comes with red calipers and brackets, because racecar, but the standard shopping basket models were unpainted. The mismatch made my eye twitch.

I cleaned them with brake cleaner and then wire brushed the heck out of them before hitting them with a few coats of VHT caliper paint, focusing on the visible areas once fitted.

After a couple of days to cure, it was time to fit everything once and for all.

The Alto once again returned to the garage, this time both sides were raised

The pile of bits was laid out for prep

I removed the slider pins, which were all free, and cleaned and regreased them with some ceramic brake grease. One of the pins had a tear in the boot, so I later stole the boot from the standard Alto pin on one side.

Interestingly I noticed the Swift pins were all solid, whilst one pin on each side of the Alto has rubber bushings on it to allegedly reduce noise and vibration

The pad retaining clips were cleaned up and refitted

The wheels were removed, and I began the removal of the standard brakes

Remember to hang the caliper securely so it doesn't stress the hose

The old rotor was pressed off with a bolt

I then cleaned the hub bore up with a wire wheel on the drill and added some copper grease so it won't rust into place. You can see the stupid CB step here

The big rotor was then slid into place with a wheel nut to hold it, and the 14V bracket bolted on and torqued to the required 85NM. The Alto pads were then slipped into the 14V brackets, with new grease.

I found my calipers were missing whatever this insert is, so I stole it from the Swift calipers

The caliper was then fitted and the slider bolts torqued to 26NM

The difference in the size of the rotor doesn't look huge there because the caliper is still close to the center hat, but what isn't immediately obvious is that the hat has a larger diameter on the bigger rotors. If the hat had the same diameter as stock the caliper would be a long way from the hat.

With my braided lines, the hose is a little tighter to reach the caliper than stock, but it's not stretched or strained, it just takes a little wiggle to get the caliper into place without pulling on the hose.

Rinse and repeat for the other side of the car, and the brakes are done. They really do push the caliper out and make a pretty good visible difference.

Stock 230mm brakes

Now I needed to give them a pounding to bed the pads into the fresh surface and make sure they weren't going to fall to bits the first time I tried to stop.

I took the car on a gentle drive out to some open back roads and set on my usual break-in procedure. Turn the wick up to high, and do a series of 100kph-20kph near-stops. I ended up doing 4 or 5 of these, getting the brakes hot enough that I could smell them, and then cruised around for a bit with minimal breaking (and no stopping!) to let them cool off.

After a little bit of cooling off, I stopped and checked the wheel nut torque, and grabbed some cheeky photos.

As a side note, the Cusco mud flaps have been doing a great job

So, how do the new brakes feel? Well, the brake feel on the Alto has never been amazing, it's a bit soft and vague for my liking, even with the braided lines and new fluid, but it is an economy car at the end of the day. The new brakes haven't fixed that, but they have made the pedal feel like it's doing more when you do press it.

If you really stomp on it, the car will pitch forward on its nose and shed speed like an anchor was dropped. If you press them hard enough the ABS will kick in and remind you it could lock the wheels if it wanted. Even on the track I had a hard time braking hard enough to hit ABS with the stock brakes.

Very happy with the upgrade so far. Was it cheaper than the Silkroad kit? Yes, by a couple of hundred dollars. Would it have been cheaper if I didn't buy used Swift rotors that didn't fit, and used Chery rotors that needed skimming too? Yes.

Knowing what I know now, you could grab a couple of 14V caliper brackets from an old Swift or Ignis from Pick A Part, order some new RDA rotors and away you go.

I'll be driving the Alto around a bit in the next week or two just to shake it down before the trackday at the end of the month and make sure we're all good. I can't wait, this thing should be a weapon on track now.

[kws]

Whilst the car was in the air for its brake upgrade, I wanted to chase a knock I've had in the front suspension.

After spending a lot of money and redoing everything in the front end, I was a little annoyed when there was still a noise when going over bumps.

The only thing I hadn't touched was the front swaybar D bushes. I had done the end links, arms, shocks, mounts, everything. Thankfully in one of my previous orders from RHDJapan I added a pair of the Cusco D bushes for my upgraded front swaybar.

So while the brakes were off, and the car was in the air, I removed the clamp brackets and bushes.

I started on the LH side, which I haven't touched before. Access is a bit limited, so ratcheting spanners are a lifesaver here.

I didn't notice at the time, but what I believe is the cause of the noise is visible in that photo.

With the two bolts removed, I removed the clamp, spacer under the bar and the bush

The bush was visibly deformed compared to the new one

The reason for this was obvious once I inspected everything. There was this weird mark on the spacer plate and bush

Ah, that's why.

The spacer plate wasn't fitted correctly, was twisted, held in by one bolt and not supporting half the bush. You can see the hole the bolt should be through here

Instead of twisting as it should, the bar was moving around within the unsupported bush. I don't know how long it's been like this, definitely before it came to NZ though.

Thankfully with the new bushes in hand, I was able to reassemble it correctly.

The old bushes were also very dry with no signs of any grease in them. I used some Superpro polybush grease I had kicking about to lube the bushes first

It's a bit of a fiddle to get everything lined up, and the bush clamps the bar quite tightly, but reassembly wasn't too bad once the bolts were lined up. Using a bar to push down on the clamp helped a lot as the bush wanted to push it up and off. I tightened the clamp at ride height, not that it probably matters since the bar rotates in the bush.

I've had the other side apart before, when I did the rear engine mount, so that was just a simple repeat of the other side

A test drive whilst bedding the brakes in shows the knocking is completely gone now, and the car feels more planted in the front. I suspect the bar was significantly less effective than it should've been. Hopefully I can get a couple of good fast runs in it this week and see how it's affected the handling.

With that done, the last thing while the car was in the air was to remove the front lip and reaffix it, since it was sagging on one side

With a bunch of improvised fixings removed, the lip fell off. Apparently none of the tape was actually holding it up

Looks weird without it now

Removing the old tape sucked. It wasn't stuck to the car at all, but it wouldn't let go of the lip easily. I used a heat gun and my thumbs to roll the tape off

New tape was applied

And the lip was put back into place, using some old and new fixings to secure it a bit better. To give it the best chance of sticking, I supported each end with a jack and block and gently heated the tape.

It's not perfect, but it's better than it was and hopefully won't come loose again

[kws]

Anyone who knows me knows that I've been hanging out all year for this day. It was trackday time!

The previous trackdays have been so much fun I have been eagerly awaiting the next one.

Of course, after the last trackday, my first in the recently purchased Alto, I left a little lukewarm on the car and had a large list of things that needed to be changed before the next one.

If you have been following this project since the start, you'll know since its last trackday the Alto has basically had a full going over; all new suspension including lowering, an added rear swaybar (and functional front one), stiffened rear engine mount, replaced thrust bearings, lowered seat rails, an intercooler change, and bigger brakes, amongst other smaller things.

In the build up to trackday there was one project I have been quietly working on; the intercooler water sprayer.

As mentioned when I swapped the intercooler to the SWK one, I wanted to reinstate the water spray the previous owner had set up, using the stock shroud

My goal, since reading that the previous owner found the 1L bag of water under the bonnet too small for his use case, was to fit a 5L bottle in the boot, with a pump, and have it pump water to the front. This is similar to what he ended up with; a 3L bottle strapped to the rear panel.

Obviously since I spent great expense refitting the interior, including the foam insert in the boot, a bottle like that was of no use to me, so after lots of research I settled on a bottle from Aliexpress which fits in the foam insert, almost perfectly. The filler cap sits a little proud, so I squished the top of the bottle down a bit to make space

To run the setup I was going to use a cool little timer relay, which was adjustable and triggered by a momentary button. I set it to run for 30 seconds each time it was triggered

Unfortunately despite initial testing showing great promise, the damn thing decided to go pop when bench testing and never worked again. As did the button, which is a damn shame because it was a nice JDM button with blue illumination which I was going to use to show when the output of the relay was turned on (thus, showing when the pump was running).

With that disappointment I decided to run the hoses and wires and mount the bottle anyway. To feed the pump, I drilled a hole in the top of the bottle and fed the hose through a grommet into the bottle, using an alloy fitting that came with the bottle as a weight

I only had a Tee joint, so blocked one side off. This keeps it nice and low profile

Using some trim tape, I stuck the pump to the side of the bottle and ran hoses to and from it

Before wiring the whole thing in I gave it a quick test by feeding power to the pump

The pump primed fine, but instead of pushing water along the hose, it decided the path of least resistance was through the joints on the body. The pump leaked like a sieve. Useless.

At this point I was getting pretty pissed off with everything failing, so flipped to Plan B; the week before trackday, order a universal washer bag kit and hope it arrives in time. Yes, it's the same setup the Japanese owner was running that was too small, but I don't care if I have to top it up between each session (I did).

Thankfully the courier pulled through and the kit arrived in time. I quickly set about installing it into the engine bay

Before wiring it in, since everything else was failing, I jumped the two pump wires right to the battery and tested it

Great success. You can't see it but both jets are working and creating a lovely mist in the shroud

The kit comes with this ugly generic button, which being momentary I would have to hold down to spray, no good when going full attack

Rummaging through my spares I uncovered the toggle switch that came with my clutch start canceller. A nice metal switch with a good click when toggled

I chose to power the pump right from the battery, using a fuse holder I pulled out of some other project

and ran another wire into the cabin to the switch, so all it was doing was grounding the pump. I was originally going to install the button on the right side of the steering wheel, where the other buttons are, but this seemed like a nice "temporary" place to put it, on the bracket that came with the kit. It's just taped in place, so easy to remove later.

It's easy to access, and visible from the drivers seat. The big long toggle is handy when wearing gloves

With the dash put back together, the wiring tidied up, and the bag filled with water, the IC water spray saga was complete, for now. The next owner can do the boot install if they care enough

That was that. Friday rolled around, I cleaned the car (check out those big brakes)

Packed my tools, checking things off my list as I went, so I didn't forget something important like the camping chairs and chock last time...

I rolled the Alto into the garage to pack it, as the weather was being a bit less than great. I suddenly thought, "I should apply some old CarPro Reload sealant I have to the bonnet and bumper, just in case I get oiled again".

This resulted in me spending an hour or so coating the car in Reload, top to bottom, front to back

I will say even though that stuff is well expired, it works really well. There's more gloss, the paint feels smooth, and the water beads off. Impressive considering the paint really needs a machine detail.

And we were off. We had a two hour drive ahead of us, in the dark. The Alto did really well, and the new suspension was miles ahead of the last trip to Manfeild where the rear kept bottoming out (blown shocks and soft springs).

The one thing that did suck was some a-hole following me in a late model BMW SUV hunk of junk, with his LEDLAZERBEAM headlights, shining right into my eyes through all three mirrors. The dipping mirror I fitted was a godsend, but I still ended up having to fold the wing mirrors in to stop us being blinded. I pulled over at the next town and let him pass, only for him to turn off anyway. Dick.

The next morning we were bright and early to the track, having stayed only metres away, and picked out our pit to camp in for the day. Considering it had been heavily raining the day before, the weather was mint all day.

Shortly after, the rest of the crew rolled up.

Yes, even blue Alto friends were back, rebuilt engine and all! Huge respect for the work they put into that car, and they were still keen to bring it back to where it all went wrong last time and try it again.

Thankfully it was all good this time, and they had a blast punting it around the track. I loved seeing it out there

We did a couple of sessions together

We had a couple of nice little battles. I was surprised, even on my high boost, their Alto wasn't easy to catch. It seems it may not be quite as stock as they expected

That pass was caught from both inside and outside, thanks to me remembering my action camera and external mic

 

The Alto managed to surprise a lot of cars on the track, and got thoroughly thrashed by others (that 206 GTI just danced in the corners, was a treat to watch)

It's an angry looking wee thing

A casual flyby of both Altos

 

And a flyby of my Alto, being driven in anger

 

So, how did the Alto do?

Very good.

The first big improvement was the seat lowering, which meant my helmet was no longer pressed into the head lining, and I felt like I was sitting in the car, not on it.

The big brakes, using Chery rotors, worked an absolute treat. Heaps of stopping power, and didn't set a foot wrong all day. I brought the stock brakes with me just in case, but weren't needed.

Finally being able to run most of the day on high boost was excellent. Intake temps were a lot lower than in Jan, which would've been helped by the low teens ambient temps, but the intercooler water spray did a great job too. Generally when running, it knocked 10-15c off the intake temps, and when turned off the residual effect worked well to help the IC shed heat once off boost.

 

The most surprising thing was how cold the intercooler was once I returned to the pits. The Greddy IC last time was hot to the touch, but with the water spray, the end tanks on the SWK intercooler were cold. Not left overnight cold, but almost colder to the touch than ambient. Very impressive.

On high boost the LSD works a lot better too, especially if you're brave enough to power on early in the corner. The amount of cornering traction was incredible. You brake hard into the corner and get straight back onto the power and let the LSD pull you around it.

The suspension upgrade was well worth the money. Last time I had issues with the car wandering, not really wanting to go around corners and bumps really upset the stability, but now the suspension just settles into the corner and holds on. The rear follows the front, as it should. It really boosted my confidence in the car compared to last time.

So, times. Last time, on high boost, my best time was 1:42

This time, in my first session, running standard boost, 9 laps into it, I ticked off a 1:39. I was already faster than last time, and I wasn't even on high boost yet!

That pretty well set the tone for the day, unless there was heavy traffic, I hardly did slower than a 1:40.

The real surprise was one particular lap in my third session, where I went full send and dropped into a 1:36!

 

I was skedaddling for sure

There is heaps of room for improvement in the corners. Although I picked up some speed, it was mostly through the middle and on the straights, where the power and braking came into effect. I believe at this point I'm limited by the road tyres, which although good tyres (Yokohama ES32), just don't have the grip to hold on and get that cornering speed up.

I have done some digging around to see what is available in 165/55R15, and the options in NZ are almost nil. Zestino has an option, but at $300 per tyre, that ain't happening. Yokohama can order in some AD09 from Japan, but there is a 3-4 MONTH lead time on those, subject to production. Bridgestone won't even consider the idea of bringing in RE004 in that size.

The day was an absolute hoot. I love being on the track, and will be looking to do more trackdays next year and maybe even get into autocrosses and the likes too.

The best thing was that everyone drove home, in their car, under their own power this time. No one really had any mishaps, except for my friend in his recently acquired Swift Sport who decided the tarmac was boring and he'd rather do rallycross. My wife unintentionally caught this on the very end of the clip she was taking, and none of us even saw it happen (as a side note, how good does that K20 powered EK9 sound...)

 

No harm done, just some mud up the side to wash off

So that's another trackday done and dusted. The Alto was excellent, all the mods worked perfectly and the car was a cohesive machine of awesomeness.

In saying that though, the Altos days are numbered. It'll go up for sale at some point soon, when I can be bothered, as although I love the little dingus, I have other stupid ideas for other stupid projects that I need to liquidate the funds invested into the Alto for. I'm hoping to move to something that I can use in basic motorsport events that is worth a lot less than the Alto and has ample parts availability in NZ just in case I send it too hard. I have a car/project in mind already, so we'll see how that goes.

Until then, if I still have the Alto in Jan 2025, it'll be out on track again at the next trackday.