Car Enthusiast Club [Now Motorcycle friendly!] - First thread to 150k! ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[chaozbandit]

22 minutes ago, bcredeur97 said:

The Miata fortunately is dry and safe. Lol 

Good news is everything is good where I am. I think the storm surge was bad — but less than originally projected. So that’s good too 

 

main extent where I am is power outages, small limbs everywhere, and a few broken trees here and there. Didn’t see anything major. 
 

im not sure where wind gusts topped out at but around 5am it was crazy. House was making so many noises lol

 

It was reported 150mph when the wall reached the coast, but dropped to 100mph as it reached the texas border.

[GAME 55]

Is a new 2020 Porsche Carrera S reliable?

[iDeFecZx]

23 minutes ago, GAME 55 said:

Is a new 2020 Porsche Carrera S reliable?

Should hope so being less than a year old

[Bitter]

1 hour ago, GAME 55 said:

Is a new 2020 Porsche Carrera S reliable?

Long term? Probably not compared to say a Corolla or Civic. Short term? Probably as good as a Corolla/Civic. It depends if you actually drive it or not. Let it sit around all the time rusting up and rotting and you'll be let down every time you drive it. On the other hand don't expect it at  100,000 miles to be reliable like a 100,000 mile Civic would be and certainly not for the same cost of ownership and maintenance.

[Wi RoZ]

It's been almost two years since I've posted anything here. Since then I've bought my first car . I've had it for about a year now and I like it a lot. Let's see if you guys can guess what I got 

 

• weighs around 1100 kg / 2400 lbs
• two seater convertible
• 210 L / 55 gallon boot in the back, spare wheel in the front
• RWD
• manual 5-speed

Anyone got a clue?

[JoaoPRSousa]

3 minutes ago, Wi RoZ said:

It's been almost two years since I've posted anything here. Since then I've bought my first car . I've had it for about a year now and I like it a lot. Let's see if you guys can guess what I got 

 

• weighs around 1100 kg / 2400 lbs
• two seater convertible
• 210 L / 55 gallon boot in the back, spare wheel in the front
• RWD
• manual 5-speed

Anyone got a clue?

 

MGF / MG TF 

[Wi RoZ]

Just now, JoaoPRSousa said:

 

MGF / MG TF 

That was quick . But indeed. Got a 2004 MG TF 160 and I love it. Basically a more comfortable, daily drivable, fat, slower Lotus Elise. I'll post a pic in a sec. 

[Sport Driver]

Old one out, new one in. It was a bit dirty after 15k km. 

 

 

[Wi RoZ]

• 160 HP from a full alloy 1.8 4 banger weighing - fully dressed, with fluids!! - just under 100 kg / 220 lbs
• Redline of 7250 RPM
• 0-60 in about 7 seconds
• OEM Sport Suspension
• 4 pot AP Racing calipers up front with 304mm discs and Brembo pads
• Single pot calipers with 240mm discs at the rear
• Toyo Proxess TR1 (not T1R) 195/45/16 up front and 215/40/16 at the rear
• Reasonably fuel efficient when you drive it normally
• Tons of fun 

Here is a side view of it with its hardtop on (the softtop just sits in its "open" position under the slightly longer hardtop) 

 

[Wi RoZ]

10 minutes ago, Sport Driver said:

Old one out, new one in. It was a bit dirty after 15k km. 

 

 

Ah yes, don't forget your cabin filter. Those weird smells I sometimes experience in customers' cars...

[Wi RoZ]

With the softtop:

 

Got a lot of plans for it as well , doubt it will ever come to it though. Dream big right? Here's a list of things I ultimately want to do to it:

 

• Buy a second engine and make that as strong as possible without increasing the weight too much. 
  • Forged or milled crankshaft
  • Lightweight forged pistons, somewhat lower compression
  • More aggressive cams
  • Uprated bearings
  • Uprated liners/sleeves
  • Uprated oil rail
  • Uprated MLS headgasket
  • Uprated bolts and other fittings
  • Lighter flywheel
  • Reflowed head 
  • Some other things
• Rebalance the built engine to F1 tolerances
• Different intake
• Bigger exhaust system with a sportscat
• Aftermarket ECU
• Increase rev-limit to about 9000 or maybe even 10.000 RPM
• Better fuel pump, injectors, etc.
• Add a Rotrex centrifugal supercharger
• Tune the VVC mechanism (continuously variable valve timing on the intake) to keep driving the car comfortable at low RPM while maintaining torque at high RPM
• Quaife 6-speed manual gearbox with Torsen LSD (they also got a 6-speed dog ring, but I doubt that'll be comfy while cruising on a sunny sunday afternoon)
• Uprated clutch
• At that point also fatter tyres with wider rims.

That should give it around 350-400 BHP on civilized boost levels with a slight weight increase.

 

If dreams come true I'll lose my license. And my savings. And my car if it ever decides to snap-oversteer again...

[HM-2]

I think the best way of making 350-400bhp without increasing weight would probably entail swapping the K-Series for something a bit burlier. Plenty of people do hot Cosworth Duratecs, VW 2.0Ts or supercharged K20s in the Elise or Exige, you could always go that way.

 

I know a couple of people who have built hot K-Series for various uses and they've always been lengthy tales of heartache. One guy has just finished rebuild 3 with a fully forged short block and a twin-scroll Garrett turbo, it's making circa 340bhp and 300lb/ft in its current tune and by all accounts running great but it's been a very long and extremely expensive journey there...

[JoaoPRSousa]

11 hours ago, Wi RoZ said:

That was quick . But indeed. Got a 2004 MG TF 160 and I love it. Basically a more comfortable, daily drivable, fat, slower Lotus Elise. I'll post a pic in a sec. 

 

I had just logged in ahah

Found the clues to be a pretty unique combo (spare on the front being the one that stood out), Google'd the boot capacity of those and bam

[Wi RoZ]

8 hours ago, JoaoPRSousa said:

 

I had just logged in ahah

Found the clues to be a pretty unique combo (spare on the front being the one that stood out), Google'd the boot capacity of those and bam

Nice

[Wi RoZ]

20 hours ago, HM-2 said:

I think the best way of making 350-400bhp without increasing weight would probably entail swapping the K-Series for something a bit burlier. Plenty of people do hot Cosworth Duratecs, VW 2.0Ts or supercharged K20s in the Elise or Exige, you could always go that way.

 

I know a couple of people who have built hot K-Series for various uses and they've always been lengthy tales of heartache. One guy has just finished rebuild 3 with a fully forged short block and a twin-scroll Garrett turbo, it's making circa 340bhp and 300lb/ft in its current tune and by all accounts running great but it's been a very long and extremely expensive journey there...

I've heard those stories as well. Read articles from developers and technicians that researched Lotus' problems with the VHPD version of the 18K4K. Most of the problems seem to originate from unbalanced parts. The engine is very light for its size and doesn't have a lot of meat to absorb excessive vibrations. That's a reason why the almost 60 kg heavier K20 can handle much more power. It's also why I want to internally balance the engine with very small tolerances so it can withstand high RPM.

 

If I can maintain torque at high RPM I'll have a pretty linear powercurve with a lot of top end power. That way it'll only get stressed at higher RPM. If I slightly overbalance the engine that should compensate for the extra stress on the crank at high RPM. Low RPM stress won't suffer much. No turbo like torque figures.

 

At least that is my theory

[HM-2]

I think the actual weight difference between a VVT equipped K and the K20 is a bit less than 60kg. 

 

I can't remember the specifics of the issues he had but I do recall one of the rebuilds was liner related. I think the other was due to issues with his first set of forged pistons as he was trying to retain fairly high CR in the first build and run at very low boost. I know he's also had issues with VVC rattle too (in multiple VVC systems and heads IIRC) but like you was determined to keep it.

[Wi RoZ]

3 hours ago, HM-2 said:

I think the actual weight difference between a VVT equipped K and the K20 is a bit less than 60kg. 

 

I can't remember the specifics of the issues he had but I do recall one of the rebuilds was liner related. I think the other was due to issues with his first set of forged pistons as he was trying to retain fairly high CR in the first build and run at very low boost. I know he's also had issues with VVC rattle too (in multiple VVC systems and heads IIRC) but like you was determined to keep it.

K20 weighs 124 kg / 275 lbs dry, while the 18K4K weighs 97 kg / 214 lbs wet, with clutch and flywheel. If I recall correctly the K20 with clutch, flywheel and fluids weighs 150-something kg. That would a be 50-60 kg difference.

 

The VVC mechanism is indeed prone to rattle IF the wrong oil is used. The only oil that the mechanism feels happy with is 10W40 semi-synth. Long story short it's because of the alleged better hydraulic capabilities of semi-synth and the correct thickness of 10W40. Non VVC engines run just as happy on 5W30 full synthetic. 

 

Other problems of earlier K-series are the reverse layout of the cooling system and plastic dowels to keep the head in place. Other engines where torqued down with the wrong torque settings in the factory. My current engine is a 2004 which has all of these problems addressed. 

 

The liners are of the floating type (open deck) and should be machine pressed into their sealing. Steel liners can handle 3x the stress that the OEM iron ones can but have slightly different expansion rates if I'm correct. 

 

Another thing that is important is the way the engine supports itself. It has a block and ladder frame to support the crank and a bolt-through design, meaning that the bolts go straight through the cam-carriers, the head, the block and the ladder, locking them together. These bolts have a very specific metallurgy and should be torqued down to exactly 64 Nm, bringing them to their yield point. That is because at that point they will stretch along with the heat cycles of the block thus having less mechanical stress. 

 

That is Formula 1 engineering, and that's one of the reasons the K is so special. 

 

It's just a widely misunderstood jewel of an engine haunted by budget cuts and stupid engineering decisions (mainly by tuners). 

 

End of K-series 101, class dismissed

 

EDIT

 

The factory liners are pretty freaking strong already. Some journalist in England managed to overspin a K-series in a Caterham to a data-logged 16.000 RPM. One liner split. Most of the time liner (and headgasket) problems come from a wrong stand-proud, plastic head dowels or non-OEM head bolts.

 

Also a lot of tuned engines are kinda rough. Most of the time it is due to bad balancing. A while back a factory 5.0 L V8 was tested on a dyno, then balanced and blueprinted to race-tolerance and tested again. The result was a 12 bhp increase due to minimizing the internal stress and friction. 

 

Bad balancing is probably also why the dude you mentioned needed a fully forged bottom end. It was necessary to keep up with the vibrations. If he'd just balanced it out he could've just used the stock bottom.

 

In short the K-series was the first truly optimized mass-produced engine that even companies like Caterham and Lotus didn't have the knowledge or experience to properly modify. Lotus for example used a lighter flywheel but kept the original crank pulley. That pulley has an anti-vibration rubber ring in it, carefully designed to work well with the crank and the original flywheel. Add a lighter flywheel, and that rubber might actually start doing the opposite of what it's supposed to do.

[TVwazhere]

I just..... 

[sub68]

1 minute ago, TVwazhere said:

I just..... 

what the crap

[atxcyclist]

XBOX mic box dropped into an aftermarket intercooler before installation, an incident that will probably never happen again in this universe.

[HM-2]

15 hours ago, Wi RoZ said:

Also a lot of tuned engines are kinda rough. Most of the time it is due to bad balancing.

Balance issues are far more pronounced at higher RPM sure, but the reason that many tuned N/A engines are rather rough often boils down to valve overlap, which is a necessarily evil of maximising head flow at high RPM. I've driven Super 1600s in the past which are ~230bhp IIRC and despite being effectively purpose-built and precisely balanced race engines they're rough as hell at lower RPM precisely because they're designed to be operated across a relatively small rev range and optimised for performance then and there. 

 

15 hours ago, Wi RoZ said:

Bad balancing is probably also why the dude you mentioned needed a fully forged bottom end. It was necessary to keep up with the vibrations. If he'd just balanced it out he could've just used the stock bottom

I think 1.6bar of boost has something to do with the need to go forged . 

[Wi RoZ]

1 hour ago, HM-2 said:

Balance issues are far more pronounced at higher RPM sure, but the reason that many tuned N/A engines are rather rough often boils down to valve overlap, which is a necessarily evil of maximising head flow at high RPM. I've driven Super 1600s in the past which are ~230bhp IIRC and despite being effectively purpose-built and precisely balanced race engines they're rough as hell at lower RPM precisely because they're designed to be operated across a relatively small rev range and optimised for performance then and there. 

 

I think 1.6bar of boost has something to do with the need to go forged . 

Yes you're right. My mind was all 18K4K last night

[That_Random_Guy]

Meanwhile....... week 583..... still waiting on my motor. expected ship date was 8/27. then they got back with me and apparently haven't even started building the motor. Their waiting on the Dart heads and they ship out maybe later this week to them, then they will start building it so i'm over here like DAYUM YOU CORONA...... already been over a month and now its gonna be another month until it ships... meanwhile my stang is JUST WAITING at a mechanics shop collecting fees.... and i'm over here with 3 to 4k worth of parts just sitting in my house collecting dust...... kinda raging rn.

[PandaCopyRight]

Hey my focus people... Random question. 

When I was filling up the washer fluid in my v40 I noticed there are 3 hood latches.... Yes 3... 2 in the front and 1 in the back (not my car but has the same layout as mine) 

.... And I think when I saw a video of a fost there was only one... 

 

So wanted to check... Is it volvo complicating things again?

[TVwazhere]

6 hours ago, PandaCopyRight said:

Hey my focus people... Random question. 

When I was filling up the washer fluid in my v40 I noticed there are 3 hood latches.... Yes 3... 2 in the front and 1 in the back (not my car but has the same layout as mine)

-snip-

.... And I think when I saw a video of a fost there was only one... 

 

So wanted to check... Is it volvo complicating things again?

I believe mine only has one.