knocked out a few things. I've been dealing with a lot of outside stress (my dog passed away, and my father has a cancer diagnosis), but working on the car has helped keep me sane. (Yeah, I really share too much online, but that's just my personality).
So on the racecar, I've been going through and cleaning it up. I started by polishing the paint and stripping the car of many decals. I want a sleeker look for 2019 and I'm moving more of the decals down into a tighter grouping once I place them back. The paint turned out great, and the car is being ceramic coated which will be put to the test against the onslaught of tire goo and marbles. The front of the car is pretty torn up which is to be expected, but the sides and top look very nice.
Then on the interior, I replaced the RaceCapture's app-dash which was a nvidia tablet with something more purpose built. The tablet was never reliable, charged slowly and wouldn't run well in a race car setting. I built automation after rooting the android OS to have it always boot to the racecapture app whenever there was power, but in practice it never worked reliably.
So combining a Raspberry Pi, a custom LiFePO4wered UPS backpack, and a raspberry pi display and housing (with some mild modification) I have a dedicated and reliable race dash. Its hard-wired to the RCP/Pro, boots in about 22 seconds, has an external button for resetting power, and the UPS provides padding for the OS to shut down gracefully after a timer (2 minutes). That way I can be on course, and if I come to a stop or have a situation where the car is off temporarily, the dash should continue. The smaller size made this a perfect fit behind the wheel. The only downside is the LED shift light array doesn't fit well anywhere on it (I had thought about 3d printing and enclosure for it), but I might move it up the back of the dash panel near the glass, which would keep it under the hoodline, but more into my direct line of sight. A bit different versus things like aim MX* type displays, but ultimately I don't look at this stuff much out on course, and the shift light is the only thing I'd want to keep an eye on (it does give me clear indication of low and high sides of the powerband, and alert status for temperature and pressure of oil, which is all I need to care about out on track).
Further, I had added and removed a large number of circuits in the first year with the car, often as I went along. While it looked clean and was well bundled, I have the time to go back and strip everything out, and lay out everything in a more modular, harnessed way. So I'm rewiring all the custom circuits, using aviation connectors to build connection points, labeling wiring, grouping and adjusting length, and I have a ton of the oem cloth wrapping to clean it up. Ultimately while a ton of work, this should make for a much cleaner, more reliable result in the car. Right now this is the before state with the wiring all unclipped:
Nothing to report on the motor side, I won't check in with the builder until next week at the soonest. Still waiting on an oil pick up tube, and trying to track down connectors for the engine harness as some things have been discontinued as the coyote evolves. I keep getting tempted to go to a controls pack and a return based fuel system. Who knows.
Some of the other stuff I may do over the summer:
- Delete the EVAP system and replace with a 302S style rollover check valve and vent assembly
- Move the trans/diff cooler to vent out of the car.
- Look at a Radium surge tank kit to resolve low fuel level starvation (and further protect the motor investment)
- Find ways to lose weight. Trying to get 30 out of the driver, pulled 5lbs of wiring and brackets out already.
- Some mild bodywork/cleanup
- Non-motor service items (rotor rings, brake pad restock, hubs, bearing checks, replace fire system, and pay the stupid f-ing Mylaps X2 tax)