- Thread starter
- #521
captdistraction
GrumpyRacer
a couple July PSAs from the over-the-summer maintenance on the racecar:
---Minor Motor Drama---
Cleaned up the pan, found the culprit: the NPT fittings I used to plug the front and sides of the pan had a coating on them that became very slick when paired with oil and the teflon tape acted as a lubricant to the threads as well. I hadn't checked them previously as I had torqued them down with a breaker bar before the last event; however they were less than finger tight. Also, the o-ring around the pan level sensor had torn.
Replaced the fittings with uncoated ones, used the thread sealing paste (we'll see), and reinstalled the pan. Found a nasty surprise along the way (read when sitting down, because it gets ugly, tap and die ugly):
The pan bolts are definitely torque to yield, one time use only. Mine had been used 4 times, and the last one snapped into the block, forcing me to drill it and extract it, I was able to do so without scratching up the aluminator.
For grade 8 M6's, they get a surprising amount of torque (177in-lb/14.75 ft-lb + 60 degrees). My bolts had visibly stretched over 4 uses. For those swapping pans, I really recommend tracking down the fasteners (W714963-S437 x3 W714962-S437 x13), and using a good trustworthy non-hazard-frought torque wrench
The 3 studs seem to be on infinite back-order, but I used bolts in their place for now and will come back and carefully replace them once they're in (m6x1.0 20mm+25mm stud with 13mm head)
Finally, as I was going back a second time, found another issue. The rearward block bulkhead on my aluminator had some damage near the drivers side bolt hole for the pan, and had cracked/damaged threads. I had to drill it out to m8x1.25 and tap it for a socket head cap (while still installed, I wasn't about to pull the motor for this). Its a temporary fix, however the bulkhead is only sold with the block. So down the road I'll have to plan to replace it. Sucks to do that to a fairly new motor, however the fix is clean, holding and will be fine until the next time I need to do a clutch (hopefully a good long time). The damage was likely from bits of the RXT clutch that had exploded a few months ago, and I just missed it while I cleaned things up. No oil was leaking from that bulkhead so hopefully it will hold for the foreseeable. ArizonaBoss might have one laying around, and MMR makes an aftermarket one as well.
---Inspect Your Stuff!---
While reinstalling the K-member and associated hardware, I took a look at my bumpsteer kit and tie rods and found this:
Come to find out, both sides had yielded upwards, and likely just in the last event (or they had previously yielded some, but not enough for me to notice). The worse of the pair wasn't far from throwing in the towel. Its the last brand S part on the car, and off it came. Unfortunately, the FRPP/mm kit has broken for another TMO racer on the connecting stud and nearly costing him the car; thus I'm not sure what direction I'm going to take.
Looking at it all, I'm confused as to how that rod end yielded so much unless it just A) exceeded its angularity range and thus bent or B) just a hot pile of shiznit (which is most people's take on it, and I have to agree, even the threads are pulled/shifted)
Just running my head through curb strikes or other suspension events I would think the stud would be the point of failure vs the rod end behind the spherical in most cases. One thing I hadn't considered is that we strap the car down by the wheels, possibly the straps were pulling it to yield.
The kit went off to a friend at another suspension company who wanted to take a look at it and see how he could overbuild it (the guy is the king of stuffing the absolute largest and strongest bearings in any application one can think of). Might end up with a bolt-through option. In the mean time, a stock pair of tie rod ends will go back on the car. Additionally I have one of those MM kits in a box here, though will likely just get resold. I'll have more on this soon
---Other Updates---
Apex wheels: Its been so hot I hadn't bothered with getting the 11" Apex wheels mounted, but I'll get to work on them soon. Look for my Apex 18x10's on the classifieds soon, I hadn't decided how I'm selling them (with or without tires) and have a couple interested parties (3 sessions on them, some scratching on the fronts but otherwise like new). Hopefully get to that soon as figuring out the proper spacing is still even a concern.
Going canbus crazy: The maniacs at Autosport labs have come up with some really cool stuff. The racecapture pro system has been very versatile with its array of digital and analog inputs and outputs, and had been able to read canbus for quite some time. However now they want to do much more with it, using a canbus channel to build your own can network to drop devices on and simplify the deployment of the devices. the first can device we're testing on this car is the Shiftx2
Once that's installed and running, there's some other cool canbus projects we'll be working on (and I'll have a full guide available for S197 mustang). Hopefully soon crack the code on the ford specific CAN pids so we can use all the data just hiding on the OEM HS-CAN network.
Finally I'll be working on the brakes soon with new master brake and clutch cylinders, and a new booster (GT500) to hopefully improve the pedal feel on the car with the massive 380mm brake package. Additionally should have the dimensions locked down soon for the girodisc rotors we'll be running.
No date set for the next event, but I might wait until at least October for things to cool down, though we will have a promotional video shoot done over the summer, but thankfully the car just needs to be in showable/parade-lap shape. I'll definitely share that media when I have it.
---Minor Motor Drama---
Cleaned up the pan, found the culprit: the NPT fittings I used to plug the front and sides of the pan had a coating on them that became very slick when paired with oil and the teflon tape acted as a lubricant to the threads as well. I hadn't checked them previously as I had torqued them down with a breaker bar before the last event; however they were less than finger tight. Also, the o-ring around the pan level sensor had torn.
Replaced the fittings with uncoated ones, used the thread sealing paste (we'll see), and reinstalled the pan. Found a nasty surprise along the way (read when sitting down, because it gets ugly, tap and die ugly):
The pan bolts are definitely torque to yield, one time use only. Mine had been used 4 times, and the last one snapped into the block, forcing me to drill it and extract it, I was able to do so without scratching up the aluminator.
For grade 8 M6's, they get a surprising amount of torque (177in-lb/14.75 ft-lb + 60 degrees). My bolts had visibly stretched over 4 uses. For those swapping pans, I really recommend tracking down the fasteners (W714963-S437 x3 W714962-S437 x13), and using a good trustworthy non-hazard-frought torque wrench
The 3 studs seem to be on infinite back-order, but I used bolts in their place for now and will come back and carefully replace them once they're in (m6x1.0 20mm+25mm stud with 13mm head)
Finally, as I was going back a second time, found another issue. The rearward block bulkhead on my aluminator had some damage near the drivers side bolt hole for the pan, and had cracked/damaged threads. I had to drill it out to m8x1.25 and tap it for a socket head cap (while still installed, I wasn't about to pull the motor for this). Its a temporary fix, however the bulkhead is only sold with the block. So down the road I'll have to plan to replace it. Sucks to do that to a fairly new motor, however the fix is clean, holding and will be fine until the next time I need to do a clutch (hopefully a good long time). The damage was likely from bits of the RXT clutch that had exploded a few months ago, and I just missed it while I cleaned things up. No oil was leaking from that bulkhead so hopefully it will hold for the foreseeable. ArizonaBoss might have one laying around, and MMR makes an aftermarket one as well.
---Inspect Your Stuff!---
While reinstalling the K-member and associated hardware, I took a look at my bumpsteer kit and tie rods and found this:
Come to find out, both sides had yielded upwards, and likely just in the last event (or they had previously yielded some, but not enough for me to notice). The worse of the pair wasn't far from throwing in the towel. Its the last brand S part on the car, and off it came. Unfortunately, the FRPP/mm kit has broken for another TMO racer on the connecting stud and nearly costing him the car; thus I'm not sure what direction I'm going to take.
Looking at it all, I'm confused as to how that rod end yielded so much unless it just A) exceeded its angularity range and thus bent or B) just a hot pile of shiznit (which is most people's take on it, and I have to agree, even the threads are pulled/shifted)
Just running my head through curb strikes or other suspension events I would think the stud would be the point of failure vs the rod end behind the spherical in most cases. One thing I hadn't considered is that we strap the car down by the wheels, possibly the straps were pulling it to yield.
The kit went off to a friend at another suspension company who wanted to take a look at it and see how he could overbuild it (the guy is the king of stuffing the absolute largest and strongest bearings in any application one can think of). Might end up with a bolt-through option. In the mean time, a stock pair of tie rod ends will go back on the car. Additionally I have one of those MM kits in a box here, though will likely just get resold. I'll have more on this soon
---Other Updates---
Apex wheels: Its been so hot I hadn't bothered with getting the 11" Apex wheels mounted, but I'll get to work on them soon. Look for my Apex 18x10's on the classifieds soon, I hadn't decided how I'm selling them (with or without tires) and have a couple interested parties (3 sessions on them, some scratching on the fronts but otherwise like new). Hopefully get to that soon as figuring out the proper spacing is still even a concern.
Going canbus crazy: The maniacs at Autosport labs have come up with some really cool stuff. The racecapture pro system has been very versatile with its array of digital and analog inputs and outputs, and had been able to read canbus for quite some time. However now they want to do much more with it, using a canbus channel to build your own can network to drop devices on and simplify the deployment of the devices. the first can device we're testing on this car is the Shiftx2
Once that's installed and running, there's some other cool canbus projects we'll be working on (and I'll have a full guide available for S197 mustang). Hopefully soon crack the code on the ford specific CAN pids so we can use all the data just hiding on the OEM HS-CAN network.
Finally I'll be working on the brakes soon with new master brake and clutch cylinders, and a new booster (GT500) to hopefully improve the pedal feel on the car with the massive 380mm brake package. Additionally should have the dimensions locked down soon for the girodisc rotors we'll be running.
No date set for the next event, but I might wait until at least October for things to cool down, though we will have a promotional video shoot done over the summer, but thankfully the car just needs to be in showable/parade-lap shape. I'll definitely share that media when I have it.
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