Dan's NC track toy

[Dan]

I was hoping my next update would be after the Supersprints but even though I paid, Fathers Day came first in priority and stopped me attending. I have put a few things in for the track though and hopefully this will be helpful if people are interested in the seat fitment.

I had a Racetech installed a couple of years ago, however I got rid of it since issues with my Evo made the MX5 a daily driver and I was saving for a second house. Now things are good with the Evo and I’m driving the MX5 almost solely on the track I figured it was time to get a seat for the MX5 so I can run a HANS device, which I’ve got sitting here.

I picked up a Cobra Suzuka Pro for $500 off the Evo forums and got an Extinguisher + Mount off this forum which was enough to get me going. I also got myself an AIM Solo DL timer which I like for the ECU Connectivity (ODBII support for the Evo X and MX5) and the fixed mounting option which will make scrutineering easy.

So what went in:
- Extinguisher
- Dorian Timer Cradle
- Cobra Suzuka seat
- Sabelt 6 Point HANS Harness
- AIM Solo DL Laptimer

I seem to sit slightly higher in this seat which I put down to the Racetech having a squarer bottom but I still sit much lower than with the stock seat, the wing of the seat also only just touches the door which is better than the Racetech which seemed to rub a bit.

As always thanks Daniel Deckers and the Deckspeed guys for doing a great job with the install

Next step is putting in a roll bar or a cage as head clearance isn't safe in a rollover given I'm a smidgen above the plastic roll hoop cover with a helmet + HANS on, maybe it will be less though with different padding on the bottom which I'll try out. I'd still be screwed in the stock seat so adding protection in the more likely crash (into a wall) makes sense. I like the look of the Brown Davis Roll Bar with removable rear stays but I am also considering taking this car off the road which would allow me to run a full cage.

Pics:

[cwto24]

Very nice Dan and it was good seeing you on Sunday!

The seats look like they JUST fit... What rails/mounts are the seats on?

[Dan]

Very nice Dan and it was good seeing you on Sunday!

The seats look like they JUST fit... What rails/mounts are the seats on?

Hey Trevor, was great catching up with you too. Looking at your car and Regie's I was getting jealous.

Yeh it is sort of tight but I think that's par for the course in these cars, the setup is a fixed seat base that Daniel Deckers made with a FIA spec Aluminum side mount.

[Dan]

Got my Brown Davis Roll bar installed at Deckspeed. Seems like a good setup with pre-drilled holes for Harness Eyelets, removable rear stays and all of the required CAMS Paperwork.

I could of got the stock plastic put back in but I don't really see the point since the car isn't dríven often on the street.

If you look at a couple of posts back where you can see top of the plastic on top of the stock roll bar sits just above the top of this seat (the actual roll bar a bit below) it's clear just how much higher this roll bar is than stock. I'm 6'1 and come in well under the roll bar with my Helmet + HANS so I feel much safer driving taking the MX5 to the track

Some pics below:

[mitch_f1]

Hey Dan, was nice meeting you over the weekend, hope you had a good day on Sunday.

[Dan]

Hey Dan, was nice meeting you over the weekend, hope you had a good day on Sunday.

Was great meeting you too mate, I hope you got back ok with all that rain!


I thought I'd post something since I had a fun weekend a few weeks back at the Circuit Club and MX5 Club Days down at Wakefield and had a few things to update.

My feedback on the Z221 tyres is that they feel faster than my previous tyres though I was about half a second off my PB so I shouldn’t really be making that statement until I go under my PB which I set with the same setup but with NT01’s in much colder weather (everyone seemed to be off PB’s at the track day which was probably a combination of the heat and heavy rains in the week or so before).

In terms of times Saturday wasn’t the best for me and on Sunday I started off the day with 13’s, then on I think the forth session we checked the suspension settings and to my surprise the rears were on full soft! We fixed that and in the next session I took more than half a second off the previous PB of the day and ended up with a 1:12.679 on my AIM Datalogger and a 1:12.65 on the club’s timing.

After my PB session Daniel Deckers who takes care of my car went for a drive to set a time and give me feedback on the setup, never being in the car before he reeled out in consecutive laps a 1:13.323, 1:12.681, 1:12.844. It made me happy that he only got close to my PB (I realise he'd do better if he had more seat time in the car) but it also showed I don’t have the consistency like he does which is something I need to work on.

The car is at Deckspeed at the moment having some Racing Beat Headers, a full exhaust and a tune put on so I'm excited to see how it goes at my next track day which is a practice at SMSP GP Circuit on the 28th of January.

Unfortunately I had a few issues with my camera (regular photo camera with a video setting) and didn’t get any footage until my last session, it's well off the pace but I think the video is pretty reflective of the lines I use.

[Regie]

I was at Deckers the other day. Roll bar looks pretty good Dan.

You will notice a massive difference with the headers and tune! looks like ill have to pick up my game on the track haha

[Dan]

Thanks mate, I'm really looking forward to seeing what the extra power does to track times!

Hopefully you can make it to the next club day, would be fun to mix it with you

[Regie]

you oownt see me on the track for a few months now. Ill be flat out studying till late march no good

[mitch027]

hey dan

with all that rear interior trim out, are there any problems lowering and putting up the soft top? (when you take out the rear stays)

the handle to release the soft top when its down looks like its a part of the trim panel - if its not there, how do you release the soft top when its down to put it back up?

[Dan]

hey dan

with all that rear interior trim out, are there any problems lowering and putting up the soft top? (when you take out the rear stays)

the handle to release the soft top when its down looks like its a part of the trim panel - if its not there, how do you release the soft top when its down to put it back up?

Honestly I haven't even tried to pull the stays out since it went in so I can't answer the question. The car is only really dríven too and from the track so I haven't had a reason to put it down completely but I assume it would just rest in the back without the latch.

Regarding that handle, it is attached to a small panel that also contain the small speakers which is separate to the larger trim panel and there are bolts on the Brown Davis bar to put it back on so you could put that on if you wanted to remove the rear trim but retain that latch.

The other option is to install all of the original trim back in like Brown Davis intended using a Dremel to cut the plastic a little bit, I just didn't see the point because race car

[Dan]

The Exhaust and tune is now on the car, it's Racing Beat Headers and a custom exhaust back from there which contains just a high flow cat and 2.5 inch piping to a muffler with a single 3 inch exit.

The car ended up making 104kw on Deckspeed's hub dyno which was a large gain over what it got un-tuned with the exhaust (we didn't get a stock exhaust/tune baseline).

I was really happy with the quality of the exhaust with clearances and how solid it is but as expected it's sort of ridiculous how loud it is, at idle it's really tame but when you give it anything it sounds like a V8 is in it with all the noise and pops to the point I was giggling every time I drove away from the lights. The only time that the car gets dríven is to Deckspeed or to the track so I can put up with it.

I have some experience with loud exhausts, this is a video of the exhaust on my Evo which I used for a year or so until I moved to Sydney from Perth (I was worried about the police attention):


I'll get a video of the MX5 Exhaust put up if anyone's interested, but here's a couple of pictures:

[wasabi]

Reckon a new PB at Wakie will be in order now that you're all tuned up

Can't get to the track on the 28th as I'll be down the Snowies, but looking forward to hitting the track with you again in our "improved" cars

[Dan]

Reckon a new PB at Wakie will be in order now that you're all tuned up

Can't get to the track on the 28th as I'll be down the Snowies, but looking forward to hitting the track with you again in our "improved" cars

Yeh, hopefully! All good mate, come down to the club track day on the 18/2 ;)


As an update I also ordered a set of 17x8 +49 WedsSport TC105N’s yesterday from Autotechnik. I was looking at RPF1’s but I wanted to get something a bit different since everyone seems to run RPF1’s, the offset is a bit better for running 235's and they are a bit over a pound lighter per wheel. 8-10 week lead time though..

Here's what they look like:

[Regie]

wow they look awesome!!!!