Rich's LS powered 944 track car

Since the oil pan is modded up front is it possible that some of the hump or heel of the oil pan that is sticking out needs to be cut back some to make it possible to lay the oil lines in closer and away from the headers?

Oil capacity is very important but how much would be lost by trimming this area back?

I don't have a pan yet so I'm just throwing a thought out there and maybe TPC can give some help and thoughts for additional mods if doable.

This is how my RH pan is, I was able to keep the lines away from the header, wish I had those long tubes. I think this is along the lines of what Tehone said.

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Now that looks a lot cleaner with room to lay the oil lines in or along. How much area do you think was given up between the RH pan and the TPC pan?

I'm with you I wish I had some headers too and an oil pan and ..........

Heres another oil pan from Moroso, Moroso #20141 Steel GM LS1 Oil Pan For Early Model GM's. Not sure how it would fit for the crossmember but it has built in 90's going in the right direction for possible header clearance.

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I've given up on the RX7 oil cooler. Installed now is an Earl's bar&plate style oil cooler. It's much smaller but still fits under the nose panel nicely. I've modified my ducting for it and put the vented nose panel back on. Oil pressure is much better, sitting at 40 PSI at idle and going right up past 60 PSI at 4k RPM just in the garage. Temperatures at idle went right up to 165 F but wouldn't go any futher. I haven't taken it out yet, will try to get a street drive in this weekend.

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The thermostat is the same Earl's unit but you can see 2 lines to the cooler. It's now plumbed in the usual way going out to the cooler and then back. The out to engine goes to the filter which is still joined via a check valve to the Accusump in the passenger front corner. It might be better to have the filter before the thermostat and cooler but just not workable with the mounting points I have chosen.

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The other thing I've done is swapped from the 75mm 3-wire Camaro MAF to the 85mm 5-wire Vette MAF. Turns out the latter was used by the shop for tuning the engine after rebuild. I learned this when I was in to have them set it back to a 4 cylinder tach output, which now reads correctly. Running just in the garage fuel trims look much better, -7 to +15 values as opposed to the 30+ I was seeing before.

I'm heading back to ORP in 2 weekends with the Oregon PCA. Hopefully I get more than 3 laps this time.

Rich

Make sure that you seal the area around the oil cooler so that air is only going through it! Not only will this help your oil temps, but your water as well. Why, the more air you have entering the nose piece, the less will flow through your radiator (which should also be ducted well).

Yes, I have the cooler shrouded directly to the openings in the nose panel. And the radiator still has all of its factory ducting. I struggled with the choice of adding air through the nose panel, which will add pressure behind the radiator as well, versus adding heat directly to the radiator by mounting the oil cooler in front as you have done.

Rich

The car finally survived a lapping day. Yay! And what a day it was at the new track near Olympia, WA called The Ridge. The long straight along the bottom of the ridge by the paddock saw 140mph. The it turns left, right, left up the hill with several long sweepers on the top of the ridge. Then a hard stop and drops sharply left, right, left like the corkscrew back down to the straight. Not much out there yet but the fresh track and paddock surface are very nice.

And the car ran very well and drew a lot of attention. I was probably 10 times I had to pop the hood to show what it was that was making the car sound and go so fast. I caught and passed a well-driven Viper, a couple of 996 turbos and a very quick 240sx. There was an Alfa Romeo race car and one of the Miatas that I could not keep up with in the sweepers, but I got 'em on the straight.

I did lose my oil temp sender during the day. I'd found the numbers from the SPA digital gauge a little hard to process while driving anyway so I'll probably just replace it with an simple analog temp gauge with a needle. But oil pressures and temps were all good now with the Mocal thermostat and cooler in place. It was an 80 degree day and even with the air inlets in the header panel taped over the oil temps stayed in the low 200s.

The only other problem is the weight of the controls. I found the manual steering difficult over the 4.5 hours of track time. My shoulders are sore today. And the brakes are tough to modulate (no ABS) given the high pedal effort required to reach threshold. I'm thinking about ways to get power assist back to those systems.

Rich

Oh, and she definitely needs a limited-slip diff.

Rich

A hydroboosted set up will fix both issues.

Glad to hear it went well.

Remind me of your brake set up. I am really starting to like my DMC setup, now that it is working properly. Also, are you running a "true" manual rack? If so, I'm surprised at the effort, mine turns quite easily and I'm a wimpy old professor

Yes, a hydraulic powered rack would be nice and reasonably easy to accomplish. I am running a true manual rack and it doesn't feel bad. But after 30 minutes with 255 r-compounds at this twisty new track I was feeling worked in the shoulders and wrists. I can do it, but when the tail would get loose my reactions were dulled a bit by my tired arms. I'm getting to full cross on my arms at this track and have to articulate my wrists a bit to make several of the turns. It's tight. The faster ratio of the power rack would be nice.

For the brakes, I'm using a floor-mounted Tilton pedal box. Master sizes currently are 5/8" front and 3/4" rear. Reducing size would increase mechanical advantage but there's not a smaller option from Wilwood or Tilton. I'm running Turbo S brakes with plain rotors and Porterfield R4 pads. I could go with BigReds up front to get more pad surface area but piston sizes are the same. And there are certainly more aggressive pads and wholey rotors to get more bite.

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Check that thing out. I believe it's just a piston pushing on a smaller one to increase mechanical advantage. Interesting.

Rich

More information on the steering. I'm running a Momo Monte Carlo wheel, but the bigger one at 350mm which should be fine. It is a touch far away from me and I've ordered a 1" spacer to bring it in a bit, nastycar style. Maybe that'll help.

And I can move the pedal pads up a bit to get a smidge longer lever. Mine are set on the 3rd position of 4.

Rich

People with manual steering cars are stronger than those with assist. I bet the next time you're at the track you'll fatigue a lot less. During the first 18 holes of each season, Im fatigued after about 14 holes, but the second time Im out, I always notice that I could probably go an additional 18! Amazing how quickly the body can adapt to certain situations.

We are using the same size master cylinders front and back as well as turbo S front brakes. I am running 951 front calipers on the rear, so have a slightly larger piston area in back. I have Hawk DTC 70s in the front and 60's in the rear. I added some metal pads on the brake and clutch pedal to give me more grip and that has helped. I've got enough time in the system that the effort is not bothering me any more, and it seems "normal". I also feel that I can modulate the brakes much better without the power assist. At present, I'm not planning on adding any assist or going bigger on calipers and rotors.

As for the manual rack, it does take more effort (I run 275's in front) but I like the feedback that you get. At a place like Barber I have had to adjust my steering by doing a slight shuffle steer in some corners, as I do not like to have my arms crossed up. Off the top of my head I'm not sure if my momo wheel is 330 or 350, guess I've had it far to long. I do have a one inch spacer that brings the wheel closer to me.

Thanks for the thoughts guys. It's very true about us getting stronger and used to efforts. Maybe between the little tweaks I have available and just putting in some seat time this will work out without drastic changes. Glad to hear your car is doing so well, Tim. What kind of life are you getting out of those Hawk pads? Looks like I'll get 5 or 6 full days out of these Porterfields.

Rich

Probably 8-10 days on the hawk fronts, more on the rears.

Brakes upgraded!

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I was unable to pass-up a deal on a set of BigRed calipers and 965 rotors. I'm getting a set of Pagid black pads, switching from Porterfield R-4 to get a higher friction material. And lastly I've moved the pads on my pedals to the highest setting, giving a slightly longer lever arm. All of this should reduce the pedal pressure required with my unboosted brakes.

Rich

Same brakes I upgraded too just recently. They definitely changed the bias vs my old turbo S brakes.

I'm running Hawk DTC70's up front, Pagid blacks in the back. More than enough stopping power, to the point where I need to reset all my braking points.

Don't expect them to stay red for long, after 1 track weekend mine are now "Big Burgundy's"...

Yep, following your leader, Doc. Good to hear about the stopping power. And the burgundy too, the red is a bit flashy for my taste.

Rich

Now if I could just get my coolant temps as low as yours...

Rich L. wrote:

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Check that thing out. I believe it's just a piston pushing on a smaller one to increase mechanical advantage. Interesting.

Interested to know more about that thing. Seems like a good compromise between full manual and hydroboost setups. The mounting flexibility would be nice too.

Since I don't want to spend any more money on my car then I have to, I've been trying to convince myself that I do not need to go larger than Turbo S brakes on the race car. One of those ways is to measure rotor temps when coming off of the track (measuring rotor temps with an IR is a whole lot easier then trying to get pad temperature, and I'm guessing they are similar; please correct me if I am wrong). This last event at Barber, the track was stinking hot, with air temps nearing 100o and track temps nearing 150o. My highest temps on my front rotors were 800 and 400 in the back. This is actually not high at all given the working range of good pads (see below for hawk). In fact, I'm just getting into the heat range on the rears. Remember, you need to get those brakes hot to work well and I've been told that race pads wear faster if they are not getting hot enough (again, no data on hand to prove it).

I'd be interested in seeing what temps you guys are seeing with those big brakes.

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PS - they look great!

I wasn't impressed by how much larger the 965 and Big Reds were vs my old Turbo S brakes. The rotors are slightly larger and the Big Red pads are a bit taller. That's it.

I got em because my Turbo S calipers needed to be rebuilt and I needed pads/rotors as well. I also got a screaming deal on the stuff, so it made sense to buy it vs rebuilding my old setup.

I haven't had a chance yet to come bombing off track to check temps. I'll try to arrange it.

Rich