Black Halo Racing's Motor Mounts

Picture direct from Black Halo Racing's website

There is something to be said about a car part that you can look at, and seriously consider it a work of art. The team over at Black Halo Racing never fail to produce top notch results, as they focus heavily on the quality and usability aspects of their products. They have recently released these beautiful replacement motor mounts for the RX-8. These mounts will last a LOT longer than the OEM mounts that are prone to failing quickly (even the revised mounts are not lasting as long as most would like). Let’s have a closer look.

SpeedSource Pulleys Review

The "Competetion Pulley Set" from Mazdaspeed is really THE best pulleys you can get for the RX-8. They are actually produced by SpeedSource and are widely used by pretty much any roadrace prepped RX-8. The kit is made to not use your air conditioner, allowing you to remove the system and save some weight there.

The eccentric shaft pulley is substantially smaller than stock, as well as much lighter. The alternator pulley however, though lighter, is much bigger than stock. For race cars, this is not an issue considering they're frequently up in high RPMs. For street cars, this can be a serious issue as that means the battery is not getting as charged as it needs to be. I've run into an issue once or twice where I started losing power steering and then ABS while sitting idle in grid, while using the lights, defrost, radio, and windshield wipers. The problem never came back when I kept my revs around 1,500 RPM while sitting idle however.

The power increase is definitely VERY noticeable and I've heard wind that it is supposed to be a 10HP gain..If that is true or not, I wouldn't doubt it given the fact that we're talking about SpeedSource here, but I for one don't have any comparisons. I guess for those that are looking for pulleys, this is definitely worth the price tag if you're building a race car and not a street car that you like to have fun with, given that it doesn't charge the battery unless you're frequently in higher RPMs.

Corbeau Purple Harnesses

I was getting tired of the red on black theme my car was naturally taking (which is a theme that I really don't like in the first place) , so I decided to change up the harnesses to my favorite color; royal purple. These things are absolutely beautiful! I'm quite happy with the quality of the belts as well, as adjusting them is surprisingly easier than my old G-Force belts. Picked up some shoulder pads as well while I was at it. Picture up top was taken without a flash to show that the text is actually silvery white, and not a darker purple like it looks in some of the flash pictures. Now lets see how they hold up at the next event!

BHR 255lh Walbro Fuel Pump

Was reading various posts on the RX-8 Club about fuel starvation and how some RX-8 owners have been seeing such symptoms when racing and cornering hard. Great post by MazdaManiac explaining it all pretty much is here. Big ups to Ray from BHR for making this awesome plug-n-play fuel pump upgrade kit, which has the Walbro fuel pump in an OEM assembly. He also has available for installs a special tool that made my life a lot easier when trying to take off the o-ring on top of the fuel pump.I was originally going to make this a DIY, but decided not to as I would rather just review about it. Feel free to shoot me an email should you need some assistance with installation though. The pump has a interesting tone to it, almost as if a whining motor sound to it. It's slightly louder, but not alarmingly louder. The fuel pump will certainly be pushed during the next event, for now it has to deal with some "spirited driving" on some on and off ramps.

Some pictures of the new pump before installation, the old pump in the car as we are removing it, and Shane deciding that the old pump makes for a great football.

Sparco Bag & Power Steering Update

Ordered a nice Sparco Bag that just came in today. Decided that grocery bags were no longer cutting it in terms of storage and carrying things to autocross events. Looks really nicely made with plenty of room for goodies, so I can't wait to try it out this weekend. Already packed up and ready to go to! For the price, the quality and the size, I would have to say this bag was certainly worth it. Big ups to Dan from Assaultech.
As for the power steering update, sadly it had taken Liberty Mazda a whole week to receive the harness from Mazda North America. Splice off the old one, solder in the new one and wrap is all they did. Upon inspecting the old one, it looks like radiator fluid from the overflow had managed to leak into the connector. Everything feels great right now, so we'll see what happens during this weekend's event and overtime. Stay tuned.

Corbeau FX1 Pro

Installed these the other day. Double big ups to Jordan for dealing with my mistake and making this project turn from an hour project into almost a four hour project. Remember when installing these seats to NOT bolt down the harnesses first and then thread them through the seats..it won't fit. Thread them first and then bolt. I learned the hard way.Anyways, here are the seats. They look great, feel awesome...just the fact that I can't drive them with the seat cushion. My head just barely touches the roof with the seat cushions in, I wouldn't be able to fit my helmet if I tried. It was worth it for the most part though as it was a 35~lb. savings. The other issue with swapping out to racing seats is that the airbag light on the dash is always on.

Last Purchase Before Winter Sleep!

Decided to pull the trigger early on replacing my brakes as opposed to waiting after winter. The pads were starting to squeal a bit here and there, telling me it was soon time to replace them and probably would last the first and second event of the following year. I went with the Axxis ULT Brake Pads (previously known as Axxis Ultimates) as they have been praised again and again by autocrossers for their great braking ability, consistency, low dust, and good initial bite. Not as hard of an initial bite as a warm set of Hawk HP+ pads, but the overall braking is apparently identical, with a higher brake fade temperature as well.

The pads will be matching up with all new rotors as well. Stock size two-piece rotors from Racing Brake will do the trick here. The rotors are much lighter than the stock rotors, with the front rotors 4.4 lb lighter than stock, and the rear rotors are 2.5 lb lighter than stock, with slots for ventilation.

Can't wait to install these on the car, hoping to get this done before the snow comes!

UPDATE: Just found out that we are expecting a snow storm this weekend, so unfortunately it looks like these will not be installed until after winter. Unfortunate but March is only 4 months away!

Autopower Rollbar

Looks like I finally got to install my rollbar that has been hanging out in the garage for over a month! I want to give a big thanks to Oleg and Josh for their help in this little project, and thanks to James and Expo1 on how to install, tips for sealing and undercoating, the works. As you can see, the final result came out awesome and I was really happy that I painted the rear and bar flat black, as everything came out smooth and blended perfect. One of the added benefits of doing the interior the same color as the rollbar is that when we scratched a bit of the metal to install the bar, I just sprayed it after with flat black.

Below is my guide on how I did the install. I was recommended to do it one way, and read somewhere else to do it another, but so I'm glad to hear suggestions for other viewers but this way is how we approached it and it came out great!

Tools to have should be

1. Power Drill
2. Lubricant for the Drill Bit (we used PB Blast)
3. 3/8 Drill Bit
4. 14 Open End Wrench
5. 14 Socket with Wrench
6. Rustolium Underbody Rubberized Spray
7. Black RTV Silicone Sealant
8. Touch up paint (if you care about scrapes inside your car)
9. Phillips Screw Driver
10. Normal Tools to remove your wheels (socket, jackstands and jack, etc)
11. Trusty and "overly willing to help" friend
12. Patience and food

Now, we started off with the car already gutted (if you had read the previous post you'll see that my carpet has been removed from front chairs to the back and the rest of the rear is gone) so we had little to no prep work other than pushing the seats forward as much as possible. Once you're done prepping the rear by removing the rear seats, the side plastic coverings, and pushing the carpet out of the way, follow the steps below.

1. Bring the rollbar into the car with your friend. Be sure to have one of you follow the bar into the car, climbing over the powerplant frame and out the other side. Just guide the feet through, and aim the top of the bar towards the rear of the car.
2. Once the bar is in, position it so that the feet of the rollbar is on the floor and against the back of the rear seat molding? Not sure what you call it, but basically put the feet back as far as you can. That is where you'll want the rollbar in the end.
3. Place in the legs into the rollbar. Line up the holes in the legs with the holes on the rollbar piping. Be sure that the feet of the back legs are set so the 2 holes are faced down and not up. (look at the backing picture below)
4. Bolt in the the legs onto the rollbar. Be sure to use the neoprene nuts for the bolts on the legs.
5. Once the legs are prepared properly, slide the rollbar back in the car as much as possible so that the feet of the hoop are against the frame where you saw before.
6. We started drilling the feet of the hoop with the drill, doing one hole at a time. We drilled one hole on the right side, then one hole on the left.
7. After the drill, we bolted those holes so it would help keep the rollbar in place during the drilling of the other holes.
8. From here, we drilled so that it was a cross pattern like putting on a wheel. So if you do do the bottom right hole, you want to do the upper left hole. Be sure to bolt the holes after you make them.
9. Once the hoop legs are done and bolted in decently enough to hold it in place, it's time to jack the car up to do the rear.
10. Once the car is jacked up at the rear, be sure to remove the rear wheels, and rear wheel well lining.
11. Go into the car and do the same as you did with the hoop feet..one at a time on each side, with a bolt right after to keep it firmly in.
12. Once all holes are drilled, we took the nuts off the bottom of the feet to the hoop to prepare the backing plate. Spread RTV Silicone sealant all over the plate so that it will seal once you place it up against the bottom of the car. Place some nuts under the plates to hold the plates in place for the hoop.
13. Do the same for the wheel well bolts now.
14. Once plates are on all feet, under the car, its time to start really bolting in the bar. We started tightening the hoop first, getting one side a decent amount, then making the opposite side identically tight.
15. After the two hoop feet are decently tight (not full), do the same for the rear feet in the wheel well.
16. From here start tightening all of the bolts until you no longer can, evenly throughout the car. A final step we did to ensure the bolts were on as tight as possible was took the impact gun to the top of the feet (in the car) while another person used the wrench to keep the nut from moving under the car.
17. After a couple of quick jolts, the bolts are as tight as possible. From here put on the remaining nuts onto the bolt so that the end result is two nuts per bolt (see picture of finished bottom)
18. Once done and ensuring that everything is torqued nicely, spread RTV Silicone along the edges of the plating under the car. You'll notice that RTV has come out since you compressed the plate against the car, creating a smoosh effect. Just be sure to spread enough around the plating so that it's as sealed as possible.
19. Once done with the sealant, the last step will be to spray the rustolium undercoating rubber spray all over the plating and bolts under the car, and inside the wheel well. This will ensure that everything is protected and sealed so you won't run into any rusting issues in the near future.
20. Once done, patch the car back up and you should be done! Be sure to touch up any scrapes or scratches that may have happened while installing the bar.

To wrap harnesses around the rollbar, I followed this video from Schroth on youtube. I'm not sure if this is the completely correct way to wrap it, but I'm sure they know their stuff.
Video

Strapped In!

Installed these new belts before the last event, but I wanted to make sure I had some good pictures before posting on the blog. These are the 6 Point (only 4 for now, 5 and 6 go in on track days) CamLock Pro Harnesses from G-FORCE Racing Gear in red, pull down type.

Quick review of the belts, they feel absolutely amazing. I get even more feedback from the car, while not having to worry about applying more pressure of my left foot down onto the dead pedal to keep myself steady. I'm strapped in comfortably, and can just focus on driving and the course, so it's a really good advantage to have. Can't wait to mount these to the roll bar I have coming soon..so stay tuned for that!
Installing is a breeze, just becareful with the bolts as I learned the hard way in the middle of the tech line at the event (big thanks again to Bob for the save). The way I did it, is to bolt the lap belts at the mounting point for the seat rails in the rear, UNDER the rail. Don't do the seatbelt rail that holds the OEM belts, nor bolt OVER the seat rail. For the shoulder belts, I bolted to the rear seatbelt lock locations (NOT good for the track, thus why I'm getting a roll bar). I've seen some buy the latch for the shoulder straps and latch it to the child safety bars in the rear, as well as get anchor bolts for the seat mounts and latch the lap belts to those. I personally prefer to have a firm, solid mount for the safety equipment to ensure it's not moving anywhere.

Just a heads up, for anyone who thinks these look completely baller or JDM... They do, but they're not for the street at all. So please, don't think I got this for looks on the street. These are purely for track/autocross events and should not be used on the street. The reason is because you are completely limiting your turning radius of your head and body to look at any oncoming cars. If you get hit hard you're probably going to get whiplash. The worse of them all is if you have it a bit too loose, or improperly installed, you can easily submarine and snap your spine. I don't usually emphasize on what you should and shouldn't do, but I'm pretty firm about this as this can be very safe on the course, yet very very dangerous elsewhere.

New Cooling

Got together with James and Mike to tackle a project I had been looking into for awhile now; Replacing the radiator, waterpump and thermostat. Now, I did plenty of prep work. I got copies of the service manual from the dealership, I looked up various DIYs, but we still ran into some parts that took us longer than expected. Regardless, the install was a great turn out.

I had purchased the Ron Davis radiator, their colder thermostat (170 degrees I believe) and their high flow water pump (boy what a huge difference) filled with Prestone 50/50. I won’t go into specific details like a DIY, but I will post the links I used for help and the order in which I did this.

1. As always, flat level surface with lots of space
2. Remove engine cover (All Mazda service manuals have this as step 1! )
3. Remove the battery and battery box (Heads up: it’s split in 3 pieces. Top, then the middle is held on by clips in the back. Bottom part is then only held on by bolts.
4. Remove the PCM cover
5. Remove the front PCM duct that goes straight down, and then to the right (looks like it goes into the fan)
6. Remove intake box – Recommended to put something to cover intake hole for now
7. Remove the drive belt
8. Remove the alternator belt
9. Right now is when you can see mostly everything you will be working with in the engine bay. The water pump is right under the water pump pulley, and the thermostat is just next to it. Lets move on.
10. Now is when you want to jack up the car. We unfortunately only had 2 Jacks for the front, but it’s ideal to have 4 to keep the car level while lifted up for this process.
11. Remove the splash guard entirely
12. Look up. You’ll see the radiator sandwiched between the AC condenser and the fans. Try and make note of anything that is connected to the radiator, such as bolts, radiator tubes, and anything else that may possibly be in your way. The goal is to slide the radiator down as smoothly and easily as possible.
13. Look for the drain plug for the radiator, get your pan (make sure you have a big one because we overfilled ours, and it was a huge pan!) and start draining. Once done, let it sit for a few minutes to try and let as much as possible drip out.
14. From here, we did the easy top two parts such as thermostat and waterpump just to get it out of the way. It seemed like the easy and quick approach. Unbolt the waterpump, replace with your new one. Tighten just enough for now.
15. Thermostat is tricky as you’ll need someone to tug on the long metal pole that we think is the EGR, though we’re not 100% (forgive me on that, but I’m not all knowing!). Remove the tubes to the thermostat, unbolt, then while someone holds back on the EGR, twist the top of the thermostat and then pull up. There you will see the thermostat in it’s case. Replace that with your new one, and place everything back.
16. Have lunch. Food is essential and by now you must be eye balling the radiator wondering why it’s going to be the hardest install. It’s not, just tricky…but eat first so you have the patience for it.
17. Once done, check out the stuff I had mentioned connected to the radiator. Unbolt the AC condenser from the radiator via the front, two bolts on top from the fan, and take off the tubes going to the radiator. The last would be the brackets under the car holding up the radiator. We saved this for last so we always had something holding up the radiator.
18. From here, have your champion of a friend tug on the fan assembly and lift up from the engine bay to get it off the radiator, while you are slowly guiding the radiator down from inbetween the two. Be sure to be careful with the AC and radiator fins, I’m sure it’s not easy to make those straight again.
19. Replace the radiator by sliding up the new one very slowly and carefully. Be sure the tubing inlets go towards the back of the car.
20. Place back on the under body brackets for the radiator, and then redo everything you took off! Wait on the splash shield for the very last step though.
21. When you’re done placing everything back except the splash shield, go ahead and turn on the car (don’t start just yet). May as well do your activation of DSC, set radio and get that all out of the way. Once done, open your coolant reservoir. Start the car and let it get to a good running temperature while watching the reservoir. Should you need to add coolant, go for it, but try not to go past the full line.
22. Once you’ve reached operating temperature, cover the reservoir and go back to the car. Turn the heat to full blast (yes the heat) and then rev the car to 3.5 or 4 RPM. Hold it for 15-20 seconds to get the coolant going through the system and then ease off the gas. Go back to the coolant reservoir and check the levels, filling if needed.
23. After that, repeat the last step one or two more times to ensure your level is steady and enough coolant has gone through the system.
24. Then you’re done! You may need to do this again the following day, but keep an eye on the levels regardless for awhile until you’re sure the coolant level isn’t getting lower at all.

The DIYs I used for help on this were
Coolant Change - by Staiclag
Replace your Radiator - by NYCGPS
Big ups to them for the great DIYs, and big ups to James, Mike, Stephanie and Liz for the help, good company, and great BBQ lunch.
As for the review of the parts, since I forgot to flush and ran home right off the bat, I noticed several heat spikes and thought I was going to lose the car. After flushing a good few times and flushing the next day, my cooling levels were excellent. In 68 Degree weather Cruising on the highway in 6th gear I was seeing temperatures as low as 175. Pushing the car in 82 Degree weather to high RPMs got me to around 190’s. When I was really running at the SCCA event we only got our highest to 208, and after opening the hood and letting it cool, it settled to low 190’s.

I’m very pleased with this setup, and I can only hope that it really does help prolong the life of my car and keep my temperatures consistent and low.

Autoexe Strut Tower Special

I think I can still hear the swears echoing in my head from the two days it took to figure out how to install these parts. With the help of my friends, (big ups to Oleg, Shane, James, and Murph) we managed to understand what the Japanese instructions could not illustrate for us. Following my brief review of the parts, I’ll have a DIY so that anyone else brave enough to buy these, they won’t have to go through the pains we experienced.

The part itself is phenomenal for a lack of a better term. The front 6 point is an impressive sight, as on Sunday’s event, I had many people observing and questioning about it while I was in the tech line. The rear got some praise as well, but people were just very surprised to see a 6 point, especially how it bolts to the fender line. In terms of feeling, the response increase was well worth the money. I get much more feedback from the rear of the car (considering I had no rear strut bar before), as well as a much more solid and responsive feeling from the front.

When I took the car out for a test run, I was surprised at how on sweeping turns, I no longer feel any slight slop or any response from the body. All feeling and focus is directly on my tires and what they’re doing. How they’re responding to me, the grip I’m obtaining with them. It’s like floating with wheels attached to my fingertips.

Highly recommended for those looking for that step above the “unnecessary but awesome” step, as this set of two really is more than good looks and some functionality. It’s top notch, and I have yet to see anything match it.

On to the DIY, in which you’ll thank me for writing and saving your time. After 2 days, 6-7 hours each day of trying to figure this out, I had to write something about this. For starters

TOOLS NEEDED

• Level surface for the car to sit on
• Sockets, ranging from 8 – 17, both deep and normal
• Swivel extension for a socket
• Open end wrenches, 10, 12, 14
• Small vice grips
• Allen wrenches (Don’t remember sizes, but on the bigger side)
• Phillips screw driver
• Touch up paint for your car (incase you do what I did)
• Drill with 15/16 drill bit to make a hole in the fender bigger
• A lot of patience and a helping hand

REAR
The rear was the easier one, so I would recommend doing this one first if you’re short on time or want to try out one of them separate first.

• Start with removing the carpeting in the trunk space. Carpeting on the side, and on the bottom to make sure you can access all bolts in the rear
• Once the rear shock hats are exposed, remove all of the bolts you see (literally), weither it be bolts for the floor, or the shock itself, just remove them.
• The rear comes assembled with the two shock braces bolted with the actual bar. Undo this so that it’s in 3 separate pieces. Remember how the bolts were on the bar.
• Look into your bag of goodies and you will see 4 black hook plates. If you notice on the illustration, this goes into the body of the car, above the shock hat…Yes, it goes into that tiny circle hole that if you drop it, you aren’t getting it back. It acts as the backing nut for some of the bolts. This is where the vice grips come handy. With vice grips, you can latch it onto the end of the hook that sticks out of the hole, so that it won’t fall in while you install the rest of the shock brace and begin to bolt it down.
• That being said, place the small vice grips on the hook ends and place all 4 into their respective holes (there is another small hole back more, you have to either sit in the trunk and look in, or feel for it.
• While your friend is in your trunk helping you with this, and his ear is right next to the rear speaker, be sure to play your radio at a good volume to make sure he’s awake and working properly on your rear.
• Line up the shock braces with the holes on the hat and the studs on the floor. From there, begin to bolt down (not full tightness yet!) using the bolts as described in the instructions. It’s not really displayed well in the illustration, but for the center large bolts (yellowish in color) you will need a nut in the back to hold it in place now (I needed a nut before hand for my coilovers. OEM shocks have a backing for those bolts). Don’t forget to remove the vice grips.
• Once both sides are in and bolted down good enough, from here I tightened the bolts from bottom to up. I felt that to center it, it would make sense to bolt it down first, then bolt the backings against the car to ensure it’s firm and straight. Did this twice.
• Last step is to place in the actual bar! Place it in (be sure to have Autoexe brand facing you and not backwards for proper bling effect) and line it up with its respective holes. Place in those bolts with washers. I tightened left bottom decently, then right top, followed by left top, then right bottom. Then I went through and tightened as much as possible to ensure it was fully tight. This is where the allen wrench comes handy because you will need it to ensure that it is as tight as possible with these bolts.
• From here, you are done! Shake it a little and make sure it’s in there firmly and securely. Place back your carpeting and away you go for the rear. In the instructions they put measurements on what you should cut out for the carpet, but I don’t use my carpet so I unfortunately can’t provide any help with that. I’m sure it can’t be that hard!

FRONT
This is the tough one. Make sure you have plenty of time for this, just in case things go sour like they did for us.

• For starters, grab your patience tool, your anger fixing drink (I’d go with Amstel or something light) and start removing the OEM (or whatever you have) front strut bar. If you have coilovers, rejoice as you can now put the front dampening adjuster on top of the shock finally!
• Once this is done, take a look at your fender walls near the firewall. I have engine insulation removed, so you may not see what I see, but in the fender there are two holes there. That is the mounting point for the fender brace.
• At the firewall, the engine insulation there (again, I have removed) is being held on by two white plastic nuts on studs. Those nuts need to be removed as your firewall braces are going to go there. Be sure to look at the picture in the instructions to verify you placed the proper brace support on each stud. It’s different for 04-08 bodies from 09 body RX8. This will be your first bolt on, but not as tight as possible as you will need some play room in the end.
• You MAY need to use pliers and lift up the cowl a bit to give you extra room by the fender. We did only because we were not sure what had to be done at first. BE WEARY of the screws in the cowl. I couldn’t unscrew mine oddly enough, but every time we ignored the screws, gave an extra scratch on my strut bar.
• For placing the front strut bar in, two people are needed for easy placement. With one person on each side of the car, as level as possible, slowly lower the rear into the car . Once in place and back against the firewall, position the strut tower holes as close as possible to the studs sticking out. NOW, this is the tricky part with the rear part resting on the firewall supports (the fender parts will probably rub thus the touch up paint). You will want to have both of you push at an angle one at a time to get the bar in. It’s really a simple concept that somehow can take more than an hour if you don’t do it right. My friend came, stood next to the car and pushed down hard to get one side in, then went to the other side and did this.
• Now that the brace is in place the fender brace plates need to be installed. To install these it is key to have the car jacked up in the front with the fender liners peeled back (towards the front), or the fenders off the car. There is one problem and that is the small hole is (yes you guessed it) to small. The remedy is a 15/16 drill bit. It makes the hole just big enough for the small allen wrench bolt to fit in with ease. Place the brace inside the fender and line up the holes, while someone else places a bolt inside to keep the brace in place. From there, bolt up the fenders per instructions, just tight enough to be on.
• From here, you now need to finish tightening the strut bar down. We did the struts first, doing a nice even torque all around, followed by the fenders, making sure it was very tight from side to side numerous times to ensure it was flush with the fender (if a touch of space is left between fender and brace, it’s okay because it’s probably flush in the back). Lastly, the firewall brace needs to be bolted down.

New Wheels - Enkei RPF1

Ask any of my friends and they will tell you with a good laugh," What does Marc want to change the most on the car?" and they would immediately answer "His wheels". Since the day I purchased my car, I've been tossing back and forth wheels that I want to put on the car. Finally, I came to the conclusion for both good looks, light weight, and aggressive offset... The Enkei RPF1.I got the wheels in 18x9 +35 in F1 Silver. They only weigh in at 17lb, which is a huge difference from the stock wheels of 23lb! Big ups to my sponsor sleepermodz.com for helping me out with this purchase for a great price. Not much to say other then I'm very happy. Full gallery of pictures here, thanks to Oleg. I'll let the pictures do the rest of the talking.

Small Fortune Racing & 4.777 Final Drive

Before I explain how great and amazing my new 4.777 modification is, I'd like to give a big thanks to Bill Gendron, the owner of Small Fortune Racing (SFR) for all the hard work on this. We had some trial and error problems with the installation but everything is all set now. Thanks again Bill, car runs great!

On to the review for all those anxiously waiting! For starters, I am now in love with this mod. This is the 4.777 Ring and Pinion upgrade from a 09 RX8, purchased from Mazmart. I would also like to add, that this mod is NOT for those who are not looking to lose their long revving. After installing this, not only is the car much quicker, but at the price of staying in gears longer. I have a feeling this will really help me in autocross because of the huge pickup increase.
If I had to explain the change, it is like going from a stock flywheel to a extra lightweight flywheel twice over. Very addictive to feel this type of torque from a naturally aspirated rotary, and very enjoyable. Of course, still nothing that throws you back, but still good enough that it is noticeable and very enjoyable. Again, recommended to those only looking to exchange top speed for some fun low end pickup.

Stay tuned for my post of this upcoming autocross to see how this feels on the course!

Grippy Weekend

Wow. I'm still wowing. All I can say is "Holy Consistent Grip Batman!". I don't think these things want to let go, ever. On a serious note, I just put on my new tires this morning. Dunlop Direzza Sport Star Spec Z1 in 245/40/18. The tread is just as aggressive as the tire, and is essentially just barely a step down from an R compound tire. Their R compound has the same tread, except without the ribbed center (which is required for the street apparently).

My driving impression on sweepers and long turns, even short ones, is that it just grips to the road. Doesn't matter your speed, as long as you are in control, the tires do the rest of the work. I noticed a hum from the tires 45miles and up, but it's tolerable and easily forgotten after awhile. Apparently these wheels are on top for dry grip, and medium for wet grip. The competing Advan AD08 is a monster in the wet, while very similar grip in the dry compared to the Dunlop. The new Bridgestone RE11 is also exceptional, but the problem is that due to the softer sidewall, my car wouldn't get the full potential of the tire like a Miata or S2000 would.

I highly recommend these street tires to anyone who basically wants a streetable race tire. I can't wait to try these out at autocross, as they may be more predicable than my old Yokohama S-Drives.

Flush And Brackets

Small update of some minor upgrade I did. All new Stainless Steel brake and clutch lines from Technafit, full flush with ATE Super Blue, and finished off with new front swaybar bushings and brackets.

The lines were very nicely made, and all fit perfectly, just very time consuming to get it all completed. We flushed my old OEM brake fluid from the car after installing each line to make sure all air was gone, and the old fluid had gone. It is kind of neat to see blue brake fluid as opposed to the traditional golden colored fluids.

After the brake and clutch line installs, I had gotten for my birthday some nice Energy Suspension front swaybar bushings and brackets. The front swaybar bushings that came with the Progress Technology swaybars were actually rubber, and not polyurethane surprisingly. So I replaced the old rubber ones with the new polyurethane bushings, and with beefier brackets. The kit fit so perfect that it was actually hard to get in.

My road impressions about the bushings is that they actually are worth the swap. I noticed that the front isn't really much stiffer than before, but I get more feedback from what the front of the car is doing. Very nice to get this kind of input with just a small modification like that. As for my impression of the lines and after the flush, it was well needed. My brakes are much firmer now, as well as my clutch pedal. Each shift is spot on consistent, while my brakes felt very responsive.

Matching Beauty

Was getting tired of having my LED driving lights be a 6000k type color and my HIDs be the OEM 4300k (which you can REALLY tell it's white since I did the project lens swap). Decided to try Apexcone 6000k HIDs, which I heard is great quality and used by BMW drivers. The results were spot on match, and look excellent. Thanks to Oleg for the help installing these puppies. Top picture is before, bottom is after installation.

Transmission Overhaul

Roughly two weeks ago, shifting in general began to feel notchy and even began to grind at certain points. After changing the transmission fluid to some fresh MT-90 and still being unsuccessful, it seems it was time for a new transmission.

Liberty Mazda was up for the task and helped me out greatly, with a quick transmission swap and allowing me to also install some new goodies. I figure, if the transmission is out, why not swap the clutch and flywheel, right?

Above are pictures of the old pressure plate and transmission parts, while below are the pictures of the fresh new setup.

04-08 RX8 Transmission 6 Speed (Aisin AZ6 ) with RedLine MT-90
ACT Heavy Duty Pressure Plate with Street Performance Clutch Disc
ACT ProLite Flywheel and Counter Weight

Doesn't get any better than this. After 500 miles of breaking in the clutch, bleeding it here and there, adjusting the pedal, babying it around town, I got to finally put the pedal to the metal. This is a highly recommended power upgrade to any other RX8 owner out there. The throttle is much more responsive, almost as if the car was a S2000. Rev's quickly and pulls very nicely in 3rd gear. Infact, I would say 3rd gear pull feels like my old 2nd gear pull, making 2nd Gear much more formidable for Autocross.

This was well worth the money, and thanks to Liberty Mazda, it was done right. Again, very highly recommended and it really gives the car that more "enjoyable quick roadster" feeling. Thanks to Mike from Liberty Mazda for the excellent photos.

The Long Overhaul

After a month of sitting in Astral’s garage, getting various projects completed on it all at once (Don’t make that mistake like I did), the RX8 is finally back on the road. I just want to give a big up to James (Greenblurr), Josh (Altspace), and Shane (Epik) for their awesome help and hard work through the truck ton of projects we did all at once. Lastly, a BIG UP to Oleg (Astral) for all of the hard work, storage time, and troubles.
Now on to the juicy stuff that I’m sure you all are dying to read. I call this a overhaul due to the many new parts and fixes that we did to the car, including power, suspension and even some enhancements on prior modifications. The days are listed with the products installed (This is the span over the month of February)

Day 1
-Started removal of header
-Removed of Catalytic Converter
-Baked headlights open to replace projector lens with a 2.8’ TSX replica lens
-Adjusted titanium exhaust tip for a better appearance
-Completed a Racing Beat Revi Ram Duct Seal Fix using the stock VFAD

Day 2
-Worked on finishing Header install
-Pieced together front of car along with headlights

Day 3
-Started Removal of Stock shocks with Tein S-Techs
-Finished Installation of Header from Fluid Motorsports (GT-Spec Design)
-Finished Installation of Agency Power Mid-Pipe
-Adjusted Cobb Stage 1 Map with a CEL Kill
-Installed Black Halo Racing Ignition Solution with Yukon Coils

Day 4
-Installed Stance GR+ Coilover Suspension (10k spring front 7k spring rear)
-Removed Trunk Carpeting Completely

Day 5
-Rear suspension was too high and clunking, front suspension was too low; Adjusted both

Day 6
-New Alignment (Front: -2.2 Camber, 0 Toe, Max + Caster Rear: -2.4 Camber, 0.1 Toe, Max + Caster)

Day 7
-Removed midpipe and swapped for Catalytic Converter
-Installed Evo-R.net Fully Adjustable Endlinks (Front and Rear)
-Installed Progress Technology Anti-Roll bars
-Received Velocity Red Painted OEM Tow Hooks

The car really is a different sort of beast now. Since I’ve done so much at once, I’m going to break it into sections, much like how I reviewed the Roadster. From there I’ll go into more specifics.

Power:
After placing all of the power modifications onto the car, I am very surprised by the outcome overall. For the upside, a major increase in power, smooth power band, interesting torque band (at about 4k it suddenly kicks up more and stays smooth), and over all a much more solid engine. The downside is that due to my poor research in the choice of midpipe and header, the car is beyond loud. It’s almost scary to drive the car because the exhaust is so loud. Upon further research, I later found out that Agency Power is one of the louder dual resonated mid pipes, so I had swapped over to stock cat. Why modify a car if it doesn’t allow you to drive it happily?
Agency Power Dual Resonated Midpipe: Looking at the welds of the midpipe, the pipe itself was not that bad. James would have liked to see some more full penetration on some of the welds, but it was good enough to not be concerned with.

GT-Spec Development Header: With the header on the other hand, the welds along the runners were poorly done and have an unknown life span. I say that because the welds were not even penetrated. It looks great on the outside, not so good on the inside. The fitment was also one of the biggest hassles around, as that it took up most of the project time. After swapping back to the stock cat, you could hear a slight difference in tone of the exhaust from before header installation. It was slightly deeper at both idle and low end, and at high end it gave it a slight “tin” sound. It wasn’t bad, and better then I expected. I would like to see a better, “race focused” header on my car though, so look forward to me replacing this in the near future.

BHR Ignition: Like when I added the Cobb, another increase of “smoothness” in terms of revving. BHR has been known to make quality products, and this is one of them. The coils are quality GM Yukon coils, with a heat sink on each one. People have apparently reported increases in both smoothness and power, but in my case I would say I feel more of the smoothness.

Racing Beat VFAD Seal: Completely sealed. Directly from the front of the car into the airbox with no unwanted openings. Can’t record much of a difference but I’m sure it’s there.

Over all, I’m happy with a lot of my choices, but I wish I went with a different header and mid pipe design. I’m happy to review it on my blog for the viewers, and share my experiences, but those two exhaust parts are not for me. The Agency Power mid pipe now lives on Greenblurr’s car and he’s quite happy with it, especially since the sound is much nicer when paired with the Racing Beat dual exhaust, and the header will find a happy home soon to someone who will enjoy it for what it’s worth.

Handling:
If I had known that the results were going to be this great, I would have done nothing but suspension first. I have nothing but praise with how amazing the car responds, how great it feels, and overall quality of the products here. Taking sweeping turns, or quick jolts to dodge a pothole, the car is much more agile and settles great when taking a turn.

Stance GR+ 15 Way Adjustable Coilovers: The main ingredient of the suspension upgrade. Not only do these behave well on the streets, these handle turns extremely well. Changing the dampening to test for the difference responses will be fun when the roads are warmer, but for now, running at the +6 all around as recommended by Stance is very pleasing. Few people have recommended running softer in the rear, but I have yet to see why. I tried running +8 front and +7, and then +6 rear and I didn’t like it. It felt almost sloppy and unresponsive compared to the front. I then tried +6 in the front and +4 in the rear and I still did not enjoy it. At some point I’ll try +8 all around and see what I think of that, but the weather isn’t that great again.

Progress Technology Anti-Roll Bars paired with Evo-R.Net Adjustable Endlinks: The Whiteline Flatout Swaybars that I had installed not long ago felt pretty good and offered a nice, stiff feeling when taking a sweeper. Once we slapped these on at the end of the night and I drove home, the difference was night and day. Paired with the coilovers, you could completely feel a firm plant on the turn with almost no roll, while quick adjustments going left and right made it seem almost effortless. Much more responsive at the steering wheel with almost a "itchy" feeling to it that it wants to turn more and more. On the highway though, you do feel the slight consistent pull left and right from time to time. Not unbearable if you have both hands on the wheel.

Other:
Although the baking of the headlights was a tricky project, the outcome of the new lens was worth the effort. The new TSX Clear Lens fit like a charm and really give a much better output of the stock lights. Stock RX8 Project Lens are rippled, dimming down the output , cutoff line, and even width of the light. This lens pushes that all to the limits, allowing you to really maximize your headlights output.


Summary:
All of this has been a very fun and educational experience. I’m pleased with most of the products I had purchased, and I also learned to not cram so many projects into one day. Next time, I’ll have a better head on my shoulder about this sort of thing. I also recommend a lot of researching before buying parts (especially in a rush) for your car. Here are some of the pictures hosted by Altspace and Astral. Thanks guys.
Altspace Gallery
Astral's Gallery