Picked up a new car... because race car

civexspeedy

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Just stock/oe replacement, not allowed to run aftermarket or modified axels due to class rules.
 

ReedMann

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Just stock/oe replacement, not allowed to run aftermarket or modified axels due to class rules.
You should check out raxles. They are OEM quality, but definitely cheaper.
 


civexspeedy

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Will do, I've had bad luck with Advanced Auto axles on my '95... Boots tear all the time.
 

ReedMann

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That's what I've heard about auto parts store axles. I have about 2000 miles on my raxles thus far with no issues.
 


civexspeedy

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Small update.

I contacted Bisimoto to check up on the status of my header. They said it is still being built. I ordered it on Dec 30th and their website says production can take 2-4 weeks. The person I talked to said being in the middle of off season and race season coming up, they have been busy. I hope they ship it soon!!!

The weather was awesome today so I took advantage of it. Took my rear LCA's off to put in the other Energy Suspension bushings in. The previous owner only installed the bushings in the rear LCA's for the shocks. So I just did the inner and outer ones today.




I forgot how annoyingly sticky that damn ES grease is:x

Going to wait to do the front LCA bushings. I'm going to tear down the whole front suspension at one time.. Need to replace the axels, switch the springs, and do the bushings.
 
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civexspeedy

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This was the condition of the original bushings. The inner bushings were ok but the outer bushings were torn up.

 

96romaCX

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Looks awesome! Such a worth while upgrade, I'm glad I installed the master kit in my hatch =)
 

civexspeedy

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Wahoo slightly exciting update. Today was like xmas lol. I ordered a few things Sunday night and they all showed up today! Yay good customer service and shipping! I ordered 2-Vibrant aluminum race mufflers, 6 feet of straight aluminum piping, 4 feet of 3/8" round bar and also a 19" strip of red LED's.

Obviously the 2 race mufflers and the 6 feet of piping is for my new exhaust. The 3/8" round bar is to make the hangers, my exhaust guy said they didn't have any more so I just bought it. I bought 2 mufflers because I need the car to meet sound requirements for National events. I can't break 100dB from *I think* 50ft away. So hopefully 2 of these will keep me under sound restrictions. I only needed 6 feet of piping because I'm doing a side exit. Looking to have it exit straight out on the passenger side right in front of the rear jack point just behind the passenger side door.
Each muffler weights just a smidge under 2.5lbs.

The 6ft of piping alone weighs 3lbs

The 4ft of round bar weights about .5lbs but I doubt I'll need that much so basically no weight there..


All together, including piping, mufflers, hangers and flange, I think the exhaust will weigh just under 10lbs. This should save me at least a good 20lbs from my current exhaust, maybe even up to 30lbs. I'll know once I remove that one and weigh it.


Here is the LED strip that I'll be using for the 3rd brake light. The rear wing weighs just a smidge over 4lbs so with this LED strip, I'll be saving 4lbs by removing the wing.

This thing is pretty bright.



Question for you guys! I'm having a little trouble figuring out how I should mount the LED strip to the window. Ideally I'd like to place it inside the rear window just for a cleaner look(no wires or mess hanging outside the car). BUT, outside of maybe using double sided tape, I'm not sure how to stick it on there. The LED's are covered by like some silicone type material. So my concern with double sided tape is will that hold up when the car is sitting outside in 100* weather with 100*+ interior car temps? I'm just afraid the glue won't hold up. It also won't look the best being able to see the tape but w/e.. You can see in the pics below that the LED strip came with double sided tape already attached but using that would mean I'd have to mount the LED strip on the outside of the window which wouldn't look very good..

Here's how it's mocked up now. The part that is taped up is what I'll use, I'm going to cut the rest of the strip that's hanging, off.




Any ideas would be greatly appreciated!
 

00siboy

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Ya thats a tough problem. Only thing I thought of is high temp silicone but I wouldn't want to put that on my window. Exhaust setup is a pretty sweet idea. Should sound interesting being aluminum.
 

civexspeedy

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Guess I'll be running to the hardware stores and see what I can find. Worse case I'll just tape it similar to how it is now and deal with it lol.

I already know the exhaust will sound like absolute sh*t haha. I love the exhaust now, relatively quite and barely any rasp(only at a WOT around 2-3k rpm). But I need to lose weight so screw how it sounds. Need to go faster!
 

mymmeryloss

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Make a bracket and a bucket and bolt it to where the spoiler attaches inside and have it hang down
 

civexspeedy

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Trying to keep busy! Since the last update I've received 2 new Hypercoil springs for my staggered spring rate setup and I had also ordered new axles to replace the old ones which had torn boots and clicking joints.

I've been working getting the suspension all together. I removed the rear coilovers in order to swap the RR 550# spring to the RF coilover. I also move the GC extended top mounts from the rear to the front to ensure I have plenty of travel in the front shocks. I installed the LF 600# spring and the RR 500# spring.
Swapping the RR spring to the RF

New Hypercoil springs. Hypercoil now stamps their springs with the info which is good.

Just out of curiosity I weighed the LF coilover assembly. 6.8lbs and I'm sure the rear coilovers are probably around 1.5lbs more than the front.


Since I had all the suspension bits off I replace the front radius rod bushings with Energy Suspension bushings. The original ones were surprisingly in good shape but the ES ones are definitely a lot stiffer.


I was able to install the new driver side axle and also install new ES bushings in the front driver side LCA. Notice I only mentioned the driver side... I'll get to the passenger side below...
New axle, new ES LCA bushings and new 600# spring on the LF side.

Old axles


Aaaaaanndddd here's the PITA issue I mentioned with the right front side. I tried to remove the passenger side front LCA and of course the damn LCA bolt is seized to the bushing collar! It's been a major PITA trying to remove it. I've been trying for days to cut through it to drop the arm but I can't cut into the collar. I've used different blades and methods and nothing works. I've tried to drill through the bolt a little but that didn't work so well, the bolt is harder than hell. I'm going to try to heat the metal and see if I can back it out but I'm doubtful right now...


This is the only thing holding me back from completing the suspension... Once I get that arm off the car I can put in the new ES bushings, install the new passenger side axle and I'll be able to drop the car back on the ground.

STILL waiting on the Bisimoto header. I ordered back on December 30th and they still haven't shipped it. They keep telling me it's in production and they told me it was scheduled to ship this week. It's end of Wednesday and I have yet to receive any shipping notification. I'm pressuring them with emails and they said they'd throw in the "freebies" when they ship. I told them to keep the "freebies"(because I know they're crap and I don't care for anything they offer other than the header) and in exchange expedite the shipping from ground to anything faster so I can get the damn header sooner. Should have been here weeks ago.. I'm PISSED off with them so far. Once I get the header and the suspension done I'll be on my way to get my new aluminum exhaust welded and finished.
 

00siboy

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Haha I just went through this today with a cobalt LCA bolt. Spent a few hours on it. Mixture of pneumatic sawsall, cutoff wheel, and air hammer. Not the kind of work I like...
 

civexspeedy

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FINALLY! Was able to cut through that damn LCA bolt. Had to make a few small cuts(to avoid damaging the subframe) using a cutoff wheel and then finish making a number of cuts with the sawzall.

You stupid POS! So glad I'm done with it..


New ES bushings in... Much better...


I talked to my sponsor yesterday about a few things. One was about some new spherical bushing shock top mounts that he has designed. He mentioned these a while back and he will probably be sending me a set of 4 next week to use on my car for testing. They might be a little lighter than the GC extended top mounts, at least I certainly hope so, but the spherical bushing would be a good bit better than the poly bushing in the GC top mounts. The other thing I talked to him about was the stupid Bisimoto header I ordered. He said he may be able to set me up with an alternative if this doesn't work out.

Speaking of which, I was told by Bisimoto that my order was suppose to ship out the week of the 17th. Here we are, Friday night with no shipping notification or anything. I ordered on Dec 30th, their website says a 2-4 week production time. So I was expecting at latest I should have received the header around the beginning of February. Here we are 8 week later with no shipping notification. I just sent them an email saying I will cancel my order unless they ship either tonight, tomorrow or Monday with next day shipping and that I'm not putting up with their BS anymore. We'll see what they have to say...Never dealing with Bisimoto again or recommending them.
 

ReedMann

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That sucks to hear about the header man. I wouldn't even give them the chance of the next couple days. I would just cancel it outright.
 

civexspeedy

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I just hate to not get the header. It's something I've wanted but it's such a pain dealing with them. I'm going to give them until tomorrow afternoon to respond and then I'm cancelling. My sponsor said he can get me a really stupid good deal on the PLM Power Driven header which is a replica of the Bisimoto one. I've been researching a ton about these PLM headers and most seem pretty good. But the majority of the stuff I find are for their B/H series headers or from S2k or TL/TSX/RSX headers which are all pretty good reviews but I just wish there was more information out there for the D-series one. I hate resorting to PLM but if I can get a really good deal on it and if the performance gains are a little better than the DC Sports I have now, I'll take it. I know I can get their header at my door step fast.. We'll see what happens tomorrow.
 

Hecz

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nice upgrades, do you always weigh the parts ?
 

civexspeedy

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Right now I am to get a good estimate on where the cars final weight should be before I put it on scales. I'm shooting to get the car down to 2,000lbs with a 1/4 tank of gas. It was 2065 last year when I weighed it. I think with everything that I'm doing, it should be just a tad over 2k lbs. which is exactly where it should be.

The '89 Si is 50lbs lighter than '91 due to the '91 having different doors(safety changes added weight). The lightest '89 Si's that are national champion cars are at 1950lbs with even more extreme(and very expensive) weight losing modifications than I have. So if I'm just a couple lbs over 2k, I'm happy.
 

civexspeedy

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Been busy the past couple days and spent a lot of time in the garage today.

Went out and got oil/filter and trans fluid. Don't know when the last time the trans fluid was changed on this car, I know at least 3 years/~12k miles ago or more so I'm changing it just to feel better. My sponsor Karcepts sent me a set of prototype spherical upper shock mounts for me to test out and report back to him. Using these spherical top mounts will allow for much better articulation when the suspension is in motion. When using an OEM or aftermarket poly bushing type mount like Ground-Control, when the suspension compresses the spring actually bends slightly every time. This is actually increased with the GC extended top mounts since the top of the shaft is moved upwards about 1" or so. Using these spherical top mounts eliminates and binding in the springs under compression which give the suspension a better geometric position when under compression.






Forgot to get a pic of the assembly outside of the car, oh well..

The Bisimoto header FINALLY came in yesterday.. After about 8 weeks of waiting:roll: I honestly am not impressed and am a bit disappointed with the quality and finish of this header. For over $1k and hearing so much hype about Bisimoto stuff, I was expecting a lot better. The primaries are not as smooth as I had hoped. The welds do not look great. Fitment is terrible for the EF chassis. I had no idea that this header had to have a flange welded on in order to fit it to the OE catalytic converter. I expected a little better/smoother collector. The only things keeping me from getting rid of it is that I have it, I don't want to wait for another header, I have hopes of an improvement in performance and the header weighs about 4lbs less than my previous DC header. When I have my cat back welded I'll have to have them make a flange to bolt this to the cat.







I had to hammer the sh*t out of one of the pipes on the collector in order to make enough clearance for the front cross-member. You can see I basically flattened out the pipe. It's an EXTREMELY tight fit.


Put their stupid little sock thingy on the brake fluid reservoir..figured wth..


I've been trying to figure out a good solution for the 3rd brake light. I just said screw it.. I used some clear heavy duty shipping tape and just wrapped the strip in tape to the back window. Can't really see the tape that much. Kinda ghetto but screw it, it works.



I also got new number decals for the car. I used magnets that were exactly the same but I lost the "5" on the driver side on the highway a while back. So just got vinyl so I don't have to worry about the magnets coming off.



And here she sits. All suspension bits are done. I set the ride height close to where I want it. It'll change a tiny bit when I corner balance and align it.


I'm just changing the oil/trans fluids, cleaning the intake filter and doing a few other things tomorrow. I'll have to take the car to an exhaust shop either Monday or Tuesday. I'm still waiting on the ASR rear swaybar which should be here by Monday. Once those things are done, it's off to my sponsor to get cornet balanced and aligned. Then I'm just about set for the season!!
 

96romaCX

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Super tidy man, looks great as always. I bet your chomping at the bit to get out there and tear it up. Always enjoy your updates. :thumbs up
 


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