how did it all go today?

 

More pics please!!!

 

Unfortunately the rally ended after stage 4, we hit a really rough section far too fast and it pushed the exhaust down pipe up, this put pressure on the up-pipe which cracked and blew a big hole out of it :-( A bit of extra bracing is required I think? we had another couple of problems, the car cut out on the first stage, I think it's an electrical issue as it started up staright away, could be a bad connection somewhere? On the 2nd stage we had a good run and were only 10 seconds off the Guy who finished 4th overall. The car certainly goes very well and took some getting used to the extra grunt :-)
Ive found a youtube clip, not great quality but a good hairpin, I nearly got the photographer :-)
we are about 2min 20secs in-http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VtsfAusfM-4

 

 

Some great pics there! What's that photographer ever done to you? lol.

 

Where did you get that spoiler mate? Savage car by the way, love it!

 

It was on the car when I bought it, I think it may of come from subaruwrcspares.com
Glad you like the car, looking forward to getting back out in the woods again :-)

 

Cheers mate! Yeah it's a really nice car, I'm gonna attempt to build a 555 Group A Impreza before the start of the rallying season next year, here's hoping! haha

What suspension are you running in this for the gravel?

 

It's Prodrive WRC stuff as fitted to the early WRC cars, it's only height adjustable, i wasn't sure how good it would be but we went across a crossroads flat in 5th on Saturday, the pacnotes said 'straight through crossroads, caution bad bump', I never lifted and it just took off and landed with no drama's. So far i'm really happy with it.

 

Ah right, much does the Prodrive gear cost if you don't mind me asking? Seems a hell of a lot better than whatever stuff a lad in a Subaru was using at a rally over here a few weeks back, over a cross roads that in 5th, lost the tail, took out a fence, bush, telephone pole and half a forest!

 

sounds more like you have the early 50mm Bilstein grpN/recce car units...............

 

sorry to hear about the troubles but nothing too major. Great looking car - keep the updates comming.

 

I had that type on the old car, it's this type-http://www.subaruwrcspares.com/33.html
The bodies look pretty much the same as the group N type but the dampers are differnt and filled with 200psi of nitrogen.

 

They were on the car when I bought it, decent suspension-Proflex, Ohlins etc are usually £2500 (ish) second hand.

 

Oh I could well imagine it. I helped put a suspension system into a client's Impreza, Reiger I think. I was told not to drop it as it was brand new and a single strut was £1,5k! haha

 

Hello and happy new year :-) Appologies for the lack of updates, ive been mad busy with engine building. I have done alot of work on the car since the Cambrian, Ive now changed the manifold to one of own tubular 3 bolt jobbies, along with a new up-pipe, this has a slip joint so should allow for some heat expansion and flex if the exhaust gets a wollop again. Ive also changed a few things with the engine, on the Cambrian it was showing signs of overheating, while it was in the garage I pulled the heads off and there was obvious signs that the heads were lifting. Ive now built it all into a CDB with 14mm headstuds just to be safe. The problem with cutting out was down to some iffy wiring on the map sensor, Graham found this while on the dyno. The car has been at Group B motorsport for a few weeks, Graham has been upgrading the Simtek Pro firmware to the latest version along with a few other tweaks :-)
Ive entered the Midwales stages on the 3rd of March, its looking like a really good entry and I'm looking forward to a blast around the Mid Wales forests.
Theres a few jobs required before the rally, we are going to try a 3" exhaust instead of the current 2 1/2", I also need to raise the rear suspension and give the whole car a good check over.

 

I assumed this fizzled out?

 

No not at all, the only thing has has fizzled out is me updating the thread!
Ive had to build another engine through the winter as the first one had a hairline crack in a cylinder, so I went to town and done the heads with Supertech valves and guides, a bit more port work and tweaked the compresion to 10.5:1. We gained 10bhp and 15 ftlbs
It now has 332bhp and 435 ftlbs
Ive also fitted some ap calipers up front and re-built the suspension.
I'll be out this weekend on the Plains rally in MidWales (car 31). I'm hoping to have my in car camera fitted so you can all have a laugh at my driving skills
I'll get some pics and do my best to keep this on track now.

Andy

 

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How did the rally go? Any footage ??

 

Pants I'm afriad, 3 miles into the first stage we had a vibration, then lost drive, it had broken one of the diff carrier bolts and shapped a rear shaft, game over! I'd like to think it was due to my mega engine :-) It's a blooming crap sport at times :-(
Oh well, I'll beef the bolts up and try again.

 

Nice power/torque figures there Andy. Did you find an STi under tray in the end?

The sport may suck when things don't go to plan, but when everything does go to plan I'm sure you get an immense buzz

Make sure you keep this thread updated

 

Hi, yes I found an undertray thanks, it was for my 2.6 STI.
The sport is great and full of highs and lows, Ive got a load of info and updates to put on here which I promise I will do.
This is a great stage incar, not me but my friend is co driving in an evo9, sit back and enjoy it :-)
PS He was only 12th fastest!!!!!!

 

Oh yeah, of course it was! Did you get a good BHP/torque figure from that car?

Looking forward to the updates on this car

 

Do you hit more boost with now 10:1 compression ratio?
And what's about second and third gear boost?
In fifth and sixth gear I hit 1.6b with my vf37 (34mm restrictor too), but in third gear I hit only 1.1b (8.5:1 compression ratio)

 

Sorry for the late reply, ive been on holiday. The higher compression doesn't make more boost, what it does do is spool the turbo quicker and make the engine more responsive, this makes more torque as the exhaust gases have more velocity than a lower CR engine.
It did give me a problem holding boost though, with a restictor fitted you have to map the boost down very low as you reach the limits of the restictor, this means you have to run a light spring (0.5bar). This meant that the exhaust gases were pushing the wastgate open and we could only get 1.1 bar. I have now got around this using a twin actuating actuator and a 4 port boost controller. We now see around 1.7 bar
I'll take some pics when I get chance.
As for you only getting low boost in low gears, this is always the case as to make boost the turbo needs to be pushing against the resistance of the drive train, this is greater in higher gears.