SPOON rigid collars

One of the highlights earlier this year was my meeting with Mr SPOON, Ichishima-San at his office in Tokyo, it was an interesting discussion.
It always surprises me how neat and tidy these Japanese offices and factory workshops are.

Since then, I’ve been installing several sets of SPOON Rigid Collars on various cars, I must admit, though the first 5 sets arrived in February this year, we had them sitting around til almost May!

I guess there was alot of apprehension and mis-understanding on our part prior to installing.

FAQ: the lessons learnt
1.) The Rigid Collars dont need to be the last modification you do to your car.
Because the Collars sit between the interface of the front &/or rear subframes and the car chassis, installing suspension, even dropping a rear differential will not affect the Collars. For the MX5 and Honda S2000, not even for a clutch change will u need to drop the subframes, unless if you’re rebuilding your engine.

2.) Can the Rigid Collars be reused?
Though SPOON doesnt answer that question, from what I have seen is that if the subframe has been aligned straight onto the chassis, and the Subframe bolts were handtighted, the squashing effect on the collars isnt as great as SPOON’s video have you imagine. On top of that, I realised that we dont drop our subframes that often too.

3.) What do the Collars do?
ok it is best explained via the SPOON Europe’s own marketing video, here’s the link

From my layman perspective..
We have seen many brand new cars on the wheel alignment machine having a different range of wheel alignment adjustments between the Left and Right wheels.
Sometimes it is because of the manufacturing tolerances inherent in manufacturing, that a car has the ability to achieve up to 1 degree more castor on one side than the other.

Sometimes if a car has been in an accident before, the subframe can lose its alignment, being skewed to one side, we used to send such cars to chassis alignment specialists to have them realign the subframe, but at such a great cost.

Rigid Collars are sort of like a tolerance bushing/ crush washer/ sleeve that fills up the tolerance gap between the subframe bolts and the subframe and the subframe interface to the chassis.

Because of the close fitting nature of the Rigid Collars, the Collars will only fit if the subframe is aligned square onto the chassis.

So how does the car feel after the installing the collars? Well I’ll continue that onto another post

heres some pictures of us fitting on the Rigid Collars.

HONDA S2000 kit

MX5 NC 2006-2011 kit

MX5 NC 2006-2011 front Rigid Collar installation

grimey engine bays, using socks to keep it clean Part 2

Hi!
ok just a quick update 1 year later, with regards to the using socks.

Just thought that I’ll share another reason to using a sock to soak up the oil,
especially for our NC mx5, just mounted below the MX5 power steering fluid reservoir tank is the radiator fan.

About 2 weeks back, we had to replace a choked fan motor that was covered in grease and dirt buildup because of over-flowing power steering fluid.
Also because of the fluid overflow, the car’s radiator and aircon condenser were also choked with grease and dirt too.

So save yourself the pain and trouble and risk of overheating later, just cut a sock in half, use the tube end to cover the cover power steering fluid reservoir and the other half of the sock to cover the brake master cylinder.

Happy Birthday Singapore!

OK yes, I have been incredibly slack with my adding new posts, I’m sorry.

here’s an explosive start to many new entries.

an amazing view from the 44th Storey, thank you YL & D for sneaking us up to your office!
Happy Birthday Singapore!

quick release video camera mount for trackdays

Ok another one of my pet projects that has been 3 years in the waiting…

finally it is done!! a quick release camera mount, so that when not at the track, the mount can be hidden away discreetly..

Step1 Removing the windblocker, who needs a windblocker in our hot weather anyway?? I rather more wind in the cabin! and we’re using an aluminium plate for a camera mount base.

the camera mount and quick release base. oh yeah in the background thats my steering wheel, another mod that I’ve been meaning to do the last few years.

alittle bit of shaping and ta da! the camera mount and quick release base all mounted up nicely on the aluminum plate.

the base just needs to be painted black and no one will know its there!

with the camera installed

now for a quick test run to see if it shakes

Trackday Tips: Securing Rim weights

here’s a quick tip,

when balancing an alloy rim and tyre, weights have to be added to ensure proper balancing, otherwise the tyres will create alot of vibration. Ok thats no big deal.

But often at the track or on the North South Highway these weights flyoff, creating alot of vibration and ruining a good track day.

So the solution to this? Add some duct tape on top of the rim weight, and weights wont fly off no more. Simple

Simple Exterior Modifications on MX5 NC

hey Guys,

after a brief hiatus, I’m back! It was another busy August, with events at Sepang. (the 12 hour endurance race) and a trip to the Bhira Circuit in Thailand, anyway details later.

so just starting off on a light note, here’s some simple exterior modifications, quite cool how it changes the look of the NC mx5, ever slightly.

in this first example, we swapped the original Mazda grill for a simple aftermarket mesh, we picked a mesh that had a slight slant in it, so that standing in front of the mx5, I wont be able to see the bumper support bar that actually covers the top half of the grill.

We also covered in mesh, the lower ‘mouth’ that sits beneath the mx5 ‘mouth. Adding this mesh is quite important I feel,  especially if you have seen my stone riddled aircon condenser.

the next other simple modification for the NC, is replacing the original Mazda antenna with a shorter Honda antenna. On many NCs I noticed that the antennas tended to harden and crack after only a few years. Also the original Mazda antenna made the NC Mx5 look very ‘toy like’ as it looked like a remote control car aerial.

and so we replaced it with the Honda antenna and obviously sticking to original parts would ensure that radio reception wouldnt suffer.

so there we have it! Simple mods that changes the look of the NC ever slightly, sharpening up the lines of the car.

grimey engine bays, using socks to keep it clean

Here’s a cheap solution to keep your engine bay clean.

Just thought I’ll share a quick tip for those going for a gymkhana or trackday soon. Something handy and a very cheap modification for your car!

Basically with an old white sock, or in my case I bought a handful from the local pasar malam for less than a cup of coffee.

Use 1 sock to cover your brake master cylinder fluid reservoir and another to cover your power steering fluid reservoir.

Depending on car to car and driver to driver, some of us will experience alittle bit of power steering and /or brake fluid boiling from time to time.

When the fluid boils, vapour or fluid will seep out of the reservoir container, covering everything with oil. Dust and dirt will stick very quickly, and soon the engine bay will be very grimey.

The sock covering will absorb any oil leaking out, keeping the engine bay clean and dry. Using a white sock, you will know if there has been any leaks recently and if the sock is soaked in oil, replacing the sock is easy, and you’ll have an early indicator that you might have to replace that fluid soon

Why keep an engine bay clean? Lately, I’ve been obsessed with washing my engine bay, but thats a different story

1.) Any oil in the engine bay will very quickly absorb any dust, this dust oil combination will retain alot of heat in the engine bay, reducing cooling efficiency, ok I don’t think I can prove this with gauges, but it does make sense. =)

2.) Also any further oil leaks from the engine can be spotted quickly in a clean engine bay, Any leaks near the exhaust, can very quickly cause a fire

3.) Also for NC owners, the power steering fluid reservoir, sits very close to the engine ancillary belt and rubber will break down quickly if it is in contact with oil.

So there you go, possibly the cheapest mod for your car yet.

Sepang at Night; Sepang 1000km race the last 30 minutes.

Another hectic week of work and life’s other important matters, I managed to spend some time to sort out the videos from Sepang 1000, surprised myself that the Racelogic Video Vbox lite camera system that we had installed on the Garage R car, driven by Lester, Kubota and Faris, had enough memory to film the ending too!

So there it is, the video captured with the Racelogic Video Vbox system, showing the final laps of the Sepang 1000km race, about 30 mins before the finish, with many competitors still running strongly.

Whats unique about this video, is neither the lines nor the driving.

This is what Sepang is at night in total darkness. A view rarely seen by us regular trackday goers.

On another note, this video also makes a convincing argument for anyone contemplating installing HID lights in their car too!  =)

Super GT Sepang June 2010, new Honda HSV

The new HONDA HSV-010 cars!
Compared to the GTRs, they actually sound very different.. the HSV has an almost F1 sound, incredibly high pitched, whereas the GTRs were bassier and possibly lower revving.

The Autech Motul GTR

This is the Keihin HSV on the right, on the left is the Kosei GT3 Gt300 car, running brakes by ACRE.

That’s me in green, . Our Japanese suppliers who are engineers for the Honda HSV cars were explaining to us that Team Weider/ Dome Racing, was also the Honda factory R&D car and there were some new R&D parts undergoing testing this race at Sepang.

Getting the most mileage out of our Traction Circle Club shirts! =)

Yaris Cup Race, Super GT weekend

Its Super GT weekend! 

D and myself went up to Sepang again this weekend, yup its our 3^rd trip this month already! We went to assist our customers who participated in the Yaris Cup race, which was a support race to the Japan Super GT Race and also to meet some of our Japanese suppliers too!

Going through some data that we got from the Yaris cup cars, I was seriously impressed how quick these little cars were. I mean these cars use the same engines  and gearboxes which we find in our regular vioses at home and they were clocking 2:51-52ish around the full track of Sepang!

The race data analysis that we did with the driver allowed him to cut a few more seconds off his lap times.

And its not the tyres too! They were running on the standard Toyo T1R in 195/50-15 size. Nothing spectacular about those.

Of course full credit belongs to the drivers, who were driving on Sepang for the first time. Apparently they spent most of the night before, watching youtube videos of the Sepang circuit!

ok the secret lay in the final drives & LSDs, these yaris had upgraded final drive gears almost similar to the kind you would find in the B series hondas running Sepang 1000 or super series races.

Doing a quick gear ratio calculation, what was interesting to note, is that these final drives  would still make for a comfortable high speed drive up to Sepang in a road going vios/yaris.

Anyone up for the challenge?

Anyway, for anyone interested in building their own yaris cup cars, they can contact SpeedD Performance http://www.speed-d.com.sg

They have everything to build your own yaris cup car, and having owned a DC2r track car before, I cant believe how affordable these yaris are!

Yaris Cup Cars

Lining up for their weighing/ scrutineering

Vios Cup cars, doing their qualifying laps, all nicely spaced out