FC RX7 5.0 race car thread

[Skervey]

Cool to see more pictures!

Just a fun fact, I got a chance to put my car on corner scales the other day and thought you might want to hear how it did.

Whole car with no driver and 1/4 tank of gas came in to be 2720lb. Its 55% front and 45% rear. I know your set up is a bit different but if you figure up how much the interior weighs and roll cage, then the EFi over carb might give your a good idea about your car.

So im glad to say that the internet was wrong and the swap does not kill the handling of the car!

[Teeson1111]

some shots from Neil:

22973660691_be7b27a506_b by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

22973635301_cea58f4205_b by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

22962494075_845feff721_b by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

22774518870_f8007bf45a_b by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

22570354599_6e3039abc2_b by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

22570350389_a0d619988a_o by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

this is with my mom riding shotgun

22544145857_bb7d430fbd_b by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

22339808654_0f5f2745d4_b by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

before I tapped the wall

22339783264_e50a2bc4c5_b by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

and after

[danny33]

damn, thats crazy. at least you're okay though. pretty savage that you drove it home after lol

[Teeson1111]

That sucks dude!!!

Glad you're not giving up!

lol never

Your crash was absolutely epic!

aaaaahh wouldn't say that. not the image that comes to mind when I say "rolled my driftcar"
good luck repeating that crash ever, but i appreciate it!

That sucks!! Glad to hear you're okay though, hopefully the next setup will be even better!

Edit: doubt you'll want to try anything with the drift car but I have a roof clip that was cut at the tops of the pillars. If you want it it's yours. I will also probably have a complete sunroof assembly with broken cables. Just throwing it out there!

Next setup will be better/styling I hope. and naw, gonna cut this shell up a bit and try some crash testing for the bash bars. haha why not right?

Wow that is a crazy roll over! Without the video I would have never seen that happening. Good to see the roll cage do its job! Also glad to hear you are going to use a new car, as cheap as FC shells are that would be the best choice. That way you are only out a roll cage and fluids and other parts you cant swap onto the new shell.

As much as I don't like to see 1.0 get in a wreck I can't wait to see 2.0 being built!

Keep up the momentum!

exactly. thanks, will do

Holy fuck dude. Glad you're ok man.

Also you get +5 internets for deciding to do a street oriented build now

thanks man, yay for safety equipment
and woo!

Wow! crazy, was just creeping this build thread and did even clue in that this is the rx7 that flipped at pumpkin smash until i saw the pic of it flipped lol. glad your okay! was pretty awesome watching it slowly but surely tip over onto its roof.

Excited to see what you have planned next

you were there? it felt pretty surreal in the car. when it popped up I'm like "yup were gonna roll" then it slowly happened. how did that look from where you were?

damn dude sucks about the roll, but glad the cage did its job and protected you and your passenger.

thats what its for, don't wanna go without one.

[hinrichs]

damn dude sucks about the roll, but glad the cage did its job and protected you and your passenger.

[cressidodd]

Wow! crazy, was just creeping this build thread and did even clue in that this is the rx7 that flipped at pumpkin smash until i saw the pic of it flipped lol. glad your okay! was pretty awesome watching it slowly but surely tip over onto its roof.

Excited to see what you have planned next

[SnazzyQ]

Holy fuck dude. Glad you're ok man.

Also you get +5 internets for deciding to do a street oriented build now

[Skervey]

Wow that is a crazy roll over! Without the video I would have never seen that happening. Good to see the roll cage do its job! Also glad to hear you are going to use a new car, as cheap as FC shells are that would be the best choice. That way you are only out a roll cage and fluids and other parts you cant swap onto the new shell.

As much as I don't like to see 1.0 get in a wreck I can't wait to see 2.0 being built!

Keep up the momentum!

[Zach Thomas]

That sucks!! Glad to hear you're okay though, hopefully the next setup will be even better!

Edit: doubt you'll want to try anything with the drift car but I have a roof clip that was cut at the tops of the pillars. If you want it it's yours. I will also probably have a complete sunroof assembly with broken cables. Just throwing it out there!

[Nagah]

Your crash was absolutely epic!

[DER E30]

That sucks dude!!!

Glad you're not giving up!

[Teeson1111]

strap in kids, this is gonna be a long update. Sorry it took so long, I was waiting for photo/videos to be posted.

So went down to Monroe for Evergreen Drift Octoberfest open drift.

IMG_0438 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

We ran 3 layouts that day, I tech'd for tandem so I got to run caged tandem layout on the 3/8ths bank layout, did a bit of short track and then we eventually all did careless tandems.

IMG_0441 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

I had a bunch of my non car friends come down for the day, they had seen videos and such and wanted to go for a ride. So i had about 10 passenger rides to give that day lol. When we ran caged tandem we would get 15 min of basically hot lapping and then go back to waiting for an hour plus and get 15 more min. I swapped passengers while letting the car cool so that kinda worked. Nic (red kouki) gave me the kick I needed to start running proper tandems with him and Tyler (grey/purp s13 vert) and man that was fun. got really close a few times, had a few close calls but made it out alive each time.
Short track I spent a bit of time on, could just link it but its so hard with a useless E brake.
Cageless tandems were great though, did a bunch of tandems with nic and Tyler again, then I was able to (and before it started raining) get some good runs in with Rhys (beige s13 coupe) and Alex (multi colour coupe). Loved the layout too.
Car ran pretty good, starter was heat soaking real bad though, got stuck coming off track onto the pit area and had to push it in and let it cool.

before that day though I had put an extinguisher in and 2 tow straps. Lol I didn't forget last time, and this time they had a tire wall up on the top of the bank.

IMG_0427 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

So before Pumpkin Smash I set out to deal with the hot starter issue, and try and get more air through the rad in order to run longer.

so I did some ducting in front of the rad

IMG_0418 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

should have used some thick aluminum on the lower one, as it started to flap around at speed.

IMG_0419 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

but fully seal and rubber insulated around the rad.

tweaked a few other things, I gave myself full control of the Rad fan as the ECU sucked at it. Numerous occasions it shut the fan off in staging. This is a lot to do with the fact I deleted the CCRM from the factory harness, when the ECU doesn't have a communication link it just does its own clueless thing. This is something I could either fix with the Moates chip or have full control with the switch. Went for the switch as I lent out my Moates lol.

Don't have pics but I bought some DEI heat sleeve and a starter blanket, put it on the starter main power and the starter trigger wire. This helped a good bit too.

Took a few days off work to prep (and sleep in lol) and then Friday we rolled down to the ferry and made our way.

IMG_0530 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

IMG_0531 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

IMG_0532 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

Photo cred: Anthony Bell

was good fun rolling down like 15 cars deep, we had rented an airbnb house like 30 second drive from the track.

IMG_0493 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

I've never driven Western before, only watched/passengered. We ran the classic pumpkin smash layout, pumpkins included in the hairpin. Wasn't really my favourite, its very technical and has a decent amount of danger areas.
Tapped the wall spinning out at the last corner, bent the frame quite a bit, wrecked the hood, pushed the rad fan into the crank pulley, wrecked the front bumper and head lights.

IMG_0499 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

I also ripped the main engine ground off, but didn't discover it until much later.
This would start to wreak havoc on my weekend. The engine was still grounding through the mounts I guess, hot start was back in full form. Engine would cut out at 3-4k rpm especially in 3rd gear or under high load in 2nd. My temp gauge wasn't reading right and the fan was crippling the electrical system when i used it.
I thought I was having major cooling issues, so we pulled the car straight ish with Neils truck, pulled the thermostat and carried on drifting.
My mom came out and went for a few rides, took a few other people out as well.

Went home that night and tried to do what i could in the dark, didn't get too far. Went to Lordco the next morning to see if I could get a belt that was smaller, instead i had to get jump started to make it back to the track.

Day 2 was "The Sheldon" layout, and while this was similar, i liked this layout better.

IMG_0622 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

Photo credit: Jaws Photography

IMG_0626 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

Photo credit: Johno Love Media

IMG_0527 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

Photo credit: Neil Marcus



Photo credit: Ryan Benoit
(http://dodologic.com/2015/10/smashin...couver-island/)

Car ran like poo, cutting out randomly and still having cooling issues. Then my clutch master started pissing fluid and couldn't find another. But I said "drift it anyway"
that was a mistake.

IMG_0512 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

Photo credit: Anthony Bell

In the weirdest accident ever, I rolled the car.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BtlSsjCVmfo&app=desktop

Thanks to Rod Squad for the vid, don't get the backstreet boys but whatever lol.

came around what should be a big 3rd gear sweeper, I was leading, but because the car didn't want to 3rd gear I had adapted to going in hot and e brake sliding late into the corner and dropping into 2nd and scoot by learning curb. This time however I initiated, started sliding and the car gripped up. I tried to be a hero and save it buy re-initiating, then with one hand on the wheel and one hand on the e brake I hit a bump on the far outside of the track and the wheel jerked out of my hand. Then knowing this wasn't going to end well, grabbed the wheel aimed for grazing the big tire and hit the brakes. Somehow the tire bounced the front end of the car up and on its side which let it roll on its roof.

IMG_0513 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

Photo credit: Anthony Bell

IMG_0538 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

Photo credit: Trevor Ball

As the car was rolling I flicked the shut off. It rolled so slow, like in slow motion. Hung upside down for a few seconds, checked on my passenger Leo and waited for staff to get there before opening the door and getting out. Heard one say "Oh good its the caged rx7". Ran to the back of the car and flicked the main battery cutoff and kinda just took it in for a moment. Gave Jordan the car behind me a hug, lol he couldn't believe what happened in front of him either.
I was 100% fine, didn't even get an adrenaline rush or shock or anything. Leo sacked himself on the harness but he walked it off after a min.
flipped the car over and check for leaks of any kind, found none so I was told to start it up. Fired on like the 3rd turn, good to go. Was told I could drive it out, so I hopped in and then heard "do a cooker" so I proceeded to do a burnout in a car I had just rolled over.
Mixed reviews here, I got applause and in trouble. pushed the car outside after and started to assess more thoroughly.
Hindsight it 20/20, that was a pretty dumb idea, but it felt right in the moment. Apologized to the staff and we're all cool.

IMG_0627 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

Photo credit: Johno Love Media

Car was pretty intact, so the obvious decision was to drive it home.

IMG_0507 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

IMG_0509 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

cracked windshield
no signals
headlights aimed useless
no wipers
noises everywhere

lost one of the mufflers when we were almost at Neil's shop, went back and got it.

towed it home the next day and took a better look at things in the daylight.

IMG_7280 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

IMG_7281 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

IMG_7282 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

IMG_7283 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

IMG_7284 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

while it doesn't look terrible at first, theres a lot of small things that are tweaked and bent and broken. Fixing this shell would be more work than starting over I think. I also can't know anymore that the cage is 100% like it was before the roll. Was planning to change a lot this winter anyway. Was offered 3 shells at the track and am working on getting one as we speak. Gonna re-use basically everything, but aim for a little more street oriented build. Racecar was what I wanted 3 years ago when I started but I've changed my mind since then.
The next one will have a roll cage, the safety equipment did its job this time around and I want the same level of safety in the next car.

Now that I know what I'm doing, and have made some friends in high places, the new car is gonna be built better, quicker and made easier to drive. I'm seeing this as a chance to start over and I'm ok about it.

Drifting hasn't scared or deterred me. I may not be back driving for a good while, but I can't wait to get back to it.

IMG_0505 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

shoutout to the homies, that was a killer weekend. thanks to everyone for making sure I was ok and that the car made it home. and putting up with that belt squeal, haha it'll be fixed on the next one. 10/10 would do again.

May not hear from me for a while, but you can bet that will be because I'm busy planning/buying/building a new shell.

there is a perk however to wrecking your drift car, the daily gets cool parts

IMG_0618 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

IMG_0624 by Tyson Floris, on Flickr

already swapped some stuff over, and I'm working on doing more. need something to do right now haha.

will post more photos and vids as they come up

[Teeson1111]

I had the same issue with the exhaust hitting the u-joint but ended up putting spacers under the trans to lift it up a little bit maybe 1/4" it did the trick. Kinda nice to hear about your issues so I can address them before I get to them.

Car looks sweet sideways! Can't wait till mine is ready to DD!

thanks
ya my fit issue could have been avoided had I put the X pipe further forward. And lol, that is the idea if this thread, learn from my mistakes.

I feel like gutting my lexus all of a sudden. Awesome build so far. Can't wait to see more.

thanks dude!

[MsDriftMissile]

I feel like gutting my lexus all of a sudden. Awesome build so far. Can't wait to see more.

[Skervey]

I had the same issue with the exhaust hitting the u-joint but ended up putting spacers under the trans to lift it up a little bit maybe 1/4" it did the trick. Kinda nice to hear about your issues so I can address them before I get to them.

Car looks sweet sideways! Can't wait till mine is ready to DD!