Newsletter 15 / ringmazda.com / 26th of October 2009

Newsletter 14 / ringmazda.com / 24th of August 2009

13 May 2009 Wednesday evening Nordschleife
No crisis on the Ring, lots of traffic. After one lap it was clear that lowering the carheight with 5 mm was too much

16 May 2009 Saterday evening Nordschleife
Again very busy so no fast laps possible with this kind of traffic.



23 June 2009 Tuesday evening Nordschleife
Great summertime……….busy on the track and at 18.50, due to an accident, the track closed before the car could even be taken out on the track. Some laps were then driven on the GP-Strecke to test the limits of the brakes.

25 June 2009 Thursday Zandvoort Trackmorning of driving-fun.com
Some laps for tyrepressure testing. Two testlaps with the MX-5 Turbo of L@urens could be driven before it's watertemperature called for a cooldownbreak. Easy car to go fast with, friendly roadbehaviour, good brakes and good power



10 July 2009 Friday Nordschleife
Due to F1 at T13 a detour was in place which influenced the laptimes with about 12 seconds. Some brakemodification proved itself in a positive way. Because of the traffic only two laps driven with a BtG8.11 in the second lap.

22 July 2009 Wednesday Nordschleife
The real challenge has become to find a time where one can find a lap with not too much traffic, not on this day with it’s sunny hot (30 degrees Celsius) weather.

31 July 2009 Friday Nordschleife Trackafternoon
Nice weather (25 degress) and about 60 participants should be the right conditions for fast drivingpossibilities.
In the 1th lap of the second stint (4th lap in total) a BtG8.04,6 was measured, but the car started during the lap to hesitate after cornering. Refilling of the fueltank didn’t cure the problem though it was not present after every corner.
The car ran fine during the homejourney so fuelstarvation was guessed to be the cause of the problems

02 August 2009 Zandvoort Time Attack
Practice in the rain showed no problems with the car.
In the final the car started hesitating again after cornering. Only 2.04,9 could be extracted from the car, with a theoretical best possible lap, according the datalogger, of 2.04. Not even close to the aimed 2.02 – 2.03.
At home at inspection a faulty sparkplug was found and obvously the cause of the problems at the Ring and during the Time attack



Now it is just waiting for the right conditions (dry and not busy) to go out again for the next attempt. 

Newsletter 13 / ringmazda.com / 08th May 2009 

01 March 2009 Time Attack Zandvoort
Practice in the morning on a dry track lasted only 2 laps for the Ringmazda because of misfiring when applying the throttle more then 50%, probably fuelstarvation because after filling the tank from ¼ to full it ran fine.
In that second lap only a 2.07,7 was recorded. In the finals of Time Attack grip on the drying track was, after drifting- and sprintsessions, had vanished which increased the best laptime to 2.18,3, not very impressive.

04 March 2009 Driving Fun Trackmorning at Zandvoort.
A day to forget. At the first five laps the brakes just didn’t feel right. But still the car was given to one of the projectsupporters for a couple of laps with the clear warning that the brakes were in no good working condition. Obviously he liked the car so much that he kept on going till finally in the 7th lap he couldn’t build enough brakepressure with his left foot and send the car into a wider line around Scheivlak corner through the graveltrap were it got stuck and needed a shovel to get the thing back on track. Some repairwork was in order

31 March 2009 Nordschleife
At last the weather improved sufficiently to go out on the Ring the first time this year. Obviously everybody had been waiting for the change in weather causing a lot of traffic on the track in the evening. This time driving on 11 year old Bridgestone S02 roadtyres. Just two laps to get the feeling. No better then 8.35 with a Baustelle that cost around 4 seconds. Proves again the advantage of semi’s. Because of the risk of detonation boost was reduced from 15 to 13 psi

01 April 2009 Nordschleife
Exactly one year ago the first laps were driven on the Nordschleife with the MX5 without the turbo (121 Hp at the crank as measured on the rolling road).
Again lots of people enjoying the good weather and taking their car/bike to the track.
Boost was further reduced to 12 psi giving away some 25 HPcompared to 15 psi but at this point and time I cannot risk an engine faillure, the car has to do some track time to get to the desired target time. This time with secondhand semi’s three laps were driven and the third lap showed 8.13,96. Car height was a bit too low, the frontwheels were touching the bodywork inside the fenders at some points of the track.

02 April 2009 Nordschleife
Again a sunny evening with lots of traffic, this time testing the influence of stiffening the bump/rebound of the AST shockabsorbers. Three laps done with a best of 8.14,05.

06 May 2009 Nordschleife
With the car height adjusted and new brake pads the car could be taken out to the track again.
It was the day before the Scuderiatraining and lots of Scuderiaparticipants were out on the track. Unfortunately one of them crashed into the guardrail that heavy that it needed immediate repair = Baustelle. After arriving at 17.00 one lap was done to test the car height which was good. Then waiting for the end of the Baustelle to come. till about 19.00. The second lap of the day showed 8.19 so after checking the tyre pressures the third lap showed a 8.09,10.
There is still progress and the average speed has gone over the 140 kmh barrier now.
Needing to shave of another 0,5 seconds per kilometer.

Newsletter 12 / ringmazda.com / 17th February 2009

Winter 2008/2009

Testing
In 2009 real winterconditions confirm again that nature can not be predicted, which prevent testdrives on the Ring in January and February thus it remains to be awaited if the modifications will bring the desired improvements

Modifications
The brakes are pushed over their limits even with the very good brakepads from Carbon Lorainne. Simply too much energy has to be transformed in heat. Raising the speed from 200 to 220 kmh increases the amount of energy to be transformed by about 27% which is the same rate that the temperature of the discs raises. From 200 kmh braking to a certain endspeed could bring the disctemperature to, for instance, 600 degr C. From 220 kmh braking to the same endspeed would bring the discs to 760 degr C. Bigger discs should improve here, but with keeping the 15” rims there are limitations to how big one can go. Disadvantage of bigger discs and distancepieces for the calipers are the extra unsprung weight and rotating mass which have a negative influence on roadholding and longitudinal acceleration

The limits of the T25 turbo are reached at about 15 psi and above that reliability will go down dramatically for both turbo and engine (in fact the standard engine internals are only really safe till about 12 psi boost)
At the moment only a simple piggyback injection-boost management is used with the static ignition timing a few degrees retarded.
Before installing a bigger turbo a motormanagementsystem that can manage injection and ignition versus crankspeed and boost has to be installed and here will BS-Autotune NL provide parts and knowledge.
 
To make the car more predictable the springstiffness is reduced somewhat and other tyres will be tested.

01 March 2009 Time Attack Zandvoort

This year the formula for Time attack has changed to the UK standard meaning one session of about 30 minutes with all 25 competitors on the track.
Ringmazda laptime should be, compared tot the BtG8.00, on Zandvoort at 2.02, which means some 1 second per kilometer has to be shaved of..............that is a lot
 

Newsletter 11 / December 25th 2008

24 December 2008 Intended Ringvisit
To improve handling and grip some changes to the suspension and tyres were planned and the parts were in just in time for a testdrive on the Ring on 24 December. As can be expected in the Eifel and at this time of year the weather didn't do what it was predicted to do so the track remained closed because of fog.
The car is ready to drive but has to wait for better weather which keeps the project in a kind of a wintersleep possibly till about March or April of this year. Updates of the website will follow the future testdrives.
 

Newsletter 10 / 22 November 2008

12 October 2008 / Time Attack @ Assen
Entry in the Pro Street class for further testing.

Some modifications on the AST rearshocks to improve handling, Toyo R888 semi's (from fellow MX5 owner Rob S) and more racelike brakepads from Carbon Lorraine (provided by Movit-Netherlands) were to be tested.

It was a fine day out there with a lot of helping hands and even the servicevan of the Downforce Raceteam available.

On this track and conditions the car had reasonable grip though the Toyo's seemed not very different from the Michelin. The brakepedal became soft after a few laps, indicating that temperatures on the pads were rising to an unwanted high level boiling the brakefluid,  it needed two times pumping before sufficient pressure was available the. From the wearimage of the brakepads it shows that brakecalipers deforme during aplication which worsenes also brakingperformance. This was, besides the still too loose rear, the main reason that the car was at least 3 seconds away of its targettime.

04 November 2008 / Driving Fun Trackday @ Zolder

On the picture the glowing 10” frontbrakedics can be noticed

Laptimes, compared to those of 13th of August, came down with 3,3 seconds to 1.55,6, but still not at the desired level of 1.54 (or better).


Again a fine trackday provided by the DF-team with good atmosphere.

Brakecooling with some ducting and 4-piston brakecalipers were to be tested on this very demanding circuit for the brakes. Unfortunately only the streetversion of the brakepads were available which were smoked completely in 15 laps during 4 stints.

08 November 2008 / Ring
Since good weatherconditions in November are rare every possible opportunity to go out on the Ring has to be grabbed. With the dedication of Movit Netherlands and Ruud and Jan from Ozephius BV better brakepads from Carbon Lorraine were adapted for the 4-piston calipers. Braking is now improved, but the wear of the brakepads indicates that the brakes have reached their limits.

To raise coolingcapacity a secondhand aluminium radiator was fitted after some modification, without the coolingfan, because a suitable one was not available at the moment. That is the time that you run on your trip to the Ring in a trafficjam with an overheated engine as a consequence despite turning offf the engine very often.

Because of the nice weather every petrolhead seemed to feel the need to take his car on the Ring on this saterdayafternoon, it took between 20 to 30 minutes to go out on the track. Normaly it gets less crowded at the end of the day so I decided to wait till the last hour. Since Tom was there to give me a tow in his M3 he drove a few laps with me as a passenger in the M3 to pass the time. Amazing how much grip this car generates with the AST suspension and,other than the size, comparable Michelin PSC. Laptimes of seconds below BtG8 are driven by him. Since it remained busy I deceided not to drive in these conditions but I let Tom drive in the MX5, to learn his opinion. He found the car "challeging" but difficult to drive on the limit and a bit unpredictable. Possibly because of too much springstiffness at the rear.

13 November 2008 / Ring
At late notice this day came available for Touristenfahrt and since the weather was good enough my agenda was adapted to go there for some laps in the afternoon. This time not many cars on the track. The third lap of that day went in 8.20 but gave some unexpected slides in corners were you don't have a lot of correctionspace, so the fourth lap was driven with more smoothness which turned out to be a little slower. The car needs to be pushed to extract speed from it.


Picture at Schwalbenschwanz by uedn.de

Some adaptions on the suspension and softer tyrecompound will have to be tested the coming weeks if the weatherconditions permit.
 

Newsletter 9 // September 27th 2008
 

Support
As mentioned in newsletter 8 progress in this project is slow, too slow for two of the early supporters of the project who will terminate their assistance. I wish to thank them for their valued input.

More testing of the Ringmazda on the track
On 13th of August at the trackday by Driving-Fun.com at Zolder stiffer springs /shockssettings at the front and rear and 4-pistonbrakecalipers were tested.
After a few laps the streetbrakepads, which were asked to be tested, failed. Replacement by a set of Sport-brakepads was better but still didn't give the needed brakeperformance, so the car could not really be taken to its limits and the targettime of 1.55 could not be reached (1.58,9). After cooling down of the brakes the weather changed and a wet track for the rest of the afternoon, not ideal for a car on semi's but fun to drive.

On the evening of 21st of August the car was driven on the Ring. Because of (too) low carheight the frontspoiler scratched the tarmac a few times too often and the connection of the frontspoiler was damaged beyond simple repair.

On the 1st of September the car was back at Zandvoort again. Carheight was raised a little and the suspension aligned properly by Pitbox. Boost was raised to 0,9 bar (12,5 psi), which should, according calculations, give somewhere between 200 and 210 Hp. Bottemcover was fitted to reduce lift.
No real progress because the clock showed times around 2.08 and after some "pulling" by the BMW M3 of Elmar a theoretical 2.05,6 was the best result. The engine was pinging in some cornerexits due to high watertemperatures which was probably caused by the restriction of airflow in the enginebay. The new brakepads had not arrived in time and the brakes were also in Zandvoort overloaded with a soft brakepedal and lack of brakingpower as a consequence which doesn't help laptimes.

On the 14th of September the car was once again taken to the Ring and with the help of Tom with his BMW M3 with AST-suspension and Michelin Pilot Sport Cup the second lap could be done in BtG8.25 despite traffic and an remaining biodieseltrail of 800 meters.(Tom drives his laps below BtG8.00)
Straightlinespeed was compared to the M3 good but the cornering and braking of the M3 was a level higher.

Newsletter 8 // August 1st 2008

Testing of the Ringmazda on the track
Building a car on a minimum budget with maximum output expectations is definitely a way to have slow buildingprogress because cheap solutions have to be found for most of the "problems" that are encountered in the proces. Lots of time is spend thinking, drawing scetches, measuring, fitting and unevitable modifying.



But once on the road it feels worth it. With the powersteering in place again the car is more easy to drive which helps the overall performance. The new clutch can handle the power of an estimated 200 HP at about 12 psi which is enough to propell the car from 100 to 180 kmh within the desired 11,5 seconds. Topspeed though is limited to 220 kmh due to the rpm where the small turbo runs out of breath.

On the 22nd of July some testlaps were driven at the Ring with fresh french semi's. Heavy (holiday)traffic with accompanying accidents prevented "undisturbed" laps, the testresult of these 3 laps was that the rollcouple needs more biassing to the front and more rebound at the rear.



On the 31st of July a trackmorning at Zandvoort was organised by Driving-Fun.com where some testing could be done. The circumstances where not ideal for superfast laptimes due to the high temperatures of track and air. For more roll-couple at the front a stiffer front-swaybar replaced the original one.
When the suspension was adjusted it showed that 1 degree 20 minutes was the maximum negative camber possible at the front, by lowering the car 10mm at the front this was increased to approx 1degr 30minutes.
Lack of time prevented drilling out a broken airbleednipple of one of the brakecalipers and the old brakefluid could not be changed............ a soft brakepedal was preprogrammed.

The car was nice to drive although in this configuration it needs a firm hand to deliver it's speed and a rather loose tail isn't the fastest way around the track.
In the 25 laps usefull information was noted. The data from the logger need to be further analised but indicated in the 3 sessions laptimes between 2.08,23 and 2.09,31.



To drive a BtG8.00 you have to lap Zandvoort within 2.02 , this indicates that the combination Car / Driver is 1,5 sec/kilometer too slow sofar.
Since the track was, due to the temperatures, about 1 second "slow", the brakes could not be used to their full capacity because of brakefluidvaporisation, the suspension had improved with the thicker swaybar but can and has to do more for this car when further finetuned.
Although the last seconds are the most difficult ones, confidence is there that the scheduled improvements and finetuning can give the car the needed speed.

On the 13th of August there is another trackday from Driving-Fun at Zolder where, if ready, the modifications can be tested to see how close the Zolder target of 1.55 can be approached.

Newsletter 7 // June 30th 2008

Preparation for BtG, the continuing story
Cancelling of Time Attack 2008 for the Ringmazda took of the pressure of the project and gave AST more time to prepare the suspensionkit, which is now fitted on the car.



Though equipped with stiffer springs the car is still very good drivable on the average roads. The rolling of the car during cornering is noticeable less which will most likely improve handling and grip.
 
The intercooler with the tubes found its way in the enginebay as the needed additional enginemanagementsystem.



26th of june while testing on the rolling road for mapping, the tyres were overheated and damaged because which prevented a good powerrun. The car was then taken for a short testdrive on the road which gave good and bad news. The good news was that the engine performs like expected. The bad news is that the original clutch is not strong enough, which involved a clutchupgrade on saturdayevening.
After some minor adsjustments the car was taken out to the Ring today for some testlaps, unfortunately without the datalogging-device.
The first thing noticed was that without powersteering the steeringforce is rather high. Because the frontwheels were touching the wheelarches and also due to the unaspected heavy traffic, for a mondayevening, only two laps were driven. The good thing is that the car is drivable now and seems reliable enough to go out for more testsessions.
 

Newsletter 6 // June 3rd 2008
 

Prepairing for BtG and Time Attack at Circuit Park Zandvoort on 08 june 2008
For a short period the Ringmazda was on the Time Attack-ProStreet-entrylist, but as the organisation made a mistake it is now on the reservelist again, but that can change anytime.

Therefore all efforts are directed getting the car drivable end of this week, .....pressure is building.


'Will she be ready?'

Engine
Intercooler is now assembled and should be ready by Wednesday and fitted on the car whereafter the additional managementsystem and 5th injector can be fitted. Tuning on the rolling road end of the week.

Suspension / Tyres / Brakes
The ordered suspension has not arrived and is not known when to arrive. Then AST / Advanced Suspension Technology in Valkenswaard (ast-suspension.com) was asked to build a lowbudget-suspension for the Ringmazda. This will give the car a much better suspension as originally planned for.
Assembly on the car is planned for Friday, together with the Carbon Lorraine performance-brakepads for the frontbrakes donated by Modiho / movit-nederland.nl.
Pitbox (pitbox.nl) will try to supply the needed semi's on Saterday and do their valued suspension alignment.

Body
Ruud at Ozephius Productions modified the hood to my specifications and together with some other minor changes the weight has come down to the original kerbweight of 990 kg.
Some ducting is planned for to get the cooling air there where it is needed and this should fill my "empty" hours on Friday.


'Weightwatching all the time'

Testing
There is simply no time for roadtesting so if Time Attack comes through then on Sundaymorning during some practice the car will have it's shakedown and about 1,5 hours later will do the Time Attack if all goes well.
The intriguing question will be "what laptime can be expected from car and driver" with this schedule. I have a figure in my head where the seconds are the same as the minutes but if that is feasable ???


'scoop!'
 

Newsletter 5 // May 14th 2008
 

Prepairing for BtG
Working on a low budget means more time has to be spend on searching for missing parts, repairing of well- or very-used parts, figuring out how to place, connect and construct simple and as-cheap-as-possible parts to make this the intended fast, reliable and lowbudget BtG8-beater.

Engine
More power has to come from a turbo, mainly because it is supposed to be relatively cheap and simple. Besides it is interesting to get into a new area of tuning for me.

Because the 150 € T25 turbo/w manifold had been lying around for years after use obviously one of the the oilsealings doesn't work properly anymore, at idlle the car is smoking heavily, that is the flipside of lowbudget.

A simple exhaustsystem has been welded together.

During the coming weeks the much needed intercooler, extra injectionmanagementsystem and 5th injector will be added.

Driveline
No budget was foreseen for any changes here, it is gambled that the original clutch can survive the coming abuse as the gearbox, propshaft and final drive.

Suspension
At the moment nothing can be done while waiting for suspension parts to arrive.
Tyres and suspension alignement by Pitbox.nl, which is another benefit for the project because of his expertise on this subject.

Brakes
The Carbon Lorraine performance-brakepads for the frontbrakes have been donated by Modiho / movit-nederland.nl and will be put on together with the suspension. That is all that the budget allows.

Body
Some weight has been taken off by replacing the seats with well-used racingseats from 1995. A hardtopshell will also be fitted for better aerodynamics and a little weightsaving.

To counteract some of the aerodynamic lift on the body a bottomcover with splitter and diffuser will be "constructed" at Ozephius Productions BV.

To save a little weight the pop-uplights were replaced.

The weightscales will tell the results the coming weeks, target is to get the car below 1000 kg.


'Out in the countryside'

Newsletter 4 // April 14th 2008

First shakedown
Rainy weather prevented the MX5 from being taken out for its first spin on the Ring before the 1st of April.
My first lap on the Ring, after 11 months absence, was disturbed by a light rain in the first kilometers. The car felt not too bad given the fact that there was no time left for serious alignment of the suspension. Lateral grip felt good, though a little twitchy at the limit. The brakes worked well since the engine (and / or the driver) couldn't get the car really going in the very windy conditions. Climbing Kesselschen with 145 kmh as topspeed in 4th gear at 5800 rpm is calculated back to about 120 Hp at the flywheel.
Second lap on nearly dry track showed BtG9.10. Improvement was aimed for in the next laps but then the Eifelghost showed up and the third lap became a wet one after just 2 kilometers which meant that the first shakedown was over for the Ringmazda. Because of the work ahead to build the car to the "BtG8" level no further attemps are scheduled with this basic configuration.

Rolling road
On April 6th the car was put on the rolling road of Kronenburg / Geldrop:
Maximum power 88,8 kW at the flywheel at 6210 rpm.(=121 Hp instead of the factoryspecification of 131 Hp at 6800 rpm) which is more or less in line with the calculated Hp.





Planning
The car will now be prepaired with a modest sized secondhand turbo, which should raise power to about 200 Hp. Hopefully the ordered stiffer springs and shocks will arrive in time to have the car drivable again in a couple of weeks to see how this configuration performs on track.


 

Newsletter 3 // March 23th 2008

On 14th of February a MX5 NA 1.8 of 1994, in a far less then showroomcondition, could be bought in Germany for a price that fitted in the foreseen carcostbudget.

For the obliged MOT only some weldingwork and a minor repair of two rubberscovers on the suspension were nessecairy. The 17"rims were immediately sold and replaced by 15" wheels.
On the 3rd of March the import-procedure was finished.
On the 13th of March most of the ringmazda-supporters were present at a meeting. Several suggestions and intentions were expressed, realisation is hoped for.

The plan is to drive the car first in its basic configuration on the Ring ( 131 Factory-Hp, 1100 kg Car+Driver+20 liters of petrol), with a set of streetlegal-semislicks to see if it can pass the Gantry anywhere near the estimated BtG8.35. This estimation is based upon the BtG8.42 that could be achieved with a 12 year and 260.000 km old E36 325 TDS 160 Hp Turbodiesel with towinghook and sunroof kerbweight 1407 kg, equiped with 12 year old 205/60/15 semi's . Now it is just waiting for dry weather to prove the calculations right.

Next step will be to get a turbo, turbomanifold, exhaustsystem, intercooler, 5th injector with added injectionmanagement to raise the power to about 200 Hp. Weight should come down with about 50 kg, despite adding the turbo and a simple rollbar for safety. Suspension will have to be stiffer. Brakes need more bite and durability from better pads. Then this configuration will be driven to establish how far away the desired target is.

March 23th 2008:
 

New pictures were added to the chapter pictures
go to pictures >> _________________________________________________________________

March 23th 2008:

What color should the Ring Mazda be?
During the first meeting on March 13th, we argued about the colour of the car. Some said red (as it is now), some said orange (Dutch National Racing colour).
What do you think?
If you're willing to sponsor us, you can decide the color of the car.
view some possibilities >>

February 25th 2008:

Autoblog.nl wrote an article on the ringmazda project: (in dutch)

read more >>