ah ok, when you sent me the first pic I wasn't sure if you just wanted to show me a Porsche lol.....
---
Also, results for Day 1 are posted. Here's MR
ah ok, when you sent me the first pic I wasn't sure if you just wanted to show me a Porsche lol.....
---
Also, results for Day 1 are posted. Here's MR
More post-rallycross mud fun caught by Steven Phillips
The car is still sitting on the trailer. I can take it off, but it'll be stuck in my backyard unless I move the trailer. Or I can try to sneak it past the gate on the other side of the yard, which would be an extremely tight fit. We'll see.
Not really all that interesting, but the Sequioa is annoyingly quiet. Add that to the fact that it has the typical pinholes in the header flange (resulting in it soundling like a sewing machine under throttle) and the rest of the drivetrain is so quiet it drives me crazy. So, let's add some noise (and hell, maybe it'll add some power or MPGs....TBD).
Don't want to drop $400 on the K&N or TRD intakes that essentially are just noisemakers, so I took a chance on another brand on Amazon, which wasn't too expensive
So, it arrived today and I'm pleasantly surprised. The intake tube is nice quality. The heat shield is a really good fit, with a high-quality seal around it and has a very good quality feel to it, and is powdercoated. The rubber elbow and filter connector are "ok" and functional, but feel a bit cheap. The hose clamps it came with are pretty decent as well. All in all, everything fits perfectly. The filter seems to be good quality, pretty much just like the AEM filter I use in the rally car, frankly. And it's pretty well thought-out, even has a mounting tab for the A/C hose just like the factory intake, so that's nice.
So out with the old...
And in with the new
Went for a drive. Not like I've never had an aftermarket intake and this is no different. At light throttle no noticeable sound or change in feel. At half load you can start to hear it. At 3/4-WOT is pretty awesome sounding, honestly. The truck does feel somewhat quicker, but that's probably as much placebo effect as anything (plus the truck is empty with no trailer, so yeah, feels faster than last time I drove it lol).
Anyhow, did what i wanted and why the hell not. Since I tow the same routes pretty much every rally/rallycross I'll get an idea if it helps at all in the hills/mountains since I know quite well what the baseline is. TBD....
how well does your Sequoia tow? Im still debating whether or not I will like my 99 LC as one, I didnt particularly like it towing my miata on a dolly.
MrChaos said:how well does your Sequoia tow? Im still debating whether or not I will like my 99 LC as one, I didnt particularly like it towing my miata on a dolly.
Tows pretty well. I mean, if you have to do a long or steep mountain pull you need to carry speed in or drop a gear - I mean, it's not a big diesel. But I don't have any complaints. Only thing I've really added was airbags in the rear to level the soft springs and I run Hawk HPS brake pads to improve the braking bite. I'm about to change to load range E tires (from regular P-rated all-terrains) which should improve things even more (though add some weight).
I have a heavy-ish trailer for an open deck, and the e30 is substantially heavier than a Miata. Plus I tend to carry 2 extra sets of wheels/tires and a lot of other gear.
The Sequoia has about 50 more horses than the LC (though similar torque) and I think has an additional transmission gear (at least the 05-06). A bit surprised that the Sequioa is a hundred LBS lighter than the LC, even though it's longer/bigger. IDK if it would be a huge upgrade from the LC in terms of towing.
FWIW there are three people in our rallycross group now that tow with a 1st Gen Sequioa and all of them seem happy.
In reply to irish44j (Forum Supporter) :
Its lighter because the land cruiser has a thicker body, I dragged my passenger side down a partially downed tree and it only left a long dent. It would have ripped into the doors of anything lighter.
Well, happy to hear that some of our friends made it through SOFR successfully (or at least more successfully than Pastrana did, at least). BUt since we weren't there, no pics from me.
So please enjoy this new photo from Steven Philipps from our last rallycross. I asked him to stick around for the "fun runs" and promised I'd give him a good photo subject. And he didn't miss :)
Nothing too exciting to update concerning the rally car. A few more weeks until the next rallycross and some rumors of a rallysprint in PA in September, but I'm not holding my breath since we can't collectively seem to get our E36 M3 together regarding COVID, which is causing a lot of events to get cancelled. So, we'll see how it all shakes out.
In the meantime, today I took the tow rig to get some new tires. I've had a couple sets of Bridgestone Dueller Revo 2's but have found that they don't get half the miles expected before being too worn for me to feel safe. They've also always been a beet "mushy" for my liking when towing in particular - I guess that's the tradeoff for having a really comfortable ride and being very quiet.
In any case, this time around decided to take advice of a few friends and get Falken Wildpeaks, and in the Load Range E (10-ply). So I went and got that done today
They're a good price and look damn nice. Driving around in DC and some highway today....wow. They are MUCH more responsive and all the sloppy handling/ride is now nice and firm, more like a car. They are about 10lbs heavier than the Revos and you can feel it, but I don't see that as being much of a big deal seeing as this is a big SUV and not a sportscar. Kind of looking forward to towing with them to see how much more stable they are than the Revos.
From there I headed into DC to Josh S's (bluej) house . Josh has an M52 (formerly turbo M20) e30 but is going a different direction now (find his build thread on GRM if you want to read about it). The M52 in the car has low compression and he described it as generally "tired." Anyhow, I wanted the e34 oil pan for a spare on my M50 and he said if I came and took the whole engine away I could have whatever other stuff I wanted off of it other than some things he was keeping. Plus it was nice to get out of the house and wrench with someone else. I got there at noon and he hadn't yet pulled the engine, so we turned some bolts...
The nice thing about him having a lift is we just dropped it all out the bottom....
Took off the subframe and transmission and other stuff....and a bit of twinning...
Then using the hoist we shoehorned it into the back of the Sequioa with fairly minimal effort.
And I rolled home. The plan is to strip the engine of anything that could be useful as a spare for the rally car and then dispose of the rest in one way or another (i.e. leave it in my shed for a couple years until the next parts shell needs to go to the scrapper, lol...)
Maybe next update will have something more interesting (or maybe not). But that's where I'm at....
Nope, nothing more interesting. Next rallycross is next weekend so at least that'll be something. I haven't touched the car during that time. I have been working on making some underbody protection for the Recce Raider...
So that's something. Also I welded a receiver to the front of the trailer today
Why? Because I have a 5000# winch mounted on a hitch receiver that I can transfer around between the Raider, Sequioa, and trailer as needed for various tasks (only for recovery on the Raider, since it's light enough).
So it has a quick-connect so I can hook it up to pre-wired setup in the Raider, and then I have a 25' 2awg cable set with a plug at one end (to hook up to the winch) and alligator clamps at the other that would go to the Sequioa's battery. So, works out pretty well.
Btw, the Raider has a front hitch now, in case you haven't been following that build. So that's what put this winch thing in motion. That, and hating trying to pull dead cars onto the trailer with a come-along if I'm alone.
well, 2-day rallycross coming up this weekend, so finally back to some action. Huge turnout expected (80+ cars), and MR class is 19 entries. Basically, everyone and then some. It's gonna be some competition!
See you there! Can't wait. Bringing some friends with cheap beaters and filming the whole thing, it will be something.
Brake_L8 (Forum Supporter) said:See you there! Can't wait. Bringing some friends with cheap beaters and filming the whole thing, it will be something.
Should definitely be entertaining to watch some of those rides you guys are bringing though lol. Which one will you be driving?
irish44j (Forum Supporter) said:Brake_L8 (Forum Supporter) said:See you there! Can't wait. Bringing some friends with cheap beaters and filming the whole thing, it will be something.
Should definitely be entertaining to watch some of those rides you guys are bringing though lol. Which one will you be driving?
I've got a '98 Volvo S70 T5 with three pedals and 296k miles. It's on new Riken Raptor tires. Should be fiiiiine.
In reply to Brake_L8 (Forum Supporter) :
Lol...so you are saying that we should probably preposition a couple of the tow rigs out on the course to haul heavy Volvo in Mercedes back in when they break? ;)
On an unrelated side note the link in your signature does not work, fyi (I know there's a Facebook page)
Aww, man! Bummed to miss that, now.
bluej (Forum Supporter) said:Aww, man! Bummed to miss that, now.
I mean considering you are technically signed up as a competitor it's not like you could not show up just to hang out for a couple hours lol.
irish44j (Forum Supporter) said:In reply to Brake_L8 (Forum Supporter) :
Lol...so you are saying that we should probably preposition a couple of the tow rigs out on the course to haul heavy Volvo in Mercedes back in when they break? ;)
On an unrelated side note the link in your signature does not work, fyi (I know there's a Facebook page)
Gah, let's knock on wood that we can all complete the two days! But uh, perhaps having a truck on standby isn't the worst idea ;-) I don't think I can make that link clickable in my signature but I'll double-check!
Side note: are shorts allowed, or do we need long pants? I told everyone to bring jeans but don't remember the actual rules. And it may be kinda hot out.
irish44j (Forum Supporter) said:So that's something. Also I welded a receiver to the front of the trailer today
The first time I saw a receiver on a trailer like that was literally yesterday afternoon and I just looked at it for a minute completely confused. Now it makes perfect sense.
Brake_L8 (Forum Supporter) said:irish44j (Forum Supporter) said:In reply to Brake_L8 (Forum Supporter) :
Lol...so you are saying that we should probably preposition a couple of the tow rigs out on the course to haul heavy Volvo in Mercedes back in when they break? ;)
On an unrelated side note the link in your signature does not work, fyi (I know there's a Facebook page)
Gah, let's knock on wood that we can all complete the two days! But uh, perhaps having a truck on standby isn't the worst idea ;-) I don't think I can make that link clickable in my signature but I'll double-check!
Side note: are shorts allowed, or do we need long pants? I told everyone to bring jeans but don't remember the actual rules. And it may be kinda hot out.
Shorts are allowed, but beware of the poison ivy at SP!
In reply to Brake_L8 (Forum Supporter) :
Yeah like Nick said you can wear shorts or whatever but generally speaking I wear some lightweight hiking pants or something. If the grass is long you will want long pants more likely. If they have just mowed it then just throw on some shorts. Also if you wear shorts definitely put suntan lotion on your legs if you don't want sunburned calves lol
Ok, let's do a wrapup on last weekend. This was events 3&4, a doubleheader with DC rallycross at Summit Point Motorsports Park. The sign-up list had 89 drivers for the weekend (about 75 each day, with some people only doing one day), which was by far our biggest event ever. Upside is seeing other new people, downside of course is less runs. Anyhow, the weather was great on Saturday and we set up to run the "Barn Course," which back in the day I was pretty good at but recently I've been less successful. It's a fairly smooth, high-speed course.
(actually Sunday's) grid and non-grid area during the first run group. Lots of cars
One of the reasons for the high turnout is a local car club joining us as part of a "$1500 challenge" of sorts, where they all bought "grampa" cars for that price and are doing various racing with them. So we had a crown vic, about a half-dozen 90s Mercedes (including an S360 and and S500), some Volvos, a Camry wagon, a Corolla wagon, and a few other randoms. A couple of them were pretty quick with good drivers but overall not all that fast, as to be expected. However, they were amusing to watch:
Also there was a Galant VR4 on Sunday- I've never seen one of these at a rallycross or much of anyplace in years. Turbo, AWD, 4-wheel steering....and it actually finished the event!
And....a "Paco" Miata with big ass tires and a turbo 1.8. It was amusing, and the owner was just there for kicks, but it literally finished dead last of like 70 cars on Saturday, even being beaten by 10 seconds by the S500 giant Benz. Looked to have pretty much no suspension travel and must have been a tight squeeze on some gates lol
So MR, as usual, was the largest class at the event. All of the usuals were there (except Josh S, who was busy doing his duratec e30 swap as documented in another GRM thread). By my count there were four prior season class champions and about a dozen others who had won individual events in the recent past....so yeah, a ton of fast dudes. Nonack also showed up again with his BRZ (among 4 total BRZs that came this weekend), and Mike Golden had his MR2 back in shape to join Michael Stock's MR2 (also documented here on GRM). All in all we had 17 cars in MR on Saturday on a BIG course (averaging about 80 seconds in length).
Also good to see Dan Gugger back with the 944
with Stock's GRM MR2
We all went out hard, expecting fewer runs than normal. The two "2nd drivers" of co-driven cars, Eric Eisele and Chris Helgesen, jumped out ahead with much faster first runs (seeing the course while riding with their higher-ranked codrivers helps..) and the rest of us played catch-up all day. Eric's first run was almost 2 seconds faster than anyone else in the class. My 2nd run was the fastest in the class, but I nudged a cone and it fell over (I watched it happen....), putting me 2 seconds back.
Also, having the roll-out shelter on the rig has been well-worth it and much less hassle than putting out a pop-up
For the rest of the day I put down runs that were the fastest or among the fastest in the class, but among the top 5 in the class, only one other cone was hit (Eric's, on a very fast run) and in the end, that was the decider. Eric took first. Nick wheeled his M3 into 2nd place, and I was just behind him, with point leader Stephen Nichols 2/10ths behind me in his e30. All in all, BMWs took the top 5 spots, followed by Nonack, who drove fast but was hurt by three cones over our 8 runs for the day. Golden was really moving in the MR2, battling for the lead for most of the day until an unfortunate snap-oversteer/understeer on his 6th run caused him to wipe out a cone wall for +6, dropping him from 1st to 8th.....
I do want to note: Even with almost 80 cars on an 80+ second course, we still got 8 runs. That's a testament to how smoothly DC rallycrosses run!
So, on to Sunday. We lost about a half dozen cars to attrition overall, and several others weren't there for other reasons so we were down to 60 cars, with MR losing two or three drivers (the Helgesen boys, whose Volvo had some wheel bearing issues) and gaining a couple in a BRZ. Sunday we ran the "Tree Course," which is substantially smaller and only about 40 seconds long. It's fun, but also kind of boring and tends to get torn up faster due to its softer and more powdery dirt. The fact that it's surrounded by trees played a role as well, as wind is more blocked so dust hangs a lot longer. While we were running 4-5 cars on course at once on Saturday, Sunday's course only allowed 2 cars at once, and just barely....so, a lot less seat time.
We all went out of the box hard from the start, with Chris Helgesen, Nichols, and Golden jumping out to a slight edge. All in all, the top-9 drivers were within about 1.8 seconds of 1st...so, really close. Again my 2nd run was the fastest in the class (or close to it), but I picked up a cone (no idea where, I didn't think I was close to any), and in this class that pretty much killed my hopes of winning. For the rest of the morning I hammered down. My 3rd run was fastest in the class, and 4th run was 2nd fastest, but at luch I was sitting in 5th or 6th thanks to that cone. In the afternoon, everyone went out hard again from the start and in my first two runs I jumped a couple people (Nick, Chris, and Neil) into 3rd, but the guys in 1st and 2nd were running the same times I was so couldn't gain on them much. Mike Golden had been leading the class after his first afternoon run, but his MR2's rear skidplate was hanging low and caught the finish line tube, which then wiped out 5 cones at the finish, ending his day. As they tried to repair it, report of lightning came in from the main racetrack and we were forced into a 30-minute delay. So we stood around and sweated.
The day was late already so at that point they just called it so everyone could get going home (6 runs). In the end, Eric took first again to sweep the weekend, with Nichols just fractions of a second behind him, and me 1.6 seconds back. Neither of them hit cones, nor did Nick, who finished behind me. Take away the one cone I hit and I would have won the event. That's how good this class is. I'll also note that the last run of the day saw Nonack crushing it and putting down the fastest time of the afternoon for the class and the 2nd fastest of anyone in the entire run group - only Adam Kimmett in his Mod All subaru was faster.
So, two third place finishes, which leaves me 3rd in overall points, with Stephen still in first and Eric in 2nd, with Nick a bit back in 4th. We have two more doubleheaders, but not until October-November, and those will be at Panthera where I've done a bit better and my (and Nick's) extra power should be helpful on the hilly courses there vs. Eric, Neil, Stephen and Chris with their M20s. Of course, can't rule out Golden (2ZZZ-swapped MR2 with about 200hp), Nonack (BRZ on proper suspension and getting more dialed in every day), or a couple other guys. It's always anyone's game in this class - and I will continue to say that in this country, no MR regional class is more competitive than here in DC.
Side note: Shawn Roberts won PR nationals last week, so congrats to him. Not surprisingly he also won both days in PR at this event. Pretty sure in the past 5 years or so he has only *not* won PR on one or two occasions. Pretty much like clockwork.
Side note 2: Eric's winning car, you may recall, is the one that used to be in my shed that I sold to them. Now I'm starting to regret it (j/k), since they've build it much better than their old "cracking-in-half" e30 from prior seasons lol.
Side note 3: A couple other stage cars there as well.
Gupta's Protege
Side note 4: Upon leaving I couldn't get the Sequioa's rear gate open. Figured it was the handle bent again (already replaced once), so had to load heavy stuff through the roll-down rear window. Spent 3 hours today sweating inside the truck trying to get the tailgate open, since the handle was fine and it was actually the mechanism seized, which was a REAL pain in the ass to get open. I basically had to use a mirror to pry stuff inside the door on the backside of the mechanism to unlock the latch. And it started pouring right in the middle of doing that. For as good as Toyota is at making cars, the latch and mechanism design on the Sequoia is absolute garbage.
I said it this weekend and I'll say it again- modified rwd in DC is the silliest class in the country. Anybody in the top 10 would be wiping the floor with the rest of MR in just about any other region, but instead you're all there at the same time fighting for tenths of a second. It's the best.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ said:I said it this weekend and I'll say it again- modified rwd in DC is the silliest class in the country. Anybody in the top 10 would be wiping the floor with the rest of MR in just about any other region, but instead you're all there at the same time fighting for tenths of a second. It's the best.
I totally think DC MR should have a battle royale against Great Lakes division MR (so let Evan/Kevin/Pete/England, etc team up). It would be epic!
What I'm most amazed about in this region is how few cones the fastest guys hit. I mean, I think top-5 on Saturday had a TOTAL of 3 cones over 40 combined runs. And that course had literally 95% of all the cones we even HAVE.....like a billion of them. IDK how people didn't hit more. One cone and you're basically not gonna win.
In reply to irish44j (Forum Supporter) :
I'm planning on October, I'll see if i can convince anyone else to come.
Of course you skipped the national challenge event we hosted. 
EvanB (Forum Supporter) said:In reply to irish44j (Forum Supporter) :
I'm planning on October, I'll see if i can convince anyone else to come.
Of course you skipped the national challenge event we hosted.
blame my employer (DoD).....range-limited from home while we are at the current COVID threatcon. Same reason I didn't go down to SOFR. 
You'll need to log in to post.
