1gn Neon SRT-4 Swap for RallyX

In reply to Pete. (l33t FS) :

I actually need to do that job on my NA - it's backwards from what the Neon is doing.  I'll give the switch a quick test tomorrow, but I know me well enough to assume that I've probably screwed something up.

Turn signals are working.  The ground wire for the flasher was tucked behind a heater duct and I didn't see it when I was attaching the grounds.

Brake lights are also fixed.  I pulled a wire out of one of the main harness connectors that I shouldn't have.  Popping that back in and it all works.

In reply to wae :

It's got to be the switch, the high beams have only one power-out from the switch.

In reply to Pete. (l33t FS) :

I'm not saying that you're wrong.  I'm just saying that this would be the first time that it wasn't me that broke it.

Spent all day out there today along with my co-driver and it's almost ready.

Using some aluminum flashing, I cut a radio delete panel and fitted the fan and lightbar switches, the knock sensor indicator, and the volt meter.  I didn't want the shiny aluminum finish, so I just grabbed a random can of matte finish spray paint out of the flammables cabinet.  It's actually almost a perfect match.  The switches came pre-wired, but I changed the wiring a bit so that the little thin indicator light at the bottom only comes on when the dash lights are on.

I wanted something a little more substantial to use as a blanking panel over the glovebox opening, so I grabbed a side panel from an ancient IBM tower server and cut it down to size.

For the gauges that sit on the top of the dash, I made an intermediate harness so that I could pop a single harness out to remove the dash, but each gauge is also isolated for removal if I want.

Once all of that was lined up, we went about starting to reinstall the dash and securing the wiring underneath.  For the megaquirt, I bought some small rubber isolators but the wideband controller and the ignition box weren't particularly conducive to being bolted down.  For those, we cut out a bit of the 1/16" rubber to go between it and the mounting plate and then used some zip ties to secure them.  Not great, but it'll work for now.  It's not perfect, but I think it's a good start.

When I was doing my testing yesterday, the wideband controller was working, but once today's work was completed, it doesn't seem to be powering on.  I suspect I have a ground wire somewhere that needs to be connected, so I'll run that down.  There's also a little bit more work to do to make sure all the wiring is wrapped up and secure and I haven't mounted or installed the knock sensor module yet.  Overall, though, I'm happy with how things are turning out so far.  It certainly looks a lot better than it did and I don't have to worry that a passenger is likely to kick a wire and shuts down the car.

The wideband problem was easy.  One of the pins in the connector I installed got bent by the other connector, so there was no +12v.  I plugged it in correctly and it seems to function.

Just a few things remaining to be ready to race tomorrow:

The car survived a test ride home without anything cutting out on me, so here's hoping...  I'm pretty happy with how it wound up looking:

I don't know that I'll bother with these things before loading it on the trailer for the event tomorrow, but there are a handful of things left to do:

• Knock sensor module needs to be mounted
• Coolant temp gauge up in the gauge pod isn't working (the one in the instrument cluster is, however)
• Bottom of the radio delete panel needs to be affixed more firmly

And there are a couple, longer-term things that are still on the list like getting the tach working again, getting the fuel gauge to operate, and replacing the oil temp gauge.  I'd also like to switch the fan relay coil over to a ground trigger and set it up so that megasquirt can turn it on and off.  At some point, it would be nice to figure out where I went wrong with the IAC valve signal from MS and get that operating properly to smooth out the idle.  And I'd like to try to lean it out just a little in a couple areas of the map where it seems a little too rich.

wae said:

I don't know that I'll bother with these things before loading it on the trailer for the event tomorrow, but there are a handful of things left to do:

• Knock sensor module needs to be mounted
• Coolant temp gauge up in the gauge pod isn't working (the one in the instrument cluster is, however)
• Bottom of the radio delete panel needs to be affixed more firmly

I am sure this will come as a shock to you, but I did exactly zero out of three!

The good news is that the car held together with no major problems.  There are a couple things that need some attention for reliability purposes, but nothing that would keep it from running.  Despite almost hot-lapping the car, the engine temps stayed right where they need to be, so it seems like the cooling system is working as it should - and that was without running the heater on full blast or spraying down the radiator with water between runs.  At this point, I'm ready to consider the cooling system as a solved problem.  There were absolutely no electrical glitches that affected the running of the car and it even seems to start a little faster than before since it doesn't have to wait until Megasquirt sees 300RPM before the injectors and plugs start to fire. 

Nothing is perfect, of course, and there was one very minor electrical problem that developed right before my last run of the day.  Both the oil temp and wideband O2 gauge were acting like they were getting turned on and off rapidly.  Fortunately, the LC1 that Megasquirt needs was staying on, so it was purely a display issue, but I'm feeding both of those gauges from the same ST-RUN power source and I suspect that one of my crimps is failing.  That should be a pretty easy fix.

I would like to get the extra coolant temp gauge fixed since that gives me a backup temp reading.

When I designed the mounting panel for Megasquirt And Friends, I did not realize that there was a large metal plate for the airbag behind the dash that would block access to the bolt holes for that panel.  I was only able to get the left bolt secured and that put a lot of vibration into the rest of that panel.  So that needs to be secured on the right side as well.  Same basic thing for the radio delete panel - I just want to run a bead of JBWeld along the bottom to support it there and give a more solid feel to hitting the fan switch.

One of my worst runs of the day was in the afternoon where I just could not get a control of the steering wheel after a long right hand sweeper into a chicane.  The arm restraints were, well, restraining my arms to the point where I could not turn the wheel enough.  I don't know if I'm doing it wrong or if arm restraints just don't work for what I'm doing with this car, but I need to double-check how those things are supposed to work.

I've been told that the car is somewhat percussive before, but I've never really heard anything like that from inside the car.  I asked my daughter to record a couple runs from outside the car on her phone so I could get a good listen.  There are a couple times where the thing damned near sounds like a rifle!

Before:

After:

Before the event, I went through and got the megasquirt mounting panel fully secured to the dash, I secured the bottom part of the radio delete panel, and corrected a wiring error with the coolant temp gauge.  As it turns out, there's still something not right with the coolant gauge, but at least the light comes on!

The event was pretty good.  The car ran well with no complaints.  I was several seconds back from the leaders in either third or fourth place but I don't really think that it's the car's fault.  I thought I had a chance to jump the leaders when the rain arrived in the afternoon and turned the surface to a super-slick mud.  I threw the mud tires on and hit the course with what I think was a pretty quick time, comparatively, but they threw those times out for the run group and only counted the dry ones.  I'm getting a little better at trusting the car and attacking the corners a little more aggressively and I think I need to work on looking farther ahead on the course.  At the end of the morning session, I was just over 1 second a run slower and, honestly, I'm just not sure where I'm losing that much time.