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1. I have a small battery and have gotten into the habit of using the kill switch to save the battery overnight.
2. I'm not sure that you can just swap the ECU, as it has to be synced with the immobilizer and the ignition?
1. Yeah, that was the red flag - with the power cut using the kill switch my battery drained overnight. Sounds like a wiring issue on the kill switch based on that. I’ll let them find out and tell me though, maybe it’s more nuanced.
2. I don’t know if it will work. Here’s what I was thinking:
I would buy an eBay ECU, send these guys my hardware (key/DME, maybe factory ECU) along with the eBay ECU. Clone my factory ECU’s hardware settings, then tune the eBay ECU for headers and no cats and optionally disable the immobilizer if that’s the key to making it all work. I haven’t called them yet; perhaps that’s just not possible in a way where the ECUs can be swapped with no other steps. https://www.ecudoctors.com/porsche-b...1997-1999.html
I suppose reconfiguring the ECU could work but it’s not as easy or clean as I would like - I wouldn’t be able to change the car back to a fully compliant SPB in a few hours with hand tools. I am hoping that after programming, two ECUs can talk to the same key and immobilizer. If so, quite a few other ECU reprogramming options are out there and worth thinking about too (two are below). I guess I need to find and ask an early water cooled ECU expert about it... https://www.europeanroadandracing.co...boxster-00-04/ https://www.fvd.net/us-en/FVD9866181...ius-flash.html
............... Or just stay GTS2 and we'll build the class. Working on this. With you and a few others we'll have 6+ for NASA weekends.
Six would be plenty! On the attendee list it looked much smaller. Doesn’t much matter - I realized I’ll probably run out of agreed upon budget before that becomes the priority. This winter I have to at a minimum do the cage, harnesses, and assorted safety gear to get the car race legal before looking into extras like that, data, a cool suit, and so on.
***
I just cut down the wiring at the immobilizer by following the advice and pictures in this thread. There’s a red/black and a black/red wire so I just left both but otherwise I’m down to the minimum number of wires there. I can’t solder well so I’m leaving the bridge connections and too many relays and I’ll have to tape up the mess. On that topic I ordered some tesa “sleeve” tape to tame that big mess in the cabin. Should be better (at least better looking!) than the fiberglass fire blanket anyway. https://rennlist.com/forums/spec-box...ter-build.html
With the battery I looked and had the shop look and everything checks out. They think it just doesn’t have enough capacity. I have a trans cooler, ps cooler, oil cooler, and accusump so that may be a bit too much on accessories. It’s on a tender now and I’ll find something a bit larger, maybe a stock Miata battery.
With the shifting issue I found that with the pedal stop I have, the bolt that hits the floor has a large enough surface area that it was catching on the irregularities in the sheet metal and hanging up some of the time near the end of travel. I trimmed the flange of the stopper bolt with a dremel. Now I won’t have issues with clutch actuation being finicky near the end of the travel range. With luck that will resolve the shifting issue.
I ordered a GT3 master cylinder and some fresh brake fluid. I went with Castrol SRF this time - cheaper than endless and everyone says it works very well too. I hope the MC and fresh fluid will improve braking feel.
I also ordered a lexan rear window from Patrick Motorsport. We’ll see how much lighter the factory top gets without destroying the structure of it.
Well, the car won’t start. It throws no codes and I changed the ignition switch and locking assembly as well as the starter relay just because I’m sick of this system having issues. The battery has plenty of juice and relay # 9 clicks but the starter doesn’t engage and I don’t see any power at the back relay. I took it to the shop and they haven’t dug in but said they push started it once and it died immediately which is consistent with an immobilizer issue. I had test fired successfully after the last wire was cut at the immobilizer so I don’t know what I managed to do. I really wish the rules allowed the immobilizer to be disabled and removed with a SPB specific ECU flash.
I’m getting a bit frustrated at this point - we just had a second baby and are finishing our basement (just about wrapped up!) so I’ve had hardly any time to work on the car, and while there were several distinct and unrelated causes, over the last several months I just can’t seem to get the car to start consistently. Maybe a short term open wallet policy will fix it for good.
Is this issue the result of working on the wiring? Replacing the ignition switch and relays shouldn't cause an immobilizer issue.
If it is an immobilizer issue, know that I have messed mine up and have been able to fix it. The bad news is this can be tedious.
To do this, you absolutely are going to need some proficiency with the wiring diagram. If you've never done electrical troubleshooting the Bentley folks explain it pretty well in the section on electrical troubleshooting and the sections that follow. Also, if you haven't done so already, look through my post history as I have responded to several questions from individuals working on their electrical systems and I won't be able to recount all of that here.
The first thing I recommend is that you disconnect the starter solenoid and wire in a test light, or better yet some kind of beeper.
2nd, make sure that the clutch Interlock circuit is working ... as a problem there can look like an immobilizer issue. I recommend bypassing the switch on the clutch pedal while working on the immobilizer.
Finally, go through the connectors on the body computer one by one using a multimeter. Using the wiring diagram make sure that each wire functions as intended. For example, power wires should have power, ground wires should be grounded, etc. Focus on the wires that go from the ignition switch to the body computer and from the body computer to the ECU. Mostly what you will be doing is making sure that the wires start and end where they should.
If you're still having trouble PM me and we can connect up by phone.
Is this issue the result of working on the wiring? Replacing the ignition switch and relays shouldn't cause an immobilizer issue.
If it is an immobilizer issue, know that I have messed mine up and have been able to fix it. The bad news is this can be tedious.
To do this, you absolutely are going to need some proficiency with the wiring diagram. If you've never done electrical troubleshooting the Bentley folks explain it pretty well in the section on electrical troubleshooting and the sections that follow. Also, if you haven't done so already, look through my post history as I have responded to several questions from individuals working on their electrical systems and I won't be able to recount all of that here.
The first thing I recommend is that you disconnect the starter solenoid and wire in a test light, or better yet some kind of beeper.
2nd, make sure that the clutch Interlock circuit is working ... as a problem there can look like an immobilizer issue. I recommend bypassing the switch on the clutch pedal while working on the immobilizer.
Finally, go through the connectors on the body computer one by one using a multimeter. Using the wiring diagram make sure that each wire functions as intended. For example, power wires should have power, ground wires should be grounded, etc. Focus on the wires that go from the ignition switch to the body computer and from the body computer to the ECU. Mostly what you will be doing is making sure that the wires start and end where they should.
If you're still having trouble PM me and we can connect up by phone.
I appreciate it and will definitely reference this if I try to do it myself. I am not sure I will though; my young children make spare time for such things rare for the next few years and I just don't really enjoy it! So I'll probably print this and hand it off to a shop if I repair it. Sad but that's about where things are for me right now.
Well, it was the immobilizer which means I must have cut a wire I shouldn't have. I took it to the shop and they suggested I just eliminate the immobilizer. While I probably should have just fixed my mistake, I hate the idea of an immobilizer so I had them get me a second no-immobilizer ECU (kept the original). I had them tune it for headers and an open exhaust, and I got that cheapo $150 eBay set of headers installed at the same time since this will be pretty simple changes with a strong benefit to help on NASA classing. I tried to get a cheap used eBay ECU for the flash and trying to save money there backfired - I waited and when it finally came they couldn't flash it - this all took a while waiting around for the ECU parts. Because of that I had them also put the GT3 MC on the car last week so I could have it on there for the next event this weekend. I got the car back two days ago, and I pulled the immobilizer out and have it sitting in the garage on the factory ECU. I taped off all the wiring and touched nothing else. Maybe this winter I'll try to sort it out.
The reason for the push is that this weekend our local NASA group does a six hour enduro starting Saturday night right after the normal track day ends. I can't do the enduro race, but since I just passed into TT I can do the enduro practice sessions on Friday and get a lot of seat time. The practice is two sessions, one 60 minutes and the other 90 minutes. That got my attention and sounded like a lot of fun to me so I signed up for it and signed up for the DE on Saturday as well. I also paid the shop for trackside support for the practice sessions simply because that's about two track days worth of time for me (usually I get 4x 20 minute sessions) all at once and I really want to get more seat time. I view the trackside support as insurance against a silly mechanical issue ruining the sessions for me.
I bought a bigger battery, a 27 Ah Deka this time. I went with an AGM battery chemistry again instead of the more expensive lithium options just to save the money for other things right now. If that fixes the problem maybe I've finally figured it out and my draw rate is just too much for the oil accumulator and coolers I have. I can get an Antigravity battery later on once the car is done if I want to reclaim the 10 lbs I just added back into the car.
I had the car dyno tested to get my NASA TT status approved. The car should be a not very competitive ST4/TT4 car as it can't class ST5 due to modification points and it can't get to the 12:1 weight to power ratio - even without the cage weight. With the ECU and headers I peaked at 193 hp and had an average of 182 hp using NASA's averaging for the power to weight classes. Since I don't have a cage yet the car is about 2500 lbs. Should be more competitive in GTS so I can register for GTS next year or ST4 if they have contingencies or something. The same crowd shares the same track sessions either way.
I went ahead and taped up the rest of the wires in the cabin with Tesa tape which was really quick and made the interior look ten times better. I also used some matte black spray paint on the front and rear lower bumpers so they now match the side skirts. I think it looks pretty good, and my three year old helped me with it so that's always a bonus. At some point recently I pulled the passenger seat and belt out of the car; I can't remember if I mentioned that. I'll have to try to do the hardtop rear lexan conversion next month. But one thing was bothering me - my hardtop has been rattling about near the upper outboard strikers since I removed the top's weatherstripping, so I used some of the thick spongy plastic foam that was packing my hardtop back side strikers and packed it up into the forward outer upper strikers to fill up the gap they were rattling in. Now the top is staying put nicely again. I think the car looks a lot better now (to me) with the interior wiring taped up and the exterior color scheme a bit more consistent. I'll probably add a stripe or two at some point and be done with the exterior.
The car ran well - I went solo for 60 minutes, then 90 minutes in the enduro race practice session on Friday, and then I did three 20 minute sessions in the advanced DE / TT run group on Saturday. After about 40 minutes I started short shifting at just over 6k RPMs as the water temperature started to show 230. The oil never got above 180, so I laughed as I realized that my oil was probably doing a decent job of cooling my coolant... Keep in mind I have an oil cooler and accumulator but no center radiator. For 20-30 minute races I don't think I'll need it. But for this endurance practice I didn't want to get the car too hot so short shifting was enough that the side radiators kept the water temp down below that 230 mark for the rest of the day. The new battery with more Amp-hours of current (up to 27Ah instead of 14 or so) solved that starting problem entirely, and I think the draw of my oil accumulator and cooler are the explanation. I did have to stop using the trans cooler for the Saturday DE sessions though as at the end of the day Friday we found it was leaking at a seal in the cooler line just behind the left rear tire. The TuneRS kit seems to be of good quality in most all regards but the seals have given us a lot of trouble so I wasn't terribly surprised. I didn't hit second gear and short shifted about half of the time to keep the heat load down on the trans for the day. I'll have to get that sorted before next month's events. My fix for the top rattling also wasn't permanent enough - the foam just fell out and blew away during the second enduro practice session - so I need to revisit that problem or get used to a little rattling.
The endurance race practice had quite a few full GT3 cars blowing by me every couple of laps so it was definitely a good way to learn how to get comfortable being passed by faster traffic. I put rookie X marks on the rear bumper to help them know I'm inexperienced and really just focused on staying my lines and being predictable for most of the first (the 60 minute) session. It got comfortable and fairly natural about two thirds of the way through. I just had to get to where I could mentally note that someone was coming up and ready to pop by me, and when going through the next turns I needed to account for the different ways they might come by me. The GT3 cars usually used their better tires and huge power advantage to pick a nice path to get by, but being passed by the couple of prototypes we had running was different as sometimes they just about ignored the racing line entirely to pass me anywhere they pleased as their aero grip contribution made their cornering limits so much higher than mine. I was three wide with GT3 cars in corners on a few occasions as they flew by me, but it was easy to see what was happening and they weren't running past me at the ragged edge of traction since it was just a practice session. Perhaps the rookie stripes helped there too as they wanted to leave enough margin that a rookie wouldn't ruin their weekend in practice. It was a good "through the firehose" type of learning experience for me. The second session I had more time and was fairly comfortable with what was going on so I was able to just focus on improving my driving. I feel I actually did improve as a driver. I was changing my lines (earlier and later apex for instance) and paying attention to whether I was very nearly at the limits of traction or not as well as whether I hit the apex right. I tried to focus on both at once - when I set up a corner wrong or was just going too slow, I would try to take the best line from that moment rather than getting back to the DE line. I'm amazed at how much throttle based clean up you can do. I found it's not hard to turn a mediocre to bad entry into a decent-but-not-great exit almost every time by just managing the throttle and steering well and using it to control the arc the car takes through the exit.
My Toyo RRs are done so I'll have to get another set. I ran the rain tires for the Saturday DE and wow they feel squirmy after running RRs for a while! I had to account for tire set in addition to suspension set when doing turn-in. Interesting... good things to learn. I was trying to keep the speed I had on the RRs with less grip too, and that seems to be a great exercise in pushing myself and my car a bit harder. The squirm certainly tells you when the tires are getting close to the limit too so they were easy to read. I was pleased in the DE - the advanced group had me passing lower classed cars and being passed by higher classed cars, and I was making mistakes in terms of lines and set up that were similar to the other time trials drivers in similarly classed cars. That pleased me simply because it demonstrated to me that my skill level is close enough to those in the group that I wasn't likely promoted too quickly/early through the DE system.
It doesn’t much matter until I get the car caged, but I’ll have to change to ST4 / GTS2 stickers now as it’s not quite built to SPB with the ECU and cheap headers on. Easy changes to reverse though!
Just an FYI, I had the same impression on the dash when I built my car (keep the pod, ditch the dash). I spoke to Walt F. and he told me that the dash had to stay. YMMV.
This was the response that I got from Walt concerning removing the dash.
"I can see why the dash is an obvious target for someone wanting to shed weight, but long ago a decision was made somewhere that it wasn't something which could be discarded even though, unlike the earlier cars, it isn't a spot welded in part of the tub."
Yeah, I was aware and appreciate the mention of it. I also emailed, and the real clincher was I found some older rule sets and found the language used to be clearer and specify the dash better. The wording changed a bit over the years but the intent did not.
My dash is still out simply because I don’t have a good way to permanently mount it until the cage goes in this winter. I was going to have tabs put on the cage and use brackets and bolts to mount it.
I assume that I can lighten the dash as part of stripping the interior?
I’m now officially TT licensed and classed with NASA! I’m happy with my driving skill progress since getting this 986.
I missed last month’s event, but it was for a good reason. I flew out to Indianapolis with my three year old where we picked up a 911 and drove it home together. It’s a modified black 997.1 MT with a good build sheet and clean history. It received the full Farnbacher Loles GTR treatment (including an X51 crate motor) and quite a bit more. I found it in the classifieds: https://rennlist.com/forums/market/1158878
I really enjoy driving my Alfa Romeo, but it only has two seats, we just had a second boy, and so now it ends up sitting in the garage more than I’d like because I can’t take both of them in it. I’m keeping it, but I wanted to add something with more seats and I missed having a 911 anyway. I really liked this one - I like the look, the feel, the sound, the interesting history, and really it’s just quite fun to drive. But the thing I like the most is simply that once again I can take my kids (now plural) around town with me in a fun sports car.
Because I’ve spent a decent bit of money on the 911, I’m leaning towards not developing the 986 much this winter and simply running it in TT for 2020. I’d then complete the build over the following winter and start racing in 2021.
Not a lot of things have happened recently, so I'll just summarize.
Last fall I switched batteries and managed to foolishly connect it backwards. Kill switch was cut so I didn't figure it out until the next track weekend when I flipped it, something seemed off, and I started a tiny fire near the engine where the battery was shorting. Tiny because I figured it out really quickly, killed current, and extinguished it with no issues. All happened very fast and I was done for the day before I even got started. I dropped the car off at the shop and had them go over it with a fine toothed comb. A few grand later I had replaced anything and everything that we suspected could have been impacted. Haven't had any issues since so I think I took care of it. That's what happens when you get into too big of a hurry.
Since the car was in already and it had been slowly weeping/bleeding hydraulic fluid I had them go through the car for leaks. They found quite a few leaks, not just one, and all were hydraulic fluid. They repaired them all. The car no longer leaves fluid behind which is nice, but the shifting issues I had last year also seem to be fully resolved. Perhaps that was part of my problem.
I've been out to several NASA events this year. The first event especially showed me that this year I've been in the canyons too much and on the track too little. I was braking way too hard and too early and just being super conservative (and slow). I'm finally getting back into the swing of things with more consistency and a better pace.
The car has performed really well. I had a rogue CEL this spring that I couldn't figure out for a few events - finally tracked it down to a metal undertray mount that was close to the exhaust manifold. In some circumstances they can just touch, make a nasty but mild metal banging/rattling/gnashing sound, and **** off the knock sensor enough to send a CEL. Most of the time they don't though. Hard to diagnose but once I did it was really easy to fix and the CEL seems to be gone for good now.
The car interior is still mostly the same - largely gutted and in desperate need of a cage for reassembly and dash reinstall. I replaced the shift **** and maybe some other trivial part but really haven't done much of anything in terms of developing the car this year. In terms of parts it really doesn't need much besides the cage to be legal to race in SPB and with NASA classes. Nets and cameras are the bigger items. And of course for SPB I'll have to swap back the ECU and header. I don't think I'll use the eBay header again when I switch back to the stock ones. Exhaust leaks, inferior sound to the OEM one, and it takes a bit of work to change. The flashed ECU is easy though. I can use it and remove the immobilizer when running with NASA, and I can swap it back to SPB configuration just a few minutes.
We had another NASA enduro locally last weekend so I entered the practice to get a lot of track time. I had fresh rubber on the car this year and had a great time. Temperatures were over 100F the whole time and we're at high altitude so the car doing well in the heat was really a big accomplishment in my mind. The oil never got over 205F at any point and was around 190-200 most of the time, but after about 45 minutes at 105F outside or so the water got up close to 240 indicated so I stared shifting between 6-6.5k instead of around redline every time and that was enough for it to come back down. I do wonder if the flashed ECU runs more fuel and therefore runs the car a bit cooler than the stock ECU - not sure but I would halfway expect it to work that way. Anyway the car seems to work pretty well in endurance racing, and I can always still add the third radiator.
I didn't spin or go off roading but I managed to knock off the front Cup splitter. I probably took it out cutting across a high curb. It should be an easy fix. I want to think about how to improve the mounting as it was simply screwed into the bumper with self-tappers. I'd like something a bit better in tension but weak in shear so I don't take off any bigger parts if I knock it again. Might just take it off for a few events until I make up my mind.
I was pleased to talk with our local PCA president at the track and find that SPB is growing here locally. He said we now have 6-8 SPBs at local events instead of the 2-3 we had a few years ago, and so the class looks to be experiencing some healthy growth. Hoping we continue to grow, and that will be additional incentive to move from TT to racing next year. For our Boxsters, NASA ST5 is becoming a decent sized class, GTS is an option, and every year or so the PCA comes in and runs true SPB here as well. And if the local SPBs all want to run full SPB configuration I can easily swap over to the stock the ECU/header and do that. Then I can skip changing my stickers!
Other car related purchases:
- Cage is still planned for this winter. Here's hoping nothing crazy happens. I should be able to race after that.
- I bought my four year old a "baby kart." It's a BirelArt B-25 with the C50 engine. So far we've gone to a big parking lot to practice gas and brakes, and after another practice or two I'll try to get him out once or twice a month to the kart track at Utah Motorsports Campus for some fun bonding time with dad. The prior owner said he had a 911 he was tracking and when his kid got into karts he got a shifter and has been really enjoying father/son time in the karts. Guess we'll see where this goes in a few years!
- I bought a new Featherlite 4926 20' trailer. For now it's primarily going to serve as a garage for the Alfa Romeo. It sits on a concrete pad beside our house and behind our fence, and the race car is in the steel enclosed trailer on the back corner of the lot on a gravel RV pad. I was planning to spend $6-8k on a storage lift for the Alfa as part of our basement remodel, but I just hated that I knew I'd just about give that lift away in a few years when we move. When the new Featherlite came up locally at a killer price I figured I'd just use it for the Alfa now and as an upgrade to the steel race trailer in a few years when we have more parking space.
06-18-2019, 10:05 AM
