It’s been a hectic year for us at BOFI, for those that don’t know this is an extension of our hobby and an outlet for us to hopefully help others in the community – sadly, not our day jobs. It’s focus has shifted several times over the past 12 months, from creating interesting clothing lines to bespoke product lines as well as all the R&D that goes into it.
So, what’s the focus?
At this point, we’ve gone back to the reason we started this small place on the internet, that’s to get more people into grassroots motorsport – autosolo, sprints, track days or weekends. Sure, still heavily focused on the MX5 / Miata (read; its the best) because that’s what we drive and that’s what we spend our evenings, days, dreams and nightmares talking about.
Road Tuning Services
I’ll add, however, that this isn’t the only interest and direction we have here – with our expertise in tuning ME221 and Megasquirt equipped MX5s we’ll look to offer a road tuning service for all that are interested, something to bride the gap between an online screenshare ‘get you moving’ map check and a dyno tune – based on known good maps of our own design and testing that are about the limit without a dyno power run. Really the focus with this service is to provide something that starts, behaves well in town and cruising, part throttle and has a real punch at WOT – rather than just a safe WOT map that you usually get with a dyno.
Suspension
We’ve been doing some real nerdery on suspension tech and alignment settings in the past few months reviewing our performance at the Bruntingthorpe track day with the MX5OC highlighted the cars ‘daily duties’ too well, i.e. they were rolling like weebl wobbles! All cars, the 1.6 Mk1, 1.8Mk1 (Lightened) and the MK2.5 Turbo have the same MeisterR-ZetaS suspension, all crica 3-4 years old. But its not the age thats the issue, its the spring rates being ‘street friendly’ out of the box which is awesome, but explains the roll.
So, expect some pretty detailed posts when we’ve finished testing the new springs we’ve ordered (10KG Front, 7KG Rear, up from 6KG Front 5KG Rear). For £30 a corner, for brand new springs you really can’t complain. These numbers have been bench raced so to say and we expect some interesting results, we may require larger ARB (Anti Roll Bars) to compensate and improve the drive characteristics.
Tires
Bridgestone have really let us down, we’re big fans of the RE002 in 195/50/15 but they’re basically gone now. Done. Nada. And the RE003 is not approved for the EU yet which is just PERFECT!
So we’re trying other things. The Peril (Mk1 1.6) has a set of PS3s, no not the console – Michelin Pilot Sport 3s, which are about £200 for a set and should be ‘reasonable’ but they are frankly a road tyre, should be fine for autosolo but i’d imagine a track will trash them pretty quickly as it did my year old RE002s.
Winston the Mk1 1.8 doesn’t need tyres for a bit, so we’ll come back to that.
The MK2.5 Turbo (YI LAG) has a set of interesting rubber with some serious shoulder to them, they’re KU36s and while they’re not on any banned tyre list they certainly look like they should be! They could be an interesting entry level track tyre that maybe, could also be autosolo friendly. We’ll await the review / comments once the car has had its arches rolled to accommodate the super square sidewall.
VVT Build
I’ve had VVT motor sat on an engine stand in my garage since i pulled it out of my last Mk1 1.6 shell, that i did have running on megasquirt (with VVT) but i don’t have plans to change the current car’s 1.6 out for a VVT, not yet anyway so i’ve passed that on to James to build up and slap into Winston along with an M62 (the Mercedes type, not a M45 in a M60 Casing) which will net at least 220WHP, which should be… interesting.
Including MAXPEEDING Rods, which frankly seem to be just fine – balanced out of the box within 1 gramme, they will be balanced by us to 0.1 gramme and with the balanced crank, clutch and flywheel assembly – it should spin pretty well.
NA8 -> NB Subframe / Suspension Geo
Yep. James is doing this too. this means all new superpro bushes on an NB subframe, arms, arbs etc. Why? because you can run more caster on an NB than an NA at the same ride height because they’re just a better geo.
Is it worth the effort? We’ll see.
6 Speed into an NA8
Yea, he’s doing that too mated to a 4.1 diff.
ATB / Ashcroft Diff into an NA8
Yep. That too. It’ll be interesting to compare to a T1 Torsen but the end result from testing before is that a T1 requires you to trail the throttle in a corner to keep it locked (accel bias) and a T2 will lock on lift off (decell bias), very difficult to explain but obvious when you drive one back to back.
Kraken Ni-Resist Cast Manifold -> NA6 & T25 Turbo!
If you follow our facebook page I’ve dropped some hints about this, we’re working with the guys over at Kraken and have been for a little while to deliver a real bolt in piece that is not only cost effective but performs comparably with the established brands. Frankly, if G19 had a 1.6 EVO2 on the shelf 2-3 months ago we’d be looking at a different build but this route also allows us to dig a deeper rabbit hole and look at GT2554R turbos for instant spool.
Expect content around this in mid to late September.
Another Car… the BEE. J-LTD2 Turbo
It’s a hack job, it is now less of a hack job but man does it need more work (time & money) throwing at it to make it right.
But what is cool about it is it has a flyin’ miata style manifold (T25) which we have now bolted a China 2871 T25 turbo to, after we removed the old Garrett TB2525 (CA18DET Turbo ~ 1984-1990) and it used to be a hectic machine which also smoked like hell due to catastrophic oil seal failures on the turbo but now with the 2871 boost isn’t until 3.8~4krpm with full boost at 5krpm but it makes for a much easier street car and perahps it feels more like how most people expect a turbo 5 to be.
Based on fuel we expect its making a pretty easy 230-240 at the fly, it has a very safe road tune on it with a very safe spark map up top.
What’s left for it? It needs a new clutch, it needs the missing gearbox bolts sorting out, it needs the boost controller actually wiring in properly and it needs a Kraken 1.8 kit. Which will be great because we have data to show how it performs and i’m full anticipating it to bring the spool down fairly significantly making for a much more responsive drive.
Oh and rust….
1.6 to 1.8 brakes
The peril needs new brakes, it’s getting upgraded to 1.8 discs and pads, we’re going to be testing Roddisons pads on the NA8 car and might try out Hawk’s offering on the NA6.
Video / Youtube
The more we think about it the more we want to push more regular content out, either as part of a podcast or a video series, what would you like to see?
MX5OC – September Rally – Live Install
We’re going to be installing the SkidNation frame rails and butterfly brace live for all to see, hopefully to demonstrate just how easy it is to do on your back, with jack stands.
JAE Autosolo Demontration!
We’ll be at JAE showing off autosolo as part of out local clubs on the 3rd of September, come check it out and talk MX5s in between the demos!
So, plenty going on in the world of BOFI right now, we’ve got more of a backlog of content than anything else with alot of projects in progress or nearing completion.
