Winter Small Bore projects.

[ferris]

The car officially came off the jack stands last night. I didn't adjust the rear brakes or the e-brake cable and I am hoping that is why there is a ridiculous amount of pedal travel until the brakes catch. Cause I know that I bled them properly and waited a long time after the steady stream of fluid was coming out of the bleeder nipple. I am going to adjust the calipers tonight and then maybe re-bleed them just in case.

Then all that’s left is installing the 6-pt harness and I am all ready for snow-x at the end of the month. I guess I should remove the interior bits on the passenger’s side to make the car look less ridiculous and maybe even out my corner-balance that I now have ruined.

But hearing the car start up right away and driving it around the block was absolutely amazing. I was even singing as I put the wheels back on ... all my neighbors who walk their dogs and have been watching me try to put my car back together over the past week were just staring in amazement as I ran around cleaning my tools up and putting wheels on the car singing about my, now drivable, car

[echan]

I didn't adjust the rear brakes or the e-brake cable and I am hoping that is why there is a ridiculous amount of pedal travel until the brakes catch.

Until you adjust the calipers, you will get a lot of pedal travel. Until you adjust the caliper, the piston has to move a great distance before the pad even hits the rotor. I would remove each rear wheel at a time, rcheck for friction on the pads to the rotor by rotating the the rear hub, then turn the adjustment hex, then check for friciton on the pads by rotating hub again. Repeat until you feel friction when rotating hub. Then move to the other side.

[milkmandan]

[eage8]

[quote="milkmandan"][/quote]



what is that, like 9" ?

what size tires are you running?

[matt.baird]

I didn't adjust the rear brakes or the e-brake cable and I am hoping that is why there is a ridiculous amount of pedal travel until the brakes catch.

Until you adjust the calipers, you will get a lot of pedal travel. Until you adjust the caliper, the piston has to move a great distance before the pad even hits the rotor. I would remove each rear wheel at a time, rcheck for friction on the pads to the rotor by rotating the the rear hub, then turn the adjustment hex, then check for friciton on the pads by rotating hub again. Repeat until you feel friction when rotating hub. Then move to the other side.

Dont forget to keep an eye on your fluid level in the reservoir when adjust the calipers well.

The last thing you want to do is have it get so low you get air in your lines again.

[ferris]

Thanks for all the help. I still have a lot of ATE super blue left from when I bleed the brakes yesterday.

I was rushing yesterday because I was supose to pick my girlfriend up from the metro after she got back from a trip to atlanta and I really wanted to drive the miata over to get her. I will take my time and adjust them properly. I just assumed that since it was such a snug fit with the new pads that any adjustment would only be for the parking brake and not really affect the piston travel. I also assumed that several pumps of the pedal would move the piston to the rotor without it going all the way back to where it was initially adjusted. This is the way it was for my passat ... which also had built in parking brakes and you had to screw the piston back into the caliper. There was no adjustment screw, but you needed a special tool to push the piston into the caliper while rotating the piston. A couple pumped of the brake pedal and the pistons were back against the rotor and the parking brake was self-adjusting.

This was probably the only thing VW got right, as far as standard maintanance on the passat

[eage8]

Thanks for all the help. I still have a lot of ATE super blue left from when I bleed the brakes yesterday.

I was rushing yesterday because I was supose to pick my girlfriend up from the metro after she got back from a trip to atlanta and I really wanted to drive the miata over to get her. I will take my time and adjust them properly. I just assumed that since it was such a snug fit with the new pads that any adjustment would only be for the parking brake and not really affect the piston travel. I also assumed that several pumps of the pedal would move the piston to the rotor without it going all the way back to where it was initially adjusted. This is the way it was for my passat ... which also had built in parking brakes and you had to screw the piston back into the caliper. There was no adjustment screw, but you needed a special tool to push the piston into the caliper while rotating the piston. A couple pumped of the brake pedal and the pistons were back against the rotor and the parking brake was self-adjusting.

This was probably the only thing VW got right, as far as standard maintanance on the passat

that's how all the cars I've ever worked on are too.

I find it weird that you have to adjust the miata's rear brakes.

[milkmandan]

what is that, like 9" ?

what size tires are you running?

949racing 15x9 6UL's, getting 225/45-15 Nitto NT01's mounted up this Saturday. The car is being prepped for Miata Challenge Modified TT instead of Small Bore autox this year, so I'm not anticipating the pedocar to be an overdog. But if some 275 A6's fall into my lap towards the end of the season...

[eage8]

949racing 15x9 6UL's, getting 225/45-15 Nitto NT01's mounted up this Saturday. The car is being prepped for Miata Challenge Modified TT instead of Small Bore autox this year, so I'm not anticipating the pedocar to be an overdog. But if some 275 A6's fall into my lap towards the end of the season...

*sigh*... don't make me get a set of 255/40/13s

[flohtingPoint]

So in summary, I have no idea how MR2s work, but I have a corolla C52 trans that you can have

Mike, you free this weekend? Hit me up at five seven one, two six eight, three two six oh if you are and I'd love to come pick up that tranny.

[hepcatz]

... and Milkman, I'll be by to pick up that hundred since it looks like you have them just lying around! lol

[david.valeri]

I didn't adjust the rear brakes or the e-brake cable and I am hoping that is why there is a ridiculous amount of pedal travel until the brakes catch.

Until you adjust the calipers, you will get a lot of pedal travel. Until you adjust the caliper, the piston has to move a great distance before the pad even hits the rotor. I would remove each rear wheel at a time, rcheck for friction on the pads to the rotor by rotating the the rear hub, then turn the adjustment hex, then check for friciton on the pads by rotating hub again. Repeat until you feel friction when rotating hub. Then move to the other side.

I've come to the conclusion that the first gen Miata e-brake and rear calipers are poorly designed. Mine have what I would consider to be "friction" but the e-brake is almost worthless. The car rolled with it on while I was tightening lugs. I guess that means the pads need to be adjusted tighter. I do not have excessive pedal travel though. I have the fraction of an inch of pedal freeplay and then it stiffens up. I much prefer the way they work on my Honda.

[ferris]

I didn't adjust the rear brakes or the e-brake cable and I am hoping that is why there is a ridiculous amount of pedal travel until the brakes catch.

Until you adjust the calipers, you will get a lot of pedal travel. Until you adjust the caliper, the piston has to move a great distance before the pad even hits the rotor. I would remove each rear wheel at a time, rcheck for friction on the pads to the rotor by rotating the the rear hub, then turn the adjustment hex, then check for friciton on the pads by rotating hub again. Repeat until you feel friction when rotating hub. Then move to the other side.

I've come to the conclusion that the first gen Miata e-brake and rear calipers are poorly designed. Mine have what I would consider to be "friction" but the e-brake is almost worthless. The car rolled with it on while I was tightening lugs. I guess that means the pads need to be adjusted tighter. I do not have excessive pedal travel though. I have the fraction of an inch of pedal freeplay and then it stiffens up. I much prefer the way they work on my Honda.

Interesting. I adjusted the brakes last night and I have almost the opposite feeling. I adjusted to where I thought that the rotor was just rotating freely (I can't have anything else slowing me down at auto-x) and there is almost no movement of the e-brake handle before I can't pull it up any further. This will hold the car on a hill without any problems. But I still have a "soft" brake pedal. The pedal does feel fine before I turn the car on, but once the cars on and the vacum boost is there, the pedal is just soft and travels a lot. I have no problems locking up the front tires, but this is almost at full pedal travel. I do need to properly bed the new pads in as I can see from the wear on the rotors that the entire pad is not contacting the rotor yet.

I am hoping that since I havn't driven the miata in awhile and I just did a lot of brake work, I am being overly sensitive to what I am feeling.

[eage8]

Interesting. I adjusted the brakes last night and I have almost the opposite feeling. I adjusted to where I thought that the rotor was just rotating freely (I can't have anything else slowing me down at auto-x) and there is almost no movement of the e-brake handle before I can't pull it up any further. This will hold the car on a hill without any problems. But I still have a "soft" brake pedal. The pedal does feel fine before I turn the car on, but once the cars on and the vacum boost is there, the pedal is just soft and travels a lot. I have no problems locking up the front tires, but this is almost at full pedal travel. I do need to properly bed the new pads in as I can see from the wear on the rotors that the entire pad is not contacting the rotor yet.

I am hoping that since I havn't driven the miata in awhile and I just did a lot of brake work, I am being overly sensitive to what I am feeling.

I would bleed the brakes again. I've had experiences where after a lot of brake work (replacing callipers or lines or something) that the first bleed doesn't get all the air out. once I got the pedal stiff and then I turned the car on and it just went to the floor.

[flohtingPoint]

Interesting. I adjusted the brakes last night and I have almost the opposite feeling. I adjusted to where I thought that the rotor was just rotating freely (I can't have anything else slowing me down at auto-x) and there is almost no movement of the e-brake handle before I can't pull it up any further. This will hold the car on a hill without any problems. But I still have a "soft" brake pedal. The pedal does feel fine before I turn the car on, but once the cars on and the vacum boost is there, the pedal is just soft and travels a lot. I have no problems locking up the front tires, but this is almost at full pedal travel. I do need to properly bed the new pads in as I can see from the wear on the rotors that the entire pad is not contacting the rotor yet.

I am hoping that since I havn't driven the miata in awhile and I just did a lot of brake work, I am being overly sensitive to what I am feeling.

I would bleed the brakes again. I've had experiences where after a lot of brake work (replacing callipers or lines or something) that the first bleed doesn't get all the air out. once I got the pedal stiff and then I turned the car on and it just went to the floor.

Especially if the car has ABS. I had nightmares bleeding my Nissans.

[ferris]

The car does not have abs ... but you were right. It took maybe half hour to bleed the whole car again and it made a HUGE difference.

Thanks for all the help

[david.valeri]

The car does not have abs ... but you were right. It took maybe half hour to bleed the whole car again and it made a HUGE difference.

Thanks for all the help

Glad you got everything working.

After bedding my pads in I adjusted the parking brake again. There was a MUCH brighter line between contacting and not contacting the rotor after bedding. Now my parking brake works too and the pads aren't constantly dragging.

Now if 949Racing would just send me that new junction block, I'd be done with working on the car for the season.

[jmac]

I haven't done anything to SPRITE this winter. I did change the fuel filter.

[david.valeri]

Add one Dan K / Frank D style tire carrier to the list of winter mods. Picking up some good ratcheting straps and some DIY laminating film for the barcodes tomorrow and I am ready to race. Now if I could only figure out how to fit a tire and an air tank in the passenger seat.

[eage8]

Add one Dan K / Frank D style tire carrier to the list of winter mods. Picking up some good ratcheting straps and some DIY laminating film for the barcodes tomorrow and I am ready to race. Now if I could only figure out how to fit a tire and an air tank in the passenger seat.

my project for Thursday afternoon is to see if I can come up with a way to fit 2x245s/2x275s in the back of my rx-7 some how... I'm not looking forward to it. Something tells me I'm going to fail miserably. Maybe I can tie one to the hood like the old land rovers

in other news, last weekend I installed my rear koni yellows on my corolla. They made a big difference (I used to only have them on the front with KYB GR-2s on the rear).
I decided to wait to install my front sway bar until the second event to see how the car runs without it (I want something to compare it to in recent memory).
and I also took out my rear seats they weren't nearly as heavy as I was hoping though...

The megasquirt still isn't tuned well enough, so I decided to wait to use it till probably the second auto-x.

[matt.baird]

Add one Dan K / Frank D style tire carrier to the list of winter mods. Picking up some good ratcheting straps and some DIY laminating film for the barcodes tomorrow and I am ready to race. Now if I could only figure out how to fit a tire and an air tank in the passenger seat.

Try taking the seat out, its only 4 bolts. I did that when traveling to MATG and wanted to take my grill along.

[milkmandan]

[Gonz]

I'm not sure what the Dan K style carrier is, but if you are talking about RA1s, you can just drive on them..... if you are talking V710s not so much.

I have some "plans" for my Miata. Namely a new FM suspension has been sitting in my foyer for some time, and I need to switch out the seat to sit lower. Have new tires coming too.

I didn't get a chance to do anything this winter. First the weather has been horrible. Then after the horror went away, I hurt myself and couldn't do the work.

As far as strapping the extra tires to your car, it has been done before. Stephen Brown used to do it on his 1st gen. MR2. Two inside the car. One strapped to the hood, one strapped to the roof. It was funny as heck seeing him pull up like that, and we used to always tease him about it. Funny stuff, but it's chepar than a trailer or any other method.

[JoeTR6]

I hope you hand out sunglasses or at least give warning before bringing that onto the course. I find it strangely attractive.

[thehammer]

I suddenly like the miata, and want to drive it