Rochester DSM OneLap

The RochesterDSM One Lap team is featured this month in Mitsubishi Gearbox Magazine.  There is a great story and some cool photos too.

Click Here for the Article

I have said it before, but the One Lap trip offers a perfect testing ground for new equipment. Beyond the needs of a single track event and more than your daily commute it helps filter out products that otherwise past the test.

Last year for the trip I let my excitement get the better of me and I invested in a few cameras to help document the trip.  I am not a video guy by nature. I like telling an entire story in a single photo, hate the sound of my narrative voice on video, but couldn’t pass up a chance to document the epicness of these tracks.

One camera I bought as a no-brainer was the GoPro wide angle camera, which came with a handful of different mounting options, and was the cheapest way to put a camera on the nose of the car.

For the weekend racer, headed out on a drivers education event, hitting up a track event once or twice a year, or even just wanting to have fun with a relatively durable camera, this is a fun toy.

Mounting

It comes with a healthy supply of two sided sticky pads which rival the strongest adhesive options out there.  You can use these pads, which mount a flat plastic clip, allowing you to quickly add or remove the rest of the mounting arm with the camera on it.

It also comes with a suction cup option, allowing you to mount the camera onto the glass in the car, or I suppose hanging out of the car if you wanted to risk it.

What it needs is a tethering point.  An easy miss in the design, but I just spent a few hundred dollars on this camera, and I really don’t trust a sticky pad to stay in place.  I would sleep better knowing I could have a small cable with a clip, ready to catch the camera from becoming a projectile on a track.  I also don’t trust the plastic from not breaking, which I will get to later.

Power

It camera takes two AAA batteries.  Those are the ones that you never have in the closet, because only one remote control on the planet uses them in your house. There are instructions to use lithium ion batteries stating on the website that you can get “3hrs. video recording with lithium, 2hrs. with NiMH”.

The batteries became my curse and the first reason for me to really detest this setup for a One Lap event.  First of all, lithium Ion batteries are freaking expensive.  While I entertain that for the weekend track warrior, spending $13 for a pack of 4 batteries, isn’t a bad investment.  Let’s say the batteries actually last for one day of track events, that is $52 to cover only the track time at One Lap.  Knowing what I now know about this camera and it’s love of batteries, there is no way I would go out on the track with anything but a fresh set of batteries, jumping my cost to $104, again just to cover the track time.

So what happens if you use this thing with rechargeable batteries, or even alkaline?  It works just fine, but don’t go out with anything but newly charged or new batteries every time.  It only took me a few lessons to know that as soon as I assumed the batteries were in good shape they lasted only minutes before shutting down the camera.

Memory

The storage memory was the second curse that I took on trying to make this camera work quickly. It takes an SD Card which is a positive, but it was limited to be formated as FAT, limiting the size of the storage, and making it challenging to actually work with for people who didn’t know any better. So I started juggling SD Cards, only to find that if the card wasn’t formated and clean I most likely didn’t get the recording.

Enclosure

The enclosure is solid, for the most part.  A few weeks after one lap, I found myself once again not able to use the camera, as the latching piece on the top cracked.   To their account, the GoPro company sent out a replacement piece without question, unfortunately the number of things that I didn’t record with that camera are already lost.

Not quite in time

So much has changed in a year.  While the quality of the picture on the first camera was pretty decent, now there is an HD version. My large frustration of batteries was solved, now that they setup the new line with battery packs instead of the AAA batteries. Knowing the problem with storage limits on SD cards was solved with the firmware update of November, the new version would probably make a good candidate for One Lap.  It would, except for the fact that I wasted an entire season trying to get this one to work, and I am not about to invest in another one.

The Rochester DSM One Lap Team is proud to announce that we have a new sponsor for our 2010 trip. Three-Speed.com has signed up to be an official sponsor this year and will be displayed proudly on the One Lap Evo X.

ThreeSpeed started with roots deep in the Galant VR-4 community as Harry Blanchard built up one of the most pristine and iconic Galant VR-4 builds that the community had ever seen. The car was “number 3″, representing the 3rd of only a 1000 that was sold in 1992. When it came time to put a scatter shield into that car, the after-market industry at the time fell short in producing a quality scatter shield that would actually hold up to the standards the car had come to represent. With the creation of that scatter shield, so started ThreeSpeed, a design and specialty manufacturing company dedicated to producing nothing but the highest quality products on the market for over a decade.

As far as scatter shields go, ThreeSpeed products are on the fastest 4G63T cars in the world. Able to meet the demands of actual race cars, the shields are made of 304 high grade stainless and can be custom ordered in Titanium. The shields are already in the vehicles of the record holders. They are already in the shops of the top vendors and have been established as the only source for a quality scatter shield since 1999. ThreeSpeed shields have been featured in most of the major import magazines, have appeared on SpeedTV, and were prominently displayed at SEMA in Vegas.

The company goes far beyond scatter shields, to support an after market industry of quality race products. They are the source manufacturer for a series of products spanning from the Subaru WRX to the Neon SRT.

We are very excited to bring the ThreeSpeed name along with us on One Lap in 2010, and very proud to have them as a sponsor this year.

In 2009, before this entire adventure began, we knew that the VR4 wouldn’t run smoothly unless we could get a solid ECU management solution in place. When we asked around to see if somebody would let us borrow an ECMlink for the trip, ECM Tuning stepped up to the plate.  They provided us with a new version 3 system of their amazing platform. The car wouldn’t have run half as good as it did without the ECMlink, and we would have never been ready in time.  When we got done with the trip, we sent ECM Tuning a nice letter explaining that we can’t send the system back, and that we would never want to drive or race the car again without that system on board.

For 2010 ECM Tuning has stepped up to the plate once again by becoming an official sponsor for the Galant VR-4 Team. While we wouldn’t have any other system in the car to keep it running, we are proud to be able to wear the badge of ECM Tuning on the side of the car to represent the best system available for making these cars go fast.

To say that ECM Tuning leads the way in engine management solutions for the DSM and Evo line of vehicles would be an understatement.  So much has happened in one year with ECM Tuning Products.  We had one of the early versions of Version 3 to use on One Lap.  Since then they have announced a Lite version of the product, along with the development of platform allowing you to add this management solution to all versions of DSMs.  All tuning solutions used to revolve around the exclusive ownership of one of the increasingly rare EPROM ECUs.  ECM Tuning has solved this problem by creating a platform that will allow you to tune non-Eprom ECUs as well, soon to be available for the 2nd Generation of DSM vehicles.

Keep an eye on their announcement page for new releases of software and new products to bring tuning and innovation into the DSM and Evo community.

Last summer Andre at Pina Motorsports introduced his chromoly rear upper control arms for the 1G AWD and VR-4 platforms.  They feature fully tig welded ends, heim joints, and a grease able ball joint end.   The fine members of  GalantVR4.org took up a collection and purchased a set for the RochesterDSM One Lap team.

Installing them is simple.  Just unbolt the ball joint and give the give the spindle where the joint passes through a couple of good whacks with a hammer to pop them out.  Then just unbolt the adjusters and the olds ones are out.  I made sure to measure the old arms before I took them out of the car so I when I installed the new ones I would at least be in the ballpark with my alignment.

Here you can see the Curtis modified control arms these new ones will be replacing.  These were “boxed in” for strength and they took everything we could throw at them last year.  If the chromoly arms were not donated we would have used these again for sure.

Here is one the new PinaMotorSports fully TIG welded chromoly control arms ready to bolt in.

Here they are installed.

Last year we were running smooth until we broke a rear control arm somewhere between Kentucky and Ohio.  The breakdown itself was not the best experience ever.  We had to stop over the crest of a hill, past a bridge, and where not overly visible from all oncoming traffic.  We were off the road safely, but we would have been hard pressed to flag down anybody, as people only saw us once they were over the hill.

The first person to stop, drove miles down the road to the next exit, turned around and came back on the other side of the divided highway, only to have his team mate drop him off, while he jumped over the median to come over and help.  It was over and above the call of helping somebody and it made us truly feel like we were part of one big team.  That man was Glen Dodd. Glen owns the Carolina Rod Shop and is a staple icon in the One Lap of America list of participants.

Glen was actually the first person we met when we arrived at the hotel for One Lap in South Bend.  With our Upstate New York accents and Glen’s Carolina accent, we didn’t understand a word he was saying and was a moment you had to be there to appreciate.  After a few laughs about it, we resorted to single words, asking for BEER, where Glen was able to point us to the bar.

We just got word that Glen Dodd was injured this week after a terrible fall from a roof and is in pretty ruff shape.  While we can mend a control arm on the side of the road, we can’t do much more than offer our support for Glen and his family as he goes through some rough times.  Keep an eye on the Carolina Rod Shop website for updates, as we all hope for the best for Glen.

http://www.carolinarodshop.com/

Tuners Nation was kind enough to donate a set of there 1G AWD/VR-4 rear sub-frame and mustache brace bushing sets. Today I got to work installing them.

Here is how I did it.

1. remove the parking brake cables
2. remove the rear calipers and hang them on the rear springs.
3. unbolt the lower shock bolts and separate.
4. remove the rear section of the exhaust
5. disconnect the drive shaft from the diff.
6. put a jack under the diff and remove the 6 bolts holding the rear sub-frame/mustache brace and lower everything out of the car.

The One Lap car is in pretty good shape and seeing how I’ve had all the rear suspension out of the car just a year ago when I built it, everything came apart easily. I think I rolled the rear suspension in about an hour.

Looking at the entire rear suspension out of the car it becomes quite clear how important the front two sub-frame bushings are to the geometry of everything that attaches to it.  Take note of how the diff bolts to the sub-frame where the upper and lower control arms tie in.  That makes the mustache braces job even more important.  Not only does it have to keep the pinion angle in control under hard launches its also the rear two attachment points for the whole rear suspension.  Inspecting the stock 200k+ mile bushings shows that they’ve lived a hard life.  The sub-frame bushings were coming apart and the mustache brace bushings weren’t that far behind.  Replacing them with hard urethane will hold everything in place under hard cornering and let the suspension do its job.

To get the bushings out I first drilled around the center pins and then I used a sawz-all to finish cutting them out.

From there is was old school, get dirty, and burn the snot out of everything. I set the pins outside on a cinder block and set them on fire. Then I flipped the whole suspension with the diff pointing down so I can get at the sub-frame bushings. These have a two-piece inner sleeve that has to come out. Once again I set them on fire, waited, and then knocked them out with a hammer. There was still a bunch of rubber left in the sub-frame so I set that on fire too. Once the rubber gets hot and gooey most of it can be scraped out.

To get both the pins and the bushing cavities clean up I used a wire wheel in a hand drill. I greased up the bushings and pins and used a clamp to push them in.

Taking a cue from Curtis I spent some time bracing the mustache brace by fitting and welding some angle iron onto it. This will help keep the diff where it belongs under hard launches. I got as far as rolling the suspension back under the car before I called it quits for the day.

We are proud to announce that Darkside Engineering has signed on as a Trip Supporter for the Evo X and the 2010 One Lap of America event! After contacting Logan about purchasing a street and track worthy coilover suspension without breaking the bank, it turns out he was selling the shop car’s low mileage setup and we arrived at a deal that could not be beat.

These are the BC Racing ER series Coilovers with external reservoirs and separate compression and rebound damping adjustments. They were in really good shape thanks to the excellent corrosion protection these units have. The list of features these coilovers possess are usually found on setups costing hundreds of dollars more making them an excellent competitor in the suspension market. I knew I didn’t want a full stiff track only suspension but the new 10k/10k spring rate combos should prove to work well and they can be ordered with 2k higher or lower spring rates without needing a revalve. You can also get the shocks revalved for whatever spring rates you choose but this will delay the order by about 3 weeks. I decided to get an extra set of 12k rear springs just in case we wanted to stiffen up the rear end a bit further without resorting to a full stifff rear sway bar and will report back my findings.

Plans are for Sean and I to get these installed and corner weighted within the next 2 weeks and get them dialed in with a conservative drop of about 1″ below stock ride height. We are trying to target about -2* to -2.5* front camber and -1.5* in the rear while keeping the toe as zeroed as possible to avoid excessive inside tire wear that toe out settings tend to impose. I’ve found that the Active Yaw Control of the Evo X already makes the car have excellent turn-in behaviour and there is no desire on my part to make the car twitchy and hard to control at the limits.

I’ve located a nearby site that will allow us to mark off a 100′ diameter skidpad so that we can see what kind of lateral G’s we can get along with the planned Yokohama ADVAN Neova AD08 or Bridgestone Potenza RE-11 tires mounted up. Now we just need some of this Winter weather to move out and make way for Spring!

I’ll be doing a full review of these BC Racing ER series Coilovers once Sean and I get some seat time under our belts, but in the mean time if you have any questions about the available options I would highly recommend talking to Logan at Darkside Engineering and see how he can transform the handling of your Evo X to an even higher level!

Be sure to check out their website at:  http://darksideengineering.com/

I used to be good at photoshop.  That was back in 1997.  Somewhere along the way, I fell under the category of novice, being able to run through the paces of photoshop, but missing the artistic knowledge to know what tools make magical things happen.

While I stick to my favorite video series of “You suck at Photoshop” there are a few masters out there among us. Luckily Sean has a few friends who do not suck at photoshop.  While Sean is still polishing off the images to some level of perfection I don’t care to understand, he made the mistake of letting me see them.  Of course now I have to leak them out.  While they now make the rest of the site look like second grade dog poo, I welcome the professional kick ass images with pride.

We have created a Rochester DSM One Lap fan Page. I think when this all started, we didn’t appreciate the difference between a Facebook Group and a Facebook Page.

Once we started on the trip itself, it became very difficult to maintain an Internet connection long enough to update everything and the Facebook group fell behind. Having a Facebook Page will allow us to post updates from emails and also give us a better visibility footprint to people who do want to keep up with us.

While it seems redundant in nature, I can see the Page being more useful to us than the Group. Take a minute to become a fan of us on the Page to keep up with the 2010 events through Facebook.

http://www.facebook.com/pages/RochesterDSM-One-Lap-of-America-Team/328432633384?ref=ts

I actually wrote up a quick article on the advantage of the fan page, since we had a lot of questions ourselves.
http://www.stephenjburke.com/2010/02/facebook-pages/

Thanks for you support,
Stephen