Simplify

So now that the car is actually getting work done i need to step up the pace on ordering the remaining necessities for the car and getting the motor itself to a state thats its ready to drop in.

You can see in these pictures that the oil filter is sitting on a pedestal connected to some water lines. This comes stock on the s2000 (and NSX for that matter) its an OEM 'oil cooler' as id come to know it. Its a water/oil heat exchanger and I assumed it did what it sounds like

 After taking it apart and really starting to dig into the topic i was surprised to find out that the name id a bit of a misnomer.
      Its primary function is too heat the oil up quickly for emissions and fuel economy reasons. Sure it does maybe have a secondary benefit; but as with all water/oil exchangers that benefit is quickly negated when both fluids are constantly at peak thresholds. 230+ water temps and 280+ oil temps are really not going to be trading a lot of heat. Worse so if i'm looking into getting away with a 2/3 sized radiator- all this is doing is increasing its already TBD heat capacity. Since im running a 14row stand alone oil cooler i started to really think if I should keep this in place.




Among other reasons i decided this is a good place to exercise the KISS (keep it simple stupid) principal. I.E- The more waterlines i have the more waterlines ill have to worry about. If I can simplify any thing, i will. Its position near the header just makes matter worse.

 

Luckily for me Honda enthusiasts are rabid and just about every single cross over part is well cataloged and documented.

After removing a couple things and looking at the factory service manuals I was able to confirm my suspensions and came up with a list of parts that id need to remove unwanted weight and properly delete the system.

Below is where the main return line attaches, thankfully its not a press in fitting and can be unscrewed (with some force may i add) The replacement part to plug this hole is off a Honda CR-v. Its a 18mm plug with a weirdo 1.5 thread pitch (pn # 11108-PT0-003)

Also since I removed the doughnut heat exchanger itself i would need a shorter filter shaft to thread for the Mocal sandwich plate onto. Its been removed already below but you can see the female port inside the circular hole under the wrench.

Turns out Honda has that part as well. its off a 02 civic SI (pn # 90015-PH1-013)

 The water hardline travels across the front of the motor and snakes down to the water pump housing under the intake manifold

 you can see the waterlines just above the main water outlet flange. The longer skinnier hose goes up into the ICV valve thats sits on the intake manifold (more on that later)

Close up of the area in question, the two exposed barbed ports will no longer be needed, the big one is the feel outlet from the water pump, the hose behind it stays. 

 They are steel press-in's to an aluminum housing. I removed the whole she-bang and sent them off to get welded shut. Instead of running barbed hose block off's welding them closed will ensure zero possibility of developing leaks like a clamped hose could.  Its the details like this that go a long ways for on track reliability AND fit and finish. 

While I was down the rabbit hole reading up on coolant passages and heat loads of the f20c i found that its one of the only Honda motors that doesn't use a tempswitch/pellet to control cold start idle within the idle control valve (ICV)

For those that dont know- on most cars there is a coolant passage that runs to a spring ball under tension. The ECU will look at engine parameters and run rich when under temp. To balance that extra fuel a temp switch or wax pellet holds open a provision in the manifold or throttle body as to run a stoichiometric balance of fuel/air. Once warmed up wax gets mushy and the ball thats under spring tension melts out of the way and closes the air channel. this triggers and the fuel map to switch to a leaner mixture. 

First glance at the f20c intake manifold you'd notice what looks like the same set up as described above. In most cases its a total pain in the ass to delete sense its tied into ECU logic that triggers the switch over in fuel maps. In this case, however, I saw some interesting differences.

 The motor reads coolant temperature from a different spot all together and the coolant hoses that route under Throttle Body (TB) are put there only too keep the throttle body butterfly from icing over and sticking open. Thats all fine of you live in Nome Alaska and want to drive your convertible sports car when its -10f out but for track driving its the opposite of what you want.

water line starts in the head above the black pulley and pipes into the bottom of the TB

 whats worse is it also plumbs the hot water back farther to the ICV in the middle of the intake manifold itself. Strangely, upon removal of the ICV you can see it goes no where...

stole this picture for illustration purposes

Apparently, its purpose is too heat up the manifold, thats it. The two ports under the blank square in the picture above are for the idle control valve. That black dealy-o  his thumb is on is basically just an air pump that acts as the wax pellet; cept this one receives instruction from the ECU directly about when to kick on. 

ICV hotwater loopty-loop

 So why is this such a big deal? Well- Mugen (Honda's factory blessed performance parts maker) has implied that as little as a 5 degrees (F) drop in intake temperature will result in 1% power gain. That means that a 25 degree reduction would result in a 5% power gain. All this free power too be had and theres no way im going to continue pumping 230 degree water directly to the intake runners.

So now its come full circle. Guess where the lower of the two tubes in the above pic connects too? 

Bam- right back down to the waterneck; the smaller of the two holes i'm having welded close.

This means that I have eliminated a roundabout and unneeded coolant loop that did nothing but heat up the stuff I am trying too keep cool.

for the TB and ICV ports I just drimmeled them down and vacuum plug them. Unlike the water neck housing itself there is no water pressure that needs to be kept at bay. By plugging the coolant feed at its source on the manifold gasket these passages are now inert, this is more for looks than anything.

 

Thats about 36" of hose i got to ditch from the engine bay, sweet

Next up was the ECU. I pulled out the AEM stuff and decided on running an oem ECU for a few reasons I explained earlier in the blog. After ordering the ECU i set to work figuring out how I was to get past the dreaded immobilizer.
 Basically Immobilizers are a proprietary Honda chip that requires the key itself to be matched with the ECU; If the ECU doesn't find this match it electronically locks out the motherboard form performing any ignition brainwork. This is good for a normal car- but im not even gunna use a key, much less a paired Honda key from and S2000. What to do...

 JDM Hondas don't have this chip at all; and likely some reckless chap realized this and decided to rip theirs out just too see what would happen....

With all the technical skills programming and development it took to design this ill tell you what happens.... nothing.

The ECU will now work with any key, or lack thereof.

pointing to the immobilizer

Its hard to miss, its the only thing that says 'made in Mexico' go figure. 

oh, hello

annnd goodbye

port once removed

 I am assured that thats all that needs to happen. I'll eat my hat if not, but for once something was easier and cheaper than expected..

Some finishing on the ECU lid too since i had it all apart and now it'll be exposed in the car for all too see. 

   All that coolant line stuff was a product of my ongoing research into which radiator i should use. I got the SPAL fan in the mail so I decided to mock it all up. Fan is a 13" puller and is rated at 1777cfm! Thats incredible out of a 12v electric fan only 3.5 inches thick.  The fan was chosen because it fits perfectly on either radiator i decide on.

Side note:   I often see sealed shrouding around radiators at the track, unless you are using the car to drive in traffic and need the fan too pull the maximum amount of air though while stopped this actually limits the natural ram air effect through the riffles while at speed. A sealed shroud causes high pressure pockets to form around the sealed corners that basically void that surface area with turbulence and stagnation. You end up only using the surface area that can 'breathe'.  Like everything you modify its a trade off between street and track. I don't plan on sitting in LA traffic in the 86 so an open back pull type fan is the best solution for for me.

Still on the fence about which one to go with. the Mishimoto type3 has a noticeably better build quality about it too.. humm :/

Some more deliveries that I just now unpacked to run though.

Tomei FPR, its a good idea to have an adjustable fuel feed for fine tuning, especially with the pump that ill be running. Tomei is one of the best names in the business and the type S FPR fit my specs perfectly. even came with -6an fittings to keep everything consistent. To the right from that is a radium oil catch canister. its got a washable filter element a oring sealed dipstick and a screw off or pet-cocked bottom. They are quite a lot more money than a typical catch can but the quality of these are unrivaled, Also designed and made in the USA. Next to that is a Mishimoto coolant overflow cyl. Its a really nice piece with a screw off sealed top and mounting bracketry. No way im putting the plastic bladder back in the engine bay.

Also picked up an izze engineering fault board to trick the oem ECU into thinking that there is still a functioning secondary air pump on the motor, the AEM likely just had this all disabled but im trying to maintain the obd2 port including the CEL functionality. Its really a time saver just having code tell you what the problem is instead of crawling around looking not so obvious clues; how would you identify an failing primary 02 sensor just by looking at it? You cant.

 

New mounts came in from JSP. these are the real deal mocked up perfectly to the oem motor mount locations and are built with some serious heft to them. I also get to use the TRD motor mounts i talked about in another post.

 

Just check out the solid aluminum blocks used to space the motor. this is quite a step up from the dom tubing spaced with a grade 6 nut that was in there before.

Random odds and ends, new engine water temp sensor, clutch slave, S2k CR non AC serpentine belt, some more gaskets and some gen-2 WIX filters.

 

Also unpacked the SPAL fan relay harness. Its self contained and only needs 12v power and to run the included water temp sensor. Im going to have the provision bunged into the radiator hose feed line. Going this route cleans up the engine bay harness considerably.

 

Areo catch needs no explanation, they've set the standard in race latches.

 I'm no longer going to use the OEM hood latch mechanism, its ugly rusted and I cant find a used one in better condition that the one I already have. These each support 400+lbs of force and have a hefty 'clunk' when they lock into place. They are use on LMP1 Toyotas for godsakes. As much as i wish- i wont be doing 200mph down the mulsanne straight in an ae86 but its good to know I could.


Last up are the good ole odyssey pc680 compact battery. i shit you not i've had maybe 6-8 of these things in the last 5 years. Yes. There are better batteries out there. Yes. These die quickly if there is ANY continuous draw on them, even when attached to a trickle charger. Also if they go low there's no bringing them back to life. But, BUT they are light. They have decent cranking amps for high compression motors and they are pretty freaking cheap when compared to everything else on the market.
 Also they aren't known for spontaneous combustion like the lithium ion ones and can be mounted in any orientation. Over the battery in the picture is the simplistic hold down bracket. Other batteries get so fancy with hold downs and charge up the ass. this one is clean simple and does the job. Also, Made in the USA.

Below that I also picked up a Painless battery toggle with 200 continuous amp rating and some boots. This will be mounted on the main switch panel and accessible while im still strapped into my seat. It'll double as a "i dont want to buy another pc680 battery" longevity device.