The Art of Tuning: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at Building High-Performance Cars

So, we're just gonna fine-tune all these cars and make sure everything's aligned perfectly. That'll be good to go. But yeah, cuz right now if he puts the cables on whatever gear you like, put it in just like kind of get stuck, it's weird. And then once you take the cables off the selector right here, the transmission will go into every gear just fine, no issues at all. So we know it's something with the cables - binding up or whatever it may be. Just got to get that figured out and then work on getting that dog box, cuz dude, that's freaking turbos huge brother. This thing I was so much potential being all-wheel-drive and that's all it needs - he has an aluminum rod motor now, if you guys didn't know yeah, cuz he hurt the other motor; he completely rebuilt one before the event. Yep, we went with a Rob motor like because it wrecked the head too. So put new valves in it, everything's good to go now.

Made 887 horsepower at 70, 100 RPM - so there's a whole bunch of potential and that's on a Mustang all-wheel drive Dino. Like those are legit numbers as you could get yeah I mean it was making 30 pounds and 30 pounds through the turbo's some power yeah, yeah. There's one 560-foot run on these freaking Mickey Thompson et's - so I mean imagine all four slicks getting it, the chassis just figured out she definitely has some potential but like every other car we're gonna be limited to a so working on it though they all literally all our cars need some training.

So we're at 70, 80 miles an hour right here and by the time you're done, really had a 115. We had some 40 pounds of boost craziness going on here yeah I don't get it that's something ask you like what do you think our next step would be? Go do another test in tuning to get more logs me or just we'll just go to our Rowland - I know yeah, I know this log shows it's turd mode even though the boots crazy nearing is going on. The mile an hour going nowhere, the RPM going nowhere look, we're making 41 pounds of boost right here 6700 rpm 83 miles an hour and look we only got 290, 310 miles an hour.

I'm not ready come on hey this is building racecars we gonna figure it out. It's got her she'll go fast one day Stepanian flame, she's already done pretty good that's what I'm saying of course every time we go race in front of a crowd yeah if you're shifting that early you would and that felt like you were laying down which is why you would shift that could be no VTEC for sure that's why I was that's the same thing in the me man remember you like your shifting early that's like, yeah there's nothing like making 40 crazy pounds then - yeah but no Vito is going nowhere so there's nothing worth the check.

Well, that is going to be it for today we just spent most of the day getting the engine tore down for the mr2 so like I said we will have that thing back up and running hopefully soon. Did have Brent come look at the prelude as well we pulled up the last log just to try to see what was going on with this thing and we're still not too sure what the issue was when we were down in Texas did also just pull the VTech solenoid off to check that but it appears to be fine the screen and stuff inside the cylinder is clean and we did hook up a power probe to it and make sure it clicks on and stuff so the solenoid seems like it's fine I think tomorrow we're gonna throw this thing on the dyno and kind of sort through it and just see what her deal is.

There's also a chance that the tune could have been corrupted after Brent reuploaded the new adjustments because the first pass was made in the prelude - it was spinning like crazy but it still went through all the gears fine and still had plenty of power and felt right you know it felt good, it just didn't hook up and then after he made the corrections to turn it down some that's when it started acting all funny. It is pretty common that when you send a new tune to the ECU that it can get corrupt and the car sometimes doesn't even start again and it just runs really rough so that could be a possibility as well.

So hopefully we get this thing sorted out soon so we can get back to the track and try to go after that record, go for a personal best, and just see what this thing can do now.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enwhat's going on guys we are back from Texas we obviously need to go through the prelude to see why she was acting up while we were down there but I was going to be for another day we're still not sure what the issue is just yeah we still need to pull up the last log because we haven't even got a chance to look at the car since we got back but yeah that will be for another video trying to figure the prelude out but for right now we're actually gonna be working on the engine that came out of the mr2 because as you guys remember we found a crack on the block it was leaking coolant into the oil which was really unfortunate but we have to you know get on it I know you guys want to see this thing back up and running in I do too so we went ahead and pulled the motor out and I've been doing my best to find a new block and I think I did find a new block I actually was talking to a subscriber and I should have a block on the way as of today for the mr2 so I'm hoping that we'll be here either by the end of this week or early next week the only thing I'm gonna have to do that is get a machine for the o-rings and then we can start slapping everything back together but before we can even do that we obviously need to get this thing pulled apart and that is what we are going to be doing for today I just want to get everything prepared for when the new block comes so today we're gonna be pulling off the transmission the intake and exhaust manifold completely tear the engine all the way down apart we have to pull the rods and pistons and every single thing out of this thing so it is going to be a process but it needs to get done and that we're just going to go ahead and dive in on that and well we got the motor completely disassembled got everything laid out over here on the table and now we just have to wait on our new block to come and we will be able to start reassembling everything and obviously once we get the new block in I'm gonna have to bring it to the machine shop get it rehomed out to match our piston they're probably gonna order some new rings just to rear inge it so we can make sure our gaps are correct even though it should technically be the same but I might go with a slightly bigger piston to wall clearance on these ones I went with a three and a half because that was what the specs on these said so that's what the machine is when to but I was talking to Bret and everyone they're saying I should go probably closer to four or four and a half for big boost and big power just because of how much stuff can expand under all that heat and load so that is why I'll probably need some new rings as well because that gap might change ever so slightly after machining but we got the block completely tore down and we did actually find something pretty interesting so this crack in the block may have actually been a good thing because if you look right here when we were pulling the Pistons out and can bend this guy all the way we pulled the Pistons out and it literally took a chunk of the IDI top edge of the sleeve with it as we slid everything out there should be no reason the piston can grab onto anything right here this should be completely smooth but as we were trying to pull him out they would kind of get jammed right here and then you had to force them out and then it literally bent this copper wire up and broke the edge of the sleeve off so this is actually a little sliver from one that broke so this was actually right here all the way along the edge and then on the backside of this is where the copper oring sat so if you see right here you can see that little bit of metal right there between the copper ring right here see that you can see that from this part forward is completely broke off and that's where this sliver was and that's really bad like really really bad so there was a good chance this thing would have failed regardless if we had that crack in it or not I'm thinking what happened is for one this is machined way too close to the edge there so there's not really much material to support the copper or ring because this copper ring went in there pretty tight we had to hammer it in there to get it to snug down and when we tighten the head down that's going to crush this copper ring really tight into that groove and I think what happened is after we torqued the head down as it shoved it in there so tight that it ever so slightly kind of squeezed that top edge of the cylinder in so when we were trying to pull the pistons out since it was kind of squeezed in that's why they didn't want to come out and that's what made it just kind of all ripped out together so I mean all it would have taken was a full heat cycle or you notice some big boost you know some something to put all this under stress and if this were to break off inside the cylinder there was a piece of we thought it was hair remember yeah yep I thought there was a chunk cut I thought someone's hair was in here because I we pulled the head off and there's this little line on the piston I'd almost looked like a tiny crack but I knew it wasn't I was like what's this and at first I thought it was a hair and I was like how the hell is a like a hair in there and then after this happened we realized there's tiny little slimmers of metal everywhere that look they're so fine they literally look like hair and that was falling into these cylinders so that is not good at all so honestly I'm kind of glad it had the leak because this would have been a much more serious problem at this point this block is completely garbage it's done I have no intention of trying to fix it or reuse it we'd have to Reese leave the whole thing too even it's not even worth dealing with so yeah we have a new block on the way luckily this happened for a good reason I guess because we had some other issues and then even after startup right here on the CSS whoever did this once again not the actual company CSS this was freshly decked we checked it before we put it together but it seems either the CSS that went around this either came up or the sleeves kind of just like some I don't think they can sink down because its stock sleeve so I think the CSX actually yeah pulled up a little bit because now there's a little lip right there that I can catch a nail on which is not good either so yeah this block definitely had some issues so it would have gone on the dyno on it it probably would yeah yeah no really good that we had to do this honestly because this would have probably led to way more damage how to you know completely get a whole new motor it would have trashed our head which is really nice four-piston how we do not want to hurt this if we you know can help it because that's probably one of the more expensive parts on this whole build yeah that's all apart so I'm like I said we just gotta wait on the new block to come in and we'll be ready to reassemble that I'm probably gonna do new bearings as well these actually look like they're in really good shape you know the water being inside the motor didn't hurt anything too bad it seems like there's still plenty of assembly Lube everywhere because you know we only let this thing run for maybe a total of three or four minutes and yeah so I'm not too worried about that but we are gonna go ahead and replace the bearings new head gasket and you know throw it all back together she should be ready to go and then we also have our L 19 studs in a little bag over here with oil in it cuz I guess that's what uh Brent said to you know storm I guess they gotta stay lubricated don't want to let them dry out we don't need those head studs snapping yeah but uh yeah that's where we're at on the mr2 we also pulled the Grinch in because Romans taking a look at the shift linkages and training stuff is what you thinking so the last pass that we did there we turned it up to like 15 pounds of boost um it left great 1/5 960 footed got it in a second like ease it in a second because that was always the issue before got in a second finally I go to stab 3rd and nothing there at all um and then I get down the track and I notice inside the cable the shifter cable itself like pulled itself apart so I think I just had him routed wrong kinda like when it came in it came in too close of an angle and then so when I was shifting it kind of just tore it all apart and then at the track we were able to K tune sent me two cables what I did is I just took one of them I took the ends off the other one and made this one work um but we put it in and it kept getting stuck in different gears so it just needs another set of cables unfortunately and then I'm gonna really take my time and find tuning them and stuff like that because there's a whole bunch of adjustment here I kind of just slapped them on there and then just sent it so live and learn you know put another set on there and then maybe have you help me because I've um come from the b-series world so I'm not used to this case yeah I was gonna slap them into to be honest so put will just fine-tune them all and make sure everything's like aligned perfectly and that'll be good to go but yeah cuz right now if he puts the cables on whatever gear you like put it in just like kind of get stuck it's weird and then once you take the cables off the selector right here the training will go into every gear just fine no issues at all so we know it's something with the cables like binding up or yeah whatever it may be so just got to get that figured out and then just work on getting that dog box cuz dude that's freaking turbos huge brother this thing I was so much potential being all-wheel-drive and that's all it needs he has an aluminum rod motor now if you guys didn't know yeah cuz he hurt the other motor he completely rebuilt one before the event yep we went a Rob motor like because it wrecked the head too so put new valves in it everything's good to go now so made 887 887 letting out at 70 100 RPM so there's a whole bunch potential and that's on a Mustang all-wheel drive Dino like those are legit numbers as you could get yeah I mean it was making 30 pounds and 30 pounds through that turbos some power yeah yeah there one 560 foot on these freaking Mickey Thompson et's so I mean imagine all four slicks getting it the chassis just figured out she definitely has some potential but like every other car we're gonna be limited to a so working on it though they all literally all our cars need some training so we the entire time look you're at 70 80 miles an hour right here and by the time you're done really had a 115 and we had some 40 pounds of boost craziness going on here yeah I don't get it that's something ask you like what do you think our next step would be like go do another test in tuning to get more logs me or just we'll just go to our Rowland I know yeah I know this log shows it's turd mode even though the boots crazy nearing is going on the mile an hour going nowhere the RPM going nowhere look we're making 41 pounds of boots right here 6700 rpm 83 miles an hour and look we only got 290 310 miles an hour I'm not ready come on hey this is building racecars we gonna figure it out it's got him she'll go fast one day Stepanian flame she's she's fast she's already done pretty good that's what I'm saying of course every time we go race in front of a crowd yeah if you're shifting that early you would and that felt like you were laying down which is why you would shift that could be no VTEC for sure that's why I was that's the same thing in the me man remember you like your shifting early that's like yeah there's nothing like making 40 crazy pounds then - yeah but no Vito is going nowhere so there's nothing worth the check well that is going to be it for today we just spent most of the day getting the engine tore down for the mr2 so like I said we will have that thing back up and running hopefully soon I did have Brent come look at the prelude as well we pulled up the last log just to try to see what was going on with this thing and we're still not too sure what the issue was when we were down in Texas we did also just pull the VTech solenoid off to check that but it appears to be fine the screen and stuff inside the cylinder is clean and we did hook up a power probe to it and make sure it clicks on and stuff so the solenoid seems like it's fine I think tomorrow we're gonna throw this thing on the dyno and kind of sort through it and just see what her deal is there's also a chance that the tune could have been corrupted after Brent reuploaded the new adjustments because the first pass was made in the prelude it was spinning like crazy but it still went through all the gears fine and still had plenty of power and felt right you know it felt good it just didn't hook up and then after he made the corrections to turn it down some that's when it started acting all funny it is pretty common that when you send a new tune to the ECU that it can get corrupt and the car sometimes doesn't even start again and it just runs really rough so that could be a possibility as well so hopefully we get this thing sorted out soon so we can get back to the track and try to go after that record go for a personal best and just see what this thing can do now that it's turned up but that is going to be it for today guys so I hope you enjoyed and thanks for watchingwhat's going on guys we are back from Texas we obviously need to go through the prelude to see why she was acting up while we were down there but I was going to be for another day we're still not sure what the issue is just yeah we still need to pull up the last log because we haven't even got a chance to look at the car since we got back but yeah that will be for another video trying to figure the prelude out but for right now we're actually gonna be working on the engine that came out of the mr2 because as you guys remember we found a crack on the block it was leaking coolant into the oil which was really unfortunate but we have to you know get on it I know you guys want to see this thing back up and running in I do too so we went ahead and pulled the motor out and I've been doing my best to find a new block and I think I did find a new block I actually was talking to a subscriber and I should have a block on the way as of today for the mr2 so I'm hoping that we'll be here either by the end of this week or early next week the only thing I'm gonna have to do that is get a machine for the o-rings and then we can start slapping everything back together but before we can even do that we obviously need to get this thing pulled apart and that is what we are going to be doing for today I just want to get everything prepared for when the new block comes so today we're gonna be pulling off the transmission the intake and exhaust manifold completely tear the engine all the way down apart we have to pull the rods and pistons and every single thing out of this thing so it is going to be a process but it needs to get done and that we're just going to go ahead and dive in on that and well we got the motor completely disassembled got everything laid out over here on the table and now we just have to wait on our new block to come and we will be able to start reassembling everything and obviously once we get the new block in I'm gonna have to bring it to the machine shop get it rehomed out to match our piston they're probably gonna order some new rings just to rear inge it so we can make sure our gaps are correct even though it should technically be the same but I might go with a slightly bigger piston to wall clearance on these ones I went with a three and a half because that was what the specs on these said so that's what the machine is when to but I was talking to Bret and everyone they're saying I should go probably closer to four or four and a half for big boost and big power just because of how much stuff can expand under all that heat and load so that is why I'll probably need some new rings as well because that gap might change ever so slightly after machining but we got the block completely tore down and we did actually find something pretty interesting so this crack in the block may have actually been a good thing because if you look right here when we were pulling the Pistons out and can bend this guy all the way we pulled the Pistons out and it literally took a chunk of the IDI top edge of the sleeve with it as we slid everything out there should be no reason the piston can grab onto anything right here this should be completely smooth but as we were trying to pull him out they would kind of get jammed right here and then you had to force them out and then it literally bent this copper wire up and broke the edge of the sleeve off so this is actually a little sliver from one that broke so this was actually right here all the way along the edge and then on the backside of this is where the copper oring sat so if you see right here you can see that little bit of metal right there between the copper ring right here see that you can see that from this part forward is completely broke off and that's where this sliver was and that's really bad like really really bad so there was a good chance this thing would have failed regardless if we had that crack in it or not I'm thinking what happened is for one this is machined way too close to the edge there so there's not really much material to support the copper or ring because this copper ring went in there pretty tight we had to hammer it in there to get it to snug down and when we tighten the head down that's going to crush this copper ring really tight into that groove and I think what happened is after we torqued the head down as it shoved it in there so tight that it ever so slightly kind of squeezed that top edge of the cylinder in so when we were trying to pull the pistons out since it was kind of squeezed in that's why they didn't want to come out and that's what made it just kind of all ripped out together so I mean all it would have taken was a full heat cycle or you notice some big boost you know some something to put all this under stress and if this were to break off inside the cylinder there was a piece of we thought it was hair remember yeah yep I thought there was a chunk cut I thought someone's hair was in here because I we pulled the head off and there's this little line on the piston I'd almost looked like a tiny crack but I knew it wasn't I was like what's this and at first I thought it was a hair and I was like how the hell is a like a hair in there and then after this happened we realized there's tiny little slimmers of metal everywhere that look they're so fine they literally look like hair and that was falling into these cylinders so that is not good at all so honestly I'm kind of glad it had the leak because this would have been a much more serious problem at this point this block is completely garbage it's done I have no intention of trying to fix it or reuse it we'd have to Reese leave the whole thing too even it's not even worth dealing with so yeah we have a new block on the way luckily this happened for a good reason I guess because we had some other issues and then even after startup right here on the CSS whoever did this once again not the actual company CSS this was freshly decked we checked it before we put it together but it seems either the CSS that went around this either came up or the sleeves kind of just like some I don't think they can sink down because its stock sleeve so I think the CSX actually yeah pulled up a little bit because now there's a little lip right there that I can catch a nail on which is not good either so yeah this block definitely had some issues so it would have gone on the dyno on it it probably would yeah yeah no really good that we had to do this honestly because this would have probably led to way more damage how to you know completely get a whole new motor it would have trashed our head which is really nice four-piston how we do not want to hurt this if we you know can help it because that's probably one of the more expensive parts on this whole build yeah that's all apart so I'm like I said we just gotta wait on the new block to come in and we'll be ready to reassemble that I'm probably gonna do new bearings as well these actually look like they're in really good shape you know the water being inside the motor didn't hurt anything too bad it seems like there's still plenty of assembly Lube everywhere because you know we only let this thing run for maybe a total of three or four minutes and yeah so I'm not too worried about that but we are gonna go ahead and replace the bearings new head gasket and you know throw it all back together she should be ready to go and then we also have our L 19 studs in a little bag over here with oil in it cuz I guess that's what uh Brent said to you know storm I guess they gotta stay lubricated don't want to let them dry out we don't need those head studs snapping yeah but uh yeah that's where we're at on the mr2 we also pulled the Grinch in because Romans taking a look at the shift linkages and training stuff is what you thinking so the last pass that we did there we turned it up to like 15 pounds of boost um it left great 1/5 960 footed got it in a second like ease it in a second because that was always the issue before got in a second finally I go to stab 3rd and nothing there at all um and then I get down the track and I notice inside the cable the shifter cable itself like pulled itself apart so I think I just had him routed wrong kinda like when it came in it came in too close of an angle and then so when I was shifting it kind of just tore it all apart and then at the track we were able to K tune sent me two cables what I did is I just took one of them I took the ends off the other one and made this one work um but we put it in and it kept getting stuck in different gears so it just needs another set of cables unfortunately and then I'm gonna really take my time and find tuning them and stuff like that because there's a whole bunch of adjustment here I kind of just slapped them on there and then just sent it so live and learn you know put another set on there and then maybe have you help me because I've um come from the b-series world so I'm not used to this case yeah I was gonna slap them into to be honest so put will just fine-tune them all and make sure everything's like aligned perfectly and that'll be good to go but yeah cuz right now if he puts the cables on whatever gear you like put it in just like kind of get stuck it's weird and then once you take the cables off the selector right here the training will go into every gear just fine no issues at all so we know it's something with the cables like binding up or yeah whatever it may be so just got to get that figured out and then just work on getting that dog box cuz dude that's freaking turbos huge brother this thing I was so much potential being all-wheel-drive and that's all it needs he has an aluminum rod motor now if you guys didn't know yeah cuz he hurt the other motor he completely rebuilt one before the event yep we went a Rob motor like because it wrecked the head too so put new valves in it everything's good to go now so made 887 887 letting out at 70 100 RPM so there's a whole bunch potential and that's on a Mustang all-wheel drive Dino like those are legit numbers as you could get yeah I mean it was making 30 pounds and 30 pounds through that turbos some power yeah yeah there one 560 foot on these freaking Mickey Thompson et's so I mean imagine all four slicks getting it the chassis just figured out she definitely has some potential but like every other car we're gonna be limited to a so working on it though they all literally all our cars need some training so we the entire time look you're at 70 80 miles an hour right here and by the time you're done really had a 115 and we had some 40 pounds of boost craziness going on here yeah I don't get it that's something ask you like what do you think our next step would be like go do another test in tuning to get more logs me or just we'll just go to our Rowland I know yeah I know this log shows it's turd mode even though the boots crazy nearing is going on the mile an hour going nowhere the RPM going nowhere look we're making 41 pounds of boots right here 6700 rpm 83 miles an hour and look we only got 290 310 miles an hour I'm not ready come on hey this is building racecars we gonna figure it out it's got him she'll go fast one day Stepanian flame she's she's fast she's already done pretty good that's what I'm saying of course every time we go race in front of a crowd yeah if you're shifting that early you would and that felt like you were laying down which is why you would shift that could be no VTEC for sure that's why I was that's the same thing in the me man remember you like your shifting early that's like yeah there's nothing like making 40 crazy pounds then - yeah but no Vito is going nowhere so there's nothing worth the check well that is going to be it for today we just spent most of the day getting the engine tore down for the mr2 so like I said we will have that thing back up and running hopefully soon I did have Brent come look at the prelude as well we pulled up the last log just to try to see what was going on with this thing and we're still not too sure what the issue was when we were down in Texas we did also just pull the VTech solenoid off to check that but it appears to be fine the screen and stuff inside the cylinder is clean and we did hook up a power probe to it and make sure it clicks on and stuff so the solenoid seems like it's fine I think tomorrow we're gonna throw this thing on the dyno and kind of sort through it and just see what her deal is there's also a chance that the tune could have been corrupted after Brent reuploaded the new adjustments because the first pass was made in the prelude it was spinning like crazy but it still went through all the gears fine and still had plenty of power and felt right you know it felt good it just didn't hook up and then after he made the corrections to turn it down some that's when it started acting all funny it is pretty common that when you send a new tune to the ECU that it can get corrupt and the car sometimes doesn't even start again and it just runs really rough so that could be a possibility as well so hopefully we get this thing sorted out soon so we can get back to the track and try to go after that record go for a personal best and just see what this thing can do now that it's turned up but that is going to be it for today guys so I hope you enjoyed and thanks for watching\n"