Flyin' Miata : Projects: The V8 Miata Project

August 11, 2008 - The rear end is complete.
The new hubs are installed as are the halfshafts. The rear end kit also comes with extended, high strength ARP studs.
entry 61

August 11, 2008 - This is the sort of problem that the GM specialists know already.
If it was a Miata, we'd know it! The thermostat from our Firebird donor is different from that on our Corvette LS2 water pump. The good thing about using a GM engine is that we'll have one tomorrow from NAPA.
entry 62

August 11, 2008 - The intake system is very complex.
An air intake temperature sensor and a MAF. The air filter is the same size usually seen on a 90 hp Honda.
entry 63

August 11, 2008 - The steering column is back in.
We installed a little bit of wiring. Not a whole lot, just enough to start the car. Start the car?
entry 64

August 11, 2008 - It's alive!
After discovering that we needed to plug in the ignition switch (whoops) and put a jumper in the diagnostic box to trigger the fuel pump (we'll sort that out later), the car burst into life.
We didn't run it for long, being without a charging system or a cooling system - but everyone within earshot got a big goofy grin on their face from hearing the big woofle come from a Miata.
entry 65

August 13, 2008 - Time for a cooling system.
We're using a Miata radiator - one of our aluminum race units - and it all hooks up easily with some formed hoses.
entry 66

August 13, 2008 - We did a lot of work without taking a lot of pictures.
The wiring is all tidied up, the interior is back together and everything underhood has been stashed away. The shifter looks completely stock. We could even use a factoy knob if we wanted.
entry 67

August 13, 2008 - Time to hit the scales.
As you may remember, we weighed the car when we started this project. At that time, it was 2349 lbs with 51.4% of the weight on the front wheels. That's with a naturally aspirated engine, no turbo.
Now, we're at 2536 with 52.6% on the front. We have added slightly heavier wheels (4 lbs total) and the front sway bar isn't installed yet (10 lbs). But the car's gained less than 200 lbs, 62 of which ended up on the rear wheels.
Looking back at when Elvis ran the Superfour Challenge with a big turbo and water injection, he crossed the scales at 2530 lbs and 51.9% front weight.
entry 68

August 13, 2008 - After a quick cornerweighting job, the cross-weights are much better.
The front/rear didn't change, of course, but the car is better balanced now.
It's interesting to note that putting the top up changes the weight distribution from 52.6% front to 53.0%.
We just checked. A 2001 LS1 Corvette weighs 3214 lbs, with 51% of that on the front wheels.
entry 69

August 18, 2008 - No, it's not staying.
Keith really shouldn't be allowed around the vinyl cutter.
entry 70

August 21, 2008 - Elvis didn't quite make it on to the track for the Open House.
He was together and functional - self-propelled, even - but running really rich. It appears there were some documentation problems with the wiring changes we made or else we made some, ahem, undocumented alterations. We're troubleshooting now, and we're hoping to have him out for the track day this weekend.
Jon is probably seeing wires in his sleep.
EDIT - we found it. A broken ground wire, deep in the harness. We patched it, plugged everything else in and Elvis fired up with a purr. It'll be on the track this weekend.
entry 71

August 22, 2008 - The compleat engine bay.
Well, almost. The car's running happily and is ready for the track day, but we haven't hooked up the HVAC yet. Will it behave tomorrow? We'll find out soon enough.
The noise, though. Ooooo. What a great noise.
entry 72

August 25, 2008 - Track test!
The first time Elvis left the building, it was down to the alignment shop so we could make sure that all of the wheels were pointing in the correct directions. Then it was straight to the track for a day of pounding around. We like to baby our cars here.
How did it work? Right out of the box, it was running lap times comparable to our heavily modified Mazdaspeed. If we'd been running at the Open House, it would have been faster than all but three of our fastest customers. Bill had a big stupid grin on his face. The engine was so flexible that he decided to simply leave it in third gear all the time and surf around on the torque. And the noise - yum. The car sounded great and launched off corners beautifully.
Our track is excellent for torture-testing cooling systems. It's relatively slow, at high altitude with low humidity and high ambient temperatures of 96F on our test day. After two back-to-back sessions - which was overheating a stock Corvette - the temperature gauge had moved up to about 3/4. We currently have stock fans set to turn on at 210F and no ducting, so we consider that to be very good and easy to improve.
It wasn't a perfect day, though. The power steering belt came off at one point. We put it back on and took the car back out again. The tach was a little twitchy so we'll have to look at the wiring there, and we never did hook up the speedometer. So we have a little work to do, but not too much work to do.

Flyin' Miata LS1 V8 Conversion Video
entry 73

August 28, 2008 - One of the nice things about this swap is how tidy the engine bay is.
A set of Corvette coil covers and it'll almost look like someone stuck a non-functional engine mockup in there - but it's far from non-functional!
This is the fully running configuration. We haven't plumbed in the heating or AC systems yet, but it's ready for a cross-country trip should the need arise.
entry 74

September 15, 2008 - Elvis has a bad Friday night.One of our neighbors was moving out and one of her friends backed into Elvis with a ford expedition.
Were they planning on telling us? Noooo. But they were stupid enough to come back with the same vehicle with Lotus metallic blue paint on their bumper. Busted. Poor Elvis.
entry 75

September 25, 2008 - Steam fitting!

There is a steam vent for the heads which has to plumb into the top of the radiator. Being the lazy type, I just drilled an upper fan mount bung all the way through and tapped for a hose barb.
entry 76

October 14, 2008 - Keith and Brandon took Elvis out for a little exercise.
18 runs later, they agreed that it was a whole lot of fun on the autocross course. The venue was a race put on by the local Corvette club - it seemed appropriate!
The speed of the car is deceptive until you have something to measure it against. The accelerator does a lot more than it does in most Miatas, that's for sure! The handling was perfect, other than the option of power oversteer at any time the car handled just like a Miata.
Needless to say, one of them took the fastest time of the day. The other was less than 0.3 seconds behind. The fastest Corvette was nearly 5 seconds slower.
entry 77

November 19, 2008 - We added some Corvette "fuel rail covers" to our engine to clean it up underhood.
These cover a lot of ugly wiring. Since we'd flipped our fuel rails around to adapt to the Miata's fuel feed location, we had to trim the passenger's side cover to clear the pulsation damper as well as our throttle cable bracket.
entry 78

November 19, 2008 - The engine looks so much better with the coil covers in place.
Now, should we paint them blue?
entry 79

December 3, 2008 - We've started another V8 install.
This one is going to run a 480 hp LS3. Yikes!
We'll be documenting the whole thing, of course. You can watch it here or subscribe to the RSS feed.
entry 80

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