Intro / Kind of a build thread

B6/7 S4/RS4
#1

Hey guys, just recently came here after JimmyBones suggested saying you are more technical than AZ.

A little background of myself…

I am from NE Ohio and currently work for Lexus of Akron-Canton. I have been racing since I was 12 years old. My father has been racing and working on cars since he was my age as well, so the whole go fast and work on cars runs in the family. I raced karts nationally until 2010 where I had won 3 WKA national championships and decided to move into a race car. Now my father and I race Mazda Miata’s in SCCA. I was my region’s Rookie of the Year in 2010 and have been racing SCCA’s national tour since then. I race in a spec miata class where we have to run OEM parts except for a few items where we have spec parts such as suspension and wheels. I also have my dads tube chassis '92 body Camaro where he used to run SCCA and also the Kelly American Challenge. I am currently rebuilding the car so that I can run the car in vintage racing.

Along with my racing with my father, I also crew for a buddy of mine where we race in the Go Trans Am series. We raced a Howe Racing Chassis Mustang bodied car last year but we are working on building a new chassis with a Camaro body this year.

Now to my car. I have a 2004 S4 which I bought about 2 years ago.

Current mod list:
JHM 93oct Tune
JHM Ported Intake - which I ported the elbow as well.
JHM 6rib LWCP kit
JHM Oil Cooler w/ Accusump setup
JHM Trio SS Package
034 Motorsport Billet “Motorsport” Track Mounts
Stern Track Density Trans Mount
Apikol Track Density Rear Diff Mount
Apikol Snub
2.5" catless custom exhaust
FK Highsports (I got them dirt cheap, cant wait to replace them)
034 Density Line Control Arms
034 Density Line Strut Mounts

Since Feburary, I ran into a lot of maintanance issues. I have replaced what feels like pretty much a majority of the car. Wheel bearings, axles, rotors, pads, rebuilt the rear calipers, replaced a lot of connector housing and plastic peices in the engine bay, and put the JHM pintle caps on my injectors as well.

Here are some pictures of my car and a few things I have worked on.

When I first bought the car:

http://i39.tinypic.com/ort3es.jpg

The exhaust build:

http://i39.tinypic.com/fwiy43.jpg

http://i40.tinypic.com/qn6wc8.jpg

When I wrecked my car:

http://i40.tinypic.com/286wqdc.jpg

Cleaning the motor during the rebuilding process:

http://i44.tinypic.com/143fjo3.jpg

After porting my elbow:

http://i57.tinypic.com/6hhzme.jpg

Powder coating and putting the bay back together:

http://i60.tinypic.com/w1y2pl.jpg

Mounting the accusump in my trunk:

http://i61.tinypic.com/15chx7a.jpg

Got rid of my armrest because I hate it:

http://i60.tinypic.com/21lqwpv.jpg

Test driving the car with no hood as I felt it was too cold for the carbon fiber:

http://i59.tinypic.com/1et01z.jpg

And finally with it all put back together:

http://i61.tinypic.com/x6d8nr.jpg

I’ve got more pics else where but this is a good intro to start. Looking forward to continuing work on my car.

Thanks JimmyBones for sending me here and helping with my questions!

#2

Welcome and nice car. You’ve got a lot of the same mods as me. And yes, Jimmy is right about this site and also happens to be one of the more technically minded people on here. I don’t think I’ve seen a problem go unsolved on this site. What are the next plans for the car?

#3

Well right now just trying to sort some bugs out with the car with Jimmy’s help.

In the future, I want to redo my suspension setup. Since I do a lot of road racing stuff and live close to Mid Ohio, I want to get my car setup so that I can track the car better. I plan on new coilovers, sway bars, endlinks, subframe bushings. Also going to get different wheels. Over the summer, I went low and ran peelers that were 19x8.5 et 25. To fit and looked good low, I had to put a 225 tire on it. I’m just tired of it honestly.

Other mods to help with tracking would be the JHM center diff, and LSD.

As far as more power mods, I want to get headers next. I dont know if supercharging is in the budget after doing all the suspension and headers. I’m not looking to have the fastest b6 s4 in the world but I want something I can track and handles decent. I’m not really a drag racing type so straight line speed isn’t as big of a deal to me. I want to take corners harder and faster so I need to get the car there first.

#4

Welcome lovin the car. The one thing you really notice is adding the led or high intensity bulbs really adds a new look to the car.

You are in the right place if your a car guy. All the big technical guys are here and usually we suggest members just help the guys on Audizine that need help to send them here. Even send the hard core car guys as we have all been here for a while. You will see a guy ask for help on Audizine and they won’t get an answer or if they do its wrong. The best bet usually is to just help send them here.

Did you make your own exhaust. I made one with a few friends. We saw a real big jump in tq and hp range with a X pipe added. How many miles are on the car

#5

Great looking car.

Welcome!

#6

The previous owner had put LED’s in the interior and put in the LED license plate lights.

When I had PM’d Jimmy on AZ, I even said I didn’t want to create a post looking for answers because I knew I wouldn’t get what I needed. Luckily Jimmy has been very helpful to me in determining whats going on.

The exhaust…well… At the time I had the exhaust done, I didn’t know how to weld. I literally learned to weld about 2 weeks ago. Never needed to weld myself as I had people I could have weld stuff up. In retrospect, I would have waited to have my exhaust done. I had an interesting idea for an exhaust setup, and I needed a shop to weld it up. One major advantage to my racing, I get a lot of good connections. I was able to have a buddies shop weld up my exhaust and I only had to pay for materials.

My exhaust idea was to have all 2.5" tubing, catless downpipes into an x pipe. I was told that old muscle car guys would put their mufflers forward on the car and run tube to the rear. It supposedly gave the car more of a “cammed” sound. So I was like, hmm a cammy sounding S4 would be badass. I’m going to try it. I ordered 2 round body Magnaflow mufflers from Summit Racing. ( I live 30 minutes from them and have a pro shop account, so yay discounts). I told my buddy my idea and got all the tubing to him.

He had his welder do all the exhaust work. So Im expecting to have a catless downpipe -> x pipe -> mufflers -> rest of pipes. When I pick my car up after it was done, I received catless downpipe -> h pipe -> mufflers -> rest of pipes.

I was pretty disappointed as the welder told me “he couldn’t fit an x pipe under the car” which we all know is complete bullshit. The exhaust was pretty much subpar welding and I don’t like how he positioned the pipes.

The down pipes come in to a V where the mufflers slide over and are held by a band clamp. Not a huge issue until you have to take the exhaust off and back on. Its very difficult to get the pipes slid in when you have a V. Then after the mufflers, one of the bends to the back was just an angle cut pipe welded together. It wasn’t even a mandrel bend like the other pieces I bought.

I want to redo my exhaust but I have bigger fish to fry and not time to do it right now. I was thinking of when I do my headers, I would build a new exhaust at that point in time

The car has 130k but the motor had been replaced at 60k. I am getting closer to doing a timing job as well. I like to tear apart once so I am trying to work out doing headers and timing at the same time. Only time and money will decide that part though

#7

Welcome, you will quickly find out that this is the site to go to for answers.

#8

Justin…for shits and giggles over my exhaust, I went to a car show in Coldwater, Mi earlier this year. It was mainly old muscle and they had a competition for the loudest exhaust…

My car won at 109.4 and I think second place was only 105.8 if I remember right LOL

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KWeY_THdyOo

I think the only good thing about my exhaust is the sound of it

#9

lmfao, love the video. I love how when u go to the the track u always catch a little flack for having an import until they see or HEAR it lol. good win my man sounds deadly.

#10

welcome. if you’re a road racing guy, headers are definitely for you. on my A6 it felt like it moved the entire power band 1000 rpm earlier (ie the car was as torquey at 2k rpm as it had been at 3k rpm).

nice work on the elbow as well. good see people doing stuff like that again, I’ve been harping on that as a small job since 2010. lots of the newer guys had just been sticking with cookie cutter stuff and no one was getting much faster.

I vote for 17’s with a fat tire for wheels (as long as the stock brakes are sufficient)

#11

Amazing video! Welcome to the site. You’ll make lots more friends here with that sort of banter :slight_smile:

#12

More torque is always a good thing for road racing. Mid Ohio seems to love high torque cars. I know with my spec miata stuff, the 01-02 cars with the VVT have about ~4-5 ft lbs of more torque than my 99. They pull 2 cars off a corner if all is equal. But since I have about ~3 peak hp more I generally catch them by end of the straight.

Again, my racing connections helped me a ton with the elbow. A good friend of mine is a big motor builder. He builds a lot of the offshore boat racing motors. Those guys will run 2 1200HP motors. Absolutely insane to watch one on the engine dyno. So he did the porting for me. He won’t charge me but the bad part is he will only do it on his down time. I think he had my intake setup for a month lol

The stock brakes appear to be sufficient enough for spirited driving. I currently run Carbotech XP10 race pads and the car will stop on a dime. My only concern right now is if I do track it, will my OEM rotors hold up? A few laps of hard braking I wouldn’t be surprised if they warped. I think some lightweight slotted rotors will be a must on my list for track setup.

Thinking about the weight of my car and the potential speeds I could be carrying down the back straight at Mid Ohio, I think the stock brakes could handle a few laps but not a ton. I think upgrading rotors and calipers is a must to be able to have hard, late braking. Driving easy is never fun :slight_smile:

As for wheels, I was thinking of the Forgestar F14 and running a 255 tire would be my best option, especially if I go BBK.

#13

Headers really transform the car. They make it so much more fun.

Good work on the intake elbow. I would have done the same thing if I had remembered a little while ago. Beem has been posting about it for a while now.

As for wheels I would go Enkei RPF1s in 18x8 ET 35 with stock size tires. I have a set with Michelin Sport Cup tires in 235/40/R18 and with wheel weights/valve stems they weigh 39.5 pounds.

The spare Avus stock wheel and Goodyear tire that I had weighed 53 pounds so that is a big difference.

The F14 Forgestars with the 265/35/R18 tires weighed 46.5 pounds which is still noticeably lighter than stock but not the lightest possible setup.

The Enkei wheels also clear the front JHM BBK without spacers too. Just in case you want to upgrade the front brakes.

#14

Weight is a decent factor on wheel and tire choice but I would think a 235 wouldn’t be sufficient for that type of driving and especially being driven hard. I had thought about getting the PF01 18x9 et35 which are ~20 lbs. I have a personal preference for Kumho Tires and their LE Sport in a 255/35 is ~27lbs. Their XS in a 265/35 is about ~27lbs as well.

Even their XS in a 235/40 is ~26lbs, and I think the RPF1 is ~18lbs. I’m sure the Pilot Sport Cups are probably quite a bit lighter.

I want to stick with a max or extreme performance summer tire rather than a designated track tire as whatever wheels I get will be driven on all summer until I could get a designated track wheel/tire setup. Unfortunately my budget will hold that back since I have plans for other big expenses like the headers, different suspension and possible BBK

#15

Anyone track their car with a 235/40 summer tire? How did it perform and hold up?

#16

dude that is one of the funniest things ever. THat old toothless son of a bitch thought he was all funny, and then you blew their fucking ears off.

Great job sticking it to everyone.

#17

Everyone has their preference on tires. A lot of people like Kumhos, Hankooks, Pirellis, etc. I am a big Michelin fan so I run only Michelin tires on my cars.

The only reason that I have the Michelin Sport Cup tires is because I got a hell of a deal on them. The vast majority of the time I run the Michelin Pilot Super Sport summer tires or Michelin Pilot Alpin PA3 winter tires. It is scary trying to drive my S4 in the winter with summer tires still on it since the summer tires become like hockey pucks and I spin everywhere.

Tirerack lists the different weights of wheels and tires that they sell. According to Tirerack, my Michelin Sport Cup tires weigh the same 22 pounds as the rest of the other kind of Michelin’s same size tires (PS3, PS2, PSS, PA3, etc).

Also I tracked my car with the F14s and wide tires a few weeks ago. The tires handled great except if I got overzealous with the gas pedal and the car wasn’t going mostly straight. Would have been better if I could have turned ESP off because of the mechanical grip from the LSDs in the front and back.

#18

I can get a pretty good deal on tires through work. I have run Kumho’s with no issues yet but I have considered Michelin’s for the car. Knowing their weight is about 5lbs less than the Kumho’s I may go that route this summer.

Still got a ways out until summer so I have plenty of time to choose a wheel/tire combo

I drove on some light snow once with my Kumho SPT. At the time I drove an hour to work everyday and I think my butt was puckered the entire drive. Straight one minute, pointed at the opposite sides ditch the next LOL

#19

And I won this trophy LOL

https://fbcdn-sphotos-b-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-xpa1/v/t1.0-9/10294450_10202979028529464_6597634643191676913_n.jpg?oh=a01bd7ac80aac054d8eb836aef409500&oe=551D8E86&gda=1423332496_9fad47bf5b99ab074678e2e98a0a9b78

#20

She’s a trophy all right! Supportive too. My wife thought it was so cute when she gave you the ‘way to go babe!’