Category Archives: Build Thread

full build thread, including repairs and updates

Ghost Flames on hood

When I bought the carbon fiber hood in 2016, it was in perfect condition from another Dart owner in Wisconsin. I drove the hood home and installed it, and one week later showed up to Midwest Chicago, only to find a large crack in the front of the hood.

I later added hood pins, but the damage was already done. I had it sanded and re-clear-coated, however, the damage went down into the carbon fiber fabric and couldn’t be fully eliminated.

I came up with an idea to cover the damage, and to make the car look a bit cooler, even though it is a pretty subtle modification. First of all, I did some research and looked up some flame patterns, and decided on a theme that I liked, and something that would work for my application.

I started with thin 1/8″ pin striping tape and laid out the pattern of the flames, being careful to cover all of the cracked areas. The tape peels up fairly easily to allow fixes and manipulation of the design.

Then I filled in the rest of the space with 1″ painters tape.

Time to spray the plastidip – I used 10 coats.

It did not peel perfectly, and did not look great until I touched it up. This was right after the tape was pulled off:

After everything was peeled, I used some Xylene and cotton swabs to carefully clean up the edges of the dip, where it started to stick to the tape. The xylene melts and re-activates the dip so you can fix peels, and smooth out edges. You can also “melt” down the corners and edges a bit to make it cleaner looking and stick better.

Final product: (in the rain)

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Headlights V4, Rust Fix, Ignition Coils, Sequential Turn Signals, Shifter

Many things happened at once, as once the front end is apart, it makes sense to add everything at one time, especially if you have other transportation available. The weather has been nice, so my bicycle has been seeing some love during this transition.

First up, the 4H-Tech short-shifter kit, used under the hood connected to the transmission. It works great with the MPX STS and solid bushings – You wouldn’t believe how tight the shifts are – it’s like sex! Installation is pretty simple, but the difficult part is connecting the tiny metal pin clip to secure the new linkage. I recommend using a pair of long needle nosed pilers to hold and attach the clip. The website is visible in the picture below:Untitled

I wanted this design I made for my shifter – Cravenspeed.com will custom print the top portion of their knob, so I made this happen:Untitled UntitledUntitledUntitled

Plasti dipped the back portion of the my stripe – what used to be the Horse-Drawn Records logo, as well as the spoiler that was orange:UntitledUntitled

Upon removing the spoiler, I found the previous genius that installed the spoiler did nothing to seal the hole, or to prevent future rust. By hand, I sanded the tiny portions of rust buildup under the spoiler mounts down to bare metal. I used some rust inhibitor, then cleaned it again and added primer and new orange paint. Also sealed the trunk side, as well.UntitledUntitled UntitledUntitledUntitled

Also painted the rear tow hook orange, and the front one black: Untitled2018

Gloss black roof wrap, using Vvivid vinyl:Untitled

Anyone know where the oil dipstick is?Untitled2018

What’s for dinner? Headlights? Awesome, Dad!! 10 minutes at 220 degrees and BAM!2018201820182018

Color matched eyelids:201820182018

Chicagoland Darts in the house!! #trytokeepup 20182018201820182018201820182018UntitledUntitledUntitledUntitled

Headlights re-assembled:2018Untitled2018Untitled

Finally replaced the factory OEM ignition coils. *tip – If you are patient, you can find these Bosch coils overseas on ebay for $50 each, including shipping if you look around.UntitledUntitled

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Finally, painted black fascia pieces and orange trim, replaced the fog lights with sequential fog lights, brought through the front, then sealed with silicone:UntitledUntitledUntitled

Raw AF! UntitledUntitledUntitledHeadlights V4Headlights V4Headlights V4Untitled

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Methanol / Water Injection, Boost Leak Fixes, & Solenoid Installation

First of all, if you are confused about methanol injection, then you should read these articles:

http://speed.academy/methanol-injection-explained-power-gains/
http://www.hotrod.com/articles/how-to-boost-engine-power-with-water-methanol-injection/
http://www.stangtv.com/tech-stories/engine/get-schooled-water-methanol-injection-101/

Meth injection provides knock protection, cools the engine intake manifold, and allows for more aggressive timing in a tune.  It can also add horsepower by allowing more boost pressure, prevent heat soak, steam clean your pistons, and keeps the turbo running at peak performance.

This installation was done with the kit from Eurocompulsion / HPSI, but is packaged with parts from DevilsOwn – it is a really nice kit.  Mine may be slightly different, as I bought it used and made a few changes.

Here is the kit.
water meth kit

The first thing I did was mapped everything out –  I chose to mount the tank and relay in the trunk, and put the rest under the hood.  I already had constant power in the trunk for my sound amplifier, and there was also a ignition switched line to the trunk, used for remote power to switch the amp on with the ignition.  (These installations can be found here.)

Before I installed anything, I had to prep the tank.  The black part is a tank empty sensor – the plastic part floats, and when the levels drops, it completes the circuit.  This can be drilled near the bottom of the tank, and the wires are run to a small red LED in my dash.  The red and black thing is the check valve – this is installed as close as possible to the nozzle on the IC pipe.

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This picture shows the spray nozzle that I tapped into the cold side IC pipe.  I suggest removing the part, drilling it, and then clean out all of the shavings 100%.  The instructions specify the hole size, as well as the size to tap the threads.

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These lines easily run along the drivers door liner, underneath the plastic tray inside – there is plenty of room, and then into the truck.  I used a distributor block for the constant power, mounted to the trunk.  Here is the wiring diagram for the meth kit – I had to later change a couple of things to implement the solenoid valve for the factory boost leak.

Boost retainer valve
The relay shows it needs constant and switched power, however, when I added the powered solenoid, it caused the pump to run constantly.  It took me a minute to figure it out – The added solenoid closes the circuit, so I had to later modify the diagram above.  BOTH PIN 30 AND PIN 86 OF THE RELAY MUST BE CONNECTED TO CONSTANT POWER.

It works fine if you just install the meth, but the boost leak needs this change, if you want the solenoid powered from the pressure sensor.

In the trunk, the relay connects to ground, and there are easy grounding screws behind the carpet – I mounted mine on the left side, and cut out the floor liner.  This way, I can still access the spare tire, and under the carpet without moving the tank.  I also had to cut a small slit behind the tank to allow the wires to pass through behind the tank unnoticed.

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Cleaned up:Untitled

All of the connections were soldered and waterproofed, using liquid electrical tape.  Two pins went to power through the distribution block, and one line directly to the pump (very short line) and then only one line needs to run under the car, all the way up to the engine bay.  This line connects pin 85 and the pressure switch.  You’ll want to connect this to the “NO” pin, or “normally open.”  This line will also connect to one of the pins on the solenoid, also in the engine bay.  It doesn’t matter which pin – it is easiest to crimp both wires together to the connector on the pressure sensor, and then waterproof it.

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You do not need to use the NC (normally closed) tab on the pressure sensor for this application.  You can see the brass T I’ve added, to give boost pressure to the boost gauge and the pressure sensor above.

Boost retainer valve

This is the T that came with the kit – perhaps it works in the Abarth, but it wasn’t the correct size(s) for my installation: Untitled

Use some heavy wire when you run the line underneath the car.  There is plenty to tie wrap it up to, to keep everything secure.  The line is also fused, to be safe. Ground the remaining pin from the pressure switch under the hood – there is an easy one next to the fuse box.

The pressure switch is connected to your throttlebody spacer (if you have one) or teed into the line for your boost gauge, if different.  This has a thumb dial to adjust – set it to about 12-14 psi.  I am spraying with nozzle #2, or 350 ml/minute, which is equal to 5.55 US gallons per hour.  This can be adjusted to your taste and climate.

The second line in the pressure switch goes to ground, and can be purchased on ebay – I found it relatively cheap here.  The second line of the solenoid goes directly to the battery, or constant power.

Use this search term in ebay if the listing goes away: “1/4 inch NORMALLY OPEN 12V DC VDC Brass Solenoid Valve NPT”  Then I purchased two 1/4″ NPT to barb connectors from home depot, and inserted this solenoid between the cold side IC Pipe and the intake.
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The evap system also tees into this line, so you’ll want to make sure you insert it before the T, or on the driver’s side.  The direction of the valve is going out of the IC pipe, towards the intake.

boost leak routing

I suggest you review this post by Greg from EC for more info.

The second factory boost leak was discovered by my good friend, Josh Cook ( @Jmcook321 on the .org ) tinkering with his engine.  When he ran a boost leak test, he heard air rushing out of the separator.  For $6.00 on Amazon, you can get a one way check valve that blocks this flow, in the line where my oil catch can is located, between the PCV and the intake manifold.  (Search 10mm 3/8″ check valve.) I don’t have the numbers, but it is likely small gains on the low end RPM, and it is a very easy fix.

check valve 3check valve 1

The arrow below shows the direction of the valve – all you have to do is cut the line, and insert this check valve – super easy!check valve 2

The methanol mixture I use is from Walmart – the winter washer fluid.  Most winter washer fluid is about 33% methanol – If you want 50/50 blend, you have to purchase “Boost Juice.”  The stuff at Walmart is posted as $2.00 per bottle, but when I checked out, it rang as $0.50 per bottle – this may have been an error, but still a ton cheaper than the boost juice.

boost juice

This is what EC recommends:Untitled

Meth party:Untitled
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Completed Installation:Untitled

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Modification List (mods, part list)

Appearance Mods:

AVS Vent Shades

Blacked Out Tail Lights (VHT night shades)

Blind Spot Mirrors (generic, Auto Zone)

Carbon Fiber Door Pillars, Interior (hand wrapped)

Carbon Fiber 3rd Party Heated Driver’s Seat

Ceiling Interior Logo

Dartlene Front Wind Splitter, Side Skirts and Rear Diffuser

De-badged

Demon Eyes and Starry Night Halo Headlights

Dragon Eyes Headlight Tint with Carbon Fiber Eyelids

DRL LED Switchbacks

Eagle Eyes Black Headlights

Grill Installation with LEDs

HIDs (Xenon-Vision H11 bulbs)

Knight Rider LEDs & Strobe Lights (ebay)

LED Reverse / Backup Lights

Mud flaps (Rally Armor)

Orange Painted Calipers

Painted Engine Bay, Door Handles, HDP Logo on fuse cover

Plastic Dip door handles, front fascia

Rear Diffuser

Sirius LED White/Amber Fog Lights

Spoiler

Steering wheel HDP badge 

Third Brake Light HDP logo

Tow Hook – front & rear

Trunk Lettering

Underbody Multicolor LEDs

Vinyl Graphics – racing stripes, hash marks, company logo, record label logo

Wheel Pin-striping

Window Tint 35%/5%/5%

 

 

Electronics:

1/0 AWG Ground Wire (engine bay grounds)

10” Subwoofer & Custom Enclosure

Bullz Audio Distribution Block (2)

Hifonics HFXR 2 or 3 way Crossover (for Subwoofer)

Kicker 41KSC354 3.5″ 2-way Dash Speakers

Polk DB691 3-way 6X9″ Speakers (4)

Raizin Voltage Stabilizer & grounding kit

Remote Start

Schoche Line out convertor & Spinning Subwoofer grill

Unichip Q4 with custom tune(s) Syked ECU Custom Tune

 

 

Engine & Performance Mods:

Brisk Racing Spark Plugs

CDV Delete

Deyeme Rear Engine Mount

DRP Intercooler Pipes (hot & cold side)

Electronic Cutout Exhaust with Custom 2.5” Midpipe

Forge BOV

GFB DV+

HDG Performance Front Mount Intercooler (28″ X 7″ X 2.5”)

HPSI RAM Air intake System

James Dean Muffler 2.5″ Straight Stainless Steel Split Exhaust

 

Jegs Air/Oil Separator

K & N Apollo / Typhoon Ram Air / Cold Air Intake

Metal Shifter Link Clips

MPX Ported Throttle Body

Road Race Motorsports High-Flow Catted Downpipe & Lightweight Pulley

 

 

Interior Mods:

Halo ProSport Boost Gauge

Momo Shift Knob with Chameleon Accent

MPX Short Throw Shifter & Base Bushings

Multi-Color Floating Island Bezel

Orange Ice Scrapper

Pedal Kit (custom with clutch spacer)

Phone Mount

Pin-striping

Redline Leather Shift Boot

Ultra-Gauge

Under dash/seat LED lighting & Strobe

 

 

Wheels & Suspension:

Eibach Pro Line Lowering Springs

Progress Rear Sway Bar

Sickspeed Spiked Lugs with Conversion

TSW Bathurst Wheels in gunmetal black – 19 x 8

Tires 235/19/8 with custom lettering

Tow Hooks (2) – generic/eBay neo chrome

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High Decibel Air Horn

I installed a twin tone, 139 decibel air horn under the hood, right near the front grill, facing outward.  Used in conjunction with the stock horn, this thing is really LOUD!  The horn was wired through a relay, installed under the hood, and still runs off of 12v power.  I put a red illuminated switch, just to the left of the shifter, and I wired it to stay illuminated while the car is running.

The horn is Stebel Nautilus Compact Mini Air Horn.

Wiring Instructions:20160615_200117 Pinout: 20160615_195819

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Hood Pins Installed (on carbon fiber hood)

Hood Pins Installed – A local car tech suggested to keep my new carbon fiber hood looking good for years to come, I should secure it with hood pins. This will keep it from cracking over time, and a safety net from the hood latch separating from the carbon and snapping up during extreme driving. Less than a week later, the clearcoat on the CF started to get a crack near the hood latch. I immediately ordered hood pins, including gaskets, so no metal would be touching the carb fiber. The hood needs to be re-clear coated in 1-2 years, so no biggie, but I wanted to ensure it stays this way.

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WOT BOX INSTALLATION HOW-TO: Turbo Dart

What is a wot box? What does it do? Why?

WOT Box – N2MB Racing
Launch Control
Launch Control – what is it?
Anti-lag System

Answer: Why not?

Enough with the reading, here we go:

First of all, I used to run a Unichip Q4, which used a harness that connects to the PCM, basically inserting itself between the PCM and the car. This made my install quite easy, as I could tap into all of the needed wires from within my harness, without any cutting, splicing, or modifying of the factory wires, except for one. Below is the cryptic instructions I received from their customer service, upon asking if it would work. There were mixed reviews on what would work, what wouldn’t work, and how to do it, as I reached out to several people who had done it before on other social media sites, and I now know the full details of this box.

The colors in the chart refer to the colors on the wot box. The one thing that may be different is the coil output wire, which may be black or orange, depending on the revision harness you receive. This is the basic pinouts from their website:

Below are the pinouts for both PCM connectors – one is slightly larger than the other, so they are easy to tell apart.  You will need to access both:
Dart PCM pinouts C1 connector

Dart PCD pinouts C2 connector

All of the wires tap into the lines in question, except for the ignition coils, which I’ll get to in a minute.  You simply need to tap into the the above wires, with the exception of the coils, in which the wot box is inserted into the path.  Skip the next paragraph if you are comfortable tapping off of electrical wiring, or using

I used a technique where I scrape the top layer off of one side of a wire, using a razor blade. You run the blade carefully down the side of the wire, basically stripping one side of the wire. You can make several passes to give you 1/4″ or so of bare wire, such as this (the actual wire won’t break so easily, as the crappy wire in the pic did – doesn’t matter, though, as the solder will solidify it) I did this quickly for these pics, but it’s easy to get perfect with no broken wires, with a little practice. (Yes, you can just use wire taps, but I make every connection under my hood waterproof, and wire taps look like sh!t) Next, add a small amount of solder flux to the exposed wire. Then, add your solder to the bare wire. This is very easy using the flux ,as it forces the solder to melt away any hanging rubber and seal perfectly to the wire:

The connection is then covered with liquid electrical tape:

Be sure to tin the new wire as well, so when you make the connection they bond. If wires are soldered properly, the bond will be far stronger than the wire.

We need to tap into the wires below:
(PCM Wire Harnesses)
Green clutch large connector pin 84 (light green/orange)
Black ground pin 2 large connector (black)
Blue accelerator pedal pin 83 large connector (white/brown)
Yellow injectors pin 3 small connector (blue/black)

The ignition coil power splice (RED / ORANGE) is to all the coils. The  WOT Box needs to be able to cut power to all the coils.  You can find this on the back on the fuse block – Fuse #16 (15 AMP) – brown/yellow wire.  This is also a dark blue/red wire at Coil #1, pin #2.  I do not recommend running bare wire directly over the engine block to connect at this end, it is better to do it at the fuse block.  If you use my method, you can remove the Wot Box at any time in 60 seconds!

The last part of the N2MB pinout instructions above, in red, is very cryptic. This is what it means – you need to interrupt power to all 4 ignition coils at once, by inserting the wot box in this line – out to the box, from the box back to the line.  Some users spliced into the four wires at the engine block, but this seems like trouble, to me. Instead, there is a brown/yellow wire coming directly out of Fuse #16 in the engine bay. If you pull the fuse block up a bit, you can get to this wire and cut it. I went the extra step, and soldered a waterproof connector here: wot box coil connectors

In other words: “Cut the brown/yellow wire in half, the piece going into the fuse gets wired to the RED wire on the wot box so it supplies 12V to the WOT box, and the other part of the cut wire goes towards the coils, so the orange wire goes there, allowing the WOT box to turn ON/OFF power to the coils.”

This way, the whole thing can be quickly removed. When not in use, the male/female connectors complete the circuit as usual. When they are plugged into the lines to the wot box, it gives the wot box power, and completes the circuit. This was a bit of extra work, but makes for a clean installation, and can be removed to repair, go to the dealership, etc. The red line goes to the fuse, which gives the box 12V+ power, the orange (or 2nd black) goes out to the four coils. You can confirm this with a multi-meter.

These are the waterproof connectors, and I also added liquid electrical tape to every connection, for added safety.

Both the wot box and the Unichip fit nicely in the fuse box – at the bottom you can kind of see the waterproof connectors inserted to the coils:

Finished installation:

The voltages had to be adjusted to work with the Dart. Our throttle peaks @ 1.95V, so you have to drop the APP voltage from 3.0 down to 1.6, and the other settings should look like this:

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Under the Hood LEDs and Spinning Subwoofer Grill Switch

Getting things wrapped up for the big Midwest Dart meet – Just a few last thread updates, before I close up this build thread. Some minor updates – I wired in a 3-way switch in the trunk. This powers the spinning subwoofer grill, LEDs in the trunk, and the orange El Wire outlining the subwoofer. I can help if anyone wants to do this – the switch is on-off-on. The first on is constant (for car shows, etc) the off is, well, off; the (lower) on is switched ignition power.

Finally, since I got the hood, there is a vent, so I can show light through it. I put the white engine lights on a separate switch with constant power, so I can turn these on from inside the engine bay.

off:

on:

New hood with demon eyes, hash stripes removed:

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Rear Diffuser How-to

Final segment of the custom ground effects kit – the rear diffuser fins. This works with the existing OEM part, and mine has the dual exhaust, but it really doesn’t matter. First thing I did was figure out a plan, and create a template out of cardboard. It took several tries to match the curve of the car. Any spaces and there is less for the adhesive to stick, plus it wouldn’t look right – it took me about 4 revisions before I was happy with it.

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Once I had it right, I found a very cheap source for inexpensive ABS plastic – I traced these out and was able to fit 4+ on a sheet, and I only needed / wanted 4

I sanded them down, used adhesive promoter, then plastic primer, then finally the black paint:

I painted these black, as well. They were used on the bottom to secure them in. On the top, holes were pre-drilled and then screwed into the plastic diffuser.[/url]

Finished product:

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