Stay tuned

[Jason@SportsCar]

I couldn't convince myself that the sedan was the better choice, so I picked up a 2012 3-door. Will start the next chapter some time after the first of the year.

Time to sell the sedan.

[CrankyOldMan]

Can't wait to see what you come up with for this one!

[ern-diz]

Originally Posted by CrankyOldMan

Can't wait to see what you come up with for this one!

+1

[Jason@SportsCar]

Originally Posted by CrankyOldMan

Can't wait to see what you come up with for this one!

It will pretty much be a carbon copy of the 2015, right down to the graphics since I am recycling the bodywork from the old car.

[Leegamer]

Racing egg incoming

[Jason@SportsCar]

Sent the sedan down the road today. Was a nice car, only 81k miles, someone got a great commuter.

Now I just have to resist the urge to start tearing into the 2012 before spring.

[Jason@SportsCar]

Not sure how I managed to let nearly a year go by without updating this...

In Jan 21' I started the 2015 build, aka H Prod Yaris 4.0. Really nothing new here, just a carbon copy of the last car, right down to the recycled bodywork - really the only parts used from the 218k donor car were the tub and the EPS. The plan was just to finish the car in time for the final Cal Club SCCA race of the season, which was supposed to take place at the new Buttonwillow track.

Stripping the well-used donor was a lot more work than the pristine new cars we had gotten from Toyota in the past, but the upside is this one is mine to keep, no crusher.

Phase 1, strip the car and send it down to Yawsport for a full cage.

[Bluevitz-rs]

Nice. I’m never on this site anymore much but I like getting the updates.

I take it this was a rust free shell?

[Jason@SportsCar]

Originally Posted by Bluevitz-rs

Nice. I’m never on this site anymore much but I like getting the updates.

I take it this was a rust free shell?

Rust free, and no signs of any wrecks. It was a delivery car for a bank, used to run around documents, racking up a ton of miles in the process. Since it had so many miles, and I still had all of the parts from the last racecar, every piece of stock running gear/suspenion was tossed.

[Jason@SportsCar]

Phase 2, paint the interior and start pulling all of the factory running gear.

[Jason@SportsCar]

Then it was time to install the rest of the safety gear and wrap up the interior. After winning our second Runoffs title in 2018 the SCCA raised our minimum race weight from 2019lbs to 2153lbs (post-race weight). With such a big weight hit I decided to try and retain the EPS. Most of the instructions I could find for stand-alone EPS require the early Yaris or Prius unit. Turns out you can in fact hot wire the 2012+ EPS, three-wire hookup, runs in failsafe mode. What a game-changer, should have put the EPS back in years ago.

In addition to the EPS, I went to a full-size battery, retained the full bumper beams (previously these were removed or lighted), cut a lot less metal out of the tub, and still had to add ballast.

[Jason@SportsCar]

The last step was installing all of the bodywork from the old racecar. Around this time I heard that the new Buttonwillow track was not going to be finished in 2021. So I took the opportunity to head up there in April and run an event way ahead of my planned completion date - after building so many of these they just kind of fall together.

It was an unseasonably warm weekend in April, and for the first time ever I overheated the soft compound Hoosier radial slicks. I believe this is largely due to the increased minimum weight and to some extent the EPS. When the car had manual steering it was really hard to overwork the front tires, with EPS you really have to take care not to stress the fronts. First race in the new car I was out front all but the last lap and a half, just couldn't hold off the much more nimble LBC. Sunday, race two, I decided to try and take it easy in the first half of the race, with the idea I would have better tires at the end, but I just couldn't keep the tires cool enough to challenge the LBC and finished 2nd again.

In 2022 I am going to play with a rear swaybar in an effort to take some load off of the front tires, if that doesn't do the trick I will move up to the medium compound slicks.

[Jason@SportsCar]

Then came July... With the ability to work remotely for the foreseeable future we accelerated our California exit strategy by two years, sold our house, and moved the family to central Florida. Super excited that we will be able to sample so many new "to us" tracks on the east coast in the coming years.

I am eyeing the Homestead and Sebring SCCA Majors in January 22', and my wife is looking forward to getting to run her Spec Miata Daytona.

[heeroyuy01195]

looking good!