- The English Racing Integra is probably one of the most recognised Integras
in both drag racing and half mile race events anywhere in the world.
We're here with Myles from English Racing.
The car's just run 208 mile an hour, a new personal record here
at Airstrip Attack 2018.
Myles I just wanted to take some time and find out a little bit more about
what makes this Integra so fast.
So can you start basically with the development of the car from when
you got it, what sort of steps did you take with it?
- Yeah so I grew up drag racing an Integra just like this
in the Dominican Republic where I spent about six years.
And when I came here I bought this car 100% stock,
and then it's just been a progression since then.
I did your typical bolt on, full bolt on, you know 185 wheel,
then I put a turbo kit on it and 280, and then just went up from there
and it went from to that, all the way to what it is today.
And the biggest steps have been, to me ECU is the biggest key
on this car.
Traction control, everything that it has is big.
And I've done a lot of arrow work on it too, which that helps.
But I felt like as soon as I put the dog box and the ECU in it,
the car just went so much faster.
Every safety I can put in on it is there.
Fuel pressure, coolant pressure, oil pressure fail safes,
lambda fail safes, it's all there, EGT, it's all there.
- Let's just come back and talk about that engine a little bit.
Obviously you've talked about the development,
you started naturally aspirated, went to a bolt on turbo kit,
and you're very far away from that right now.
So let's talk about the base block.
So it's based around B18C block, can you tell us what's done inside.
- Yeah so it's English Racing built, so we actually assemble,
actually I assembled the shocks, so technically, I'm not a tech,
I'm just the office guy.
- You're the one people ring up and talk to.
- I'm the one people ring up, talk to,
I have to know everything about all cars,
and I'm pretty knowledgable, so I built the whole engine
with obviously, my engine builder there, TJ,
definitely pointed me in the right direction of what I need to do,
he usually shows me the first thing and I build it all.
So it's custom Wiseco piston hard anodised.
It's almost an 11:1 compression motor, CP Carrillo custom rods,
the most expensive steel rod they've ever made for a Honda they said.
And it's a stock Integra type R crank actually so they're a tiny bit
heavier than a GSR.
84.5 mil bore and so it ends up being like a 1.956 litre engine.
- Now talk to us about that bore, can I assume that you've at least
sleeved it?
- Yeah it's a gold needle sleeve block, yes.
- So this is one of the big problems where you start making really big
boost, really big power with the Honda engine,
most aluminium blocks in general, the factory sleeves are very thin,
and they don't hold up so the sleeving is essential in your opinion?
- Yeah I'd say if you don't have an iron sleeve of some sort or something,
you're only gonna be able to make so much power.
Once you get to the level of over 1000 wheel,
however you look at it, a four cylinder's not that reliable,
I mean you can only do so much to keep 'em.
But if you didn't have a sleeve block, you're definitely fighting it,
yeah you're not gonna do it.
- In terms of the power level you're running here today at Airstrip attack,
and the boost level you're using to achieve that,
can you let us know where you're at?
- Yeah so that pass right there, fourth and fifth gear were like
45.5 pounds and the last event I went to which was at sea level,
I ran 207 but that took 54 pounds to do it.
The main difference is traction was really bad there,
and then here if you make the same power here,
you're always gonna go faster because of the air being thinner.
The problem is making the power is always harder.
- So we understand here really it is a catch 22.
The air density right now, barometric air pressure, sitting around 80 kPa,
typically we expect about 101 kPa at sea level.
So we're 20 kPa down, that means it's that much harder for the engine
to actually make power.
But the benefit that a lot of people may overlook is that it's easier
to push the car through the air.
My understanding is that this really benefits the higher power cars
running north of 200 mile an hour, more than the lower powered cars,
is that fair?
- Yeah to me anything over like 180, 190,
it's definitely an advantage on that arrow wise.
I have some good data from a couple of years ago when I was here
with the arrow I had then, the power I had then versus now,
and everything I've done just shows that up here it definitely has a good
six, seven miles an hour more from the quarter mile to the half mile.
And yeah a lot of people do forget, they're like oh you know,
probably 'cause they're used to your naturally aspirated cars,
that they're stuck with what you got.
You can't turn up the boost on a naturally aspirated car.
So when you come up here, if you have turbo,
your turbo, and if you're not maxed out at sea level,
you'll go faster here every time.
- What sort of turbo are you using to create that boost pressure?
- Yeah it's a Precision 7675 Gen 2.
- And boost control?
- It's got two MAC three port, or I guess you'd call 'em
MAC three port boost controllers.
Right now it has 6.5 pound springs in the gates.
Unfortunately the design of everything, it creeps to 20, 38, 30 pounds.
- So you're running twin external wastegates?
- Yeah twin 34 mil gates but it won't run any less than 30 pounds
no matter what I do right now.
So that is kind of a problem, good thing about that is really
first an second gear can't actually make enough load to put that much
boost down so it kind of works out good.
A single three port got me 54 pounds.
So I do have a second three port that'll put pressure to the top.
But I haven't had to use it yet.
I might have to use it tomorrow if I wanna go faster.
- OK so there's no secret that it's reasonably easy to make a lot of power
with Honda engines, they are a very well designed engine,
particularly in the cylinder head department.
One of the challenges though is when you're making a lot of power,
getting it to the ground reliably in the gearbox is a weak point.
So how have you addressed that?
You mentioned a dog box earlier in our chat, what are you running?
- So this is actually a Graf, they're out of Argentina.
It's a five speed dog box.
So instead of your traditional four speed with a cuff in fifth gear,
this has five gears obviously.
I'm shifting fifth pretty much right at the end of the quarter here.
So I'm in fifth gear all the way to almost 10600, 10700 RPM.
It's straight cut dog box, nothing special, just custom ratios.
It all just works out for the car pretty well.
- With a dog box as well, one of the advantages particularly
for motorsport use is that they can be shifted clutchless
and often you can incorporate a gear change ignition cut
feature, are you doing that?
- So I have a strain gauge on it.
Right now I'm just logging how everything does before I actually set up the cut.
So I'm just seeing how much I actually do, do I keep my hand on it so I'm watching
all the voltage and the force that it has, before I implement the gear shift cut.
Right now I'm just full throttle clutch shifting.
It drops like two pounds on a shift.
- And for those who aren't aware, the strain gauge is basically
a gauge or sensor on the gear lever that detects how much effort
or load you're applying to it so the ECU can then cut the ignition.
OK in terms of the engine management side of things then,
obviously you've already mentioned that's quite critical.
You've mentioned the safety features and the traction control.
What is the ECU?
- So it's a Motec M130 right now, I have an M150,
I just haven't put it in there.
I figured in the beginning, I was like, oh I'm not gonna need any more
than 60 IOs and everything, I'll be fine,
but I got wastegate position sensors, I got shock plots I wanna put on,
so all these extra things that I have that M130's just not gonna be enough.
And it runs a John Reid Racing Honda package.
And I've had it in there since the beginning of 2016.
I was the first Honda package he had done.
And it's super successful, I mean John Reid puts everything that I need
in there and it all works, I can't argue, I loved it,
ever since then I've just never looked back.
- Now in terms of actually looking at data from the Motec ECU
once you're performed a run here, where are you looking at that data?
You've got a Motec dash in the car, are you analysing your data
from the dash or from the M1 ECU itself?
- Right now it's all strictly from the M1 ECU.
I did just unlock the IO and I did unlock the loggings for it.
So I will be using the dash, right now I just have a couple
of safetys that are on the dash that'll display.
Like if I over rev it or if the coolant pressure was above say 25 pounds,
longer than 500 milliseconds or something,
it'll display it during the run.
Other than that it's a nice display, shows me what's there,
it has some nice shift light and that's about all it's used for right now.
- I think probably it is overlooked actually, the real value
of the high powered, highly strung engine having a user display
there in the car and let's be honest, when the car's doing everything
it should do, you're not looking at it at all.
All you're gonna be doing is focusing on those shift lights.
But as soon as something goes outside those user defined parameters,
oil pressure, coolant pressure as you've mentioned,
then it'll bring up a warning light, and that lets you know something's
wrong so you can then put your attention onto the dash.
Now I just wanna focus on the pressure sensor that you just mentioned,
coolant pressure.
So that's one that we see a lot in drag racing,
can you just let us know why that's important.
- So I learned that hard way about not having coolant pressure on a car.
Everyone was like oh you should do coolant pressure,
this was like three years ago, and I'm like well once it pushes,
it's done right, so what's the point.
Well perfect example is I actually torched a head 'cause it just
basically breaches that an it turns into a torch out the head.
So that's what happens so it torched the gasket,
put a little thing in the head and here I'm like OK,
I'm gonna do coolant pressure.
So it runs a closed system, has a 32 pound cap on it,
and it has no thermostat right now and just runs a factory Honda
water pump on it, and at about 170, 180 degrees,
it's about 12 to 13 pounds.
Runs there, it cools well enough to not have a problem.
I know that if it hits anything above 24 or 25 pounds,
it's breached the middle layer of the gasket.
So my coolant pressure safety is set at 25 and if it sees that for longer
than 500 milliseconds, it cuts the engine.
- OK so again for those who aren't sort of following this conversation,
this really comes down to, with a high power turbocharged engine,
one of our real challenges is keeping the cylinder head sealed to the block
and that's really often the limiting factor on how much boost
and hence power we can make.
So that coolant pressure sensor is detecting if the head gasket
does start leaking, the combustion pressure makes its way
into the cooling system, hence it raises the pressure
in the cooling system so that's what you're looking for there.
- Exactly yeah.
- Now I just wanna also talk about the fuel system that you're
running on the car.
So what fuel are you running?
You mentioned an 11:1 or close to 11:1 compression,
so sure as hell you're not running pump gas,
particularly with that boost, what are you running there?
- Yeah so right now, beginning of the year I switched it to M1 methanol.
So it has eight FIC 2150 cc injectors in it.
Runs 80 pound base with a mechanical pump and then I have two Bosch 044s
that feed a surge tank from a five gallon cell in the rear.
So you have these two pumps feed the surge tank and then the surge
tank feeds the mechanical pump that's driven off the intake cam
on the passenger side.
- I think that's one of the things that's overlooked.
Methanol's a great fuel for very high boost due to its cooling properties,
but all things being equal, compared to pump gas,
we need to use around about 2.5 times the volume of fuel
to make the same power so you do need a huge amount of fuel.
So your choice on a mechanical pump over an electric pump,
is it just you can't find an electric pump big enough?
- I think you could, but you'd be running like two of 'em,
then you'd have to run 16 volts to be able to power them to get that,
and then in the end it's just like, you know I do drive the car on the street
every once in a while, as dumb as I might be,
but the mechanical pump, it's always what we've done,
it takes load off the alternator too.
So I still have an alternator in the car.
And the mechanical pump just seemed like the logical idea.
- On that note as well, you've mentioned a 16 volt charging system,
or 16 volt battery and this is something quite unique,
we see a lot of drag cars ditch an alternator, ditch a charging system,
and switch from a normal 12 volt battery, to a 16 volt electrical system.
Now you've gone a slightly different way, and this is something I've seen actually
on a lot of the English Racing cars, I'd never seen it before.
Can you tell us about your RC batteries?
- Yeah so basically it just came down to, all my guys have a lot of RC cars,
they have these really cool planes, and they have these 5S and 6S batteries,
and he was just, TJ, like I said, the engine guy, very smart guy,
awesome guy there, he's like well why can't we just run the car
on some of these batteries?
So we tried it and literally we never looked back on any of our drag cars,
they're literally a 16 volt, China battery.
And the problem is it doesn't have any lipo cut like your standard batteries
that you would buy that are 16 volt set up for cars.
But some of the cars have PDM, so we implement a cut at 14.5 volts.
But they're just literally, they are $75 each,
lipo, China batteries that we get, that you would put in an RC car,
and we have a charging set up for 'em.
Each car has, the GT-R runs three batteries actually, all in one.
And every other car will run two.
This car actually has a 6S battery that powers,
that's like a 20 volt booster pump, to the 044s.
So that gives me a little bit more pressure, little bit more voltage
to those pumps, it can keep up with the demand of the little surge tank.
- And obviously the 20 volt feed to these 044s hasn't hurt them?
- Not yet, not yet.
Actually the 044s, they're AM 044s.
They came out with a new 400 or something that I put in last year,
and they did flow more than your standard 044.
And as of right now I haven't hurt 'em yet.
- And you need to charge the batteries between runs?
- No, mine will pretty much go the whole weekend.
'Cause it's only activated when the second fuel pump comes on,
which is via RPM so it never sees that, so it'll actually go 15, 20 passes
before I actually need to charge it.
The other cars, while they can go about, I would say they could go two, three
passes before we have we have to charge 'em.
- Alright look Myles, really interesting to get some insight into what goes
into this Honda.
There's not too many Integras we've seen running 208 mile an hour
in an event like this.
And considering that's your first real run here,
you got the whole weekend ahead of you,
we wish you the best to go even faster again, thanks Myles.
- Yeah thank you, thank you for having me.
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