NoPistons -Mazda Rx7 & Rx8 Rotary Forum

i thought you all might be interested in my trip to Judge Ito's this week. my friend dick lambert and i left wisconsin monday and arrived at the Judge's the following morning. there were the usual accidents along I-80 that closed it down here and there due to snowy driving conditions, (read- driving error).... thanks to the really cool GPS navigation setup in Dick's car we didn't make a wrong turn and snaked our way thru downtown Paterson and right to Ito's shop. reader's of this forum will know Ito's h p- making abilities are cutting edge. in addition, it is rare for someone with such propriatary knowledge to share as Ito does. he certainly is a major asset that our rotary community has. Ito has a nice shop and a very well developed RX-3sp drag car that is just itching to make major noise this spring and melt some serious asphalt. i found him to be a straight ahead look-you-in-the-eye kind of guy. above all he loves rotaries. he showed me some pictures of one of his first drag cars w a motor he had ported when he was 15. (it ran in the 12s)... i wanted to find out just what leads him to be so generous with sharing his expertise and found the answer. Ito believes, as i do, that the rotary has had a bad rap as to reliability. sure, the systems on the stock FD degrade the engine, but if they are replaced with a properly setup alternative and if the engine is properly built the rotary will last. i raced for 6 years SCCA Nationals and during that time i placed 2nd, 3rd and 4th twice at the national championships (Runoffs) and lost only one motor in 72 races and 6 Runoffs... the last 3 years i ran my motors between 7 and 10,000 rpm for the entire 35 minute races. true, they were NA motors but the track was littered w broken pistons, connecting rods, pieces of oil pan etc from Toyotas, Nissans, Bimmers etc trying to catch me. i agree w Ito as to the rotary being potentially bulletproof if properly prepared. (BTW, my personal feeling about the OEM turbo setup is that it is a fundamental disaster and needs to be replaced. i can't imagine why you would bolt 22 lbs of literally red hot/ 1750 degrees/ cast iron to the side of a rotary and not expect it to bake the engine to a crisp. cast iron retains heat bigtime.) the Judge enjoyed looking thru my old RX3 racing pics as he appreciates the significance of the RX3 since it was mazda's first rotary car and kicked major XXX in IMSA. we spent the better part of the day bench racing, sampled the local pizza (++) and as we headed out for the 900 mile trip home i knew i had met a person who is going to make a major name for himself real soon on the quarter mile... and one real nice person. it was sure worth the trip.

howard coleman