Mods done, tuning now

Well, I have all the parts installed.  Quick recap of what was completed since Feb 2010 (yes it took me a while):
1) Exhaust – Longtube headers, high flo cats, xpipe, left the titanium Corsa in place.
2) Engine – Vararam intake, 100mm MAF, 90mm TB, 102mm FAST manifold.  Fuel lines, rails, regulator.
3) PCM – HP Tuner pro, LC-1 wideband sensor
 
Right now I am tuning the vehicle’s PCM (computer) for the added stuff.  I am using HP Tuner Pro software along with a wideband scanner which is dual purpose between reading air/fuel from the headers and simulating the narrowband stock O2 sensor so my PCM doesn’t freak out.  I am very new to tuning however I am using a great "teach yourself" type training from www.thetuningschool.com.  I highly recommend this course for anyone that wants to get into Tuning.  I am still cleaning up the wiring in the car from the wideband scanner.  It’s all run into the glove compartment currently and I hope to make a container for it to clean things up a bit.
 
Can’t wait to get this thing tuned, already the exhaust note makes it known that I’m not stock anymore heh.
 
So am I done with the vette?  Heck no, lots of other plans.  I am getting pricing for a new motor in the event the stock LS1 (has 196K miles) goes.  I’ll more than likely go forged and I’m looking at either an LS2 with stock bore size or an LS2 402 stroker.  I am going to do dished pistons so I can go blown (supercharger) at a later date.  Working with A&A Corvette in California to get this done, they do great work.
 
That’s it for now.  Hope to get the before and after video of the exhaust sound up here soon.
 
L8r,
Mowpow
2010
08/09
CATEGORY
Corvette
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Zune HD – Impressed

So I’ve been using my Zune HD for about 6 months now and I have to say that the device as well as the Zune subscription service really works well. 
 
For the Device:
The screen is a bit small.  Cost is OK (same as iPod Touch).  Interface is fast and well laid out.  The DJ mixer works very well to pretty much make a custom playlist based on your listening patterns.
 
For the software+service:
I think this is where the Zune really shines over iPod/iTunes.  Microsoft took a new approach to getting more music to more people for a reasonable price.  How much do you spend on music a month?  For the price of one average priced CD a month ($14.95), you get the following:
 
1) Download as much music you want.  That’s right, you can download and play on your Zune HD, Gen 1 or Gen 2 device music that you don’t own.  Think of it as renting the music.  As long as you pay your monthly subscription, you can keep this music.  $14.95 a months, thousands of songs that you can add/delete any time.
 
2) OK, so you are thinking the rent vs. buy scenario with houses right?  Zune gives you 10 song credits every month to buy 10 songs.  So if you figure it’s 99 cents per song, you are really getting $10 of music just for paying the monthly subscription fees.  These songs you keep and own and are from what I can tell DRM free.  I store them on my home server and play them from my Xbox’s, phone, etc.
 
Apple does have the app store which is very successful and works very well.  There are security concerns there though so be careful what you use and what you let access your data!  Microsoft has an app store called "Marketplace" where you can download games/apps.  It hasn’t caught on too much but I suspect with Xbox and soon to release Windows Phone 7 (Holiday 2010), the Marketplace will take off. 
 
That’s it for now.  More car stuff in the next post as my 98 Vette has come a long way!
2010
07/07
CATEGORY
Entertainment
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Out with the 87, in with the 98

Just noticed I suck and didn’t post that I sold the 87 corvette but I think that’s old news now.  I purchased a 1998 Corvette that has 195K miles on it.  It’s in great condition.  I got it in Sept 09 and it’s kept me pretty busy.  Not that there was anything wrong with it, I just decided to start "fixing things" right away.  In other words, upgrade some things.  The car is white so right away I knew it had to be a decepticon tribute.  I saw this one dude’s white vette with a punisher sticker on the back and it was all blacked out.  I was pretty impressed by how that looked and I’m not even one to like white cars.  I knew that’s what I had to do if I ever got a white car so here we go! 
 
So far, here’s what I’ve done:
 
  1. Replaced Automatic shifter – Old one was pretty worn out.  The previous owner had one and gave it to me with the car so I installed this first.
  2. Installed a Viper alarm system with voice module.  This taught me more about the car’s electronic system than I cared to know heh.  Plus, I now can take apart the entire interior and put it back together.  The voice module also has a PA system so I use that for a good laugh from time to time.  I also installed a proximity sensor so if someone looks in the window or puts their hand in the car when the windows are down it says "Warning, self destruct system is now active".  Classic. 
  3. Decepticon Sticker on the back window, decepticon oil cap.
  4. 15 Purple LEDs on a rocker switch.  These are pretty cool and very subtle and add to the decepticon theme.
  5. Blacked out all lights except for headlights and side markers.  I plan to do the side markers just haven’t gotten to it yet.
  6. Replaced the rotors (fronts were warped) and repainted the calipers from red to black, again going with that black/white combo color.  This was brutal and took weeks as I had many challenges.  Stripping the calipers was a bigger pain than I ever imagined.  Painting them wasn’t too fun either but they look a lot better.  I hand painted the white corvette lettering on the front calipers.  One came out great, the other, meh not perfect.  When this paint goes, I will definitely do powdercoat as I am never doing a manual paint on calipers again.  I also broke a brake banjo bolt and let me tell you how hard that was to find to replace, it sucked.
  7. New parking brake shoes.  The old ones fused to the old rotors which indicates either someone was having fun with the ebrake when driving or flat out forgot to disengage it and drove a ways with it on.  Who knows.  This was another pain as there was this little clip, ah never mind, I’m having flashbacks now.

Currently, I am installing LG long tube headers, high flow cats and a new x pipe (also LG motorsports).  I have the driver side one in and I also replaced the tunnel plate.  The new tunnel plate is 1/4" thich aluminum.  Essentially it keep the body from flexing and also protects the drivetrain and keeps exhaust heat out of the cockpit.  The stock one is pretty crappy.  I took pictures so as soon as the exhaust is done, I’ll dump them all up there.  While doing this exhaust I also noticed that the Corsa titanium mufflers are not secured to anything, they are just hanging over the rear axle.  I have to figure that out to as I knew I heard something rattling back there just couldn’t tell what it was, now I do!  I am also replacing the spark plugs and wires since they look OEM.  I’m using Taylor wires with AC Delco Irridium plugs with stock gap.

Next, I have these parts that I plan to install.  They are sitting in my garage as of right now but I’m anxious to get them installed:

  1. FAST LSX 102mm intake.
  2. Nick Williams 90mm Throttle body
  3. Torrent fuel rails, new fuel lines and a pressure regulator – Hinson Super Cars is fabricating this for me now as this is required for the new intake (http://hinsonsupercars.com/)
  4. 160 deg thermostat
  5. Vararam cold air intake – this system is pretty cool, it draws air from the fog light bays in the front.  Brilliant design.

Once all this is done I’m going to get a tune (have to with all the mods, sheesh) and have it dyno’d.  It will be interesting to see what numbers I put down with these upgrades.  Best guess is probably +35 hp at the rear wheels, the tune alone with the headers will probably get that so it’s a modest guess.

One thing that is eating away at me is the oil leak that I think is coming from the rear main seal.  I don’t think I can get to this without pulling the motor so I’ll probably not worry about this just yet.  The only thing that sucks is that the oil is dripping onto the cats so it smells like burning oil on my car all the time.  Boo.

Anyway, I’ll post pics as soon as I get to a stopping point and get the car back on the ground again!

Jake

2010
04/13
CATEGORY
Corvette
2 comments

87 Vette all ready to sell

Well, done everything I want to do to the 87 Vette as it is ready to sell.  Posted some pictures so check them out!
2010
01/13
CATEGORY
Corvette
1 comment

Corvette status

Well, I’ve officially had my Corvette for 7 days and it’s kept me pretty busy.  The day after I got it home my son and I got in the car to take it to my parents to show it off.  Turn the key, click, no starting for you! 😦  After some troubleshooting and research, turns out the starter is bad.  I thought this might happen as the previous owner had an issue starting it initially when I looked at it. 
 
After about 8 hours, lots of cussing, bruises, ruined clothes, and money spent on tools, the starter is now swapped out and she started right up.  Luckily the neighbor across the street from me was able to help since he worked on LS1’s in the past, this was a huge help. 
 
The main problems I had with swapping the starter were:
 
1) I’ve never swapped a starter out in my entire life.
2) I didn’t have very many tools.
3) The fuel lines ran right over the starter.
4) Long tube headers made this working in tight quarters to say the least.
5) The wires for the starter were way too short. I had to hook up the wires when it was bolted in and the whole to get my hand to the wires was smaller than my hand.
 
I noticed after driving the Corvette a couple times the idle is a bit rough.  Today I cleaned out the throttle body, it was pretty nasty.  I haven’t driven the car since the cleaning but I image throttle response will be a bit better now.
 
Next I plan to powerwash the engine since it looks like crap but I need to finish the baby room first!   I’ll post some new engine pictures once I have it cleaned up.
 
I also have some ideas about the projects (short and long term) that I would like to do in the Corvette:
 
Exterior:
1) Full Zaino detail to help with the swirls in the paint.  Polish the wheel wells.
2) Blackouts for all lights.  I am still thinking about this one.
3) Bring back the personal license plate "Mowpow".  I had this on my 2001 Camaro SS.
 
Interior:
1) New seats.  All controls work fine but the leather looks terrible and is quite worn.
2) Minor dash/control repairs.  There are cracks in the plastic facings on the dash but the top is in good shape.  The driver side window switch is damaged but still works (part on order).  Carpet needs to be cleaned. 
3) Upgrade the radio.  I don’t have any tapes anymore :).
4) Replace the steering wheel.
 
Engine:
1) Powerwash and detail.
2) Reseal oil tank.  Not leaking majorly but did notice some ooze when I was replacing the starter.
3) May need a new AC compressor.  Strange clicking noise when AC is on but it still blows cold air.
4) Turbo.  ~6-8 psi boost.  Add some power to the top end and raise HP to the 500’s.  This is definitely long term hehehe, $5 grand at least :).
 
I’ll take some new pictures of the exterior once I get it Zaino’d up.
 
Jake
2009
03/29
CATEGORY
Corvette
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New toy

Well, the 2006 Eclipse is no more, say hello to my 1987 Chevrolet Corvette!  Haven’t gotten to drive it very much today but I imagine I will come up with all sorts of excuses to get it out tomorrow.  All I have to say is damn, this thing is fast.  I snapped a couple pictures tonight but will get more when I polish her up a bit with some Zaino action!  Check out my Photo’s section, here is one:
 
 
 
I would like to also thank my wife for allowing me to finally get a hot rod I can get in moderate trouble with.  Jen, you are the best!
 
Jake
2009
03/21
CATEGORY
Corvette
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Why the console gaming experience is better than PC gaming – My Opinion

So I finally got a PC that was good enough to play Crysis, which in 2007 was the game of all games.  I download the demo and honestly the game just rocks.  I really would like to see this game come to the Xbox 360.  The controls would definitely work well since they resemble Gears of War.
 
This is where the story takes a turn for the worse.
 
I decide that I like this game so much that I purchase it for $29.99 off GameStop.com using the direct download option so I can play the game instantly instead of waiting for a disk to ship in the mail.  The game downloads fine (which is crazy fast on my U-Verse connection of 12Mb down, woot) and seems to install fine.  I go to run the game and can’t find it on the Programs menu.  No biggie I think so I go find the file manually and launch the game.  Then I remember, what if there is a patch or something for the game to fix bugs found after release.  Yea, I better download those.  So I go to EA’s site that redirects me all over the place finally to a mirror site that has the updates.  The updates seem to all conflict saying that some require this update first, but on another page it says it can be installed solely, etc.  OK, starting to get frustrated here.  So I get what I think patches I need, I go to install them and I get some cryptic MSI installer error with just a code.  I start to research the code online and find some people saying that the code can be caused by not installing the PunkBuster anti-cheat in multiplayer option.  I didn’t install this because I’m not much of a first person shooter multplayer person and will probably never play online.  But whatever, I’ll go install PunkBuster.  So I kick off the Crysis installer again but now it’s looking for crysis.msi which it can’t find.  I make sure show all files is on and I go searching for the file, it’s not on my system.   I think it’s because the game is already totally installed so the install files were cleared, but who really knows.  So I am like, screw it, I just want to play the game.  So I go to launch the game and I see an EA logo screen that asks me for my game registration code which can be found on the manual for the product…… Uh…… I downloaded it…..there is no manual!  So I try my product key, no joy.  I even go as far as to try to register the game on EA’s website.   After EA’s registration site times out about 10 times, I finally get in.  I set up an account and all that crap then it says "Thanks for registering!".  No place to put you install key, no game registration code, nothing.  So screw it, I decide to uninstall.  I go to uninstall the game and it fails.  Sweet.  Oh but it really succeeded since now I can run the set up again and instead of getting the old "Repair, remove, change" options, it reinstalls the game.  So now the game is reinstalled and it launches fine now.  One little funny gag I noticed is that it asks you at the end of the install if you want to remove the downloaded files, I click no but it deletes them anyway which is where the crysis.msi was.  Hah, real funny.
 
So now I just launched the game which is about 2 working hours from when the download completed to my machine and the game starts.  No idea if it’s patched yet and considering one of the patches is for a security hole, I think I’m still going to need to figure that out before I run this on my system.
 
So let me compare this to the Xbox 360 experience if I bought this game from Gamestop or even downloaded it off Xbox Live (yes you can download full games off Xbox live).
 
1) I download the game.
2) I start the game.
3) Game automatically checks for updates and downloads them.
4) I play the game.
 
Probably 5 minutes of good, hard work in there to get it working.
 
Glad to see that my choice to go console for gaming is still a good one.  The PC world has a loooooong way to go to catch up.  Perhaps EA should check out World of Warcraft, they autoupdate, handle group play, etc all within the game itself.  That’s really how PC gaming should work.
 
Mowpow
2009
01/28
CATEGORY
Gaming
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Back on the ice

Well, all is good and I’m back on the ice after about a 4 month vacation.  I am playing in an instructional league now a little closer to my house and I’m loving it.  Yea I get sick of drills but it’s ice time so who cares.  Got some sweet new skates since I think my feet flattened out or something (toes were pinched big time in my old skates).  Check out the new skates here:http://www.nikebauer.com/site.cfm#/Content/Features/ONE95SkateFeature.html
 
Trying to get back in shape and lose a couple pounds, always a good thing.
 
Mowpow
2009
01/21
CATEGORY
Hockey
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Ouch

Rough game Friday night.  Looks like I injured a rib so that’s twice in a year and a half.  Rib injuries are pretty stinkin’ painful.  Hopefully I’ll be good to go next week since it will be the last couple games for a little while.  I do still enjoy hockey but my body definitely is not conditioned for the hitting (and I play in a no-checking league)!  Oh well, gotta go take some advil :(.
2008
08/31
CATEGORY
Hockey
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Another one bites the dust

Well, not completely.  Zeus got a hold of my wife’s iPhone again only this time, we caught him right as he cracked the glass on the screen so the touch screen still works but the phone looks ugly.  Probably time to upgrade the iPhone to a 3G phone.  Although, looks like the 3G iPhone has some security issues:
L8r,
Jake
2008
08/31
CATEGORY
My pets
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