Monster 'rocc TEC tuning w/Dan Bubb

[sfwilliams@comcast.net (Scott F. Williams)]

Dan Bubb is the supreme lord god Scirocco mack daddy:
Folks, I've got to tip my hat to Dan Bubb who is absolutely one of the
COOLEST dudes on this entire list! :^) A good while ago he asked if I'd be
interested in his tuning my Scirocco's TEC-II. If not for his great
enthusiasm for the idea, I would have declined the offer out of general
guilt for accepting such a huge favor! The very big deal here is that the
man had to drive four hours north from his place in Maryland to my car's
location. That's dedication, folks! :^)

Not only did Dan make the trek north from the D.C. area to North Jersey in
the rain, he spent all the damned day diagnosing and fixing one unexpected
problem after another that we found with my car. We surmounted 90% of the
issues by the eighth straight hour of work and only got in around an hour's
worth of solid programming. Wow, patience, expertise, an unfailing sense of
humor, and a chipper attitude -what more could I ask for?

Finally, Dan pilots one of the smoothest-running Scirocco's I've ever
driven. The thing is deceptively fast, extremely driveable, and stops and
handles great, too. I thought the overall execution was top grade and
reflects Dan's vast technical expertise and maturity. Who knew a NA 8v could
deliver like *that*? Oh yeah, it looks great in its early Mk2 simplicity,
too. YEAH!!!
*****************************
Tuning details:
Dan and I ran into a bunch of incredibly wacky challenges. First we had to
deal with a stuck throttle cable. That was pretty easy to fix; it required
installing a new grommet and trimming a little bit here and there. Next, we
tried filling the engine with coolant only for it to pour directly out a
hole in the back of the block! ACK! That was the fault of a freeze plug that
apparently popped out during the winter freeze. We found it out in the
parking lot and were able to pop it back in without too much fuss. That
totally amazed me because I really thought our day was done at that point.

Dan then got into teching the electrical system. We discovered that
my main power cable had mysteriously failed. The voltage simply wouldn't
reach the front of my car. (The battery is in the back.) Without a better
explanation, this was blamed on a sub-atomic copper-eating mouse. Anyway, we
dicked around with that forever and finally got enough voltage to the TEC-II
to start it.

Upon doing so, we discovered a substantial fuel leak from one of the
injectors. The cursing was brief and fairly limited, but it did become
obvious that my car is demon posessed. Hmm... what else?

Orange flames erupted from the throttle bodies and crackled out the exhaust.
And, blue/white flames shot out the oxygen sensor bung (which we forgot to
plug). Whoops... -lots of backfiring, smoke, and NOISE! One crew member
stuck with the project the whole while, but ran towards the door whenever we
started
the car. That was pretty funny.... :^)

After nine hours of steady work, Dan finally got the thing under control and
actually produced a fairly even-running engine that sounds *wild*!. It'll
still take a bit more work, but we're definitely in the homestretch now. All
hail the Bubbmeister! You RULE, man!
--
Scott F. Williams
NJ Scirocco nut
'99 Subaru Impreza 2.5 RS
Mazda 323 GTX turbo "assaulted" vehicle
Golf GTI 16v "rollycar"
ClubVAC: "Roads found. Drivers wanted."