Working in the heat!

[verboten at michiganvw.org (Jason)]

I got teh motorcycle running and rode it all weekend

On 8/7/06, Dan Bubb <jdbubb@verizon.net> wrote:
>
> Spent Saturday replacing the tie rod ends and aligning my Audi A4. The
> original tie rod ends, amazingly, have a rubber sleeve in the middle that
> lets them stretch and contract a small amount, I guess to absorb road
> shocks, but now with the new solid parts, the car seems a lot less wandery.
> That was definitely a worthwhile project.
>
> Sunday my nephew came over and for some reason all else stops when he
> shows up. Might have something to do with him owning the only turbo Scirocco
> in the family! :^(
> When last dynoed the car had made 208lb-ft @ 3900 where the boost was
> spiking to 13 psi and 177 whp @ 5400 with boost at 10psi. Basically the
> torque just drops off in a straight line and we've been wondering where the
> restriction is that's causing the loss of top end. Mike's been slowly
> improving his Megasquirt maps based on datalogs and by leaning out the top
> end to match the lower VE up there to get a consistent AFR and playing with
> the advance he's been picking up a couple HP here and there (or so our butt
> dynos suspect!)
>
> Anyway his car sounded really bad with an exhaust leak that coincidentally
> seemed to have improved the top end performance of his car? A quick
> inspection revealed the downpipe was cracked. Turns out it was nearly broken
> off at the turbo flange and also had a series of little separate cracks in
> the same area! Well, I don't feel too bad since this was the first downpipe
> I'd ever made, probably the one I learned to weld stainless steel on, it is
> totally unbraced and had lasted over 4 years! A little clean up and some
> bead blasting to remove any carbon in the area so it didn't contaminate the
> weld and I welded it all up as good as new although it did look a little
> like a Frankenstein downpipe with all the little weld beads running this way
> and that.
> While I was welding that up Mike was playing around with throttle bodies
> and found out that the bigger A2 TB would mate up sufficiently well to the
> IC pipe that was shaped to match the small TB. So, we changed that out while
> we were at it. Recall that he's using MAP based accel enrichment so we're
> just using regular TB's without TPS, so that was an easy swap. Mike took the
> car for a test drive and his butt dyno indicated the top had picked up yet
> more power despite us welding up the power inducing exhaust leak. ;^)
>
> The last change was an effort to kill two birds with one stone. I had
> welded a tail pipe and hanger to a 2.5" Borla muffler I had laying  around
> for my 16V to replace the Flowmaster that sounded like ass. Well, turns out
> the Borla didn't sound too good either and was too loud for my tastes. I
> figured we'd swap the Dynomax on my nephew's car for the cobbled up Borla on
> my 16V. Pulling the Borla off the 16V wasn't too bad since I'd been careful
> to not tighten the clamp too much. Pulling the Dynomax off my nephew's car
> was even easier since it was an old old muffler and I just torched it off!
> ;^)
> Well, that's when I discovered that those bastards at VW changed the
> location of the exhaust exit from the body and the placement of the rear
> most hanger between the 8V and the 16V! Balls! So another hour later I'd
> managed to reshape the tailpipe and move the hanger. The 16V will have to
> wait for its muffler!
>
> So, his car is a touch louder with a nice rich tone to it and it seems we
> managed to pick up yet a little more power. Might have even made enough of a
> difference that a little retuning of the Megasquirt is in order! Another
> pretty successful project and Mike did all the wrenching! ;^) Did I mention
> this car is just a kick in the ass to drive??
>
> I also managed to drain the tank and replace the crimped tank to pump hose
> on the 81 I've been working on. That 2 year old gas smelled so bad it almost
> made me puke!
>
> So, what have you all been up to?
> Dan
>
>
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