Fonzey

Thanks Gents, will look out for you at Cadwell. Running TD0520G with a billet compressor wheel.

Next up is a purchase I made back in October(?) DAMD flat bottomed wheel. Smaller but chunkier: Then it was Oulton time, finally! :D Day was very wet, cold, windy and we even had hail and snow!! Morning running was very slow and nervous, with lots of red flags. Got some good mixed/dry running in the afternoon though despite traffic. Car felt great, loved it. Cadwell now booked for the 29th.

Been slacking on updates, got a couple though. Car has been running fine for a few weeks now, no repeat evidence of it bogging down or misfiring. After seizing up one of my Brembo's at Blyton last time out, I decided to buy a seal kit and some paint and go for a refurb. Everything went great with the seals and paintjob: Bolted them back up to the car, fitted all the lines and then came to tighten up the bleed nipples. Got all the way around the car to the last nipple on the last caliper, and it stripped the thread out... This was all about 5 days before Oulton Park :( I responded by sending Ian@Godspeed some money... :D Got the AP's bolted up, and did a few bedding in miles. Also gave the car a post-winter wash, went full on with: Snow Foam 2bm wash with CarLack shampoo Iron-X Sonus Clay DA Polished with 3M pads and Sonus Restore Hand polish with Carlack protection and sealant The observant amongst you may also notice I moved house, so now have a double garage for my tinkering :)

Anybody regularly attend these? First tuesday of every month IIRC, at http://www.squires-cafe.co.uk/ Bit quiet in the winter, but I've been before in summer with over 100 cars there - from clapped out civics to GTRs and everything inbetween. I've not been since my return to the UK, but really don't have an excuse with me being 20mins away - so will be restarting the habit from March, be good to see some other people there too!

I'm there, date depending ofc! Can probably span this to a few other clubs too, providing they're happy to mix up FWD and RWD cars too.

Had a mixed couple of weeks with the car, but as of today - we're on a high! 1) Booked Oulton Park for 31st March, did I say that already? 2) Car started bogging down in second. Fiance's brother came round to see the car, went out for a ride in it and it was holding back in second gear - and a bit in third. It annoyed me, but I had to go away for a couple of days so left the car parked up at work. Got back, and on the drive home - floored it on the bypass and it violently cut power on boost. Got it home and quickly found a tear in the vac hose feeding the FPR reference: Chopped the end of the vac hose, refitted and went for a drive. No more violent cut-outs, but still hesitating in 2nd and 3rd. Hmmmm.. 3) Ordered a new fuel pump. SWRD 340lph in the car was new, but still an "easy" thing to swap out and rule out. Thanks to Alyn @ AS, my Deatschwerks replacement arrived in less than 12 hours - !Removed! brilliant service. Swapped it out on the drive: Took the car out, pulling like a boss in all gears - excellent :) 4) Fitted a CDF Brake stopper... no pics. 5) Had the car booked to go see Andrew Carr again, this time on a rolling road. Went down today, Andrew was aware of my fuel pump/vac hose adventure - so we were expecting a troubleshooting session, but as I got on top of things at home - it was to become a power run! First run on the rollers, car made 378bhp. Andrew explained it was running quite rich, presumably because it was previously mapped on a failing or inadequate fuel pump. He leaned it out a bit, and the next run fetched 391bhp. Two more tweaks led to 395 and then finally 398.6bhp with 362ft/lbs of torque, oh and a massive grin from me! Happy boy, that additional 20bhp I gained today is most definitely noticable - car is an absolute hoot.

The two "go-to" choices are: Revolution 3" System: http://www.revolution247.com/catalogue/shop-by-category-exhausts-revolution-exhausts Or The Cobra Sports Trackday system: http://www.cobrasport.com/index.php/cobra-sport-exhaust-products/subaru/impreza/subaru-impreza-wrx-sti-17/subaru-impreza-turbo-track-day-turbo-back-system-with-de-cat.html I've been taking my prodrive backbox in the boot, so if I get flagged - it's two bolts to swap out to that (its very quiet). Thinking of bumping up to the Revolution system though later in the year.

Cheers folks, definitely worth publicising them here - or maybe even arranging our own? They're a great day out normally. Did one at Scoobyclinic, is a good excuse to see their premises if nothing else.

Anyone aware of any RR days in the north? Wouldn't mind seeing the effect of my winter modifications and a health check before the first trackday of the year :)

Events Thread, got it!

Aye the undulations are excellent. Also, I signed up to run at the JGM memorial event at Elvington. Anyone else attending?

Really wanna do more Cadwell this year, did plenty of Blyton last year whenever I flew home which is a great track, especially for learning - but Cadwell has character!

Cheers Chaps. Gambit I've just checked out the thread, looks like one to watch :) As my car has been sat for best part of a year, it seems my battery has taken a turn for the worst. Alarm chirp on startup every morning this week, but failed completely this morning and needed jumping. Checked voltage with the car running and getting 14.7v so the alternator is fine. Got myself an AA trickle charger which is on the case now, see if it's recoverable or if the battery needs swapping.

Collected the car last week, here's the story! Left home at 0730 and walked to the train station, the walk turned into a sprint - as I misread the train times. No worries, got on the train. Got into Bradford at about 0845 and started the walk over to Richard Henry's. It's about a mile, and it was kinda snowing. 50yards into the hike, and I hear a familiar burble. Look up the road to see my car on its final shakedown, but the fuckers drove straight past me despite my frantic waving Arrived at the shop puffing and panting, and bollocked them all for driving past me. They showed me round the engine bay, braided hoses everywhere! The Mapper was due to arrive at 09:30 - so had a coffee and just talked **** for a while, checking out their other projects and bits and pieces. Andrew Carr arrived bang on time, and got to work on one of my FMIC pipes. It needed drilling and tapping for an intake air temp sensor which would complete the measurements which used to be dealt with by the MAF. After a the FMIC was all plumbed back together - he started on all his other sensors and bits and pieces before doing some basic setup on idle. We paused for breakfast butties, then he was on his way for a road run. I stayed at the shop and talked some more crap. Half an hour or so later, Andrew pulls back in - with what looked to be a frown. The other Andy (from RH) went over for a chat, which i tried to listen in on. I was sure in my head the turbo was a duff - and that it was causing issues. As it happened though, he wasn't getting enough fuel - and the car was leaning out bigtime on boost. I bought a 340lph fuel pump for this install, but RH had struggled to get it fit in with my Spec-C anti surge tank thingy. As a result, the 255lph had gone back in. We decided to change out for the 340 and run without the Spec-C tank - to see what happened. All hands on deck, and fuel pump was swapped in minutes and Andrew was off again. He was probably away for close to an hour, and came back with what looked to be a smile - then a thumbs up :) Car was breathing really well, and still needed more fuel than he expected - but was healthy. He warned me what I already knew, which was that it would feel a bit damp under 3k RPM - but described it as "quite quick" over 4k. One last check under the bonnet, and he was off and I went to thaw out whilst the lads put my rear bench back in. Drive home was annoying at first, went the wrong way and ended up in 30mph/stop/start for 20mins Finally got to the motorway and hit boost for the first time. It's such an event now, wooshes and swooshes from all over the place - and when it really comes on it's ballistic. Had to tweak the peak warning on my boost gauge a bit, as it seems I'm making 25psi now (23 previously) and temperatures/pressures all looked great. The lack of dumpvalve/recirc valve sounds hilarious - flutter at low boost and a full on swoosh when going for it. Drives really, really smooth at both low speed and at pace, new clutch/flywheel feels excellent with no strange noises or smells. Got it back to Selby, and went a back way to find a quiet B road. Pulled over and gave launch control a try. I had no instructions, so just pulled up and floored it. RPMs held at just over 5k and boost was building, just dropped the clutch and then I'm pretty sure the world went backwards a little bit Lost traction on all four wheels for about half a second then it gripped up and I was off! No smell of clutch, just a bit of wheel hop on the fronts. Can't wait to try it with warm R888s. Pictures! Engine bay needs a cleanup now, the loss of TMIC and AirCon has exposed a lot of grubby - so steam cleaner and wire brush will be out soon enough I reckon. Really happy with the combo of the silver FMIC and the black grille. Keeps it a bit subtle, but still looks menacing. Snorkle thingy modified and refitted for the cone filter. Will get some closeups on a better day, there are some great details in there with the fuel system. Hope to get on a Dyno soon, probably when we revisit the fuel pump - to see what's going on

Blasphemy!