Ghostwhite
New member
Moving this over from my garage
I ordered the car January 9th, 2012 without options. The car sat in Miles City, Montana for two weeks with another Sti ordered the day after. The shipping company wanted to wait for a truck load of cars to haul to Grand Forks, ND Not Likely!!! After a few calls to SOA and my dealer they tracked it down in MT and lit a fire under the a** of the shipping company.
I picked it up in a blizzard and hap-hazardly drove it 90 miles in whiteout conditions and glare ice after dark to get it home. I learned how horrible summer tires are in the winter! I ordered a Cobb AP shortly after and flashed Stage 1 after about 200 miles, got RallyArmor mudflaps and WeatherTech Floormats as well. I installed a Viper Security system with Autostart outside my apartment in the cold after a few weeks. I ordered and installed a Cobb Short Throw and Kartboy shifter bushings after about 300 miles.
In the spring I attended a Trackday at Motorsports Park Hasting in Hastings, Nebraska with my local chapter of SCCA. I did great, learned how the car reacted on track and burned up the stock tires in one day. At 3300 miles they were still fresh that morning but well past done at the end of the day. My only concern throughout the day was hitting fuel cut with more than a quarter tank of gas onboard. I thought it was the rev limiter at first but hit it again at low RPM and ended my session for some fuel.
I upgraded to 265-40-18 Star Specs and was loving life! I attended my first auto-x with the car in Minot, ND and ranked 4th overall in a field of about 35 cars. Car understeered like crazy but I beat out a few highly modified Sti. Then on June 2nd I competed in my second auto-x in the car finishing 3rd or 4th again in a field of 30-40 cars. Throughout the day I started to notice a little bit of smoke under load and on start-up between runs, I knew my fate was nearly sealed at just short of 4500 miles. After Buck runs I went to my workplace to pick up my boss after he put his car away(nice C6 Z06) and headed to his place. On the way there the car started to lose power above 2000 RPM and logged a whole ton of knock. I took it home, cleaned out the intercooler and intake and installed a Cusco Catch can. Life was better for a week when I left for another auto-x competition 160 miles away. After cruising on the highway it wouldn't accelerate with any sense of purpose and was knocking bad. I limped it to my dads near the auto-x event and trailered it home after the event.
I knew what had happened and decided to call Rallispec to talk about a Street Spec Short Block. I could save some money by reusing my current block if it was within spec so I tore it down at work(Polaris Dealer) to a short block and sent it off to New Jersey.
After tearing the stock motor down to a shortblock I sent it off to New Jersey. The cleaned it up, check clearances and did a hone and deglaze on the cylinders before installing Cosworth pistons, Manley H-beam rods and ACL race bearings before assembling and sending it back my way. It was received by Rallispec and on its way back in less than 4 days! I received it back and started putting everything back together. I upgraded to ARP headstuds, a Moroso Oil pickup tube, deleted the air pump, and inspected and cleaned the oil pump and water pump. Only part that gave me problems was not having a clutch alignment tool and being impatient. It wasn't the easiest way of getting the engine and trans back together but I got it.
Since then I have been babying it, logging a lot and waiting till I can have it tuned. Last week I ordered a ZT-2 wideband with LCD display and plan on install the display in the factory clock location. I also have a Invidia catless DP coming to get to stage 2 as I begin the tuning process. I will hopefully have the guys here have a look at my stage 2 map to make some adjustments so that I can be safe to start with. I want to start learning how to tune on my own as I have been coming through the recommended tutorials and will be asking questions as I go in the Premium resources section.(One the greatest rewards to becoming a Premium member!!!!)
I have a load of Whiteline bushings sitting in the garage waiting to be installed.
I have my invidia dp finally, gotta get the bung welded on as the extra bung is only 3.5 inches from the turbo flange. Then onward with the zeitronix install
Installed downpipe last night on jackstands in the garage, pretty painful. One of the downpipe to turbo bolts was seized even after soaking with PB. Tried cutting with no lick so ended up cranking on it until it snapped.
After that everything went better. Couldn't find a metric shoulder bolt locally so ended up with one standard bolt on reassembly. My shot in the dark wideband bung location worked out ok and the angle will work without hitting the firewall.
Flashed acn stage 2 and test drive with no leaks! Going to get my zt-2 brain wired in tomorrow as I will be work 8am to 10pm today.
I ordered the car January 9th, 2012 without options. The car sat in Miles City, Montana for two weeks with another Sti ordered the day after. The shipping company wanted to wait for a truck load of cars to haul to Grand Forks, ND Not Likely!!! After a few calls to SOA and my dealer they tracked it down in MT and lit a fire under the a** of the shipping company.
I picked it up in a blizzard and hap-hazardly drove it 90 miles in whiteout conditions and glare ice after dark to get it home. I learned how horrible summer tires are in the winter! I ordered a Cobb AP shortly after and flashed Stage 1 after about 200 miles, got RallyArmor mudflaps and WeatherTech Floormats as well. I installed a Viper Security system with Autostart outside my apartment in the cold after a few weeks. I ordered and installed a Cobb Short Throw and Kartboy shifter bushings after about 300 miles.
In the spring I attended a Trackday at Motorsports Park Hasting in Hastings, Nebraska with my local chapter of SCCA. I did great, learned how the car reacted on track and burned up the stock tires in one day. At 3300 miles they were still fresh that morning but well past done at the end of the day. My only concern throughout the day was hitting fuel cut with more than a quarter tank of gas onboard. I thought it was the rev limiter at first but hit it again at low RPM and ended my session for some fuel.
I upgraded to 265-40-18 Star Specs and was loving life! I attended my first auto-x with the car in Minot, ND and ranked 4th overall in a field of about 35 cars. Car understeered like crazy but I beat out a few highly modified Sti. Then on June 2nd I competed in my second auto-x in the car finishing 3rd or 4th again in a field of 30-40 cars. Throughout the day I started to notice a little bit of smoke under load and on start-up between runs, I knew my fate was nearly sealed at just short of 4500 miles. After Buck runs I went to my workplace to pick up my boss after he put his car away(nice C6 Z06) and headed to his place. On the way there the car started to lose power above 2000 RPM and logged a whole ton of knock. I took it home, cleaned out the intercooler and intake and installed a Cusco Catch can. Life was better for a week when I left for another auto-x competition 160 miles away. After cruising on the highway it wouldn't accelerate with any sense of purpose and was knocking bad. I limped it to my dads near the auto-x event and trailered it home after the event.
I knew what had happened and decided to call Rallispec to talk about a Street Spec Short Block. I could save some money by reusing my current block if it was within spec so I tore it down at work(Polaris Dealer) to a short block and sent it off to New Jersey.
After tearing the stock motor down to a shortblock I sent it off to New Jersey. The cleaned it up, check clearances and did a hone and deglaze on the cylinders before installing Cosworth pistons, Manley H-beam rods and ACL race bearings before assembling and sending it back my way. It was received by Rallispec and on its way back in less than 4 days! I received it back and started putting everything back together. I upgraded to ARP headstuds, a Moroso Oil pickup tube, deleted the air pump, and inspected and cleaned the oil pump and water pump. Only part that gave me problems was not having a clutch alignment tool and being impatient. It wasn't the easiest way of getting the engine and trans back together but I got it.
Since then I have been babying it, logging a lot and waiting till I can have it tuned. Last week I ordered a ZT-2 wideband with LCD display and plan on install the display in the factory clock location. I also have a Invidia catless DP coming to get to stage 2 as I begin the tuning process. I will hopefully have the guys here have a look at my stage 2 map to make some adjustments so that I can be safe to start with. I want to start learning how to tune on my own as I have been coming through the recommended tutorials and will be asking questions as I go in the Premium resources section.(One the greatest rewards to becoming a Premium member!!!!)
I have a load of Whiteline bushings sitting in the garage waiting to be installed.
I have my invidia dp finally, gotta get the bung welded on as the extra bung is only 3.5 inches from the turbo flange. Then onward with the zeitronix install
Installed downpipe last night on jackstands in the garage, pretty painful. One of the downpipe to turbo bolts was seized even after soaking with PB. Tried cutting with no lick so ended up cranking on it until it snapped.
After that everything went better. Couldn't find a metric shoulder bolt locally so ended up with one standard bolt on reassembly. My shot in the dark wideband bung location worked out ok and the angle will work without hitting the firewall.
Flashed acn stage 2 and test drive with no leaks! Going to get my zt-2 brain wired in tomorrow as I will be work 8am to 10pm today.
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