MountainBikeMike's Skodaru

[MountainBikeMike]

So then it hit me... Why don't I just use the board from the top.. use the EZ lip I had on the bumper to form a seal at the rim bead.. tape the bottom to seal it.. and run long bolts thru to the top board... Oh my god its genius, and I could use butterfly nuts to unscrew it when I need to use the wheel! And so I pushed the glassing to the side, knowing that if this third go doesn't work I can always continue with the glassing, and that should sound better than the MK1 sub!

After a trip to bunnings to spend $10 on bolts and nuts, this is what I ended up with


Taped up the bottom heavily


You can see the EZ lip in between the rim bead and the wood, now painted roughly


Sits just deep enough


Made little brackets to center the bolts in the wheel holes, and put the butterfly nuts on. It just clears the bottom of the wheel well


Poked the wire through the bottom, hooked it up and all finished! I only need to get a metal grate to cover it with, and make a cut-out in the mass loaded vinyl so the sound comes through lol


Haven't tested it much yet but I'll spend more time on this project once the DNS810 head units finally arrive. Keen!

On a side note the other benefits of this change were:
-Lower center of gravity (height reduced by 20cm and centered in the car instead of right above the back wheel)
-First fiberglass box without driver was 7.5kg, this one is less than 2kg
-I get that corner back so lots more space
-Discreet! Stealth sub!
-Now my mates want one
-????????????
-Profit

[Deadpool]

Very nice updates, Mike. I quite enjoyed the read.


Sent from my eyePhone in the year 3013.

[dArK5HaD0w]

so now u have no spare tyre?!?!?!?

[Rooboy]

so now u have no spare tyre?!?!?!?

I think he has a spare tyre but he's just going to have to take a bit longer and a lot more care changing it lol. Nice 'outside the box' thinking

[Mysticality]

On a side note the other benefits of this change were:
-Lower center of gravity (height reduced by 20cm and centered in the car instead of right above the back wheel)
-Now my mates want one
-????????????
-Profit

I edited your post for you.

Great outcome!
How do you run the wires??

[MountainBikeMike]

I edited your post for you.

Great outcome!
How do you run the wires??

Lol what did you change?

So the wires run from the amp inside the right compartment through the hole near the tail lights, under the carpet and back trim to the boot release lock, then down under the tire and in.

Sent from my HTC One X using Tapatalk

[kamold]

Great work again Mike.
I'd ideally like to do something like that too. I had a Mazda 6 that has the amp in the wheel well like that from factory. Great use of space.
Those LEDs are great. I find myself reversing towards walls just to bathe in their icy white glow
I've got the yellows in the indicators too, they look much better than the stockies too.

[MountainBikeMike]

A few more updates:

The little orange clip to hold the bonnet rod fell out the second time and got lost, so I improvised!



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A bought a box of goodies from a guy in Tassie on Gumtree. $375 for about $900 worth of stuff. Typhoon intake, 3 pods, a brake banjo bolt, a BSH PCV revamp, a maf, some cai inlets, 4 coil packs, factory diverter valve, an o2 sensor, and I think thats it.



I had to ride home from work with the Typhoon because I really wanted to get it installed straight away, this is what I looked like lol. Had to go pick up noodle box then go to the gf's then home with it...







Initial install. I had to run a zip tie initially cos I couldn't reach the clip to tighten it properly on the turbo. The zip tie is now gone
heat shield went on without dramas.





Then I went ghetto





I finished the top of the heat shield/air box with perspex. Initially with hot glue, which melted Then some metal clips and 150 degree silicon. Good ENOUGH! Looks great, and pops off with a couple of self tappers.

So this intake sounds pretty insanely loud. Massive spool noise, and quite a large dump sound when coming off throttle. I couldn't believe it sounds like a BOV... weird. There is a whistle at some revs which is annoying and I'm wondering this is the filter. Its a double cone type..

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Stock stuff vs new

This BSH PCV revamp camp with all the ****, so I installed it. Took 15 mins.



Looks good. Who knows if it works.

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Finally put a solid bit of metal across the sub to protect it, and also cut out the mass loaded vinyl for the sound to come through better.





Then I put on some velcro to stop vibrations on the wood under the carpet.

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Also got an ECS order today!!! Will update that tomorrow

[Mysticality]

The weird turbo noises will be the VGT (variable geometry turbo) vanes changing to give max boost at all different RPM.
Thats why we have such an awesomely flat torque curve

The whistle - is it a whine?
If so, its TSI thing

[MountainBikeMike]

The whistle - is it a whine?
If so, its TSI thing

Mines an FSI.. Its a whiney whistley thing that goes for half a second. Sounds like a real mouth whistle.

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So yesterday I got a nice little package from ECS Tuning USA. A set of R8 coil packs @ a measly $22.81US, a new cam follower @ $43, and about $130US for this ECS lightweight accessory pulley. $60 postage though... worth it! I decided to NOT go for the under-drive pulley as there was to much of a difference and I run a sub/amp and also frequent the drive in cinema!



So I installed the new coil packs after work and instantly noticed the one nearest to the drivers side had a massive brown dust build up! Its very light and dusty, but didn't hang on and cleaned up easily so I dont think its just rust, UNLESS its rust down near the spark plug????? If it is, that could be bad.... Didn't know what to do so I just put the new coil in for now and its still running fine.

I think though that this COULD have been the reason I've been getting some blue smoke under WOT in first and second sometimes... will suss this out at some stage. Theres a good thread on here about these with lots of real data- and for example, the voltage created in the stock OEM coils is around 3.2v, whereas the R8 coils put out in the region of 4.5v. Good to know that even if it ain't much difference to the car its made all the improvement it can in this particular area.

Here's some more pics of the red R8 coils installed 20hp extra cos they're red.





I really should have gotten the red coil looms for an extra $20... ah well, next time.

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Well today was fun. Got up in the morning before work and though I'd smash out the install of this ECS lightweight accessory pulley. Bad idea as usual hahaha, but lucky I ride to work. I got the the point of taking the pulley off and though I had to take off the big bolt in the middle. The sockets I had weren't working with the rattle gun so I went to the store with 15 mins to spare before work to get the right one, which didnt work either! Ditched, packed up, left the car on stands and went to work. Borrowed a neighbours socket set, then realised I was already at the stage I could just pull it off LOL. No need to remove center bolt which wouldn't move! Noob moment. The rest was pretty simple including taking off the belt and re-installing. You WILL need a second pair of hands for this though.


How it looks without the pulley or belt


All done! And being artsy with le cam


All done again

The magic numbers:
The stock pulley came in at a hefty 1670g, while the ECS pulley is 290g! Its actually 10g lighter than manufacturer specification Bound to save some horses and gas!



I come back to my car at the end of the rainy day with the wheel off and my DBA's look like this..

[rjg]

Heh heh heh. Nice work, you certainly don't mess around.

Cheers for the insert too, although I don't think I'll try an install before work.

Sent from my GT-I9305T using Tapatalk

[MountainBikeMike]

Heh heh heh. Nice work, you certainly don't mess around.

Cheers for the insert too, although I don't think I'll try an install before work.

Sent from my GT-I9305T using Tapatalk

I tried on my lunch break. Twice. What a waste of time lol

Sent from my HTC One X using Tapatalk

[Mysticality]

Petrol, then. Better?

TSI, TFSI, etc etc

[MountainBikeMike]

Hasn't been to long for an update again

Turbosmart DV:

I've been speaking a lot to V-Tech Australia lately and they've been extremely kind and helpful.

I got one of these Turbosmart diverter valves to rid the possibility of any boost leaks in the future, and also for a bit of good old fashing waaapsshh! It actually gives a little bit of a whistle, a short dump, or a sutututu sound, depending on how much boost you have and how you release the throttle. Not sure how it sound outside the car yet, but inside its fairly minute- you need to listen for it. A few heads have turned though in quiet Mt Buller





You can see on the right hand side there is a plug provided the block off the electrical circuit and dismiss any CEL's. Installing was fairly straight forward once under the car and once the DV was located. The m5 bolts were lock tighted very tightly and took a while to extract. After installing the new bolts and DV it was just a matter of attaching the electric plug and zip-tying, attaching the vacuum hose with a spring clamp, and running it to the boost tap on the inlet manifold, zip-tying along the way. I ran the vacuum line as far as possible away from the engine to keep it cool.

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DIY time: Pioneer remote bass level dial for amplifier, installed to center dash empty slot

So my Sub's Amp has a remote that I stuck stealthily under the steering wheel column to hide it which worked very well. But I thought I'd make it more official and just do something fun for an hour. I'd seen how you could put custom buttons in the center unused slots, such as garage door buttons.

Here's where it looked like:




Taking the bits apart:




Making things fit. Slots to hold the circuit board:




Super glue:


Tight fit!


All done! Works well! Neat.


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More DIY: Grade 0000 Steel Wool and RainX for a smooth window and HydroPhobic

I saw this method on VWW earlier this year and have wanted to try it for a while. Its scary at first, then you realize its great!


RainX in a liquid form, $22 @ AutoBarn. Steel wool grade 0000, lots of it, $3.61 at Bunnings.

Circular motions with the wool cleans amazingly, very smooth:



Then after wiping the RainX on (in much the same fashion as waxing), containing hydrophobic properties, this is the result:







The drivers side has been treated with RainX, and the passenger side has not. You can see the beads of water forming as the water falls. Then in the second and third picture the beads has settled on the left but the water is thinned out on the right. Cool stuff! And I only used about 5 drops! Crazy, the bottle will last a long time, and I could build it up higher. I really need to get a video of it inside while raining and driving.

[MountainBikeMike]

Also got rid of this little engine cover bracket to save 330 grams and get a little less cluttered in there. It sat right of the BSH PCV revamp







I really need to get rid of this one, but its to tight a fit. Will have to wait until I clean out the inlet manifold one day

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I was up at Buller for the Elevation All Mountain series this weekend. Besides a massive crash putting me out for the weekend after two runs, I did get these rad photos. And got a sub 11 minute time up the mountain. Could've gone harder though and had to pass three cars.