A Different Twist

I have always like Danny's car because its always been different. Theres not to many people running the Sorcery front bumper or the Ings+1 wing, and First Molding side mirrors, but it still flows together so well. I think the Mugen hard top and Voltex risers for the wing are the most recent mods and have really brought everything together. The suspension is not lacking either with Bilstein PSS9 coil overs, and the wheels are pretty cool being Advan RGD's. He has really taken alot of time to source super rare parts, and his car is all about the attention to detail. Everything on the car is authentic too, and I think thats why it looks so good in pictures, most cars look like shit in person and in pictures it looks better, but when I can spot flaw after flaw in good quality pictures its easy to draw conclusions about the quality, and with Dannys car its hard to find any flaws.  

Grip Royal

Looking for a steering wheel? Let me introduce you to new company called Grip Royal. A personal friend of mine decided to come up to me and let me check out his line of steering wheels he has been working on. So off with the Momo wheel and on with the Grip Royal. This is a great steering wheel that has the right amount of dish and the right diameter. This is actually a very strong steering wheel I believe on there website or Facebook page he has posted a strength test video(Im stuck overseas and country shit wont let me watch it). Grip Royal also hinted to me that there is more of the selection of wheels in the works. Also Grip Royal horn buttons and stickers are coming any day now. I can vouch that the hardware is top quality as well, with an allen wrench included. This wheel is priced right too and about $120.00. This is really something I always am interested in when someone comes up with a legit company and offers a legit product to sell and be used to keep the scene moving along. I know there is some of you that wont be interested because you'd rather spend four or five times more money just for some "JDM" or whatever wheel and thats cool. These wheels are race inspired from the Drifting guys, and Grip Royal is wanting to take it further and move into all other racing. So if your looking for a steering wheel pick one these up and support local innovators! Make sure to add Grip Royal on Facebook as well. Im also sharing you followers a 15% off coupon code at the bottom here so when you buy a wheel you can get the hook up!

NOTE that the Momo horn button was used this was prior to Grip Royal horn Buttons.

Make Sure to go to...

Grip Royal Facebook
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100002620626612&sk=wall

Grip Royal website
http://griproyal.bigcartel.com/

And when you buy a wheel use the code to receive a 15% off discount!!!!
HANGAR9

So Whats Up?

The engine is dead due to Innovative Mounts I had installed. Heres the reason, I installed the mounts earlier this year, and the company shorted me hardware. I called them and asked if I could get my bolts, talked to the woman on phone, that always answers, put me on hold forever like normal and then handed me over to the tech, where he proceeded to give me his spill. You would think for such a large company customer satisfaction would come pretty high and sending me 4 bolts would be no big deal. However it was not the case, the tech said it was a mistake I should use my OEM bolts on my engine and they would not send me hardware. So fine I went ahead, and let it be know at this point that yes I know the left and right mount bolts are different lengths, and I know what a bolt bottoming out feels and looks like, but don't forget I also used a torque wrench. So it was a ticking time bomb with the OEM bolts in the mount. I believe that the when I spun the car at the Auto X it put enough lateral load on the engine and thats with the bolts snapped through the block. Finally took the pan off found the bearing pieces and the block pieces and then found where they came from and why. I called Innovative Mounts back and told them whats up. They told me too bad that it happened and they had no problem sending me the bolts at this point. Gee thanks. I was expecting more than a "I don't care" attitude after all I had told them that this was there fault due to the information giving to me by there tech, who I was talking to. Hopping maybe they would see this and prevent this from happening to someone else. So here I am. This was at in inopportune time, because my Go Pro and ASM front lip was on its way, the car was really coming along. So what do I do went after another engine wanting to keep the stock engine and not have anything crazy I sourced what should have been a stock engine. Took it home put it under the knife carefully taking the damaged pieces off the head and by the way whoever put the head together sucks at life. I was really excited to be back up and running soon. It turned out to be a ERL sleeved block with Wiseco pistons built for boost, this puts me back at square one.

Here was the block pieces

From the mount bolts Picture 1

Picture 2

Comparing wasn't hard

I picked up a Nikon D3100 as I promised for the blog finally last night. I know you keep hearing this but the wheels are still turning at a slow pace. But, I got some essentials down now.  Heres a glimpse at a few pictures I took today.

First Video From The Nurburgring

Okay If anyone has been following Formula 1 you would have know that Sunday they raced at the new track, Lewis Hamilton took the victory and Masa got shafted on the last lap pit decision Ferrari made. But, who cares because Team Redbull didn't win(I wish Ferrari did you tried Alonso)! So what did I do, given my opportunity afforded from my predicament at work? I journeyed back the the Nordschleife aka Green Hell! We rented a BMW 2011 320I diesel rocking snow tires, not quite ideal but you work with what you have right? Its just a toll rode. So of coarse the Nordschleife was packed with a lot of people left over from the weekend and the people there for the nice weather we had that day.  Im going to add more pictures with more of the stories from this past weekend. But this is a video made from one of the runs we did, three of us rented the car, one not really a car enthusiast, and by not really I mean not one all. So the whole concept of what you were doing and how cool it was to be at mecca and all didn't mean as much to him. So as we swiped our card and left the gate I noticed that Lincoln big body was behind us and we joked about make sure that doesn't pass you, sure as shit he didn't just get passed they flew past him. A middle eastern guy with middle eastern tags on a huge boat Lincoln with stuff in the back window and white walled tires blew our doors off, afterwards I was never able to catch up with the guy and share a laugh. So enjoy my first video using the Go Pro thats has advertisements on the blog!

Lots of Updates Coming Soon

Sorry everyone I have been super busy with work and moving. But theres tons of stuff me to catch you all up on! From the death of my engine to some new mods to the GPW S2000, and a trip to the Nurburgring I finally was able to get my Go Pro so the videos will be the first chance I had to use it!!!

Auto X June 11th

If you read the previous post then you will know that I lost my engine during all this, but the good news was that I managed to pull off my first win! I had the fastest time of the day and the car handled very well! My wife improved a great deal in her S2000 as well, and is really starting to enjoy the sport I think. I believe my weakest point of the event was that I need to work on my concentration level and focus. The day of the event was very hot over 100 degrees, and we all got sun burnt but, it all was worth it! Heres a few photos from this past weekend 

126000 Miles :( RIP 2.0

This past weekend at the Auto X I participated in my engine went. I managed to finish and drive an hour home with a terrible noise like an exhaust leak. During the event I spun the car and tried to start it then heard a loud thunk. As the day went on I noticed the oil pressure progressively dropping. Once home I drained the oil only to find a bronze metallic color in the oil and the viscosity of water. I realized this year I was racing the clock on this but, now was the worst time for it to happen. But all things happen for a reason, and hopefully very soon I will replace it with a 2.2. But I believe really this story shows just how well Honda manufactures engines. I bought the car is 2002, and have really driven the car the whole life as it was meant to be driven, I ran ITB's with no filter for 60000 miles, ran the car super rich on bad tunes, also had numerous terrible tunes on the car and so on so forth, but I always changed the oil and never had any other problem with the engine until now. I must say that I am upset, however it is what it is and I guess 2011 has just been a year of rebuilding, and hopefully the end of year or next year the car will be better and stronger! Ill keep everyone up to date.

Go Pro

I have recently set up an associate account with Go Pro. What that means to you is that if you click a Go Pro link on the page and buy a Go Pro through that link we will receive a small commission from the sale. The commission will go to funding decals,shirts, cameras, and more to help the site improve!

We all know how good the Go Pro video recorders are, and how they have a great price!

Busy Weekend

I know I don't cover any drifting on here but several of my friends are big into this, so I am planning on going to to there Tractional Optional Drift Event Under The lights, heres a copy of the flier if your near the area make sure you try to make it out, it should be a good time!!!!

Then the following morning I will be participating in a local Auto X, hosted by BMWCCA, at the Millington Airport. This will be the first BMWCCA event I have attended so I am looking forward to it! Pictures and coverage will follow! I hope I see some more people in the area attend this as well!

Here is a link for more info http://www.rivercitybimmers.org/

$20 for BMWCCA members
$30 for non members

Registration at 0800
Drivers Meeting at 0930
First car off at 1000

Hind Sight

Most people will agree that no matter how you build your car there is always other cars that you covet, and you might say "If I did it all over again it would look like that". And then there is other instances where you did this and that and may get forced into a situation where you just cant go back and are forced to go forward. Chris Lum's build has always been one of those cars to me. I think his car is one of the best street built cars I have seen. First off his Ti Silver Volks have always been my absolute favorite colored wheel on the market bottom line. Then there is the front of his car with the ASM I.S. bumper and lip to round it all off. I talked to him and his original intentions was to build a track car out of it so where do you start then, suspension. His first mod happened to be some amazing TEIN SRC coilovers, but then opportunities arose for him to turbo his car, then that was out of his system and wanted to go for some aesthetics while his car devalued before he could make his next debut at the track.  So the SRC's were sold for a more friendly Mono Flex and some more parts. Chris had told me that at on point he had a bunch of "style" parts on his car and then realized the importance of the innovators and the research and development that goes into the parts we buy. I always tell people that if you take your time and buy the real parts you will receive so much more satisfaction in the end product. The import world is has been hit buy all the copies from abroad and when you buy the fakes you help take money away from the next new product. Another great point on this car is the Tamon spoiler. This is just a super nice piece, I just absolutely love how well it flows on a car like this and that is still has the third brake light. Chris drives this car every day to work and wherever, and feels that there is no rush in trying to finish the car overnight, I really love hearing that. He recently picked up a Bride Stradia Seat Japan Edition. Once again the patience on the details pay off in the end. His exhaust is a GReddy SE Single, next to HKS I personally believe that this is a great looking and sounding exhaust. Just to round things off more it seems that he has picked up an ASM rear bumper, another addition in the works that I cant wait to see the final product! Keep up the good work and I cant wait to see the rear bumper done!