I decided to change the oil and filter on the car today. Aaron told me that it has been changed at least three times since he's had it at the shop, even though there have only been 400 miles logged on the odometer since he's had it. But I figured that with the car running pretty rich because of those screwed up O2 sensors, probably would be a good thing to do now, just to play it safe.
I was quite surprised at how dark the oil was coming out of that oil pan....
EVEN BETTER! Since I haven't started to "mod" mine yet, I am unaware
of parts and supplies like that! Guess you can get just about anything you need nowdays.
Andy
Andy, before I forget, you need to know that if you use the rear O2 sensors, you will need an adapter to hook up the O2 cables to the front wiring harnesses. The connectors are different. The rear O2 sensor cables for the C5 have a square 4 pin connector whereby the fronts have an inline straight 4 pin connector. LG Motorsports has both the extension cables for the front O2s as well as the adaptors if you use the rear O2s.
I had a LONG phone conversation with Aaron today, and it didn't get as heated as I really thought it would. We both kept our cool and had a conversation that we will likely both look back on as being the best that could be hoped for, all things considered. I simply laid out all the cards on the table as I see them, and Aaron laid his own out as he saw them. Obviously there are some disagreements in interpretation of some of the points.
But point of the matter is that I had expected to be driving a car home from his shop that I could DRIVE afterwards. It's been in my garage ever since, nearly a month later, except for a brief trip to my front porch so Bret could look at the tuning remotely for me. There are problems that need to be resolved that I thought I had already paid him for, that I will either need to resolve myself, or pay someone else to resolve them for me before my car is driveable. Aaron said I could bring the car to his shop and he would fix the problems, and even offered to have Jim Smith come to my house to work on the tune. My response was simply that I couldn't see any reason in doing it that way, as they had already had 14 months to do this, and I couldn't see any reason why I should consider giving them more time at this point.
With that in mind, I asked Aaron if he would consider refunding a small amount of the money I paid him, and he agreed, saying he would send me a check in two weeks. I sent him a followup email detailing the conversation and asked him to reply with an acknowledgement of our verbal agreement.
I really hate burning bridges, even when there appears to be no choice in the matter. But it is what it is.....
Hi Rich, I have been following this thread from the begining...I think you asking Aaron to defray some of the money back is deserved...You expected a car that would be running and streetable at this point in time, considering how long Aaron has been working on it...As far as the guy tuning the car, I am not impressed at all with his expertise...Hang in there, do what you have to do, you will get the car sorted out...
Aaron called me today. I think he feels just as bad about all this as I do. I'm actually surprised that he is taking the position that he feels that he just screwed up and let me down. Most guys would never admit something like that, so I do have to hand it to him for agreeing with my perspective, much less even LOOKING at it from that angle. I guess my car has just beaten both of us down, maybe even more so him than me. Maybe a bridge didn't get burned after all.
Anyway, Aaron said he spent a lot of time on the phone checking around for someone to get my car tuned RIGHT. He said nearly everyone brought the name up of a guy named Mike Carnahan (VengeancePCM.com) out of Cummings, Ga. I'll give the guy a call and talk to him, but right now I've got other cats to fry. I'm not totally sold on the 2 bar MAP tune quite yet, to be honest. Maybe I'll see what this guy Mike says. Seems like there are some pros and cons to either method. The 2 BAR MAP tune gives you more detailed mapping of the tune via tables, especially during boost, but at the expense of going to a system that is not self adapting to changing environmental conditions on the fly as it is now. In some respects, I like the idea of a fuel and ignition system that LEARNS as it goes. But I guess what matters most is what would be BEST for my setup. Unfortunately, I may not know the actual answer to that question until looking at it from hindsight.
But I have plenty to do before I get to that point, anyway. No sense worrying about tuning too much beyond just getting the car running till I get all the mechanical and ignition issues straightened away. I'm hoping just replacing the O2s and harnesses will straighten up the readings I'm getting off of them. If not, well, SOMETHING else has to be causing it that will have to be tracked down. Heck, maybe the exhaust leaks are throwing a monkey wrench into things.
In any event, some of the exhaust parts came in today, so maybe by the weekend I can start getting the exhaust system straightened out. If not, I guess I know what I'll be doing over Christmas weekend.
One of the things I want to do is to straighten out that fuel line that goes across the front of my intake. Harwood put it in so that it is sitting too high and rubs against the inside of my hood. Aaron just didn't get around to fixing it for me, so it's up to me, it seems.
I thought, "heck, no problem, I'll just get some new ends and a length of braided hose".... Not so fast. After reading a LOT about this, apparently there are some incompatibilities between different manufacturers. In other words, hose from one manufacturer might not work in the connectors from another. And I'm trying to eyeball the hose to figure out if it's "-6" or "-8"... Outside diameter is around a half inch. But I'm just guessing if I say I think it is -6 hose.
I'm thinking I want to put 45 degree ends on the hose so it will form out towards the front of the car, so I can set it lower and in front of the intake manifold. Yeah, I guess I could just take apart the one on there and shorten so I can lower the one side, but maybe the other way will look neater.
Worse comes to worse, at least I'll have some hose and ends in case I screw something up. Always good to have a backup...
Temporarily you might try to rotate the 45 fitting to pull the hose down away from the hood.
I looked it over with that in mind, but it appears to me that all that would happen is that it would push the hose up higher. I think I would need to take off about an inch of hose in order to get it down lower. So I figure if I'm going to go that far with it, might as well try to dress it up a little better.
I sent those pics to Summit Racing and asked them to tell me what I need to get in order to do what I want.
Oh yeah, I found a small section in Summit Racing's catalog explaining how to tell which size AN (btw, for those who don't know, like me just a few hours ago, "AN" stands for "Army/Navy") hose and fitting I have. It appears to be -8 and not -6.
I agree about pushing it up farther if you rotate towards the throttle body but if you rotate it back towards the wheel it should pull down on the hose.
I think the correct fix is the one you are pursuing with Summit. At least as looks and function goes. My idea was just to keep it off the hood temporarily.
Since I haven't started to "mod" mine yet, I am unaware
Outside diameter is around a half inch. But I'm just guessing if I say I think it is -6 hose.
Linear Mode
