mad082

i had heard somewhere that rb20's didn't have paris hilton (aka rich and retard), LOL. but since it has to do with the rb20 i never bothered finding out for sure

ok, just spoke to mate from a shop in brissy who went to the shimano trade show last night. they had the di2 stuff there. looking at about $3600 to $3800 for the full electronics kit (shifters, battery, cables and derailleurs). he said it is ok, but it seems to be more something they have done as a prototype, like how car company make all those cars for the international car shows each year and half of them never actually go into production, and the ones that do often flop after 6 months. he said the some of the stuff was pretty rough (such as the diagnostics unit) and looked like it had been made out of a lunchbox and some lights. something interesting that he pointed out was that if it is fitted to a carbon frame (and some lightweight alloy frames) and a special backing plate is left off when mounting the front derailleur, you will end up with a hole in your frame the first time you change gears. this is because of the fork in which the motor has to push on the frame to move the derailleur. he also said it has some trimming functions which it automatically does. this is when, for example, you are in the smallest cog on the cranks and the largest on the hub (easiest gear) and if you then change down to the smallest cog on the rear, the derailleur will move over slightly to stop the chain rubbing on it. most of the road bike shifters already have this function though, it just isn't automatic. you just move the shifter about half or what you normally would to change gears. found this video on youtube about it

not sure about weight savings. don't have the actual specs yet though, but i reakon it would probably weigh more because it has to have the battery and the motor, etc. still run cables. don't have the catalogue with it in yet so have only be going off very small pics on their online ordering site. they don't even have them listed on their main website yet. also if the battery, charger and cables aren't included in the price above (not sure if they will be because i just got the individual prices for the shifters and 2 derailleurs and added it all up) then you can add another $650 onto the price. taking it to around $4000 for the setup. and that doesn't include cassestte or cranks. so what you pay for just the electronic setup, you could nearly buy a complete bike running the manually operated version. and at least then if something goes wrong you know that any bike shop will be able to fix it, as this requires a diagnostic tool which wholesales at over $400 (depending on the problem). something i'm sure as hell not going to invest in. and yeah campag is good.... if you can afford it. 11 speed ftw

i'm sure they will sell well. roadies are always willing to hand over money if they think it is better quality, despite the fact that 8/10 times it isn't any better, just costs more, which by their thinking means it must be better

the pressure drop they are talking about can be caused by 2 things. 1 is restriction. if something is restrictive then the pressure on 1 side is lower than on the other side. this is how a boost controller works. the other pressure drop can be caused by the cooling affect. cold air is less dense so takes up less space. this results in lower pressure on the engine side of the intercooler than on the turbo side. there are videos on youtube of a balloon being put in liquid nitrogen which graphically show this. the stock intercooler is small and suffers from heat soak rather quickly so after a few hard accellerations in a short period of time you won't get much cooling effect from it and will also have higher pressure in the piping (although same amount of air) due to the higher temps firstly if they disconnected your boost controller then you are probably running less boost which will make the car slower. but if you have a missfire issue then running higher boost won't do much. to raise the boost you will need a boost controller. if you are having missfire issues at your current boost level then you will need new coils. you won't need a new ecu to raise the boost a little bit. you can generally go to around 11psi easily on the stock ecu, however your coils may let you down before you get that high. as for your loss of response, you do lose a touch of response with any FMIC due to the larger piping, however with a decent one it will be minimal as it still flows well. with a crappy one it can make response even worse due to poor flow. but think the main issue you need to fix first is your coils. get that problem sorted before blaming other things

you can't drop boost by adding more piping unless your turbo is tiny and can't supply as much air as what your engine is using. your wastegate is controlled by boost pressure. it won't open until a set pressure. if you add 400m of extra piping the wastegate still won't open until you reach that set pressure. if you saw a pressure drop on your gauge after putting in the cooler then your cooler is more restrictive than your old one (but you would only see this if your boost controller reads from before the intercooler and your gauge from after. if your boost controller gets its pressure from the stock location on the pipe going up to the throttlebody and your boost gauge reads from after the cooler there should be no drop. if you noticed a drop in pressure and have the controller before and gauge after setup, then if you hook the gauge into the line the boost controller is using you will find that your boost pressure magically jumps up by a few psi without even touching the controller. this is because the before/after setup adds a restriction between where the turbo reads it's boost and where you read what is going into the engine. this also probably accounts to why some people blow stock turbos quicker than others at higher psi. if you have a restrictive cooler and are running 14psi according to a gauge after the cooler, your turbo may actually be running 16 or 17psi, where as someone with a good cooler may only be running 15psi when the gauge reads 14psi. if you lost 9kw from putting on a front mount, then the cooler must be a really really bad design, as you should gain power simply from the extra cooling effect it has to the heat box that the stock intercoler is. was that 9kw loss from a run done on the same day on the same dyno and within a few mins of each other to make sure it wasn't due to different air temps? looking at your setup i would say that your power loss would be due to the intercooler design. i'm not a big fan of the cooler setups that use the stock piping route. the length of the piping compared to the type that goes over the radiator is minimal, and the drivers side end tank just screams turbulence. at least with the normal style cooler the air is flowing in a straighter line

the BK plug is shorter from the washer to the terminal (where the lead or coil clips on) than the BC plug by 2.5mm. so using the BC plug is going to make it sit up into the coilpacks a bit better and probably help with contact in the coils

if the fuel coming out of the filter was dirty it's pretty safe to say the injectors are going to be dirty. get them professionally cleaned.

won't destroy them, but my personal opinion is that it doesn't do them any good. and i also think that you get better response on gear changes having a bov

do you ride a road bike? are you sick of having to exert all that energy to move your hand to change gears? do you wish you could simply press a button and have it done electronically? do you have a spare $3300? well if you ansered yes to all of the above then your wish has come true with the new shimano dura ace di2 shifters and derailluer. yes that's right folks, shimano now has a battery operated shifter system. so now instead of having that simple cable setup you have a complex motor system. why pay about $1800 for cable operated top of the line shifters and derailleurs when for an extra $1500 you can go battery operated..........

i ran the resistor type in my 33 and had no issues, same goes for probably hundreds of other poeple on this forum. also NGK recommend using the resistor type plug. you will find that most cars with ecu's will recommend using resistor type plugs as the resistor cuts down electrical noise also it should be said that the BKR plugs are 2.5mm shorter from the gasket to the top of the terminal than the BCPR plugs, so using the BCPR plugs is going to squash the spring up a bit more giving better contact on the spring

while it is a bit off topic, i am also against the letting your car sit there and idle to warm up. the main reasons being that it takes longer for a car to warm up when it's just sitting there idling, which means the car is running for longer at colder temps. the other reason being that it doesn't warm up the oil in the gearbox or diff. another thing to take into consideration is that if you run your car for 10 mins every morning before you start driving, over a 1yr period, that is nearly 61 hours of running that your engine has done that hasn't been taken into account on your odometer, which means more than likely not taken into account on your servicing frequency. and not to mention the extra fuel you are using.

i would check the dump pipe. when removing or installing the new exhaust you may have twisted the dump pipe a bit (possibly when trying to undo the bolts on the cat) and it may be causing the wastegate flap to foul slightly and not close properly. definately a problem. i had a 3.5" exhaust with stock ecu and was making 12psi by under 3000rpm. may be an issue with your boost controller (i also had an issue with a boost controller causing boost to come on very late. it wasn't releasing the pressure between the controller and the wastegate when you lifted off so when you changed gears the wastegate would still be open, and on a few occasions it was open so far at 5000rpm i was only just starting to make boost)

that is a bit stupid. i have been on ebay for years and have a feedback of under 200. does that mean i'm not trustworthy or no-one should buy from me? someone with 5000+ feedback is less likely to give a shit about someone giving them negative feedback than someone with 50 as it is going to have a bigger effect on their rating, however someone with less feedback is more likely to be a scammer. also someone could have a high possitive feedback from buying things and then on the first time they sell something it could be a scam. to the OP, good luck man, hope you get it sorted

well he doesn't own the car, so crushing is stupid as it only punishes the owner of the car, not the driver, so the people who are saying to crush it should grow a brain. i'm guessing he will lose his job, not just because of the fact that he will lose his licence (high profile case so he will more than likely be made an example of) but because he has damaged the image of the business he works for, and also because the car was scheduled for reviews by other people during the week, so i'm guessing the company that owns the car will think twice about letting the financial review's motoring writers test any of their cars. they may even be able to take legal action against the driver, or the financial review if any of the other testers had paid money to test it.

ahaha, not quite jase, cause he would have to post the wheels up here first. no i'm not in vic, i'm in qld lacing isn't that hard to do once you know what you are doing. if you don't know what you are doing, even just trying to copy a wheel you have sitting next to you can end in disaster. if someone brings a wheel in to me that they have tried to lace and stuffed up, i charge extra to fix it because i have to start from scratch (charge a fee for removing the spokes). often what they do it tighten each spoke up all the way before they put in the next spoke and this ends in disaster (and can end up stuffing the rim) the problems from incorrect lacing range from sideways buckles (easy to fix), incorrect offset/dish (also easy to fix... most of the time), up and down buckles (harder to fix), rims being damaged (can't be fixed) if all you are doing is changing the spokes but using the same rim and hub (or changing rims and using old spokes and hub), this is generally pretty easy as you don't have to calculate the spoke length. you can just measure the length of the old spokes. dishing is also easy, again if you know what you are doing. generally using 2mm shorter spokes on the drive side will give you enough difference to dish it easily.

if you do add any more glass in, do it from underneath, for 2 reasons. 1: saves you having to smooth it out again, and 2: the more you add to the top, the further it is going to sit out from the lights and be higher than the 1/4 panels

spark plugs wear out over time and injectors get dirty. might be worth just pulling a few plugs out to have a look at them and see if they look like they are fouling up at all. was it doing it before the fuel pump went in or did it start just after? as has been said, make sure you give the pump time to prime before turning over. if you are and it still doesn't start easily then you can pretty much rule out the pump as it shouldn't affect things once primed.

as has been said, could be the battery not having enough amps, or it could be a fuel or spark issue. if you haven't changed the plugs in a while, might be worth replacing them (doesn't hurt and they are pretty cheap at only a few dollars each)

was it just the core that you pressurised or the whole system?

just check your coolant (when cold of course), as long as it's fine then it is just the usual condensation.

you can have a blown gasket and not have water in the oil or vice versa. when i had a falcon i blew about 3 head gaskets and each time it was only letting water into the cylinder. never ended up with milky oil. as for the smoking when cold, if you haven't driven the car all day and start it up in the afternoon will it blow white smoke? if it does then it is the headgasket. this can also make it hard to start sometimes. also, i would fill up the coolant (making sure to blled it properly) then get the car hot on the spot with some cardboard under the car and look for any signs of water dripping to elimiate the chance of it having a leak somewhere.

i charge $35 in labour and spokes are between 50c and $1 each. most are 50c so a 36h wheels works out to be $53. i don't mind only charging $35, because it usually only takes me half an hour. gotta do a wheel this morning actually should've gone michelin pro race tyre. they last long time, LOL. i ran them on my road bike. very good grip thanks to being dual compound (one compound is the same compound as f1 and superbike tyres) and last a long time as well as being very puncture resistant. about $100 though.

fixed wheel bikes have been around for ever and a day. i have been able to order them for as long as i have been working with biks (since 2000). they were just called track (velodrome) bikes and were only available with drop bars (bars not bears, LOL), but now they make flat bar versions. building wheels is probably my favourite part of building bikes because it takes the longest and is the bit that takes the most concentration. piecing them together just shits me off, as does adjusting them. that is why the gears on my own bike aren't anywhere near as precise as customers bikes, LOL. just cbf'd doing my own. i can actually wheelie better without brakes than with brakes.

may be cool, but not legal. you CAN go brakeless, just can't ride on the road/footpath without brakes. kind of makes sense to have at least 1 brake though. LOL