Beer Baron

hmm, interesting. not sure about this bit: "The production of this little gem isn't flash," not exactly compelling me to buy a copy. also listed as paperback, would be keen if it was hard cover. been reading my senna 'lotus years' book btw. good book with lots of nice pics.

wise words. something so often overlooked and yet so important. thick cores are awful for air flow through the core and even worse if they are bar and plate. a nice thin tube and fin core up to about 80mm (max) is perfect. and the good onse (ARC) etc do fine up to 800hp and more.

she single and like ugly blokes?

mate! that wing mount is a work of art!!

couldn't agree more. i am just as anxious as the rest to see how it goes. from what I've seen it looks positive. hopefully when we get back to testing one on marks car it will do what we want. nothing really to do but see what happens. I'll leave it at that.

whose to say if the house brick was hit by the moon module or if perhaps your house brick actually jumped off the floor and hit the module as it was minding it's own business mid-hover in your living room? I think your warranty will be paid but only in 3 dollar bills as per your original purchase. lol, you are funny bugger. I never can stay mad at you. just for you I'll say there's been nothing go wrong with the castings on any of the EFR turbos I've seen. but it's 100% behind the delay in supply. nothing really else we can say about it except hopefully their move in facilities etc has sorted it out and they'll be shooting out the door soon.

it's hard to say because of what I explained above. think of it like this. Sony give me a TV to test. It's going ok, then it fails. I can tell everyone my Sony tv failed and people will think badly of their product. What they don't know is I dropped a brick on the TV earlier that day whilst extending the wall in my mud hut so there's a fair chance that the reason it exploded when I switched it on was the brick I dropped on it damaged it. But then again, maybe it wasn't the brick I dropped on it, maybe another un-related part failed. Until Sony looks at it and until I tell them everything that happened whilst testing the TV no body knows how or why it failed. So to just tell people "my TV failed" automatically puts it in a negative light which might be grossly unfair. Once I know how and why it failed that's different, and even if it wasn't my brick that caused the TV to fail Sony might find the cause and explain "the internal tuner failed due to it picking up radio emissions from a moon module, we hadn't seen that before but we've since improved this part for the production models" and in that case even though it was a straight component failure I'd be able to explain what happened and how it's been addressed and people would be able to take that knowledge on board and make fairly accurate conclusions. At this point nothing is known so as I said posting anything would just be pure 100% speculation which is a waste of time and possibly gives people the wrong idea. Once we have some conclusions I'm sure all involved would be happy to say what has happened. As for Mark's thoughts I can tell you straight from his mouth he's wrapped with the 9180 and that is what the car is going to have. I'm sure he'd post that himself but he's just a tad busy working his arse off to get his car ready for action.

what's wrong with your 3 dollar notes Noel? I just checked my wallet and all the ones I have look legit?

well you speak from a position of experience so we'll agree to our differing views. though I do tend to agree quality of movies has dropped a little but I don't find it too bad since I have the full package so i've got so many movie channels to pick from.

P plate legal car for $20k i'd be getting an EP3 civic type R. nice and modern so it won't keep breaking down on you and cheap to repair/maintain. they are quick, 6speed manual, beautifully made, lovely handling, an import so they are a bit different/cool and lots of tuning parts available for them if you want to mod it. great cars.

yeah, still cool

meh I'd love to see the F1 come onto foxtel. it would mean easy to record, rewind etc, HD coverage and most importantly LESS ADVERTISEMENTS!!! possibly even ad free. I don't know how anyone watches stuff like movies on free to air anymore with all the ads they put in. on fox stuff like that is ad free. anyone who reckons foxtel is rubbish doesn't have foxtel! most people I know who've had it for any length of time can't live without it. (ok that's a bit sad but still...).

geez there's some people quick to cut others down. All I've been trying to do is keep people updated on what's going on and hopefully share some results. We had a failure that cut our testing/tuning short. It was not necessarily a defect or problem with the turbo so don't jump to conclusions. I didn't post any more than that because anything other than saying "we don't know" would just be speculation as to what happened and what was the cause. We had a few teething issues that were completely un-related to the turbo and then we had some that were related to the turbo (but to re-iterate until we know the cause it's not fair to just say it failed). as for results being elusive... god if I had them I would post them. We have all been running around like mad the last week (and shit the last year for some of us) to get this going. We've had a few small hiccups but the short time we got with the turbo tells us it's exactly what we want. Mark Berry's exact words were "this car will have a Borg Warner on it for the foreseeable future and the 9180 is THE turbo to have". I don't think I have to air every little step we take in public so please understand there things I can share and things I can't. It's not about trying to hide stuff or be evasive it's just a fact that the development process is not always 100% for public consumption. We are dealing with peoples businesses and peoples hard work and sometimes stuff gets mis-interpreted or misquoted (like SkylineSky's quote 'from the tuners'). So everyone will just have to wait a little. We are not trying to cover stuff up. if the results were not good we'd still share them and then try and figure out why that was the case! This is not a component in isolation either. Don't forget that. We are not just testing this turbo on some kind of standardised test rig. it's going onto an engine in a car with dozens of other little components that can affect it's performance. On top of that we are dealing with prototype/test parts. So for now the only results I can give you is that at lower boost levels (sub 2 bar) it was out performing our previous set-ups on the car. It exhibited amazing levels of response on the 3ltr to the point that Mark reckons a 9180 would even be fine to use on a track use RB26 as the lag would not be unacceptable. Once WTAC is done we'll get back to testing the 9180 and there will be more results to share. There's only a lack of results at the moment due to lack of supply of 9180s which has been explained to death. On a more note the car that is running the 6258s just hit the dyno for the first time. After last weeks nonsense I'm not game to post any 'preliminary' results yet so we'll just have to wait and see.

Yeah sorry what I meant was he constantly commits bullshit driving offences and doesn't get penalised. sure he cops penalties nearly every race but he should have copped even more.

yeah I wondered about that too. I was pissed. he was in my top 10...

lol. harsh but true I'm sure.

agreed. I was surprised the commentators and others weren't as appaled as I was. it was a desperate dangerous move. I'm glad he finally got a penalty because he does shit like that all the time. no regard for others safety just desperate not to let his team mate pass him. like a spoilt child.

you will love it mate and $1150 each is still very good price. flights during GP time are usually a bit exxy, hotels even more so and brabham tickets alone ate $600+ (guessing 4 corners maybe a bit cheaper) but yeah, you will have a great time. melb airport to city is pretty easy. cab or bus. about 40min or so. just be aware the pit walk is usually 'pit straight' as in down the main straight on the track, not actually inside the pit lane (which is what it was years ago).

I know. if I hear vettel say it again and show his finger I will snap it off and put it so far up his nose it'll come back with his brain skewered on it.

lol. good man. freeze her out!!!

before you pull it down do a leak down test, or at least do a 'wet' compression test. with engine warm, do a comp test again on the 3 suspect cylinders. then dump in a capfull of oil down the plug hole and test again. if the compression comes up you can be fairly sure it's rings as suspected. if it doesn't change then chances are it's a head problem (sticky valves, bad valve seats, bent valves, etc etc). you can narrow down the cause a fair bit more with some basic tests before ripping the engine out. especially if you're paying to have it removed this should be the last step as it'll cost you a fair bit more $$$.

yeah no worries. definitely start with the basics. trouble shoot it properly before you rip it out. apart from the stuff I mentioned (crankcase ventilation etc) yes it could well be rings not sealing (puts pressure into the crankcase and sends oil and vapour to spots where it shouldn't be!). but cross off the basics first. compression test and leakdown test will give you a fair idea of whether or not it's rings. if the rings are not sealing/bedded in properly and you and the tuner have followed what the machine shop recommended for run in procedure then they may help you fix it since the problem could point at their work. I doubt they'll buy you a new engine but they may help with discount on their services or something to get it fixed. there are just too many variables to pin blame on one person. you worked on it, machine shop worked on it, mechanic worked on it, tuner tuned it. no way to pin it down to just 1 cause unless it's very, very clear what the problem is and how it was exactly caused. hopefully you'll find something basic wrong in the install and go from there.

Yeah there is a couple of EFR set-ups in aus now, don't think there are ANY production/retail 9180s anywhere in the world yet though. Simon. It's not safe to say anything yet. I'm not trying to be evasive. The simple fact is testing is not done yet, I've told you guys the only meaningful results I have and that is the response was fantastic and it was making good power at lower boost levels. Once the wick was wound up to start getting towards serious power, testing was cut short. We didn't get a chance to run it at high boost so we don't know what it's ultimate potential will be. That's the situation. Preliminary testing was positive but (for now) it's been halted. Obviously we are 'testing' and that process is still on going so no conclusions can really be drawn yet. When they can be there will be updates for sure. Try and be patient and see what happens.

the reason they can be had for around $1000 is tomei deal in america. and with the current strength of the AUD vs USD it's acutally cheaper at the moment to buy tomei products out of the US than it is to buy them out of japan. It's a bargain. not long ago they were near enough to $2,000 for a set of tomei rods. for $1,000 I'd jump on them if building an engine. They are a cleverly designed rod and nicely made. I think that was just a typo in the listing you looked at but this one is pretty specific. http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Tomei-Forged-H-Beam-Conrod-Kit-Nissan-RB26-RB25-121-5mm-_W0QQcmdZViewItemQQhashZitem4cf84a8487QQitemZ330583147655QQptZMotorsQ5fCarQ5fTruckQ5fPartsQ5fAccessories

could be. still 350kw on pulp is right at the good end of power for -5s on 21psi so things seem fairly healthy. I would have expected a bit more like 380kw or so though with 3psi more boost AND E85 change. still I wouldn't be too concerned. fix the exhaust leak though, they certainly don't help.