Josh's Build Thread
 

So I figured it's about time I do my own little build thread.

My FC is my daily driver. That includes a lot of winter driving, especially since I've been working in our snow removal shop working on the equipment used to clear the air field (plows, brooms, blowers...all giant sized). I'm about 30min from the Nurburgring, so the goal of the build is to allow me to thrash the 'Ring and drive semi-comfortably the rest of the time. I guess you could call it a resto-mod build.

What I started with:

http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/e..._7587960_o.jpg

A series 4 TurboII with an unknown number of miles and engine rebuilds. When these cars are imported into Europe they tend to go through a bit of an identity crisis. Mine is definitely a S4, but it's registered and has the VIN plate of a S5 (1990). This didn't really matter to me, because the price was right and it is mechanically sound...for the most part.

I got the car from my friend Higgi, who has been a member on here and numerous other rotary forums for a long time. Before he delivered the car to me he installed a Racing Beat front sway bar and Torsen LSD (from a FD). These will be the only parts and work not done by me...that's mostly because he had the parts and he made me an offer I couldn't refuse.

It has since developed an odd cooling system issue where it occasionally over fills the overflow and I end up refilling it. It doesn't happen all the time and I'm sure I have a small leak somewhere allowing air into the system, just haven't picked up a pressure tester to check it. It doesn't over heat or smoke and I have muy bueno compression so it hasn't been a big hurry for me.

The parts:

My goal is to try and get as many parts second hand or rebuilt, as I can. I have a wife and two kids and I have to be realistic about how much I can sink into this project. My goal is to keep it under $8k and that includes the price of the car. I'm a little under $5k so far. This is what I've ordered and received so far:

- 17x8 +35 and 17x9 +40 Rays Egrets
- 235/45 and 255/40 Federal 595 tires
- KSport Kontrol Pro coilovers
- Racing Beat Rev2 turbo back exhaust
- HKS Sequential Blow Off valve Version 1 (old school)
- Twin plate OS Giken Clutch (more on this later)
- Custom Landon Shift Knob
- Mazda Racing Short Shifter
- Tubular S4 turbo manifold
- Prosport Gauges (oil pressure, H2O temp, boost)
- S5 tail lights (convertible, since I need the extra room for my long euro plate)

The remaining items I need to upgrade/order are (list is not all inclusive or final :) ):

- Reman calipers all around, along with new rotors and pads
- Hybrid turbo (DIY build)...I have 4 cores on the way, lol
- RTEK 2.1
- eBay v-mount setup
- upgraded radiator

Think that's it for now. Next post will be some more current pics.

The car after installing the wheels with tires and the KSport coilovers:

http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/e..._5619875_n.jpg

http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/e..._2804137_n.jpg

Ignore the dirtiness...we've had a helluva a lot of pollen this year.

Had a busy day working on the car this weekend. Yesterday was just removing the old exhaust, the turbo, and UIM and exhaust manifold.

Today I wrapped the new down pipe and tubular exhaust manifold with thermal wrap. Here's a couple pics of that:
http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/e...4/b851ea1d.jpg
http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/e...4/5a8cf7cc.jpg\

I found some pretty nasty cracking on my factory exhaust manifold and also discovered that two of the manifold to engine nuts were missing. Needless to say, I'm pretty sure that is the cause of the nasty exhaust leaks I've had going on. Here's some pics of the old manifold:
http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/e...4/983e9706.jpg
http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/e...4/b7725d62.jpg

I also ported the wastegate and the smaller twin scroll runner on the turbo. Since my new manifold is almost fully divided and I'm losing the twin scroll actuator I figured this was the least I can do. Hopefully I don't experience too much lag as a result, but it'll be hard to discern any real downside since I've been rolling around with such nasty exhaust leaks the whole time. Here's a pic of the turbo with it's new blanket installed too:
http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/e...4/c6dddb80.jpg

While I have everything out, I removed the air pump and ACV since I won't have any cats. Installed my block off plates this evening. I am keeping my BAC and keeping the throttle body stock for driveability.

Also, on Saturday I rolled my passenger side fender a bit to resolve a rub I was getting.

This upcoming week I'll be reinstalling everything. Putting in new motor and trans mounts. Installing my Mazda Racing short shifter and Landon custom knob and installing my Prosport gauges along with the various adapters and such that go along with that.

That looks like a very solid base to start building from. It looks very good so far and I must admit I envy the fact you live 30 minutes from the Nurburgring. There's a few cool tracks here in Florida to do track days out, but not many in the world stack up to the Ring.

what manifold it that . havent seen to many tubular for s4 .

I'm 90% sure it's custom made. I bought it from another member in the classifieds. I saw one other one not too long ago, but you're right, they're pretty uncommon.

Working on the car today. Just got done doing the motor mounts and trans mounts. They're a lot easier to do without a turbo in the way, lol. I'm glad I had them on hand to swap out because I've had a clunk ever since I did my clutch and I think I know why...here's a picture, since they're worth 1,000 words, lol.

http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/e...4/85921e88.jpg

Now it's time to start putting the turbo back in and then the exhaust. Slowly but surely getting there.

Nice kicks, dude. Definite upgrade.

Finished working for the day.

I Installed motor mounts and transmission mounts. Not sure if it's covered in other posts, but installing the motor mounts is pretty easy with the turbo out. I loosened all the mount bolts, then used a floor jack to raise the motor up until the slave cylinder was almost contacting the tunnel. I also just loosened the fan shroud to make sure the fan didn't get broken. I noticed that if you remove the three bolts for the driver's side bracket and pull the whole assembly out, it gives you more wiggle room on the passenger side so you can slide that mount out without messing with the bracket.

After doing the mounts I installed my Mazda Racing short shifter and my Landon custom shift knob. This was a huge improvement since, for whatever reason, the bushings on my factory shifter fell apart so I had zero bushings left. Made for very sloppy shifting. Here's a pic of the shifter in it's new home:
http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/e...4/cba85e8a.jpg

I serviced the transmission fluid since the car was up on stands anyway.

The last project for the day was reinstalling the turbo/manifold assembly and installing the Racing Beat Rev2 exhaust (with wrapped downpipe). Went on pretty easy, but the muffler flanges are hitting where the lower control arms attach at the subframe. However, I haven't installed the Y pipe hangers yet because I was missing a couple bolts to bolt them on, so maybe they will help adjust the positioning just enough to prevent any contact. The turbo went in pretty easy, but it is a very tight fit because of the turbo blanket. I had to make some small adjustments to the blanket so that the coolant banjo bolt could go back in, other than that, pretty easy. Here's a pic of the turbo all snug in the bay with it's blanket:
http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/e...4/1e88a727.jpg

So far so good. Tomorrow I'll be tidying up some of the rats nest, installing those missing hangars, installing my gauges, and reinstalling the UIM. I may even get to fire her up, we'll see.

So today I got everything cleaned up. The UIM gasket was baked on and took me the better part of 4 hours to remove. I finished removing the rats nest. I installed my Audi Q7 fuel pump and rewired it (per the directions on 1300cc.com). As my time was quickly running out for the evening, I decided to bolt down the UIM and call it a night. Tomorrow, all that's left is the rest of the intake system (IC and airbox),a little vacuum hose rerouting and re-assemble the interior from running the wires and hoses for the boost gauge. Then I'll double check everything is good to go and fire it up. I can't wait to hear the sweet sweet sound of that RB exhaust.

Well shit.

I got everything finished up this morning. Double and triple check everything.

Checked the fuel pump wiring and plumbing by priming the system (little yellow connector) and found a small leak at the top of the filter. Tightened it up and no more leaks.

So I fired it up. It started on the first shot and idled perfectly, but there was very obviously an exhaust leak in the engine bay and it sounded terrible (almost like an open header). So after doing a quick look over the engine bay I shut her down to tighten the exhaust manifold nuts (since that's where it seemed to come from). I tightened up the nuts and also observed some smoking from the thermal wrap, which is pretty normal till the wrap gets "baked" the first time.

I went to start it back up again and nothing. So I thought maybe I flooded it with all the fiddling with the fuel pump and not letting it warm up. I pulled the trailing plugs and the EGI fuses and cranked for a bit. The plugs weren't wet and nothing came out when I cranked it. So I put the plugs and fuses back in and tried it again. Nothing. It just cranks and cranks, but doesn't fire.

I'm at a loss here, I can't seem to get it to run again. When it was running it idled perfectly, no stumbles or anything. Anyone have any ideas?

Was it a new fuel pump that you installed, or used? Can you hear/tell if it's running or not?

Yeah it's a brand new pump. It is also equivalent or better than a Walbro 255.

The only thing is because it's designed for the Audi direct injection engines it has two outlets, one of which is super high pressure. When you install it you block the super high pressure outlet.

Well because it's in the tank I didn't think to check it and it wasn't tight enough. This means the pump was putting hardly any pressure to the engine and was instead cycling the fuel back into the tank. Well, once I determined that that was what was happening, I pulled the pump and put new clamps on the plug.

Once I did that, I reprimed the fuel system and now have another leak. It appears the increased fuel pressure is over running all of the old squeeze clamps in the system and I only replace those that were necessary to do the rat's nest delete...no one to blame but myself.

Gotta run to the store and get more hose clamps, then tear off the UIM again and reclamp all the remaining fuel lines. Hopefully another update in a few hours after all that's done.

id recommend running an aftermarket fuel pressure regulator

An aftermarket FPR is on the buy list, but according to Higgi (who's ran this mod quite a bit) it's not necessary.

I got the fuel lines all clamped up and I know I'm getting fuel pressure, I can see the fuel lines "jump" when I bridge the yellow plug.

The thing that really boggles my mind is that it ran. It's ran since I did all this work on it. I tighten a couple lines and all of a sudden it doesn't run any more.

Still can't get the car started. Higgi is on his way tomorrow for a prearranged meeting, hope we can get it going. There's a possibility I may not have installed the silly Audi pump properly. Something about a little plastic piece that needed to be there. Cross your fingers for tomorrow.

I would take out that fuel pump and put a standard (upgraded) pump in. Those direct injection engines run THOUSANDS of PSI fuel. Ours needs... 37-40 PSI base.

There are two outlets on the Q7 fuel pump. One is "regular" pressure, the other is higher pressure (but not 1000s of psi). The DI engines have a high pressure pump in the engine bay that bumps the pressure up the rest of the way. The higher pressure outlet is blocked off on my pump.

Here are some links to a flow test done on a Walbro and a Q7 pump:
http://rx7cz.net/pdf/PP13.pdf (Q7)
http://rx7cz.net/pdf/Walbro13.pdf (Walbro)

Basically, the Q7 draws more current than the Walbro, but flows more fuel at higher pressures. The Walbro drops to 230lph at 4bar where as the Q7 pump hangs tough at 280lph at 4bar. The Q7 pump's flow doesn't drop off as much as the Walbro.

I'm pretty sure I have managed to just install the fuel pump wrong. I'll try and document the proper installation in case anyone else decides to do this upgrade.

^I see. I actually (obviously) don't know much about these pumps.

Well I swapped out the fuel pump with my old factory one and it's running. Going to try to figure out the problem with the new pump, but at least it's running.

I still have a minor exhaust leak, but I was just happy to get it out. The thing smoked like crazy from the thermal wrap, but after driving it a couple times it's not smoking anymore.

I didn't have any more leaks, fuel or otherwise. That makes me happy, since I need new gaskets for the turbo lines.

Got her out and stretched her legs yesterday.

It appears I didn't do enough of a port on the turbo as I'm hitting fuel cut. I'm kicking myself for not ordering my RTEK or FCD when I was ordering everything. Now I'll just have to take it easy on her till I can either buy one or build one.

Still sorting a bit of an exhaust leak, but it's getting there.

So when I drove the car to base yesterday the car flooded...twice. Once when I initially shut it off, then again after driving it to my office.

I don't know if I've got a bad injector now or what (maybe caused by the factory pump being rewired?). When I deflooded and started it the second time it was missing for the first minute or so, then smoothed out, but wouldn't hold an idle till it had been running for a few minutes more.

It's been suggested that I reinstall the FPR vacuum solenoid that I deleted as that may be causing the condition.

On a better note, I mailed off my spare N332 ECU to get the RTEK 2.1 installed. So I suppose if it is the solenoid, I could just wait to get the ECU in and adjust the cranking map.

Thoughts? Suggestions?

Thought I'd throw this on here since I googled and couldn't find anything.

I wired up the Prosport Performance Gauges today. I wanted them to be amber all the time and I couldn't find the wiring for them. I called Prosport and this is how they get wired to be amber all the time:

Black = Ground
Red = 12v ignition
Orange = 12v ignition
White = Not hooked up at all
Green = Sending unit (if applicable)

Hope it helps someone else who may be doing the same thing.

Can't wait to get my RTEK. My gauge pod from Retro-Spec shipped and should be here soon, I'll post pics of all of that when it gets here.

How about a dyno run ? :nod:

Soon as I get my RTEK in, I'll definitely be up for a dyno run :)

Wow, its like I put together a build kit to replicate my car and you are building it. So far the only difference seems to be the wheels. Subscribed!

About the flooding issue, the stock fpr is only suitable for the stock fuel pump. Additionally the stock cranking map is STUPID rich, when I got my rtek I took the cranking map down at least 40% except in the hottest and coldest conditions.

Everything I've been reading has said the OEM FPR can take a Walbro 255 as well as the FD fuel pump and the Q7 pump isn't flowing much more than that.

Something else is going on with the fueling now.

I got the exhaust leak completely eliminated finally. It sounds a lot nicer in the cabin while driving now.

After I fixed that I took her out for a spin and it seems that when the secondaries should be kicking in, it falls on it's face. So basically high revs with any boost and it loses power...still runs, but ceases to accelerate. If I "ease" it up past 4k rpm it will keep going, but as soon as I give it any boost revs slow dramatically and so does acceleration (obviously).

I really need to get a fuel pressure gauge so I can get an idea of what is going on with that.

I guess in the end, a lot of this should be easier to sort out with the RTEK installed...then I can data log.

I be'd interested to know where you've been reading that; I've never met/spoken to anyone that found that to be true. The stock fpr cam handle the fd pump because it only flows about 20% more than stock any more than that and its not up to the task. I had a walbro 255 when I first got the car, it would flood, it would shoot a cloud of black smoke every time it started up, and ran rich pretty much all the time (according to a NB). As soon as I put the fd pump in, all those problems went away. The Q7 flows even more than the 255 so the problem would be worse for you. Combine that w/the rich stock starting maps and....

Caveat: All this is on the stock turbo, if someone were running a hybrid or other larger turbo then the over running of the stock fpr and ensuing richness might not seem like a problem but it is a bootleg way of increasing fueling and not ideal or tunable.

What was the cause of thee exhaust leak?

I had a very similar problem, turned out the secondaries (recently cleaned/ flow tested) were sticking from a long period on non use (clutch break in). I had to apply 12v directly to the injector several times to un stick them. There is a lengthy thread about the issue in both the rtek and 2nd gen tech section if you search my name.

Yes! Data logs arr your friends.

Well right now I'm running the factory fuel pump till I can sort out why the Q7 pump wasn't building enough pressure to even overcome the FPR and pass fuel back down the return line. As soon as I swapped out for the factory pump it fired right up. I'll deal more with the fuel pump and FPR issues when I move past the fueling ability of the factory pump.

The exhaust leak actually turned out to be a loose manifold nut and not the one I expected. I put the car up on ramps with it running and crawled under it and saw it was the top rear nut. So I tightened it till the leak stopped. I then test drove it, pulled it back in and put it back on ramps. Once it's done cooling I'll double check torque, then I'm putting double nuts on all the manifold studs so they won't back off anymore.

When your secondaries were stuck, could you hear them clicking under the proper circumstances (3800rpm+ and positive manifold pressure) and there just wasn't fuel? Or were they just not clicking at all?

I'm thinking I definitely have a secondary injector issue that's causing power to fall flat, but it's hard to tell since I can't go WOT because of fuel cut.

Good catch, I may double up on manifold nuts next time around myself just to be sure.

Yeah, that was the worst part about my injectors, they passed every test and seemed like they were working fine...
I followed karack's advice and swapped the primary and secondary injector pins at the ecu, them used a spare cas to simulate cranking. I listened w/ a mechanic's stethoscope and I could hear them clicking! Yet when I swapped the pins back and went for a drive it was still falling on its face.

I then took 12v and ground leads and to the injectors directly while the fuel system was pressurized. I held them open for 3-5 seconds and I could hear each one spraying strong. I went for a test drive and I was@ 9.x afr due to my previous attempts to "tune out" the secondaries not working.

My best guess is that the injectors only open for ms @ a time under normal operation and that wasn't enough to un stick them.

So redline often :icon_tup:

Well, I don't think it's fuel anymore...I think it's electrical.

I drove the car to a friends house so we could do a little driving and to take some pictures. When I got there I shut the car down (using the "WOT rev, shut off at 3k rpm" trick to prevent flooding) and walked up to his door. He met me at the door and we walked back out to the cars. I got in and went to turn the car on and got nothing...except the headlights popped up. The didn't turn on, they just popped up. No lights (except dome and door lights), no gauges, no radio, no tail lights, no head lights, no reverse lights, no BAC coming on...NOTHING.

So I checked all of the fuses (both engine compartment and cabin), they're all good. I checked all the grounds (top of engine under IC, underneath the coils on the shock tower, and main battery ground at the bottom of the shock tower), they were all good too. So I pulled back the carpet, pulled the ECU plate and checked the ground near the ECU, it was good. I also checked the battery terminals and they were clean and nice and tight. The only thing I didn't try was jumping it off another car, because we didn't have cables. It's on the "To Try" list for tomorrow.

Now my car is sitting at my friend's house tonight while I try and research what is going on with my car so I can fix it tomorrow. It's a good thing I'm on leave or I'd be pissed about not having my car working.

Any ideas?

Well, after creating a whole other thread trying to sort out the problem I discovered that it was a single old, nasty connector. I fixed it and she's running again, but it didn't fix the high rpm hesitation I have. I'm going to try adding the boost sensor ground to see if that helps. The weird thing is it does fine in 1st and 2nd gear, same amount of boost and rpms. In 3rd it's around 4500rpm when it hesitates, in 4th it's at 5000-5500rpm that it starts hesitating. The rpms will still climb, but the power is just gone.

Also, my Retro-Spec gauge pod came today! Here's a pic:
http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/e...4/14df597b.jpg

I don't know if I just have too high of standards or what, but I'm not super impressed. They used some kind of black gel coat on the lower half of the pod and it's like it over sprayed onto the top portion (the exposed part)...you can kind of see it where the lip comes out in the picture. I'm not about to go another 2months without a pod, I just would have figured waiting this long would have resulted in a flawless product. It was a good price though.

What psi is the hesitation occurring @ ? If its above 6.5 it could be maxing out stock components.

I got that pod for my brother for christmas, the finish was impressive, but I didn't really test the fit as I had my idiot lights still in. I went w/the ian99rt pod myself as I liked the mounting system, the fact that the gauges are angled to the driver and I'm too lazy to cut my own holes, lol.

The hesitation is at 4-5psi. If I let up on the gas a little it starts to take off again. I'll worry more about it when I can data log with the RTEK (end of Aug, when I get back from the states). I'm only going to be driving the car for a couple more days before we fly over to the states for vacation.

The fit is good into the dash. It's tight enough I'm really not worried about taping it in. I may do velcro at some point. Unfortunately, I had to clearance the Oil Pressure and the Water Temp gauges because they were too long for the pod. I'm not sure which crappy design to blame it on, the crap Prosport gauges or the pod being too sloped. Here's a couple pics:

http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/e...4/9153c20c.jpg
http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/e...4/9564d34e.jpg

I'll definitely be going for new gauges in the near future. After I installed the boost gauge (the only one that's 100% hooked up) it started reading 10inHg with the car shut off. Tweaking the wires in the back causes the needle to move around. I gave them a try, but I am totally unimpressed with the Prosports. Lucky for me I'm only out $60 for the set of three. Guess you get what you pay for.

Can't wait to see those data logs.

The problem is that u got the cheap (probably mechanical) gauges. The premium gauges are 1.x" deep, fit easily, and have higher quality senders. I have been running the premium boost gauge for over 3 years w/no problems. Even the 45mm gauges are of good quality. So yes, you get what u pay for.

Edit: even the cheap ones look good, lol.

Well, I'm probably just gonna go the other end of the spectrum and get Defi gauges...I'll end up spending a grip of money, but at least I'll know they're accurate.

I found out I can get all my injectors cleaned and flow tested by Witch Hunter (witchhunter.com) for $100 ($20 of that is the shipping to and fro). $20/injector isn't a bad price at all and since they're a smaller and lesser known company than RC their turn around is likely to be a little quicker. Plan is to pull the UIM again tomorrow. Pull the injectors and mail them off on Monday. Then when I return from the states the post office will have my RTEKed N332 and my newly cleaned and tested injectors. That should work nicely.

I also have a Gilmer Drive kit on the way. The gilmer alt pulley is for an FD, so I think I'll try and hunt down a scrap yard FD to harvest an alt off of. The only remaining concern will be if my power steering crank pulley will work with the gilmer setup or I may have to order the separate v-belt pulley that fits with the gilmer crank pulley.

So the next three weeks are going to be lots of nothing while I'm state side, followed by a week or so of scrambling to put everything back together and running for me to finally go back to work.

+1 Witch Hunter is great.

I hear ya, I went w/ Injector Rehab myself, very informative website and quick turnaround.

As far as the gauges, I got swept up I'm the defi hype when they first got popular, fortunately I didn't have the money to buy them at the time. By the time I did I got a chance to do some research, its hard to justify the difference in price when compared to the difference in quality... (unless maybe u get a deal on some used ones)

Good idea on the FD alt, fc alt is crap. Glimmer drives look cool, but I've never seen one w/power steering, good luck on that.

In any event, should be a fun trip to the post office when u get back!

I'm open to suggestions on gauges.

I'm definitely going with the Innovate LC-1 for the wideband, but I hate that there's no accuracy comparison test or anything out there for gauges.

I just want something that's reliable and accurate. I'm considering a couple PLX DM-100s since that will allow me to get senders for all the different parameters and only have to have the one pod. And I can get em one at a time and just keep adding on the senders, no real additional wiring hassle like when you have to add more gauges. I've been doing so many searches trying to find gauge info, but most of what I find is too old or too qualitative (no accuracy checking).

I haven't mess with the RTEK at all, if I have my Palm hooked up to it I can monitor boost and all that via the ECU until I get a reliable gauge right?

With my boost gauge not working properly I need some way of monitoring it...though it is definitely secondary to O2 levels.

The lc-1 is a great choice, its the only wb out there (that I'm aware of) the checks itself for accuracy.

The xd series display units (also from innovative) can display a wide range of data and can be linked to run off the same power/illumination source. So you could use all innovative units for your gauges. The only issue I have is that some gauges are easier to read at a glance if they are analog (needle) as opposed to digital, but I suppose that's a personal preference.

As far as accuracy checking, you can compare the values that matter against the rtek and see how they stack up. My coolant temp gauge reads low by 10-15° but that is because I don't have it mounted in the ideal location. However once you establish that the coolant temp sender gives a reliable reading you should be able to trust the oil temp as most companies use the same temp sender. For fuel pressure monitor w/ a mechanical gauge to verify the readings, same could be done w/oil pressure. Electronics don't slowly degrade, they either work our they don't, so once you establish the accuracy of the gauges you can just worry about enjoying the car.

Yes, the rtek can monitor and log any sensor that the ecu sees (read: not gauges). It can also set alarms for certain values. However it is not ideal for on-the-fly monitoring as the screen is small and most palms don't have outstanding battery life.

I prefer needles, or being able to have a needle option.

What I meant about accuracy checks is that there's no third party our there that test gauges and reviews them. I know how to check gauges for accuracy, what I'd like are gauges that are known to be very accurate from the get go. Gauges that I won't have to constantly wonder "is it accurate still".

I've seen horror stories about a lot of the major manufacturers, but it's hard to sift through it all and know what's real and what's stupid people that don't know how to install a gauge.

And Innovate just discontinued the XD-16 gauges.

Gotcha!, yea, the only comprehensive accuracy test I've ever found was for WB and it was conducted by Innovative.

Honestly if accuracy is your primary concern, go with VDO gauges they are cheap, accurate, and standard equipent on planes and BMW's......should be easy to get on your side of the pond too. Only downside is they are less stylish than some other gauges that you might "wonder is it still accurate?"

Really though, is it that big a deal? even cheap gauges are better than stock (just leave the fuel level gauge alone). Also, many race cars run autometer gauges which I've heard many accuracy complaints about and they seem to do just fine. The only place where extreme accuracy is arguably necessary is the sensors that the ecu sees (which with the Rtek are all stock anyway)

The main ones I worry about being accurate are oil pressure, fuel pressure, and boost. Mostly because they're the ones that if something is going to go awry it will involve one of those three.

I'm not worried about cost too much, I don't mind spending a little more to get the right parts...I've already been burned by a couple of things I cheaped out on and am paying for it now (gauges and fuel pump immediately come to mind lol).

I don't really buy much here, I order mostly from the states cause the dollar sucks so much that the exchange rate really jacks the prices up here.

I know some people that have had great luck with Speedhut and Stri Gauges. I fixing to get a set of Stri's if money permits.

Well if money is no object, then speed hut all the way. An fd guy redid his entire cluster...its awesome. $800 worth of awesome? You be the judge lol

I think I may be sold on the speed hut gauges...they had me at lifetime warrantee. And their prices aren't bad at all.

So I've been sitting in the passenger terminal at Ramstein AB since Aug 3, ugh. In the mean time I've just been doing lots of reading and monitoring my tracking numbers.

My RTEKed N332 is waiting for me to pick it up. My injectors are being delivered to Witch Hunter today. Gilmer drive kit arrived at my grandparent's house.

All I need to get to be prepared when I come home is the LC-1 (with or without gauge, doesn't really matter) and a FD alt for the gilmer setup.

Speed Hut actually makes wideband gauges that are specifically calibrated to work with the various wideband manufacturers. I did a lot of looking around their site and am completely sold on them.

I'm juggling getting the last few things I need for the 7 and working a deal on a Harley V-Rod Muscle. Selling my GSXR-1000 for the down payment on it...very excited about the new motorcycle. So needless to say, I've been pretty busy despite being stuck in an airport.

Got an FD alternator and I got a LC-1 on the way (sans gauge), both pretty cheap.

Planning on eventually picking up the Speed Hut wideband gauge, but I can run it without for now as long as I have it plugged into the extra input on the RTEK and have my Palm connected. I'm definitely glad I got the IIIc because it's back lit and easy to read at night.

Paid for my injectors and they're on their way back to my APO box.

Enjoying my vacation, but will be happy to get things buttoned up on the car when I get home.