like jamez, i finally figured out my boost prob. its amazing the havoc no wastegate can cause i had to drop the exhaust to get the turbo heat shield off, then get that ****** thing off, plus remove the acv(i think).. needless to say, i wish i had done it a long time ago! i noticed that the wastegate actuator rod was 'off' and missin the e clip. all my car probs are now gone! although i tried to jimmy rig a 26g block off plate for the acv, not a hope in hell. and while i was taking off random bolts by feel(because of the anti-lock brakes), i forgot to put one of the coolant line bolts that goes to the turbo back on. got about 10 kms from my house when all i could smell was burning coolant! limped back to the house. now she's just like when i bought it

 

stuck open wastegate + stock exhaust = slow car lol

I forgot how crappy these are to work on when they're stock lol
I just stripped EVERYTHING off my motor and pulled it today, took about 3 hours of work

once you remove all that crap you can see 90% of the bolts on that side, even with the ABS.

 

3 hours!!?! lucky guy..

i dont have stock exhaust though, and most of emissions have been removed. still a bugger though. i figure ill wait for the haltech to pull the motor and get it to bare essentials. at the calgary meet, Maxthe7man and chrisNG were staring in awe at the motor(back in the good ol days with a stocker)

pic 1 - you can see the down pipe
pic 2 - a whoopin 16" to work under
pic 3 - little bit after the y pipe

2.5" from turbo to y pipe, and 2" to mufflers

before the wg fix, i was hitting around 10 psi @ 6500-7000rpm. now that its fixed, with a cone filter intake and exhaust, i dont break 7.5psi. some strange reason it doesn't creep. thats good though. im so happy. crap part is i have to wait till tue to make a block off plate then ill burn a couple tanks of gas. still have to work on the bov, it is really hard to set(generic pos). now that my boost is stable it will prolly be easier to find the sweet spot where the psi doesnt push it open, but the surge does.

 

I guess its a lucky day for 7s today lol :P