Technical

Well might have noticed I haven't posted in months. My host somehow nuked my database that drove my blog and image gallery so I spent a couple months rebuilding it. Finally got them up and working again so going to go through and back post some stuff and add new things.

Well I finally got the brake module installed for my Windrestrictor and I also got the LED changed from red to yellow. Long story short I got pulled over by a cop who made me disconnect it...

It's pretty cool. Lets me control the brightness of the LED light strip along the bottom, lets me turn it on and off, also lets me trigger it on when the brakes are pushed in.

Well I finally got around to wring up the electrical system for the trailer lights. Not too difficult of a process, I'd have to say the hardest part was getting the little zip ties to wrap around using one hand under the car. The kit came with the 3 wire taps, the full 4-pin harness, one zip tie, one self tapping screw, grease, and even a wire tester. I've got a 4-pin mount on order to hold the end in place off the hitch so it's not dangling. I'm pretty much done now. I still want to get the bearings inspected and regreased at least. But I could probably do one event with the trailer as is with no issues.






And now for the ooops... While I had the rear wheel cover off I decided to remove the brake caliper to try painting it. Well I've never removed a caliper or painted one for that matter so it was an all new experience. Well we pulled the emergency brake handle and as soon as we did it I thought "crap I bet that was a bad idea." Sure enough it was as it pushed out the brake piston/pads and from that point on wouldn't go back in (the brake piston that is). My car has an integrated e-brake control in with the normal brake piston. These types of devices have an auto tensioner built in as well so that as the brake pad wears down it auto incremented outwards to compensate for the smaller pad. Well when you pull the brake with no pad there it in essence thinks you have a pad that’s worn down to nothing pretty much and increments all the way out and WONT go back in. Come to find out it takes a special tool to make it go back in. You have to apply pressure and rotate inwards at the same time which the tool lets you do. We... well it was really a learning experience and now I have the tool and the know how to change brake pads on most cars.

The SP-Race exhaust had pretty much been planned as a stepping stone from the start to their SP-Street/Race kit. The stock exhaust weighs in at about 54 lbs, the Race at 22 lbs, and the Street/Race at 33 lbs. The S/R wasn't out at the time and they wanted me to evaluate their product and test it against the Curt hitch I have intended for towing items with the Base Solstice. The Race kit was only a single outlet with no tip where the S/R is twin outlet with tips on each side. So I finished the install up earlier today. I have to say the looks and sound of this kit are pure awesome. The Race kit was pretty high pitched and very loud, but the S/R really drops that high pitched sound and replaces it with a much bassier sound that doesn't get as loud or annoying. This one as well does not have any type of muffler or resonators, but from what I've heard so far with it installed it doesn't need them. However the Race version does offer slightly better performance and weight savings. It is the "Race" version so it does what it's mean to do, highest performance possible. The best part of the S/R kit is my Curt hitch works with it!!! Now to connect the wires for the trailer lights when I get home and I'm almost finally done with the trailer. I just need to get the bearings replaced and I'm good to go.

I've been wanting to get graphics done on my car since I had the previous Solstice. Been working up ideas in Photoshop and bouncing ideas of my friend Micah. He's a Mustang fan and suggested something like the older Boss mustangs where they just had a big section of the hood made inot one massive stripe. So I worked it up in PS and thought it was cool. However I was kinda afraid to spend big $$$ to get a giant decal made when I might not like it. Well I was watching Motorweek on TV and saw them talk about a product by Dupli-Color which is a removable paint. You spray it on and it can sit on your car for up to 3 days then you wash it off with soap and water. Spent some time looking but finally found it at Auto Zone. $7.99 a bottle and it took 2 spray cans (15 oz each) to paint the entire area and do an extra coat to smooth the look out. I really like how the look came out and I think I'll get this made once I have some spare money. It only took me and Micah maybe 3 hours to do the entire process with masking off and spraying. Well worth the money to be able to prototype something for $16 to ensure I'd like it.

Besides going to see Wicked yesterday I also had my new SOLO-Performance exhaust installed at Mike Norris Motorsports. Four hours and 8 dyno runs later we were done. I gained peak 16 HP to the wheels (about 20 HP to the flywheel) and 5 ft-lbs of torque at peak as well. However the biggest benefit is the max gains off peak. I gained around 25 HP & 25 ft-lbs at the end of the graph where the car started to greatly loose power with the stock exhaust. I've got a bunch of youtube videos of the before exhaust sound, working on the post sounds to have up soon.

I installed Silvania Silverstar bulbs in my GXP. They weren't too expensive and I had them in my ZX2 S/R and liked them there. Replacing the bulbs on the Solstice is such an easy task. You just twist the lights out and pop the new ones in, simplest setup I've ever used. They make a bulb higher rating wise then this for output, but they don't make it in the H13 my car uses. They're slightly brighter, but the main difference is the lights are a brighter white then the normal yellow haze the stock bulbs make. The digigcam I used also recognized more noticeable areas on the screen with the new bulbs. It puts small green boxes around areas it recognizes as focus points. With the stock bulbs outside it never recognized any areas to focus on but with the new bulbs it picked up areas in the low and high beam tests to focus on.

W00t, the SOLO-Performance Race exhaust arrived today!!!
No resonators or mufflers, this puppies going to be loud. Not as loud as most cars though since having a Turbocharger on the car in itself actually acts as a muffler for the sound waves. Working with Mike Norris Motorsports locally to do the pre & post dyno of my car along with the installation. The owner said he was wanting to try to get a magazine involved too which would be awesome. Hoping to get this done early next week. I'm also hoping this will finally let me use my hitch with my car.

Finally got my Dashhawk installed, I actually installed it right before I drove down to go do the 1/4 mile runs.

Well I finally rolled past 1000 miles the other day. Had to take another action shot of course when I hit 1111 miles.


I changed my oil out shortly after that (the next day of course) and changed out the filter too. This car comes stock with Mobile 1 synth stock which is damn nice. I had picked up a Purolator PureONE and some Bosch filters too. Took some comparison pics that can be found in that gallery by clicking the image below. I went with the PureONE this time, I'll try the Bosch next time.



I wanted to get a good 50+ miles on the car post filter and then it's time to make an appointment for a grudge match at the local track. Going to go go down and face off against my friend in his new 2007 Mustang GT. Our cars have comparable times, so we'll see how it goes. Speaking of his Mustang GT...



We installed a Shelby GT500 spoiler and mini-guards on his car right after I changed my oil. You can see some pics by clicking the image above. It's a pretty involved process and took a couple hours.

The next day I debadged the GM badges off the side of my car and added a turbo badge to the back. You can find some images in that gallery.

Well my car was at the dealership for 11 days... lots of little minor warranty things plus one big one. Had my entire rear diff replaced instead of having a 2nd seal put in. This should hopefully completely eliminate those pesky diff leak issues.

Well this weekend I spent about 3 hours doing it but I got my hitch installed on my Solstice now. I'll let the images I took do the speaking better then I.

Trailer Hitch Installation Gallery

Here are the recent images I've taken. Unfortunately the camera battery was dead the day I went to pick the car up.

2005.11.01 - air intake
I took some images and photochopped some of them to show the extensiveness of the insanity that is the air intake system in my car. There are two baffles/resonators on the intake one at the end and one up front that are just massive. They're bigger then the intake itself pretty much.

2005.11.06 - Oil Change
Changed the oil at 1350 miles. The oil life indicator was at 87% oil life. GM suggest a 500 mile break-in period of various things to follow. Various other solsticeforum.com members have agreed switching the oil out at ~1000 miles for synthetic is the way to go.

2005.11.06 - pre car wash
Dirty car.

2005.11.06 - post car wash
Clean car.