The journey of one man and his Mule(s)

[Peter Gidden]

Secondary door pocket for your personal grooming kit?

[craig]

It'd have to be bigger than that!

Hair appointment card recepticle?

[Magic Beans]

I should have expected as much

Although you're not far off. Not the grooming products of course

[Magic Beans]

Well after a fair bit of sitting and patiently waiting, both of my parcels finally arrived today, from the states

This follows on from the clue the other day.


Can ya guess what it is yet?

The other parcel was a blanket for the turbo, courtesy of PTP Turbo Blankets. So far I've been nothing but impressed with them and the product. So much so I might be doing a little bit business with them





Got the day off tomorrow so I'll get it fitted and tested, to see what it does for spool times and engine bay/intake temps.

[Johnr32]

That turbo blanket looks very tempting! how much was it? looking forward to how you get on with it

[GreddyMR2]

How can that turbo blanket improve spool time?

[Magic Beans]

It was $135 ish, shipped. Took around 10 days to get here, however USPS have a full tracking service, so you can see exactly where it is. Quite interesting, in a sad kind of way

I spent a LOT of time looking at the various offerings out there and reading user opinions. This met my requirements perfectly and the pre sales was superb. I tend to ask a lot of questions It pays to know what you're buying or need to buy, before you take the plunge.

[Magic Beans]

How can that turbo blanket improve spool time?

In a nutshell:

A turbo blanket improves the performance of your turbocharger by keeping "the hot side hot." In keeping the exhaust gases within the turbocharger hot, turbocharger efficiency is improved. As you may know, the hotter a gas is, the more expansive it is. Within a contained system of a specified size, the more expansive a gas is, the greater the pressure derived and thus, the greater the flow of gas to escape the containment. With this increased pressure and flow rate for a given engine RPM, the acceleration of the turbocharger's impeller is increased as compared to the same turbocharger with the engine at the same RPM but with cooler exhaust gases. This equates to faster spool up of the turbocharger, as well as greater attainable levels of boost. What a driver will experience with a turbo blanket is greater turbocharger responsiveness. The faster spool up of the turbocharger means less turbo lag and a more linear power curve.

[GreddyMR2]

Thanks, that's interesting, let us know if it helps when you fit it

[Magic Beans]

Will do

The main aim is to reduce engine bay and intake temperatures, in preparation for getting in remapped in the next few weeks. Water injection is also going back in soon, which should also help reduce temps and to keep the engine good and healthy. The last thing any of us want to do is to do all this work and damage the engine due to causes we can control, simply through a bit more investment and research

Ultimate power has never been my goal with this car. I'm far more interested in having a good, solid and healthy car, as opposed to it being bleeding edge tuned and failing a few months down the line. It would be nice to get 450bhp safely, however if not a solid 400bhp is more than enough for most sane people

[Magic Beans]

For some reason my brain didn't want to be asleep last night, so I decided to get up (at 6:00am! ) and make a start on fitting the blanket. Amongst other things...

This was never going to be easy


Trying to squeeze the blanket between the downpipe, screamer, oil lines etc proved to be a challenge


An hour later, persistence paid off and it's in place


A couple of better photos of the manifold heat shield.




It's in there somewhere


The only glimpse of it with everything back in place


Just for fun I decided to do a quick video of a cold start, to demonstrate the nice quite head Peter built. A far cry from the rattling lump it was before the overhaul

http://s1072.photobucket.com/albums/w37 ... GA0404.mp4

The test drive will have to wait, as Mr Blue Skies isn't living here today

[riot68]

Looking good my friend, 450BHP you are insane haha, better order a neck brace to go with that!...

[alan_uk]

just read through this full thread,

this car is awesome and love the styling making me think now lol

shame about the old car mind was really nice and had my fave all time wheels on too

[Magic Beans]

Looking good my friend, 450BHP you are insane haha, better order a neck brace to go with that!...

Do you have any news for us sir?

[Magic Beans]

just read through this full thread,

this car is awesome and love the styling making me think now lol

shame about the old car mind was really nice and had my fave all time wheels on too

Rays TE37s are awesome looking wheels. I have been deliberating getting some more for this car I think I'm due a period of not spending any money on it soon though

[riot68]

Did you not get a text? Kurt was born on the 26th, weighing 7lb 8oz ...

[Magic Beans]

Did you not get a text? Kurt was born on the 26th, weighing 7lb 8oz ...

Nope. I was starting to wonder if you had a fighter on your hands, who didn't want to be born yet

Congratulations to you both though (well, all four now I guess ) Really pleased for you buddy

[riot68]

thanks, all happy here, will have to come along soon, although 2 off the road for now, might have found a turbo also ...

[Magic Beans]

So after taking delivery of this the other day, I've spent the last few days toiling over the latest addition to the Mule


So what is it? It's Ultrasuede, which is basically Alcantara. I chose this stuff as Alcantara in white is a pain to get hold of, although this wasn't that much easier in the end

And what's it for...? Well, I've grown tired of the leather/vinyl interior of the car, so decided to spruce it up a bit by re-trimming a couple of elements. First off are the cubby box lids.

As always I've got step by step photos of what you need to do for this, however in the case of this I would suggest not embarking on this journey unless you are prepared to put in some serious time and patience to do it. It's not the most technically demanding job in the world but getting it right takes time and planning. Anyway, on to the photos

First off the lids need to come off, strip the covering (massive PITA) and then put some time in cleaning the glue residue off the lids. Once done you're ready to go. My approach was the same as I used when fitting the gear gaiter. That being to use strong glue and clamps. The downside of the glue is each bit you do you need to leave for 30 mins for it to take properly. Once set though it isn't coming off!


Fast forward a few hours


A few more later and it's done




Then the other one


Many more passes later


The box then had a damn good clean


Done! A side by side comparison



Time to fit it. Before


After



As always I'm struggling to get the light balance right on the photos, as it doesn't glow quite that much All in all though I'm really pleased with the results It was a lot of work and has somewhat put me off offering to do it for others, which I had considered before I started. Maybe next time it will be easier

That's enough for today. Next up is the doorcard inserts, which should be a bit easier

[alan_uk]

that looks ace mate were did you get the material from ?