oh geeeze.......
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Captain
Joined: Sep 2005
Posts: 504
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RE: oh geeeze.......
Friday night....11:55 pm.
The project for this evening was the stage one and needswing downpipe. I had the help of my friend, Mike, the mechanic. Well,,,he is actually a coal mine mechanic, but hey, he knows a lot more than I do.
Stage one. Well,,,it's in. Honestly, I don't think I could have done it without his help. HE NEVER EVEN LOOKED AT THE INSTRUCTIONS...not ONCE. That just blows me away. Never glanced at them.
He had ZERO trouble getting the air box out. He had a little trouble getting the mounting bracket out for the stage one ECU. It probably took him/me/mostly him about 40 minutes.
Onto the downpipe. In a nutshell------a disaster.
There are four bolts that hook the downpipe up to the O2 thing. The bottom three bolts come out without too much trouble. But OMG, the top one was unbelievable.
Ole Word has NO trouble looking at the directions. Thus, I was looking at the directions. There is a clip or something on the back of the top bolt that is supposed to hold the bolt in place while you take it off. Nope,,,,,this one didn't. The bolt kept turning and turning. Soooo,,,,,we tried to put a wrench on the back side of the bolt. However, the back side of the bolt was not the same size as the front side. I'm tired, so this may not make much sense. Anyhow, we finally found a wrench to fit it and he turned from the bottom of the car and I held the bolt from the top. FINALLY, the bolt broke into. I mean,,,,it shattered. I am now the proud owner of two busted knuckles!
Okay,,,,,got the bolt off...easy sailing, huh? Wrong. The effing downpipe wouldn't come off of the catback. We worked and tugged and pulled.....FINALLY it come off. Smooth sailing now, huh? WRONG.
The Needswing downpipe would not fit back into the catback....grrrrr. We beat and banged on that like you cannot know. We got it to go in about a 1/2 inch, but that was it. Therefore, my car is going into the muffler shop to get it put into the catback right. Mike says that they have things at muffler shops that stretch pipe.
He and I worked on the car for about 6.5 hours.
To all of you that work and modify your cars, my hats off to you. It takes a helluva person to not only understand how all this stuff works, but to also be able to do it. Doing this stuff to your car is hard.....freaking hard. I mean like 18 year old prom night ***** hard. I was telling Mike, when I got done, that I am never going to bitch again when a mechanic hands me a bill. That **** ain't easy. Mike was saying, "Word,,,if we had the car up on a rack and had proper tools and stuff, it wouldn't be that bad."
Sometimes I bitch about my job. I get frustrated about things I have to do, but there isn't a day that I've ever worked that I have come home this frustrated. You know,,,,where you just feel like you beat your brains out and did everything like you were supposed to, but still couldn't get it to work.
Now,,,,even though the exhaust isn't quite right yet, it does sound cool as can be. And it does seem a little faster, but not much. It really does sound a lot better, though.
LSP,,,,,,if I would have had your number with me, I would have called you. I would have called the cemetary and had them dig up the dodge boys if I thought it would have helped.
STS arrives in 2.5 weeks. Am paying for the mechanic on that one. The downpipe has taught me a valuable lesson.
The project for this evening was the stage one and needswing downpipe. I had the help of my friend, Mike, the mechanic. Well,,,he is actually a coal mine mechanic, but hey, he knows a lot more than I do.
Stage one. Well,,,it's in. Honestly, I don't think I could have done it without his help. HE NEVER EVEN LOOKED AT THE INSTRUCTIONS...not ONCE. That just blows me away. Never glanced at them.
He had ZERO trouble getting the air box out. He had a little trouble getting the mounting bracket out for the stage one ECU. It probably took him/me/mostly him about 40 minutes.
Onto the downpipe. In a nutshell------a disaster.
There are four bolts that hook the downpipe up to the O2 thing. The bottom three bolts come out without too much trouble. But OMG, the top one was unbelievable.
Ole Word has NO trouble looking at the directions. Thus, I was looking at the directions. There is a clip or something on the back of the top bolt that is supposed to hold the bolt in place while you take it off. Nope,,,,,this one didn't. The bolt kept turning and turning. Soooo,,,,,we tried to put a wrench on the back side of the bolt. However, the back side of the bolt was not the same size as the front side. I'm tired, so this may not make much sense. Anyhow, we finally found a wrench to fit it and he turned from the bottom of the car and I held the bolt from the top. FINALLY, the bolt broke into. I mean,,,,it shattered. I am now the proud owner of two busted knuckles!
Okay,,,,,got the bolt off...easy sailing, huh? Wrong. The effing downpipe wouldn't come off of the catback. We worked and tugged and pulled.....FINALLY it come off. Smooth sailing now, huh? WRONG.
The Needswing downpipe would not fit back into the catback....grrrrr. We beat and banged on that like you cannot know. We got it to go in about a 1/2 inch, but that was it. Therefore, my car is going into the muffler shop to get it put into the catback right. Mike says that they have things at muffler shops that stretch pipe.
He and I worked on the car for about 6.5 hours.
To all of you that work and modify your cars, my hats off to you. It takes a helluva person to not only understand how all this stuff works, but to also be able to do it. Doing this stuff to your car is hard.....freaking hard. I mean like 18 year old prom night ***** hard. I was telling Mike, when I got done, that I am never going to bitch again when a mechanic hands me a bill. That **** ain't easy. Mike was saying, "Word,,,if we had the car up on a rack and had proper tools and stuff, it wouldn't be that bad."
Sometimes I bitch about my job. I get frustrated about things I have to do, but there isn't a day that I've ever worked that I have come home this frustrated. You know,,,,where you just feel like you beat your brains out and did everything like you were supposed to, but still couldn't get it to work.
Now,,,,even though the exhaust isn't quite right yet, it does sound cool as can be. And it does seem a little faster, but not much. It really does sound a lot better, though.
LSP,,,,,,if I would have had your number with me, I would have called you. I would have called the cemetary and had them dig up the dodge boys if I thought it would have helped.
STS arrives in 2.5 weeks. Am paying for the mechanic on that one. The downpipe has taught me a valuable lesson.
