wacky.banana

Thanks Ian,

To be fair, got an email through last night. I need to do some serious thinking as to my options as safety and "unburst-abiliy" (how we murder the english language at times) are my prime concerns, not mega power that's going to go bang on a Sunday afternoon when I decide to stretch the car's legs a little.

This is one of the reasons why I'm so keen on the tuning industry finding a trusted and accountable way to assure potential customers that their products do exactly what it says on the tin. Mind you we have the same issue with food labelling in the food industry so this issue will be with us for a while yet.

Will let you guys know which way I eventually jump (if you're still interested, that is).

Regards

WB

BretMan

Sorry, Dave, I never actually replied on the other thread on the exact setup on my car , so here goes:

STI7 JDM June 2001
Standard up pipe
Scoobysport 3" into 2.5" downpipe
2.5" centre section with resonator (custom fabricated)
2.5" Stainless backbox (custom fabricated)

The system was fitted locally in NZ and we checked the boost levels with the Select Monitor. Initially it was spiking higher than 1.45 bar (the max on the Select Monitor), but after enlarging the restrictor diameter (don't know the exact measurement), this is now peaking at 1.26 bar and holding at standard levels.

We tested this under high load situations fairly thoroughly and were not able to get higher spikes. We also experimented with a 3 port boost control solenoid to see if any advantages or otherwise to use this. We found the factory 2 port to be more effective.

Because there is no uppipe cat on the STi, I don't see any real need to replace that at this stage. I agree that it could cause further issues and may get to the point where an EBC is necessary.

As the the exhaust/CAT CEL, I did obtain the 0420 delete fix from Scoobysport, but at this stage, I have not fitted it and have had no CEL problems in around 3,000 Kms with the decat. (I'm keeping it just in case it comes up later).

Finally, I have been waiting on a Blitz boost gauge to monitor the boost levels on a day to day basis which should be in next week.

Throughout the process, the local guys over here were surprised that so many problems were envisaged (I was quite conservative and warned them of possible issues) when they didn't encounter them in practice.

As to others: Deep's car is almost the same configuration, fitted by Scoobysport and he is reporting similar positive results. In NZ, the company I used has also fitted the decats onto two local cars with similar results.

Jonno's car (I believe) was experimenting with a 3 port solenoid, and was still getting some boost spiking. This correlates with what we found - the 3 port was inconsistent in its response to boost control - differing between runs. (Have you gone back to 2 port now, Jonno?)

Finally, and most importantly, the performance of the car (and sound) are significantly improved. The low end response is much better and the power delivery more linear. In the top end, the power band seems to continue higher in the rev range, still going strongly over 7000, while previously it would tail off a bit around 6000-6500.

So, in summary, despite expecting some problems, in practice fitting a decat was pretty easy with good results. The lesson learn't is that you should ideally use an experienced team to fit the system and check the results.

I agree that, as with any mods, its good to be careful - but lets not overemphasise the negatives, or put people off following this route...

[Edited to fix spelling error!]


[Edited by BretMan - 6/8/2002 10:30:52 PM]