986Jim

Most headlights are held together with a rubber glue kinda stuff and plastic clips. I did some surgury to my Jetta light, to get them appart I put them in the oven at 250deg for 10 minutes. Just wear some mechanics gloves when you pull them out they will be sorta warm, and the glue is warmed up enough that you can pull them appart. Do whateve it is your gonna do then toss em back in the oven for 10 mins and re-assemble. You want to heat it up before you put it back together so the glue will stick again. If you don't heat them up enough during the re-assembly you will get air gaps and get condensation in the glass, so the re-assembly is the most important. My Jetta lights are Bosch as well, so almost guaranteed they are madet the same way. The grey around was the glue I was refering too. These lights are my aftermarket cheap-o ebay lights and they came appart fine and went back together fine and they were fine in the oven as well. The better bosch stuff is also fine in the oven. It's only 250 deg for 10 mins, don't do anything to the plastic, not to worry.

Take a guess what Color i'm gonna tell you to get.

Wow, sounds like my wife and I, except were 29 and 26 and have a Jetta VR6 for the daily driver (which isn't really slow like a Vibe is) and we just had to have the Boxster as well.

http://www.renntech.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=10247 Same thing. It's an H7 HID kit, there's nothing boxster specific about it other than it's H7 which is not Boxster specific either, many cars use H7. I bought them from cqlight.ca and they were much cheaper and the results quite stunning. Any old HID kit will work as long as it's H7.

All HID's are 35w. They won't damage the housing as the original headlamps run a lot hotter than a Hid lamp ever will. The projector will give you a really nice cut off as well should would out pretty well i would say.

I'm 6.0 and I fit in the boxster just fine. You guys are sittting to straight up in the seat then if your head is soo close.. You'll have ot assume more of a "gangsta" seating position to fix that problem.

Since you read my post about EVERY honda engine turning backwards until 2002 you now know it's not just the Corvair. oh wait. you obviously didn't read my post.

Or you can just use a pair of plyers and grab the top of the torx screws and unscrew them just applying slight pressure to the screw head and turning. They are into plastic so there is very little torque on the screw holding it. Then replace the screws with a phillips head screw (or Robertson if you live in canada) and not mess around with those stupid bits anymore.

There should be a sticker under the trunk lid that says that.

Don't laugh when your dad is right.

It's a lot cheaper to make a car handle well than go fast. Buy a mustang and spend 5k on suspension system. Guys run these in SCCA as fast as BMW's and other FR cars but they smoke them on the straights, and give up a little in the turns. Much easier than buying a cheap good handling car that costs 20k to make go fast.

Not all tips were e-gas as e-gas never started till 2000.. E-gas was only so the computer can have control over the throttle body, not really so much to do with tip tranny as even the 5 and 6 speed had egas after 2000. I would think a non e-gas tip tranny would be easier to retro into your car than on from an egas car tho I have real reasons why. It just seems that after 2000 it all changed and were having to deal with 97-99 with all parts from 97-99 porsche's. So if we wanna do an engine swap a 99 carerra non e-gas engine is the one to go with not an e-gas one. THe tip tranny did come in 97-99 cars would in my mind be the easiest to get one thats from those years, most likely to be compatiable with our cars. Typically however in most auto cars the tranny has it's own computer and harness, not sure about the tip , does it have that and do you have all that related stuff?

Our intake has a manifold around it, thats what the big silver box it. The hood of the car goes over it which makes it a cowl induction. The size of the box around the ITB's is specifically designed to be exactly that size per the displacement of the engine. The ITB's were cut and had a 45* pitch added to them between the head and the throttle plates for a few reason (Velocity and entry angle into the head). The injectors are also external at that particular length for air cooling the intake charge with our cooled fuel. Look at the picture that shows the overall engine. The box has a slight say 25* angle in it. Then the itb's go straight into that box then have about a 45" pitch on them which enter the head straight. Re-making the intake like this vs' the old setup made huge power gains... Here is how it used to be http://www.etdracing.com/team/vibrant/finished7.jpg See the ITB's go straigth back but still external injectors (F1) style.. I dont have another side shot like that, but we now have the itb's pointing upwards towards the windshield and that box around it still with the external injectors..

I'll bite... What is it?

In a forced induction application we have seen some good results from the Denso Iridium plugs, they seem not to blow out as easily causing mis-firing. One of the biggest problems with high HP cars is mis-firing on the plugs when your tuning on the dyno. When a plug mis-fires it doesn't burn any of the fuel. When the fuel doesn't get burnt the air isn't used up in the cylinder. The O2 sensor see's all this air that's not used during the combustion process and gives a lean reading. Then you have to guess if it's mis-fire or really running lean. Denso Iridiums have solved some of this problem when running 30psi on a 600 or so hp ish motor on the dyno. Outside of when your running into a problem with your plugs, OEM stuff is just fine. You increase your HP by say 50hp or so with headers, exhaust no cats, intake, chip etc etc.. then a plug 1 range colder than stock will help out.

The engine is generally the only part they do replace whole and have no choise about. Generally the manufacturer wants the whole motor back to see what the problem was and how to fix it so they don't want the dealership fixing it even if they could. In many cases with the engine the mechanics are only tech's remember they are not the same. They know how to re-re the engine but not acctually build an engine, thats an engine builder. Setting ring gaps, assembling a motor, checking piston to valve clearance, micing bearings etc is not taught in a general technicians course at school. This is generally why they can't fix problems, no solve it with new parts.

Yeah thats cool I guess. I take what I say from my knowledge building tuning and racing some of the countries fastest all motor import race cars. So what I say is just based on my own mistakes and later changes to our own car in an effort to get the maximum amount of HP out of it. Most if not all what what we learn on that car is directly applied to setups on street cars. Typically we build custom headers and exhaust systems for cars before using manufacturerd parts as we can more easily customize them to our setup/needs vs buying a part. In a way, we are tuning that exhaust and intake to match our setup. I guess its all in what you call "tuning" ... Tuning to me is a lot different than smart design to maximize hp. I still however respectifly disagree what the intake pipe and filter has any baring on exhaust. Any car with enough overlap in a cam to make a difference is already running a non-restrictive intake becuase if you pop in a set of performance cams, your not about to do your intake next lol.. So generally speaking when you have enough cam you already have the intake and exhaust system inplace. If you were to tightly restrict a car with a lot of cam and exahust then yeah its gonna hurt it. Which is guess is what your saying.. The stock intake on these cars with the stock cams is not restrictive enough to alter your exahust choice however. The stock intake is pretty good as seen with the mild to non existant gains made by aftermarket exhaust systems, so there really isn't much consideration there when it comes to exhaust systems.. Anyway, enough I think we have beaten this to death really.. Maybe some day somebody will come back and read this post later on and it will give them some extra knowledge that we have decided to share... On another note... I think what we 2.5L guys would relaly like to know is will the 2.7L intake manifold with the the second cross over chamber work on our cars? Apparently a few HP was picked up from that second tube across the top of the intake manifold. It would create a larger reservce and also serve to balance the two cylinders out better. I would love to swap one over on my car and port my throttle body if anybody knew is the 2.7L intake manifold works?

You missed everything I was trying to say. Obviously that would not be the case. A smaller outlet on the collector on a NA motor is more beneficial where on a Turbo car you just simply make the exhaust as large as possible and a good collector doens't really help, there is no tuning.. What I'm refering to is our cars. I was using our race cars as an Example thats sort of related for our cars from an NA point of view. Our race car doesn't have an intake on it, it's has Individual throttle bodies with a custom made box and external injector setup. So what I'm talking about is completly a different league what what your refering to. (not to be rude, don't take it that way) I hear what your saying. On a stock N/A car is what im talking about. It just doesn't make a difference and you don't really need to "Tune" the exhaust form that stand point. THe engine does make enough hp. 250-300 is diddly squat so the exhaust setup is not that huge a deal. If we were pulling lets say 140hp/L from our cars like our all motor car does (to the wheels to btw) then setting up the exhaust better is a much bigger deal. Take the GT3 for example. Thats 420hp from 3.8L, thats good HP/L and also good HP over all. It's gonna be hard to improve on that and will definately take some serious work. For racing, headers and straight pipes woudl work best as it would give all top end HP which is what you want for racing. On the street that would suck and stock setup would likely be the best. Thats all I was saying.. More or less the setup with 195hp that felt the best would be the best as all peak power is fine for somebody who really drives the crap out of their car, but generally we don't so it wont be the best. It all depends on what balance your looking for. Our cars will make HP increases with only the exhaust and not doing anything to the intake. Intkae will make more power if you do that too, but one is not dependent on the other. Gains can be made with or without the intake or exhaust depending on the road you go. Attached are some more pics just for fun... That is our new header which we totaly re-designed to move the power around in the band a little better. We have changed the intake 3 times but never changed the exhaust, again one is not dependent on the other. This car makes 280whp from 2.0L or about 315 at the crank which is like 157hp/l at the crank. The newer style engines are getting 315 whp from 2.2l which is crazy... (they are also running 9's we go 10.6 @ 129 currently)

Quick question. WHen your comparing them are you doing so with the car running or off in the driveway just turning on the lights? Many of my previous cars had one light that looked different from the other when I turned them on while the car was not running. Because it take a 30 amp shot initially to turn them on then they run a 5ams afterwards, if the car was not running one light would look fine, the other looked dimmer and wierd. I started up the car and turned the lights on again and they were the same. I guess they needed the power of the alternator running to have them ignite the same for whatever reason. If the car was running then it definately could be age, or your old bulb is about to burn out. Ever seen guys with HId's and one is normal looking and the other is almost pink looking? (see this all the time in Mercedes Benz now cause they are gettin older and have HID for a long time) its because the bulb is shot and the guy hasn't change it yet... It could also be a sign your bulb is on the way out.

Thats because they are not litronic. Thats a halogen bulb. HID light simply doesn't look like that. Pull out the bulb and take a picture of it. The headlight looks exatly like the litronic headlight with the projector etc, but it seems like they put a halogen bulb in it or something. That could explain why the light is only 10 ft in front of the car because the halogen light bulb in your lights is not on the right spot on the projector and it's not shining correctly. If you do really have a litronic bulb and ballast there, something is wrong with it causing it to burn very dimly giving it that yellow color. Honestly, I say NO WAY thats an HID bulb. The headlight and fog light are the same color, the fog is halogen for sure so the headlight should look nothing like it. That a halogen bulb in an HID projector giving off crappy lighting because its not correct, and that color.. Don't take that 100% cause one picture is hard to tell, but really... Pull the head light out and see if there is a ballast on the back of it, and if so, open up the back of the light pull out the bulb and see which it is, take a pic and post it if you can. Do they look like my OEM Halogen bulb on the left or my HID bulb on the right? My halogens http://www.etdracing.com/jim/phid12.jpg My HID's. http://www.etdracing.com/jim/phid11.jpg Obviously no OEM, but your lights look exactly like my halogens color... Where did you buy these and how much btw?

Tuned exhaust has nothing to do with the intake. What you do to the intake of the car is TOTALLY IRREVELANT to the exhaust. Yes, to get the best results from the whole setup on the dyno you want to do all the mods you can however if the exhaust gives you 15hp it will give you 15hp without the intake, you won't need an evo intake to get 15hp from the exhaust (though you will get more with the intake and exhaust together obviously) but one is not dependant on the other. For some reason Porsche guys have this thing that there's no point to doing an intake if you didn't do the exhaust and vice versa. This simply is not true, I have no idea where this thought process came from. Obviously a lot of guys here have never been to a dyno or tuned a car before. I build and tune cars for a living so surprise surprise I have a different opinion. Not saying this is what you guys think, just sometimes seems to be a general consensus from many people... Tuned exhaust means that the size of the collector and length and output side is designed for the engine. If you look at burns collectors (who made our race car collector) they want to know the displacement, bore, cam lift, hp, torque, where that power is made in the band etc etc so they can make you a collector that is TUNED to your car. It has nothing to do with the intake however. From a racing standpoint when you say intake, you mean intake manifold and throttle body. An "intake" is not a pipe and filter generally, it's just a pipe and filter. So when you tune your collector to match the output of the engine you have already selected your size of intake manifold based on your desired results. Large Plenum small runner for high HP, vs. small plenum long runner for lots of torque type of deal. This is how it's Tuned, not with an evo intake. (I Have an evo btw, love it). Your optimum exhaust system for racing is basically no exhaust because back pressure only robs HP on the high end, however that may not be optimum setup for the street. These are not high revving cars to start so it will create a peaky narrow power band which isn't really much fun, like an S2000 with lots of mods on it. So stick with a setup that keeps the pipe diameter consistent and not too big so you get a good balance of HP and mid range. If you make it too free flowing you will make the max HP at peak power, but not enough in the mid range. For racing this is what you want, but not really for the street unless you drive your car like that. You would be better off with something making the 198hp level which felt better than 202 with all peak power. Sacrificing 10hp in the midrange for 3hp at peak is fine for racing but your better off with the 10hp in the mid range for street driving. http://www.etdracing.com/team/vibrant/finished4.jpg This is our old exhaust header on our race car. As you can see right after the 4-2-1 collector it gets very narrow then goes quite large. This keeps velocity high to the collector then after the savenging effect where velocity is high, the pipe opens up to keep back pressure off the collector. This header was designed by burns stainelss (www.burns.com) on their computer model based on our cars design. Obviusly peak power was the only desire here. This is just to give you an idea... I can elaborate on any of these points if you want more discussion on a particular area...

One other solution we run in our race cars is Waterless Coolant. It's coolant with no water in it, it's glycol or some type of alcohol. It has zero expansion when heated super hot so your coolant system is never under pressure anymore, it also will not boil in the engine with a boiling temp of over 400* C. We don't even run an expansion tank in our race cars because this stuff doesn't expand so you just pour it in and seal it up. We can run the car all day then pull the rad cap off and the water is just sitting there. It's hot, but not under pressure. This is perfectly safe for a street car and would allow us to totally eliminate our expansion take entirelly. How about that? http://www.evanscooling.com/catalog/C_npg1.htm

Mine look bizarre on the wall like that too, but the halogens looked exactly the same. Thats the stock lighting output for the stock lamp. WHen you put HID in it, it's just over emphasised. When shining on the road however, my lighting is awesome, nice sharp line on the road with the angle up over to the side of the ditch/curb just like the oem halogens did, but nicer light with more power. No glare off to the sides or prolems with on-coming traffic at all. As a matter of fact after 3 months of them now, not a single high beem yet.

Your exhaust system will take about 4-6 weeks before it settles to it's normal sound. That is ofcourse if it's a fiber packed muffler (generally stainless fiber fill) if it's baffled then the sound won't change too much with time. I would suspect they are stainless fiber filled and will get louder with some break in time.

It shouldn't need any type of adapter. I would guess that your cat's have been replace with something else from another model or something changed. When a part made to fit all models suddenly doesn't fit one car, then something on that one car is different. Chances are that it's not an OEM mistake but more that something down the road in the cars life has been altered and now that part will not fit as they designed it to fit exactly on an OEM setup. So either a new pipe was welded on the back of your cat and or part of the muffler setup, the whole cat/muffler pipe has been changed, or (highly unlikely) your car is an OEM mistake. Either way, a sleeve like what you did is perfectly acceptable way of making it work.