I would call it a “toy” if it weren’t something bolted into place and you were able to carry it around with you. Alas, Neil received his new exhaust on Monday and had it installed within an hour of receiving it, despite feeling a bit under the weather. You might remember a few weeks ago, during his PDX Racing event in St. Louis, a piece of his exhaust (the canister) detached and shot into the air, *ping-pinging* several times before coming to the rest at the side of the fourth turn. It was something he was looking to replace, and after a short discussion and search on the for sale threads, he found a replacement for a reasonable price that would do the job.
And it does the job, albeit quite a bit louder than before. You’ll see he used to have dual exhaust, and now its single, pumping everything straight through, creating more noise. But its 9 lbs (titanium) compared to the 48 lb. stock exhaust. That will be perfect for the weight reductions he’ll have to start thinking about in order to prep the car for more serious racing. A complete gut and roll cage are hopefully in store for 2010. All in all, its still a beautiful car, we just have to start adjusting our thinking of it in more realistic terms of racing, and not something you buff with a diaper and obsess over. Sometimes I think I have a harder time with that than Neil.
Oh and in case you’re curious, the new exhaust does to your ears what the cleaning brush at the dentists’ office does. Its like that high pitched piercing, cable outage, electronic sound that feels like its swiveling down your ear canal before reaching the drum and turning it in circles. But only in the ear thats absorbing most of the sound. Actually just watch this. Feel me? Good.
Sweet photo, the car looks awesome from the side!
I don’t know that much about racing and cars, but I do think that is a gorgeous car…I’d feel really cool riding around in it.
Jes *used* to like riding around in it just for fun, but any more she is too scared of other people:
A. hitting me
B. seeing the car and wanting to steal something from it
C. seeing the car and following us to our house to steal something from us
D. door dings, and/or rock chips
The roles have certainly swapped. I used to be very meticulous and OCD about the car, and while I still am to some degree, she has become much more than I in the past year or so. I still very much enjoy going out for a drive and having some fun, however I have 100x more fun when I am on a racetrack, so although it is a tough choice, I am pretty sure in the years to come this car will evolve to a full out track car with roll cage, gutted interior, and the bumps and bruises that come with a track car. Personally, I cannot wait.
I will have to bring it down to Springfield sometime that everyone is down there and take you for a ride and scare you a little bit. It is a ton of fun, and I think everyone would benefit if they had at least one avenue in their life that is a bit irresponsible and vulgar.
To quote Jeremy Clarkson:
“I think its mostly a question of attitude. A sports car does not have to be fast or pretty. It need not have a folding roof and it can have seats in the back. But it does need to be uncompromising in some way, shape or form. It needs to be hard riding and noisier than necessary. It needs to remind its owner every single yard of every single journey that he or she bought the car to be exciting. It needs, therefore to transmit its interaction with the road with a series of semaphore signals in the driver’s pants. It needs to telegraph every burp of its engine, every squeak of its tires. A sports car is a state of mind.”
I completely understand Jes’s fears…I freak out in the Element because it’s J.D.’s….I think, “Oh s***, I just bumped the door on that post.” Whereas in my old Jeep I usually though, “Oops…oh well!” As for scaring me…that’d take a lot so now I’m challenging you! (Just angling for a ride in the cool car).
lol well I guess it is a good thing to care for other people’s things. If it works out I will try to bring the car down for Halloween. It really depends on how many people are coming down from Columbia and if Jes and I can be selfish enough to take a two seater while everyone else carpool in the other car.
Keep us posted! It’d be awesome to take some more pimptastic photos of your awesome ride [I messaged Jes about this]. However, I totally understand if you just want to relax and leave the Z mainly for the track :-).