Daily Archives: November 1, 2010

The Z06: There’s Nothing Vetter

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Cars are my hobby. I thought my hobby might have been writing… but I don’t every write. Drawing? No… don’t really do that either. Maybe my hobby is working? I work alot, but that doesn’t do it for me.  Cars. It’s cars. For Father’s Day Fran got me an awesome 1000+ page automotive textbook that covers everything car related. Beautiful.

A few months ago I bought a newer Corvette, but it was just this past week that I put the finishing touches on her (I named her Vanessa). When you get a car you have to do certain things to make it ”yours” (like giving it a name). Some people just need to add a bumper sticker, put on seat covers, or get some new floor mats.  Others have to overhaul their car’s physical appearance in one way or another (there’s a right way and wrong way to do this -learn more HERE).   Sure I did the floor mats and some stickers, but I did the wheels too.

I replaced the stock Z06 rims (18″ front, 19″ rear, flat, kinda boring, generic) with West Coast Corvette’s WCC Forged 946 EXT custom series (19″ front, 20″ rear, not flat, super exciting, made by Asanti). For tires I went with Michelin’s PS2 series. So far I really like them- good ride & great traction.

As far as cars go I’m having a good time with this one.  It’s an actual Z06 (my last car looked like one but had a secret)  with nearly 800 horsepower  (the APS Z06 twin turbo system on an LS7 engine is pretty mean) last car accelerated so fast it made some people scream.  This car is so fast that it will compress the air in your lungs so you can’t scream (better for you, better for me). Not that I have ever sped. Mom thinks I should get something quieter. Something safer. Sorry Mom. I like my cars loud and fast.

Originally Posted August 18, 2009

July 2009 Car Post

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I did steal some time to work on another car project that’s been haunting me for several months. I recently got a new car (a newer Corvette) and, aside from the usual tune tweaking, one of my first projects was to put in a new Stereo. I put the head unit and mid speakers from my old car into my new car but I couldn’t move my subwoofers because of car design differences. Justin was on the job- he built my sub box and amp rack and I did the carpet and installation

I relocated my trunk lights to the center (previously they were on the corners where the sub and amps now go). I think I like them better there

Instead of two 8″ JL Audio W3 subs I went with one 10″ JL Audio W6 (it’s a beast). I’m running matched Kenwood Excelon amps. Since I only have a single sub this time we tried to balance the visual presentation by putting the amps in the other corner. Overall I think it turned out great

Originally Posted July 18 2009

April 2009 Car Post

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A couple of days ago Justin and I finished the stereo wiring in the car! Ultimately I had great time and I learned a ton of fun stuff, but the stereo upgrade was a way bigger project than we had thought. Running all the cables and keeping them hidden was really tricky (we ended up pulling out tons of the body paneling). The mess of wires behind the head unit was intimidating but we got everything wired up a-ok. I will confess that it was a little frightening to see my car in so many pieces.

I got everything put back together earlier tonight and spent some time road testing it. For the most part I’m really happy with everything.  The two subs (JL Audio 8″) are fantastic. They give off nice tight base (which is what I wanted) but still sound very full. I replaced the stock speakers in the rear with some 5 1/4″ Kenwood Exelons (nothing fancy) which have a nice bright sound that complements the subs. I left the 10″ stock speakers in the doors- for now they get the job done just fine. Everything (subs and mids) run of the two Alpine amplifiers (both 250 watts).  As an aside, cramming everything into the trunk and still leaving room for the removable roof was difficult, but we pulled it off! Visually I think the set up is very appealing.

There’s a lot of tuning left to do, but I think the final result will exceed my expectations. Sadly I’ve got  humming noise that parallels the engine speed. I need to figure out where it’s coming from and what’s causing it. My initial hunch is that the ground wire is too long (the chassis of the car is fiberglass to we had to run the ground wire back to the battery- nearly 16 feet). It may also have to do with poorly shielded wires in the engine bay (i.e. spark plug wires). This, coupled with my Blu Ray sync issues, has made it a bad month for sound! Ah well- it makes me feel manly when I fix stuff.

Originally Posted April 18, 2009

At Some Point Around Easter…

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After coloring eggs I commenced the wiring portion of my subwoofer / amplifier install. That’s going to be a big job. Mike was a huge help and we got the seat and some panelling out and and started running the ground wires and RCA cables. This coming week I’ll have to remove the center console and the actual receiver (from the instructions I’ve got it won’t be fun). But hey- that’s what life is all about: Doing things that aren’t fun with the hope that later something not fun that you did will result in fun.

Originally Posted April 13, 2009