I picked the Ghibli up from Jorrit at Auto Forza late Friday afternoon. As usual, we spent an hour or two chatting about our favourite topic... cars. We eventually got 'round to the subject of my Ghibli and he started to ask some questions about the new intake system I'd fitted.
The thing I like about Jorrit is that he's a genuine enthusiast and always concerned about doing things properly. So the first thing he asked me was whether the hose joiners I'd used had the proper profile to prevent the hoses from slipping off. Ahhh... sweet!
From previous conversations that I've had with Jorrit, I know that he's not a huge fan of aftermarket race filters since he believes that they let through more particles than the OEM paper filters. He bases this on the observation that he sees more junk in the engines of cars fitted with aftermarket filters. I was therefore quite suprised with his enthusiasm regarding my latest upgrade. He'd taken the car for a drive and wanted to test out the accelleration and brakes. He seems to be quite impressed with the results, stating that the car feels quicker than a new Ghibli and one of the hardest accellerating Ghiblis he's driven. Given that the last time he drove the car he thought it was a bit flat and not driving so well, this is quite a turn around! He also said that he thought it was very torquey, that it pulls from much lower down the rev range than a normal Ghibli, which finally convinced him that swapping the turbos for the 3200 GT ones was a good idea.
I explained to him why I'd changed out the inlet tubing and when I said that one of the nice bi-products was the interesting noise it makes when lifting off the throttle, he grinned and agreed, saying that there's quite a few people who can confirm that since he tested it out in quite a busy area... he said a lot of people turned around and had a good look.
Although the car was performing pretty decently the last time I drove it when it was working OK, I was still a bit suprised at how enthusiastic Jorrit was being, so I was pretty keen to give it a drive. Unfortunately, it was pissing it down with rain on the drive home, plus it was rush hour so the traffic was averaging about 20 km/h. I'm a bit reluctant to say too much until I've taken the car back to the dyno, but... it seems to be performing even better now! It may be the result of the big service, with the timing reset and everything running a bit tighter, but I have a sneaky suspicion that I might have been running on only 1 turbo for a while. The car is now pulling really hard from as low as 3000 rpm and the really strange difference I noticed is that when I back off the throttle, I hear both pop off valves blow with a slight delay between the two... so I hear "pst, pst" instead of one "pssst". The spool up of the turbos is now also much more audible... I can really hear the bearings race up, much louder than they were before. I think this might be because it was the left hand one that wasn't working and now that it is I can hear it much more clearly on the drivers side (since my wife says that she's always heard it on the passenger side). There really is a philharmonic orchestra performing under the bonnet now... although I had the radio fixed (Jorrit installed a neat little new aerial) I turned it off and just listened to the engine working... it had me grinning all the way home! I'll have to see if I can record and post a video of it, since it's hard to describe. On pushing the throttle, you can hear the turbos start whirring and whistling as they spool up and then when you change gear you hear a combination of engine roar and a distinctive double blow off noise. I think passengers in the car will be as intrigued by the noises as they will be impressed by the accelleration.
I need to reset the E-Boost again now... Jorrit's tinkering has resulted in the boost pressure increasing up to 1.24 bar (I had it set at about 1.19 bar before) so that implies that something is working better! I'll call Rica on Monday and arrange another trip to the dyno. I'm interested to see if we can get the car performing better, since the emissions appear to be back under control, with the car now through the road worthiness test. Hopefully now we can get the car running a little less rich.
First thing though is getting the new wheels fitted... I've an appointment arranged for Tuesday afternoon. I hope that all goes to plan!
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