I do apologize in advance if some of the FAQ sounds a bit rude, I've met one too many assholes in life and I just want to set things straight.
Q. Hi, I am driving the same car as yours and I am interested in souping up the car. Can you point me in the right direction?
A. Sure mate, as posted in my blog the car is fully done up by GT Auto. The link to their website is available from my main page so please feel free to get in touch with them directly.
I always respond to my emails personally and I will try my best to share whatever information I have with you gladly.
Just one thing, no questions on voltage stabilizers or air chargers please.
Q. I do not want to do my bolt-on kit with GT Auto, I have a tuner that I trust. What are the things that I should look out for?
A. Not a problem, as long as you have a tuner that you trust will do a good job that is good enough. Most important thing is that it has to be done by someone professional and reputable so that later when you have issues with the car you can always take it back to them.
Couple of things you should look out for, if budget permits try not to go with second hand parts. A second hand turbo might cost you a lot less, but a new unit with a warranty will give you a peace of mind. The last thing you want is a turbo that leaks oil every time you boost and your car spending most of the time sitting inside the garage rather than you driving it on the street.
Heat is the biggest enemy of any turbocharged cars, if you can keep the heat issues at bay then your car will be a lot more reliable. Things like ceramic coating, low temp thermostat, fan controller, aluminium radiator and an efficient intercooler will do you lots of good.
Its difficult for me to list all of them here, please feel free to contact me if you have any inquiries.
Q. My car is currently NA and I do not intend to put in a turbo kit in the near future. Is there anything I can do besides that?
A. Yes actually, there are plenty of mods that you can do for your NA car. You may want to start talking to a tuner that you trust, or you can look up GT Auto.
You can start with simple mods like air filter, exhaust and a piggyback first. Just don't waste your money on useless stuffs like voltage stabilizers, period.
Q. You seem to have something against modifications like voltage stabilizers or air chargers etc.
A. The fact that we don't even bother to talk about such products here is because it doesn't work period. Anyone can come to me with an attitude by pulling out a ton of dyno charts from god knows where and claims that such voltage stabilizer products gave them an increase of XXX power can kiss my ass.
Give me 2 bone stock standard cars, one with the engine bay full of voltage stabilizer products like a Christmas tree and another car with just a simple air filter mod or exhaust mod with a piggyback like an E-Manage and I'll prove to you without a doubt that you can have as many voltage stabilizers as you like in your car and it ain't going to make any difference.
You might probably feel good because you just spent a bomb paying for it and your butt dyno tells you that there is a difference because you can "feel" it.
I hate to burst your bubble mate, but if you're just one of those kiddos who spends blindly on stuffs like voltage stabilizers or air chargers, you don't call yourself a modder and you certainly don't deserve respect from any as well.
But hey its your money so if you feel good doing it by all means please! Whatever that floats your boat mate :)
Q. But I can see that you have a Sun Auto Hot Inazma Hyper voltage stabilizer installed in your car.
IT IS NOT THERE FOR PERFORMANCE REASONS.
I have a high intensity discharge kit and a sound system setup in the car, so the voltage stabilizer is there to reduce the fluctuations so that I get less flicker on the headlights when the air conditioner kicks in and a better clarity in the sound system.
A. It has been taken out as the standalone ECU is able to operate as one, for example adjusting the charging time for the ignition coils amongst many others. If you're suffering from bad wiring, my advice is just get it sorted by identifying it and replacing it as a long term solution.
Q. Out of so many cars in the market that has much more potential, why a Toyota Vios?
A. Yes I do agree that the Toyota Vios is probably not the best modding platform to start with, and it never crossed my mind that I would actually want to spend time and effort building the car up.
However, if you read up the history of the car you'll know that I took over the ownership of the car initially to please my old man.
Q. With the amount of money you spent on the car, don't you think you could probably buy yourself an Evo or something already?
A. Yes you are absolutely right. Honestly, with the money I'm spending on this car I could have just gotten myself a better car to play with. But again we'll probably end up spending more money to mod the Evo and we'll come back to this question again and asks ourselves with the money spent we could probably afford a Skyline GTR or something.
And yes, you can justify it by saying with the same amount of money if I were to throw it to a better car like an Evo I can actually obtain higher horse power. We all know that very well and hence like I said the Toyota Vios is not the best platform for modding and you need to read up the FAQ above to find out why I did so initially.
Or, I can choose to be plain rude and reply you that since its my own money I can very well choose to spend it the way I like :)
Q. How much have you spent for everything?
A. I often get asked this question and out of kindness when I chose to disclose the amount, I get idiotic comments/replies like "So expensive?" or "Is it even worth it?"
To be really honest, plain talk is cheap. Until you actually get your hands dirty and do it yourself, you are just looking it from the surface and probably will never know what are the complications involved and hence its easy for you to just discredit the amount of effort required to justify the costs.
So if you're really serious about a certain mod that I did and you would like to find out more, please feel free to contact me.
