The Story of My GPW AP2 by JacobFatz
07-21-2017, 09:55 AM
#51
Thanks man. I absolutely love them and how the look with the rest of the car. I never really liked them on other S2000s as well, but I took a leap of faith for these because they fit my brakes without any fender rolling or stretched tire.
It's super easy to use. Saves so much time. Here's the one I have.
UView 550000 System Bleeder - Cooling System
It's super easy to use. Saves so much time. Here's the one I have.
UView 550000 System Bleeder - Cooling System
Thanks for the info!
09-12-2017, 07:36 PM
#52
Thread Starter
Well, I've only driven the car like four times since I last updated, but I have updates at least.
My friend about an hour from me began a "back-to-stock" part out on his Laguna 06. I got really excited because I've wanted Recaro Pole Position seats for a long time now. I bought it.
I hated it. The Buddy Club Super Low seat rail barely worked as a slider, the seat fit okay but not really, and the seat belt was a huge issue. It lasted in the car for maybe five minutes before I yanked it out.
I wasn't totally sure of it before I bought it, so I offered it to a friend who is very local for what I paid plus a tank of gas in my Camry if I didn't like it, so all was well. He bought it within 30 seconds of me removing it from my car.
Being the nice guy I am, I delivered it to his house. He had just bought another S2000 that was modified and he was in the process of taking the modifications off to sell and the sell the car as stock. That car had an amazing TODA exhuast on it that I absolutely fell in love with. I ended up trading my OEM exhaust and a handsome amount of cash to take it home.
So now I'm the proud owner of a TODA dual titanium dolphin tip exhaust.
I went ahead and bought a new helmet (SA2015) since I've been doing a lot more HPDE. I really like this helmet. Good noise level when wearing, decently light, and very comfortable. Which leads me to another track day update!
I went down to Dawsonville, GA for Atlanta Motorsports Park. This place is amazing. I HIGHLY recommend coming here if you are in the south east.
Here's the video of me taking a random lap during the last session: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2fjr0RE8b4&feature=youtu.be
The car did really well aside from a little bit of clutch slip. I suspect the CDV was the culprit... that will be taken out soon. It only has 65k miles and three track days on it at this point, so I really doubt the clutch is worn out already.
If you didn't notice in the video, my steering wheel is really crooked. I didn't notice until I was leaving the track's gates that my wheel is wayyyyy off.
I thought that I bent a tie rod or my front LCA bushing must have torn completely apart. There was no clunking so I kind of narrowed it down to bent tie rod in my head. I reached out to the Atlanta S2000 community and within an hour I had somebody that was less than 10 miles from me offer to let me use his shop, his tools, and his alignment machine to fix my car before driving the 250ish miles home.
Kevin, thank you so much again.
The driver rear LCA cam bolt came loose and the toe was close to -2* and the camber was over -5*. The thrust angle was super screwed up causing my wheel to be crooked. I was able to get the alignment somewhat okay there. I zeroed the toe out with a little bit in the rear just so I could make it home without ripping my tires to shreds. I really didn't want to take up more of his time than I already had especially when I knew I was able to get everything perfect once I got back to my shop.
When I got home, the alignment went smoothly. This is basically how I wanted it to be setup, just with a little less camber in the rear but my adjusters are maxed out. We will find out in the next few events if I want to get extended ball joints and correct this camber issue. I triple checked each bolt to make sure nothing would come loose again. I don't know if it was my fault or not but that could have been really bad. BTW, yes it's in a page protector. I still keep all documents in my S2000 binder.
So now that the car is happy again, it needed a bath. I gave it a quick three step "detail" to get rid of the melted rubber, bugs, and general dirt on the paint.
I did a light clay bar on the front and around the areas that needed it, like the bottom of the front fenders where all the melted rubber ended up from the tires. I followed that with a light machine polish with a black Meguiar's pad to get rid of any swirl marks that may have been there from drying the paint. Lastly, I waxed everything including the wheels and calipers to make it all shine again. The interior got a standard cleaning like I do with every wash. Carpet treated with hydrophobic spray, leather conditioner on seats, dash, and steering wheel, and then cleaned all windows with Rain-X inside and out.
My friend about an hour from me began a "back-to-stock" part out on his Laguna 06. I got really excited because I've wanted Recaro Pole Position seats for a long time now. I bought it.
I hated it. The Buddy Club Super Low seat rail barely worked as a slider, the seat fit okay but not really, and the seat belt was a huge issue. It lasted in the car for maybe five minutes before I yanked it out.
I wasn't totally sure of it before I bought it, so I offered it to a friend who is very local for what I paid plus a tank of gas in my Camry if I didn't like it, so all was well. He bought it within 30 seconds of me removing it from my car.
Being the nice guy I am, I delivered it to his house. He had just bought another S2000 that was modified and he was in the process of taking the modifications off to sell and the sell the car as stock. That car had an amazing TODA exhuast on it that I absolutely fell in love with. I ended up trading my OEM exhaust and a handsome amount of cash to take it home.
So now I'm the proud owner of a TODA dual titanium dolphin tip exhaust.
I went ahead and bought a new helmet (SA2015) since I've been doing a lot more HPDE. I really like this helmet. Good noise level when wearing, decently light, and very comfortable. Which leads me to another track day update!
I went down to Dawsonville, GA for Atlanta Motorsports Park. This place is amazing. I HIGHLY recommend coming here if you are in the south east.
Here's the video of me taking a random lap during the last session: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2fjr0RE8b4&feature=youtu.be
The car did really well aside from a little bit of clutch slip. I suspect the CDV was the culprit... that will be taken out soon. It only has 65k miles and three track days on it at this point, so I really doubt the clutch is worn out already.
If you didn't notice in the video, my steering wheel is really crooked. I didn't notice until I was leaving the track's gates that my wheel is wayyyyy off.
I thought that I bent a tie rod or my front LCA bushing must have torn completely apart. There was no clunking so I kind of narrowed it down to bent tie rod in my head. I reached out to the Atlanta S2000 community and within an hour I had somebody that was less than 10 miles from me offer to let me use his shop, his tools, and his alignment machine to fix my car before driving the 250ish miles home.
Kevin, thank you so much again.
The driver rear LCA cam bolt came loose and the toe was close to -2* and the camber was over -5*. The thrust angle was super screwed up causing my wheel to be crooked. I was able to get the alignment somewhat okay there. I zeroed the toe out with a little bit in the rear just so I could make it home without ripping my tires to shreds. I really didn't want to take up more of his time than I already had especially when I knew I was able to get everything perfect once I got back to my shop.
When I got home, the alignment went smoothly. This is basically how I wanted it to be setup, just with a little less camber in the rear but my adjusters are maxed out. We will find out in the next few events if I want to get extended ball joints and correct this camber issue. I triple checked each bolt to make sure nothing would come loose again. I don't know if it was my fault or not but that could have been really bad. BTW, yes it's in a page protector. I still keep all documents in my S2000 binder.
So now that the car is happy again, it needed a bath. I gave it a quick three step "detail" to get rid of the melted rubber, bugs, and general dirt on the paint.
I did a light clay bar on the front and around the areas that needed it, like the bottom of the front fenders where all the melted rubber ended up from the tires. I followed that with a light machine polish with a black Meguiar's pad to get rid of any swirl marks that may have been there from drying the paint. Lastly, I waxed everything including the wheels and calipers to make it all shine again. The interior got a standard cleaning like I do with every wash. Carpet treated with hydrophobic spray, leather conditioner on seats, dash, and steering wheel, and then cleaned all windows with Rain-X inside and out.
09-26-2017, 02:19 PM
#54
Thread Starter
02-14-2018, 08:35 PM
#55
Thread Starter
I'm just now realizing that I haven't updated this since last September.
First off, before people start asking why there's no more photos working in a shop, I left my dealership job at the end of October. Because of this, I haven't had as much opportunity to work on my car and definitely a lot less access to special tools and equipment like lifts and alignment racks. This change was my own doing, not negative at all. I'm currently in my last semester of my undergraduate career and doing an internship at a government office - quite the change from what I've been so used to doing.
Anyways, I helped a friend swap his interior with a full RedLine Goods package. It came out... interestingly. He gave me his soft top tonneau cover as thanks. Here's his interior:
Like I said, it's interesting...
The tonneau cover looks good though!
Since 2016, I've been getting really involved in the S2000 scene in Charlotte as far as planning events. With the help of some members, I put together a winter regional meet for NC/SC/GA members. It had a pretty good turnout and was a ton of fun.
All of the cars, drone pic compliments of JasserV:
Afterwards going out to lunch:
The more I wash my car, the more I see imperfections, mainly in the Stoptech Calipers. I wanted to powdercoat the calipers to avoid any more chipping or discoloration, but then there was the issue of replacing the Stoptech logo. Well...
Hanging out with a few local guys (JasserV, SRestre22, Yoyosupmang)
And then my new coworker sent me this photo of my car, not sure who took it, but I like it:
I wanted the windshield tape to be removed so it would be white all around. You'll see why in a minute. Doing this on my AP1 was horrible. Once I started, I realized it would be easiest to remove the interior and seals on the windshield so I could access all of the vinyl...
Before:
Can't go back!
And my car is a victim of the sanding scratches! My car was built in the AP1 plant in 9/03 for reference. Three small spots in the center of the frame.
All done:
Now it's story time. For some reason, I started to really want a GPW OEM hardtop, but it had to be original paint and near perfect condition. There was one posted about three hours away from me and the seller told me it was original paint and in excellent condition. I took the trip with SRestre22 after going around to a million ATMs and gathering $3400 in $20 bills because the seller told me he wouldn't accept anything other than cash and it was on a Sunday. So we got the money, drove all the way there, and the hardtop was in very poor condition. To top it off, it was half way repainted GPW only on the top, the entire underside was still the original Suzuka blue. So we left, very frustrated having wasted an entire day. This trip made me realize two things: I wanted a hardtop again for sure, and my exhaust is too loud for me.
Fast forward about two weeks and I found another hardtop posted here on S2Ki, but all the way in Texas, about 16.5 hours away. The seller (Silver9k) was absolutely amazing in all of my dealings with him. He sent me 35-40 very detailed photos of any and all imperfections in the hardtop showing all angles and kept in touch with me for about a week as I waited for my carrier to pick up the hardtop. It arrived and was in better condition than I expected it to be. Trust me when I tell you it's near perfect.
I need to go back and polish out the sanding scratches after I install the hardtop. (Sorry, I will update with pics after I do that... Probably this weekend.)
Back to the exhaust discussion, I loved how the Toda sounded, but I like quiet cars more now. An OEM exhaust WILL fit on a Camry roof!
And working on the ground because no more lift
The exhaust sold for $950 for reference. I know there aren't many out there so if anybody is finding this post through searching for Toda values, there you go. It had quite a bit of surface corrosion, so I'd say in perfect condition it would be worth $1,300-$1,500.
I need to go back and bend the hangers a little bit on the OEM exhaust, the tips are sitting really weird right now. My seat belt lock also stopped working so I need to fix that. Lots of little projects to do...
Lastly, I made a purchase I've been wanting for a LONG time and not sure why I never pulled the trigger... BYS seat rail!
I haven't installed anything yet or even polished out the sanding scratches at this point. I will update next weekend after I've installed everything and cleaned it all up. I'm very excited for these changes to start off 2018.
First off, before people start asking why there's no more photos working in a shop, I left my dealership job at the end of October. Because of this, I haven't had as much opportunity to work on my car and definitely a lot less access to special tools and equipment like lifts and alignment racks. This change was my own doing, not negative at all. I'm currently in my last semester of my undergraduate career and doing an internship at a government office - quite the change from what I've been so used to doing.
Anyways, I helped a friend swap his interior with a full RedLine Goods package. It came out... interestingly. He gave me his soft top tonneau cover as thanks. Here's his interior:
Like I said, it's interesting...
The tonneau cover looks good though!
Since 2016, I've been getting really involved in the S2000 scene in Charlotte as far as planning events. With the help of some members, I put together a winter regional meet for NC/SC/GA members. It had a pretty good turnout and was a ton of fun.
All of the cars, drone pic compliments of JasserV:
Afterwards going out to lunch:
The more I wash my car, the more I see imperfections, mainly in the Stoptech Calipers. I wanted to powdercoat the calipers to avoid any more chipping or discoloration, but then there was the issue of replacing the Stoptech logo. Well...
Hanging out with a few local guys (JasserV, SRestre22, Yoyosupmang)
And then my new coworker sent me this photo of my car, not sure who took it, but I like it:
I wanted the windshield tape to be removed so it would be white all around. You'll see why in a minute. Doing this on my AP1 was horrible. Once I started, I realized it would be easiest to remove the interior and seals on the windshield so I could access all of the vinyl...
Before:
Can't go back!
And my car is a victim of the sanding scratches! My car was built in the AP1 plant in 9/03 for reference. Three small spots in the center of the frame.
All done:
Now it's story time. For some reason, I started to really want a GPW OEM hardtop, but it had to be original paint and near perfect condition. There was one posted about three hours away from me and the seller told me it was original paint and in excellent condition. I took the trip with SRestre22 after going around to a million ATMs and gathering $3400 in $20 bills because the seller told me he wouldn't accept anything other than cash and it was on a Sunday. So we got the money, drove all the way there, and the hardtop was in very poor condition. To top it off, it was half way repainted GPW only on the top, the entire underside was still the original Suzuka blue. So we left, very frustrated having wasted an entire day. This trip made me realize two things: I wanted a hardtop again for sure, and my exhaust is too loud for me.
Fast forward about two weeks and I found another hardtop posted here on S2Ki, but all the way in Texas, about 16.5 hours away. The seller (Silver9k) was absolutely amazing in all of my dealings with him. He sent me 35-40 very detailed photos of any and all imperfections in the hardtop showing all angles and kept in touch with me for about a week as I waited for my carrier to pick up the hardtop. It arrived and was in better condition than I expected it to be. Trust me when I tell you it's near perfect.
I need to go back and polish out the sanding scratches after I install the hardtop. (Sorry, I will update with pics after I do that... Probably this weekend.)
Back to the exhaust discussion, I loved how the Toda sounded, but I like quiet cars more now. An OEM exhaust WILL fit on a Camry roof!
And working on the ground because no more lift
The exhaust sold for $950 for reference. I know there aren't many out there so if anybody is finding this post through searching for Toda values, there you go. It had quite a bit of surface corrosion, so I'd say in perfect condition it would be worth $1,300-$1,500.
I need to go back and bend the hangers a little bit on the OEM exhaust, the tips are sitting really weird right now. My seat belt lock also stopped working so I need to fix that. Lots of little projects to do...
Lastly, I made a purchase I've been wanting for a LONG time and not sure why I never pulled the trigger... BYS seat rail!
I haven't installed anything yet or even polished out the sanding scratches at this point. I will update next weekend after I've installed everything and cleaned it all up. I'm very excited for these changes to start off 2018.
02-15-2018, 06:17 AM
#57
Moderator
It's pretty simple. Takes about 30-45 minutes including removing and reinstalling the seat into the car. The only thing to get used to is that the seat pan sits so low it drags on the carpet when you slide the seat towards the back. It take s a little bit of force to move it into the furthest position back, but it will go. I'm 6'1" and it lowered my line of sight about two inches. Do yourself a favor and just go buy the rail. It's worth every penny.
02-15-2018, 06:23 AM
#58
Community Organizer
That's quite the shop you get to work in.
02-15-2018, 03:35 PM
#59
Thread Starter
It's pretty simple. Takes about 30-45 minutes including removing and reinstalling the seat into the car. The only thing to get used to is that the seat pan sits so low it drags on the carpet when you slide the seat towards the back. It take s a little bit of force to move it into the furthest position back, but it will go. I'm 6'1" and it lowered my line of sight about two inches. Do yourself a favor and just go buy the rail. It's worth every penny.
Yes, it is. I’ve been lucky to have had access to all of these facilities. The main shops you see in this thread are the dealership that I used to work at and a NASCAR race shop that one of my good friends worked at (he actually just quit, too).
