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Glad to heard your doing ok and good choice on turbo's |
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| Posted by |
lewoolf2 on December 23, 2007 at 9:59 PM |
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This message has been viewed 130 times. |
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| In Reply To |
Added a new twist to my Z and this last year retrospective.. posted by RAGTPZ on December 23, 2007 at 08:56 PM |
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:I guess you could say that I have not been very active so much on the board here this year or at many events. This year has been particularly difficult for me mechanically and healthwise, but there was some neat and good things that came out of this as well as you will soon read.
:Back in April, I decided to have a physical done as it had been a while since I had one. I really have not had any health problems but figured that I was going to be 35 this year and that I might as well do it and get a baseline. I go in and it's the normal thing; pee in the cup, cough left/cough right, heart looks good, get blood work done, etc. So the next day I get a call from my doctor's office wanting to see me right away and I figure, ok now what? I go in and they ask me if I had been feeling bad or not right in any way and the answer was no in that I was feeling fine. They then told me that I was very diabetic and apparently had been for quite a while. Now see, I have a medical background so I know all the signs of diabetes and I had ZERO, none, nilch, nada. My cholesterol numbers are through the roof as well. I also have no family history of it whatsoever. Alright, so I'm diabetic...not the end of the world and I'm lucky enough that I know a lot about the disease itself already. So let's treat it, and I'm going to be aggressive with it because the better I control it now the better off I'll be later.
:Fast forward a bit, on a high not in early May my job takes me out to Phoenix for a conference and low'n behold I happen to need some parts for ZdayZ. Why not make a stop at ConceptZPerformance. Although I had never seen him, I knew it was Coz behind the desk instantly. An addict always knows his supplier. :) Muchas gracias Coz, it was great to finally meet you after giving you a small fortune. :) LOL!
:Fast forward to ZdayZ and I head down with the guys from RameyZ (Brett and Tim (SilverTwinOH)) and it's Brett's first time at an event with his recently finished TT convertible (seen here with Tim and Brett)
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:At this point I'm about a month out of starting treatment for the diabetes and the medication I was on was making me as sick as a dog. Many of you probably didn't even see me there as I was really only down at the event one day and pretty much puking the rest of the time.
:Well, disaster hits while down there on the last day as both my turbos blow coming back from a photoshoot with Tim. Oil is spewing out the back of my exhaust like crazy so now I'm pondering...now what? We limp the car back to the cabin very gingerly and contemplate what to do for the trip home. We decided to see how the car does coming back into town and if the smoking continued then the only option is to tow it home. The next morning comes, we get back into town and the car at this point in time is not smoking at all actually so we decided to see if we could make it back to Cincinnati by driving as gently as possible. I think the drive through the mountains and the constant load shifting finally took it's toll though and the car started smoking worse that ever. I bet I was killing bugs for miles around. We had to stop at this point, it was just becoming too dangerous. At this point we are about half way home.
:Luckily we found a tow service whose driver was especially nice and cautious with the car and had previous experience loading lowered cars on the carrier. I bet it took him all of five minutes to get that car on that truck as seen in these photos:
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:Many thank yous go out to Tim (SilverTwin(OH)) for hanging around with me while waiting for him and for the ride back home.
:So we get the car back to RameyZ, disappointed but not angry. I mean, shite happens and I drive the piss out of that car so stuff's gonna break. Just fix it or upgrade it. :)
:At this time I am trying to decide on what direction to go with the car. Bigger turbos? Needed to think about that for a bit and then the bottom dropped out.....
:The first week of June, I pass out at my desk at work. My blood pressure and blood glucose level dropped to very dangerous levels. I was rushed to the hospital and had to be revived at one point. After a little while in the emergency room with my head spinning it was discovered that I was in kidney failure. Being so, the blood pressure medication I take and my diabetes meds were not being filtered out so I was being overdosed on every dose I took hence why my blood pressure and glucose levels were so low. We found that the one diabetes med was causing the problem. I was in the hospital for five days while my kidney function slowly came back. After being discharged, it took two weeks for my blood pressure to finally return to normal and then to start that medication again.
:At this point, the Z became a non-priority. I had no clue as to what to expect next so I decided to wait a while to see what happens with my health before making any plans.
:Fast forward to October, I am beginning to finally feel normal again so it's time to decide what to do with the Z. Just fix it or upgrade? I contacted Greg and Seb at SpecialtyZ to get their thoughts and they were great as always. I decided to stay with the Sport 530s, I just love the throttle reponse with those too much. They are just kick-ass turbos.
:Funny as it was, I sent my turbos out to them to be fitted with new CHRA sections on a Wednesday and found out on Thursday that I needed to go to Los Angeles for work. I was going to ship a couple of other things out to them as well so I figured I would just hand deliver. What was even funnier was that, by coincidence, the hotel I was staying at was just a couple of blocks away from SpecialtyZ! SMALL WORLD! So while I'm out there I get to meet Greg and Seb and SeedyROM was there as well. Damn glad to meet you guys! Great facility you have there!
:So in the course of half a year I get to personally meet two of the most respected vendors on this site and within the community. Kick ass! Thank you guys for all you do and the advice/service you have given to me.
:On to my new twist! Being that I had so much of a crappy year, I decided to say Merry Christmas to myself. For those of you who haven't looked at my profile yet, there is a drivetrain change. :) Swapped the automatic out to a brand new 97+ spec 5 speed
:Last pic of the car being an automatic:
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:Six puck South Bend DXD FX 6 puck clutch, I decided on this after Joe (Spddracer) was nice enough to let me take his car for a test drive on this clutch. I am not disappointed to say the least:
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:Went with a stock flywheel:
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:Clutch in place:
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:SilverTwin(OH) short shifter, I don't have to tell you all how awesome this is. THANKS TIM!
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:Autovation pedals, yes I know one bolt is missing on the clutch pedal (drill ran out of juice, will fix tomorrow):
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:First pic of 5 speed interior after installed:
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:A very big thank you goes to RameyZ for the install, took all of 6 hours I believe.
:Well, that's been my year in a nutshell. As far as my diabetes is concerned, it is improving. My hemoglobin A1c level is now 6.1. Hemoglobin A1c is the measure of how your glucose level is in control over the past 90 days or so. For non-diabetics, the high end of what is considered normal is 5.9 so I am very close to being in that range. When I was first diagnosed, my level was 10. I've come a long way in a fairly short amount of time. I continue to have some problems with my kidneys regardless and although I am far from being in any danger with that, I need to be diligent in my therapy to make sure it stays that way.
:All this has once again reminded me that I have some of the best friends of my life right now. It's a great feeling and it is something that I am truly thankful for this holiday season. Everyone should take time to reflect on those that are important in your lives, look past that you share a common interest in a car because it is much more than that. It is something that becomes a part of you and who you are.
:Sorry for the extremely long post here but I thought I would share my experience over the past year with my highs as well as my lows.
:Everyone take care of yourselves and your families.
:Have a great and safe holiday season!
:Randy
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