Saturday, February 28, 2009

Published: Friday February 27, 2009 MYT 5:04:00 PM
Updated: Friday February 27, 2009 MYT 7:50:42 PM

(Taken from TheStar)

Toll hike postponed indefinitely (Update 2)

By ROYCE CHEAH and MAZWIN NIK ANIS


KUALA LUMPUR: The toll hike for five major highways that was set to take place on Sunday has been postponed indefinitely.

Works Minister Datuk Seri Mohd Zin Mohammed said the decision was made due to the negative public reaction and the current economic situation.

Is this one hell of a strategy or what? When you do not have any idea on how to improve, what do u do? Create something that all the ppl will hate and have it rejected out of good will. I do wonder what is the next stupid action or press statement. Other countries are trying to bail their citizen out from the economic crisis. But Our's is doing very different. Please we are at least UPSR graduates :).

Friday, February 27, 2009

Scuffle breaks out in Parliament (Taken from NewStraitTimes)
By : V. Vasudevan and Eileen Ng

Karpal Singh’s son, Gobind Singh Deo, is restrained by Parliament staff  during a confrontation with Umno Youth members at Parliament House yesterday.
Karpal Singh’s son, Gobind Singh Deo, is restrained by Parliament staff during a confrontation with Umno Youth members at Parliament House yesterday.

KUALA LUMPUR: In a day of shame, Parliament came close to emulating the Taiwan legislature.

A fisticuffs was prevented, but not before a scuffle broke out.

The drama started when DAP chairman Karpal Singh was confronted by about 20 Selangor Umno Youth members as the Bukit Gelugor MP was entering the Tower Block at 2.45pm.

The group, who had been waiting for Karpal since 1.30pm, surrounded the wheelchair-bound Karpal and demanded that he apologise for calling Umno Youth celaka (damn) in the house on Wednesday.

Shame on you all for acting like an "uneducated fool". Making us a laughing stock in the world. Now the world have one more country to look a 'wresting' Parliment other than the Taiwanese.

Is this the Future Leaders of our country? Maybe we should have a rule set for Political Youth members to be at least graduated from UPSR?

Sunday, February 22, 2009

Bumper fixed

Bumper Cracked :(














I had a mishap on the way to work on last week. My bumper cracked, lucky nothing too major happened. So brought the car to NEW ONE Auto paint to get fixed.

JOB done. Looks ok ya? I really like their workmanship (Call Leong 012-2111693, tell him Orange Civic recommended)

Thursday, February 19, 2009

Who are you kidding?

Taken from TheStar,

Published: Thursday February 19, 2009 MYT 6:49:00 PM

Zambry: ‘Has Sivakumar acted according to the rules?’


PANGKOR: Perak Mentri Besar Datuk Dr Zambry Abd Kadir has challenged state Assembly Speaker V. Sivakumar to prove that suspending him had been done in accordance with the rules.

“He (Sivakumar) should check whether it had been right for him to do that,” Dr Zambry told reporters after a fishermen, livestock breeders and farmers programme on Thursday.

Who is this guy thinking he is kidding? Do we the rakyat looked dumb? Hello, we are now in the age of technology and we are very well educated compared to 10 or 20 years ago. Please keep these jokes away from us.

Us 'the Rakyat' does not give a damn at all to what any of your have to say, be it PKR or BN. We want to see progress in our state and country, and if any of you do not understand this. You can resign, because we are not going to elect you in the next election!

Remember: The challenge is "How do you improve and what have you done?". So smarten up, who ever the MB is. (Respect is gained and not bought)

B16A Extreme..... If you have the cash call Shane!

VTEC Powerhouse

What's this on the dyno? A 1.6 litre Honda VTEC producing 180kW and running to 10,000 rpm!

By Michael Knowling

Note: (Please give all your credit to This Guy for writing this and to autospeed.com for publishing it. I put this in my blog because it may be deleted later from the website.)

Click on pics to view larger images


At a glance...

  • Honda 1.6 litre VTEC on the engine dyno
  • 180kW without forced induction
  • Spins to 10,000 rpm
  • Quad throttles, head work, forged pistons, Autronic management - the works!

This article was first published in 2005.

Check this out! A 1.6 litre four-cylinder cranking out 180kW (241hp) at the flywheel without the aid of a turbocharger or nitrous; we’re talking about a performance-built Honda VTEC that spins to 10,000 rpm!

Yes, 10,000.

Click for larger image

This particular engine - built by Shane Wilson Competition Engine Developments - is configured to meet Australian Class 2 off-road racing regulations. Class 2 buggies require a naturally aspirated engine not exceeding 1.6 litres capacity; adding forced induction puts you in a field of buggies with engines up to 6.0 litres... This means it’s wise to grab the most sophisticated and powerful naturally aspirated 1.6 litre you can get your hands on. And that’s where the Honda B16A VTEC stands out from the crowd.

"The owner of this engine previously ran a Toyota 4A-GE 20 valve. I did some light modification on the Toyota and it went well - but when we wanted more, the Honda VTEC was the obvious choice," says Shane.

So what’s been done to the engine, you ask?

Well, pretty well everything...

Engine Internals

Shane started off with a late-generation Honda B16A, which has a slightly higher compression ratio, larger throttle body, different cams and some other minor differences compared to early versions. Despite its reputation, Shane tells us it’s a nice engine – but it's not a standout above its rivals.

"It has a full-length windage tray, a pretty good cylinder head and, of course, VTEC - but when you look at most other parts it could easily be a Nissan or Toyota," he says.

Click for larger image

The original aluminium block has been bored, honed and fitted with a deck plate that effectively makes it a closed-deck block. Inside the bores you’ll find CP forged pistons from the US. These increase the compression ratio from 10.4:1 (stock) to 11.0:1 – still mild enough to let the engine run on 98 RON unleaded without detonation. Conrods are from Carillo while the crankshaft is the standard Honda steel item. Everything is balanced and the bottom-end is assembled with genuine Honda bearings.

Click for larger image

Interestingly, the stock oil pump is fitted with billet steel gears to provide greater reliability at high rpm. Shane also modified the original sump, increasing its capacity to 6 litres, installing baffles and fabricating a custom oil-pick up. A high-torque starer motor is also fitted to cope with the engine’s extra compression.

In the hunt for maximum power it was decided that the standard DOHC, 16 valve cylinder head would receive the die-grinder treatment. Cylinder head guru Bill Hanson says he spent considerable time working on the Honda head and his trusty flow bench revealed an 11 percent potential power increase. A set of US-sourced titanium valves is also installed. The cylinder head is attached to the block using an ARP stud kit (which replaces the factory head bolts) and a TODA multi-layer steel head gasket provides effective sealing.

Click for larger image

With the expectation that the engine would run at high revs, Shane installed Crower high-tension valve springs, retainers and collets. And the cams? Well, they’re Crower shafts that retain a near-standard lobe profile for low rpm operation - this gives almost standard levels of drivability and bottom-end torque. However, the new lobe profile for high rpm operation delivers considerably greater valve lift and duration as well as altered lobe separation – and this is where much of the engine’s top-end power comes from. The cams are driven via a TODA competition belt and cam timing is manually altered using Edelbrock adjustable gears.

How Does VTEC Operate?
Click for larger image

The B16A’s VTEC system employs three in-line camshaft lobes for each pair of intake valves.

During low-rpm operation, the two outer lobes - which deliver low-lift and short-duration - control the intake valves via their own set of rocker arms. A third set of rocker arms - which align with the centre camshaft lobes - are left idling during this stage; their movement controlled by a so-called 'lost motion' spring. Then, during high rpm operation, the engine management system locks the centre rocker arm to the outer arms using a hydraulic synchronising pin. This sees the centre camshaft lobe - which delivers high-lift and long-duration - taking control of the intake valves and giving increased engine airflow at high rpm.

The benefit of this two-stage system is a healthy spread of torque across a wide rev range.

Induction and Exhaust System

Click for larger image

Shane researched aftermarket parts to suit the B16A and decided a US-sourced TWM induction system was too good to pass up - there’s simply no way you could fabricate a similar set-up for anywhere near the cost of this off-the-shelf kit. Purchased from Quantum Racing Industries in Queensland, this particular TWM induction kit comprises quad 50mm throttle bodies, a relatively long runner intake manifold (with two injector bosses per cylinder), bell-mouth entries and a composite airbox. Note that the engine was dyno’d without the airbox attached.

Click for larger image

This photo shows the underside of the intake manifold and throttle bodies. Note the elaborate, fully adjustable linkage arrangement and throttle position sensor mounted on the third throttle body. It’s a very nice kit...

Click for larger image

The exhaust system is uniquely built to suit the off-road buggy chassis. The 4>2>1 headers employ 1 5/8 inch primaries (which step up to 1 ¾ inch a short distance along their length), 1 7/8 inch secondaries and a 2 ½ inch tailpipe. Exhaust backpressure at full power is minimal.

Fuel and Engine Management

Fuel is squirted into the Honda motor as far away from the combustion chambers as possible - Shane uses the injector bosses that are furthest away from the engine. This helps improve the fuel/air mix and provides a small cooling advantage.

Click for larger image

Interestingly, the fuel injectors, rail and pressure regulator were purchased as part of a kit along with the TWM quad throttle manifold. The injectors are 400cc units which operate at a rail pressure of 55 psi. A Bosch Motorsport fuel pump was employed in the dyno cell.

Click for larger image

Shane tells us he was reluctant to retain the factory distributor-type ignition system given the engine’s off-road application – dust and water always seems to end up inside the distributor cap... His solution is a switch to direct-fire ignition using a pair of M&W double-ended coils and Bosch 008 modules.

Click for larger image

Fuel and ignition are controlled by an Autronic SMC programmable management system. Shane has added a crank angle sensor to the flywheel and a cam angle sensor in the position of the original distributor. This photo shows the new cam angle sensor with a detonation sensor also seen near the foreground (the detonation sensor was used for dyno tuning only). Note that mapping is based on throttle position and rpm – there is no engine load input to the ECU.

On the Dyno

Installed on Bill Hanson’s SuperFlow water brake engine dyno, this heavily worked Honda 1.6 is surprisingly docile. It idles smoothly, happily accepts full load from 1000 rpm and runs to 10,000 rpm without hiccup. But at 10,000 revs Shane admits it sounds "busy"...

Click for larger image

Tuning began with a lot of experimentation using different cam timing (with optimised fuel and ignition timing to suit each configuration). Shane settled on cam timing settings that give the best average power – he says he could have achieved slightly more top-end by sacrificing mid-range torque, but it wasn’t worth it.

The optimal VTEC change-over rpm was found by running the engine at wide-open throttle with the VTEC system locked in each of the two configurations. Optimal change-over rpm is where the torque curves intersect. However, due to an inevitable delay to actuate the secondary VTEC lobe, Shane says the switch-over point is programmed into the Autronic ECU approximately 100 rpm earlier than this point.

Once the cam timing and VTEC switch-over were set, a Lambda sensor was installed in each header pipe to measure cylinder-specific air-fuel mixtures. As it turns out, one cylinder was running slightly lean and another slightly rich. Shane says injector duty was individually tailored to give consistent mixtures and an extra 4kW (around 5hp) was found.

The final tune uses 26 degrees of ignition timing at wide-open throttle all the way from 4500 rpm to 10,000 rpm – and note that the detonation meter shows no sign of detonation when running on 98 RON pump fuel. A full load mixture of 0.91 Lambda (13.3:1 AFR) gives maximum power.

Click for larger image

And exactly how much power are we talking?

Well, this graph shows a peak of 180kW (241hp) at 9500 rpm without any steep rises or falls. We should point out that 180kW from a 1.6 litre engine equates a specific power output of 112.5kW per litre – we can’t think of another naturally aspirated production-based piston engine that comes close! The torque curve (shown in pink) shows there’s just over 150Nm from 4000 to 5250 rpm, at which point the second stage of VTEC is engaged. Torque then swells to a maximum of around 200Nm. Note that engine output data below 4000 rpm was not available.

Click for larger image

And, in case you’re wondering, what’s a highly-tuned 1.6 litre beast like this worth?

Shane says approximately AUD$15,000 - $20,000 - depending how you source an engine, the exchange rate and a few other variables.

It’s not cheap - but, then again, achieving 112.5kW per litre without a turbocharger is no small achievement...

Contacts:

Shane Wilson Competition Engine Developments 0409 550 351/+61 8 8724 8000

Bill Hanson Engine Developments +61 8 8362 8545

Quantum Racing Industries +61 7 3290 5911


I Can Only Dream of this unless i strike lottery :)

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Quitting When there is Problem?

Taken from TheStar:

Wong offers to quit, PKR says hold on (Update 5)
Wong ... "I have done nothing wrong; I wish to state that I am not ashamed of my sexuality as a woman and as a single person."

PETALING JAYA: Selangor executive council member and Bukit Lanjan assemblyman Elizabeth Wong, whose nude photographs are being circulated, has tendered her resignation from both posts, but party leaders have yet to accept it.

PKR adviser and de facto leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim said the party would make its decision after Wong comes back from extended leave, but declined to say how long she will be off.

“No one in Pakatan Rakyat is pressuring her to leave,” he said, adding that he was concerned with the “pattern of tarnishing PKR MPs’ reputations.”

This is so disappointing to hear her say she would quit. Please tell us the Rakyat, how quitting can help to solve the problem? It does not, be strong and so do something else that the Rakyat would appreciate like how to improve the rakyat's quality of life. There would be once in everyone's life that you will do something stupid or wrong but the important thing is to know how to overcome it.

Personally, i really admired Chua Soi Lek for admitting the scandal, but quitting does not help him or the Rakyat at all. We all know how good CSL is by looking at the improvement at our Gov Hospitals. Lucky that he realized that quitting does not help and he mange to get back to seat No 2 in MCA.

So the moral is do not quit if there is problem, solve it and you will go to a higher limit in life. Do you agree?

Monday, February 16, 2009

Recap Sunday 15 Feb 2009















Today, I went to Gunung Lang Lake to release a pet tortoise. To my surprise, i saw many fish there :). Quite a relaxing place, I will come here again to clear my mind. So now i have 2 special place to release my mind, Cameron and Gunung Lang. I like the natural environment there, there will be nothing that is noisy or bothers me.

Web: http://wikimapia.org/3967228/Gunung-Lang
Search for "Gunung Lang" in Google maps. :)

Recap Saturday 14 Feb 09















(DIY OCT using Fuel Filter)
The thought of oil stain in my intake manifold bothered me for quite some time (saw it when i got my Throttle body removed for service last month). And the constant problem of engine shut down it self (since i got the car) with no error output when diagnosed is really disturbing. I did ask the workshop where my engine were install about the problem, they told me it could be ECU error. So forget about it, if it is ECU problem it would be intermittent (i won't get chopped the 2nd time).

So send my car to the workshop for the DIY of an OCT (cheap version) using an fuel filter as the catch tank. The whole setup is cheap (less than RM30) but ugly. I don't care as long as it works, we shall know the result after a few weeks/months to see if there is any oil caught there.
For the auto engine killing it self issue, i have had the ICV and FITV serviced sometime back about a month ago, but the problem still persist (both valves were not clogged when i checked it). Finally the mechanic suggested that it could be a fuel problem because the way the engine shuts it self down is similar to no petrol intack case. The first thing to get changed is the fuel pump relay, and walla no problem till now :) Let's keep my fingers crossed.

Friday, February 13, 2009

Ipoh Government (Taken from TheStar)

Nizar to vacate official residence in 10 days

By SYLVIA LOOI and CLARA CHOOI


IPOH: After almost two weeks of staying on in the Mentri Besar’s official residence, former Perak Mentri Besar Datuk Seri Mohammad Nizar Jamaluddin has agreed to vacate the house within 10 days.

Nizar told reporters at a press conference at the official residence here on Thursday, he wanted to leave with dignity.

“My family and I will rent a place in Ipoh near my children’s school,” he said, adding that he was giving up the house in accordance with the law.

“By me surrendering the house, it will not jeopardise the case that we are filing at the High Court tomorrow (Friday),” he added, noting that he and the Pakatan Rakyat excos would operate from his rented place and the PR state headquarters.

To a question, Nizar said state secretary Datuk Dr Abdul Rahman Hashim had called him on Wednesday requesting him (Nizar) to relinquish the house.

“Out of respect, I agreed to leave,” he said, adding that incidents in the past week had turned the official residence into a symbol of the legitimacy of the Pakatan state government.

Nizar also said all the state’s former Pakatan Exco members would leave the 11 remaining Toyota Camrys for safe keeping at the official residence on Saturday.

“We are doing so as we respect the laws that we have,” he said, adding that the Pakatan Excos were no longer using the cars.

“After handing over the cars, we will use public transport, motorcycles or our own cars for official duties,” he added.

Asked why the former Excos did not hand over the cars at the state secretariat, Nizar said: “We felt that the official residence was the most appropriate place to hand over the rakyat’s belongings.”

He added that it was up to the Barisan Nasional state government to come to the official residence to claim the cars.

On another matter, Nizar stressed that Pakatan was not involved in the mammoth gathering said to be planned for Friday at Kuala Kangsar.

However, when asked if he would urge supporters not to attend the assembly, Nizar said it was their choice.

Finally it is almost over for the drama. Whoever takes the Gov will improve Ipoh? We do hope so, let's see if they will smarten up and win the hearts of the rakyat as 4 year is just very brief.


Thursday, February 5, 2009

Sepang International Circuit SIC


















I really hope to go SIC Track day. (even when i know will get smoked by all the sports car there :))




SIC TRACK INFORMATION
Info Details

Length

5,542 meters

Min. Width

16 meters
Surface Tarmac
Turns 15
Longest Straight 927.543 meters
Area 90 hectars