I have had some custom emblems in the works for a while now and they finally got finished this week.  I feel the exterior badges, while being just a slight enhancement, go quite a ways in making the car look more ‘production’ compared to the ‘de-badged’ look.

Amazing what a few pieces of carbon fiber and a new grille can do to change the stance and ‘feel’. I couldn’t decide what pics to be selective about and upload, so I’ll just put them all up.

Installed the carbon fiber rocker extensions to complete version 2 of the Stealth GTM.  These are a straight-forward install – nothing worth noting really. I thought it would be tough getting into the car with these sticking out, but it doesn’t change the degree of entry/exit difficulty at all. Greatest benefit of these extensions, other than appearance, is that they will keep debris from hitting the side of the car.

With the new grille installed and nose aluminum back in I was able to install the FFR carbon fiber splitter. The nose of the car is not symmetrical at all (or maybe the splitter isn’t?) so getting the splitter to line-up from side to side is pretty much impossible.  If you get the ends lined up at the same spot on each side of the hood the front of the splitter will be asymmetrical as it curves across the front of the car. Flip-side is if you center the splitter to the center of the nose the sides/ends will be slightly off kilter, but at least the front portion is right on. Seeing as you cannot see both sides at once, I opted to have it look spot-on from the front and have the ends slightly off. In the end the difference side to side is only noticeable if you know to look for it (talking a quarter inch of variance from side to side where the splitter ends).

I mounted the splitter with some longer 1/8″ rivets, sandwiched with stainless washers (ie: rivet – washer – splitter+body – washer – end of rivet). The idea is that if the splitter takes an impact it will shear off without damaging the nose of the car (too much), as the washers will shear the rivets, rather than the nose fiberglass itself.

The splitter, combined with the new grille, really changes the look of the front of the car, and makes it look more polished and aggressive (imo).

I’ve been getting annoyed with the mesh grille on the car as it is warping and getting chipped from road debris, so I contacted Shane (VRaptor Speed Works) to cut up a new grille for me. I had it powder coated after assembling it and started installing it today.

First, I had to take the nose aluminum out so I could pull off the old mesh grille – not too tough of a task. Then I had to disconnect my front camera and mount it forward an inch or so since the new grill’s middle support strake interferes with its old location. Finally I got the grille held and braced in place with some random lumber and adhered it into place with the old trusty 3M 8115 panel bonding adhesive.  Tomorrow I can pull the supports out and hopefully it will all stay in place.

Got the GTM’s windows tinted. In hindsight, I should have had them tinted while I was building the car, but I thought the inspectors would gripe about that. Turns out they would not have cared.

To get the windows tinted ‘properly’ I removed both windows and brought them to the shop. They were able to apply the tint and bevel the corners so it is completely seamless. Turned out great, and completes the ‘stealth’ look. I also hit 224 miles on the odo today.

With the gluing of the exhaust mesh pieces into place I have officially completed the GTM Assembly Manual.  I removed the diffuser to get to the underside of the mesh easier.  Hopefully the weatherstripping trim pieces will hold up to the exhaust temperatures, but if not I will either roll the mesh back (like the manual has you do), or come up with something else to use.

After gluing the mesh in place I secured the intake tubing to the frame. Josh found some cool swivel zip tie mounts that take 2 zip ties and have a swivel in the middle for flexible mounting. The bottom zip tie goes around the frame the tubing passes over, and the top zip tie goes around the tubing, effectively cinching it down to the frame without the need of any hangers or mounts.

Finally, I cleaned up the hosing that connects each fuel tank vent to the air filter. I lengthened the fuel hose and secured it to the top frame member of the chassis running  behind the rear window, and then secured the filter to the frame. Lastly, another fuel hose was attached to the fuel filter ‘out flow’ port and ran to the back of the car for disposing of fumes away from the cabin.

Finally got around to mounting the exhaust last night. Josh fabbed up an exhaust mount to replace the Kooks ugly (to me) mounts that wrap around the nice polished mufflers. The Kooks mounts mount to the trans (you make the brackets) to avoid flexing the exhaust against the stationary frame. Josh’s mount does mount to the frame, but it uses a rubber ‘bumper’ so that it can flex under revs, etc.  Works very nicely as I can see the exhaust moving with the motor as it idles, etc. The mount is out of the way and not very conspicuous.

With the exhaust mounted the rear mesh was set in place (with the cutouts made for the tips, previously). The mesh was slipped over the exhaust before it was mounted. After some fine tuning of the cutouts weatherstripping was applied around the cut edges. This creates a nice finished look. I will have to remove the diffuser to glue/silicone the mesh in place.

With the exhaust on I set to tuning again. The motor still dies after revs out of idle with the exhaust – I was hoping it would magically fix itself with the exhaust in place. Today I was blessed with an easy tuning session, however. I added 5g/sec of air across the entire base airflow table and it started up and idled great and took some flogging of the throttle without any problems. Revs, drops to idle flawlessly. It would seem that the garage tuning is done for now. Once I get the car inspected (the 20th!) I will be able to get it on the road and see what needs to be done (if anything) in regards to driveability.

I finally received the 3/16″ black rivets I needed to mount the louvers onto the diffuser this week.  Mounting the louver assembly is a straight-forward task. With the louvers in place I hammered (with a rubber mallet) the strakes onto the louvers and got them into place. With the strakes drilled and riveted I was ready to mount the diffuser on the car.

Since I had previously prepped the body for the diffuser install it didn’t take long to bolt it up. The only thing I have to do yet is jack up the car and rivet the underside of the diffuser to the frame of the car. That will not take long at all. The diffuser really completes the back end of the car and shows you how low the vehicle really sits.

In other news, I am still working on the tuning side of things.  I know I could pay a pro and have it done today, but I’m trying to learn how the computer works and if I can get it close on my own I will be happy! A week ago the car would not start with the 96mm tb, and it would not idle with it. I could only run it with my foot on the throttle (then it would die). Now I can start it and it will idle for 5-10 seconds before dying, and I can start it and coax it to idle indefinitely by bringing the RPMs down to idle manually then letting off. Rapid throttle fluctuations are the target of my tuning focus right now, as a hard rev in neutral (ie: 4000rpm+) will cause the car to stall when the RPMs try to come down to idle (overshoots the idle and dies).

The GTM actually looks like a complete car! Had the glass guy come by and install the windshield and rear view mirror. Looks great! I just have to wire up the mirror and the interior will be complete. Afterwards I mounted the wiper blade and tested that out and got it to park where I wanted.