Summer wrap up

I can hardly believe that this year is already coming to an end! We have been extremely productive this summer on getting videos organized and filmed. If I remember correctly, we already have the entire eighteen episode season shot and ready for editing. However, I am not planning to release all eighteen episodes this season; I have explained in one of the previous posts this year that we are focusing on a lot of other things and don't have the time and budget to continue Machine Zealots to the same extent as Seasons 2 and 3. I am currently aiming for twelve episodes each season. After we get all the episodes edited, both Puyang and I will select which episodes to air for this season, and which episodes to air for Season 5.

Wow, if we make it to Season 5, so in other words the fifth year, that would be quite the stretch. After working on our cars this summer, both Puyang and I got the modding bug back again. We are addicted to modifying our toys!

Our garage condition for taking out the Downpipe for a bung relocation.

If you have been following us on Facebook, you would have seen that we had been uploading a lot of pictures of our modding days. I think there was about three weeks where I had some down time from work, and we spent pretty much everyday of it outside working on our cars. I really enjoyed it. Of course, making a video while modifying increased the time outside about three fold. However, it didn't really bother me, it was just more time spent outside. Soon after installing the Turbo Back Exhaust (TBE), I quickly realized that the extra O2 bung I had gotten welded last year was off angle, therefore I could not possibly install a wideband O2 sensor there.

I had to contact the shop that welded it and removed the downpipe, plus the heatwrap, for the shop to re-weld my bung. It was a pretty bad experience, but the removal and re-installation of the downpipe went much faster the second time.

Original position of the bung on the left side, the angle would cause the sensor to hit the firewall. The fixed bung angle on the right. Also tested to see if the angle of the bung cleared a standard O2 sensor. The sensor seen in the picture is my stock O2 sensor that later got placed back in the proper spot.

One of the most exciting things about this Season has been getting to Stage 2. Installing the Turbo Back Exhaust (TBE) has been one of the biggest installations on Machine Zealots to date. I know it's nothing compared to what some other people have done, but for us, it's a starting point. We are already looking ahead at the possibility to go bigger. Won't get into that now though. We've also got a lot of mini projects in mind, and have been buying little things here and there.

Bought a fog light switch from an 05 STI owner.

Nope, I'm not installing fog lights, instead this will work as a switch that controls something else I have in mind. This will give a cleaner OEM look. I also took out the light bulb so I can research what it takes to make these buttons illuminate red. If this is successful, then the Intercooler Spray button will also be modified. This is just an example at some of the "smaller" mods we've got planned.

Polyurethane lip for the 2012 Golf GTI. Aw Yeah!

If you are a GTI owner, or even any European car owner, you will know that your aftermarket parts are generally more expensive than American, or even Japanese cars. Well, the Golf GTI, as affordable as the car is, is also no exception to this rule. Puyang had been researching for a nice aggressive lip for a really long time, and to no avail; the pricing of any 2012 Golf GTI lip can easily add up to 400 dollars, on top of that you've got taxes and shipping costs too. They would most likely be made out of ABS plastic, and would be prone to cracking and breaking if not careful. Finally, after months of research and looking, Puyang came across a deal too good to be true. A high quality polyurethane lip that costed only $150 shipped to the door! We were skeptical of the quality, but for that price, he was willing to give it a shot. Turned out, it was one of the best looking and cheapest mods he has gotten so far. In the picture above, we've only mocked it on, and we have to say, it looks pretty good as it is. We will get it installed at a later date while we look for the hardware.

Introducing the Spider Pod.

The Spider Pod turned out to be one of the most useful tools I've put together. It took five minutes to make out of K'nex, and in the spirit of saving money, it turned out very well. Its purpose was to serve as a P.O.V. camera when I work under the car. The high powered LED strapped to the pod serves really well as a lighting source for those hard to see areas. The legs detach in a matter of seconds for flexible height adjustments. Pretty cool huh?

We also went to an Autocross event on July 19th, where Puyang raced his GTI for the first time. We've got photos on the Facebook page right now, but I will update the blog specifically on that event at a later date. We also went to Importfest 2014 on August 9th. Photos and videos will be posted at a later time as well.

Hope you guys had a really productive summer as well! Till next time, stay tuned!

Baby Steps

As mentioned in a previous post, we have started off this season a bit late due to circumstances in life. We have picked up the pace quite a bit in the last couple of weeks, and the ball should be rolling a bit faster now. With the weather finally getting warmer, we are prepping our tools and necessary components to tackle these upcoming mods and episodes.

An STI Episode.

A GTI Episode.

We've got another batch of tools coming in soon for other episodes, but we took some time this week to get two episodes done. They aren't heavily technical episodes, but they have been something both Puyang and I wanted to do in our cars for a while. If you follow us on Facebook, you'll see some of these mini updates as they happen, so be sure to check out the MZ Facebook Page.

Again, because of life circumstances, we are keeping our budget as low as possible on our modifications. However, it would seem that Puyang has a higher budget on the GTI than I do for the STI this year.

In keeping with budget restraints, I decided to create a camera dolly for sliding shots. Some of you may have seen it on our Facebook feeds, but here is the picture of the prototype:

K'nex slider dolly Mk I. (KSD for short)

KSD Mk I with automated sliding feature. (Battery powered motor attached. Working prototype.)

This was an idea that came into my mind about a month ago. I never really sat down and planned this out, but it occurred to me that I needed some tools to help with my film making. However, instead of paying upwards of $200 for a good slider dolly, I thought of building one myself. I'm not great at working with metal, nor wood, so I thought about these K'nex pieces. When Puyang and I were little kids, we got whole boxes of these K'nex building toys. I would create tons of my own stuff, and got relatively good at it. These toys had been sitting in boxes for years, so I'm glad I got another chance to use them. Cost? Well, these were gifts, so it really didn't cost me anything to make this. I spent about six hours on this so far, and I'm not done with it yet. It's sturdy, stable, and makes pretty great shots actually. (You'll see in future episodes.)

This is actually a pretty fun little project, so I am going to continue to do updates on this; we are called Machine Zealots after all, not completely limited to just cars you know. I won't be making YouTube videos on these things though, but will definitely be updating you guys via this Blog, and the Facebook page.

More information to come soon.

The Summer Prep

As summer time is approaching, and with a new season launching, the Machine Zealots team took the week to get things prepared; starting with a good old car wash. It was a tiring day, we spent almost six hours to wash and clean three cars. A third car? Well, the third car isn't really a Machine Zealots project car, but a car belonging to one of our own.

Puyang washing his white GTI. White cars get just as dirty as black cars.

Close to completion.

A humble guest joins the wash.

Clean and simple.

Just showing off!

While the first two cars were washed at the Machine Zealots HQ 2, the STI was washed at our main headquarters. Washing the STI was nice, but the shiny STI only revealed two door dings! People don't know how to open doors, or that they banged up my STI on purpose. It wasn't a real ding, but just some missing paint; which is annoying enough. The wash itself went by faster than usual because I had some help cleaning the wheels. She did a really thorough job; a lot better than what I could do actually. She actually asked for more tools so she could get the really tough spots. o_____o

We also found a fully built birds nest in the engine bay. A week previous to this car wash, I had realized the STI drank gas like it was nothing; I kept on thinking that maybe because I drove a lot harder, or that maybe I was just driving a lot more than I thought, but it was actually the nest blocking most of my TMIC!

I was thankful that there were no signs of cooked bird's eggs, so I removed the nest, and placed it on a tree. I personally prefer birds over rats living in my engine bay, and I found it funny that a bird would choose an STI for a home. Flattering.

Thank you for your hard work!

The nest was a bit torn up, because I'd tried to remove it before I was told to take a picture.

STI ready to do battle.

Nice clean wheels. They were pretty much dark bronze before this wash.

An end to a tiring day.

Oil Changes all around

Last weekend, Puyang and I finished shooting a brand new episode where we'll be changing the engine oil and filter on the 2012 Volkswagen Golf GTI. Puyang's GTI has already been broken in, and he'll be showcasing his stock GTI on the autocross course by the end of this year. Hopefully.

Screen shot from the GTI Engine Oil Change episode!

In any case, I had to get my oil changed as well if I wanted the car to be in tip top shape for carving the pavement at the upcoming autocross events. Since the last oil change, I had installed a brand new magnetic drain bolt on my Subaru. I took the time to take some pictures of this drain bolt for you guys to see. I think it's worth investing in!

Look at all those metal shavings caught on the magnet!

This drain bolt had gotten a tiny bit rusty. Mod time.

Painted the drain bolt with an old touch-up brush from the 2010 Camaro. It has a nice lacquer finish.

If you don't already have a magnetic drain bolt, I would highly suggest buying one for whichever car you drive. Puyang also installed a magnetic drain bolt on his GTI, but you'll get to see that in the full episode.

In the next two weeks, we'll be extremely busy. The first weekend will be spent at an import car show, and the following weekend will be our first autocross event of the season. In preparations for the upcoming car show, I have been trying to sharpen my knowledge on using the Canon EOS 5D Mk. III.

I am also expecting a 77 mm circular polarizer lens filter in the mail. Hopefully it will get here in time for the car show!

In the meantime, hope you enjoy some of the test photos I took with the DSLR.

First episode on the Golf GTI

We have been looking forward to filming the new project car on Machine Zealots for a long time now, almost a year to be precise, and we are proud to present the first official episode featuring the 2012 Volkswagen Golf GTI.
Since it's pretty much a brand new car, Puyang is taking it slow on the modifying front. This is just a small, but fun modification to the car.
The Audi S-Line shift knob is a great addition to the GTI. The style, and colors match perfectly with the interior of the GTI. In the video we mentioned that the shift knob style is all based on personal preference. Being in an STI myself, I am biased towards any shift knob that is more ball shaped than anything else. So, I love his new shift knob!
For those of you who own a GTI and are looking into this shift knob swap, this modification isn't cheap in price. I won't say how expensive this mod was, but I will conclude that most people won't find the price worthy of the upgrade.
In summary though, Audi does make high quality stuff, but that carries on the large price tag. This modification took a bit of time figuring out, but it wasn't hard. If you aren't familiar with taking apart your car, we hope this video will help.
To the people who don't own a GTI, we hope you enjoyed this episode as well. We will make more episodes on the GTI as time goes on. In the meantime, stay tuned for upcoming videos on car shows, mods, and maintenance on both the STI and the GTI.

Expect what you'd expect

After around two weeks of errands and ordering parts, we have finally gotten everything we need for the next step in our videos. No, sadly it's not stage 2 on the STI just yet, but hopefully I will get some updated news about that later... hint hint.

I have much to tell you, but since a picture is worth a thousand words, I will let most of the pictures we took reveal to you of what's in store for Machine Zealots:

Three episodes will take place on the STI as shown here: Clutch Fluid Change, Transmission Fluid Change, and Rear Differential Oil Change.

Expensive Subaru oils.

Puyang will be leading an episode on the Engine Oil Change for the 2012 VW Golf GTI.

Tools that will be helpful in some of these episodes.

More tools. Even tested some of you on what this is, and what it is for. ;)

Puyang will also be making his first modification episode on the Golf GTI. This shift knob is pretty great!

These are just some of the episodes you guys can expect. These will be our usual technical tutorial videos, that most of you guys watch us for. There are still two car show videos I have yet to edit and upload as well: Revscene Spring Meet 2013, and the 2013 Vancouver Auto Show. That's all for now!