Volant- first impressions

[jaydee]

Well, thanks to a couple of members on here as well as a fit of summer warmth induced activity, I "did" the mesh grille and the volant induction this last saturday.

The mesh grill was a tight squeeze and I managed that within about an hour. Thanks to all the helpful postings by others who have gone before me- I REALLY like this grille over stock- gives the car more of a "finished" look than the gaping holes of the stock (through which you can see radiator fins and probably not being able to prevent damage due to rocks, given the large size of the grille apertures)

Anyway, that grille change encouraged me to try the Volant.. I used the stock car jack, after shoring the wheels with immovable blocks. The top part was relatively easy- the bottom part (removing the shroud, and stock silencer) I had to go off and get a socket wrench extender (10") in order to get the stock clamp off from below.

Putting the volant down tube was not so difficult as to thread the two clamps of the downtube through the opening - this was a bear as also the need to clamp the hose on the bottom part after the bottom tube was in place with the bracket- It was a two person job and painful for someone not accustomed to such contortions within so little wiggle room! That downtube is tapered at one end and has a flange for the connecting silicone pipe which connects to the filter box bottom. The lower, broader, end faces forward towards the back of the left lower vent.. I'm not happy with the seal between the volant filter and the box it emerges from and connects to the S bend pipe to the intake. The steel cover sometimes gets pretty hot (when I checked it to see what temps it was absorbing/dissipating - Im not sure whether the better insulated older version carbon fibre piece would have served this function (of keeping the air cool) better)

However, I AM thrilled with the volant- the sounds are interesting, I feel as if the engine is more responsive and I am able to go up to 17 mpg in places and situations where I was never able to get more than 14 Mpg at most (in town)-I used the 4th gear for this in town- as soon as I shift to the D, the MPG drops to 13 and 12 MPG levels.

On the highway, the sound on acceleration is exhilarating as also the response of the engine. I was able to get about 25- 26 MPG on a long trip with the volant and there was not much additional noise at cruise.


and thanks to members of this forum for helping me experiment- the next projects are - front dash speaker upgrades to infinity Kaptons, and the MDS warning light mod a la magnuman..


More later!

jaydee