2024 Updates

In 2023 fashion, I’m dumping a lot of my activity into one thread, as things have been turbulent and hectic. I sent off the car in late 2023 (transmission jammed/rebuild), got it back in March, sent it back in April (second gear still popping out), got it back in May, and am sending it back…

Arai GP5W

Haven’t made a post just for my helmet, but I really love this one. It’s an Arai GP5W, which is actually on its way out of production. I have a connection in Japan snag me an SA2020 + pink/gold visor for about half of what it costs in the States. I had been shopping around…

FP 71HTA, ETS Intake, Artec Exhaust Manifold

Thought I’d never do it again, but here I am. Turbo upgrade incoming for the Evo. On my old Evo, I went from the stock turbo to the HKS7460R, an incredible turbo that spooled quicker and made much more power up top than stock. That turbo blew its oil seals, dumping loads of oil into…

Lime Rock Park Proving Grounds Autox 6-1-24

I have not done one of these for quite some time, wow. I had to look back at some previous posts on how I usually formatted these. Some background: This is the 3rd time I’m attending this event, but in a way just my 2nd. After doing this event for the first time last year,…

Cuscos Incoming (450F & 141FG)

These next few posts aren’t going to come out in order, but I’ve been bad about updating the journal so I’m just going by what’s off the top of my head. Yes – this is diffs again. 2nd diff (technically 3rd if you include the factory helical) for the front and 4th (? stock, Cusco…

A Few 2023 Updates (Evo, Sequoia)

Evo The Evo has had a fairly substantial amount of work done over the last 2 years, and I’m still sorting out all of the upgrades that were made. I don’t like to change a lot between racing the car, but with how scheduling has been, it was fairly inevitable. I’m back on track now,…

Front Windshield & Window Tinting (Venza)

We have added front window tinting and windshield tinting to our Venza. The front windows seem to not have any tinting at all, which was surprising to us. It looks like the rears are tinted at about 20%, so we added a 35% tint to our front windows. This will help with both the heat…

2021+ Toyota Venza Oil Change How-To

This is a how-to for the second-gen Toyota Venza (USDM) oil change. If you are a DIYer, want to do more oil changes than Toyota recommends (you should), or have just run out of Toyotacare’s maintenance, this is a very simple, straight-forward job. See below for a detailed step-by-step and a slideshow of important steps.…

2023 Alignment & Corner Weights (Evo)

After getting the fender braces & crossmember brace on, I decided it was time to do an alignment. It has been a while, and I wanted to make sure everything was on straight. It wasn’t too far off, just a little bit of toe to adjust. I’m running about -3.5front, -3.5rear, with 0 toe all…