It's been some time since I shot an update out. Nope. We haven't thrown in the towel yet. In fact, we're just getting warmed up.
All the news that's fit to print, straight from the Baltimore Sun.
You wonder what else is wrong in the news if they can't manage to get something like your name correct. No matter. Any publicity is good publicity ala Paris Hilton.
In case some haven't heard, the first leg of the first race was announced. The location will be New York City. Date is September 09. By then our lean green racing ma-chine will be ready to rock-and-roll.
Speaking of the ma-chine we've had some significant developments with respect to hardware:
1. Direct from Munich by way of Holland, a Lupo 3L is now sitting in my driveway! This was a significant accomplishment in and of itself. Importing the car required the blessing of both the Department of Transportation and the Environmental Protection Agency. Dealing with the DOT was a pleasant surprise. Dealing with the EPA was a descent towards madness. If you've never read the Clean Air Act consider yourself lucky. Many thanks to Erik de Widt for helping us import the Lupo.
The Lupo is fully functional. Lets just say it's an interesting vehicle to drive. Preliminary eye ball measurements say the engine is going to fit nicely in the Insight. And, the Lupo diesel is going to make the Insight a much more driver friendly car.
2. Andy Tebbano has been working diligently on our wiring harness problem. The short story is that we need a means to sample electronic signals that sensors are sending to the Engine Control Modules (ECMs) of both the Insight and the Lupo in order to make a controller that will keep both happy when we swap engines. Because what we're doing is way off the beaten path, we can't just buy pre-made devices to sample the signals of interest. Fortunately we've got Andy and Andy's buddy Pat on our side. The Insight wiring harness is done. The Lupo harness is soon to follow.
3. Our data acquisition system is ready so we should start sampling Insight signals this weekend. Although this may sound like a small thing, this is a major step in the development process. I'd say cracking the electronic side of this problem is over half the entire project. If we couldn't do it it would certainly hold the show.
4. Finally got an electronic copy of the Lupo service manual to work. This was a royal pain in the ass. Fortunately Andy is also a real wiz with computers. This thing is an essential resource. Without it we'd be wondering around wasting mountains of time trying to find essential bits of information.
5. Just recently the Insight has started popping battery codes. I've been chasing down the problem using the Insight Service Manual as a guide. Lets just say that the Insight is a fairly complex vehicle. After looking at the battery/power generation side of the vehicle I'm glad we're working on just an engine replacement and not electric motor development. So, we've definitely picked the easier route. I feel sorry for the guys that are trying to go the other way without steeling the technology from somebody else.
Before this message gets any longer I'll wrap it up. Before I go allow me to introduce Josh, Bryan, and Erik. Josh was a classmate of mine at Test Pilot School, a good friend, and now puts his PhD-in Physics-skills to good use at VX-20. I spent three years in VAQ-138 with Bryan. He's an instructor at VAQ-129, is interested in what we're doing, and threw a contribution our way. Erik imports vehicles from around the world for nut balls like ourselves. He's a car guy at heart and without his help we'd be dead in the water. Welcome to the team fellas.
