Topic: Our trip to Westers for Dyno & Tune afternoon

[KWhale]

OK, here goes.  I hope the pics and videos actually show up 

Late in May, the wife and I took Raggy Mae for our first road trip.  The goal was Waterton National Park, with a side trip on the way down to visit Westers.  When we left it was about 38F out, so even though we packed for top down weather, the top was definitely UP!  About 5 hours later we arrived in Tilley.  Well, arrived is not really what you do in Tilley, it's more like you just doubled the population of the town when you get there    We were worried about finding Westers when we got there, but that wasn't a problem.  Just look for the only business in town with a bunch of Corvettes, hot cars etc parked around it!

We were greeted warmly by Eileen (??  I am horrible with names, but I think that's right).  She is the one who apparently keeps Westers going.  She was great to deal with all afternoon, the epitome of small town friendliness.  Before we knew it the car was being strapped down to the dyno and Lyndon was already reading my ECM.  Lyndon is great about letting you wander around his shop and ask annoying questions!  Once the car and Lyndon were ready, he went for the base pull.

Here is a video (I hope) of that first pull by Lyndon:


For performance mods on Raggy, I have a K&N Filter with a Solo high flow cat and Mach exhaust.  The numbers on that first pull were:
Max Hp = 200
Max TQ = 215

After that pull, Lyndon loaded in the tune he had that pretty much already matched my mods.  One advantage of the tuner driving the same car as you!  After a few more pulls and tweaks, he was happy with the car.  Total time was like 1 hour on the dyno.  Lyndon and his mechanics are fast and efficient at doing this to say the least.

Lyndon did one last pull to make sure everything was to his liking

Sorry about the sun shining through the front door making that bright spot in the middle (at least it WAS sunny!!)

The numbers on the last pull were:
HP = 224
TQ = 308  <<<<---- That's right 308!  And the max was hit by 2,800 rpm!  Yikes!

The guys unstrapped the car and Lyndon took it for a drive while we paid up.  When he came back he was all smiles so I just knew this was going to be good.  He told me to take it for a run and see.  Remember, Tilley is really in the middle of nowhere, so there were a few good places to run the car hard.  It was so much faster it was almost scary.  The wife was holding onto anything she could find to keep herself from flying out    The car was almost scary in the first 3 gears.  Well, 1st is almost a waste now as I'm in and out of it in about 1.5 seconds.  The power in 2nd through 4th is enough to keep pushing you deeper into the seat.  I later found out that when cruising on the highway in 5th, if you want, you can leave it in 5th to pass rather than downshift, and it's still very responsive.

To say the least, I was incredibly happy with the results of the tune    And by now the temps were up to 70F, so it was top down time for the 3 hours drive down to Waterton for a few days.  We got incredible weather there 72-75 every day, tons of sun, and sun burns.  I took a few pics of the car in the mountains, so I'm posting a few here too.

One from the side of the road, about 1/2 way up to Cameron Lake (a beautiful mountaintop lake)


One from up at Cameron Lake


As you can tell, winter was still living at the top of the mountain!  The lake was still frozen (we were walking on it) and there was at least 4 feet of snow still on the ground.  It was about 70F the afternoon we were there, so we got to drive the long twisty narrow road with the top down, and the new tune, life was good!!

Here's one where a Blue Jay fell in love with the front of our car!  He was eating all the bugs off the nose.  A more natural bug remover?


Well, that's it!  The car is fantastic, the trip was excellent, the weather cooperated the whole time...LIFE IS GOOD!!  It's makes living through that horrible last winter worth it now!  We've been home for a week or so now, and the car still amazes me every time I drive it.  A small side benefit of the tune, and even with me literally flogging the heck out of the car every chance I get, the gas mileage is better now too.  It went from 30.3 mpg average to 32.4 mpg average (not EVIC numbers, actual calculations).  All in all, I would recommend this tune to anyone who is sitting on the fence about it.  For the money, it gives you a whole new car to enjoy, and you can't beat the customer service you get from Westers.

[Sly Nic]

I wondered where you had gotten to! 

Nice videos and pictures, KWhale - isn't it a great way to spend an afternoon (or morning)? And then there is the tune itself. You must have really enjoyed the rest of your drive after the tune. I am going to be driving out to the coast in August and I can't wait to hit the mountains and coast.
 

In the mean time, I am terrorizing the streets of Calgary. Got pulled over twice since my tune by the local constabulary  and yet I still have no tickets. There are actually a couple of cops that yell out "Hey Sly Nic" when they see me coming.

See how much trouble I would be in with a GXP? 

Are you going to the Vernon meet?

[DeepBlueGXP]

Nice, it must be sweet to be able to have "the man" tweak your car and test drive...  Love the videos

[GXPinKC]

Awsome post KWhale!  Lyndon Wester is the best at what he does, no doubt.  Loved the great pictures and the video's.  I can't imagine what it would be like to have the tune.  I have got to get over to Bob's (snaponbob) and drive his to get my "fix"!  Thanks for the post.

[jonymac]

WOW!  Great post!  My wife and I honeymooned through Canada and the pics bring everything back!  I would LOVE to make a pilgrimage some day to see the MAN...   Goat?  Deep?

[KWhale]

Thanks!  There was one thing I was kicking myself for on the way back home.  We went through Calgary, which is of course Nic's home town, and we decided to do the world famous (in Alberta anyway lol) Peter's Drive In.  If I had thought ahead we could have arranged a meet and eat.  It was gorgeous sunny that day too.  Next time Nic, we'll plan a little better!

   The burger, fries and shake was as good as ever at Peter's too, but it was a little early in the year so not very many nice cars to look at.  The only other rag top was an Audi TT, which is a car I liked the looks of a few years ago.

[Sol Asylum]

So I take it you highly recommend the Westers tune.  Looks like it would have been a nice trip through the Rockys, I'm jealous.  It's only about an 18 hr drive for me to see the Rockys.  

I see you found a "green" bug removal system have you found an alternative removal system for road tar?

Now that you know how to post video I am afraid of what you might try to win the next Poorboy's competition.

[TecSolOnt]

 Great Post KWhale,  love the Sly colour against the mountains !

 (course I am slightly biased  towards the Sly lol)

[KWhale]

It's funny you ask about the tar removal Esay, I do have a plan for that too.  I'm going to take some honey and put a dab of that on each tar spot and then let the dog have at it.  If she licks the spots as clean as she does her dinner plate, I'm good to go! 

The video plan for Poor Boys is a no go.  Their lawyers talked to my lawyers      and there was much talk about cease and desist and something about e-stocking and jail time, so I've had to shelve the video plans for winning the contest 

As far as recommending the Westers tune, that a giant grinning You Betcha!!

[Koobie]

Holy crap a 100 ft-lb increase...!!  Now that is PRETTY impressive!

Why the low HP gain though?  You would think the HP would have shot up as well.  Is it the stock turbo?

[Mac]

Wow great T numbers, you know if west gets the GMPP tune for a 08 auto I would go and make it a vacation would be a great trip from AZ , this would a great way to sell it to the wife! a better tune and a vacation up north.

[KWhale]

Holy crap a 100 ft-lb increase...!!  Now that is PRETTY impressive!

Why the low HP gain though?  You would think the HP would have shot up as well.  Is it the stock turbo?

  Yes Koobie, it's the stock turbo and intercooler.  Not sure why the HP only went a little, but I have to say, with all that low end torque now, I really don't care lol  I should have asked Lyndon, but I was just staring at the torque numbers and was tongue tied.  Then after test driving it, I didn't care about any of the numbers any more, I just wanted to drive it!!

[Koobie]

I bet...  I need to get on the tuned train.  I mean seriously that is an insane increase!

[Critterman]

Interesting thing about tunes, when my car (2.4) was totally stock, I have a Vector tune put on it, I actually lost 1 HP, gained 4 lb's of torque and lost .8 seconds in a quarter mile.  the last figure was the most telling and important one.

[GXPinKC]

  Yes Koobie, it's the stock turbo and intercooler.  Not sure why the HP only went a little, but I have to say, with all that low end torque now, I really don't care lol  I should have asked Lyndon, but I was just staring at the torque numbers and was tongue tied.  Then after test driving it, I didn't care about any of the numbers any more, I just wanted to drive it!!

The ultimate endorsement.  Lyndon would be duly proud!