Category Archive
The following is a list of all entries from the General category. Noteworthy entries are filed topmost.
Been a while since an update
I have been waiting for something big to happen so I could provide a report on it, but over the past weke or so there’s not been so much happening in this little part of Japan. So here I am with lots of little updates on things that have been happening in my life.
Firstly, this entry is going to be dedicated to a very good friend here in Okinawa, who because of an unfortunate situation, is having to return to England this afternoon much before she planned. Over the past 9 months or so we’ve become really good friends and she will be missed by me and quite a few others here on island. One slight saving grace for her is that her car (one of her loves) is going back with her and will be in England in a month or 2. So be on the lookout for a Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution III flying past you on the British roads soon. If it’s being driven by a good looking blonde, give her a wave!
A weekend of diving and driving
Well it’s been a fun weekend overall, and an extended one for those of us lucky enough to live in Okinawa and my employed by the local government. Yesterday marked the end of the Battle of Okinawa, and therefore was Okinawa Memorial Day, with all public offices and schools closed for the day. So, while many families attended their ancestral tombs and shrines for the day to have picnics and pay homage of some sort, I elected to get into the ocean and pay my respects to Poseidon, Neptune and Darryl Hannah from Splash!
It was actually the 2nd attempt at getting into the water after I had tried on Saturday. Was scheduled to meet a diving student and start an Advanced Open Water course with her. So we met up, got to the dive site and geared up. All was well until we got into the water and about 4m/12ft down when my dive buddy indicated there was a problem and that they wanted to surface. So we went up and my buddy said they were having problems breathing from the regulator. I tried breathing through it and it seemed to be tough to inhale; almost as if the diaphragm inside was sticking. I looked at the alternate second stage and tried breathing through that and encountered the exact same problem. Very strange. If you hit the front of the 2nd stage (near the purge button) it seemed to loosen up for about 20-30 seconds before it started sticking again. As we were planning a deep dive there was no way I was going to take any chances with equipment, so we had to call off the diving. Have sent the regulator off to get checked but I only had it serviced 2-3 weeks ago. Hopefully it is just something that has stuck and needs lubrication or similar. I could have taken the regulator apart and given it a visual inspection, but I would rather give it to someone who has easy access to the parts and who will know straight away what the problem is. So instead on Saturday we decided to snorkel around Maeda Misaki instead. The sun was beating down and the water was about 29C at the surface; it really was beautiful there. We snorkelled around to the “cave” but that was just a huge mass of people colliding into each other, elbowing each other in the face to get past etc, so we didn’t stay in there for long. At one point I had someone just push my head down under the water to give them leverage to get past - not nice. The sun was pretty strong and I could feel the backs of my legs had been burnt a little by the time we had finished.
Devils Own Alcohol Injection Stage 2 kit: a review
Something very different here for you, and probably not so relavent to my regular readers. But I spent quite a while writing this so I thought I’d put it here. As some of you know, as well as diving, one of my loves in Japan is now my car. This has been a recent thing, and has only really developed in the past 14 months since I got my 1992 Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution. Well I have gone and bought myself something called an alcohol injection kit. Contrary to popular belief, this doesn’t mean just throwing a bottle of Bacardi Breezer in the petrol tank every now and then! It is actually a system that injects alcohol (usually ehtanol or methanol, although you can use very strong vodka or gin at a push!) and works to cool the air going into your engine, increasing the octane of the petrol, which makes it safer for the engine and increases performance. Here’s a review on my experiences of getting the kit, installing it (well, helping/hindering my friend while he installed it) and some testing/tuning of it. Sorry if I seem to go on quite a bit, but I want to make this review accessible to people who have no knowledge of alcohol injection beforehand. Althoug if you don’t know so much about cars then a few of the terms may confuse you.
First, a couple of words about my setup. I’m still running the small 16G in my Evo I, along with 264 Comp Cams, Punishment Racing manifold, HKS 1.2mm head gasket, ARP head studs, turbo-back exhaust with decat, ported O2 housing, iridium plugs and Bitz Dual SBC Spec S boost controller. Prior to installing the cams I was hitting about 1.47bar of boost but since the cams went in I’ve been limited to about 1.13 bar as going over that was increasing my knock too much and fuelling wasn’t really cutting it out. So I thought I’d go for methanol injection to see if I could get some timing back into the car and up the boost some.
I ordered the Devils Own Universal Stage 2 kit. I should note that if you have an Evo then you’ll want the 3-bar MAP sensor DSM Stage 2 kit. I mistakenly bought the voltage-controlled universal controller kit thinking that the signal from the MAF would trigger the controller. Didn’t realise until it came that the Evo MAF has a Karmann vortex system of Hz to report the airflow and the controller needs a voltage sensor. So I had to order the 3-bar MAP sensor separately. A 3-bar sensor will allow you to control methanol injection for up to 2-bar of boost, which should be enough for most of us running early Evos. Now you can buy a stage 1 kit, which is a bit cheaper. The difference is the controller. The stage 1 kit basically runs like an on/off switch. Either the meth isn’t running or it’s pumping meth in full blast into your intake. This could be fine for many people but the problem could occur in that, at low boost levels and when it first comes on, it could pump too much meth in there, flooding the cylinders and making the engine bog. With the stage 2 kit you get a progressive controller which allows you to control at what level of boost the meth starts to be sprayed in, and at what level of boost it’s at its maximum spraying level. I would say if you have the money then the progressive kit is the better one to have, mainly as it is a bit more configurable.
Problems commenting on my blog?
A couple of people have sent me emails recently, telling me that they are having problems commenting on my blog. The problem seems to be with the authentication code that you are supposed to type in not appearing on the screen when you try to leave a message. This problem only seems to be happening the 2nd time a user leaves a message (presumably something to do with the computer remembering your details or a glitch in the space/time continuum or something like that!). Well the news is that I am working on a solution and have tried a couple of things to maybe sort it out. “Jan” left me 2 messages on the site last night which gives me hope that maybe the problem has been resolved, but if you have a minute or 2, please try posting a couple of comments on my stories. If you have any issues, use the contact me link at the top of the page to let me know.
Thanks.
Student teachers have arrived
Another slight personal update today (as you might be able to tell, I have quite a bit of free time on Mondays!). June is the time of year when student teachers come to various schools throughout Japan for a few weeks of teaching experience, both watching and then later taking part in lessons. The student teachers are university teachers and will be 21 years old, give or take a year. They always come looking exactly the same: same hairstyle (differing ever so slightly between males and females), black suits, white shirts/blouses and darkish coloured tie for men. This seems to be the case for anyone newly entering a workplace in Japan. But this year was a little different as I walked into the school staffroom and suddenly realised that I knew 3 of the students! Now comes the more scary thing from my point of view: I know them because I have taught them! In my first year here in Okinawa, these three were 3 of my favourite English students. And now I’m going to be teaching a class with at least one of them and maybe two of them. It will feel a little strange and makes me feel very old; I shouldn’t be teaching WITH my students! But it should be a good few weeks as we learn from each other and I get the chance to catch up with a few people from my past.