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Hey all, I know some of you had read about my latest "adventure" from the header thread posted by sfdownhill. Just wanted to chime in directly, as it was truly an ADVENTURE! I should first say, thank you to both sfdownhill and shotgunz, these two are some of the best people you can have on your side. Even if they could not contribute to my betterment medically, just their presence and their visits really helped me recover mentally. Knowing I have such good people who care about me really made a difference, so thanks guys, I really appreciate you stopping by! As for my story, well, that started 16 years ago I guess, when I went to the Dr. to see why my upper arms seemed to be going numb every once in a while. Well, after being poked and prodded and quizzed and scanned, we did determine a pinched back muscle was the cause BUT they did find something inside my head via an MRI that really shouldn't have been there. Yep, some little "tumor" like item that was beneath my forehead and just behind the left eye. Well, of course that brings up a whole other topic of what to do about it. The Dr. I had did not think it was something overly threatening and felt that it had been there awhile and based on what he saw in the MRI, felt I was probably something we could keep an eye on. That is, unless I wanted to remove it then. After a few conversations and feeling good about it, we decided to just keep an eye on it, meaning take MRIs of it every 6 months or so, so that's what we did. Fast forward another 15 years and BANG! The tumor decided that it needed a little more room, so it grew a CM and that's all it took to trigger a seizure! Yep, 1AM or so in the middle of December 28th, 2022 my wife wakes up to me "snoring". Well, so she thought. The normal process is to poke me in my side and tell me to roll over on my left side so my snoring stops. Well, that didn't work. Let me shake him awake and see if he'll turn...hmm, that didn't work either. Wait a minute is that snoring? Realizing that what we normally do did not work, she listened more carefully, note that she had lost a lot of her hearing some years back, so somethings don't always sound like what they are. Well, on comes on the bedroom light and low and behold, yours truly was having a full-on seizure. She sees me biting my tongue, blood coming out my mouth and me in full on seizure mode! BAM! runs straight to the phone, calls 911 and low and behold, within minutes the ambulance is there ready to rush me to the hospital. She literally saved my life folks, had she not been there or reacted as fast as she did, I would have most likely drowned on my own fluids. So, if I say or do anything here on the forum that upsets you, you can blame her 😉 What was so weird and odd about this happening, I had no recollection of anything up until I wake up in an ambulance strapped down to the gurney. WTF! As I start to come to, I start looking at where I am and what condition I'm in..."Wait, I'm in my pajamas strapped to a bed, holy s#!t, they've taken me from my bed! Where's my wife, please tell me she's not in this same predicament????!" Well, the crew start to let me know what exactly is going on but I'm still a little slow to process but ultimately demand I be released from the bed, unfortunately, I wasn’t, and I finally get to the hospital. Here is where I finally become more myself again and learn of what had transpired. This is also when they start to really quiz you to see exactly where you are mentally. Gratefully I am answering their questions well and accurately BUT one of the crew decides to quiz me on when I was married. I let him know, "October 17, 1998", he then asks, how long have you been married? I say 20 years or so...He snapped back "It's 24 years!" Oh no you didn't! I raise my head look him in the face and say very vocally "At least I got the F#cking date right!" Oddly, this is where I felt I wanted to smack him! Alas, I didn't. Probably for the better. 🙂 Well, a week later I'm talking to the surgeons and getting ready for my Craniotomy. When did that happen? Friday the 13th! Yes, you heard that right, all good though, everything went well, could not have asked for a better outcome. I have to say that all in all, I been through a lot but can honestly say that I feel really good and have very little to NO PAIN! Can't ask for better than that, right? Unfortunately having this surgery means a few things, #1, No riding of motorcycle for quite some time ☹, #2, No drinking for quite some time, but that's not always a bad thing. #3, get healed up! What can I add here, for sure 2 more things, #1, you can never have too many friends and family to support you while you are in the hospital, whether that's before, during or after surgery. And ultimately...IT'S GOOD TO BE ALIVE! Cheers, D

Hi, all! I'm in the process of building a set of variable length velocity stacks. Inspired by mohawk's yoshi style velocity stacks and variable systems built by MV Agusta and Yamaha I've decided to do something similar on my '02 VTEC. I bought a whole other airbox, with velocity stacks included. 6th gen comes with two long and two short stacks, so I have 4 of both. The long ones are repurposed to be fixed at the bottom, this way the bore diameter is increased and the length of the stack is reduced. The short ones will be kept stock and made to move up and down. When down they will insert into the bore of the bottom ones. The length and bore diameter in lowered position will equal the original long stack. When in upper position the upper stack will move above the lower stack. In picture below is the initial idea. I have much longer bolts now that will enable the upper stacks to move up to fully clear the bore of the lower ones. The bolts have threads only on the bottom. The upper stacks have these hollow cylindrical pieces inserted in bolt holes. This enables the upper stacks to slide up and down on the bolt. I cut off the radius part from the longer stacks and made them flush with the bottom of the airbox. I used dual compound epoxy to glue them. After curing I used a file and sandpaper to match the holes of the bottom of the airbox to throttle body bores. That is the bottom part done. For the movement I decided to repurpose the flapper assembly. I glued the vacuum diaphragm actuator upside down in the middle of the airbox. It clears the fuel rails and connectors beneath with no problems. It has about 12mm of travel, but I need around 25-30mm of travel so that the upper velocity stacks fully clear the bottom ones. Because of that I decided to use a lever system. This way the movement is reversed and the range is extended. I drew a schematic of how it will be done, only one side is drawn for simplicity, but it will be simetrical. The lever system will be mounted on a metal U shaped profile (red), bolted to the bottom of the airbox. A bolt (cyan) will go horizontally through the U profile and the lever arm (green) will rotate around the bolt. The lever has rotational movement, while the actuator and the movable stacks have linear movement (yellow arrows). To solve that problem I will simply drill the holes in the lever arm that are wide (the ellipsoidal shape of the holes in the schematic). There will be a bracket to connect the front movable stacks together (cyan). Same in the back. The bracket will slide on long bolts. I intend to intercept the VTEC signal and use it to activate a relay, which will activate the flapper solenoid. The original signal for the flapper activates at 5500rpm which is too early. I will update the thread with more details when I take more pictures. I'd like to know your thoughts on this mod, if you have any ideas to improve the design feel free to share them. When I finish the build I intend to test the stacks. I can assemble a stockish setup with 4 short original stacks. That will be the baseline. Then I can compare it to the modified setup. I will try to bring it to a dyno. If I can't get it dynoed I have an idea to do 3rd gear pulls from 3000rpm to limiter. Time every 1000rpm segment from video or from Rapid bike logger and compare gains/losses.

Wow, give my best to Darryl - I hope his recovery is as fast as his riding! Lots of fun in the Sierras with all you guys!