Visit to Callaway Golf Performance Center

A bit over a month ago, I was fortunate enough to be invited to play in a golf tournament being sponsored by PDS Gaming in Las Vegas. Their VP is a chairman of the Boys & Girls Clubs of Las Vegas, so were offering raffle tickets and a putting contest where all proceeds would go to the charity. I bought $80 worth of raffle tickets and putts and at the end of the day was lucky enough to win a Callaway Big Bertha 454 driver along with a matching Big Bertha 3 and 5 woods.

All of my current clubs have have either stiff flex or firm flex shafts and the clubs I won were R flex, so I thought it'd be a good idea to get fitted and find out if the clubs I won would work best for me, and if not, get them reshafted or replaced so that they would.

Callaway's Golf Performance Center is right down the street from work, so I scheduled an appointment which was Tuesday. There is an impressive amount of technology in the room with an an array of cameras and computeres used to monitor swing speed, swing path, ball speed, launch angle, etc along with racks of clubs along the walls. Everything you need to know to find the perfect club. You hit balls into a net behind which an image of a fairway is projected so you can watch your ball flight after a swing.

After hitting about a dozen balls with a 9 irons into the net to warm up, I started with a driver identical to the one I won, a R-flex 11* Big Bertha 454. My swing speed ranged from 93-100mph getting higher as I hit more balls and I was getting around a 12.5* launch angle along with 2500rpm of backspin. That was right in the range that they like to see, they look for a launch angle between 12-14* and 2000-3000rpm backspin. I have a slight upward angle of attack to the ball and usually come inside out a few degrees but hang onto the club instead of releasing it which leads to the fade I play with which turns into a slice on bad swings.

Scott, the Callaway fitter helping me, explained that they normally put an R flex shaft into driver swing speeds of 85-95mph, firm flex from 95-105mph and stiff for 105mph+. That would put me at the upper end of a R flex, but since I've got a smooth swing he recommended to keep me in the R flex shaft which should also help release the clubhead and give me better clubhead feel.

He also gave me a few pointers in my swing where he saw I could improve, moving ball position up closer to my left heel, getting a straighter line from my left shoulder down to the ball at address and making sure I don't sway over my right leg during my backswing. It's like getting a swing lesson at the same time! He also suggested that using a softer shaft in my irons that matched the woods would be a good idea.

I haven't yet had the chance to take these clubs to the course or the driving range, so we'll see how they work in real life soon (hopefully tomorrow morning before work!)

I'm going to be a father!

In case you haven't been watching my wife's blog Wendy's BELLY, I'm going to be a father! Wendy went in for her 13 week checkup yesterday and they ran some sonar over her belly to find the little monkey's heartbeat. It's a healthy 150bpm and should be the size of a jumbo shrimp.

Wendy's belly has been steadily growing the past 2 months and she's finally starting to show a decent amount. We looked at some cute maternity clothes last night and found some that she might like at Old Navy which doesn't cost a fortune. She's going to be a hot mama!

First Post on Blogger!

Here is my first post on Blogger! I'll be moving all my old posts from my old blog here when I get the time.

To tide you over, here's a pic from my recent vacation in Kauai:

New Plugs, Clean MAF and Still Low IAM

As mentioned earlier, my ECU doesn't seem to want to advance the IAM above 11-12 when running on the stock map, indicating that it's encountering detonation and reducing timing advance. Well, I've tried new spark plugs (NGK IX Iridiums, stock heat range) and cleaned the MAF with electrical contact cleaner, but the IAM remains the same.

So either it's normal for cars with the fuel I'm running here in southern California, or there's something else in my engine causing excessive detonation, possibly a manufacturing defect leading to a hot-spot, excessive oil blowby or ??? I need to find out what a normal IAM is for stock WRXs running on California fuel before going any further...

TaxCut Sucks

I ordered TaxCut software back in October as they are a bit cheaper than the main competition (TurboTax) and were also throwing in free state with the purchase of federal as well. The price is for the downloaded version, and I immediately downloaded the federal version.

However, the state version (California) was not yet ready and was informed that I'd receive an email when it was ready for download.

1 month later (November) I received the email and set it aside knowing that I didn't have any of my tax documents ready so didn't need the software yet.

Last week (a bit over 2 months since I received notification that state was available for download) I go to download the State software and find that I can't. Apparently your download is only good for 60 days from the date of purchase, at which point you need to pay another $4.99 to "backup" your download for an additional 2 years.

At this point I'm furious as I've now paid for software which I've never received! I also find out that I need to turn in my rebate form within 30 days of purchase so I've lost out on that as well.

I guess that's what I get for not reading the fine print, but I contact their customer support anyway and tell them the situation. They do not budge after chatting with their customer service for 30 minutes.

Like it's going to actually cost them anything to let me download something I never downloaded in the first place! It probably cost them more than $4.99 to pay the customer service rep to chat with me for that long. I could understand TaxCut's position if I had actually received the software and then lost it but I feel like I've paid extra to get something I never received.

I imagine that a lot of customers have been caught by these loopholes and that is how they are making a significant amount of extra revenue. I feel that it is shady practice, so I am recommending to everyone to avoid TaxCut software.

Their main competitor TurboTax while costing a few bucks more up-front at least appears to offer an immediate rebate on the state product with the purchase of federal saving you from the hassle of filling out any rebate forms. In the future I'll be using TurboTax and recommending that product to all friends and colleages.

Subaru ECU Learning

I've researching how the Subaru ECU in my WRX reacts to operating conditions to help me interpret the logs I've been getting from my Delta Dash. I found this thread "knock sensor activity in Deltadash?" at NASIOC which has some good information in it posted by Shiv from Vishnu Performance. I'll quote what I found important here:

The code at our disposal allows us to change the rate of retard, rate of advance, operational load range, operational rpm range, learning authority range, etc...

(The ECU) will pull back timing and store the knock correction levels in memory. If it does this in enough places in the table, the advance multiplier will drop and stay dropped until its sees consistent maxed-out positive knock correction.

The knock control system is active from ~2000rpm to ~6000RPM, give or take a few 100rpm based upon application/mapping. It's also active above moderate load (under boost). It is very unusual to hear audible ping within those conditions with deltadash consistently showing no drop-outs in knock correction.

BTW, if you try filling up a stock car with 87 octane, it will ping instantly, pull back timing, send the ignition advance multiplier well below 4 which will make the car run on its rich fuel map. For the most part, it will run ping-free. But every now and then, it will try to advance back to normal. And in doing so, it may ping audibly.

FWIW, I never look at the knock signal display. I only concentrate on knock correction as it's never let me down. Not only does it tell me when the car is starting to detonate, its behavior also gives insight to how severe or minor it is.

Recently I switched from the Cobb Stage 1 map back to the stock map. After a reset and a drive to work, the IAM advanced itself to 16. However, after driving a week, it's now down to 12 indicating that the ECU has detected enough knock that it decided to lower the maximum amount of timing it is willing to run. The trick now is to try and figure out why my engine is encountering detonation. Is it the poor quality gas we get here in CA? Is it something else in my engine (spark plugs, fuel filter, air filter, excessive blowby, or ???)? Until I figure this out, running a more aggressive map such as the Cobb Stage 1 will only lead to more frequent detonation and the increased possibility of engine damage.

Quote of the Day

"Patriotism means to stand by the country. It does not mean to stand by the president or any other public official. The president is merely the most important among a large number of public servants. He should be supported or opposed exactly to the degree which is warranted by his good conduct or bad conduct, his efficiency or inefficiency in rendering loyal, able, and disinterested service to the nation as a whole. Therefore it is absolutely necessary that there should be full liberty to tell the truth about his acts, and this means that it is exactly necessary to blame him when he does wrong as to praise him when he does right. Any other attitude in an American citizen is both base and servile. To announce that there must be no criticism of the president, or that we are to stand by the president, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public. Nothing but the truth should be spoken about him or any one else."

--Theodore Roosevelt