E36 HIDs in a Corrado

I stumbled upon a post in the Corrado forum today about installing/retro fitting the headlights from an E36 into the headlight bodies of a Corrado. The result is pretty good in my opinion but form the looks of things the install was pretty involved.

The two E36 lamps were removed from their original housing and then grafted in to the Corrado’s. From the post it looks to be entirely too much work. Check out the picture up top. Although the update look of the bimmer lights makes the lower fogs and turn signals look a little out dated and out of place; over all I think it’s a nice look.

It got me thinking about things I could do to my Corrado to update it’s looks. I’ve come up with a lot of neat ideas, none of which are even a little bit financially feasible at this time. Some of the less expensive things I’ve come up with include removing the rubber siding, tinting the windows, tinting the upper half of the tail lights, and purchasing a new grill – one that isn’t bent to shit. Below is a picture of my Corrado as it sits right now… any one have any neat ideas?

Skier Cross Super Badass Shit

The winter X-Games were/are in aspen this year. They actually had to cancel some terrain events because of snow. Overnight snowfall on the order of feet ended up covering most of the rails and didn’t allow skiers to build up enough speed to hit most of the jumps. They were still able to do some stuff though and I caught some of the highlights online. I love watching this shit almost as much as I like doing it.

Oh man, if I could ever be good at one sport I’d like it to be Skier Cross. Skier Cross is a full contact race where four skiers race against each other down the mountain. The racecourse is packed with hard slalom turns, banked 1/4 pipe turns, rollers, moguls, tabletops and water jumps. Unlike other more traditional forms of ski racing the race is not timed and results do not depend on a difference of milliseconds.

You throw yourself into the hoopla with three other riders who only want one thing, to get to the finish before you - at any cost. Some would even call it the ultimate head-to-head alpine competition.

The pic up top shows a sketch of a typical course that a course designer uses to build from. I like the little stick figures that look like they’re about to eat shit in mid air. Below are some real-life action shots. That’s hot!

The Truth About Nonsensical Nonsense

I've been using the word "nonsensical" in converstaion for about a week now with out knowing for sure if it was a real word or not. Chelsie pointed out to me a few nights ago that it probably wasnt. Saturday morning we looked it up.


non·sen·si·cal adj
1. having no sense or meaning
2. deserving ridicule

Encarta® World English Dictionary © 1999 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Developed for Microsoft by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc.

That’s right Chelsie, nonsensical is a real word. In your face!

Get Together in ABQ

Chelsie and I went to Albuquerque for a Volkswagen get together today. We met up at the Il Vichino on Montgomery and then took a drive over to the Tram. John was there with his .:R and Diego and Adrian were there giving everyone a trial flash of the Revo 1.8t software. Everyone that got the flash said the difference was night and day.

There was a yellow Corrado 16vT there that was totally sick. Its come a long way since I first saw it, the catch can is now a legitimate stainless steal cylinder instead of a small plastic water bottle. Also he fixed an oil leak on the turbo seal that used to make the car smoke like crazy. I didn’t get a ride in it, as much as I would have liked to but I sounded/looked really fast.

Finally, everyone loves pictures!

Back from the Dead

It’s been a very long time since I’ve posted. It’s not because I didn’t want to cause believe me I did. Writing on here for me has always been a good place to get some things out there and in textual format that I would otherwise maybe only think about briefly and then forget about forever. For those of you who have missed me on here and aren’t in the know about my activities I offer the excuse that I’ve been to busy doing cool shit, and this post where I will try to give a summary of what’s happened lately.

On the drive back to Santa Fe the idle tensioner pulley on the Corrado seized. The resulted in the serpentine belt melting the plastic pulley and leaving nothing but the seized metal bearing to keep the alternator and water pump working. It held on just long enough to make it to the brewpub in Socorro. I spent the night (drunk) with Mac and Phil and then had the car toed up to Santa Fe in the morning.

The rest of December brought along a lot of interesting opportunities at LANL. I ended up working on a problem that required conducting various cooling load calculations and noise monitoring – something I’d never done before, so the whole month I spent back at work proved to be a great learning experience. Hopefully based on my recommendations the necessary improvements can be made in order to reduce the various noise levels associated with the problem.

Christmas rocked. I’m now the proud owner of a bunch of stuff I’d always kind of wanted but never got around to affording. It’s all super practical and I’m sure I’ll get a lot of mileage out of most of it. Some of the material highlights include a Patagonia fleece that I’ve worn almost everyday since, a SS coffee thermos, some new games (Rumis, and Apples to Apples)… I’m forgetting things I know it – this is what I get for waiting a month to write about all this.

For New Years a group of us went to Wolf Creek for a totally boss ski trip. After a season of almost no snow we got hammered the night before with well over a foot of fresh powder. It made for a great day on the slopes.

For my birthday my Dad took the ‘rado in to get all the little odds and ends fixed. It was a great, although expensive, gift. From what I remember Diego at Konstruct replaced the passenger side window regulator, water pump, fixed the motorized rear spoiler, changed the oil, and replaced the idle tensioner I was borrowing from his Jetta with a new one.

The time the car spent at the shop delayed my planed return to Las Cruces by a few days and I missed some of the birthday plans I had with Chelsie. Classes are currently underway… I’m taking 18hrs this time around with two extra math classes so that I can pick up a math minor with my degree in May.

That’s all for now, stay tuned for what I expect to be a whole lot more dependable and frequent posting.