Welcome To The PSI Blog

Many of you don't know what Zooey Magazine is and neither did we when we first heard about it from Katee Sackhoff, Erick's sister.  

Above: Katee and Erick at PSI private grand opening at our current location off of HWY 26.  

Katee sent a link to Erick regarding an interview she had recently done with Zooey Magazine.  They were interviewing her because her show "Longmire" is premiering its second season in a couple of weeks.  In the interview, she talks about how she got started in acting and her career.  They also ask her about PSI and if we have built her anything, but sadly we have not.  But hopefully in the near future, that is somthing that will change.  

Here is a link to the article, http://zooeymagazine.com/this-is-me-katee-sackhoff/

Network A released a bonus episode of Tuerck'd from Ryan's trip to Oregon.  Ryan and Retaks chose us to build his 2013 Formula D competition car, a 2013 Scion FR-S.  As you probably have seen already, the powerplant that was chosen was a single turbo 2JZ.  

We were checking out Speedhunters.com, which we also do, and we spotted one of our client's cars in the #FEATURETHIS: BORN IN THE USA section.

Mark's 1963 Pontiac Catalina.  It has a 428 under the hood with a Muncie M21 transmission.  It sits on 17″ steel wheels covering Wilwood brakes.  While it was at the shop, one of our technicians went over the 428 and then did some carb tuning.  It put down 313 whp and 374 ft-lbs of torque. 

This past Saturday, Dean Karnage Kearney revealed his competition car for the 2013 Formula D season.  He will be piloting a Dodge Viper SRT-10. 

Did you spot the PSI on the side skirt?  We joined the team last season before Round 5 in Seattle.  It is going to be exciting to watch Dean compete in a Viper.  We will be supporting Dean and his Achilles Radial teammate, Robbie Nishida.

During the off-season, Ryan Tuerck has been working with Network A to produce his online series, Tuerck'd.  

This past November, Daily Planet featured Daigo Saito and Design Craft in one of their episodes.  They talked about drifting and how it differs from other motorsports.  Here is a link to the video, http://watch.discoverychannel.ca/#clip810215.

Kyle Pollard was one of a group of local car owners who were chosen to exhibit their cars at the Portland International Auto Show.  He will be exhibiting his Formula Drift Nissan Silvia K's at the show.  

For the show, he wanted to introduce a new livery.  He found out last week and worked hard to get the old vinyl stripped.  

Everyone here at PSI wants to wish everyone a Happy Holidays.   

For the holidays, the FR-S got a little present from our friends at Scion.  

Tonight was a long night preparing the cars for a drift event at Pat's Acres Racing Complex (PARC).  

As you all might know, we stay very busy and encourage proactive preparations for next year racing season. With that in mind, we are offering a discounted rate for tuning and now LABOR during the next few months.

Above: Jason Oefelein tuning Robbie Nishida's 2JZ SC before Formula D Seattle.

15% off labor and suspension tuning -- call or email for details

Above: Brian Hartsock doing an alignment on a Subaru STi.

A few weeks ago we had a 1994 Nissan S14 on the dyno. It had a SR20 with a T3/T4 twin-scroll turbo and Jason Oefelein tuned it with an Apexi PowerFC. After tuning, it put down 300 whp and 265 ft-lbs of torque at 19 lbs of boost. While the car was on the dyno, the owner's friend took the opportunity to do some filming around the shop. He put together this video of the trip to the dyno.

Tandem of Die is the film making duo of Joe Ayala and Justin Shreeve. They travel the world filming many motorsports events, particularly drifting.

They are also known for doing hand stands and other antics. Above they are doing hand stands at the the track at Gatebil.

We did a little decorating in the lobby for Halloween.  

We are fortunate to have a good working relationship with the guys over at Yaer Productions.  These guys are known for making some awesome videos especially car related ones.  They travel the country and the world covering a wide variety of events from drifting to road racing and hill climbs.  A few weeks ago, they took some time out of the busy race season to make us a video to show who we are and what we do.  

Ryan Davis getting some footage of Kyle Pollard's F20c powered Hachi.  

Ever since the current website has been up and running, we have had the same video that Yaer previously made for us on the home page.  It was a great video that showcased the shop, but it was time for something better.  

And here is the video, which can also be seen on our home page.  

Portland Speed Industries - YAER 2012 from Ryan Davis on Vimeo.

Be sure to check out all the other videos that the Yaer team produces.  

We wanted to congratulate Robbie Nishida for winning the Most Improved Driver award for the 2012 FD season.  We are proud to support him and will continue to do so next season. 

Robbie Nishida at Irwindale.  Photo by Larry Chen for SpeedHunters.com

Title Fight, the final round of Formula D this year is coming up this weekend.  Jason Oefelein and Brian Hartsock have already landed in Cali and Andrew Coomes' LS240 is almost there.  Before Andrew's car left, Brian Hartsock changed the alignment setup for the banks of Irwindale.  The last event was in the parking lot in Las Vegas.  The tracks are very different and so are the suspension setups.  Between every round, Brian adjusts the suspension for the upcoming event.  

Brian also changed the fluids and finished preping the car.  

Last week, the Yaer Productions team came down to the shop to get some footage for their upcoming video for us.  Ryan Davis was joined by a few team members from the north.  Both Sully and Connor Surdi made the trip down.  

Above: Sully, Connor, and Ryan (in the back behind Connor) filming.  

A car's fuel system is a very important part and should be considered in any big build.  A lot of forced induction applications will quickly require an upgrade in the fuel system as the stock setup will not be able to supply enough fuel to the engine.  Often times choosing the right pump for your application can be difficult.  There are many different brands of fuel pumps to choose from.  Radium Engineering, the guys who make turbo kits for Lotus' and universal components, has set out to test several fuel pumps.  They offer many different pump options for their Universal Fuel Surge Tanks that use have many of these pumps as options.  We have personally installed their tanks with different pump setups and we like the results.

Above: The surge tank setup in Kyle Pollard's Formula D Nissan Silvia.

They wrote up a great article on their findings, which can be found here.  We will definitely be using this as an aid to assist our customers.  If you are interested in any of Radium Engineering's products, feel free to contact us as we are authorized dealers. 

Lately, we have been seeing more and more Formula D competition car's liveries showing up in Forza 4.  The artists who create these replicas of the real life cars spend a lot of time on them.  Here are a few the cars that represent PSI both in real life and in Forza 4.  

Rob Primo is a local Northwest drifter that is getting a lot of attention on the Forza Motorsport 4 community.  Recently, they held a contest to recreate his EVD ProAm car and soon to be Formula D competition car on Forza 4.  

A few months ago our friend Wally won a NHRA "Wally" at a race at Bremerton, WA.  

Wally won in his twin-turbo Ford Mustang.

We want to congratulate Rob Primo on earning his Formula D license this past weekend.  As one of the Top 4 finishers in the Evergreen Drift Pro-Am series, he was awarded his license to compete in the 2013 Formula Drift series.  

Rob Primo and Erich Hagen tandem at Round 5.  Photo by Always Reckless.

During the summer, we see an influx of sandrails and offroad vehicles and this season is no exception. Along with the turbo Polaris RZR project we have been working with John Reed Racing, there have been several sandrails in for tuning.

Help support the rest of Kyle Pollard's Formula D season by buying a poster and have it signed by Kyle Pollard.  

Along with professionals in the automotive industry, we have a relationship with the creative and talented guys at Yaer Productions.  Connor Surdi took some time between photoshoots to come down to the shop and do a quick photoshoot with Daigo Saito's Achilles Radial Bridges Racing Lexus SC430.  Here is one of his photos,