Heel & Toe
I'm pretty sure most folks who read this are racers, or wannabe racers, or at least car people, and probably know what "heel and toe" means. But, since I had to explain it to my wife at lunch today, let me begin with a brief explanation of what I'm talking about. Heel and toe refers to the act of blipping the throttle with a "heel" while braking with the "toe" of the right foot. (Or is it the other way around? No matter... whichever way your foot likes to twist.) Now, why would a person want to do that? Well, if you've driven a stickshift for any period of time, and done so "agressively", you know that an abrupt downshift can really "rock the boat" so to speak, and possibly even break traction on the drive wheels. In a racing environment, when cornering at 95% of capacity (or preparing to)... upsetting the car like that is what we technically refer to as a Bad Thing. The first thing you need to know is that (even if you're not braking) a blip of the throttle to bring the revs up close to where they need to be for the lower gear you're shifting into will make the transition smoother and upset the car less. So, on a race track, when we need to brake hard and downshift for the turn ahead as quickly as possible WITHOUT upsetting the car, we use the left foot on the clutch, and the right foot has to brake hard AND blip the throttle at the same time to smooth the downshift. Cool, huh? Yeah, I know, we make it look easy out there racing around... but we're really quite busy out there!
Why do I bring this up? Because I find the Yaris to be IMPOSSIBLE to properly heel-toe in! The accelerator pedal and the brake pedal are so far apart that I just can't do it. I can aaaalmost do it... but even with my widest shoes, my foot is just barely on the brake and could easily slip off. (see "Bad Thing" above) So, I needed to modify the accelerator pedal to get some of it at least 1/2" over to the left where I can reach it. Simple enough, eh?
Now, these days, most of the kids on the street (you know the ones, dare I say "rice boys", with the big exhaust tip and no muffler, giant wheels and no ground clearance... yeah, those guys) think that "pedal covers" are a required fashion accessory, so they aren't hard to find. I checked eBay and several other places. You can get them in red, blue, yellow (the color of speed), chrome, brushed aluminum, faux titanium, with rubber inserts, with carbon fiber inserts, with freakin' lights, and of course, there are the coveted "JDM" (Japanese Domestic Market... a seriously bastardized term) pieces. None of these really turned me on. There were a couple of generic kits that might have done the job, but they were all sold as kits, and I really didn't want to add anything to my clutch or brake pedals. (the last thing I need is something coming loose on my brake pedal when I'm hard on the brakes!) All I really wanted was an extension for my accelerator pedal.
After a fair amount of searching, I eventually found the ultimate USDM (made in China) accelerator pedal that I needed. Better yet, I found one on eBay for $17 shipped, and it was coming from GA, so I knew it would get here quickly. It arrived today, woohoo!
With any generic aftermarket part like this, you never know for sure how it's going to fit or how you're going to secure it. I got really lucky with this one. The pedal is cast with a reinforcement channel down the middle and two going across it. The stock pedal has grooves in it. These fit together perfectly so that the new pedal can't rotate on the stock pedal. All I had to do was secure it against the stock pedal and it would be good to go! I scrounged around the garage and found some nice spring steel clips (leftover from a mini-blind installation kit), cut and ground them to fit and bolted it all together with a drop of Loctite on each screw. It's super-solid. Very nice, if I do say so, myself.
Reinstalled the pedal assembly in the car (drive by wire is pretty cool in that regard... two bolts and one connector, no fancy linkages or cables to deal with) and verified that there was no interference with the new pedal. (I have a ScanGauge connected to the OBD port which lets me read throttle position... max TP is the same after as it was before) All is well there.
All that remained was a test drive to make sure it works. (okay, I actually had already tested it... I did a test fit with a piece of coat hanger wire holding the pedal on before I started making brackets) It works great!
And now, I can Heel-Toe and Hang Ten all at the same time!
Never let it be said that I take myself too seriously.
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