|
October 4, 1996
Simple Parts - Exotic Power (Part 1)
Only a small percentage of our customers are interested in building an all out race car that has to run race fuel full time, be trailered everywhere, have constant maintenance, lose overdrive, be driven just right - you get the point. Most of our customers are interested in going as fast as possible without sacrificing streetability. This waterbox is the first in a series showing that conservative, well chosen parts, can run far better than average standards when properly tuned and driven correctly.
The first car we'll be showcasing is owned by Grant Simons from London, Canada. He bought this '87 GT new and started modifying it around '91 with all the usual bolt ons, and then in '92 toped it off with a Vortech 8psi H.O. kit.
The car then made it's first visit to Alternative Auto in '93 for a GT-40 iron cylinder head swap along with a GT-40 intake, E-303 cam and 1.72s. The car already had 1 5/8s headers, 3.55 gears and pulleys. The Heads where treated to our street fighter port job which consists of bowl work, runner work and a multi angle comp valve job. The chambers were also polished, and still use the 1.84 and 1.54 valves, no welding or major gouging is done to the castings.
With the above work, the car ran mid 11's. It was then B-trimmed and tweaked a little more. With marginal traction conditions at Detroit Dragway the car responded with 11.00s. In late '95 Grant took some weight out of the car and brought it back to us in early '96 for a C-4 conversion with a trans-brake. At that time we also removed the power steering and switched to an electric driven water pump. With the B-trim still on, weighing 3250 we went a best of 10.67 at Detroit Dragway in 70 degree air around May of this year, again with a marginal track surface.
In August of this year, the car came back for an S-trim conversion and a torque converter loosening. At J&P Day in London, late August with 80° temperatures, the car performed beyond expectation. On its first pass with Lidio driving, it ran 10.41 hitting the 6200 MSD rev limiter about 150 feet before the end of the quarter. We removed the MSD chip leaving no rev-limiter at all, because our custom EEC-IV chip eliminates the factory 6250 limiter. On the very next run the car went through the traps at over 6500 rpm and astounded everyone by running a 10.21 at over 132mph. We then backed it up with a 10.21 and a 10.22 with no problems. The combination is so simple and streetable that his wife drove the car home from the track, which is more than a half hour away.
On the day these numbers were run the plugs came out looking a little richer than we'd like and we were being extremely conservative with the timing (only 28° total). We used a 2.75" pulley instead of the smaller 2.5" which would give us even more boost. With cooler fall air, slightly more aggressive timing, running a tad leaner and using the 2.5" pulley, 9.80's should be no problem.
The entire appeal of this car is its over-all simplicity. The car is lightened a bit, but not beyond the average guts and still weighs a lot by race car standards, it still has a working heater and power windows. However, the true beauty is that it has the simplest and most basic combination of parts. You won't find any expensive super secret custom cam grinds or cylinder heads boasting huge gains and carrying a huge price tag.
This car is neither a milestone in 5.0 technology nor some one-run-wonder glory car, but it is very fast for its conservative package and could be easily duplicated by the average enthusiast with proper tuning and good traction.
More details and a profile on this car can be found in the Cars page and will be updated when the car goes faster in the near future.
|
