jt1

Find another muffler shop. That guy is either a kook or just doesn't want to do it. If you convince him to, he'll probably make a mess of it or rape you on the price. John

Look closely at your rockers, Mark. It looks to me like a piece of a snap ring off a roller rocker shaft. I don't know what kind of rocker setup your LT-1 has, I've never worked on one. I'm iffy for tomorrow. Work has got super busy, right now it looks like I'll be there if I have a good day today. John

You'll be fine. My car has GC plates up front and sectioned struts all way around. If you're gonna open track or autocross the car, you pretty much want all the neg camber you can get. Tire clearance will probably be the limiting factor so far as ride height, unless you have flares, mine doesn't. One of my next projects is gonna be rear camber plates to get the car to hook a little better off the corners. John

Mike, it does seem like bad news comes in bunches sometimes. Be thankful that he wasn't hurt, and don't let it overwhelm you. Take one thing at a time, there are bound to be better days ahead. John

Anybody besides me see the V8 Z on ESPN2's Inside Drag Racing? It was a mustard yellow tubbed car, and ran a 9.40 IIRC. Said the owner was Mark or Mike Eggers? Anybody know him or is he a member? It would be pretty neat to see your car on TV. John

Those look great, Mark. I know you're glad to get them after waiting so long. I can't wait to see them on the car. John

Mike, the heaviest stuff I've ever used is 1/8", and preforming isn't a problem with it, just start at one side and work your way across, it will conform to the windshield frame with no problem. Where I was running, 1/8" was accepted, and it was a lot lighter than glass, but I don't know about any thicker stuff. Three supports down the center of the windshield were required and needed to support the lexan at speed. John

Been there and done that. Now in middle age and looking back, it's a wonder I survived my "bulletproof" late teens and early twenties. I cut it way too close way too many times with alcohol, other stuff, and automobiles. Resolve yourself to get thru this without making it any worse. If they're like mine, your family is probably pretty disappointed, so sincerely apoligize to them. Let them know you realize your mistake and how you plan to correct it. Then prepare yourself to face the music. Court, lawyers, loss of driving privledges, high insurance, ridicule from your friends, having to ask your date/girlfriend/wife to drive when you go out, etc. Try to come up with a plan for transportation to school or work before you go to court and actually lose your license. It's gonna be pretty bad, but remember the best thing to do is get thru it without compounding the problem. A big part of growing up is facing up to your mistakes and dealing with them. LEARN FROM YOUR MISTAKES. There are gonna be some bad days ahead, but you can handle them with some planning and work. Remember a big part of how this will be perceived by friends and family will be determined by how you conduct yourself in the coming days and months. It's not the end of the world, keep focused on where you want to be in life and how you're going to get there, and deal with setbacks along the way. Like I said, been there, done that, got the shirt. Regards, John

The 69 Dodge Daytonas and 70 Plymouth Superbirds were built for one purpose only- to dominate the Nascar superspeedways. They did it so well that Nascar effectively outlawed them after the 70 season. The nose cone, back glass, and wing produced something no other car had at that time; downforce at both ends of the car. They did not sell well, and many sat on dealer's lots and could be had for about any price. Today junkers bring 40-50K, and a nice hemi car gets up around a quarter mil. Time's change, don't they? Lot's of good reading at http://aerowarriors.com/ John

The front one won't be a problem either, Mike. Get the glass out, use some heavy paper or thin cardboard to make a template from the existing glass, lay it down on a sheet of lexan and whack away. Used to do 'em for circle track cars that way all the time. John

Board member Mark has a very nice strut bar made by Top End Performance. It triangulates back to the firewall. I don't have any contact info, maybe he'll join in or you could try a search. John

Spiirt, you're on the right track. Let me say that an engine is a complete system from air cleaner to the tip of the exhaust. There are many, many compromises made on each part of that system. Spending a lot of time optimizing one part of the system will pay small dividends if the rest of the system is not similarly designed. Carb, intake, head, head mods, static and dynamic compression, CID, headers & exhaust, fuel, rpm range and operating requirements all affect cam choice. Many changes can have so small an effect that the only way to know if it's an improvement is lots of expensive dyno time. So consider your entire system, remember that any engineering solution has many compromises, a lot of them economic, and that changing any part of the equation changes the results. It it also important to remember our V8 zcars are, to put it nicely, exhaust challenged, due to crappy header choice and exhaust packaging requirements. So keep the whole package in mind, balancing all parts of the equation yield the most pleasing results. John

tt350, with the horsepower #'s you're planning on, the car is gonna need full subframes anyway and now is the time to do it. There's a lot of good info on the subframes here, a search will turn up a lot of reading. John

My feelings are that if you have to buy new pistons, you might as well give them fresh straight bores to ride in, since the pistons are the biggest expense. If the pistons were ok to reuse and you were gonna rering, a hone would be fine if the lip isn't too bad. How much to bore sorta depends on the budget, 30 pistons are very common and less expensive, 10's and 20's are usually more $$$$. john

Mark's car is SHARP! and fast, too. There are rumors of it spending about a month at one of the LT1 tuner shops in Charlotte, but Mark won't confirm them. Regardless, it's a very nice car. David, the Friday track days are done by Turn One Motorsports. http://www.turnonemotorsports.com/ Mark & I are planning on going to the May 16th date, load your car up and come on. NO SNIFFING BUG SPRAY AT THE TRACK! johnc & katman: Thanks for your input. What methods would you recommend for increasing rear camber? Offset LCA bushings and camber plates or slots for the strut towers? Both? About how much camber would be a good starting point? I'm going to step up in tires, probably to kuhmos, don't know if my limited driving ability is ready for full slicks yet. Thanks for all the help. John

We felt it here in western NC, about halfway between Charlotte and Asheville. Wasn't a lot to it though, just enough to be noticable. That's the third time in my 42 years we've had an earthquake that was strong enough to feel. John

johnc: Thanks for the input, I was hoping you would take a look at it. I'm definitely getting hammered from the apex to trackout. At the last event before this one, I ran with a friend with a stock Z06 quite a bit with almost the same results, except I was not able to outbrake the Z06. What you are saying makes sense, once the car gets out of roll I can put the power down pretty good. Would adding a rear bar and going to a larger front bar, trying to maintain overall balance, help out? I have several F & R bars on hand from previous projects, part swapping, etc. I've been busy with the auto to manual swap and haven't had time to try them. The Yoko's only have a couple of track days left on them. I'm going to step up some in tire for my next set, probably some Kuhmo's. Thanks, John

Mark, I got the tremec in and love it. I had heard of a few problems with shift quality, but I was pleasantly suprised, it shifts great and isn't even broken in good yet. It made a huge difference in the car, it accelerates out of the corners better and I can brake a lot harder into the turns. Less rotating mass I suppose, the 700R4 convertor weighed 45 #'s, my clutch & flywheel only 29 #. I was a little rusty downshifting but got back into it pretty easily. The #$%@&* brand new hydraulic throwout bearing started leaking on the next to last run Sunday, so I didn't make the last run. Now I get to pull the trans again to fix that. I'm planning to come May 16th, I'll see you there. Got the Panasports and Hoosiers on yet? John

Car w/fat driver, 1/2 tank gas LF 706 50.38% RF 654 52.35% 47.65% LR 707 49.62% RR 632 Total 2699 # LF-RR 49.57% RF-LR 50.34% Sorry to misstate the F/R % in the first post. Brain fade. Front toe: 1/8" out Front camber 1 1/4 deg neg, all I can get with my camber plates. Front caster: unknown, no adjustment provisions anyway. Rear toe: Very close to zero, possibly 1/32 in, no adjustments. Rear camber: 1/4 deg neg, no adjustments Starting cold tire pressure 33 psi, goes to 40-41 psi hot. No tire temp data, rears usually gain about 1 psi more than fronts. John

Went to a track event at CMP this weekend with the porsche guys. Had a great time, but need some advice. I was running in the advanced group, and myself and two fox mustangs were the fastest cars in the group. The two mustangs drivers were friends and had very similiar cars, both with 13" Baer brakes, Griggs susp, one a stroked 302, the other a 351W. Both were running Kuhmo Victoracers, one 245's, the other 255's. Both weighed about 3100#'s track weight. We tried to line up together and ran together a lot. We were pretty equal, but they would pull me a consistent 2-3 car lenghts every lap. On the straights, I could gain a little, and I could outbrake them. We seemed to be about equal in the corners, but exiting the corners they could get on the power much quicker and harder than I could. This was where they were making a lot of time on me. My car is 2700#'s on the track, 49.5%F/50.5%R, 250F/275R coilovers, Tokico 5-ways run in the middle setting, 7/8 front bar, no rear bar, 225/60-15 Yokohama AVSi's, 12.2 Wilwood's. The car typically has a light entry push and is loose off depending on how much throttle is used. Can anyone offer any tips on suspension or driving to get off the corner better? I was trying to late turn-in late apex to get a better run out of the corners, but still getting pulled pretty badly. Horsepower isn't an issue, I can light the tires up easily with too much throttle. I know the car could use a better driver, but I want to stick with the current one......... Thanks, John

FMF, that's a good looking combo. It looks like a Crower 00425 cam, which is already a split pattern cam, with a little more lift/duration on the exhaust. IMO, unless you're planning on spraying it, I don't see the need for different ratio rockers. I would call Crower and discuss it with them. You might get a hint about where the 1.65's were by looking at the pushrod holes in the head, they may be clearanced a little, the pushrods are closer to the valve when using the 1.65's. That baby oughta rock! John

The rod ends keep strut tower deflection from applying any moment (bending force) to the strut rod. That way, the strut rod only see's either a tension or compression load. John

No way a little wear in the wheel brgs is gonna give you 1" difference between the top and bottom of the tire unless they are so loose the hub is about to fall off. I'd guess a bent strut, bent strut tube, shot lower ball joint, bad LCA bushing, or frame damage from a wreck. John

The rod ends are to allow some adjustability for manufacturing tolerances and slight variations in chassis's. Assuming equal section's and materials, a straight rod is significantly stronger than a bent one. A bent one can be as strong as a straight one, but must be much heavier to give the same amount of stiffness. There is no reason to use a bent one unless you need the clearance. John

FMF, the question about the rockers is a tough one. Is this a freshen of a motor you purchased from some one? If so, I'd contact them and ask how they had the rockers set up and why. Summit's catalog only show the Gold rockers in 1.5 and 1.6, no 1.65's, but they may be a special order item. You could contact Crane and ask about the part #'s, then you'd know for sure what you've got. Where they go depends on the rest of the combo, especially the cam. If the motor was built to spray, it would be a safe guess the 1.6's were used on the exhaust. Or, if they thought it was a little weak on the intake side for some reason, they could have used them on the intake. How the previous owner built it may not be what you want to do. Find out what cam you have , talk to the cam maker about the rockers ratio's. As always, but esp. when using 1.6's, check the pushrod to head clearance and piston to valve clearance. What's the rest of the engine like? Heads, cam, compression, carb & intake? Sorry there's no clear cut answer, but....it depends. John