blueovalz

I'll lay odds on the GTR. I love and admire the GT40 above all other types, but the GTR has some impressive records as well, and is wickedly quick.

Michael, thanks for the more detailed explanation, and it corresponds exactly to the characteristics witnessed from my seat on the plane (both a 757 and 737). I just could not make myself come to the conclusion that a shock wave existed, and still boast efficient thrust/drag numbers that current day airfoils have. The shadowgraph effect was right on in terms of what the refractive shadow looked like on the wing. It did indeed extend all the way out to the wing tip, but in a scalloped pattern (one slightly arcing pattern joining to another slightly arcing pattern down the entire length of the wing). Thanks so much for the explanation. As I knew when I posted this question, this site has a wealth of technical knowledge backing it up.

I know for a fact that a bare 302 iron block, gutted with nothing in it, weighs 121 pounds. This has been measured with 3 different blocks during rebuild.

A distant friend of mine (aerodynamicist) feels strongly that this phenomenon that I saw on the wings was indeed a shock wave. He said at the temperature and altitude we were at, and that the air speed over the top of the wing would be faster than the speed of the aircraft, thus it could be possible that this "vertical wall that refracted light" could have been a shock wave right at the transition of sonic speed. The shadow that this wave was leaving on the top of the wing very much resembled film of shock wave characteristics of supersonic air speed. Only this shock wave was perfectly vertical instead of sweeping rearward. Anyway, I consider the mystery solved, and even at 46 years of life, I still find nature's interaction with man's intellect to be most stimulating.

The tranny lost reverse only. All front drive gears are normal, and shift normal. The shop says I need a pump stator, planetary gear set, drum, etc. I could almost accept a new converter (why not just thoroughly flush the old one?), but these items above make me wonder, being everything about the tranny works great, except for reverse. And why would a rebuild kit come without the bands? I guess I've been away from automatic transmissions too long.

Yeah, somebody (I don't know who though) makes them. And they recently have been priced much more reasonably ($1800 I think). Ernie (RacerX if I'm correct) knows the specifics on it I believe. The weight was not much lighter than the iron block though, just a lot stronger.

It's been a long time since I've purchased a fiberglass part, but in general, most all pieces will have a good gel-coat covering on them. This covering will need to be blocked out to make sure the part is true and straight, and this may be what the shop was making reference to. Thus, the parts are only as good as the mold in this case, but they all need to be gone over lightly to gauge what to do next.

Did you Plasti-gage the main and rod journal/bearings to make sure you don't have excessive clearance? Is the oil pump new or used? Did you check any and all gallery plugs in position prior to installing the outside parts?

Thanks for the laugh. 1) I think I'm getting shafted by the transmission repair guy. 2) On my way back from Seattle this week, I noticed a pressure (refractive) "wall" of some sort over the wing (visible as a thin shadow line along the entire length of the wing when the sun was lined up with it - diffracted light). This "wall" even distorted light rays coming from the other side when viewed on edge). I just wanted to discuss this with a good aerodynamicist being I've never read about this or seen this before.

If anybody on this forum is well versed with the Nissan Pathfinder 4wd trannies and/or real sharp about air flow over airfoils (specifically the current generation jet aircraft), I've got some questions I'd like to ask off site via E-mail. I know we have quite a varied group of experiences and intellect here, so I thought I'd throw my questions out here first.

I went to the local speed shop the other day, and the guy took me behind the counter to view a 4-cylinder titanium exhaust header. Absolutely beautiful. I went to lift it up and thought I was going to throw it through the ceiling before I got a good grip on it (light!!!). While admiring the craftsmanship and the myriad of colors from the TIG welding heat, I was told the reason the header was there was because it was being sent off to Jet-Hot to be coated. It was too pretty to send off and get coated. Heck, it should have been hung on a wall in a museum. What a work of art.

Morning coffee and the comics. Now I'm ready to earn my keep.

Try a search on "competition hood". We had a string going about that very same hood "cover" quite a while back. The string includes a picture of the part.

I never got the specific pics up either, even with the C&P method. I think once you join or register it's available, but I did not try that.

Here is the grill with a more visible silver paint on the grill edges. The flat black grill just did not show up at all.

It's got an Acura grill in it. It's flat black and you could not see the grill (horizonal lines about 1/2" apart from top to bottom). So I lightly sprayed some silver paint onto the outside edges of the grill work, and it looks real nice with the grill finally visible.

Don't they also have inboard brakes? If so, I don't think there is enough room around the differential for them anyway.

What kind of ball joint are you using with that aftermarket lower arm?

My headers are semi full length I guess. I built them with 21" tube lengths, which is a little shorter than most full lenth tubes. In regards to the Hookers, most headers are made either for a specific application (or for as many applications as posible with one design for economy). Being the Z never really had an OEM V8 version, you may have to do a lot of hands on measuring to find out what header will work. There are a lot of SBC headers on this site, so I'll let them tell you what they used.

I'm a bit confused about the 48 degree part at full extension. Camber normally (depending on what kind of driving you're setting the car up for) runs between 1/2 - 2 degrees camber. So the 48 degrees has me baffled. Camber is the measure of how the wheel's vertical centerline is oriented with a perpendicular line off the pavement. 0 degrees means the wheel is perfectly vertical in reference to the ground plane (on level ground). Then as you lower the car, this measurement slowly goes more and more negative (top of the wheel starts tilting inboard as the bottom of the wheel is being pushed further out). Camber can be adjusted on the rear suspension with campber plates at the top of the strut towers, but this only slides the top of the strut (and the top of the wheel) in or out. I'm not sure what you meant by cutting some holes and moving the strut up or down.

I've always used Auto-Jet. http://www.auto-jet.com/mandrel_tube_bending_data.htm http://www.auto-jet.com/

It is a lot wider than the small blocks, and taller. I don't know if it would fit, but steering rod problems may exist, plus the fact that the exhaust routing will be tight. Then you've got the tranny to consider. A lot of size on both of these.

Holley made a "center squirter" (650cfm?) that had the accelerator nozzles in the center post of the carb instead of the sides of the center section. This carb did have both venturies open equally, but this is a pretty rare carb, and was an aftermarket one. It was basically a race only product.

I've also got a '92 SX, and when the K24DE finally bites it, I'm going to try the SBF conversion I think. I'm obviously partial to Fords, but in the SX case, more so. The reason is that the SX will not have the weight distribution advantage that the Z has, and therefore, the lightest possible V8 would be what I would go for, especially considering even with the SBF, you will probably gain a 100lbs on the front end (OVER the front tires, not behind as in the Z). With the Chevy, you can add another 75-100lbs on top of that.

I wanted to see what shelf of parts broke down and fell onto the top of this car, but I won't talk about another guy's dream car.