Mikelly

Not me... I'm a KISS kinda guy... Keep it simple stupid... Takes three hours to change a serpantine belt on a SC equipped corvette. About the same amount of time to do the spark plugs... No thanks... I'll wait until spring, maybe send my 99 heads out to be cleaned up and checked out, and possibly swap them in place once I have more revenue coming in... We figure I'm probably making about 425Crank HP, which is still nothing to sneeze at, so I guess I'm semi-happy... On another, Unrelated note, I've got to pull the oil cooler off the car. It is leaking, and I can't seem to get it to stop, so it's coming off. I won't need it for the winter anyway. Mike

I was in the shop yesterday for a little bit and this is pretty much gonna work... What I plan to do is use matting and resin to strengthen the underside of the dash, and then I'll epoxy the tabs for the mounts in place. I'm also going to use the black metal panel that bolts in between the firewall and the factory dash as my stiffener. I'm going to rivet it to the dash cap and weld tabs to the cross bar on my roll cage so everything will bolt in. I'll take pics as I go. Might start on this the coming weekend. I think this will be an easy mod... Mike

One reason I like the weld in plates by Arizona Zcar is that you get a little more "Free" lowering because you don't have to worry about the added hardware stuffed under the strut tower (Maybe half inch???) . I plan to do the AZC units on all four corners of my car. Mike

I'll throw out another comment here... Make sure you know what you're buying when doing "knock-offs" especially if you plan to do any high speed events. BBS wheels are manufactured to the highest standards in the world. Their wheels won't come appart like the HRE wheels that have been put on the ban list by SCCA. You defenitely want strength over light weight. A lot of these aftermarket wheels are fine for street use. But I'd not run them on the track. Mike

GEEZ... Tim, Cut the friggin' thing up and make it into what you want... Unless, of course, you have already found another clean shell to start with... I'd sell it as a roller if you can and just duplicate the suspension and whatnot... It's just a car, remember that... Mike

I"ll have to dig through some "stuff", but I'm pretty sure I can get a set of those in the width I was looking for in 17inch size for about $1400. When you consider that CCWs are only about $1800 shipped, might want to check them out as well... Mike

Just to give you an idea of "worth", there is a 1987 Vette up the street from me painted metalic Pearl White (Really odd color) and it has a Greenwood body kit on it... Guy is asking $7600 for it and it is running, tagged and legal... The car (other than the choice of color) looks nice, and I see it being driven... So that should give you an idea of what a totaled one should run you. Mike

This is Alex we're talkin' about... He's lurkin' everywhere on the web... Mike

I"m looking to register a domain name and get a website built for our company and before I go out into the market, I figured I'd throw it out here first... Anyone doing this for a living, feel free to contact me offline. Mike

Well in my exact experience, The head made, or in my case DIDN'T make the motor... My Vette has been dynoe'd three times now... The first time the car was bone stock except for a CAI and a Catback Borla system... It made 296WHP and 301#ft. Torque...This was Memorial Day weekend 2004 and no LS1 Edit tuning was done. Then: My bone stock LS1 in my corvette withLS1 EDIT tune, LGM long tube headers, high flow cats, 3 inch exahust, an LS6 intake and shaner ported Tbody, made 335HP and 353#Ft. torque. This was on a 112K mile car and the same motor 9 months later, February 2005. NOW, last week I tuned the new motor and the numbers speak for themselves... My new LS1 ported heads have bigger (Stage 2) valves, and lots of port work... Probably to much port work (Port velocity is probably screwed) to make the power it should have... There are a LOT of guys in the Corvette community with my exact setup (Except for the heads) and running the thunder racing 224/224 114LSA cam making well over 400WHP. The ONLY thing we can think of is the heads. So yea, Heads make a HUGE difference... 375WHP and 370#ft. torque is a far cry from our goal. And I'll say this again about those patriot heads... BEWARE... There is a huge inconsistancy in their performance. Guys are reporting this everywhere, and Jeff at Carolina AutoMasters has seen it over and over again... I suspect the Patriots are suffering the same issue as my heads... Port velocity loss on some of them... In General, LS1 heads flow so well out of the box, that you really have to know what you're doing with them to gain power. My builder didn't know, and ported the beejesus out of them (And they LOOKED so damned good too! ) and that port work (At my suggestion, I didn't know at the time) was probably what killed the power... Heads are gonna get you 40HP easily and likely more... So buy what you KNOW will work... Don't do what I did and then find yourself standing in a guys shop with your car strapped down and wondering WHY you didn't make the power you had been told you should make. Sux 2 B me! Mike

I'm actually looking at BBS wheels for my car when it is done... Not sure which model yet, but those are nice... Mike

Arizona Zcar has them, and you can get them from ground control. Do a google on ground control... http://www.arizonazcar.com Mike

Booty makes a man go crazy... This is well documented time and again throughout history... Poor car. Mike

That driveline noise is fine. If you ever get a chance to take a few laps in a real race car, you'll get into your personal vehicle and thank every inch of your interior for protecting your ears from all that noise. No, A Zcar drivetrain won't be that loud, but when gutting a car, putting in the level of chassis fortefication that car has, and then putting the race suspension under it the way it is, you get a really LOUD, really rough car that is made for one purpose... The track. rudypoochris, Go to a track day event as a spectator, sign the waiver and then beg an instructor for a ride around the course... You'll have a different opinion on what cars are capable of at speed... I was watching his hands during a lot of those moments and he was getting quite a bit of understeer at times, as you could see him correcting for the "push"... That was a VERY cool video...Especially with the inset cam of him driving and the view through the windshield. Gollum, Yes, larger tires do create more friction... Good example on the balance of a tire compound at work with regards to friction was the most recent NASCAR race at Lowe's Motorspeedway. Goodyear selected a compound they were happy with, but didn't account for the fact that the track had been re-surfaced and was MUCH faster. However, the higher speeds increased heat in the tires, building pressure and causing catastrophic failures... Basically the race ended up being a demolition derby and the owner of the track (Humpy Wheeler) and Goodyear both took a beating in the racing press. Goodyear stated that drivers and teams weren't running the correct pressure, and it became a big finger pointing excersise! The other example is when Michelin pulled out of the Indy GP. They did the responsible thing after doing the wrong thing, which was come with only one compound of tire. Tires do two things when they are rolling on any surface: Wear and heat up. Tire size can impact how fast a car goes, how fast the tire wears at that speed, and how the car will handle... When plussing up on wheel/tire sizes, it is always good to have a general understanding of the tire make and compound you will use and compare it to the size you currently have... Weight is another issue all together. Some times the added weight and the additional rolling resistance will offset any adantage in traction gained. The key is to strike a balance. I won't entertain a comment on simms vs. the real world... Mike

Yup, you do... Someone else asked about an age requirement... There is one... You have to be breathing. And you have to be "into" rusty old Datsuns. Mike

Use zip 22407 when trying to sort distances to the Fredericksburg Area... Mike

My guess the relay is failing. I'd go buy a Haynes, or other type shop manual, and then find the relay and do the test procedure for it before you replace the pump. Mike

On the plus side, Durham has better weather than Frederick... Mike

I hope to one day be 1/10th as good as he is... Mike

Well what I plan to do is pull these heads off, send them out to be flowed so I know what I've got, and then either build or buy a shortblock for them. I want to copy Mark's drysump deal, and put an LS1 in the Zcar for track duty. If the car gods and business gods can agree to smile on me, then the track biatch will be painted and wired by spring, and I'll actually be able to drive the thing on the track... Only thing stopping me right now is a contract I was hoping to sign yesterday... it has now been pushed back until the end of the week, or possibly next week. Money money money! Mike

I'm going to do two things... Wait for the Dart heads to see how well they perform, and I'm going to send my 98s off to get them flowed. I need to see what they need to work with... THen I'm gonna get another block or shortblock and start building an LS6 for the Zcar. This will be a dedicated track only deal, so a drysump will be employed, along with other "stuff"! MIke

We're using a Gforce in Jim McNemar's Zcar and I'll be using a TKO600 in mine. We went with a Lakewood bellhousing but the hydraulic slave we were using apparently wasn't up to the challenge. It was a HOWE unit... Now the instructions CLEARLY state not to use that bearing in a high HP car... But the installer used it anyway, after calling me and discussin getting a Mcleod unit. Now Jim's car won't go into gear and is leaking fluid... Won't hold any clutch pressure. Go with the Mcleod hydraulic bearing or go through the motion and find an external slave that will work... I'm going to go that route, and source a slave cylinder from a third generation Corvette or a Datsun Pickup truck. If you're gonna run a 305 chevy, you'll probably be just fine with just a WC T5. The torque won't kill it, and the car is much lighter than the camaro the tranny was rated for. Mike

I'm running a Mustang 8 inch wheel with a 5.5 backspacing. The car has coil overs and I am running a half inch spacer in the back to clear the tire to strut assembly. On the front, no spacer is required and this is with a 240Z style and dimension from hub assembly (Jamie T.s!) Mike

For my track car I'm actually considering taking a Dash cover (I've got three or four laying around!) and glassing in some aluminum bracing to stiffen it, resin and matting, and the required tabs so it will bolt into factory locations. I'll also glass in the brackets for the autometer gages. Might actually start on that this weekend. Mike

I've currently got Borla Stingers on the Vette with 3 inch exhaust, custom Xpipe after the catalytic converts and it is kinda loud... When I had the 383 Stroker running in the Z, I was running block hugger headers and 2.5 inch exhaust back to twin 3 chamber flowmasters and that was L-O-U-D! I'm a Dynomax fan, myself. I'd thinkn about using a couple of those small bullet mufflers in the trans tunnel area as some guys have done, and then go to a pair of traditional mufflers in the rear of the car. that would give a little more noise relief. Mike