Mikelly

Uhm... She is 15, I'm 37... That is beyond wrong on soooo many levels... AND she is my 19 year old Kid's Gfriend... Ya, you go right ahead and do that when you are my age... Mike

Her dad thought I was crazy for driving it hard, but understood when I said "Umm I bought it to drive it... there are no artifacts or museum pieces in the kelly household." and he shook my hand and said "I like you! My kinda guy!" My son's Girlfriend loves the car, and made some unflattering remarks about his rice-mobile... She had to take her mom and sis over and show them the 383 stroker on the stand... She is such a car girl! Mike

Well the best part was the fact that it was in front of his Girlfriends sister, mother and father, and infront of his own family... No one knew I was gonna do that, but I'd been planning this for a while... Didn't expect a FULL audience, which made it that much sweeter! Mike

SO yesterday My 19 year old calls and asks if I can take his girlfriends dad for a ride in my Vette... His Bday is today and they have been out looking at them, and test riding them, but the salesgeeks don't really drive the cars hard... No biggie, sure I'll give him the dollar tour... So they show up, I meet the family, nice folks, and we load this guy up in the car... I warn him that I drive fast... He says "Show me what she'll do"... So now there are twin stripes leading from in front of my house for about 200 feet... My poor new tires... Anyway, we take her for a spin and get back, and My son's G-friend wants a ride... So She and I go about a block from home and I let her into the Driver's seat. She just has a learners permit and I've let ABSOLUTELY no one drive this car... My 19 year old has been relentless in his requests to drive it, so letting her drive the car in the subdivision, back to the house will be... Price of Corvette - $17,900 Price of mods to date - $4200 Look on Step son's face when he sees HIS girlfriend driving StepDad's New plattoy that no one has been able to drive - PRICELESS! The look on his face when he saw her behind the wheel was worth every dime I've spent on this car. It was hilarious... He'll be pissed for weeks! It is hell being my kid sometimes... Mike

Oh Yea, All the carbon fiber underhood is a kit... Costs about $600 for all of it... Mike 8)

I believe that specific car is packing a Magneson Supercharger and is making in the 800HP range. SAWEET! Mike

Yup, and the general principle works BEST on a VENTED rotor. So if you haven't upgraded your systems solid rotors, then most of the ifficiency is lost... in theory anyway.... Mike 8)

I'm currently trying to figure out how to make a drive on ramp for each side of my twin post lift so I could drive the car ontl the flat ramps, and lift the car up so I can do suspension setups... Mainly for the Vette, but also for the Z. I have turn plates on order and just got my camber gages and toe gage. mike

The profile of the tire is the issue. You should be running a 50 series to insure clearance. However, My recommendation is to do a search for tire availability... You will find that tire selection in the 15 inch tire size is quickly going away in most of the Z/W/Y series tires... I'd consider an upgrade in rim size in your future plans for that reaosn alone... Even V rates tires are becoming difficult to source for 15s... Mike

http://www.nbc12.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=WWBT%2FMGArticle%2FWBT_BasicArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1031773649364&path=!news Long story Short... Two Late model Vettes were racing Wednesday evening around 5:30 DURING RUSH HOUR... When one of them left the road and struck some trees, killing both people in the car... The other Vette Swirved left and HIT an off duty state trooper who was on his way to the hospital with his WIFE who was ready to deliver their baby... the Red Vette then stikes a brick wall at the entrance to a subdivision... So these two idiots are racing in a residential area, that is typically congested during rush hour... Oh, and the drive of the red Vette, the guy who survived... DUI... Can you say Darwin... Before all is said and done, he'll wish he was in the black Vette with the other two corpses... The utter LACK of discretion in this particular case is staggering... These guys were in their mid to late 20s... Not some 16-18 year old kids with little experience in making good judgement calls... Mike

What John Said... I removed mine when I wasn't at the track... Nothing more embarrassing then having some hot babe waving you over, only to find out that she wanted to tell you that your car is DRAGGING parts. Don't ask how I would know about such things! Mike

I forgot your dad does this type of stuff... If my plans come together, I may need to hook up with you... Might need an alignment machine and other stuff... Mike

Myron, Sounds like you need to learn how to tig weld! Mike

Big thanks to everyone... And especially DOUG!!! Who was on the phone with me for about two hours last night giving me pointers and such! I'm a MP3 Rippin' fool now! Mike

Well unfrotunately there aren't enough high HP Zcars out there to really support this. In the Mustang and Vette groups there are a BUNCH of guys with serious $$$ who dyno every mod. So you pretty much know going into a purchase of an item the exact amount of gain you could expect from a bolt on part or other modification. IF I get the chance to build the shop I really want to build, it will have a DYNO... One of the things I'd like to see tested is a baseline 383 stroker Chevy motor with cast manifoilds, Large diameter block huggers, Tr-Ys, then different design step and long tube headers in differing primary tube and collector sizes... That would help make my life simpler right now! Mike

I'm actually gonna do a swap for one of our more financially secure members who rarely posts on the site. Jim asked me if I would swap oh just about everything Ross offers into his Scarab, and convert the Scarab to JTR, and I of course said yes... Pushing my project to the sidelines while I do his... Doug Carrow and I will look to start on it in the next 30-45 days, dependant on parts arrival. I think this would be good if all parties know the parameters up front. Some of our members have more resources than others... I'd be more than willing to host something at my shop, using my car when it is closer to being completed... It is a GREAT learning experience! Mike

OK, Let me chime in here... I've done a civic/ acura motor swap recently and it wasn't easy, wasn't hard, and certainly was NOT any easier than doing the 383 stroker in the Zcar... If I didn't already have a 500+ HP powerplant sitting on my engine stand, I'd be looking at an LS1 Chevy motor to transplant into a Zcar or 510. Here is why: The motor makes EXCELLENT power in stock configuration, and can make WELL OVER 400 wheel power with bolt ons...AND is OBD2 compliant, emissions friendly, and the amount of support out there for the thing is ungodly! Other advantages are weight, used parts market, and vendor support. I predict more aftermarket companies will start making parts for the LS1 since it was just approved for some circle track class racing in 2005. Edelbrock has made a commitment to provide intakes, cams, heads, and packages for the LS1 platform, Scat is now making a crank, and Eagle is making a complete rotating assembly. prices are not as cheap as doing a standard V8 Chevy smallblock build up... Yet. Prices are coming down, and building a 400 Wheel HP motor will be less than many think. We're building one for my 99 C5 Vette and I don't expect to have more than $5000 in everything, complete, finished, ready to drop in and tune. The Ford 302 is a good candidate IF you know how to fabricate. It has a pretty good support network on this site and I think that it could be done cheap, due to the huge parts availability in the Mustang world, and used parts are cheap. When we were researching a 347 Stroker for my Wife's 95 Mustang GT, we budgeted about $4000 complete for that, and that was with blower pistons and cam, forged bottom end... So building a super stout FI 302 isn't expensive... They have better weight distribution than the standard chevy Small block, and weigh less, but you have to sort the mounting, wteering linkage clearances, and there is no manual you can grab off the shelf at 2AM... The SBC is the absolute easiest and best for a couple of reasons... You can get parts cheaper than ANY OTHER swap into a Zcar (Other than common Nissan Turbo factory swaps of course) and you can tune the thing up with parts from WALMART... Which means that most likely if you are stranded in the middle of BFE, you can get parts... You also have the LARGEST group of support in any of the V8Z swaps.. Plus a manual from JTR. So at 2AM when you are on the crapper and you need reading material, you can take it with you and learn a thing or two while you make doo doo... Hope this all makes sense and helps... contact me offline if you want more... Mike

Dave, as ussual, I'm a day late and $.84 short... I've got the new system in. My ears hate it because now everything is EAR PEARCING CLEAR! Mike

Guys, I'm gonna try to live without the CD Changer in the Vette, and since the unit plays WMA/ MP3 file formats, I'm gonna start dumping CDs to media files... Since you can get many hours worth of music on one... Anyone know of the fastest/ most efficient software out there??? I'm using Win/XP... BTW, the new system in the vette is now AWESOME... Mike 8)

Actually, The Vettes seem to have this issue... Apparently the system they install in the vettes has lots of issues... Sounds great for about two years, then the bose simulator starts to lose all midrange... I purchased some 6.5 inch three ways (Pair of Blaupunkts and pair of JLs) and a Panasonic Head unit with a bazillion feautres, including MP3... However, it isn't compatible with the THREE CD changers I own! Oh well... I'm gonna check into the Basslinks, because I really don't want to go cutting up my rear panels... This system sounds 110% better... I finished it up tonight, and if I do nothing else with it, I could certainly live with this setup and a changer. Mike 8)

Actually Jamie T., Member here (And Buddy of mine) had bought a northstar motor and had moched it up. I believe it would have bolted in with few mods and been a very nice transplant... He got derailed with a Turbo Swap, now doing an LT1, Next week doing a Jag V12, kinda requirements creep... I'd know nothing about that in a project! Mike

OK, I've had my Vette for almost two months now, and aside from the MORONS who like to pull up beside me and rev their motors, my only complaint with the car has been the stereo... Yes the stereo. How is it that FORD can put such an absolutley wonderfull stereo (Mach460) in my 1995 Mustand, yet Chevy puts that BOSE CRAP in my 99 Vette? You got highs, and you got lows... You got BOSE! NO midrange, horrible speaker placement, and just a bad design of sound system... So I'm gonna buy a head unit today, and probably an amp and a sub or two (10s or smaller). I've already upgraded the door speakers and the rear a-pillar speakers, but need to by-pass the factory wiring, because everything runs through the heart of the problem, the Bose similator/ pre-amp... Oh Well, Other than that, I really can't complain... Knocking down up to 29MPG at times, and the fit and finish is still good, so I guess I can replace the system and be happy! But you'd expect for a $40K car to have a decent system, ya know? Mike 8)

I suspect yours couldn't be any worse than our 16 year old on full coverage to drive his MR2... 93 model... Non turbo Ttops... Anyway, To add him and his car to our policy (Car is in our name) was just under $1100 per year and that was with coverages of 300K/500K/ 300K, $250 deductable, and $50 for towing and glass breakage. Of course, that also means he can drive my 350 chevy powered Lowered GMC, the 250-ish HP Mustang GT... and My 99 C5 Vette! Only thing we have he isn't covered to drive is my 98 ZX9R Ninja. Mike

I'm likely gonna OWE taxes... But I'd really like a set of your aluminum hats for 5 lug rear! Mike

Tsk tsk tsk... You haven't been to my neck of the weeds... But I agree that if they are gonna put them on TV, they ought to shoot for the prettiest... Or maybe they are Mike