metaruss

The national convention was back in Chicago again this year. The car show was at the same venue in Fox Lake along with the Chicagoland Mopar Connection’s “Mopars at the Park” show. It was neat seeing such nice FWD Mopars next to the classic iron again. The weather was perfect.

The drags were at Da Grove again as well. I was able to make a few passes. These new tires aren’t as sticky as the old Kumhos were. That along with this hair-trigger ceramic clutch had something to do with my launch problems, I think. The cal has been tuned better since the last time, so my MPH was in the 100s even on the worst pass. But I wasn’t able to beat my previous E/T. Best was 14.343sec @ 102.90mph. Best MPH was 103.66.

Coolant started getting pushed into the overflow at this point, so I called it quits.

Here is a video of one of the runs taken by Ron M from the SDAC-Chicago club.

Another awesome time at SDAC has come and gone.  The performance driving school was a blast as always.  The Daytona did great overall, but the stress did highlight some issues.  The intercooler definitely needs to be kicked-out at the bottom to allow some air to get around it.  The loss in cooling capacity was very obvious after a few laps, though it will happen on the street in traffic with the A/C on as well.  I’m thinking of buying a new fan as well.  The other issue was oil pressure.  I know the pump has issues and when the oil temps got high, I was seeing only about 30psi of pressure at 5000rpm.  Not good, so I think it’s time for a new pump.

I made 14 passes at the drag strip.  Times weren’t what I had hoped (was shooting for 13s), but I didn’t break the car.  I couldn’t get the car to hook nor could I get it to make more than 18-19psi of boost…even with the wastegate unplugged.  I also trashed 3rd gear by the end and it seems that it will need a new syncro.  Did a bit of tuning, but most of the effort was spent trying to learn how to launch the car.  Best time was 14.269sec @ 98.87mph.

Well, another year, another convention.  SDAC-14 was a blast as usual.  I went home each night, which made it hard to get up at 5am for the car show and the driving school.  The car show was pretty cool, as we were right along side the classic Mopars from the Chicago Mopar Connection.  My dad had a good time checking out all the classic Mopars.  I didn’t bother showing the CSX because it was…well just ugly.

The performance driving school was awesome.  I liked it even more than SDAC-10 (even though that one had the NASCAR oval).  Blackhawk Farms is a really fun track and the weather was beautiful.  I got a total of 6 sessions in and my instructor was with me the whole time.  He really helped me a lot.  The car was running a little lean at the top end.  Some 100 octane stopped the pinging, but it still broke up on the straights after a couple of laps.  I think I cured it the next day by raising the pumping effeciency table up a bit in the upper RPM range.  Guess I’m flowing a bit better than stock…probably the ported exhaust manifold/bigger exhaust.  By the end my rear brakes were toast.  They sounded horrible, so I just put a new set of pads on since I couldn’t find rotors that night.

The drags were fun, but a little quieter than usual in terms of participation.  There was some scheduling confusion and the bracket races happened while everyone was eating lunch.  I didn’t realize until the end that time trials were still running between events.  I would have run more if I had known.  One thing on the Shelby that I have not been able to fix: the car won’t boost past about 14-15psi, even with the wastegate unplugged.  I made a new BOV flange, swapped Talon BOVs, replaced the ribbed, upper hose, etc.  Nothing helped.  It’s either a boost leak in the intercooler or somewhere that I can’t see or the wastegate actuator is toast.  The turbo is getting rather sloppy on the compressor side and there seems to be some oil in the IC now when there wasn’t before the headgasket change.  I have a feeling that it’s on the way out.  Grrr.

In the staging lanes at Da Grove.  Thanks to Kevin Schellenberg for the pictures.

My best run was the first of the day: 14.737sec @ 96.35mph:

SDAC-10 = the best time I have ever had with cars in my entire life.  I finally got to put faces to some of the names that I have known for years now.  The Chicagoland folks were probably the rowdiest bunch there.

The highlight was definitely the performance driving school.  It was done at Michigan Speedway (NASCAR).  The road course included almost a full mile of track oval, allowing me to achieve speeds of over 120 MPH!  My 3rd session was in the pouring rain, which resulted in a spin-out on one lap and some hydroplaning through the cones on turn 1 on the lap after.  Not long after I flew through the cones, someone smashed their nice 1987 Shelby GLHS into the wall on turn 1 due to hydroplaning as well.  Big bummer.

My first trip to the drag strip went fairly well.  My time slips are below.  The only things I did to the car were empty the trunk and remove the muffler.  I drove very consistent low-15s most for the day.  The ND Computer was only giving me 13-14psi of boost (should be 16), so I borrowed a G-valve.  Unfortunately, the ball was not seating and I only got 3-4psi and ran high 16s.  I fixed the G-valve and set my boost to 18psi.  The engine would break-up real bad above 4700 RPM.  The 8th light on the A/F gauge was flashing at those speeds, so I raised the fuel pressure.  I also gapped the plug down a bit.  From then on, I couldn’t get traction (see my 60-foot times).  I finally got a run in the 14s with 20psi of boost: 14.918 sec @ 94.68 mph.  I KNOW the car can do deep 14s if I could just hook it up.  The treads on my tires were full of track rubber because I couldn’t find a clean spot.  All in all, I had a great time.

I certainly got a lot of runs, as the track was not busy at all.  I wish the track stayed open after the SDAC events for more runs.  Many of the other drag racers were having car troubles and everyone seemed to have trouble with traction.  Anyway, it was a blast.  I’ll definitely try to bring the car to more local events to work on my launch techniques.