Tim, cant wait until you get all the issues sorted out.....impressive numbers so far! Wish I could have been there this weekend!

Jason

 

hey guys. i am the guy that camaroman is talking about. i havent been on here in a while so i guess i have some catchin up to do. if you want to run 11's with good drivability and not spend a ton of money then weight reduction and suspension are the most important things. get some QA1's for the front and just some cheap competition engineering drag shocks for the back, lower control arms, and a good torque arm so you can adjust pinion angle. remove the front sway bar and then put that heavy pig on a diet. you will be amazed. i would leave the stock short block and stock heads. and to answer your other question about upgrading the stock 10 bolt rear, it is possible to upgrade axles and all but what usually breaks is the pinion gear. good luck and remember.....weight reduction is key and best of all ITS FREE!!!

 

mind if i ask what shot you are running? and are you still using the 10 bolt rear?

 

I have gone 10.97@126.4 on the stock 10bolt. That was on a 150hp dose of nitrous. I have to agree with shady that weight reduction is one of the best mods. The only thing is, its addictive. Once you start to pull weight out of the car, you never stop trying to find more to pull out.

 

actually its not all that bad. i did my own and i've never really worked on a car. unless you have a good memory get you some ziplock bags and label all the bolts and stuff so you can be sure of what goes where. the main thing is to try and keep everything as clean as possible. as far as the money goes you could get a nice head n cam package from Lloyd Eliott, unless you are keeping your cam, and he has nice prices. it took me a little more but thats because i was starting from pretty much stock. i hadda buy roller rockers and all that stuff. any info you need can be found on shoebox's page and be nice n leave the man a tip

 

Thanks man..I picked something up from Joe O. this weekend that should help out with my problems I was wondering where you were at. You just have to be sure to make it next year.

 

no i am not running the 10 bolt still. although i had pretty good luck with the stock 10 bolt, i got a good deal on a 9 inch. it has an aluminum spool (not very street friendly without power steering). other suspension mods are bmr extreme duty rear sway bar, bmr lca relocation brackets, bmr boxed subframes, bmr ds loop, lakewood lca's, jegster torque arm with adj. pinion angle, hal QA1's for front and rear. weight reduction includes no heat, a/c, p/s, airbags, front and rear bumper supports, rear seats, front sway bar, abs and light-weight carpet. the car runs consistent 11.90's @ 111 on motor and on a 150 shot with low bottle pressure on a super hot day it went 10.9 @ 123. i have not done any tuning on suspension yet as the track was too crowded to get enough runs in. i set my fronts at 3 and my rears at 5. my 60' time on the 150 shot was 1.49 with the stock torque arm. on motor it cuts a 1.58 60'.

 

you dont know waht you're talking about i will race that turd any day. lol. btw, the pinto is going to the track with us on sunday

 

How about nitrous? It would put you at the 400 rwhp mark easily

 

What time you guys going sunday. I want to run the car one last time before it comes apart.

 

I can't belive you bringing the pinto... Inferno I am sure we will be heading out early to be the crowd of people.

 

It all depends on how daily-drivable you want your car to be.

Stock eliminator cars are running 10s on hydraulic cams, stock heads, etc. That doesn't mean anything to me if you have to spin your car over 7000 rpm to make power. Before you know it, people are going to be running no interior cars, one seat, 2800 lbs w/driver, etc and bragging about ETs.

Who cares?

Running a fast ET wasn't nearly as fun to me as taking my 396 down the street, blowing the tires off the rims at 50mph, making the girl soaking wet, and banging her in my full weight, plush, 3870 lbs pig of a car, turning the air conditioning on, then taking a road trip 300 miles away running 93 octane the entire time.

It's all about racecars vs streetcars. Seems as though some of you are missing the point. If I wanted to build a racecar, a heavy 4th gen wouldn't be the best starting point.


Mike

 

It all depends on what the person building the car considers a street car. I will drive my soild roller, no heat, no ac, no ps, th350 anywhere. To me it is a total street car. It still has a radio, carpet, and both stock front seats. To others, i have a race car, it all depends on how much your willing to put up with. I had a 69 camaro that didn't have a/c or p/s from the factory. It had a th350, and a prety much stock motor. Everyone would consider that a joy to drive around. The only thing my car doesn't have that it had is heat, and the clasic look. To everyman his own opinion of a street car.

 

well put camaroman!

 

I know the feeling. My 55 Chevy is almost complete and with NO A/C, PS, PB, etc, it will not be as comfortable as the average $2000 car. It has .030 over 454, big hyd roller, 4.10 gears, 3500 stall, TH 400 with NO OVERDRIVE or lock up converter. It will kinda suck being on the high way at 3000 RPM and steadily being passed by old people. Eh, it'll be worth it. This is more of a cruiser anyway and will probably be sold soon after completion. I just always wanted one.

I would hate to know that this was my only car and I had to drive it everywhere I went though. If that was the case, it would AT LEAST be geared and stalled differently and would very possibly would have been upgraded to an LT1/LS1 with A4 trans and AC conversion. This would have pushed the completion date back a wghile though. Since I have other vehicles to drive, I can get away with building the 55 just like it is.

I remember my younger days, this would have been a mild ride and I would have had no problems driving this around. The overdrive transmissions and HP potential of the LT1/LS1 have got us all pretty much spoiled now and it is not uncommon for an F body to run LOW 12's to mid 11's and still be able to drive 300 miles and get 20-25 MPG with the A/C on.

Lloyd Elliott
972-617-5671
NightTrain66@msn.com