2004 Pontiac GTO!

[wrp]

Yes indeed. We should have it dialed in within the next couple or three weeks.

[BurnTire]

What are you shooting for in the 1/4 ?

[wrp]

I start going down that path I get out of reality land quickly :) In the back of my heart there has been a desire to have a sub 9 second timeslip in a nearly full weight car if that makes sense? Certain things I have set out to accomplish include:

• Guys like you inviting me to share the build and offering interesting discussions on it.
• Exhalting Vendors I work with who go an extra mile to provide a product or service and who do so with a friendly ful attitude
• Prove to my self that I could achieve something through hard work
• Doing this and avoiding a big amount of debt...I do not owe a nickel on the car as it now sets.
• When I first bought the car some folks said they were ugly and slow, can't fix ugly but would like to make it fast
• Talking shit to other car guys :)

My dad once said it was stupid to waste this much time and money on something. He made the comment as he was climbing into his Bass Boat. That was a number of years ago. Dad is a civil engineer and quite accustomed to challenging technical issues over time he couldn't help but get interested in the car and has got to the point now where he asks questions like how do you use a boost controller to set the power ramp up to keep the tires from being blown away. I was staggered when he asked that. Then I learned his deep dark secret. A mutual friend of ours is a NHRA Hall of Fame member. He drove a Top Fuel Slingshot in the 60's and a funny car in the 70's. I did not know that but Dad did and the guy has been feeding dad things to ask me, Once I discovered the secret, Preston invited us to the NHRA Hot Rod Reunion in Bowling Green. We sat there for three days listening to former world champs talk about the old days of match racing and various other war stories. Preston showed Dad how they developed direct port injection on their top fuel Hemi's in 1966. Now dad calls and asks me when I am going to Oklahoma to mix it up :) Here is Preston Davis, our friend, telling former world champion Jim Walthers a fishing story about my Dad.



I guess you can say everything else is pretty much gravy.

[wrp]

Here is Preston's current build

[wrp]

Here is Preston's current build

[wrp]

So with everything going on trying to get the build done I brought the car home Friday. If any of you saw the fire, the explosion raised the hood a couple of inches and loosened the back bolts. While the hood has primarily been held on by the front latch, for peace of mind I decided to pin it. Understand that I have not pinned a hood in 46 years. Now, at age 17, I have a damaged nerve in my neck and the cold weather today did nothing to help any other essential body part to feel better. So I just said screw it and pinned the damned hoods. You guys that do this stuff all the time will probably laugh your asses off, you would for sure if you had watched me. At the end of the day, the pins are in and I enjoyed doing the work.
The biggest problem on our cars is figuring out where to put the damned pins. The narrow radiator support brace is pretty near the front of the hood, not leaving much real estate to bite on if needed to keep the hood in place at 155-160 mph. On top of that, in that area, the top of the hood has a sharp curve that makes laying the pins in an area that is relatively flat to the top of the pin is difficult.. I am sure there will be several why didn't you do this comments which will make me ill but for those of you following this, will make your experience and installation much better.
Remove the front bumper and the headlights, might as well take off the radiator shroud as well.
The obvious candidate for the pins is the bumper stops or pre existing holes in the brace. After pulling the headlights and front bumper I first took the data plate off and looked at the two large holes located in that place on each side. beautiful holes, fit nicely on the brace, cleared the headlight but was way too close to the front of the hood and did not fit into the indentation in the hood bottom above it.
So, I decided on the radiator support brackets. They are more inboard and further back from the front of the hood. That entailed pulling the shroud, marking, and drilling holes in the brace. For those of you that have not really studied it, our cars are not symmetrical. Every inside measure must be confirmed from the outside by backing off and visually inspecting them to ensure they are in fact spaced correctly.




Once I decided where the pins should mount and drilled the base holes I installed them and put white grease on the tips, then lowered the hood to mark the underside for the drilling.
The hood underside is double paneled meaning there is a lower panel and an upper panel. I used a 1 1/4" hole saw to drill the bottom half, Then I put more grease on the poles and closed the hood again to mark the top panel. I drilled a pilot hole through from the bottom then lowered the hood and used the hole saw to drill a 1 and 1/4 inch hole in from the top too. This gives the pin room when you close the hood so it doesn't get snagged on the side of the newly drilled holes.



Once the holes are drilled close the hood and position the striker plates. I chose a cheap traditional hood pin set from JEGS but will probably go back and get one of those kits that has neoprene striker plates. These seem to be less stressful to the Fiberglass.

[wrp]

Took the car to Ennis Texas for Opening night. Conditions were terrible.We only got three passes before calling it quits. Did manage to trap 147 though.

[wrp]

Went 9.2 @ 154 today, much more to come.

[BurnTire]

Damn that thing hauls ass. 8's are coming.

[wrp]

Damn that thing hauls ass. 8's are coming.

I think we will be deep in the 8s when we straighten out the suspension. We are running stiff bushings. We are going to replace them with aluminum solids. Means my street days are over probably but on the launch, the rear wheels are pinching forward and inward. Check this out. This was the 9.2 @ 154 run. As the car passes the camera which was at the 330 foot mark you can see the front tires are close to off the ground and still lifting/weight transferring. The slicks are pushed forward in the wheel well and you cannot tell it but they are pinched inward. Standing on the line, you can see the left front wheel for the whole 1/4 mile. The 9.2 pass was literally sideways from start to finish. You can see the wheels are trying to lift off all the way out to the 1/8 mile mark

Front tires at 330 foot


Rear Wheels at 330 foot


Past 330 foot out to 1/4 mile