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April 10, 2017- Another New Best Times and highest MPH - Deep in the 10's

The local track just opened this weekend so it was time to do some testing. My plan was to get used to the car and see how it responds with all of the winter changes, which included, front coil overs, new rear end with a 4:30 spool, battery relocation to trunk, as well as stiff wall slicks/tubes, and other misc stuff. My first two passes were easy ones, just going to the 330 and then the 1/8 before doing the 1/4. I was trying to get a feel for the car along with seeing how consistent it was without making any changes. With the new gearing and suspension changes, the car definitely responded slower off the line as evident by my reaction times, so I started leaving a little earlier and it got better. Lots of tweaking and learning left to do.

Overall runs were pretty consistent with a new best all time ET of 10.17s and a best new MPH of 134.86. Even the 60 foots improved over last year, but still require some suspension tuning since the car was breaking loose. If I can improve the 60s and drive better, should be able to just touch the 9's.

Hopefully get back to the track in a few weeks.

So now for the technical part. Even though the 60's were much better than last year, there is still lots of room for improvement and I am sure a big part of it is shock adjustment.

If you look at this slow motion video link below you can see the rear dead hooks, and even has some rear end bouncing. Even with all of this, was still doing high 1.4s 60's.

Slow motion video of the launch:

Also if you look at the Racepak data below, after the 60' mark the run looks good. But from launch to 60' you can see it hooking and breaking as evident by the Acc G's jumping up and dropping, as well as drive shaft speed changing.

Current car setup:
- Caltracks: Just touching, so no pre-load

- I used the same shock settings that I ended last year with as a starting point:
Front Viking shocks: 7 rebound, 14 compression (keep in mind these are coil overs now with a lower spring rate)
Rear Viking shocks: 6 rebound, 12 compression
Hyatt Soft loc, 3 1/2 turns on base = 555lbs, with 8.5g counter weights.

Another thing to note is the new heavy duty rear, weighs about 30lbs more, and now the battery (35lbs) is in the trunk, so about 65lbs more in the back, along with less up front between the battery, and coil overs reducing weight around 50 lbs

First questions I need to answer:
1. I am running with 14lbs pressure, should I increase the pressure to get some spin?
2. Or, should I adjust the rear shocks and tighten the extension so it does not hit the tire so hard, or something else competently?

Overall the rest of the pass looked good, however, on the 1-2, 2-3, and 3-4 shifts, you can see the clutch slipping for approx .7s with a max slip of 29% before going to zero, including in 4th, where the clutch only had 12% slip then locked up, so it is not driving through the clutch in 4th.

April 22, 2017- Engine Containment / Diaper

Time to add a bit of insurance on the safety side with a diaper and hope to never need this.

I decided to go with one by DJ Safety due to good recommendations I found in regards to fitment. In the end (about 6 weeks), the one I received fits great, however, the first one they sent me their template was incorrect for the pan I have (Ford Racing M-6675-FT351), so they were sent the engineering drawing from Ford and they made another. Joel Orme from Orme brothers was very helpful in this order and pushing DJ to send the correct fitting one to me.

Ballistic Nylon, SFI Spec 7.2, with the optional Kevlar straps since attachment will be to the header bolts and the optional back strap that snugs it around the back of the pan pulling it from the blocking plate - it fit so well that the back strap could of been left off.

In general clearance around the block and pan and between the headers was good, with only one tough area for clearance. The #8 header pipe tucks into the oil pan with just about 1" of gap between it and the pan with no diaper. Given the thickness of the diaper I wrapped that section of the header pipe with DEI header wrap, and also made an aluminum shield and covered it with some DEI heat shielding material that goes between the header and diaper. The shield is attached with 2 of the scatter shield bolts. I brought the engine up to temp and it worked!

These pics show the nice tight fit with nothing hanging down.

It snugs the pan nicely, so there is no interference with the centerlink or any other components.

April 29, 2017- A few more passes

I made it to the track this past weekend to do some additional tweaking. The biggest difference was about 20 degrees warmer than the previous time.

The focus was to clean up the launch. As suggested here I did work on slowing the front end rise, as well as not hit the tire as hard.

With all of the changes below, what I found interesting was the 60' did not change much (.052s spread), but after the changes looking at the data logger, the launch was MUCH smoother than the last time at the track. The other interesting point was last time I was crossing the 60' mark just after hitting 2nd gear, where as now, I am at the 60' just before shifting.

So what I tried and the results:
Pass 1. Slow the front end rise-Added 3 clicks to front rebound. Settings now are Front: 10 rebound/ 14 Comp, and Rear 6 rebound/13 Comp. Car did not break loose on the 1-2 shift as much as before.

Pass 2.Do not hit the tire as hard- Increased rear Rebound 3 clicks to soften the hit for a total of 9 clicks rebound. Everything else the same. 60' increased .1s and ET increased .2s

Pass 3. Since 2 above made things worst, set rebound back to 6 clicks as in 1 above and got the same results as pass 1. A least things are consistent.

Pass 4. Increased front compression and rebound 1 click to further slow the rise and what seemed to be a slight unload just before the 1-2 shift increase the compression slightly to keep the nose from falling.Front: 11 rebound/ 14 Comp. Smoothed 60' quite a bit without the bounces as in the first graphs at the start of this thread.

Pass 5. Repeated a pass with no changes and almost exactly the same. So again consistent.

Ran out of time for any more passes.

What I found was for the exception of #2 above, overall the times were all consistent, with 60's all within .05s, and ETs .02s. I had a similar tight grouping the previous time at the track, however, this time I am about .08s slower. Most likely due to the temp increase. But, I like the smoother launch.

So about the smoother launch. It was not evident in the time slips since the numbers were all close, but the data logger tells a different story.

Here is an inside video showing a few 10.2sec 133mph passes and shifting with no clutch from this past weekend.

The clutch is definitely slipping to much, so I need to add base ands possibly some counterweight.

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June 20, 2017- Scaling the car

It has been a while since I have updated this thread and not a lot has gone on for the exception of clutch tuning and suspension tweaks. Still running in the 10.15sec range at 134mph, but 60's are still not great in the 1.45s range.

Been working on getting the car to hook better, so I broke down and picked up a set of scales to 4-corner scale the car and get a baseline. I went with a set of Longacre scales. Since I am just going to use these at home I built some ramps out of scrap wood that I can drive the car right onto the scale.

To get everything level, I first positioned my car on the lift and marked where the 4 scales would be. Removed the car, placed the scales and then worked on getting them all level. Since my garage floor has a slight pitch, after some trial and error with measurements I made some shims to level the lift so the scales are well within 1/16 using a laser. Then marked the 4 places on my lift exactly where the scales go so I can repeat the process in the future.

Also having the level surface allowed me to measure front side to side and rear side to side ride heights. The front Coil Overs allowed me to adjust the front and fortunately the rear was within 1/16". All of the measurements were done race weight (my weight in the seat, fuel and tire pressure for the track). I used weight plates in the drivers seat and on the front floor pan during adjustments, then at the end just verified it with me in the seat.

Ride height from top of scale (bottom of tire) to fender along tire centerline is Front: both sides 25.5", LR=28", RR=28 1/16", so almost dead on.

I was a bit surprised by the weight distribution, but at least now I know what it is.
Front 54.4%
Rear 45.6%
Total weight 3553lbs
Front: Left 992lbs Right 941lbs
Rear: Left 847lbs Right 773lbs

Now that I have a baseline, I can see how changes effect things and see how it hooks.

Battery is already in the trunk, have an AL radiator, and light weight coil overs, so at this point the only way to get closer to 52/48%, without major chassis changes, is fiberglass components in the front and lighter brakes and I am still not sure how much that will drop.

June 22, 2017- Drag Race Reunion

Went to a Drag race reunion in the next town where they close down an airport and have heads up nostalgia racing for pre-1974 cars only. I have done it for the past 5 years and always fun. Just very hard to hook up and stay hooked on the untreated runway.

I had to launch at about 3500rpms versus my normal 5700, and could not shift as hard since it would break loose as you can see in a few of the runs. I spent more time just having fun and did not mess around with shocks or other stuff.

I was talking to the owner of that vega that blew my doors, while we were waiting to race to get a feel how bad he was going to kill me. It was a 9 sec car, weighing 2200lbs with the driver. I was just hoping he would blow the tires off, but nope, was out 10 feet even before I moved 2 feet.

It was still a blast!

This is 5 of 8 passes that I was able to get videos and stills on.
Enjoy

July 15, 2017- At New England Dragway again

Weather has not been good on track days, but Saturday was perfect. The track prep was great and super sticky since they had a bunch 200mph+ cars.

Update:
Been working on dialing in the clutch and increasing the counterweights has reduced the amount of clutch slip on the shifts as well as the duration it slips. The overall magnitude has been reduced to 50-75% of what it was before, and now the actual slip duration's are also much less, around .4 to .6 seconds.

What is surprising is with the above changes, along with some shock setting changes, I have been consistently stuck around 10.2s at 133mph. Here is a summary of 10 passes before and after adding counterweights, as well as shock settings. The one important thing to note is that the car does launch and go down the track much better than before, so things are better from that standpoint, but still dead hooks on a sticky track, and the 60' should be a good 0.1s lower

10 passes from 3 separate days (20 deg temp range as well):
-------min---max---spread
60 = 1.458, 1.529, 0.071
330= 4.187, 4.360, 0.173
1/8= 6.496, 6.706, 0.210
mph= 105.41, 107.09, 1.680
1000= 8.496, 8.671, 0.175
et = 10.174, 10.278, 0.104
mph = 133.160, 134.860, 1.700

It has been hard to get others to take pictures since the test-n-tune slots have been very short, so I set up a camera to record the underside of the car.

Here is a video of where the car is now. When I first stated looking at these there was much more bounce on the shifts from hitting the tires too hard, and shock tweaking has helped.
You can see that it launches straight and there is no twisting of the chassis, and the rpm pull down on launches is no more that 500 rpms now.

I am still focusing on reducing the hit by increasing rear rebound and get the tires spinning more. I currently have Caltracs with the low profile front cam plate that only has one hole. Just ordered the 2 hole version so I can use the lower hole and try and reduce the hit more, since that should help with this being a stick car.

August 28, 2017- Installed the standard 2 hole Caltrac front cam plates

Update: Installed the standard 2 hole Caltrac front cam plates a few weeks back and made it to the track this weekend. I was able to get 4 passes in.

For the exception of my very first time out this season on a cool April day with great track prep and near perfect air when I did 10.17s @ 134mph, I have been consistently stuck at 10.21 to 10.26. This weekend I hit 10.16, so a new PB, but not by much, however, given the warmer temps and just okay track prep, it was a definite improvement.

I am still hitting the tires too hard and not getting much spin on the launch.

Video of best pass (#3):

Summary:
Pass 1. Using the same settings, including shock settings as previously with the 1 hole Caltracs (Front 11R/15C, rear 8R/13C), got a new best 60' of 1.451 which is about .026 better than my previous best all season. Very little spin on the launch.

Caltracs have no preload, with a dime space. Car launched nice and straight.

Pass 2. Increased tire pressure from 15.5 to 16.5, everything else the same. 60' improved to my all time best of 1.448, but still in the 10.22 range. Sill very little spin on the launch.

Pass 3. Kept tire pressure at 16.5 and increased rear rebound from 8 to 10 clicks so it would not hit the tire as hard, everything else the same. 60' went up to 1.46, but got new best ET of 10.16s at 134.2mph. Again, very little spin on the launch.

Pass 4. Kept everything the same except increase Rear rebound by 2 clicks, to 12. Totally blew off the tires at launch.

Thinking next time at the track to slow the front rise a bit and see if that helps, as well as increasing the launch from 5700 to 5800/5900rpms.

September 18, 2017- New Best ET and MPH

New Best ET and MPH

I am ever so slowly improving things, and hit a new best ET of 10.12s, from a PB of 10.16, but the bigger improvement was in a new best mph of 135.33mph, up from 134.8.

I am still looking at the data recorder logs to see what differentiates the 3 best passes, versus the other 4. Of course this excludes the driver errors

These 3 passes below were in a row with just a tire pressure change and no change to the car setup.
Pass 3 = 15.5psi, pass 4 = 16psi, then back to 15.5 on pass 5. The reason for increasing the tire pressure is the car is still just about dead hooking and I was trying to get a little spin on the launch, but this hurt the 60' a little and I really did not seem to get much spin when I look at the vid. On a subsequent pass I increased the launch rpm form 5700 to 5900 and the tires spun way too much. Seems like a very fine line right now.

October 7, 2017- Another New Best ET and MPH

Finally the car is launching very well, and a new best ET and MPH this weekend.

I have spent most of the summer getting the car to launch well and be repeatable and FINALLY, it does! The focus has been on shock settings (Compression/Rebound front and rear), Caltrac preload, tire pressure, and lastly this weekend some fine tuning of the clutch. I think there is also some room for playing with the Launch RPM, that has been 5700rpms which may help the 60'.

This weekend was great with a new best ET and MPH of 10.015s at 135.56MPH, along with the 60'. I had 3 runs that were all very close to this best one, and what was even better was my reaction times were more consistent in the 0.02 to 0.04s range, whereas before they varied by well over 0.1s, so I can also fine tune that a bit more now as well.

It was still a warm and bit humid day similar to the last time at the track, with the Density Air within 200feet using data from a close by airport since I do not have a weather station.

The track closes in a few weeks so I am hoping to go back one more time and now be able to make some carb jet changes since looking at the A/F that may help.

So close to touching the 9's, that I may not eat for a week if it helps.. LOL

October 28, 2017- Made it into the 9's- End of the Season an yet Another New Best ET and MPH

Ended the season on a good note!! Finally got into the 9's today and new best MPH. Had a number of passes that were in the high 9s to 10.02s, with most mphs in the 136's.

Best of the day was 9.911s at 136.86.

Now that the car reacts consistently I did not change the suspension setup (shocks, preload, tire pressure) or clutch at all for the exception of:
1. I increased the front and rear jets 2 sizes, and the air was a little better.
2. And I experimented a little with launch RPM.

April10, 2018- Winter Work

Spent the winter doing mostly general maintenance, as well as the freshening up of the trans and clutch above.

One thing that I had noticed was some gasket creep on the intake where some of the gasket material squished into the port area. Pulled the intake and cleaned it up a bit more and installed it with the Felpro gaskets with the metal core (1262S3). Had to do some cleanup of the gasket port openings to match the head/intake.

Also checked for things that get abused such as the axles. When I received the new rear end assembly from Strange last year I pulled the axles and painted a line down the shaft so I could monitor any twisting. Checked them this winter and and no detectable twist in the shaft or splines.

The wheels also needed to be upgraded. The standard conical lug nut/wheel combo could not hold up to the hard launches (1.4 60 foots), and I was getting some minor bend on the wheel studs. Upgraded to some Weld wheels with a shank style lug, and some nice ARP studs.

Between the lighter flywheel and the lighter Weld wheels, as well as removing what was left for sound deadner under the carpet, it was time to scale the car again. The flywheel saved almost 15 lbs, and the wheels were 7 lbs total.

I have the car getting better as far as weight distribution now

This is getting me to 56% front / 44% rear for distribution, and 52% left side / 48 right side
This is with the car as setup for the track, along with fuel, and driver weight.

The slicks form last year were getting beat so I picked up some new ones. I was happy with the Micky Thompson 3055S, 28x10.5 stiff side wall with tubes, so using them again. When I checked rollout they were within 1/16" so very good.

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