I thought you guys might be interested to know that my '87 IROC with a 427 big block went 1,700 miles on this year's Hot Rod Power Tour. It sat through grueling traffic without overheating, ran through the curvy Blue Ridge Parkway on it's drag radials and skinnies, traversed train tracks without hitting the exhaust, ran bottom 12's at Gainesville and South Georgia, and, at the end of the Tour, ran 11's at Englishtown. I'm a happy camper.

Excellent! Back in teh day, I used to take my 8-71 blown 454 up and down highway 1, and broke mostly drive-
train pieces not motor....

[quote=Neil87Z28] I'm a happy camper.QUOTE]

As you should be! Way to go. I'm jealous as hell.

COOOOL!I am just finishing my BB swap,so nice to replace radical with cubic inches.If you don't mind me asking,what size rear tire are you using,and did you do any modifying to get them in there?

WTG! That is good to hear(or read).

I have 275-60-15 Nitto Drag Radials on the rear. The wheels are 15x8" with 5.5" backspace. The inner wheel well had been clearanced by a previous owner in order to fit L60-15 MT Sportsman SS tires. The passenger side fender lip required rolling due to a slight rear end offset to the right.

Sweet car.
What kind of milage did you get on the Power Tour?
What trans and rear end are you using?

wow I bet that was really fun. I would love to do that someday

i saw you run at englishtown

Glad ya made it ok!! We were also on the power tour.

I just added up my receipts. I used 145 gallons in 1,754 miles, so I got 12 miles per gallon. Not too bad for a big block with a 750 Holley double pumper, TH350 (no OD), and 3.73 rear gears. I spun it on the highway 3,000rpm all day long. It actually gets better mileage than my stock 454SS pickup.
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Nice ride. There were several nice third gens on the tour.

motor pics?

Here are a few pics...

Excuse me, i have to go change my underwear after looking at that car!!!

i'm impressed it all fits under a factory hood. good job.

To get it under the hood, it requires the Edelbrock Torker II-O intake, the flat air cleaner lid, and some trimming of the hood's inner structure. Plus, there's no room for a nitrous plate (the solenoids are in the air cleaner). I had some issues on the Tour with the nitrous and did not make a pass on the bottle.

What's your best pass to date on spray?I'm curious,as I just finished the swap to a similar 468 in my car.
I'm itching to get it to the track,just wanna get things dialed in a bit better first.

I have not made a pass on nitrous yet. Best N/A pass is 11.91@115 so I'm expecting low-11's on a small shot. It doesn't have a cage so below 11.49 gets me sent home anyway.

Sweet ride! could you post a link to your cardomain website! I havent been able to come across it I'm building a 496 right as we speak for my '86 IROC and wanna see what all you guys have done to get them to go in (mine should be in in the next few months)

My site is pretty lame because I really only use it to host photos, but here it is:

http://www.cardomain.com/ride/515786

what kinda cam/ heads/headers are you running?

The heads are 1968 -063 oval ports.
The headers are Hooker 2226 BBC 1 7/8" swap headers.
The cam is unknown because a previous owner built the motor. My ear tells me it's approx. 240-250@.050 on a 108 or 110. Idles at 1,000rpm in neutral and 750-800rpm in gear. Pulls hard to 6K+.

hummmmm... sounds good.... im build a 454 right now with 781 o-port heads, im going to run a cam a little smaller then yours.. porlly like a xe274 or voodoo276.... hoping to run some times like yours! nice car... i love it...

let me just start off by saying that this is one of the most beautiful cars I have seen on this site, really great job you have done, i would love to do a project similar to this in the future and i was just wondering what kind of budjet would i be looking at if you dont mind?, thank you so much for creating this beast haha gives the rest of us somethig to look up to

Unfortunately, I cannot take credit for the BBC swap. The swap was nicely done, and it is a 31,000 original mile car with original paint. When I bought the car, it needed minor paint/detailing and a bunch of little things to make it reliable. I have added an aluminum radiator, fuel pump, trans mount, alternator, misc. gaskets, plug wires, Mufflex 4" exhaust, nitrous solenoids, pinion seal, new tires, and manual brake pushrod. I also repainted the front end and painted/detailed the engine bay. I have about $13K in the project as it sits and I'm about to do a 12-bolt rearend and rear disc conversion.

Let me start by saying that Neil's car is the poop,I'm not downgrading him or his Camaro.It is a top notch car.

But his end $ figure can be trimmed considerably if your not looking for perfection.If you want an original,unmolested car w/ absolutely flawless paint and interior,than a low mileage survivor is the way to go.You'll never match what was assembeled at GM by doing it at home.

My car is a lesser version of Neil's,I've owned it since I was 17,and admittedly have a helluva lot more than $13k in it.But that is from years of engine builds,tranny swaps,tore up stuff,etc.You gotta figure,I've owned it 14 years.
But in it's current form,I'm confident it could be built for a ballpark $7500.That's figuring buyin a clapped out 3rd gen for around $1500,and doing all the work yourself.
Granted,for some reason my aftermarket fortified 9 bolt chooses to live,and I don't know how.But as it sets,I built the engine myself,so parts/machine work is the only expense there.I painted it myself,but Maaco could probably do as good a job,just a little more $$,and my interior is fairly sparton.I had the seats recovered in 97,they could damn sure stand it again.And my stereo consists of a Pioneer CD player and whatever Wal Mart had on sale for speakers.
My whole point is,do what you can afford.Put your $ in the go,it's way more enjoyable to pound on it than it is to clean on it,at least in my opinion.If you watch your pennies,you can build a fast 3rd gen that looks presentable,even w/ a bigblock,for a reasonable sum.

I absolutely agree. Just be realistic about what you want, develop a plan and a budget, and go for it. Just be careful about the little things, because they add up.

AMEN to that!
I sure hope you aren't offended by what I said,just don't wanna see anyone afraid to build because it has to be perfect.

Your car is beautiful.I hope that someday I can afford to turn my car over to a paint shop for about a year,and upholstry for 3 months or so.But until then,I'm gonna enjoy beating the piss out of it.

No offense taken. Thanks for the compliments. Your car looks great - enjoy!

yea thanks for the advice, i would really like to do a BBC in my car and its gona be a little while before i get the money to do somthing like that but its going to be my first project, im 16 right now and im going to BOCCES next year for votech and i plan on working on this car as i learn both your cars look amazing really hope mine can turn out like both of yours, thanks

I definitely saw you and checked out your car several times on the tour, GREAT car!!!! My car also made it all the way. I had to drive it from Maine down to Florida, and then all the way back up, but she made it! I wish I'd gotten a chance to chat with you a bit, but major props to you on the car and bringing it on the tour. That was an AWESOME time!!!

-Paul

hey man idk if you remember me or not but i came up and talked to you in kissimmi fl. i told you i had an iroc the same color. well its in the sig. i rode with my dad on the tour in our 66 chevelle. you have a very nice car man and i saw you make that fast pass up in englishtown. i bet you had a ton of $ in gas though. we spent alot and we have a small block that got over 20 mph.

I gotta ask is Englishtown nashinally known? I mean I see people from way out of NJ talking about stuff there and I thought it was a local thing only...

thats friggin sweet dude

It was definitely a great trip. Lots of great cars and scenery.
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I remember chatting with you. I didn't realize you were maroon88iroc - I love the stance and wheels on your car. I got 12 mpg on the tour, which was better than I thought. Glad you had a good trip with your dad - I wish my dad could have gone.

I've read and learned about Englishtown in the car mags. It is a track that I always wanted to run at.

Englishtown has just been around for a LONG time and is known as one of the better kept up tracks so all the small tire street cars work on it well.

Nice job Neil, we went over 2100 mi between 2005 and 2004 on the Power Tour and had a blast. I would recomend to anyone that if you have a chance to do it, go ahead.

This is a pic of my car at St. Louis Raceway when the tour was there in 04. I got around 22 mpg with my car ....not counting screwing around

I saw you in Orlando for the show prior to the PT kickoff, was looking for a bib to catch the drool, must say a sweet ride, I have a 84 Z tossing around whether to go with a 383 stroker, or try a bbc swap