BPWilliams

Big Mods - After running the car that I used to on the track and knowing that this was a unibody my main goal was to make the chassis as stiff as possible. My thought was that the car will twist as the turn pressure is applied to any given tire. I thought that running parallel bars in the front with connection points to the frame it would eliminate the twist that these cars will see while diving into the turn up front. Nothing worse than having your front end flex under pressure causing a mushy corner entrance. Same goes for the rear and that is why I ran the main bars to the rear bumper.

How does your Camaro handle? I just bought KYB AGX shocks for all the way around and plan on cutting the springs to get to the 6" rocker pannel height. By cutting the stock springs they will also stiffen up. Are you still running the torque bar or have you switched to a 3 link? Also have you been able to get the car into the netrual handeling posistion? I bet these push like a banshi... what about the rear sway bar are you still using it? Sooo many questions and so little time...

zlathim

Wow, racing your show car takes nuts! I'll bet not many of the other owners at the car show can say they did that. You definately have some cool cars. What is your DD?



I would love to see pictures of your car. I'll let you know how the strut towers work out.

Cool to know. I'm sure ours will get hammered eventually.

Thanks for the link. I'll check that site out when I get a chance.

BPWilliams

Zlat, my daily is a Ford F-150 4X4 need something to pull the toys with! I have ruined the paint job on the Cobra from the race track. I had raced the car for 4 years and it took a beating on my House of Kolor custom paint job, but luckly I did the work myself so it can always be re-done if needed. Here is a shot of the rig and the motor in the cobra at Phoenix International Raceway in AZ. Now what were we talking about? Oh ya turning right OR left....

BIG_MODS

iTrader: (9)

I'm not saying that your wrong and I'm right, it's just my theory on it

I've never tried the KYB shocks myself, but I'm sorry to say that I haven't heard great things about them from the AutoX and Road Race crowd. They could be fine for a circle track car, but I don't know much about circle track.

The details of my car are here: www.f-bodysport.com

800/200 springs with weight jacks
36/24mm sway bars
Koni Sports (yellows) front and rear
panhard bar lowered ~2" in the rear (this is how I can get away with the relatively stiff rear)
It handles neutral the best I can tell with my limited seat time, but it pushed like crazy when I had the automatic and stock stuff.

I recently picked up some used Bilstein Race shocks (valved by Unbalanced Engineering) for the rear with 400 lb/in springs. Yeah, that’s quite a bit stiffer than stock (107 lbs/in) and 2x stiffer than what I have now. I might look for some 300's. With this setup I will lower the PHB about 2" more. If I use the 400's I'll probably have to change to a ~19mm bar. With 300's I can probably keep the 24mm. I also just got some used 1200 lb/in springs for the front off ebay.

I made a decouple torque arm modeled off of the 4th Gen Camaro DCTA made by Unbalanced Engineering http://www.unbalancedengineering.com/Camaro/TA/ It is a Torque arm under acceleration and 3 link under braking. My TA is here: http://www.f-bodysport.com/decouple_torque_arm.htm I'm going to make a new one that ties into a bar that runs from the harness bar to the floor kinda like you did for your 3 link and its IC height will be adjustable.

Fords88Bird

Impressive work so far guys. Later.

nicklane

Hi everybody im zane's friend nick. Thanks for all your input and pictures. After much discussion in the shop expect to see some mods copied from your builds in the future.

Our strut plates are welded in at a fixed split-caster setup of LF 2 deg RF 4 deg.
We just got the motor in this weekend and a prliminary checks shows we should have a camber adjustment range of LF +4 to -2 and RF +1 to -5. Later this week i will be building a bolt in strut brace and to eleminate any possibility of the strut shifting in the slot under load we will be using a lock bolt setup thought up by Mark Collins, of Falcon Fabrication to complete the setup.

Question for basiccamaro. On using the sway bar for adjustment for cicle track application would you preload the RF by lengthening the link or pull down the LF by Shortening that link?


Thanks again everybody. Its been very motivational to see so much interest in our build.

nicklane

Some pics with the motor in and the dash

gregsz-28

iTrader: (1)

As a car is lowered, the endlinks should be shortened anyways, so you probably want to shorten the LF link.

basiccamaro

Even though it was based on the stock method (to some degree) with modifications, of how the factory set it up, My Howe sway bar mounted differently.

I think you can preload your bar setup probably just as well (within the limits of the stock parts) on either the right or left side with the stock linkages. Binding or interference with other suspension or chassis parts would probably be your only worry, or running out of thread adjustment on one side. Maybe both sides.
My experience is that when the bar is preloaded too much, the car wants to push in the middle of the corner. This can cause you to steer hard to the left and feather the throttle trying to stay off the wall and maintain some speed. Then what happens is that the car slows down some, finally takes a set, the front tires finally grip, and the car whips around it's polar moment of inirtia ( I saw that in a book somewhere, LoL! ) and now it's TURNING, a LOT! Now you think the car is loose on corner exit. Well, it is! But it's from an unatural amount of left steering input to try and fight the sway bar push that makes it go snap loose.

The theory of the sway bar on the front is that as the right lower control arm gets loaded with the car's weight from turning left, it moves up and against the spring. At the same time the left lower control arm is doing the opposite, it is unloading and falling down toward the track as the left front of the chassis rises.
So, if you tie the lower control arms together like on a street car, when one arm moves upward under load, the other one must try to follow it with as much enthusiasm as the bar and linkages will force or allow it to, instead of uselessly falling away from the chassis and just being more dangling weight that the car has to fight around the corner.
This means that the unsprung weight of the opposite side's front suspension is now being used as ballast weight to help transfer more weight on the (in)side of the car that you want to turn into the corner, a good thing! And, since that inside corner of the car can't rise up nearly as much since it is now helping resist the forces of gravity and inirtia that the other side is fighting, the car drops a little on the inside and flattens out and has less body roll and stays down on the track better where your front spoiler can do a better job of keeping the air out from under the car.

The setup on my 5th design Howe Chassis with the stock Camaro clip used a stock appearing tubular sway bar. The right side of the bend had the flattened out section with a bolt hole to bolt the sway bar bolt spacer and rubber grommets, but the left side bend was just flattened out at the end and slid up UNDER the lower left a- frame control arm where an extra piece of plate was welded across the upside down "U" web of the arm for a landing pad for the sway bar to seat up against.

Just before where the long, middle section of the tubular sway bar made the bends to go down each side to the lower control arms, my car had through- the- frame load bolt holes, where a piece of 3/4" all thread could be adjusted up and down through the frame and jamb nutted in place. The all- threads had a ring of tubing welded to the bottom ends that the bar passed through. This held the bar in place under the frame rail front snouts and allowed them to be adjusted up and down either equally or unequally. You would adjust the jamb nuts and move the all threads until you had the left front "foot" of the sway bar up underneath the control arm and resting on it's special landing pad, but not attached to anything. And the sway bar linkage bolt on top of the right side lower control arm would just be taking a little tension and load. Then you would usually back off the all- threads to make the left side sway bar foot a little bit slack. Or you could preload it as much as you thought you wanted to. Then crank 'er up, take her out for hot laps and twist it sideways and see what happens!

The setup I had was a cross between a stock sway bar and a racing sway bar. Back in the old days they used to call them "Wisconsin" Jacks or Bars or something. This was from like the early days of **** Trickle and Ed Howe and such.
The NASCAR cup cars use a straight bar with splines on the end with rectangular bars that go down to th A frame control arms. You adjust those by taking the arm off the end of the bar spline and moving it a tooth and putting it back on, and maybe a little at the control arm linkage.
You track rules will probably keep you from doing too much modification in this area.

I remember when Ed Howe used to bring his personal car to our local track and let David Pearson drive it once in a while for special promotional races. Before that, Bobby Allison used to bring his car in on these special nights to race against the locals. They were paid to do this, they didn't even need to qualify if they didn't want to!
It was really cool to see Mr. Ed, the "Green Hornet" walk around the car and adjust it all night. This one night Pearson went out for the fast heat starting up front out of ten cars. I think he finished 9th, the big NASCAR star! My high school buddy says "he don't look smart enough to drive a race car!" I told him, that's David Pearson, a former factory driver and two time NASCAR Winston Cup Champion. But you sure couldn't tell it!

When he stopped the car in the pits, Ed Howe started in on it. He'd adjust one thing, stand on the bumper and jiggle the chassis, frown, and then go to another corner of the car. He kept doing this for a while, sometimes giving a scowl to anybody looking his way.
Then Pearson took the car out for the Australian Pursuit race (also the top ten qualifyers) and started up front again. This time he finished middle of the pack.
Back in the pits Mr. Ed started in on the car again. He must have circled that thing 15 times. All *******s and elbows. And that front swaybar did get a workover.
When they started the feature, Pearson was midpack. In about 12 laps he was in the lead checking out on everybody. He won the race handily, I think he was in another zip code when it was over, he just dissapeared! Howe was just standing there on the hauler watching, with his arms crossed and a smirk on his face. Good times!

zlathim

Nick- It's about time you showed up.

basiccamaro- I like that story about Howe. Thanks for sharing it.

Nick got the car painted with his free paint. I was wrong about the color, it turned out to be satin black and not flat black.

Here's a bigger picture of the dash panel that Nick fabbed up. It turned out great, although this picture doesn't do it justice:



We mounted the battery box in the car using some 1/2"x1" rectangular tubing welded in the depression right behind the driver.



We got the engine mounted. We are running an electric fan. It is a two speed fan from a Ford Taurus. Chevy purists may crucify me, but that Taurus fan absolutely rocks! It was a piece of cake to install it using a standard tranny cooler mounting kit from Napa.


The tranny is bolted to the engine. Nick grabbed a stock crossmember from the local pick and pull, we plan on modifying it to fit the three speed sag. In the meanwhile, we have the tranny hanging from some chain attached to the tunnel.

BPWilliams

The NASCAR type sway bars can be bought at Speedway engineering and have a lot of adjustability options to complemeny the springs. Here is the set that I put on my Cobra and have made provisions to install the same kind on the Camaro. When I built the bar that runs between the lower frame rail between the steering arms (Wonder bar?) it is designed to clear a straight bar swaybar type set-up. These bars are awsome and the adjustment is something like +/- 300lbs based on which hole it is mounted to.

zlathim

Those are cool swaybars. Unfortunately (or fortunately for us because we are poor) the rules don't allow them.

basiccamaro

Howe Racing Enterprises use to always use something as close to stock as possible back in the old stock-front-clip days before later going to all square tubing chassis and all fabricated control arms and a-frames.
Sometimes I'd get parts like a metal double fan belt pulley setup from Howe and it would be something that came on a high performance production GM car and come in GM parts boxes with the lids ripped off where the GM part number went. Of course, it had a Howe number in the Howe catalog now. This was to satisfy some track rules and it also kept the cost down over getting stuff like aluminum aftermarket pulleys or other specially fabbed alloy parts. Of course if you wanted aluminum pulleys and such they would sell them to you as well.

With the Howe- type sway bar you MIGHT possibly get past the inspectors in the street stock class. Maybe.
Also, in the top levels of NASCAR, they don't usually adjust the sway bar during a race. At least it would take a looonnnggg pit stop to pull the splined arm off the bar and reposition it. The Howe type setup can be adjusted much more quickly. Even though you would still be doing it in the pits between heat races and the feature at the local short track.
I've also noticed over the years that the splined bars were often more of a Southern, NASCAR preferrence, even at the local short tracks, whereas up North, more cars ran the Howe style bar setup on the local tracks.

Both setups work well. I'm just used to using the non- splined type.

zlathim

Something like this?

83 Crossfire TA

iTrader: (2)

Is that a t-top car? Looks like you have the bars tucked up pretty tight, what are you planning on doing with the tops?

89ROC-Z

iTrader: (7)

i would think they'll just put sheet metal over the opening and weld it down. Thats what i would do, the tops are worthless on a race car!

Ca[maro]88

iTrader: (2)

good to see some racers on this site. ill be a 3rd generation race car driver someday (when im not poor) my dad drove an old monte carlo which was a street stock at the local dirt track at Peoria Speedway. he won rookie of the year honors in 92 and was leading points 8 events in when his sponsors took his car he built in 93 (dad took me and my mom to disney world, i was 2 at the time and we live out in the country and we left the car on the trailer next to the house. apparently its an easy place to get stolen so they took it) the next race my dad was driving a different car and he was on the inside of his old car, they entered turn 1 and my dad never turned. destroyed the car he built and pissed off his ex-sponsors VERY badly. my grandpa was back-to-back sportsman series champion. 90-91. he quit racing after 10 years. 8 times in the 3 years my dad and grandpa raced they both won the A-main in the same night. ill post pics of their stock cars later.

sorry if i bored you lol just like to share some racing stories.

zlathim

Ca- thanks for posting! Cool stories. I especially like the part of both of the old men winning their main event on the same night 8 times. It sounds like the family is a force to be reckoned with at the track. We have a few families like that at our local track too.

BPWilliams

ROC-Z My car had T-tops also and after I installed the subframes and the halo bar I cut the roof off to finish welding the cage. It was much easier to get in and out of the car. After removal I went down to the local junk yard and picked up a solid roof for $40.00. It went on surprisingly easy and I just welded it on. I cut all the support out from under the roof because it does not need to act like a frame anymore. HOWEVER, I have more clearance with the solid roof because the T-top roof is much thicker because of the rigidity factor of the T-top design, I could have moved my halo bar up an inch or two if I looked into this feature ealier.

Here is the update on the brakes... I am putting in the rear-end this weekend complete with a bearing support back cover, axle tube seals, steel braded lines, C5 Z06 brakes, and the custom 3-link bracket. I will post pictures as they come avaiable.

zlathim

BP- That's a nice looking brake set-up.

I like the picture with the Hoosier banner in the background too. Thanks for sharing the pics!

1brd2brd3brd4

Where did you get the pieces used to cover the tail light area? I have the front and rear "race bumper covers" but have never seen tail light covers

zlathim

Nick made those out of 18 gauge sheet metal. It is two pieces, riveted together in the middle. He's still working on the deck lid, but it is close. He ran some beads on it as well.

BPWilliams

Thanks Zlat, The brakes are by Ed Miller at www.flynbye.com he was great to work with and now I can upgrade to almost any brake set-up if this is not good enough in the future.

My Garage is a total mess! I am in full blown fab mode and I have about a 1/2" of layer on the floor and my work bench is about 5 projects deep. I bought all the parts to complete the car so I have boxes all over the place as I go through the fit process. I am usually pretty clean but the brakes took longer than expected so I have not moved the car out to clean lately.... I am so close to wrapping this thing up just three more major projects.... Rear-end .... Fuel cell ..... Dash .....

83RDRACR

great looking car. I've run street stock with an 85 monte w/ same drivetrin as you have on a 1/4 mile paved oval also. Run the saginaw in 2nd. You may have to change your rear gear to get the rpm range where you need it. On a GM crate motor w/5800 redline we ran a 3.42 gear. With a built motor that had a red line of 6800 we ran 4.56.

For exhaust you need the LT1 style manifolds that exit at the rear. The ram horn style will run into the k-member big time. Look for 4th gen camaro/firebird, caprice and roadmaster wagons for these.

Please do install the sfc's for protection and rigidity. And please add some rear down bars that extend to the back of the car to keep the back of the car from folding up and crushing that fuel cell.

you're doing a great job, Good Luck

fbirdroller

iTrader: (1)

i just wanted to say nice job and i enjoyed reading over this thread

BIG_MODS

iTrader: (9)

The cage will be fully tied to the roof. I was originally going to make a composite T-top replacement panel so I removed that T-top bar down the middle since it weighed 11 lbs. Before removing the T-top bar I used some scraps to tie the front windshield frame to the rear to keep the car from folding in half.

Since then, I've decided to just transplant a hard top roof since I couldn't come up with a good way to put the weather strip back in and get everything sealed up, amongst other things. It will be easier and weigh about the same. A-pillar tubes will be within a 1/2 of the outer roof skin so I will trim away the structure in the replacement roof, and then tie it into the tubing. I will be putting in weatherstrip back in and the car will be driven on the street occasionally.

BPWilliams

Another fun day in the garage. I was working on the front springs to establish the ride height and finishing on the radiator and engine compartment. Rear-end is tomorrow.....

Wrong pictures, these are the Sub frame connectors, I will post the car....

BPWilliams

Work over the weekend...

BPWilliams

Those are 17" rims and the brakes fill them up! here are the oil breather and the cold air ducts to the front brakes and the radiator.

Stephen

iTrader: (12)

How did you determine the proper placement (angle etc) of the strut mount in the cage?

deadbird

II'd like to add on a question to what Steve said.

It's it really alright to have the shaft of the strut turning with the steering ? (I don't know if anyone else asked this already, I skipped some text in the post)

The strut mounts that were removed had bearings in them to let the strut turn (float) as a whole. Now that the shaft is bolted direct to the cage mount, will that be a problem over the course of time ?

I suppose what I'm asking is due to the heat build of the brakes and the fluid in the strut, will the constant twisting using the strut as the pivot cause a seal failure. Which, I'm not that into suspension tuning, would be detrimental in the midst of a race to have a strut fail.

It seems as though it may have been better to recreate the mounting point of the strut mount and then reuse it. It seems as though it may give a bit more alignment options as well.

I can't remember the members name but, I doo recall at least him rebuilding the entire front of his firebird in a manner similar to what is going on here...

BIG_MODS

iTrader: (9)

I like those wheels. What brand?

BPWilliams

They are Crager 17" Steel Soft eight rims. I waited for ever to find a steel 17" rim and two years ago Crager finally came out with them. As you know the best size rim is the 18" then you can buy cheap scrubed slicks. or you need to go back to 15" for even cheaper slicks.

We are required to run the TOYO tires so no big deal on the 17" size. Does look awsome with those big brakes in there and the Raybestos race pads (43) should pull this baby down pretty good.

89ROC-Z

iTrader: (7)

what are you doing for rear brakes?

BPWilliams

For the rear I am also running C5 Z06 brakes, they are 12.5" diameter rotors and Raybestos 43 race pads. The best part of the brake swap is that once I changed the brackets to the 2004 Corvette offsets I can now go up to Alcan 6 piston brake calipers with minimum issues. I went with the stock Z06 calipers because I got them for a great price for now!

These brakes are something like 160% more braking surface and I am running full race pads so the projected life of the rotor and pad is about 5 events. I also am using a Tilton pedal assy which has 3 master cylenders with a built in bias control. I can change the braking force from front to rear, in very small amounts within the car via a red **** hooked to the bias bar. I always had stop get out of the car and make the adjustments manually and it was a comprimise based on track/fuel load/ tempature... Now I can adjust from one lap to the next id I want to.

1brd2brd3brd4

I took some pic's of my dads car tonight. as soon as I figure out how to post them I will. So you can see some of the things we did. You need to find a set of the large IROC exhaust manifolds. I dont know what your rules are. but if you run ram horns your going to have to modify the K-member (we are not alowed to). We went from regular 305 manifolds to the IROC larger diameter output and what a world of differance! We also used a stock y-pipe off the same car, cut it and ran the exhaust up into the cab right as it comes off the y-pipe and ran it out the passenger door for ground clearance. We run dirt. hope to have some pics for you soon

gregsz-28

iTrader: (1)

IROC manifolds are the same as any other manifolds. Manifolds are engine and model specific, so a sport coupe with an LG4 will have the same manifolds as an IROC with an LG4, and a Z28 with an L98 will have the same maniflods as an IROC with an L98.

Maybe try L69 or L98 manifolds, the L69 manifolds were partially responsible for its 35hp gain over the LG4.

1brd2brd3brd4

Understood, but your kind knitt-picking there. My point was to get the bigger stock manifolds that fit the engine bay without modification.............. Most TPI engines had the larger manifolds even some of the LB9's and since you can assume that if you see an IROC its most likely a TPI car (But I know not all were). Point being there is no need to look on a berlinette for the big manifolds. Ergo "IROC" manifolds. Its pretty obvious with a glance which cars have these manifolds by the size of the Y-pipe. IROC is just a direction to head in. The guy seems pretty sharp I'm sure he can figure out what I ment.

basiccamaro

Been real busy lately and haven't had time to get back to this thread until now. BP Williams, Big Mods and Zlathim, these are all good builds and very enjoyable to read about.

I think Deadbird is right, I looked right at the strut supports on Zlathim's car and didn't even notice about the strut pivots! How is that going to steer and work without the pivot plates?

On the picture of the swaybar deal, that looks like a pretty good setup. But it is a little different than the Howe setup I was talking about. Same principal, but more adjustment with the Howe setup. But it is also a little farther away from stock, too.
The Howe setup uses all-thread with a ring welded on the bottom end, going all of the way through the box section of the front frame horn at a slight reaward ange, with a sleeve welded inside the frame for strength. There is a jam nut both on top and on the bottom of the all-thread where it sticks through the top and bottom of the frame horn (with the sleeved hole down through it). Then the ends of the sway bar go through the rings welded onto the bottom end of the all thread.

gregsz-28

iTrader: (1)

Do you have a picture of the howe setup? It's hard for me to picture what that looks like.

zlathim

Thanks for the info. I have been bugging Nick about the sfc, but at this point, we are in a time crunch. They will have to wait for later. As far as the rear of the car is concerned, it has been beefed up with rectangular tubing. There is also a pretty stout rectangular steel bumper lurking beneath the factory bumper cover, so I think we are good there.

Nice work as always! Thanks for posting.

Good point! I'll admit that we had not thought of that. Oh well, we'll let you know how this thing works. If it does not work, we will fire up the torch and hack it all off to start from scratch. We realize that some of our ideas may not work well, but it's all about the journey.

Cool, I'd love to see some pictures. If you want to post them in the thread like I do, you need to host them somewhere and link to them. I use photobucket.com. I just upload the pics there and then copy and paste the IMG code into the text of the message and the pictures magically appear!

Thanks for the info. Nick has an idea (gleaned from spying on the other cars in our class) that uses a modified version of the stock sway bar, but very similar to what you are describing. We'll let you know how it works out.

TO ALL: We really appreciate all of the input we have been getting here. You all have helped us out a bunch. If it seems like we are ignoring good advice, I assure you that we are not. We are just in a bind for time at the moment. We have missed three races so far, and we don't want to miss any more. The next race is on June 27th, (edit) but Nick is busy screwing around on the weekends so no work is getting done(/edit). We know that we can't do every thing that we want to do to the car in that amount of time, so we are going to get done what we can so that we can go racing(edit) next year(/edit). We feel that we owe it to our sponsors to get their name on the car and get it on the track(edit) or maybe it's just me who is thinking along those lines (/edit). Even though our car isn't ready, we have been at all of the races so far, and we hang around in the pits sneaking peeks at the other cars in our class to see how we compare to what they are doing. So far ( I hope I don't sound too cocky) we think that our car is built better than most. Some of the stuff I have seen on other cars makes me cringe, but it seems to be working for them, because they are racing and we are not at this point.

Right now we are working on a list of stuff that is absolutely necessary in order to get the car on the track. Much of the other stuff, ie sfc and the like, we are not going to get done, so we have just put that stuff on the back burner for now. We know that we could have a better car if these things are done, but we are simply out of time.

Please keep the ideas coming, even though we may not get to them right now, we are keeping track of what has been said here for the future when we have a little more time.

zlathim

As far as progress goes, it seems like everything we did last week was one step forward, then two steps back. We mounted the clutch master and slave only to find out the master is bypassing and leaking. We will have to replace that.

Then we installed conduit to run the fuel line through. When we went to run the fuel line, we found out that 10 feet is about 6 inches too short, so we were not able to complete that task either. Nick will have to go buy another length of fuel line.

We then started working on the radiator hoses. The bottom hose is going to work, but the upper hose is too short, so we will have to rummage through the hoses at the parts store to find one that works.

We did get a carb, but then realized that the manifold that we have will not work with it, so Nick got a different one and we will clean it up, paint it and get it on.

That is the way it went this past weekend, so we are hoping to have a little better luck this coming weekend. I'll get some pictures taken and posted up as soon as I am able.

Here is the list of stuff we need to get done before we are ready to race:

Build rear tranny mount
Build torque arm mount
Install radiator hoses & overflow tank
Swap out intake manifold
Replace clutch master cylinder
Have a driveline made
Install driveline hoops
Install fuel line
Install HEI, wires and plugs
Install carburetor
Install exhaust manifolds, pipes and muffler
Install starter
Mount shiftter
Mount temp gauge
Mount oil pressure gauge
Mount ignition switch
Mount fan switch & relays
Mount starter switch
Wire Ignition, starter, fan, & gauges
Build & install strut tower crossover bar
Install new front struts
Install new rear shocks
Install new right outer tie rod end
Plumb P/S
Install padding on cage tubes within reach of driver
Straighten, paint & install hood with pins
Finish & paint deck lid
Build cover plate for tranny hole on floor pan
Install plexiglass windshield
Cover headlight openings
Install harness
Build switch panel
Install scanner
Install fire extinguisher
Build bellhousing protection
Design, order & install sponsor decals
Put the car number on the doors
Tune engine
Test car at track and set up suspension


Thanks for looking.

BPWilliams

OK I have a question for all the backyard racers out there.......

I installed a true 3-link on my roll cage that has adjustment for the IC, I plan on running a centered bracket on the differential and here lies my question....

Has anyone had experience in welding to the cast iron surface or modifying the rear end in this fashion? I was thinking of making some elaborate brackets to stay away from welding on the cast surface but if I can I would just like to throw down some beads to the brackets and call it good....

Let me know if you have some input!

zlathim

I stole this from a 4x4 website that I frequent. I hope it helps...

BPWilliams

Thanks Zlat!

After talking with an aerospace welding supplier I have decided against welding to the cast surface. This bracket will receive 100% of the shock from the gas pedal and brake pedal and I can not risk having that part fail at 160mph. I would be putting me and others in harms way and "no can do" on that one!

I will however, weld to the axle tubes and devise a bracket that uses the stock torque arm bolt holes and the rear cover mounting holes on the top of the cover. I made a quick drawing of what this will probably turn out like and I will make it out of 3/16" Mild steel plate. I think that this will work and hold up quite well for road racing....

zlathim

BP- That looks like a great solution. I know a lot of guys weld to their cast pumpkins on 4x4s, but they aren't doing 160 mph either. I think you are doing the right thing.

1brd2brd3brd4

Hope I did this right. More pic's later if you want to see. This is an over all look of the car. We run dirt track with it. It is about 8 years old. Basicly here you see the strut brace we made and the modifid camber plate I have pic's of the way we did the exhaust through the floor and how we installed a rear fire wall. On this car we bought a late model stock chasis and cut the cage off. We then sectioned the frame and cut out the floor pan. Gutted the rockers and put the frame sections into them. Then we set the cage back onto the frame. We have to run a stock floor pan so we had to split it into 4 sections trim it and weld it back in.

zlathim

It looks like you did just fine with the pictures. Thanks for posting them.

I really like the looks of the front of your car. We still need to make some headlight opening covers for ours, I hope you don't mind if we steal some ideas from you.

What carburetor are you running? It almost looks like a single bbl in the picture. Our rules mandate that we run the 4412 Holley, but I am just wondering what you guys have and how well it works.

It looks like you added some flat steel to the strut tower plates and then elongated the adjustment slots. That is what I envisioned before Nick came up with his idea for a slotted plate. If we find out that our method does not work for one reason or another, we may be doing something similar to what you have done, although it would have to be tied directly into the tube because we hacked our inner fenders out.

I can't remember if you mentioned it before, but what tranny and rear end ratio are you running?

Are there very many 3rd gen Camaros running in your class? I only ask because we will be the first one around here that I know of.

Thanks again for posting the pictures. Feel free to post up any others that you might have.

Zane

zlathim

On another note- There is no way in *&%$ that we are going to make the June 27th race. Nick decided to go racing out of town with his dad last weekend and this weekend, so his car is going to be sitting there gathering spiderwebs instead of being worked on. The next race would be July 11th, but I bet we miss that one too. Maybe, just maybe this thing will be done in time for the race on July 25th, but I am not holding my breath at this point. Maybe we should just shoot for next year....

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Carb is a Rodchester 2 bbl. I think its a casting number 114(last 3 didgits) might be a 118 tho, I cant remember. Drilled and tapped for Holley jets.They run stronger than one might think. Take all the ideas you want I'm glad to help. Just put my name on the car! LOL. Our track is a 3/8's mile dirt oval We run a TH350 in second gear with anywhere from 3:73's to 4:30's. Right now Dad has 3:73's in the Camaro, I run 4:11 in my car (it's a 78-84 Malibu)but would like a set of 4:30's as some of the others run. No other 3rd gens in the class. Dad was the first and only. We did have a few people try to run some in what we call the "Any car" class or "Run what you brung" as we say in the south. And of corse your late models run "Camaro" bodies/noses. But they dont really count. Here is some pic's of how we did the exhaust, up through the floor and out the passenger door. One of our dash, crude but effective. I wish I could get the camera in the back to show how we did the spring perches. I'll try.