Found some 35mm photos of my original car so I decided to scan them then make a list of the car over the years. I'm not sure if I have pics of all the engines.

1999. Installed slicks and SFC and went racing. Car number C454. Running 14's



By 2002 it had a new paint job and a scoop. BBC is under the hood already. Car number still C454. Running 11's



2003, more decals and a name on the car. Changed car number to C033. Running 10's



Spring 2004, went to a different scoop. Car number still C033. Still running 10's



2005 I tried this idea but the top only lasted half a season. Car number now CX09. Finally got the car into the high 9's

 

Ran it like this in 2006-2007. Car was cursed so it got the name Black Pearl and a car number H311 (HELL). Running mid 9's



Finally did a drastic change and ended up like this in 2008. No more curse and the car number now changed to 1Z28. Running low 9's

 

that's the type of evolution they should be teaching in school....

 

I love how the tires keep gettng tucked in more through the years. those first wheels were just horrid

 

What does 2009 hold for its evolution?

 

Those first tires were 15x10 rims with 3.5" backspace. I bought them used just before the race season started just so I had some good rims for the slicks. Shortly after that I bought some with 5.5" backspace and it made a big difference. Tire sizes kept changing also. Every time I went deeper in gears, the tire got wider and taller. Started off with 26 x 10.5 ET Streets. Final size before the back half was 29.5 x 10.5 ET Drag's. There was 2-3 different sizes between those. Once I back halved the car, the tires really got tucked under the fenders with 32 x 14's. The first year, the front tires were 165R15 VW tires mounted on space saver rims. Looked ugly but a cheap way to have front skinnies. Could have looked better if the rims were painted silver.

2009 won't bring any cosmetic changes. I think I now have the look I want. If I make another change, there will be an Enderle injection hat sitting on the tunnel ram or a blower poking through the hood.

I just finished upgraded the diff with an aluminum center section, spool and pinion support and dropped the gears from 4.86 to 4.57 to bring the rpm down a bit.



I purchased some bigger heads but I'm not expecting them to arrive until at least mid January. My old heads are too small for this engine. I also purchased a parachute. The mount is already installed and I'm pushing closer to 150 mph where I'm required to have it. Other than that, I need to pull the tranny to upgrade some SFI stuff.

The car needs to be back together and running by mid March. I need to get a chassis certification for 2009.

 

I like the looks of the 2003 and the 2008 pics. I think most of us started out that way too. One thing about this sport, the work is never done. I've got my 406 back together, and will be putting it back in towards the end of the month. Probably will have to gear it down to tame it down some though. Can't run faster than 6.39. With the meds I take for the tickker, I found out I can't get a NHRA liecense. Oh well I'm happy running 6.40.

 

OK. Looked through different engine pictures to see what I had and tried to make sense of what years they were from.

1999-2000 383 SBC that came with the car. First year sucked only running low 14's. The engine had problems. Second year after changing the heads, carb, tranny and converter, I was able to get into the high 11's before blowing up this high mileage street engine.



Next came a BBC. Displacement ranged from 454 to 469 (454 + .070") for 2001-2004. It was damaged at least once every year.



In 2005-2007, a 540 was put together and went straight to alcohol and a tunnel ram with the rectangular port aluminum heads.



In 2008, the alcohol carbs were gone and an injection system was installed along with an intake swap.

 

flyin-toilets are neat, but a hat is just plain cool. You thinking bird or bug? - if From the pics of my blue car, you can clearly see my vote....the throttle response of an over-driven blower will blow your mind!

 

Any pics of the back halfing process? That car has seen its fair share of change thats for sure. Looks awesome though.

 

There a thread on doing the back half somewhere in the Fabrication forum. Search for "back half project". There's a similar page on my web site without all the user comments.

The toilets are dual 4.1". 1800 CFM each. I doubt I'd put a hat or a blower on the car anytime soon but they would look cool. Even having a hat on top of a blower

I would need a minimum of an 8-71 blower. I already run around 13:1 compression but running alcohol isn't that bad if a high compression engine is also blown.

I could even install a dual NOS plate system on the car. Two cheap 150 shot plates under the toilets for an extra 300 HP would be a good kick in the pants. I'm not into running in an Outlaw class where I need to get into the 8's with a power adder. I'm trying for that 8 second time slip with NA HP. If I got down to a lower elevation, I might be able to do it. Racing at 5000' density altitude sucks.

If you look at the car pictures, the first one, the car was running in the 13's. Second picture, it was in the 11's. Third and fourth picture it was 10's. By 2005, it was my 7th year of racing the car and I was hitting 9's and I've been inching down ever since. It's hard to say if I'll ever take that 9 off the windows and replace it with an 8.

 

There's a guy down here running a 540 with a 671. He has yet to go faster with a new stripped 1471. Some combinations work. - It runs mid-low 5's in the 1/8.

I must be too used-to low altitude. I've got a buddy with a weekend warrior stang that's running 9.17 on 28x11.5's, stock suspension, stock wheel wells. He drive's it atleast once or twice a week. 351ci with a fogger, jetted at 250. He's got some mre to wring out of it yet, looking to get into the 8's with it. - It's tough to get a decent tune-up spraying a methanol motor. The no2 doesn't mix with methanol for crap so you about have to spray gas with it. There's a few guys who pretty well have it figured out.

We run just at 12:1 compression in the outlaw car with the 1471 turning 25% up. I turn the motor around 9600. When the buzzard showed up with the new blower I was dumb-founded....three 5-1/2" butterflies...

 

It's easy to use a race gas/NOS mix since many kits are jetted for gas but there are also kits jetted to alcohol. You need to dump almost twice as much alcohol as gas with the NOS. Gas jets and solenoids can't flow enough fuel.

 

That makes sense. I've found that many people understand that you have to dump/use more fuel with methanol, but most don't realize how much more(obviously not refering to you here). - My dad showed me this years ago; He took a coke can, cut the top off so it was an open cylinder and filled it with methanol. He unhooked the accel pumps on the carb, he opened the butterflies and dumped the can in(basically in one motion)...it stumbled cause it didn't get enough fuel on the hit. - There are a couple guys down here playing with NOS and methanol that are spraying with gas off an enrichment tank. You get the cooling of methanol with the nos/fuel mix of gas. They've said finding a tune was tough but supposedly it hits harder and is a bit more forgiving.

 

Wow, I had to find this thread to show someone how much the car changed over the years and didn't realize how old the thread was. I hope to have some new pics this year. With the fiberglass doors installed over the winter, the flames on the doors are slightly different but other than that, very little has changed. The chute did get installed. The car finally got a chassis certification in the spring of 2010. The 4.57 gears sucked and I quickly went back to 4.86. The large Dart 360 heads were rebuilt and installed for the 2009 season. I didn't really run any quicker but the engine sure liked the high rpms after the head swap. It didn't feel like it was nosing over at 7400 like it did with the smaller heads. A different cam can really wake up these big heads but I'm not ready for a cam swap yet.

I now have a look that's familiar and popular and don't plan on any more changes. The car will probably look like this for many more years.

 

Car is definetely one of a kind.
Primered third gen with flames and Alcohole injected BBC/PG