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1985 Monte Carlo
Lance,
Good to see it is going together Yes you do get good at pulling and reinstalling engines if you run them hard and have had the same vehicle for a while My Firebird has eaten 8 engines and the current one has been in and out 3 times now Pantera has only been 3 times Practice makes perfect Hope it runs great Bob |
Headers and transmission in place...
https://photos.smugmug.com/1985-Mont..._131139-XL.jpg Good thing I don't do this for a living, I'd go broke. Only small parts left on the table now, hopefully the rest goes pretty quick and pain free. |
What headers are you running? They kind-of look like the 3/4 length variety in that image.
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I guess you would call them a "mid'length". Longer than a shorty but much shorter than a long tube.
https://images.holley.com/2466-1hkr_02.jpg https://www.holley.com/products/exha...arts/2466-1HKR For my application they are probably as good as it would get. A couple spark plugs are a bear to get in and the rear passenger side bolt can only be accessed from under the car. A skinny 5/16s box end can tighten the rest of the bolts down okay. |
Ok.... About the same thing I've used on the G-bodies I've done. I call them 3/4 length as most refer the street-rod style that dump like RamHorns as 'shorties'.
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Had to make another run to Speedway this afternoon to get another fitting to finish the fuel line up, then it freaking leaked a little bit anyway. I strategically placed a few fire extinguishers around and fired it off anyway...and it hit and fired off on the first hit of the key. Took a quick look around and topped off the coolant, then shut it down to wait for my neighbor Mark to get there. Then we fired it back off and he held it up around 2,000 RPM for 20 minutes or so while I watched for leaks runs, drips or errors and fire...
It sounds awesome and seems to be super smooth. I marked the intake and distributor before taking it apart and basically just put the distributor right back on the marks and it seems pretty dang close. No hint of smoke out the exhaust, cooling system works perfectly, hot idle oil pressure is almost double what it was before...and no strange noises...so far I'm very happy. Now I get to re-do the fuel line, then put the shifter in and make sure the clutch is all good...then put a timing light on it and dial that in...then it's time to hit the streets!!! |
While re-doing a motor hurts the wallet, its a good excuse to upgrade some items, and the sound of the first exhaust note of a fresh motor has to rank right up there with any automotive pleasures.
Break it in and let er rip Lance. |
Congrats, Lance! Glad you got it all back together. Have fun breaking it in.
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First drive in the books! All good...
Man does is accelerate smoother now. I've had people tell me before it vibrated under acceleration but I've always just thought that's how it is. Now I know what they were talking about. It is SO much smoother than before. Power is good, I didn't beat on it too hard but enough to realize it's spiking lean on hard tip in and waits until fuel catches up before it takes off like a banshee. I've already sent the logs and file to the tuner and we'll get that cleaned up right quick. It's making a bit less vacuum at idle, so pulling fuel out there and adding a TON of fuel at WOT middle RPM range. We had the comp % limited to 15% since the last tune was so dialed in, he adjusted that out also to help dial it in. Email just came in with new tune. Time to upload it and go drive again!! |
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Most of it is probably from balancing the clutch.
2nd tune got it much closer. Its still asking for more fuel 3500-5000 rpm at WOT...which is good because that means its making more power there. All else still great. I'll nut and bolt everything tomorrow and drop another tune in it...then maybe take some video. Oh, and now my injectors vibrate my dash instead of my floor... |
I have about 100 miles on the new build so far, tuning has gone well and the new install bugs all seem to be worked out. Very happy with it so far. It is much smoother now thanks to the great balance and it winds up a bit faster than before.
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Same cam right? Are you guys 'helping' the tuning or are the changes from the self learn functionality of the set-up?
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Same cam... Bit more compression, bit more dwell because of rod length change and revs faster because of better balance.
The learn table initially asked for some stuff that was pretty strange. We chased it for a while and figured out we were going the wrong way. We found a couple of little things that were contributing to the "strangeness", fixed those and now we are back on the right track getting it real close once again. It's been pretty close all along, we are just fine tuning it trying to make it as good as it can be. The process basically is to drive the car letting it learn and compensate live, then we look at the learn table once back in the garage and decide how to make permanent changes to the base fuel table etc. |
Car sounds really good Lance.
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I had my car out on the road yesterday. Weather finally broke and we had mid 70s yesterday morning. I have to say, the new engine LOVED the cooler weather. :D
After the drive I sent my tuner Andrew the GCF and in true Andrew fashion, he liked what he saw but wanted to "try" a few things differently. He monkeyed around with the air temp enrichment, the AE vs TPS table and some stuff via teamviewer live on the idle. It was fun to mess with it again, been too long since weather was good enough to enjoy tinkering on it. Today the plan is to pull the oil filter and run it over to the builder so he can cut open and analyze. Hopefully it's all good and I can put a new filter on, top off the Valvoline VR1 20W50 racing oil and go racing next weekend. I'm registered to run local SCCA event on Sept 20. |
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NASA is running at Inde in late Oct. I went to a Proautosports event there last weekend and the weather was pretty good - should be great in Oct. Also went to the new track at Maricopa - Apex. Nice and close, and I will be looking for events there. I'll keep you posted. Pappy |
Yes please, let me know Pappy. Friends of mine were up at Inde last weekend, the heat and a scheduling conflict kept me from making it.
Plus, well...I'm just not ready to treat this new engine the way I treated the old one. :D Yet... Can't afford to do this again any time soon... |
You planning to dyno the new engine once you get some miles on her, Lance? Glad it's worked out so well for you.
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Finally got back out on course Sunday after a 7 month long break. Had a blast running our "modified" event, was a bummer to not get too see those that ran the afternoon session but hopefully by next event the restrictions will be lifted.
Here are the results... http://www.azsolo.com/backup/index.p...s-info/results I was 17th raw time, 18th pax and finished 0.16 seconds out of first place in a packed CAM T class. Pretty happy with that, had a blast racing with James all day for the class win, congrats to him on that. I've watched all the videos back, multiple times and spent some time talking with others about the course and times and watching other videos. I think I could have got a bit more out of the car with better line choice (keeping the course shorter) and maybe been more aggressive on the start. That said, I still think it did pretty dang well. The new engine and more importantly the tune fixes REALLY helped increase the mid range power as well as making it pretty manageable to put down. Other than aerating the power steering fluid on my first run, the powertrain performed flawlessly all day. The only suspension adjustment I made to the car during the run group was to add one round of rear brake bias and then back a half round back out after 1 run. It is amazing to me how just one turn on the knob can change it enough to lock the back brakes up first before the fronts. Here is my fastest run of the day with the Solostorm data overlayed. The new version of Solostorm took some getting used to but in the end is MUCH easier to deal with than the older version I was running. I just need to get more of our Region's drivers to start using it so we can compare to each other's runs and all get better. It's an invaluable tool... |
Nice work, Lance. I'm glad you were able to get it back out there. 7 months is pretty quick I'd say.
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Thanks Trey... Technically I only missed the March and April local SCCA events. I guess I picked a good time to blow it up huh? :D |
Strangely, I didn't take one picture while performing my latest upgrade. Not one...
So text will have to do to keep you all in the loop. A friend graciously offered to loan me a third member with a Gleason Torsen differential and 3.89:1 gears so we swapped it in this morning. My Detroit Locker had been acting a bit funny ever since the track day when I hurt the engine and I didn't quite trust it anymore. It started shuddering on decel and making all sorts of weird clanks and clunks and had a "dartiness" to it on the street. Plus, I have been wanting to ditch it ever since the new big sway bar install up front as it just isn't needed any longer and it detriments were outweighing it's good traits. I was anxious to see how much metal was in the bottom of the case and what else we may find and honestly, it all looked and felt pretty normal. Gears look decent still as well. IF there is anything wrong with it, it's inside the locker itself. Driving the Gleason is pleasurable for sure. It basically acts and feels like an open differential until you stab the gas enough to spin a tire which it then instantly and smoothly engages as a locker and spins both equally. No strange dartiness, no clunks or clangs, just smooth operating. The 3.89 gear is great for street driving. Haven't had it out on the highway yet but I expect it to shine there as well. For SCCA\second gear courses I also expect it to shine. Looking at drive ratio calculators it appears that it'll top out at 71 mph at 6500 RPM which is perfect. First gear Good Guys courses it hurts a bit more though. 6500 with the 3.50 was 51 mph while 6500 with the 3.89 will be 47 mph. 7,000 RPM gets it back up to around 51 mph though. I may be just a bit limited on top speed in first gear but it should pull harder getting there and the Torsen should make getting around the tight turns better as well so who knows... We'll race it next Saturday with SCCA, that will be it's first real test. Personally...I can't wait to feel how it acts in the first high speed sweeper. I know I'm gonna LOVE it. I'm pretty sure I'll dig the lower gear for pulling out of corners as well. |
Man does my car like the 3.89 gear on the street! I've had a 3.50 gear in it forever, cant believe the difference that little bit of a lower gear makes. The WOT shifts land right in the powerband and the car just keeps on pulling hard. Still loving the Gleason as well.
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275/35/18 RE71s about 25.5" tall new, 25.0" tall in current condition.
I've run these ever since going to the 18s about 3.5 years ago. |
I have 3.90s in the TA, Lance. I love them. I could have easily gone 4.10s as highway speeds in sixth still puts me right at 2000rpms. 26 inch rear tire I want to say.
Do you have a lightweight flywheel, too? I have a Fidanza aluminum unit. Rev match down shifting is so easy as it revs so freely. Glad you're enjoying the new rear gear ratio. |
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Ran a comparison of drive ratios between the 3.50 and 3.89 gear. Speed At Engine RPM 6500 3.50 vs 3.89 1st Gear Speed 53 48 2nd Gear Speed 79 71 3rd Gear Speed 108 98 4th Gear Speed 141 127 5th Gear Speed 190 171 6th Gear Speed 282 254 I'll race the 3.89 at SCCA this weekend and I assume I'll love it. We'll see how the Gleason acts as well. Some say they unlock when the inside tire is lifted and while I've fought that int he past, I don't believe it'll be an issue now. We'll see. I can't wait to barrel off into the first sweeper and not have to cringe waiting for the BANG when the old locker would disengage. That alone should make this a MUCH nicer diff to race with. |
I spent the last week or so chasing and correcting some issues so I figured it was a good time for an update to the build thread.
When I originally swapped in the electric cooling fans about 10 years ago, I also upgraded to a CS-144 style 140 amp alternator which I hung off of March Underdrive pulleys and brackets. It took a bit of work to get the larger alternator case to work with the bracket and turnbuckle and several tries on belt length until I got it "right". It all worked pretty well until about 3 years ago when that alternator failed (right after moving to Phoenix and of course a couple of days before my first race event here). A friend loaned me a Alternator out of a 90 Caprice which is basically the same as what I had and I've been running it since. When I swapped in the EFI last year, I discovered that the alternator didn't put out enough amps at idle to run a heavy load of accessories. By the time the AC blower was full blast and engine cooling fans were on high, the charging system was down around 12 volts. We remedied that by building a table into the EFI software that bumped the idle up as the volts dropped below where they needed to be...and that worked well as well. For the last year I've been limping along a 9 year old Optima Red Top that would only charge to about 12.2-12.3 volts even with the big Optima charger. It was fine as well as long as I kept up on it. Well, until Tuesday that is. This is the day I finally took my wife for a second ride in the car since the EFI install. The first time was when it was 110 degrees out and the ECU freaked out when the volts dropped too low and we barely made it home. This time I dropper her off at Target for a bit then went for a cruise to see how Andrew's latest tune was...when I noticed the care was having trouble idling. When I looked...the volts were down in the 10s... Even a cruise up the highway wouldn't cure it so I called her, told her I'd come back in the truck to get her as I had to get the car home. I pulled into the driveway with it at 9.5 volts and yes, it was dead as soon as I turned it off. My first thought was the battery finally died. It would hold 12.1v but as soon as I turned key on and fuel pump would prime it would drop into the 9s...so I put a new battery in it. During the next test drive, all was good, volts were fine, it idled great...all good... Until the engine warmed up enough to turn fans on when the volts dropped down to 12.0 once again. Even revving the engine to 3,000 RPMS wouldn't spin the Alternator fast enough to make enough amps to run the fans. So I started the chase for a new alternator knowing full well I had about 3 days before a race and then another 5 days or so before a 2 day race event at Good Guys. Making wholesale changes to the charging system was a dream, but reality was I needed it to be fixed that day. I found a place that rebuilt alternators here in town, so I loaded both of mine up and headed there. They gave me several options but the most favorable wouldn't be ready for 8-10 days (270 amp alt that would bolt right on). So I bought a rebuilt CS-144 with a stock smaller pulley for about $100 and headed home. I knew I'd need a shorter belt but I forgot that I'd need to work around the turnbuckle that would only move the alternator so far before it would interfere one way or the other. A 42" belt was great with the larger March pulley. A 41" looked to be about right with the smaller stock sized pulley, but O'Reillys only had a 40" in stock. Of course it moved the alternator so close to the water pump the turnbuckle was too long. I thought about cutting it down or searching for a shorter one...then decided to try AutoZone to see if they had a 41" belt, which they did. I had to fiddle with the turnbuckle just a bit to get it so it would tighten the belt up but in the end everything ended up in just about the right spot. Next time I have it off I'll space the turnbuckle out from the Alt just a bit for a bit more room to turn the lock nut but for now, it's ready to race. https://photos.smugmug.com/1985-Mont..._141334-X2.jpg What is really sweet is it now holds 14.3v at idle with the cooling fans on. And with every accessory and light on full blast it holds about 12.8v at idle...so the smaller pulley and the fresh alternator cured the charging issue I've had for a LONG time. I've got the car all cleaned up, all autocross gear loaded up and it's ready to head out at the butt crack of dawn tomorrow for Arizona Region Fall 2020 Event 3. |
This is the best picture I have with the old Alternator and March underdrive pulley.
https://photos.smugmug.com/1985-Mont..._143213-X2.jpg |
Glad you got it fixed, Lance. Good luck at the event!
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Guess I forgot to update here...
Picked these up on a Black Friday deal. https://photos.smugmug.com/1985-Mont..._113544-X2.jpg 275/35/18 Falken RT660s Once mounted they are about 1/4" wider than the RE71s. https://photos.smugmug.com/1985-Mont..._152805-X2.jpg https://photos.smugmug.com/1985-Mont..._152821-X2.jpg I've scrubbed them in and man, I hadn't realized just how bad my old tires were. Just on the street these ride so much better. They also make pretty good clouds of smoke when spinning... I get to try them on the track for the first time this coming Saturday. And just because, here are a few pics my friend took of me at GGs couple weeks ago. https://photos.smugmug.com/1985-Mont...84599_o-X3.jpg https://photos.smugmug.com/1985-Mont...55413_o-X3.jpg https://photos.smugmug.com/1985-Mont...99664_o-X3.jpg https://photos.smugmug.com/1985-Mont...67040_o-X3.jpg |
Great action shots, Lance. Glad the new tires are working well for you.
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Your pic about old alternator with pulley.
When I zoom it, ��it doesnt make any sence. Pulley not in alternator axle. One of the belts coming and another belt cuts off before water pump.. To me looks alot like photoshop'ed.. |
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Yes I was... and why didnt I think of that.... My bad.. |
Been a bit since my last actual car update. I've raced the car a few times with the new tires installed and frankly...I'm just not happy with it's performance. At our last event I had to make a hero run on my last run to get back past Mat for the CAM T win by 2 tenths, but still placed like 37th in raw time out of 120 which is not up to par. I got to thinking about things, analyzing videos and data from the event, and decided it was time to get back to basics. It had been 3 full years since the car was on an alignment rack and tire temps taken after my runs at January event showed the inside edge of the front tires was 10 degrees hotter than the outside edge...a sign of too much camber (for this tire apparently). I am also having trouble putting power down without the rear stepping out if I have any steering angle in the car at all, probably related to the torque sensing rear diff. When I get back into the gas while still turned the inside wheel slips just a bit, the diff senses this and directs 2.5 times the torque to the outside wheel which then spins more and throws the car sideways. While I love the diff for corner entry and roll through portions of a turn, I hate it's corner exit traits and this is where this car makes it's bones...on corner exit. Something has to change.
First up, full physical evaluation to see where things are. I started by weighing the car. https://photos.smugmug.com/1985-Mont..._141012-X2.jpg This is the naked car, no driver weight. https://photos.smugmug.com/1985-Mont..._150441-X2.jpg Some how over the past 3 years the car has gained 80 pounds. The good thing is, it is almost all on the rear tires. This is with simulated driver weight in the driver seat. https://photos.smugmug.com/1985-Mont..._140812-X2.jpg I'm actually pretty happy with this. Cross weight % and weight equals right side % and weight to the pound. I also measured ride heights with the driver's weight in car and I'm happy with that as well, right where I like things. I then rolled the car back, replaced the front scales with turn plates, rolled the car back forward and checked the alignment. This is where things went haywire. https://photos.smugmug.com/1985-Mont..._155334-X2.jpg This is the sheet from the last time I had the car aligned...on a computerized rack, with a trained tech, that I paid good money for. https://photos.smugmug.com/1985-Mont..._082757-X2.jpg Shame on me for not keeping a better eye on things. Now that I see where it was set with my own eyes, and realize there has been way too much camber in the RF for the past 3 years, a few things are starting to add up. One for instance is the RF has a tendency to lock up under hard braking when entering a right hand turn, the LF doesn't have this issue. My goal was to take some static camber out to try to get the tire temps more evenly spread across the tire and I also wanted to see how taking a bit of caster out affected the rear tire weight...to see if "caster jacking" is somehow playing havoc with my diff causing my rear stepping out issue. I quickly realized that I had some work to do to get things back in shape. After a bunch of pulling shims, measuring, rolling the car back and forth, measuring again, etc etc...I came up with this. LF Camber -1.25* RF Camber -1.00* LF Caster +9.00* RF Caster -9.25* Toe in 1/8" That is close enough for now to see how the tires and the car react. We race again Feb 13 which will be next test. Before I made any alignment changes, I measured the weight on the rear tires with the front tires on turn plates. Actually I took 3 measurements, 15* left turn, wheels straight, and 15* right turn. I'm not sure if this test was scientific or not as I'm certain there are other variables at play. The results were interesting though. With the extra 1.50* camber in the RF and 10.00* LF and 10.75* caster RF, a 15* left turn lifted 66#s from the LR and put 20#s onto the right rear also resulting in 47#s moving to the LF I suppose while a 15* right turn lifted 41#s from the RR and put 41#s on the LR. After I made all of the alignment changes, I did the same test again. This time a 15* left turn lifted 32#s from the LR and put 27#s onto the right rear resulting in 5#s moving to the LF I suppose while a 15* right turn lifted 44#s from the RR and put 44#s on the LR. Basically basically the changes netted almost zero change in caster jacking on a right hand turn but really cleaned up and evened out the caster jacking on a left hand turn, the differences between the two probably have something to do with the car being so left side heavy. I can't wait to see if the changes help the rear end stick better at all, I kind of have my doubts. I am encouraged that I'll be able to dive into a corner harder and possibly carry more mid turn speed now with the front geometry evened out and better. Tire temps after a few runs will tell the real story though. Moral of the whole story though...stop paying other people to do things you can do yourself... Every freaking time it seems like I pay someone else to do something, they screw it up. You'd think I'd know better by now. |
Barney
Hate to say it Lance but going away
from the Re71rs may be an issue Killer tire as far as I am concerned Several years back I could not get my Hoosier size for a track event so went to a hankook dot road race tire Best thing I ever did. Changed the car dramatically MY 2cents Bob |
Well, the RE71 is going away so not really my choice. I'm not convinced the tire is my issue yet, hopefully I can dial the car into these still.
They have good grip for sure. |
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