After thinking about my hood latch failure I realized it would be a lot safer to have the locking nut mounted on the top side of the upper hood latch bracket. I purchased my car as a roller with the body work done and the latch was installed with the locking nut below the upper mounting plate tightened against the tack welded latch nut. It made it 22K miles like this and I'm not sure which way its done from the factory but the way I've done it below is much safer.

http://carphotos.cardomain.com/image.../19090146.jpeg

Pic is with the latch off the car but I can still just barely get a 3/4" wrench on the nut with it installed on the hood for fine tuning the hood latch height.

So mine failed as well (three different times), you have the male side (hood) shown (you'll need the blue pill for your hood lol), while i had issues with that factory weld breaking (then rewelded, had the back up nut you have shown), my issues were on the female side (still haven't solved it-hence the "eff it" hood pins). Good luck with that...

Change the nut out to a "nylock" or a "hex lock nut"....

Hmm what failed on the female side? Did it break or allow the male pin to slip out?

Good idea. I threw locktight on the nut when I assembled it but a nylon locking nut is probably safer.

Been trying to catch up on some updates.
Since getting the car on the road I've felt my Mast crate motor ran way too rich. This was based on:
> How bad it stunk up the garage when working on it and idling it for any length of time
> Horrible mpg (best tank was 100% freeway super easy driving and 15mpg, most tanks 10-12)
> Black soot all over the tail panel after 1-2 tanks of gas

So last Thursday I took it over to Westech to have them tune it on their chassis dyno. I'm not sure if the car runs any better or not and it's too soon to judge if the MPG improved. It was interesting that the Mast factory tune was spot on for full throttle at a very rich 11.5-12.0 AFR. Initially Eric at Westech was shocked at how rich that was but as soon as we started adjusting towards 12.5-12.9 AFR the motor made less power.

With the Mast tune the car made 505 hp to the wheels and 493 torque. After realizing they couldn't improve it Westech's final tune made 497 hp and 482 tq. Interestingly the Westech tune made 10-20 less hp and torque over the entire RPM range... They said that the difference is small enough to be chassis dyno related...

Here is some video from the day.



My old zz4 motor was chassis dynoed at 280 hp and 326 tq. So the new set up makes 80% more hp and 51% more tq. Doesn't drive as nice as my old EFI ZZ4 nor get as good of gas mileage though.

Here is an old video of the ZZ4 pull.

View on Vimeo.com

I attached to this post a PDF of the detailed numbers comparing the Mast tune and the final Westech tune.

For comparison here is the flywheel dyno from Mast:
http://carphotos.cardomain.com/image..._large.jpg?v=1


I'm not sure what to make of the engine falling off about 500 RPM sooner and the fact the Westech tune made less power.

Went out to the Camarillo autocross this past Saturday. My first time running there. Great group, very organized and despite lots of cars there we all got 15 runs. Weather was beautiful and lots of cool cars.

I think the fastest time of the day was a 40.4. Below is a video of my best lap at 42.6... As you can see from the in car view I've got some work to do on my driving technique. Sal ran in the 41's... also a reason I got to work on my driving :)



Some pics Jason from TCI took.

One of the highlights was riding shotgun with Sal from TCI when he went flying off into the dirt at 60+ mph. That run got the blood pumping!
http://photos-b.ak.instagram.com/hph...12112299_n.jpg

Ed's gorgeous Mustang
http://photos-e.ak.instagram.com/hph...31871643_n.jpg

https://fbcdn-sphotos-e-a.akamaihd.n...883cb9c43b5fca

My car on course.
https://scontent-b-lax.xx.fbcdn.net/...9b&oe=5541B987

Dyno's are tuning tools -- no two will give you the same readings. They're used to know if the tuning is going the right way or the wrong way.

My new Mustang motor "dyno'd" at slightly less power than the previous build... funny - because not only does it sound more powerful - it runs better and FEELS way better.

2014 Super Chevy Handling Challenge
 

The March issue of Super Chevy has the write up from the 2014 Handling Challenge.

You can read it on their website here: http://www.superchevy.com/features/1...s-1968-camaro/

Cool pic:
http://image.superchevy.com/f/867143...ont-view-1.jpg

Their video:


They were a bit critical of the street manners / ride quality of the suspension. A big part of this is due to the fact that no shock changes were made to the car for the street portion. Personally, when I drive the car to the track I soften up the rear shocks a fair amount which totally transforms the ride quality into one that is much more street friendly. I also know the car would of scored much better on the skid pad but we made a shock tuning change right before that test which was in the wrong direction.

Anyhow always cool to see your car in the magazine! It was a fun event.

Very cool Chad! She looks great in the magazine. After all that work and frustration it must feel pretty good to finally be able to have some fun.

We're going to SOW's on the 8th with Speed Ventures if you're looking for a "fix."

I thought it was cool Chad! Wish I coulda made it.