The Comeback.

Phew, what a crazy few weeks. After our initial teardown from the last post, the full teardown revealed where things started to go wrong.


#6 broke a rod bolt, which was the splayed rod cap that was in the bottom of the pan. 5 and 1 followed suit as things wound down, so we have 3 mangled souvenirs for garage art. Our suspicion that the heads were spared proved to be correct, but they did need some work to get back into shape.


Lots of bent valves, and about .004" warpage around #6 from the piston hitting it (!). Everything cleaned up well, saving us a LOT of time and headache.


All ready to go back together.

A bit of cleanup..

While the pieces for the motor were being staged, I took the Saturday morning before the 4th to clean up the mess that evacuating the crankcase at 6000+ rpm left. Literally everything under the hood was bathed in a fine coating of Driven XP3 oil.


Misery is..crawling around under a car while oil and SuperClean drip in your face. At least it was early so it wasn't too hot yet.


Better. Faster. Cooler.

While everything was out, it was the perfect time to finish up our cooling system upgrades. Step one: streamlining the airflow through the nose. Without the crash bumper, the nose has two big caverns for air to flow into and go nowhere.


The second half of this equation is a bigger radiator. The old one had a few extra inches on each side. A new 31" fit the bill, maximizing the space and just fitting between the framerails, core support, and steering box. We transferred the Black Magic fan over to a new shroud, with a relief for the steering box, and got it mounted to a set of extended tabs.


421

Back to the motivation. Dad got everything assembled on the 4th, and we got it set up on the run stand for break-in time last week.


Had a couple little quirks to take care of on the valve seals (which have given us problems on these heads a couple times in the past), but this week we were able to get it dropped in.


Fortunately, our system works pretty well and has been made even easier in the new shop. The plan is to button up the rest of the details Sunday and take it down the road. I can't wait to see how 40+ cubic inches helps motivate things :D

Time is short for Austin, but we will hopefully get it to two autocrosses before then to help me get a handle on things. A lot of memories of thrashing to make it to Drag Week in 09 the last few weeks. That ended up working out pretty well, let's hope we're good for another.

The motor sounds sweet, Nice crisp throttle response.

Thanks, Wayne. The crazy thing is that's with a weak little HEI and headers that are way too small. It sounds a little, uh, different with the MSD and some pipe behind it.

Speaking of..

27 Days

It lives. Today we got everything buttoned up and took it down the road. Seems happy, other than a few odds and ends to work out. Dad has done a killer job with the motor, I'm super happy for him that it's doing what it should be.


It's crazy, it sounds like a completely different car. We fired it open headers for a minute to make sure things were good before going back up and finishing the exhaust. It was immediately apparent that it's a whole new animal - it's got THUMP with the extra cubes.

With the mufflers on, it's super deep compared to the raspy scream that the 377 had. Still turns 6500 before you know it, though. Did a quick pull from 3000 in second during my short drive back and it's zero drama, it just gets down.

We have two events on the schedule the next two Sundays - just enough time to relearn the car and figure out what this whole low-end torque thing is all about.

Sweet update! Nice turnaround getting it back on the road again. Good luck with the relearning of the car, torque is good... :D

Glad to hear everything is going well Dusty! I don't know that you needed more power tho! Your mighty mouse power was more than the tires could handle, and most the rest of us around the area!

Can't wait to see/hear the new power. Good luck at COTA and please come back without things broken.

Greg

very nice indeed!! Good luck at COTA as well.....

Thanks, guys, looking forward to COTA even more after this weekend. Speaking of..

LET'S GET BACK TO IT!

Two events to get things sorted. First up was Equipe Rapide this past weekend, and the new combo didn't disappoint.


Before that, though, a full day in the shop was needed on Saturday. There is still much to be done, including front aero, CoolShirt mounting and wiring, and a whole list of other things I can't even think about right now.


Picked up where I left off before we went into crisis mode on the air dam/splitter. Finished up the driver's side half of the template and started shredding aluminum. Still finalizing the support structure for this, but it uses .040 aluminum and will have at least 3 steel struts tied to the bumper support frame.


Got the second piece started, but it was quickly time to get loaded up so this is where it sits currently.


Dad also got a shiny new red tow hook mounted up front (one of those things you remember you don't have when you're sitting stranded on the back side of the track..).


Continued next post..

Let's Do This Thing


Sunday's event saw us getting the lucky draw of running first before the temps climbed to the top of the gauge. The car was perfect through the whole session, with a slight 'run-on' event after killing it one run that was solved by pulling a touch of timing out with the MSD timing retard.

The 421 is a lot like the 377 amplified. It's still got runaway power at 5000+ (it would spin the tires at 60+ over crests on the course), but the fat buttery smooth torque curve getting to that point is downright addictive.

Pulling out of lower speed corners has never been as good as it is now. The newly neutral handling that the stiffer front springs gave it combined with down-low grunt is just awesome. Through 6 runs I was still finding time and pushing harder, and a little more tuning on the brakes will improve things even more.

The sound is pretty sweet, too (at least I think it is).


This was my last run of the day (thanks to not checking the fuel level - more on that shortly). A 58 was in the bag (GPS markers were off, this run was a 59.1), but I botched the last offset into the finish costing just shy of .4. Super fun course that rewarded some bravery through the middle..


FuelSafe Mysteries

Back to that fuel thing. As frequent readers will remember, we installed a rather pricey FuelSafe cell in the car in anticipation of running big boy tracks. It included a tube-type sending unit, which apparently only reads every inch. This means that the fuel level is either 0, 12, 26, or 54.

After run 6, I technically had two runs left due to a rerun and a timing error, but we were showing 0 on the gauge. Could have been 11, could have been 0. We don't know. Not overly happy with that aspect of that purchase, but we'll learn to work around it.

What's Left to Do

Feeling pretty good about things heading into Austin. We have an SCCA event next weekend to get a last bit of seat time in, but before then we'll do our best to finish up the air dam, get the CoolShirt cooling, and do our best to nut and bolt the whole car in short order. The fun's just getting started :headspin:

Quickie update. Drove up and spent a few hours on the air dam Tuesday night. Hoping to get the finish work done on the aluminum and the steel reinforcement frame and road test it Saturday.


Tick tock! Closing in on a week..

Glad you were able to get back in the game so quickly, Duston. Good luck at COTA next week!

COTA Recap

Before we get started, let me down another of these just for good measure..


Wow, what a fun weekend yet again with Jimi Day and the Optima crew. Going to the big boy track at COTA loomed over us all last winter, and we knew the weekend would be a challenge happening in August. In the end, we got a break with the weather and had an absolute BLAST for two full days. Let’s recap it all..after a picture, just because.


Last Minute Prep

No good summertime thrash to get things put back together would be complete without a little last minute thrash to make it to the big event.

Going into the weekend before, we were able to get the air dam finalized, painted, and installed..and then figure out that it wouldn't go in the trailer anymore without some super sketchy wood stacking action.


The week of left us scrambling to clean it up and finalize little things, including my lifesaver for the weekend.


With all this done, and some RaceRamps procured (BIG thanks to Terry and Jon at Vorshlag for their help getting them here in time), it was time to head south.

Friday - Registration, Tech, and General Prep

Friday was brutal. Just, outright awful. I pride myself on being pretty tough in the heat, and had tried to prep for it, but it was just oppressive that afternoon. We got settled in at our spot, tech'd, and started the decaling process.


The canopy provided slight relief, but overall it was a draining couple of hours. We finished the day with grave doubts about how we were going to race a full weekend in it, and called it an early night back at the hotel.

Continued next post..

Optima at COTA Saturday - Design & Engineering, Speed Stop, Autocross, Road Rally


Saturday started out bright and early, with a 7 am arrival at the track. Took time to walk both courses (which I totally missed last year dealing with tech and stickering the car) and had a generally normal pre-event prep. It was a huge help having tech on Friday, and made for a much more pleasant start to the event.

We realized early on that several other Texas locals from the Dusold Designs shop were lined up to be judged first thing, and decided that sounded like the right plan. Last year we had lost the last part of our speed stop session to waiting in line for this, so knocking it out early sounded like the ticket.


Our car, I guess, is a little too much 'business' and not enough 'style' for this portion of these events, and last year we got absolutely destroyed in the judging. This year was much of the same, finishing 14th out of the 17 cars that showed up in GTV - the last car in the standings that wasn't missing road-worthiness items.

I don't get it. I won't pretend to. On to the racing..

Speed Stop

We drew run group A, and on a coin flip in the drivers meeting were selected to run speed stop first. This was ok, as we would rather give up time to be judged here than autocross which is definitely our stronger event.


Much like last year, it took several runs to get in the groove in this event. There is so much emphasis on a clean start and pushing the final braking to the absolute last second there is zero room for error.

After playing with all 1st gear on the first few runs (including buzzing it to nearly 8,000 one run WHOOPS), a short shift to 2nd proved to be the ticket. The torque of the new motor yanked it out of both corners like a freight train.


Best time was a 14.252, which ended up being good for 5th in class and 26th overall. During the session we had no idea if this was any good or not, as the four GTV cars that finished ahead of us were all in group B on the autocross course at the time.

Autocross

We called it a day on the speed stop a little early, and after a quick sandwich and some chilling in the shade made our way to the autocross course.


While you normally expect an autocross to be flat, the H lot turns steeply downhill as it runs north. Fortunately, our usual autocross haunt has several 'ups and downs', so we're no strangers to off-camber, downhill, and uphill elements. A super tight first half gave way to a very fast and flowing second half, and an extremely speedy finish.

We had made a quick rear bias adjustment during the speed stop searching for just a bit more whoa. This would have been a great point to remember heading into run number 1 of the day..


After the second run, I still totally did not have it together. Quickly determined that some cold water, a cool towel, and a little snack were in order. Not drinking enough water that morning caught up real quick, and it was a little scary.

I proceeded to down a bottle of water after each of the next four runs, and things came back around.


We had the advantage of knowing what the time to beat was this time around - Jake Rozelle's other worldly 29.5 was looming in large in my mind as we progressed down to a 30.06 on run 5.

I tried to get a bit too much in the wrong places on both of the next two runs, falling back to 30.3 and 30.2. Hot, tired, and convinced there wasn't anything left in the 130 degree pavement, we decided the 8th run would be it. If we got a 29, great. If not, live to fight on Sunday.


And run 8 proved to be the charm. I crossed through the lights feeling fairly good about the run, then pounded the steering wheel after I read 29.942 on the display. The entire tone of the day changed, and we were both ecstatic to break that 30 mark and get up with the rest of the 'big guns'. This run was good for another 5th in class, 19th overall.

And of course, that's the one run we didn't get video of :headspin:

Road Rally

Just when you think the fun is over at an Optima event, it's just getting started. At 4:45 when the drivers meeting for the Road Rally started, I would confidently place the heat index at around 157 degrees. Everyone was hiding in whatever shade was available around the Optima trailer, waiting with breathless anticipation to find out where we were headed.


Jimi and the guys took pity on us, taking us around 12 miles each way to an Advance Auto Parts in south Austin. Of course, being Austin, this was around a 25 minute drive each direction with plenty of stop lights and uneven pavement, along with a Google detour down a closed road and the stoplight from hell on the return trip.


It was great to get out in the car on the street, as it's fairly rare that we've gotten to do that lately. The new motor is definitely more 'racecar' in town, requiring a little more coaxing from stop lights and just generally being a little grumpier. A fat carburetor in the thin hot air didn't help matters.

The line of cars was getting thumbs up and pics from a huge percentage of passers-by. Really cool, despite literally baking in the car.

We finished the day packing up and moving into the 'Big House'


Next time: Sunday, and the gut check of driving a nearly 40 year old car you built yourselves on a Formula 1 track!

Great write up!

Sunday: The Real Reason We're Here

Let's be honest. We drove to Austin. To an FIA-spec Formula 1 track. Autocross and Speed Stop are great and all, but we came to put it on the line and run this 3.4 mile monster of a track.

We had told ourselves heading into the weekend that we would be fine without spending the extra scratch to get a garage space. That sounded great until we pulled into the paddock Saturday evening and Dad and I both thought "We can't very well be here and NOT get in there.."


We did some pre-run checks, moseyed around a little bit to check out some of the other cars, and soon it was time for the driver's meeting. "This track is big. It will bite you. If you screw up, it will be dangerous and expensive."

Understood.

Each Optima Hot Lap day starts with 'orientation laps'. Or, in the case of a 3.4 mile track, 'lap'. We got a chance to sight in the layout and see where we would be exiting should we make it to the end of the session, and check transponder functionality.

I entered again in the Intermediate group, having never been to the track and having not run the car on such a big track before. The first session, predictably, was a bit of a mess with no times to go off of. I lined up in the back with a few friends, including one who had run the track before, in hopes of getting a good look at the preferred line.


After a bunched up first hot lap, I fell back in hopes of getting some clean track and soon noticed warning lights flashing. Our oil temp warning threshold was set at 240 (the oil is good to 300 we would determine later), and after a second lap with some holdup I headed in to investigate. Best lap 2:53.

After a little research, we bumped the temp threshold, and headed back out for session 2, gridded mid-pack. A slow outlap, and two passes toward the end (thankfully the green was given in the last half of the outlap) provided a full lap unobstructed. Clean track let us get down to a 2:47.


This made some progress, bumping up to the 6th spot for session 3. A lap behind a GT350 led to a point by and some serious progress. 3 good clean laps, still being extremely conservative, saw the times fall each lap. 2:45, 2:43, and finally a 2:41.4. We knew we weren't even in the same zip code as Maier, Rozelle, and Woo, but it felt good to get a clean session and make some progress in that direction at least.

Session 4 brought one of the most fun moments of the weekend. We sat third on the grid, behind a McLaren and a Z06, with Chad Ryker's super cool first gen alongside. The grid workers looked at the list multiple times for both Chad and I, making sure they had things right.


The final session was by far the best of the day. The Z06 and I played chase for a few laps, and at times on the first hot lap I had the target in my sights. With a 2:41.4 as the best time from before, predictive was showing 1.4+ in the green during the lap. Unfortunately, a fat carburetor and a botched stadium section dropped it back down to a 2:40.9.

At this point, it was incredibly warm, and the tires were increasingly greasey. After a few slips in the first sector of the next lap, I decided to opt for discretion and pack it in (after blasting through 16-17-18 one last time, of course).


Final Tally

When the dust settled, we loaded back up and headed to the awards ceremony. We knew the deck was stacked coming into this event, and a repeat podium was pretty much going to be out of the question. In the end, we managed a 5th in GTV, when my expectation was that anything in the top 10 would be a success after seeing the entry list.

We again lost massive ground in the Design & Engineering portion, which leaves me with a moral dilemma. I like the car how it is. I feel like it is designed to be no-nonsense and easy to work on and drive fast, but can see the issues when viewing it in terms of a 'street car'.

Aside from all of that, Optima events are still amazingly fun. Sunday was a trying day with a few on-track and off-track incidents, and Jimi and the crew handled everything that was thrown at them better than most any group could have and with smiles on their faces throughout. We are definitely still hooked on these events, and can't wait to do our next one.

Post-event Wrap-up


A few nagging problems (namely some leaky oil cooler lines) showed up during the weekend, so they have been addressed along with the usual post event checks. The Wilwood pads and brakes look excellent enough to let me know I wasn't using them nearly hard enough on the track.

What's next?


There's one other 'big boy' track in Texas. We're going to try to sample it one more time before it's gone..

I love the car Dusty! I can't wait to see/hear and ride in the car with the new motor!

Heck yeah! Thanks for the recap and especially thanks for the virtual ride along on that iconic track.

Dustin,

Awesome!You did good against the high tech guys.I liked the fact that your not high tech.Thats why your thead is one of my favorites to follow not to mention you have a second gen Camaro.
Mike,

79 Camaro
 

Duston,
great to see the car is doing what you want
and I agree pretty is not really what all of us
want out of our cars.. making go is the important
thing... your next track was a great run for me
last year TWS... too bad they are tearing it down

Have fun

Bob

In what was one of the crazier ideas of my adult life, buying a house, spending a week at SEMA, and going to College Station seemed like a grand way to spend 10 days.

I've almost recovered enough to tell the tale.

The Timeline

Friday
2:00pm - bolt out of the show and head to the airport
6:00pm - fly out
11:00pm central - land, get picked up by the wife
11:45pm - head south
Saturday
3:22am - pull up to the gates and get a 2 hour nap
6:00am - pull into the track and unload
7:00am - driver's meeting


Not gonna lie, kind of proud of the insanity of this endeavor. This is also how I know for a fact I picked a GREAT one to call my wife.


So, the car was an absolute blast on this track just like I thought it would be. Big flowing corners, high speed banked front straight, this place was made for cars with too much power and not enough handling.

In the first session Saturday, I was able to match my best of a 2:07 in the Z without pushing the car hard at all. We had a great group of drivers that allowed a ton of open track time which helped a lot.

Our sessions at COTA never allowed me to build up a whole lot of confidence in the car as all but one got cut short or had issues with traffic. This was just what the doctor ordered.

Second session I went out behind a club racer who knows the track like the back of his hand and was super helpful working out some of the issues I was having. Dropped to a 2:01 quickly in the session, and was super pumped for the rest of the weekend.


We had a long break during the club racers race sessions, which provided ample time for a back of the truck nap, and the rain set in. Last session started damp and dried quickly, but I didn't put a decent time down before calling it a day.


I had issues at COTA with pad knockback through the esses and other left-right sections. A quick check of the pedal normally solved it, and it was back to business as I was braking super early all day. This changed a bit at TWS as braking points got later and harder, and a couple times on Saturday it led to a missed downshift or a jerky un-rev-matched shift and slide.

Sunday's first session had ideal conditions and with a full night's sleep I was ready to go get my '59. 2 laps in, charged off the banking into 1 and 2 and the car felt amazing. Did the usual brake pedal check and got it back up then drove hard down the short chute to 3. That's when things got interesting..


The brake check had not produced the amount of pedal I was expecting, and the corner was coming rather quickly. Rushing the downshift and missing the gas pedal led to a horrendous rear lock up (you can hear it wheel hop in the video), kicking the car sideways to full opposite lock at somewhere around 85 mph.


The combination of the wheel hop and nasty slide broke the main link of the panhard bar mount, letting the rear end shift around 3 inches to starboard. My initial thought after the car straightened out and the wheel was no longer straight was that something had bent in the front end. After I got out of the car and looked at the rear tire it became pretty apparent what had taken place.


Needless to say, this ended the weekend early. It was disappointing, but I knew with the knockback and what I was pretty sure was the fluid going away, another session wasn't going to be very productive anyway.

The one upside to the early exit was getting to take in the midday session from the control tower at the track atop the hill - a place I've wanted to go both of my other trips but hadn't gotten to.


Now what..?

Now the question is, how do we build it back better? I've questioned the effect that the high position of the bar has on the handling for a while, but our mount design and packaging constraints didn't allow us to move it.

The first thing on the list is a floater housing to solve the pad knockback issues, and an adjustable stock car style panhard mount will allow us to adjust roll center. We've looked at watts links, but I don't know that the benefits are great enough to warrant the added complexity.

For now, though, life takes priority - almost time to move into our house!

Congrats on the house, Duston. Glad to see the panhard breaking wasn't more catastrophic. That had to be a scary moment.

Might want to contact Ron and see if he has any recommendations concerning relocating the mount or if the height of the mount/bar is an issue. My limited understanding is that the rod just needs to be level at ride height.

Good luck!

As we add more and more lateral grip to these cars, the more speed we can carry in corners which results in even more forces put on integral pieces trying to hold everything together. I'm just thankful that your parts breakage didn't result in any further damage Dustin. I'm certain you'll build it bigger better and badder than before and go after it once again after.

Thanks for the update and congrats on the rest of life as well. Wish I would have run into you out in Vegas...

When did it become January :headspin:

So, we decided it was time to get our butts in gear on this thing. Everyone else keeps getting faster, so there's no point going into this year with the same pile as we ran last year.

First up, though, there was the matter of a certain silver thing that had decided it didn't like having oil pressure after it got warm.


With a refreshed bullet tucked safely away into the truck, the Camaro thrash is on. Several items on the to-do list in all areas of the car:

Stiffer, and slightly taller
An equal percentage bump in spring rate front and rear. Also going to bump the ride height back up a smidge and hopefully cure some clearance issues

Floater time
As we started pushing it harder, it became obvious that even the tapered bearings on the rear end weren't up to the loads 315 Rivals can deliver. Also a good time for revisions on our panhard bar

Engine checkup
After pushing it hard several events losing oil pressure in high-G corners, a checkup on the rotating assembly is in order

Trans Swap
We went with the American Powertrain TKO Extreme with hopes it would solve some of the problems we'd had with our first one.. Long story short, it's T56 time.

Let's get to work..again.

When it came time to get a floater, we explored several options. Ended up going with the Mod Lite from Speedway Engineering. Big thanks to Kenny there for his help getting us all the right stuff, and to Mike from Wilwood for giving us a great contact.


I still love working on this car, and it's even more apparent after working on the truck - race car simplicity is just hard to beat. In the span of a few hours on a Saturday morning I had the motor and trans basically ready to pull by myself, and we finished getting it out in short order in the afternoon.


By lunchtime Sunday things were starting to get a little crazy. Front springs out, rear end out, just chaos.


Before this shop, there is literally no way we would have tackled all this at once. It's been a complete game-changer being able to spread out and get the car off the ground. A year in, we're completely spoiled..


By the end of the day, we had it mocked into position at ride height using some shock analogs fabbed up to hold everything at the current ride height.

Panhard bar

The panhard bar has been a question mark for a long time. After doing a bit more learning over the past several years, it became apparent that mounting the bar this high is less than ideal, so we set about getting it down and adding some adjustability.


We now have 2" of up and down adjustment to play with, and will have the bar around 3.5" lower than it was before. The car has always been really twitchy, and from the research we've done I'm fairly optimistic that lowering the roll center will help with this. Having this as a tuning option will be a great new tool at the least.

About that fresh motor..

Replaying the videos from COTA alerted us to a bit of an oiling issue. Turns out, it's less than ideal dropping to 5 psi in high speed corners for multiple events. Spot checking a few bearings led to the decision to play it safe and go ahead and put a set of rod and main bearings (and a new oil pan) in.


We'll be going back with the same Canton oil pan we had on before. That one had some sealing issues on the rear main, but hopefully that won't be an issue with this being a new block.

Some thoughts on Camaros and 'Camaros'

Been thinking a lot with some of the new builds coming out in the Optima and Cam Challenge events, and us pondering some more extreme modifications for the future.

Our car is a racecar. I don't make any effort to deny that. In the end, though, it's still a Camaro. And I'm pretty damn proud of that fact. We've tossed around the idea of cutting it up, building a full custom subframe, and hacking out all of that Camaro to make it even better and faster and more exotic..

.but I still keep coming back to the feeling of knowing that it's gotten to be pretty good..while still being a Camaro.

How many more months til the season starts? Oh, weeks? 2 weeks? Eep.

Thanks, Lance. We have to cross paths soon - we're planning on doing some traveling this year with the car so hopefully we'll get to race!

Thanks Trey! Been a crazy few months but it's starting to look like something finally.


..I'm told progress is being made in the rest of the house too..

Great update Dusty! You'll make it for the season opener I'm sure, you always seem to eek something out and show up.

Your garage looks a lot like mine only, a lot more race car'ish than street car'ish. I hear ya about everyone getting faster and faster, I too am adding a bunch of modifications this winter and I'm sure we'll have a lot of fun with them. I'm not sure how competitive the Gold TA will be though. Not only is your car becoming a lot faster but, you have learned a ton behind the seat and that helps when you get to the Optima events and our local events.

Update time! Been a crazy few months to say the least.

Shortly after the last update, we decided to go to the Optima event at NOLA. Those of you familiar with the calendar will note that meant having the car together and ready for battle in just a couple of months.

We got things wrapped back up in early March and hatched a plan for maximum seat time and testing ahead of NOLA. This included a few autocrosses and more importantly a load of track time with NASA and an open track day.


We hit a local club's autocross, where Dad got to drive the car for the first time and officially became HOOKED. Everything went well there so it was off to Motorsport Ranch Cresson for a NASA HPDE.


This proved to be an up and down weekend chasing some braking issues, but worked out well in breaking my fear of working on stuff at the track. I was also able to bump into HPDE4 and take a step closer to the crack of Time Trials.

We still had some time left before NOLA, and the stock spindle and bearing setup began the stick out as the last weak link in an otherwise strong chain. We sourced a set of C5 bearing spindles from CPP along with 5x4.5 pattern hubs from Detroit Speed and blew the front end apart again.


With a few weeks left, the schedule fell perfectly to get an open track day and two autocrosses in before leaving for Louisiana. This would be the perfect shakedown for all systems, as well as a significant amount of seat time.

We headed to Eagles Canyon Raceway with the goal of getting a few sessions in with no issues. It soon turned into 3 sessions, playing with shock settings and tire pressures and actually tuning the car for the first time in a while. We chased a push through the center of the corners, eventually stiffening compression on the rear shocks a few clicks and going up in tire pressure to get some rotation on throttle.


When all was said and done, we had dropped 4 seconds off the lap time from last year and felt fantastic about where things were sitting. There was an autocross that Sunday, and it was too good to pass up..


Hindsight being 20/20, we should have skipped it..

The event was being run at a lot known for being rough, and one section went across a ridge that fell smack in the middle of a braking zone. I had the unique experience of watching the car get broken, as Dad was driving it in a separate class during the heat I was working.

We loaded up and went home, and after a few days I had kinda sorta calmed down. Fortunately, I had the next Friday off and was able to rebuild the center section and get it buttoned back up for one last event before NOLA.


Just for giggles, we decided to make one last spring change, bumping the rear rate even further in an attempt to get some of that tail happiness we had before back and cure some other issues we discovered at the first event of the year..


The last autocross went without issue and provided some much needed tuning time for the new springs. With that, it was time for a quick wash and on to NOLA.

Dustin,
What do you think about the quality of the cpp c5 spindles?

Mike,

They looked good out of the box, and everything seems to be good with them through a few months of use. I'm not sure if it was the spindles themselves or the hubs, but we did have to add a 1/4" spacer to gain back some track width that we lost with them, but they are rock solid even on one of our home tracks that is really rough.

NOLA on my mind..



With a quick wash, some fresh brake fluid, and a general once-over completed, we loaded up and headed south. Got to the track, got tech'd, fire drilled, and decaled, then headed out to find some gulf coast seafood.


Saturday we started out the day with design & engineering judging out of the gates, and finished in time to get our first autocross run in on the first trip through. I spent the whole morning tagging cones and being a general mess, finally gathering things up for a clean run as we went into lunch.


The course was fun, and required pushing right out to the limit of several cones to be where you needed to be. In the afternoon, I found time early, then fought all afternoon to put all the sections together into one run. We sat on a fairly comfortable lead until the next to last run, when Cody Puckett in, of all things, another 79 Camaro, got within .03.


He put together another clean run but wasn't able to improve on his last lap, and with the pressure off I let out a deep breath and finally stitched all the parts from earlier together into a 30.9.


The new format has autocross going all day on Saturday, which ended up being fun because we got to run with all the cars in our class vs. being split up like previous years.

Saturday evening was the road rally, D&E points were posted (a bloodbath for us again), and then we did some general maintenance including a pretty substantial carburetor change for the incoming cold front.


We knew coming in that to have any shot at winning, every single point in the timed events would be critical. Falling as much as 51 points behind other GTV cars, the hill got that much steeper Saturday night. We knew for Sunday every every last bit of time we could get would be critical.

Hot Laps and Speed Stop and Hot Laps and Speed Stop and..

In previous years, Sunday has been pretty typical of a standard track day. Go out for 20 minutes, come in and chill and look at the data, repeat. This year, the Speed Stop moves to Sunday and makes for a pretty hectic but fun affair.


Timing issues in the morning caused some delays, so we spent time at the Speed Stop chasing time on both sides of the mirrored course.

The whole day was kind of a blur, and I never managed to get video of any of the Speed Stop runs. Through random draw, we kept getting the right side first which put us on the left with hot brakes and tires. A 9.46 came fairly early on the left, but I just couldn't find the pace on the right until the very end after road course session 4 with a 9.37. We weren't able to keep up with everyone in our class, but felt good about the times and called it a day with that.


Road Course

Oddly, we came into this event with way more seat time at the track than on the autocross. I had studied up on video and track maps, and felt pretty good about the layout. The back side of the track has a similar flow to the front section of COTA, just without the hundreds of feet of elevation change.


Consistently found time throughout the day, and our move to the expert run group proved to work out well with tons of clean track in every session after the first.

The T56 really paid off, as the car now just keeps pulling hard in 5th gear, running up to 145 on the main straight. We are planning some aero work for the front end that will hopefully help it out in that area in the future.


It once again came down to one final session. We had waited for the charge from Mills in the Beach Cruiser 68 all day, and went out for the last session to take one more shot at improving after sitting on 1:58s for three sessions. I was able to hook up with Feras in his Z06 through much of the lap and get some help with the line, and cracked the 57 mark with a 1:57.840.


The predictive timer on RaceChrono wasn't working, so I had no idea if the lap was good or not. It wasn't until I pulled into the hot pit after a cool down lap that I realized what the time was. It was an awesome feeling to finish up all three events with our best time of the day at the end.

When it was all tallied up, the road course was our best overall finish, which is huge.

Waiting for the Points

Optima awards ceremonies are fun, especially if you get to hear your name called. We were fairly confident we had the times, the question was were they enough to get it done for the class win and that invitation. Fortunately GTV gets called first, I don't know that we could have handled waiting through the other classes.


14 points ended up being the difference over Mills, with Ken Kelley in the former RideTech Chevelle close behind him. I'll say it again - holy crap.

Since these events started, we've watched them and thought about how cool it would be to get that invite to Vegas. As excited as I am to get to drive it in that event, it means a ton to get there for my dad who has treated this thing like a second job this year.

We also have to send a big thank you again to Mike at Wilwood for his help not only with the brakes, but also for putting us in contact with Speedway Engineering and recommending the new spindle and bearing setup. The braking has never been better, and has made a huge difference.

Now the to-do list begins again. Have to get ready for the show - see you guys at SEMA!

Congrats on the win Dustin. Good luck in Vegas.

Tu

Well Done Dusty! That's really awesome for you and your dad, who have put a lot of work into your car but, also into your driving!

Well done! Great write up. You and you Dad are living the dream.

Fantastic work, Duston! Congrats to you and your dad!

Been a little while, and we've had a busy summer. SEMA is coming in hot, and our prep is almost complete..


..I am not a fan of doing interior work, but I'm pretty happy with how this turned out. Hopefully it will help us with D&E, but either way it's much more pleasant inside than it was before.


We've snuck in some running, but mostly done a lot of detail work on the car. Resprayed under the hood and and did a little dress up.


When you start out with a clean wheel, and 5 runs later have this, it's been a good autocross course.


Getting down to it, still some things to button up then the detail job of our lives before we head west.

Looks good. Who or How did you do your custom interior carpet pieces?

We ordered a couple sections of carpet and I made templates with paper before cutting all the pieces. We had a local upholstery shop sew up the edges with fabric to get a finished look.

It's all glued down using 3M Super 90 (I will be hating life if we decide to pull it out) but it works pretty well as sound deadening. The car is about 100 times more pleasant on the highway now along with actually looking finished for the first time ever.

When life gives you an autocross course that lets you run 88 mph, there's only one thing to do..


SEMA prep is winding down, but what would it be without a little excitement? Ended up trashing a shift fork in the trans, necessitating a last minute thrash and a trip to Dederichs Motorsports for some expert rehab. He came through big, turning it around in a few days and greatly simplifying things for us.


All that's left is the cleaning the pig up and it will be ready to pack up and head west.

I just watched your other two video's.

Holy crap you can drive this bitch !!!!

wow! I'm honestly surprised they allowed the course to get that fast. Very impressive run Duston. Good luck out at SEMA.

That put a big smile on my face, haha. We've become pretty decent dance partners the last few years. It's fun just grabbing it by the scruff of the neck and yelling LET'S GO!

It's a once a year event, we typically run outside the track in one of the parking lots but get to hit the road course every October. Silly fun, it's my favorite autocross of the year by far. And, thanks!

Quarterly update time! SEMA was a blur, OUSCI was a blast, and we ended up in a picture with the craziest group of cars I could possibly imagine.


We managed a 5th in class in autocross, 9th in speed stop on one session, and 8th in road course with 2 and a half sessions.

A few laps into the 3rd road course session, the rear end side of the panhard bar broke loose and our weekend was over.


We were able to get it patched back together for the photo at least (pictured at center..)

As a souvenir from the trip, I also broke my toe by dropping a jack on it during the drive home.


To finish the year off right, we even got a little time on the Vegas show thanks to a close battle down to the last run with Chad Ryker, who was nursing an ailing rear end in the afternoon runs.

Continued..