78 Cutlass Wagon- "CopperTop"

[SRD Art]

He's cleaned it up, but it still needs help, summer's gonna be stifling here in Southern Utah and the smell is gonna kill us! lol When we swap steering wheels we'll deep clean and paint the column. The carpet's gonna go and eventually it'll get front buckets.

[Coppertop]

Yes! Finally some more updates and hopefully we'll get updates on here more regularly now.

First off, we've taken the car to a couple races; we have taken it both, drag racing and autocrossing so far.
I was actually surprised with how the car handled both the different racing styles.

First off is the drag racing... The car ran an insanely lightning fast quarter mile of 17.2 Seconds at 79mph with a reaction time of .655 seconds.
However, the car did pull surprisingly strong and the motor stayed together. The only issues it really had was, it was pretty dang hot down here in St. George and the car was getting vapor lock and the fuel was burning up before it got to the motor so the car would slouch down and completely quit making power towards the end of the 1/4.

The same type of thing happened during the autocross towards the end of the day.

But honestly I can say I'm completely surprised with the way the motor took all of that abuse. I felt like I was beating the absolute crap out of it because I always would think to myself "This is an Oldsmobile Station wagon from 1978, it's not made to perform like this" so I really couldn't help but smile when it took all of that abuse without any complaints.

Changing subjects to the autocross, one of the funniest parts about it was where I thought I was doing pretty good and felt like I was really pushing the car and then traded off with my dad and let him take a quick run in it and he actually knocked off a few seconds from my best time. After seeing that though, I realized I could actually push the car more than I already was (because before, I was sure I was pushing it to it's limits) so I pushed it a LOT harder the last couple times and got really close to my dad's time, even with it vapor locking and slowing down. So I was kinda proud lol.

As for the suspension on the autocross, well... I can say for sure this car was not made from the factory to do that kind of racing hahaha. There was a ton of body roll and over all the car didn't take the beating in the best way possible.
Basically the day before the race, we put my dads old rear lower control arms and shocks on the rear of the car (since he upgraded to full on Speedtech suspension) and I noticed a difference right away in how the car drove. But it still wasn't enough to overcome the rest of the suspension all working together.
The car did actually stick really well, most likely thanks to the semi-wide and sticky tires it has on it currently. I went in thinking the car was going to get both ridiculous understeer and oversteer but I really didn't have an issue whatsoever with either one. There was one run that we experimented with the air pressure in the tire. We pumped it up to probably around 40 pounds and that run I got extreme understeer and went off the track, so as soon as I finished that run we lowered the pressure back down and it stuck great the next time. Also another thing was the interior. The bench seat had no lateral support at all and while this would normally be a con for professional racing I couldn't stop laughing with the way the car threw me around in there, it was so much fun. But after it all, I can absolutely say for sure, that it was an indescribable amount of fun taking the car out there and just driving the thing. I really cannot wait to do it again

Here's an example of that insane body roll:


In comparison, here is my dad's car coming out of the same turn (just taken at a different camera angle)


Here's some more pictures from the same day


Another one


Also I think we may have some videos of the drag racing so I'll see if I can dig them up and get them uploaded soon.
Thanks for reading! I'm so excited to really start doing stuff to the car to make it more race ready

[SRD Art]

It was a great time for us both. The SCCA guys really enjoyed calling us "The CAM Cars" and talking about how we had near identical old school wagons. I had a good time testing out my new suspension, but by far my "funnest" race of the day was when I drove a lap in Coppertop. My car was having vapor lock issues too but despite that my it's best was a 75.9, about middle of the road against all the imports. Roman was running 89-88s in Coppretop. When I took it for a run I went all out and no holds barred. I absolutely abused those poor 225-50-16 front tires and pulled off an 81.7. I was ear to ear smiles and even laughed a couple times during the run because of the crazy body roll and all the effort you have to put into trying to stay put in the seat. It was a blast! The funny thing about this car is the body roll is it's saving grace. Once the body rolls over it plants the tires and although they complain out loud for the most part they stick. It gets a little understeer but not enough to get out of shape. You have to remember this is stock suspension, the only upgrades are Varishocks on the rear and Edelbrock lower rear arms. Factory front sway bar and no rear sway bar. At least one of the front shocks is blown out, the right side wheel has static Positive camber, all the factory rubber bushings are in rough shape, and the 16" BFG tires are worn and about 6 years old. I showed Roman my time as if to say "Push it harder". I think it was his next run or two he nailed a low 84 with bad vapor lock throughout the course. I'll bet with a better running motor and a few more runs he would have been right on my heels. That was near the end of the day so we had to pack it in with that. The season is over out here so next season he will be pushing some faster times with all of my car's old suspension in place. Then it'll be even more of a challenge to keep your cheeks planted on the bench seat, lol!

Way to go Roman! It was a good time watching you run your first AutoX.

[Zoomin]

Nice project guys! Love seeing the father/son build and drive.

[instro84]

nice!

[SRD Art]

Thanks guys!