1968 Camaro - Project "BLUE HOUR"
05-22-2012, 07:37 PM
#122
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The car is almost out of paint jail!!! 
Still got a few things to do like finish off the hood pins and put the rear spoiler back on, but it's pretty much ready.
I had a stripe painted on that's a nod to the new 2012 SS's... only difference is the words blue hour put in the stripe. The stripe matches the wheel lip and is lightly "brushed" on. Looks slick up close
Going to the shop tomorrow to pick it up and drive it home. Crossing my fingers that my car makes it all the way home LOL
Still got a few things to do like finish off the hood pins and put the rear spoiler back on, but it's pretty much ready.
I had a stripe painted on that's a nod to the new 2012 SS's... only difference is the words blue hour put in the stripe. The stripe matches the wheel lip and is lightly "brushed" on. Looks slick up close
Going to the shop tomorrow to pick it up and drive it home. Crossing my fingers that my car makes it all the way home LOL
05-30-2012, 12:01 PM
#127
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I'll let you know when i get the THIRD fuel pump in... grrr....
http://www.lsxtv.com/features/p-lsx-...ect-blue-hour/
Full feature on LSXTV coming shortly!
http://www.lsxtv.com/features/p-lsx-...ect-blue-hour/
Full feature on LSXTV coming shortly!
06-05-2012, 09:14 PM
#128
i'll let you know when i get the third fuel pump in... Grrr....
:d
http://www.lsxtv.com/features/p-lsx-...ect-blue-hour/
full feature on lsxtv coming shortly!
:d
http://www.lsxtv.com/features/p-lsx-...ect-blue-hour/
full feature on lsxtv coming shortly!
06-18-2012, 08:31 AM
#130
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Well it's track time folks!
Blue Hour made its first debut at the local AutoX scene and came away with it's first win! (Ok, its a class win and there was only 1 other car, but hey, a win is a win, amirite?!!?)
Truth be told, this is my first time racing anything that didn't involved a 'reset' button so I was very nervous about the whole notion of this with a car that is probably too much power for me and I have zero experience with driving a car to its limits.
Regardless, the car needed some time to get broken in and weed out a few problems, plus the driver really needed some seat time in the worst way.
The good news is that I was getting faster by leaps and bounds at each pass and I know I left a TON of speed on the track and the car is capable of so much more than I was able so that's very promising. I only was able to get in 3 runs before it rained and I wasn't really all that keen on trying my rain driving skills. But, by the end I had improved my times by 16 seconds on a course that really good times were 65-70 seconds.
That said, here's a photo my buddy nate took and a couple videos of my first time out.
Here's my first ever run at the AutoX and Blue Hour's track debut. Randy was a very good instructor.
http://flic.kr/p/cg5UQb
Ok, here's my first spin out. I had a different instructor with me... truth be told, he even tensed up and reached for the door handles when I gunned it right before the slalom... it was kinda funny to see. I took out the timing light but the car was fine, not even a scratch anywhere on the car.
The best part was that this was my best run and since I tripped the lights, it counted as a full run and I wasn't DQ'd for it! LOL
http://flic.kr/p/cg5RKS
Looking forward to OPTIMA this weekend, driving the car was a blast and can't wait for more 'auto'-erotic abuse.
Blue Hour made its first debut at the local AutoX scene and came away with it's first win! (Ok, its a class win and there was only 1 other car, but hey, a win is a win, amirite?!!?)
Truth be told, this is my first time racing anything that didn't involved a 'reset' button so I was very nervous about the whole notion of this with a car that is probably too much power for me and I have zero experience with driving a car to its limits.
Regardless, the car needed some time to get broken in and weed out a few problems, plus the driver really needed some seat time in the worst way.
The good news is that I was getting faster by leaps and bounds at each pass and I know I left a TON of speed on the track and the car is capable of so much more than I was able so that's very promising. I only was able to get in 3 runs before it rained and I wasn't really all that keen on trying my rain driving skills. But, by the end I had improved my times by 16 seconds on a course that really good times were 65-70 seconds.
That said, here's a photo my buddy nate took and a couple videos of my first time out.
Here's my first ever run at the AutoX and Blue Hour's track debut. Randy was a very good instructor.
http://flic.kr/p/cg5UQb
Ok, here's my first spin out. I had a different instructor with me... truth be told, he even tensed up and reached for the door handles when I gunned it right before the slalom... it was kinda funny to see. I took out the timing light but the car was fine, not even a scratch anywhere on the car.
The best part was that this was my best run and since I tripped the lights, it counted as a full run and I wasn't DQ'd for it! LOL
http://flic.kr/p/cg5RKS
Looking forward to OPTIMA this weekend, driving the car was a blast and can't wait for more 'auto'-erotic abuse.
06-28-2012, 07:49 PM
#132
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Well, I just got back a day or two ago from Road America and the OPTIMA Challenge.
The entire thing felt like it lasted a week, but it really only ran for 2.5 days, it's a lot of stuff to do and very little time to do it all in. Friday I helped a group of people teach kids how to build a bike, then it was a nice dinner at Andrew Chevrolet in Milwaukee. Saturday it was a 70ish mile cruise to a car show with some dyno pulls and then onto Road America where we had tickets for the Grand Am race and NATIONWIDE series race where Danica got punted on the last lap. We then had an hour long go-kart enduro where it was teams of 4, my team placed 6th out of 12 thanks to some catch up laps by Randy Johnson of DandZ customs. Sunday, it was all racing. Goldberg was there with the OPTIMA filming crew interviewing everyone about their cars and what not. Goldberg was very nice and stayed for every picture, signed everything put in front of him and really seemed to enjoy my buddies 1,000+hp Grand National and unfortunately blew his tranny at the road course. We had to finish the road course (back half of the Road America course, 2.2 miles), a stop-box with a slalom and the AutoX which was the go-kart track, which was my favorite of the whole event.
I set myself a goal of "not be last" and that goal was achieved!! LOL I haven't seen the final tally yet, but I saw my road course times and it seemed to be about mid pack (maybe slightly lower than mid pack). There was a pretty knarly wreck by a new mustang and Jeff Van Buren (being the smart of the two of us) told me it was bad karma to post the photo, so I'll take his advice and not show it.
I met a lot of really cool people and had a great time, Cam Douglas, Jimi Day, Jim McIlvanie, Randy Johnson, Bret, Jeff Van Buren, Telly V, Goldberg and a few others that their names aren't coming to me right away, but it was a great experience and will certainly try to do it again.
So, without further ado, here's a few videos and photos of the experience. Seriously, it's an experience to say the least.
A couple quick notes:
- I didn't really feel comfortable taking the car over 110mph, so in the road course video, you'll see i kind of just hold it in 5th gear.
- My rear-end whines like crazy, I know this and am working on solving the problem.
- My go pro kept running when Goldberg interviewed me twice after the AutoX, it's essentially his arm pit, I edited that out figuring no one wanted to see it LOL.
- I'm not %100 comfortable with the car yet, so I braked early in a lot of placed and didn't really take the car to red line in many places.
These two photos I borrowed from Bangshift.com
This is from my camera I lent to someone.
Now, onto videos
The short course:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4HqwM...ature=youtu.be
Stop Box
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WaMxx...ature=youtu.be
AutoX
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDyYy...ature=youtu.be
The entire thing felt like it lasted a week, but it really only ran for 2.5 days, it's a lot of stuff to do and very little time to do it all in. Friday I helped a group of people teach kids how to build a bike, then it was a nice dinner at Andrew Chevrolet in Milwaukee. Saturday it was a 70ish mile cruise to a car show with some dyno pulls and then onto Road America where we had tickets for the Grand Am race and NATIONWIDE series race where Danica got punted on the last lap. We then had an hour long go-kart enduro where it was teams of 4, my team placed 6th out of 12 thanks to some catch up laps by Randy Johnson of DandZ customs. Sunday, it was all racing. Goldberg was there with the OPTIMA filming crew interviewing everyone about their cars and what not. Goldberg was very nice and stayed for every picture, signed everything put in front of him and really seemed to enjoy my buddies 1,000+hp Grand National and unfortunately blew his tranny at the road course. We had to finish the road course (back half of the Road America course, 2.2 miles), a stop-box with a slalom and the AutoX which was the go-kart track, which was my favorite of the whole event.
I set myself a goal of "not be last" and that goal was achieved!! LOL I haven't seen the final tally yet, but I saw my road course times and it seemed to be about mid pack (maybe slightly lower than mid pack). There was a pretty knarly wreck by a new mustang and Jeff Van Buren (being the smart of the two of us) told me it was bad karma to post the photo, so I'll take his advice and not show it.
I met a lot of really cool people and had a great time, Cam Douglas, Jimi Day, Jim McIlvanie, Randy Johnson, Bret, Jeff Van Buren, Telly V, Goldberg and a few others that their names aren't coming to me right away, but it was a great experience and will certainly try to do it again.
So, without further ado, here's a few videos and photos of the experience. Seriously, it's an experience to say the least.
A couple quick notes:
- I didn't really feel comfortable taking the car over 110mph, so in the road course video, you'll see i kind of just hold it in 5th gear.
- My rear-end whines like crazy, I know this and am working on solving the problem.
- My go pro kept running when Goldberg interviewed me twice after the AutoX, it's essentially his arm pit, I edited that out figuring no one wanted to see it LOL.
- I'm not %100 comfortable with the car yet, so I braked early in a lot of placed and didn't really take the car to red line in many places.
These two photos I borrowed from Bangshift.com
This is from my camera I lent to someone.
Now, onto videos
The short course:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4HqwM...ature=youtu.be
Stop Box
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WaMxx...ature=youtu.be
AutoX
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDyYy...ature=youtu.be
07-25-2012, 10:24 AM
#135
Launching!
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UPDATE:
Well, it was RSE time at the Car Craft summer Nationals in St. Paul, MN. I was really psyched up for it. The finally made the track bigger, but still extremely tight and my car doesn't have the turn radius for it, which totally sucked my times right out the window.
I think I ended up 4th after everything was said and done of a field of 10-12 I believe. Jimi's AMX and the Crusher were just too much for either myself or my friend Nate to over come. Both of them were miles ahead of us on the AutoX and the Stop Box. Still, I had a lot of fun and naturally, there's never enough seat time. Btw the end I had whittled my AutoX time down to be very competitive but it didn't amount to any winning times.
I'll be back at it for sure soon, for now though the car performed well, it just needs a better pilot LOL
Here's a video of my car a friend of mine took... notice how short the course is? It's a lot worse to navigate, trust me, it was TIGHT.
http://s191.photobucket.com/albums/z...2-10-45-13.mp4
A couple photos my friend at jsphoto.com took.
KONE KILLA!!! LOL
AutoX -
Stop Box -
So I think the next step is to take it to some more AutoX's and possibly step up shocks to something much more adjustable, these single adjustables were just a dog the entire weekend, I couldn't fiddle with squat.
Well, it was RSE time at the Car Craft summer Nationals in St. Paul, MN. I was really psyched up for it. The finally made the track bigger, but still extremely tight and my car doesn't have the turn radius for it, which totally sucked my times right out the window.
I think I ended up 4th after everything was said and done of a field of 10-12 I believe. Jimi's AMX and the Crusher were just too much for either myself or my friend Nate to over come. Both of them were miles ahead of us on the AutoX and the Stop Box. Still, I had a lot of fun and naturally, there's never enough seat time. Btw the end I had whittled my AutoX time down to be very competitive but it didn't amount to any winning times.
I'll be back at it for sure soon, for now though the car performed well, it just needs a better pilot LOL
Here's a video of my car a friend of mine took... notice how short the course is? It's a lot worse to navigate, trust me, it was TIGHT.
http://s191.photobucket.com/albums/z...2-10-45-13.mp4
A couple photos my friend at jsphoto.com took.
KONE KILLA!!! LOL
AutoX -
Stop Box -
So I think the next step is to take it to some more AutoX's and possibly step up shocks to something much more adjustable, these single adjustables were just a dog the entire weekend, I couldn't fiddle with squat.
07-30-2012, 03:00 PM
#137
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Well, the wife HAD to buy our boy a Camaro powerwheels for his birthday and she HAD to have me paint it blue just like Blue Hour, so me and a friend Jake spent the better part of a night tearing it down and repainting it from red to blue. It's pretty close to the color, not exact but close enough for a 2 year old.
Today, July 30th is officially his birthday so we gave it to him last night because I had to work today and wouldn't be around for him to see it and use it.
He's only 2 and already figured out the most important part... the gas pedal! LOL He can't steer for nothing (gets it from his old man) but he works that gas pedal like a mad man! HAHA!
Anywhoozle, I present you with "Project: Blue Minute"!
Today, July 30th is officially his birthday so we gave it to him last night because I had to work today and wouldn't be around for him to see it and use it.
He's only 2 and already figured out the most important part... the gas pedal! LOL He can't steer for nothing (gets it from his old man) but he works that gas pedal like a mad man! HAHA!
Anywhoozle, I present you with "Project: Blue Minute"!
