'02TA

Right now C5's are going for incredibly low prices so I'd have to disagree with you on that one. You can get into a C5 with half the miles of your car for around 16k. By the time you do everything to your Z-28 you'll be close to that if not more just in parts, plus labor if your not a DIYer...

Right now I'm looking at C5 Z06's with around 40k miles for 20k-22k...
thats crazy cheap compared to the same car a couple years ago.

KurtRardin

iTrader: (11)

Well if you didn't include the flux capacitor then I'd say it would be cheaper to do the Z28

I'd love to have a C5 Z06... especially in blue

lovescamaros28

Why not have a canyon carver that is also fast in a straight line?

The best of both worlds.

KurtRardin

iTrader: (11)

Here's a little update:

In a few days I hope to receive my Strange Dana 60. While this rear end is the heaviest rear end option that I could have purchased, I do not feel that it necessarily means that I still can't build a car built for handleing. It will however, be a bigger challenge to hit the corners hard with a Detroit Locker I couldn't resist the locker. It was the strongest option (other than a spool) that I could have gone with and it will most certainly always lock up when I want it to. I guess if nascar drivers can do it with lockers then I can too

I've got a nice little summit racing gift card for my Bday, and Christmas is around the corner so I think I'm going to be beefing up the rear suspension and purchasing a few things that I would need for either style of driving.

Here's what I've got on my shopping list:

Wideband
RevXtreme catch can
UMI boxed sub frame connectors
UMI Adj. poly ended LCAs
UMI Adj. Poly PHB
UMI LCA relocation brackets

I think these mods will still allow me to go either way. Honestly I think I just want to build the car for driving. The wideband and catch can will get me running smoothly and allow me to tune for precision. The rest of the stuff will just firm up the back half of the car and hopefully let it hook up. Maybe that chunk of weight in the rear will help with my traction issues.

dragonrage

Cornering is a million billion times more fun than straight line, but you can't give up engine performance to corner (see: Mazda Miata - ruined by the engine)

rjensen

iTrader: (2)

if there is a track near you go corner carver. that way you can still have fun stop light to stoplight straight line if you want. you cant really have fun with a drag car taking corners.

KurtRardin

iTrader: (11)

I've actually got a 1/4 mile track near me I just ordered a few items yesterday: Relocation brackets, double rod ended PHB, power steering cooler, shock tower brace, and a RevXtreme catch can. So far I think I'm staying right down the middle as far as which car I could build, but its starting to lean toward a handling car... with a detroit locker.



Feel free to contribute to this thread. I think I started out buying mods for my car without a real direction, just wanting to make some HP for my daily driver. If I could have a stock car again and all the money that I have spent on parts (especially those which I have sold) back again then I think my purchases would look a lot different.

I can't stress enough the importance of a goal for your car. You can elimenate a lot of hasty purchases that way!

subarubill96

iTrader: (9)

what would you do different?

the funny thing is a few months back in this thread i was talking smack about miata's. now that ive seen how easy an ls1 swap is in one of those cars, ive got a hard-on for a ls1 hard top miata lol how the mighty do fall

KurtRardin

iTrader: (11)

Well to start I could have saved a ton of money on parts that I've sold becuse they were sweet at the time but my plans changed and I needed to buy more stuff. My, how plans do change

To start I was just going to have a lid/catback car , now I'm slowly accumulating the parts to build a car that can handle big power. Big contrast here. One is pretty much stock while the other needs a welder, chrome-moly stuff, fender well alterations, intense tuning knowledge, sweat around inspection sticker month, etc.

I've sold or moddified the following parts (for next to nothing) because they were very wrong for me:

Loud Mouth
Borla XR1 (to fix the loud mouth part of the loud mouth)
TSP catted Y (terrible ground clearance)
Got a hooker catback to replace my LM
Pacesetter ORY merge replaced with a flowmaster merge
Ditched the VHP handheld tuner ($450 down the hole)

Should have invested in a rear end a long time ago. Should have gone with different headers (like kooks or edelbrock stepped Stainless) as my 4 year old pacesetters are rusty and aren't the best for a larger cube engine (something the catback/lid only car never thought of). Should have gotten HPTuners from the beginning. Should have gotten a wideband.

In other words, if I had of just rocked a totally stock car from the beginning until I knew what kind of car that I wanted to build then I would have saved a lot of money... or freed up lots of cash to spend on the unexpected things, like tick master cylinders.

And really, since I ultimately want to weld up a home-brew turbo kit then I shouldnt have ever invested in any exhaust mods, or the SLP ram air, or the lid, or, or the hotcam... but who can resist ... especially since its going to take me forever to get to that point.

johnzss

iTrader: (11)

if this is going to be a daily driver.. i suggest getting the car built for both straight lines and twistys. feel free to disagree but whats the point of having a all out drag car daily driven? Yeah, it will be fun as hell blowing any car in the street out the water, seeing how many people break their necks in a parking lot with a nasty cam! MHO i believe that ANY daily driven car should be well rounded, just change tires and suspension settings.. Great question BTW!

BrownBoy

iTrader: (10)

I might get flamed for this, but what about doing a build along the lines of mine?

RX-7 chassis + LS V8

Personally, I'm using a 5.3 but a lot of RX-7 owners have LS1/T-56 setups that are putting down ~450RWHP in one of the worlds best-balanced chassis...what's not to love?

KurtRardin

iTrader: (11)

No flame. Great idea! Having both is something super cars aim to accomplish

Well, things for my car will be different than I had originaly planned: I was just informed that my S60 was being built with a Truetrac instead of a locker. Something got mixed up and my order was delayed so they could get another problem taken care of and when I found out about it I was informed that it was also built with a truetrac. I said "Perfect! Best mixup ever." I'll be getting a refund for the difference the locker cost me and it should hopefully ship out tomorrow. Just as I was starting to sweat the locker I find out that its not going to have one anyway. Looks like I'll be able to still enjoy my car in the rain and mabye make an autox car out of it too. I originally thought that truetracs are worthless, but I think the 35 spline dana 60 application is an exception to the normal perfomance people have with them.

So, it looks like I'll still be right down the middle: could go carving, could be a drag car.

From research I saw where Sam Stano recommended the SA koni shocks for a particular persons car that was being built as a dual purpose car. I believe he mentioned adjusting the front shocks to better suit drag racing and disconnecting the sway bar. While not incredible he said that he has a few customers with "handling" setups that can still accomplish 1.50 and 1.60 60' times.

Since he's got Koni shocks on sale now I'll probably be giving him a call soon. He seems to be one of the authorities on making an f car plant in a corner and offers great advice. Since Koni's are probably the best suited for a "dual purpose" application, and Sam is one of the most respected in that area then I might as well do some business with him. I wouldn't feel bad about spending a good bit of time on the phone with him if I'm going to do business with him.

For more suspension components I think I'll source Eric at midwest chassis. He offers a lot more stuff than people are even aware of, and I've spent a lot of time on the phone with him too. Definitely a stand-up guy worthy of my business (I ordered my S60 from him). I suggest contacting him if you're interested in some suspension components and need to know technical stuff down to the nitty-gritty.

dutinsss

iTrader: (2)

where i live, we don't have good autox tracks to race on, or good roads that i would think about flying around turns on so i'm more focused on straight line speed. and too, if we had an autox track, i'd buy a cheaper car that would handle better for that anyway.

Juicy J

iTrader: (5)

Make sure to do your research on the true trac. Most guy that go with the true trac end up replacing it later on with a locker, or spool.

spoonraker

iTrader: (5)

This is kind of a silly thread since it's all just based on opinion. Don't let us decide what you should do with your car, do what you want to do with it.

When you go to the extreme, no matter which way you go, your car is getting hacked up and money is getting dumped into it.

My only bit of advice, no matter what you choose, would be to buy a dedicated daily driver. A daily driver is neither a drag racer or a road racer, and if you keep limiting yourself by keeping your car daily driver friendly then you'll never be happy with the results on the track. You don't need an expensive and flashy daily driver, trust me, you just don't. I drive a POS Saturn every day to work, I paid for it in cash and carry cheap liability insurance on it. This also means the mileage on my Camaro stays low, and I qualify for super cheap insurance on it as well since it's garaged in the winter and only driven for leisure purposes.

KurtRardin

iTrader: (11)

That's probably the best bit of advice I've heard yet on this board, since 2005. I believe I may have stepped a little far from my original point to the thread: Letting other people come and say how and why they wanted to build the car that they built.

Post away everyone!

spoonraker

iTrader: (5)

Thanks!

As for why I chose to turn my car into a drag car, I think the biggest reason is because that's what everyone else around here does. This town has a decent street racing scene, and there are several tracks that aren't terribly far away. All the drag racing guys know each other pretty well and hang out plenty even when we aren't racing.

Also I believe it's a bit cheaper to get into drag racing then it is road racing. If all you're doing is autocross then it's cheap, just pay $20-$30 per event, but if you want to race on a real road course usually you have to have a special license and training which cost quite a decent chunk of change. Plus, right off the bat road racing cars have faster wearing parts. You'll be buying tires and brakes, and not cheap ones, pretty regularly.

KurtRardin

iTrader: (11)

I thought I should come back and say that I've installed my S60/4.10/Truetrac. In addition I performed the heater hose mod (to net a 0" drop from the increase in axle tube size), installed new poly swaybar endlinks (since my old ones broke and the local parts house stocked new ones with poly bushings), installed a double rod ended UMI PHB, and... I went ahead and put my Koni 3rd gen shocks on the rear... wow. I haven't installed the front end stuff yet (STB, 1LE swaybar with poly endlinks, and Koni SA) but if makes the car feel half as firm as the rear then I can safely say... well... that I really like driving a car with responsive suspension.

Maybe my opinion is skewed because I just replaced my worn out shocks and bushings with new stuff, rod ends, and poly stuff and the differnece is massive, so I'm not going to say that I think I want a strait up corner carving car.

I think its fair to say that both extremes can have negative effects on driveability, and both can be expensive. But I believe that a canyon carver is cheaper to build than a 10 second car. And by that I mean that a canyon carver built to control the power of a bolt-on car wouldn't cost you as much as it would to build a car to trap 140 in the 1/4. Now, after saying that, if you were to build a car with the power to move a mostly-full-weight car into the low 10s and have the ultimate goal of ripping up Leguna Seca then I bet it would cost you a lot more than the drag car (which for this analogy would make the same power).

Call Sam Strano and ask him how to control a ~370rwhp car and his recommendation will probably be much different (and cheaper) than if you called him with the goal of keeping a 600rwhp turbo car planted. Speed is obviously a huge factor in this build as the more powerful car will approach the corners much faster than the bolt-on car, and will have different braking needs, etc.

I think it's fair to say that more parts exist in the aftermarket/shelf stocked parts world to make an F car run a 1.40 60' than there are to make an F car compete with the more high-end road racing competition.

And after thinking about all that I have to think about how I would ever go about funding either of those...Good thing it's only money. Maybe I'll get my gun out and see if I can find some bubling crude. My Alabamian neighbors shouldn't mind if I put up an oil rig in my back yard either. Yeah, that should be sufficient in funding my car needs.

subarubill96

iTrader: (9)

id go as far to say that a corner carver is going to be a bit cheaper than a drag car while being alot more "tame" for driving around. if i had a truck and trailer id build a drag car but if i did that id have no money left for the car so it's just a pipe dream.
i am going to give it a try doing both, hoping to run middle 11's on spray while keeping a 10 bolt under it and my 4ljunkieE on the stock converter. i know the 60e isnt great for either but it should be alright for my dual purpose street car. it'll give me time to continue building up the subaru to be a dedicated track/ rally car and to find a miata to throw a large displacement
(427ci+)LSx into to give a try at some silly fast trap speeds. only need a money tree....

KurtRardin

iTrader: (11)

I believe the money tree exists, it's called Marijuana