How many times have we heard "I was planning to keep it stock.." Have fun with it, the exhaust sounds like it doesn't want to be kept stock.

Those two are a given. What you had was some guy in his late 30's early 40's who still had that retro 70's thing going on with the gold chains and unbuttoned shirt with the most gawdaweful 'cologne'. They also warp the brakes from sticking their head out the window at some gal walking down the street asking if they want a ride.
ppfffft yeah, riiiiiiiiiight

About time someone said this! And everyone wonders why I prefer a M6 over an auto....

Ellis is right. *poof*


You are kidding, right?

What a great day to get it delivered and it really isn't in as bad shape as you sort of made out to be. The exterior does look a little beat and off color but detail may take care of that - along with the funky gold sparkly decal (another indication of who drove it). Glad it got to you okay and had some time to lit the tires - might as well burn em' off before replacing them

 

Well, the hood baffle has been removed, also.. and there's 8 holes drilled in the bottom of it... For what reason, I'm not sure. Maybe it's where the steer horns mounted to the front.

Here's a pic so you can see what I'm talking about. Two on either side, and 4 in the center.


I would prefer it off of the drag strip. But when I am drag racing, I'd rather leave the stick at home and drive a A4 car. Can't beat that consistency.


No, I'm not kidding. Would be nice to just have a time slip on it... wouldn't you at least be curious what it would run?

Besides, I have to carry on my tradition of not owning a car that hasn't made a pass or two down the drag strip. I've taked every car I've owned since 1998 to the track.. and even some I didn't own.

I'm definitely going to dyno it as is... and I'd at least like to make a few TnT passes with it. Not going to bracket race it though. I might pull it out to race if the Formula is hard down, but I'm not going to make a habit of it.

I don't wanna have to start doing the clutch swap game.

 

Are the Crown Royal stickers realy that bad? I was hoping to hear the whole story about the stickers, they realy do not look like something that was added on by the owner.

 

Mine never bothered me but then again, I play the radio pretty loud too.
But it isn't anything a lil bit of sound deadening wouldn't cure if it bugged you too much.......just something about that rasp of the LM.

I would be more worried about that 10 bolt then the clutch.........it will give out far sooner then the clutch will.
I have to agree......it looks more like something the original owner's ricer kid added when Daddy wasn't home one weekend.

 

I gess if the VIN did not turn up any cool info I gess it was just a dealership trying to capitalise off the purple color and the series cars. I am going to dig a lil more but I doubt if I will find any more than Evyl has. They were still running Trans-Ams in '05 and will most likely still be running them in '06.

 

I found that out today... I took it out for a 2 hour drive this afternoon, hopefully the rain washed some of the grime off. But this time I brought some music with me, and I played it loud enough that I didn't really even notice the exhaust a whole lot. I am half tempted to just leave it because I REALLY like how it sounds... It sounds really badass... deep and throaty.. not raspy. I think I scared my GF half to death when I started it up today.



So if it goes I'll take the 10 bolt out of the Formula, put it on the T/A and buy a 12-bolt for the Formula. hehehehe

The story that is the only thing I have to go on is that the dealer said the previous owner told him that he put the decals on the car because he was a fan of IROC racing.

Someone also recently pointed out to me that Crown Royal wasn't the banner sponsor of IROC racing in 1998, True Value was. Crown Royal didn't start sponsoring IROC until 2004. The previous owner bought the car in 2004, which supports the story the dealer told me. I think that alone is enough to convince me that it's not intentional... it was just someone putting stickers on a car.

So it's coming off of there.

 

If that is the case then hellz ya tear them off and burn them!

 

Beg to differ.

 

I made another discovery about the car this morning... the rear end is NOT stock.

I've been noticing that it really seems to be sucking gas, so it made me wonder if the gear ratio had been changed... so I called up the old gear calculator, and it said that at 60 mph I should be taching 2000 rpm in 5th gear.... but on the highway I was only doing 50 mph at 2000 rpm. Then I threw in 4.10 for the gear ratio, and bingo... there it was. The numbers were dead on what I'm seeing on the road.

So the car has 4.10 gears in it, too.

 

It's not to say that a clutch can't die first, but my experience with these cars has been the rear end is far weaker then the clutch........although I know my clutch (in the '02's) is the same one from the Z06's so maybe that helps me out.........also know a LOT of LS1 F-Body owners who have had rear-end issues/drama long before their clutches have gone out.........

 

My ex g/f had bad hearing in her left ear, which was another reason I loved my LM, when she was the passenger, she could barely hear me so we didn't talk much during drives in my car.

AWESOME idea.


Sounds groovy to me. Sounds like you got an awesome car too and I am uber-jealous.

 

Well my clutch went first at about 64k miles with 375/375 to the wheels. I've had to do my rear-end since then but it was only the pinion bearing and the rest could have been saved. The bearing went due to improper tightening when the dealer replaced the pinion seal. Or at least thats what Tommy feels about it. Right now I've got decent power and the rear is holding up fine, but I also dont run slicks and launch on the 1/4 mile. The thought being from Tom is that slicks will cause it to break for the traction they'll provide and at my current power level.

 

This is a little better...

Note the "Crown Royal IROC delete" mod has been completed.

 

 

looks good, would look better black , but looks real nice. congrats

 

If it was black, it wouldn't be rare.... so at least for me, that wouldn't be better.

 

Looks good Zeke....

Sense you can't count on an accurate reading for rpm down low (atleast via stock tach) I would try this....use 4th gear to get the rpm's up....3250 rpms in 4th at 60mph is 4.1. 3.73 gears would be 3000 rpm at 60........Usually 4.1 gears in stock 10 bolts whine bad....3.73's are pretty quiet....

Looks much better with some cleaning and sticker removal... I likey..
Jimbob

 

I tried it at a number of different speeds, it's definitely 4.10s... and yeah.. they whine. Not bad, but they do whine.

 

So, you need some cheese with that?

 

Wow, it looks much better with a bath and sticker removal