Hey guys, just curious for some simple places I might be able to shed some weight off my Trans Am convertible WS6?

This is a STREET CAR not a strip car so don't give me any of the "airbags, a/c, carpetting, seats, power top, etc." and stuff like that. You may be thinking well theres nothing left. Well as long as it doesn't take away from the appearance, functionality or drivability of the car then I want to hear but I don't want to gut my car down to a shell if thats what you're thinking.

To start things off I heard a few references to people taking out some type of styrofoam backing from behind the bumpers or something. If someone would like to divulge some information on that it would be helpful.

I'm wondering is there anyone out there that produces lightweight body panels? I mean obviously the rear fenders are a heavy peice has there been anyone out there to ever replace the metal fender with plastic/composite piece?


thanks in advance guys.

 

Yes, suspension parts count. If there are parts that are worth upgrading for weight loss I'll consider it. such as K-member, lower A-arms and stuff like that. But don't mention things like panhard rod because you're not going to lose anything worth mentioning off that. (not weight wise)

Obviously I could just add more hp and chances are it would be more cost effective. Well I have plans for power and they will be substantial but I want to keep things N/A and smooth and driveable rather then pushing big loppy cam, N20 or FI at it I would rather lighten it up a bit.

thanks again.

 

how about pulling the spare tire and jack out of it?, unless you already did that

 

https://ls1tech.com/forums/drag-raci...y-updated.html

 

I've done a few things to mine and I pulled onto the scale at the Fertilizer plant this morning. 3600 with me in the drivers seat and a full tank of gas. I weigh about 180 so she's sitting close to 3420... Not bad.. I still have factory radio, speakers A/C Power Steering bumper braces.

I've installed Spohn Tubular K member, Upper and lower A arms.
Rear seat back is out, factory seat belts are out, any mount or brace not needed removed. Air bags are history. The Right one alone is close to 10 lbs.! ABS delete.
L power seat track is out, replaced with a manual. It's ok though I'm going to try and recline it a lil. Once it's sit's right for me, it's not going to move. I also removed the rear sway bar and it still corners good.
I've added the Dana 60 which I think is almost 75 > 100 lbs more and the oil pan has been enlarged towards the front to hold 1 more Qt.

Though with the weight reduction and NO traction control, I really have to Watch it !
As I found out yesterday.... I changed lanes on a slight curve at about 50mph and damn near lost it !!!

That sticky is really helpful if you really want to get into the reduction thing.

 

jack and tire are out, thanks for the replies guys but most of the stuff in that sticky is stuff I'm not willing to do to my car. I guess all I have left are body panels and suspension stuff...

Still no mention of the bumper backing thing I heard about...

 

The front bumper brace is not that heavy at all. Plus the foam on it, I do not think it's worth messing with. I did not touch it yet, and may not... I'd like to relocate the battery, but with all the cubes the engine has, I'm sure I'll have cranking troubles..

The front suspension is heavy, there you might pick up 70 > 100 lbs off if you go all tubular.... Good luck.

 

did you weight your front parts when you converted to tubular?......just kinda curious as to how much weight was lost

 

Bottom line is if you don't want to lose all the heavyweight **** like seats, carpet and creature comforts, you need to mod the hell out of your engine to get that sled moving faster.

As for your power and "pushing big loppy cam", a good tune will make a "big" cam and heads combo very driveable and almost sound docile at idle.

 

Why are you worried about weight reduction if it's just your street car? you can just add like 20 hp to cover the weight.

 

Well if you havent pulled any weight out of your car you prolly weigh in at around 36ooish. i weighin at just over 3100. think 20 hp will cover 500 pounds?

And of course you can always add power. But no matter what you could always be faster if you had pulled the weight out.

 

true enough but I think I've already answered that question... the reason being is that once my build is done there won't be one of those little mods left to do to add another 20hp unless I go FI or N20 which I don't want to.

 

I've heard iffy stuff about the full tubular front suspension. Some people talk about cracking the K-members. Also, the tubular upper members are no lighter (or stronger) than the stockers. The lower A-arms are iffy as well. There was one thread where a guy bent the shock mounts outward. The design for the mounts on the lower arms are not braced enough for my tastes. At least not for daily driving.

The only reason I'd go with a tubular front suspension would be if I was gonna make a drag car. Otherwise, I don't think the designs are strong enough to tackle street driving on a regular basis.

 

you could get a fiberglass or carbon fiber hood all the way to lexan windows for these things theres all kinds of things to do but total weight isn the whole ball game here you should also do some research on where the weight is located and how it is transfered [(Herb Adams) <---- chassis engineering guru] mostly it just depends on what you wanna do with the car do you wanna straight line it autocross it or have a 50/50 both. you cant have both in oneand it beat everything inboth categories you pretty much hafta focus one or the other if you wanna get really serious. for a straight line you want good weight transfer towards the rear which includes having soft springs that dont corner like stiff springs do which are what you want for road racing apps. i couldgo on for a while i really get into this stuff but ill stop here

for you street car id say just start off with simple stuff like body bracing and some weight dispersion (just saw a cool kit to move the battery from the front to the back inside the trunk where the spare goes) and see how you like this stuff cuz it will change the ride of your vehicle and idk if you want a comfortable ride if you dont mind a rough ride or what.

your app will also determine what kind of drive train you can set up to go along with it which can totally change the ride of your vehicle, could also go on with this for a while but theres plenty of info out there to look up

i dont know why you would wanna take out stuff like styrofoam to save weight whats that weigh 1 or 2 pounds? that'll get you and extra ten thousandth at the track woo hoo plus whats gonna brace the body panels if thats not there?

 

sorry ifanything doesn make sense or isn worded correctly im comin off of 30 hrs school and 40 hrs work this week just got on and wrote this before going to bed

 

agreed this is dumb. also to the above our cars weigh 3400 not 3600, unless you were talking about convertibles. but id still defend that losing 300 is better than adding 20 horses.

basically if you care so much about weight you shouldnt have bought a vert. you will always be heavy, not having a roof will make it flex more and less stable. verts are great weekend cars but for a drive on the street not racing.

 

I know it's in the Drag Racing Tech Forum, but the weight reduction sticky there still would provide you with several ideas for removing weight and still keep the car street-friendly.

 

I don't think I'm going to worry about getting rid of weight until I can't afford to add hp. You're right it would take more than 20 I was just being sarcastic, but at the same time I can see doing it as a free mod but I wouldn't in a street car. I don't think It would be that big of a problem.

 

Thats probably because you have no rear sway, they help alot

 

You can do what I did and lose 30lbs of body fat lol. It only takes 2 months.