Well now that I've been walking again (planned ankle surgery) for a bit and I got a couple house projects knocked out and have financially recovered from last season I pulled the trigger on new pistons for my Stoptech calipers.




Off to YouTube to see how to safely remove the old seals and not get into the housing. I bet a little pick would do it.

 

As some may know, I've been chasing an inconsistent brake pedal for some time now. After about 3 laps the car gets sketchy. I used to pad certain brake zones and just live with it, but the competition has stepped up forcing me to as well. I tried a couple different iterations of better sealed brake ducting with no change. Eliminated rear knock back in 2 phases with no change. Went up 1 in front brake compound with no change. Tried a firmer brake fluid that was firmer for 3 laps then the same old same old. Upgraded from C5 to stiffer C6 calipers to no avail. Upgraded from Camaro hubs to C7 SKF x tracker hubs to no avail.



Time for the Stoptechs. I had to pull my pants down and unload over $1100 for these 2 piece rotors last year to play with the calipers I already had.




​​​​​​The rotors showed up the day I went to the track for practice (you know, the day I snapped an axle and watched my wheel pass me and launch itself into outer ****** space off the tire wall), the Friday leading into the race weekend. Ended up being a moot point as the caliper pistons were trashed.



The other 4 were worse. Maybe I would have been OK? But there's very little send left with my approach to setting up and equipping this car. Thanks to my friend who's been learning from a pro, there's nothing I can leave on the table. Here you can see the newer pistons are more thoughtfully designed. I'm genuinely curious as to what's up with the inner surface of the piston. The diameter being cast in is an excellent detail. An old piston is pictured in the bottom for clarification.



One or both of the calipers was leaking and I got them for basically free with new seal kits. I traded tires I won for them. The old seals didn't look hammered, but the dust boots were gone.



While they are radial mounted 4 pot calipers, they're not true racing calipers. I wonder if I should have left the boots off. I bet they're roached within a season.



Rebuilding was easy peasy though. My compressor died so I couldn't split the hubs from the adapters to relocate the spindle cooling duct shrouds. I'll swing by the hangar tomorrow and handle that to mock it all up and see what I'm missing. While this brake kit is a bolt on when you buy it from Stoptech, I've tried to piecemeal it together on the cheap with moderate success. I anticipate a couple issues I don't see just yet, but that's why I do this now and not the weekend before the first race.

Edited to fix pic links. The copy/paste job I attempted last night didn't fly.

 

I monkeyed around with this yesterday and did some mocking up to verify parts fitment, seems I have all the right stuff here.




The shroud is pretty flimsy and doesn't sit flat, but the cardboard template did. With a flat shroud the only trimming required would be for the brake pad to clear.



And this pic shows why there's interference at all.



The shroud is ever so slightly larger than the ID of the rotor, but the offset keeps the shield just off of the rotor face. I need to get some thicker shrouds cut for this and re-engineer the duct portion as well. Going to put some angle on it this time to keep the newish hoses happy.
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So now I'm going after the plastic tank swap and fixing/reinstalling my 3.73 diff. First thing I noticed removing the diff was a massive interference issue between the rotors and my rear pad abutment brackets.



I don't understand how I lathed that much iron off without a wheel coming loose, the car not wanting to move, etc. I had a similar issue when I cambered the diff last winter that mysteriously fixed itself and I noticed it immediately and began troubleshooting. This is a bit unnerving as it could have had catastrophic consequences. I'm not opposed to risk, but I prefer it be calculated. In this next pic you can see what got me off my *** to swap.



The car has always stunk like raw gas and I always attributed that to the vented tank with no charcoal canister, or because racecar. Last winter the stink got worse and I noticed the tank surface was moist, but never a drip. I wanted to change it out, but hadn't done my research and had bigger fish to fry. Well I'm done with the stink, I've done my research, and since the diff is out it's the perfect time to knock it out. Thinking I'll hit the pull and pay tomorrow to grab the gas gauge sending unit that'll play ball with my LT cluster seeing how the tank is LS. Another benefit of the tank is lighter weight, higher capacity, and the ability to run it lower without starvation which gives me more flexibility WRT weight distribution. And apparently the LT lines plug right in.
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Dropped the tank.





Can't really tell where the leak came from and I wasn't curious enough to find out so it's in the scrap metal bin now after I robbed the pump and chopped the harness. Next I unloaded my wounded axle and loaded the borrowed assembly. I then disassembled the wounded assembly. Looks like enough meat is still there to biff a seal back into.



Just need to straighten that up a bit. As for this POS?



I found a use for it.



Balancing the axle assembly to drain overnight. Plan is to shove a used axle in there, new seal, maybe a blob of silicone, and send it.
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Plastic tank is in. 3.73 axle is repaired and reinstalled. Stoptechs are rebuilt, gravity bled, and reinstalled with new pads and modified brake ducting and plenums. The LS1 pump is a few orders of magnitude quieter than the LT1 pump and fortunately the car fired right up. Only problem was it stunk the garage out like a 2 stroke. So my biggest concern now is the Stoptechs not leaking and the pump that's been sitting so long remaining happy about being alive. I think I did it all right, but the thing that screws you is always the thing you least expect so we'll see. I just want a successful practice day and race weekend even if it costs me some asspain.

 

I did get my knuckles and rear caliper mounts sandblasted and then painted with VHT roll bar and chassis satin black. Seems to be more durable than the regular Rust-oleum I've used for so long and doesn't need a primer either.





Here you can see an issue that developed, somehow, last time the car was out.







Somehow my rotors ended up lathing the caliper mounts to the point these hammered *** brake pads tried walking right out. I was tired of wrenching on the car Sunday of that race weekend so ran it metal on metal out back twice, including my only win that weekend. No matter as the rotors trashed the mounts anyway. This happened on the borrowed axle with my brakes. All set up on my axle now it all looks OK. Next up I had to redo my brake ducting, but the solution ended up much simpler than I had originally imagined. I figured I'd get fancy with a pie cut and angle these suckers forward. When I went to do just that, I came to realize that this perpendicular setup really is ideal. I thought they pushed the hose into the coilovers, but when I checked range of motion with the tie rods hooked up I was clear and full lock the other way was much happier, so I welded the first one back together, moved the rest mount, and was done. I also reduced the diameter of the shrouds to fit these schwanky new rotors.




This side I cut back a little too far, so welded the piece I cut off back on.



Come on don't leak and do fix my knock back issue!

 

Thanks for reminding me what stock fender trim looks like. Too bad the brake master is so restricted, was hoping to come here and pick the brain.

Welcome to the smashed passenger quarter club. Someday I'll swap to a clean shell. But the money just keeps going to making the old turd faster.

 

The inner fenders are 2 piece, I cut the middle out because the tires like to grab when you bottom out. I ran my own fender trim over the first time I had it on track. Since going to the 2 piece setup, I've not lost a single piece.

As for the quarter, I know a guy who does bodywork by day and actually did some quick PDR a couple years ago that made it look less bad. The car had a rumply quarter when I bought it, but I've certainly done plenty to it myself. If I could get that PDR guy in my garage for just a couple of hours he'd have it looking semi-presentable but as you can see, I chose to spend $2000 on brakes and Corvette hubs instead of making it pretty. Priorities.

 

Yes, and $2000 easily buys an entire roller. Easy to justify throwing the money elsewhere no matter how cheap it is

 

It looks like the tank swap is good to go, minus the fact that I need to drive the fuel neck down farther and make a bracket for it. Pump and sender are doing their jobs. The brakes seem alright too, but I need to put the axle on stands and idle the car in gear to see if I have a bent rim or axle. The guys at the dyno said it was jumping pretty good. Hopefully it's just out of balance. Speaking of dyno, I couldn't have picked a shittier day to load and go. I loaded as the snow started coming down which was made even more entertaining by the fact that my knuckle swap netted me 3.5" of toe out which I realized as I got partway down the driveway that was covered in snow so I pressed on to the trailer. I almost didn't didn't make it up between the toe out and snowy ramp with slick tires. Thought I was gonna have to winch it for a second.





I ended up running a space heater in the trailer overnight because the low was 26 and the car has no antifreeze in it.



The only way to open this door the next morning was with a propane torch. I got the ramp door with a prybar and the other side door from the inside with brute force. Had to use 4wd at the gas station because the truck was sliding downhill in park. Everything was a sheet of ice. It was so bad I couldn't position the trailer to fill the car so I filled a jug and hit the road. At the dyno, I ended up having to plate up from a 35mm to a 37mm to get my 260whp, I got 307wtq. Initial pulls on the 35 were 251/301. When I got home I roughed in the alignment at 1/8" toe out. I still need to make sure the rack is centered and get camber evened out on both sides. Leftist good at -3.0 but right side is at -2.7. It's probably close enough but I'll be running counter clockwise next weekend on a rival so the additional camber is welcome on the right side. Once I do that and finish my trap door cover for the fuel tank/pump I should be ready for tech which is scheduled for Tuesday.

 

Alright, got the alignment re-roughed in with -3.0 camber both sides, had it at 1/8" of toe out, then decided to center the rack. It's now eyeball centered and I'm at 3/16" of toe out, so plenty of wiggle room to correct it on the road tomorrow. I'll shoot for somewhere in the 0-1/16" out range, favoring the 0 side to see how it works for me mid corner. Toe in is supposed to be best for mid corner, if I could make that work I'd like to see how it works. I think the driving approach there would simply be an earlier initiation with the same late apex.

Edit: I also went ahead and marked my bias valve.




I bought the car back in 2013 and took until last season to decide I wanted to **** with the valve, mainly because I'd walked the compound down to the point I could deviate from full minimum. We'll see if this does me any good. Seeing how I whooped *** with metal on metal rear brakes last year I have my doubts.

 

Today I sent the fuel neck down the rest of the way with brute force, WD40, and another obligatory sacrifice to the blood gods. In addition, I nailed the alignment down. I got it DAMN close last night with the tape measure and eyeball. The wheel was only slightly left of center and I was able to get it right by reeling in that 3/16" of toe out by necking it down to 1/16" on the right side. Next I set my sights on the right rear wheel. I put the car on stands, in gear, running, and observed movement on the right side that I didn't see on the left. I then swapped wheels and repeated, the problem didn't exactly track. It was so inconclusive I wasn't sure what to make of it, so I called a friend and he suggested the dial indicator. Duh! So I set it up the lazy way at first on the brake rotor and got 12ish thou of lateral runout. Fail. I then tore the brakes off and repeated at the axle flange.



Both lateral and radial are at or under 5 thou, so I believe my issue is the wheel(s?) itself. Gonna have the rim runout measured going forward with tire mountings. For now? Send it!

 

Got the car tech'd today, that's a mental load off. Also received my AiM SoloII DL.




If I can get the laptop to play ball I'm in business. This thing should be a game changer. For that to happen I think I need to shoehorn a Windows 10 upgrade into my already tight schedule. Still need to pump a liter of brake fluid through the system along with some other piddly stuff. And do my j-o-b. We do this for fun, right?

 

So today I got the right rear tire mounted onto a spare wheel as that one was noticeably bent. My dumb *** was staring at the outside of the wheel, but it was the inside of the barrel that was fucked and that was very obvious on the balancer. I then bled the brakes, tightened the dash pad back down, "repaired" my NACA duct, and loaded it.



The laptop issue boils down to me being able to replace a stupid .dll file that I don't presently have rights to even as an admin so I'll be borrowing someone else's for data analysis this weekend. **** Vista. Gotta get up bright and early tomorrow as the PM sessions were sold out but the all day wasn't. Lame. That tells me the morning session will be less slammed, plus we have a lot of parking spots to reserve, so it's for the best that I'm beating the gate down at 0730.

 

At least you figured out what is going on w/ the wheel.

For the dll you can try changing the ownership, on the file or even go a folder up and propagate new ownership from there, then take permission of the file and see if it helps.

 

The ownership deal looks to be a W7+ only thing as the mouse clicks don't line up with how Vista is set up. For now I've been having a racer who wants to study my data thumb drive it over to me as I can still look at it with RS2. PPIR back in April was the first race with the Stoptechs. I still had the Raybestos pads, but with 4 pot fixed calipers and 2 piece floating rotors. WHAT A DIFFERENCE! It's a good thing I did the practice day as I had to completely relearn the car. The pedal required MUCH less travel to do its thing, but the pads still sucked and faded 2-3 laps in. That Saturday, I got some weird feedback through the pedal, thought I was locking up (in a 119-35ish mph braking zone) so trailed off just a touch. . . and slammed into the car I was chasing.


All patched up!


I got his front wheel here, it got in so far that it broke the power steering cooler. I didn't realize that until the weekend was over. You can see if leaking on my floor here.


This one's a little tougher to hide. But I managed this past weekend.

I really wasn't 100% sure what happened until I looked at the data, you can see it plain as day.



Don't mind me chopping the throttle there at the far right. That's the biggest hit I've ever been a part of, and we both finished the race! You can see how far everything got pushed in compared to the spare shell.




I got it pretty close, slapped another red fender on, and was done with the front. Didn't even check the alignment, the wheel never moved. When I did check it a month plus later, it was where I'd set it before the hit. The hit was big enough to knock my booster reinforcement out of whack though, so ideally a trip to the frame rack is in order.

 

In addition to the fender, structure, and PS cooler, I finally got around to replacing the NACA ducts. The ones I originally installed in the bumper were not lexan, so I sought out some lexan replacements. I don't like their shape as much as what they replaced, but at least this way minor nose to tail contact or flying dirt and crap won't destroy them.



After the last minute PS cooler install, I remembered that the diff had puked out a bunch of oil at PPIR so I took another look. I realized that the vent no longer existed and was the likely cause seeing how the pinion seal was a year old and the diff cover had been buttoned up a month of so prior. So this bastard, along with 1/2 qt of gear oil, went in the car around 10 PM the night prior to practice. Fun.



Thankfully I had a spare on hand or else I would have just made a mess again at Pueblo.

This was also the weekend that my competition paid for a pro to come out and help anyone who raised their hand to go faster. My first session out on practice Friday was going to be a gentle pad bedding session seeing how I hadn't been to this track since 2019 and I'd slapped Stoptech pads on Raybestos bedded rotors. That plan fell to pieces about 4 seconds after I hit the racing surface as the pro, in another CMC car, blazed by me on the front straight. I entered chase mode as the pads came and went and did their thing. He slowly left me until he hit traffic, the pads came on, and I came on. Then it was lead/follow and a download after the fact. The next session out was much cleaner driving, lead follow again, and afterwards he told me that there was nothing he could have done to get around me. He drove my car about a half a second faster than I did, on pace for .7 faster until a corner worker ran after a cone when he was coming in. I've been faster than his time, but he's a pro and will find it as well so. . . at the end of the day to be less than a second a lap off of a pro is huge. Then you get to talking to them and find out all the weird stuff they do to go as fast as they do. This one had NEVER been to Pueblo and just picked it up on the spot. He'd picked out all the camber spots and non school lines almost instantly and just started laying it down. It was impressive to follow him and see how differently the car acted with him behind the wheel vs my usual nemesis. It was an experience to say the least. For Saturday though, the timing loop was being wonky so we did a qual race instead of qual session which meant we qualified based on finishing position and not fast lap times. Near the end, I got lucky. We'd been trapped behind the Spec Z guys for a few laps with them and their side by side through the dirt shenannigans that we're also guilty of, when Rob (said nemesis) gets up too close to them leading onto the front straight and they're side by side. I checked up just enough to get a clean run onto the straight and motor him and about 5 Z cars for the pole in R1 which was a flying start. I then proceed to lug the car down to 3000 in 2nd gear (we both had 3.73s, he has an LS1) and the start was mine. The race was mine too until the damn water temp gauge randomly just buried itself a lap or 2 from the finish. I came in immediately, got it cooled down quickly, and the car seemed fine. The next race, not a money race, the car ran fine. R3 Sunday it pullled the same crap, but I'd built up a good lead and held off for 1 lap to see if the white would fly. When it did, I went just fast enough to not get passed and keep the win. I changed radiator caps for R4 and the car did fine, so was the car fine? I didn't feel confident that it was. I found a leak at this level sensor hole, but wasn't 100% confident that that was my problem.

 

So I ripped the heads off on the 1 weekend I had between Pueblo and Hallett. . . after I'd signed up for Hallett. I didn't see anything on the head gaskets that would concern me.



To be safe, I was gonna throw on my machine shop fresh spare heads. When I unwrapped them though, it because clear there was a problem.




This fuckery sits right where the firing ring goes so I shitcanned that idea and checked the old heads for warpage. The interwebz say I get a total of 4 thou. I measured 1.5 in the center of both heads, and in the next one over on one of the heads. Sounded good to me so I slapped it back together. For may moons, this car has been a 2 stroke upon startup, but never chugged excessive oil during a race. I discovered why once I had the heads off.



5 valve stem seals basically ceased to exist. That and the passenger side exhaust manifold was pretty loose. Car's a bit cleaner and less stinky now. When I got to Hallett on Friday, it was still barfing a good half a gallon of water out each session. It'd stay cool until I came in then lose its mind. I ordered a 20# radiator cap Friday night and Saturday morning popped that bad boy on along with some Bar's head gasket magical fixer upper. Lo and behold it only barfed out about a pint per session after that, so I survived the weekend. OK survived is an understatement. I got screwed in qual by an dbag in an AI car that wouldn't swallow his pride and move, so I let him know how I felt about that. Then they gridded AI BEHIND CMC because they sucked so bad. I was gonna make a public announcement at the drivers meeting to those in higher classes in CMC, but slower, to GTFO of the way but them gridding behind us sufficed just fine. I still ended up qualifying 4th and pole blew the start so I got 2nd in R1, can't complain about that.


R2 was an invert from R1. I finished 7th I think, but got bumped to 4th as a bunch of people got DQ'd for "passing under yellow". Once I saw how it shook out, I realized how lucky I was. These guys had initiated a move, but bailed and still got penalized. There was a flag stand at the top of the hill between T1 and T2 and that's where they made their mistake. I stuck my nose in down at T2 and bailed and didn't get caught. So right there I had nailed the pole for R4, but I still wanted to send the **** out of R3 to prove a point. I started around 8th and finished 2nd, more than enough to send the point home.


Now we're up to the final. Those in CMC understand how big a deal that Hallett is. If you can win here, you can win at nats. Well unfortunately I didn't win, but I did finally get my *** up on the podium. I blew it in T1, John left me plenty of room but I'm always more comfortable on the outside without a car to run into if I get into the gas too soon. After that, I hounded him for a bit, then missed one ******* shift leaving T9 (the bitch), and never made up the ground. Late in the race we had a multi lap full course yellow and I got stuck behind, you guessed it, some ****** dipshit in a slow *** AI car who didn't understand the urgency of my situation. After the green, he let me by in T2, but I couldn't close that kind of gap in the 1 lap we had until the checker.


Overall an excellent weekend of racing, and I even got a spy photo of our boy @StangkillaSS



Notice his lack of presence and alcohol consumption? And he calls himself a NASA Texan.

Aside from Cryin Bryan, the F bodies generally don't fare well down there, especially not the LT1 cars. I proved that wrong this year. And based on the pro driver's feedback, really has me questioning the need to pony up for the LS swap. I didn't realize how influential the LT1 torque was with respect to how the car handles. If I LS swap I guaranteed need to regear or the car will plow like a dumptruck the way it did last October with the 3.42s. And watching me and Rob leave slow 2nd gear corners, holy crap the the LT-Juan just lays it down! After cracking off some 5-3 downshifts this past weekend, I'm becoming more and more in favor of just keeping this pig LT powered and hopefully guinea pig the 411 swap with it so I don't have to worry about optis anymore.

 

Hell yea, congrats on getting it done and getting more figured out on the car!