Blerv's Car Chit-Chat

[Blerv]

I love knifes, flashlights, video games but a very important hobby is a love of cars & trucks. Growing up my family didn't do sports but my father was/is a total motorhead so boring cars were rarely in the garage. We almost always had a V8 Mustang around and I knew more about turbo lag in Elementary School than my classmates when he bought a 1988 Buick Grand National :eek: . Driving vacations were the norm and at 16 we drove to Reno for Hot August Nights for a little slack-jaw adoration.

Typically we enjoy/ed modified variety but really anything under the sun that is well engineered and/or styled are appreciated.

Rather than pepper your knife threads with car stuff I figured it might be a good place to have a dumping place for links, updates, and random musings. Feel free to share your own stories, thoughts, and everything else! There is a certain camaraderie that comes from spending way too much money on something and then spinning it in the wrong direction on public roads. How else are you going to learn life lessons and question mortality all in a few seconds? :o

Cheers,

[Blerv]

I know more about cars than history. Admittedly that is pretty sad .

I watched this 6-part series for free online. "James May's: Cars of the People". In the words of the British, it's "quite brilliant!". It's about 50% history and 50% cars. While some of the perspectives are a tough pill to swallow like the results of war the counterbalance is the perseverance of the human spirit. That and since history tends to repeat itself...well, you know the rest of it.

Here is the first one; the other 5 can be found in the same place with a little searching:

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x24ifq ... ode-1_auto

PS: It's a funky site and sometimes takes ages to load. My best success has been searching for "james may's cars of the people episode __" on Google with the appropriate episode and then just clicking the video.

EDIT: 5/3/16 - This series is now on Amazon Prime for easy viewing :).

[Blerv]

Reserved for future updates

[Evil D]

Rev limiters are like condoms. It's more fun to play without them but the consequences of not using them are expensive

A couple years ago I took my Mustang out after not driving it for about 3 years and in less than 2 miles I managed to break off a rocker stud. I did confirm that it'll rev to 8500RPM at least once lol.

It's still sitting in my garage without heads, but I have some new AFR's ready to go on whenever I find the motivation.

[OldHoosier62]

I know very little about hot rodding today, all my experience was in the 70's and 80's mostly. Built Vegas, Monzas, couple of Corvairs, Pintos, Mustang IIs, and a bunch of midsize stuff and a few trucks. No computerized stuff, just old school "Smokey Yunick" style builds. Had a ball doing it and lived to tell the tales.

Dual quads tri-powers, blowers, early crappy turbos, water/methanol injection and the early nitrous stuff....fun and crazy learning curves...a wonder me and my cohorts lived to laugh about it. And all of it just antique knowledge these days.

Switched to hot rodding Harleys in the late 80's because they were easier to store while I was deployed then stopped that after opening my first business...Oh well. Still got the memories.

[Blerv]

@Evil D: Ack! Yea, I had a "friend" back in the day with a mid 90's Acura Integra GS-R who tried to grab 4th at the top of 3rd while merging on the highway...he grabbed second. Even rev limiters won't idiot-proof a car :D. The mechanics did the math and think he hit somewhere around 13k rpm before like 80% of his valves bent.

@OldHoosier62: The principles all work though :). Old school and new school meet up on certain cars too; it's the basis of Chevrolet performance. If we keep on the path we are headed I'm sure electric power and hydrogen power cells will slowly take over. The nice thing with that is while complicated there is also a serene simplicity to it.

Really, power density and ease of charging/refueling will determine if that's the next 5 or 30 years. I guarantee there will still be vintage drag and road racing. We are big dumb animals and loud noises make us very happy. :D

[Evil D]

Heh, the jury is still out on what mine revved to, my tach only reads up to 8500 and I buried it lol.

[abbazaba]

Funny that you mention a Grand National... Growing up swapping engines in 80's Cutlass Supremes and Regals, the GN is one of my "grails" :D

[Blerv]

Funny that you mention a Grand National... Growing up swapping engines in 80's Cutlass Supremes and Regals, the GN is one of my "grails" :D

The 80's were a wild time. That thing as a project for Buick was just silly. Probably not the best executed car but few since then have had as much attitude. :)

Low compression engine, massive turbo, stall converter, black on black on black. :cool:

[SpyderEdgeForever]

Cool, Blerv, thanks for having this topic.

I have a question for everyone here about a custom built sports car, infact:

What are your opinions of someone taking parts from different autos, and piecing them together, and makin it work? Good or bad idea or what?

Example: Say you want the body of a Mustang and a VW engine, stuff like that.

[Evil D]

I grew up in a Chevy family, lusting after my cousin's '79 Z28 that ran a mild 454 and ran high 12s (which was insane back then but is absolutely laughable now with that much engine lol). Then when I was about 20 or so my best friend bought an '87 Mustang LX 5.0 5 speed and I drove it one time and completely fell in love with it. Six months later I bought a used '88 GT 5.0 5 speed and it took about a month before I had headers and full exhaust on it and was terrorizing everything in town with it.

I always loved the Grand National/GNX/T Types though. Those cars were just so sexy. They're secretly why I run that same style mesh wheel on my Mustang today (shhh, don't tell the Ford guys lol). What was even more crazy than the GNX though, was the Cyclone/Typhoon. The Cyclone was the fastest accelerating car in the world when it came out, even faster than a Ferrari Testarosa. Most people think they had the same 3.8 as the GNX but they actually ran a 4.3. I read an article years ago that said the GNX was capable of running 200mph in stock trim and that magazine featured a GNX that was outfitted with salt flat tires and a bit of aero ground effects and it did indeed go past 200mph at Bonneville.

[Evil D]

Cool, Blerv, thanks for having this topic.

I have a question for everyone here about a custom built sports car, infact:

What are your opinions of someone taking parts from different autos, and piecing them together, and makin it work? Good or bad idea or what?

Example: Say you want the body of a Mustang and a VW engine, stuff like that.

What you're talking about is good old fashioned hotrodding. Guys have been throwing pieces together to go faster since the automobile was invented. When I was really young, the hot setup was taking a small car like a Chevy Vega or Ford Pinto and dropping a 500ci Cadillac engine in it. Personally I really dislike brand engine swaps, I hate seeing a Chevy engine in a Ford and visa versa but guys do it all the time. I'm a bit of a purist when it comes to this stuff because there really isn't a car brand out there that hasn't made a viable engine to build and go fast with.

[noseoil]

Planning on Bonneville again this year for Speed Week on the salt flats!

Cadillac engine you say?


Rod & salt

[Evil D]

I'm really impressed with what those salt flat "cars" are doing these days, but I kinda hate the fact that they're basically airplanes built for down force instead of lift. When it comes to racing, pretty much all types of racing, I really prefer the stuff that starts with an actual road car.

[SpyderEdgeForever]

Regarding the Ford Pinto, was it as bad as people claim it was, with the rear mounted gas tank that would explode?

[Evil D]

Regarding the Ford Pinto, was it as bad as people claim it was, with the rear mounted gas tank that would explode?

Well there apparently was one case where it did happen, or so that's how the lawsuit went. We had at least two in our family that ran forever and were sold still running and we somehow escaped being engulfed in flames. I've also known quite a lot of them that were built up into drag cars, but that may not count since they were so heavily modified.

[Blerv]

Cool, Blerv, thanks for having this topic.

I have a question for everyone here about a custom built sports car, infact:

What are your opinions of someone taking parts from different autos, and piecing them together, and makin it work? Good or bad idea or what?

Example: Say you want the body of a Mustang and a VW engine, stuff like that.

* Many things are possible: Putting a front engine/rear drive combination into a similar car for example; Front/front into front/front, etc. Old VW/Porsche transplants are common. Even some Subaru/VW swaps have been done.

* It's just if they are economically feasible: Depending on the era and how close the companies were some are literally plug & play. The Nissan 240sx (USA) using a SR20DET turbo engine from the Nissan Silvia (JDM) for example. My friend has put a Lexus V8 into a 4-cylinder 4Runner but it required a bunch of parts including a custom transmission housing from Australia. People also have put the Infiniti Q45 v8 into 300zx's which is pretty funky :).

* Then the question is if it's justifiable for the person: You can put a Chevolet V8 (LS1, etc) into a Miata...which makes an AMAZING car. You can also put a Toyota 2JZ-GTE (supra turbo inline 6) into an El Camino. From a performance perspective these are extremely interesting swaps. Purists though might argue the cross brand/cross country swaps ruin the "spirit" of the car. I tend to think keeping the same make with the same model is the ideal situation...even a Ford Falcon engine (Australia) into a Mustang would be more agreeable in a car show than the Toyota one (even if the Toyota engine is wayyy better). Likewise putting a Corvette ZR1 engine into a Chevy hotrod would be more collectible than a Lexus V8. That whole branding thing, etc.

Swaps and mods are possible from mild to wild. The possible ones are expensive to insanely expensive. If you are swapping newer engines into older cars typically emissions are less restrictive. If you keep factory catalysts you can even do things legal in California depending on the combination of the engine/car.

[awa54]

Regarding the Ford Pinto, was it as bad as people claim it was, with the rear mounted gas tank that would explode?

A second cousin of my father's was killed in one, the rear-end crash was probably the cause of the fatalities, but the fire guaranteed no survivors. Most small cars in the 70s were not very crash-worthy, easily burst fuel tank or no.

[Evil D]

Well lets see some pics already!


Mine's an '85 KY Highway Patrol pursuit car, one of 10 built for KY in '85 so it's a rare pony. I got it from a guy who had it set up for his wife to drag race. It had a horrible POS fiberglass cowl hood on it and a C4 automatic (factory 5 speed though, still had the clutch pedal zip tied up, thank God). The hood and spare tire/cheater skinnies on the front were quickly swapped out.

How I got it:



Then I got a '82 GT nose and swapped it on. I always had a thing for the old '70s Trans Am race cars with their low front air dams, and this was always my favorite nose from this generation of cars but Ford didn't put it on a coupe so I had to make it myself.




It sat like that for a loooong time, then I finally got sick of waiting to find the right painter so I spray bombed it in primer.




Then I finally got it painted, which turned out to be a complete nightmare that almost ended in a fight with the guy who painted it. Crack is bad for ya lol. But, the car now looks half way decent.




And this is how it looks today, apart from the interior being in the process of getting swapped out for black.




Engine wise it has seen a lot of changes. Started out with this mess..


Shined it up some..


Then built a stroker for it and decided to try to make it look somewhat stock..


I don't have current pics of the engine bay but it now has this beauty sitting on top of it..


It made 362hp/364tq with some old school ported 351W heads and a stock Holley intake on a duel plane intake. With that custom carb and single plane intake, plus the AFR's I'm about to put on it, I'm hoping for 450hp or so at the wheels. It only weighs 2800lbs and some change :D

[Blerv]

Very cool David!