Final Thoughts & Lessons Learned
Since the car’s completion in spring 2007, I’ve driven it all over town, and spent some time working through cones with a local autocross club. I finally had a chance to test out the custom suspension at Road Atlanta. The car did great: flat in the turns, braking right now, lots of acceleration. The car gets to 140 mph easily. I found some weak points and fixed them. The power steering went out in the pits after I came in, and I had to change out the crank pulley to get more cranking power from the alternator at low rpm. Mike Norris has been tweaking the EFI tuning over the past year, and it now starts quickly, and runs all day.
Stock Car Products modular sway bar meets Speedway Engineering arms. Riggins Engineering bent the arms to match a sheetmetal prototype I made. The bushings are Delrin with grease fittings.
The car is now officially “done” and I’m itching to build another. I’d like to think I learned some things along the way:
- If you are going to build a full-on car, start with just a body. A completed car is just too hard to cut up. At least it was for me, and was part of the reason I sold the ‘66 and bought the ‘67 shell.
- Watch your scope creep. Have a detailed plan, and stay with it. I went though a lot of changes from the original plan and it cost me time and money.
- Don’t stockpile parts. Buy the stuff you need when you need it. Get the parts, install the parts. Stockpiling parts will inevitably lead to buying stuff you don’t need, and it will cost you time and money.
- Consult with experts. I started out trying to do everything myself, and got caught in some false savings. If I had turned to professionals to start (like Wegner, Road Killer, and Prodigy Customs) I would have been better off.
- Remember (at least for me): it’s a street car. Race car parts usually won’t work for what you want. Use stuff designed for the real world, and don’t the let race stuff make your car into something you’ll regret.
Anyway, that’s a wrap. Now I gotta build another one and see if these lessons learned me anything.
Sources |
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| Art Morrison Engineering 800-929-7188 artmorrison.com |
Auto Meter 866-248-6356 autometer.com |
| Holley Performance Products 270-782-2900 holley.com |
Lunati LLC 662-892-1500 lunatipower.com |
| 1 Off Rides 407-416-5157 1offrides.com |
MagnaFlow Performance Exhaust 800-817-3930 magnaflow.com |
| Mike Norris Motorsports 407-616-2518 mikenorrismotorsports.com |
Prodigy Customs 407-832-1752 prodigycustoms.com |
| Road Killer Kustoms 770-720-4040 roadkillerkustoms.com |
Ron Davis Racing Products 623-877-5000 rondavisradiators.com |
| Stainless Works 800-878-3635 stainlessworks.net |
Wegner Automotive Research 920-394-3557 wegnerautomotive2.com |
| Wilwood Engineering 805-388-1188 wilwood.com |
Woodward Precision Power Steering 307-472-0550 woodwardsteering.com |