Chris Duncan
Supporter
After 6-1/2 years of blood, sweat, and swear words, of essentially working 2 jobs, of a big box full of back tracked botched parts, of neglected yard work and other sundry shelved projects and pastimes, finally got to drive this machine. It's just like a big hi-po go-cart, I think cuz you're sitting so low. The most torquey thing I've ever driven. Start off in 2nd gear easy. P E R M A G R I N !
First trip out ran out of gas because the gauge senders weren't calibrated, said 1/4 tank when it was empty, thought I'd checked that, apparently not. Apparently the super rich first map sucked up the initial 3 gals. in no time. Got kind of flustered and nervous in the F.O.R.D. position. If I hadn't been might have just switched tanks and continued on. Called my buddy and he rope towed me back to the garage. Tow hook came off en route and tore both fan blades and put a nice chunk in the $900 radiator. Well some new fan blades and the rad isn't leaking, little touch up paint, so it's just a beauty mark, you can't see it anyway unless you know it's there.
2nd drive had my other buddy, who's just gaga on this car, follow me in his pickup. Brought a tow rope (WITH NO HOOKS) We hit the local cruise spot and just parked for a while. You can really tell a lot about people by their reaction to this car. First you separate the car lovers from regular folks, then you separate the people who know the marque. It seems that car lovers of all types sort of let their guard down right away and you can have a nice conversation right from the get go.
The thing is still in gray primer but everyone seems not to care, but many ask what color it's going to be painted. I have painted the wheels. One side fluorescent green with blue spinners, the other a dark blood red with gunmetal spinners. These colors split about 50/50 between everyone's preference.
I'm driving it in primer to sort out any problems with the prep work. Had a nightmare once before with some spot putty swelling up after final paint. Already justified in that there's a couple of blisters in front of the top exhaust vent even with some heat shielding. Need better shielding and attention to possible air pockets in the body/primer work.
The Gen 7 was problematic to get it to the moderately driveable point. First I couldn't get the FAST distributorless to share the cam sync signal with the Gen7. Resolved by setting the Gen7 to batch. Then generic Gen7 startup software settings were all for 4 barrel Tbody setups (unstated), it was running WAY too rich. After re-drawing the supplied Gen7 wiring diagram (hard to read) in ACAD and giving it to the guys at Accel they were real nice and sent me a 8 barrel map (400ci). I tweaked it down a little for the 302, It still has a miss on transitory throttle but it's driveable. Going to tune with the G-TECH/Pro Homepage before big $$$ on the dyno.
The steering/suspension settings seem good. It's lighter parking steering than my Civic which is also non PS. It steers very quick but seems to track well at speed. Track time and the G-meter will tell on performance.
The rear view is just like everyone said, very limited. I also made the roof roll bar wider in the center which makes it even harder to turn around when backing, a camera may be in order.
Came in at 2170 lbs wet weight (no driver) which justifies all the hours spent in designing and fabricating lighter pieces all around. I spent days probably just drilling lightning holes.
The footbox is crowded going to have to get some racing shoes. The brake pedal effort is fine but the left front is locking up first but doesn't seem to pull that much.
Gobs of torque/throttle response/acceleration but the speedo needs calibration, think I'll register it first before driving it much more. Going to be hard explaining to the officer why the plates come up for something else, "hey that's not a Honda Civic!!".
Only thing could be better would be a group ride, and Neal already knows everyone so we're going to hook it up.
YEEEEEEEEHHHHH HAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!! (originally from Texas
)
First trip out ran out of gas because the gauge senders weren't calibrated, said 1/4 tank when it was empty, thought I'd checked that, apparently not. Apparently the super rich first map sucked up the initial 3 gals. in no time. Got kind of flustered and nervous in the F.O.R.D. position. If I hadn't been might have just switched tanks and continued on. Called my buddy and he rope towed me back to the garage. Tow hook came off en route and tore both fan blades and put a nice chunk in the $900 radiator. Well some new fan blades and the rad isn't leaking, little touch up paint, so it's just a beauty mark, you can't see it anyway unless you know it's there.
2nd drive had my other buddy, who's just gaga on this car, follow me in his pickup. Brought a tow rope (WITH NO HOOKS) We hit the local cruise spot and just parked for a while. You can really tell a lot about people by their reaction to this car. First you separate the car lovers from regular folks, then you separate the people who know the marque. It seems that car lovers of all types sort of let their guard down right away and you can have a nice conversation right from the get go.
The thing is still in gray primer but everyone seems not to care, but many ask what color it's going to be painted. I have painted the wheels. One side fluorescent green with blue spinners, the other a dark blood red with gunmetal spinners. These colors split about 50/50 between everyone's preference.
I'm driving it in primer to sort out any problems with the prep work. Had a nightmare once before with some spot putty swelling up after final paint. Already justified in that there's a couple of blisters in front of the top exhaust vent even with some heat shielding. Need better shielding and attention to possible air pockets in the body/primer work.
The Gen 7 was problematic to get it to the moderately driveable point. First I couldn't get the FAST distributorless to share the cam sync signal with the Gen7. Resolved by setting the Gen7 to batch. Then generic Gen7 startup software settings were all for 4 barrel Tbody setups (unstated), it was running WAY too rich. After re-drawing the supplied Gen7 wiring diagram (hard to read) in ACAD and giving it to the guys at Accel they were real nice and sent me a 8 barrel map (400ci). I tweaked it down a little for the 302, It still has a miss on transitory throttle but it's driveable. Going to tune with the G-TECH/Pro Homepage before big $$$ on the dyno.
The steering/suspension settings seem good. It's lighter parking steering than my Civic which is also non PS. It steers very quick but seems to track well at speed. Track time and the G-meter will tell on performance.
The rear view is just like everyone said, very limited. I also made the roof roll bar wider in the center which makes it even harder to turn around when backing, a camera may be in order.
Came in at 2170 lbs wet weight (no driver) which justifies all the hours spent in designing and fabricating lighter pieces all around. I spent days probably just drilling lightning holes.
The footbox is crowded going to have to get some racing shoes. The brake pedal effort is fine but the left front is locking up first but doesn't seem to pull that much.
Gobs of torque/throttle response/acceleration but the speedo needs calibration, think I'll register it first before driving it much more. Going to be hard explaining to the officer why the plates come up for something else, "hey that's not a Honda Civic!!".
Only thing could be better would be a group ride, and Neal already knows everyone so we're going to hook it up.
YEEEEEEEEHHHHH HAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!! (originally from Texas
)
Last edited by a moderator:
