My car is still at the shop, eight weeks later, but it's only minor final checks, and a tune for the street and to check it behaves itself when cold, after sitting overnight, etc. The major work and the testing are all done.

New: 85 lb injectors, modifications to the fuel system, impedance box controller for the injectors, new pulley on the crank to give more diameter and "bite" to the belt so it won't slip turning the supercharger, new matching pulley on the SCr, etc. plus a plethora of small mods that do nothing for power (like a really cool billet oil filter with removable/reuseable filter and inspection trap, etc.).

For now, boost is limited to 6.5 lbs, and the tune is conservative, with driveability the major goal - a stock-like idle, perfect street manners in traffic, and good behavior while warming up from cold are the major priorities.

Peak RWHP with cats and mufflers is a bit over 633, which translates (see my post under General Tech) to 715 flywheel using a "no BS" computation. The DS1 Procharger is obviously not working that hard, this is only about 1120RWHP over normally aspirated.

I get it back Thursday or Friday, I hope. I doubt it will improve performance noticeably, since the car was all wheelspin before this was done, but it will have better dirveability around town, I am hoping, which I why it went into the shop in the first place.

 

Dude, your car is mad crazy. I'd give my hind teeth for a blast in that thing. When you get her back, any chance of pictures to post for us to drool... er, admire... over?

 

Envious in Denver.

A guy need a second job for this stuff...

Enjoy and drive safe!

 

I'm just lucky to have the income to indulge a completely crazy passion, actually two, since I also collect art which is actually more expensive, but different, because my wife approves of that and i don't have to hide the spending. But I had to wait until past 55 years age to afford all this.

I don't really drive it fast, by the way. Once in a while my son takes it to the track, or we do the occasional grudge race on a back road, with the 20 something drivng rather than the old man, but other than that its just a street cruiser most of the time. I would like to take it out to Utah (miller Speedway) or the Maxton mile and see it do 200+ mph, but I'm way too chicken -- a guy could get killed doing that. So I will just continue, probably boosting it up by another 50 Hp (alcohol injection) later this year, but still just puttering around on sunday mornings and friday nights. .

 

My supercharger money will probably be going into a car or truck for my son......then my daughter in a few years. THEN, maybe I can get one. By that time my C5 will have approx. 40,000 miles on her - still ripe for artificial aspiration!

Dave

 

Wow Lee!

Like the Black Eye Peas would say.......Whatcha gonna do with all that stuff?...all that stuff with all that fuel?
I'mma gonna make, make, make you drool....make you drool, make you drool!

 

Your priorities are in the right place. I had to put three kids through college, etc. It was worth it. They turned out good, and I'm proud - much more important than a few hundred HP. But Now, I can spend on me.

Your time will come. But you're doing the important stuff first. Good for you!

 

Good for you, Dave & Lee! You are absolutely doing the right thing!!! My husband is older than I am, so my 3 step children are older and out on their own. Until that happened, they always came first. Now it's our turn and I feel no guilt in saying, "Hands-off my vette and don't even think about driving her!" Ha, Ha!

 

Just sick Lee, WOW!!!!!!! Instead of doing all the stuff you did to your vette did you ever think of taking it to Lingenfelter? I was just curious if that was ever a thought or if you just wanted to do it your way. Anyway great vette as if it wasnt before. Again a final WOW!

 

Actually, I did take it to Lingenfelter. When it was new and stock I was #3 in the country, and the first "remote" install, to buy the full Lingenfelter Magnusen SCr kit. At that time they sold the complete thing only as a package: headers, exhaust, SCr, manifolds and fittings, hood and a new ECM, for a package price. A local qualified shop did the install. It was good except I had the #6 manifold made for the SC and it did not have a boost guage fitting, so we could never get the bnoost guage to read, the latter flatter rear manifold face. Also, like all the Magnusen units the first two years it was not intercooled.

But it worked flawlessly: 465 RWHP and gobs of torque even at 2500 - the advantage of the roots style over the centrifugal.

And, then, as now, I have only the highest regard for Lingenfelter -- in particular they do not BS you with inflated claims and they will refund your money if the parts aren't right, etc., reasonably.

But I wanted more, particularly displacement, because 427 cubes had always been special to me. I talked with Lingenfelter about buying their 427, but I sort of wanted the fun of having it build locally and "designing it" (picking out the parts) myself. so that's what I did. It was more costly, longer, and more frustrating than if I had simply bought a Ling upgrade. took a year (during which time I just drove the stock Magnusen setup until the new engine was ready.
I did have a lot of fun. This being Nascar Country, I was able to find something rare -- someone I thought could build a better engine than Lingenfelter. Mine was built by Charlie Hempfield, who makes engines for the Hendricks teams and built the '96 Daytona winner plus a slew of pole sitters and other winners over the past two decades. So I bought a C5R block, let Charlie pick out the internal parts (he went with all Crowler but did some machining, and had CP custom machine piston-centered rod type lightweight pistons, which were works of art. I then bought super heads asnd everything else premium and had it put in the car - it did 507 RWHP with 200 miles on it (would be about 535 RWHP worn in) N.A. with a mild cam.
But it was also frustrating, too, because there were gobs of small problems, which a company like Ling. knows about, which we had to discover and fix one by one--example: I bought the highest grade Jesel Pro-series rockers and springs, which required high-rise covers (at the time only Katech made them) but they rockers would not quite fit, by about 1/25th inch, and they would shove the covers aside until the covers would leak oil. We eventually had to grind the inside of the covers for more clearance and fit the covers and seal them.
I don';t regret this route at all, because the car is basically a project, not a real car, and as such I really do (stil) enjoy kind of deciding on and doing all the work step by step locally. But the car is in the shop, or waiting for parts of whatever, more than it is dirveable - something to consider if you ever decide to take this route.