Eli's 69 Camaro

[eligould]

well I've been driving the car off and on to work and bombing around on the weekends. been real busy at work so I haven't mad much progress. I have some electric fan wiring sitting at home and an x pipe and race bullets. rebuild kit for a double pumper. couple o2 bungs. just need some time off to work on it. spent all weekend wrapping and moving motors from the shop to the lean-to in an effort to make some usable space in the shop. made a huge dent there. skipped the races to get that done. hopefully I will have some fun updates soon.

[eligould]

well I put the x pipe and bullets on it with an O2 bung and an afr gauge. been driving it and tinkering. I had a good day at MOKAN Saturday with my dad, brother, girlfriend, and her sister.

ran 12.3@113 first pass. raised shift points and ran [email protected] on a 1.88 60 ft, gave it a jet change and ran 12.22 @116.22mph on a 1.97 60 ft. that's the best I was able to do for the day.

I was surprised the converter (super street fighter) was only stalling 2800rpm leaving the line and that held the 60 foots down. also ran some 28x9 slicks that I had around which didn't help the 3.55 gears any. I think I was hitting the traps under 5500 rpm while the car ran best mph shifting at 6700-6800 rpm. overall a really fun day at the track.

91 octane 360ci small block. 116mph traps with far from optimized gear/converter @3480lbs.


I'm pretty pleased with the power output so far and I think there's a little more in it. anxious to get the electric fan on it. had some issues tossing the alternator/fan belt. I hope getting rid of the clutch fan cures that, but I expect to replace the pulleys with a serpentine for the alternator/water pump.

[yellomalibu]

I can't imagine the flex fan causing the belt to go. it's usually an alignment issue or the shallow groove stock alternator pulley. I have the deep groove, large diameter moroso pulley on the Chevelle, and the belt doesn't go anywhere (up to 7200 rpm) - but the alternator doesn't really charge at low rpms. Since it's not a race car anymore, I'm looking to trade it for a stock pulley. Short trips around town bring the battery down after a few starts... requiring me to put the car on the charger before taking it out... though this may also have to do with the age of my battery. ;)

For better cooling, I prefer a belt driven fan. The plastic flex-a-lite fans work great. Electric fans retrofitted onto older cars can be hit or miss.

For bracket racing (repeatability / consistency) the clutch fan has to go. It can kill a tenth from one round to the next - but for cooling they generally are the best option.

[Scott Liggett]

Those 6800 rpm shifts with stock shallow pulleys are mostly your belt issue. Mine toss theirs at 6200 rpm. 6000 every day and they don't move. Sometimes find the belts upside down or twisted.

[RideTech_Ryan]

This cool little project is coming along nicely!

[eligould]

I do like the reliability and cooling power of the clutch fan. What really worries me is the rpm capability of the engine and the fan that says not to exceed 4500 rpm right on it. The pulleys look really straight, but there seems to be a little flop coming off of the crank pulley. After the first pass the belt was upside down on the alt. Every other pass tossed it.

I bought a 2 speed Thunderbird fan, some 50 amp relays, and an adjustable thermostat switch for it. I have the same combo on my turbo Pontiac and have had fairly good luck with it. The Pontiac seems to be very hard to keep cool though, especially since adding the turbo. It got very warm in gridlock traffic at drag week last year, but I only had the fan wired on low speed.

I'm going to try the serpentine crank/water pump/alt setup with the fan on low and see how it goes. Mostly because I already have all the parts besides the alternator pulley which I mistakenly returned on the core. Hoping for less parasitic drag too. If it needs it I can try the high speed. I'll wire it heavy and see if it will hold up to the load on the 50 amp relay.

[DanStokes]

Back in my youth we had a serious Pontiac racer who ran a Henry J gasser w/Pontiac power. Anyhow, he built little skids to kill that flop so the belt would stay on and not flip. It worked fine so that's something to think about. This was MANY years ago but IIRC they bolted off of whatever was close (cylinder head, whatever) and used 2 struts and a sheet metal skid that sat just off the back of the belt. Nowadays it seems like you could use a belt tensioner (like from a 5.0 Mustang for example) set to just touch the belt though I haven't personally tried that.

Dan

[eligould]

now that is an interesting fix!