X Pursuit 1987 Mustang Drag and LSR Project

[BBR]

I short shifted, hit the 'rev limit' again, shirt shifted 3rd and a drove through the traps just below the 5300 number. 12.58 @ 105. Aaaugh.

lol My first pass ever in my car was a blazing 12.97 @ 109!

[CDMBill]

As mentioned I have been chasing the loss of crank signal since DW '14, which I thought was a problem with the sensor mount and changed gap to the 36-1 wheel. Then later in the Spring of '15 a replacement LS1 sensor after the original which had been in the car since 2007 abruptly died right before a 1/2 mile LSR style event in May. At that event i had the 5300 rpm cut reoccur I thought I found and cured the problem with a rewired LS1 sensor plug. What made it tricky was that it only happened with full throttle acceleration loading, not free revving. There are limited places where I can get full throttle loaed testing as first gear with street tires was useless and 2nd or 3rd invloves serious jail time speeds if tested on the street. So as I moved into full speed to finish x-pursuit, discovering the source of the 5300 rpm breakup issue which may or may not have been fixed on the '71 was pushed to a back burner.

[Scott Liggett]

Glad to hear you finally made a pass on this car after all those long days. The relief afterwards is like a weight off the shoulders, even with a bug or two to fix. Looking forward to seeing a video, or two running drag weekend.

[TheSilverBuick]

Sounds like Randal's first night at Drag Week this year! his "limiter" was set around 4300, IIRC.

But hey, you made it down the strip!

I made a best pass of 12.55 at 112mph, I'm ready to race ya!

[AdvAutoBob]

you ARE going to keep us posted through Drag Weekend, right?

Oh yeah.. and thanks for the assist with the EZ-Up at Gateway, since MY trunk monkey was nowhere to be found! ;)

[CDMBill]

I made a best pass of 12.55 at 112mph, I'm ready to race ya!

Ok Randall, but you'll have to step it up a little. I hit the TnT at Auto Club Dragway aka the quarter mile track we call Fontana yesterday and made four test hits. The first was 9.70@136 getting the feel of the new ride, best was 9.24@147 with a 1.44 60 ft., had a better 1.37 60 on the next pass but shifted 1-3 for a 9.33.

Car feels solid and repeatable. The traction at the hit is better than expected and I think it'll run a 1.2x 60 and a high very high 8.xx with a good run at the converter and shifts at the power peak as I've been short shifting a little so far. We'll try some 2-step hits at the Tucson TnT and see if it responds.

[squirrel]

sounds good!

how is the air at Fontana, compared to Tucson?

[CDMBill]

We're doing this a little backwards as I'm behind on posting updates on the car and the process of getting it running. So as seen above, the car is working really well through four test laps at least. The car is stable at speed and leaves cleanly. The suspension setup recommended by Mike at TRZ has been spot on, no wheelie, just up and moving, no spin so far.

On the fourth run at Fontana the alternator belt left mid run, I remember smelling something odd at mid-track but I didn't make the connection. I did an uder hood check before trying to go for round five and reallly gaet after it and spotted the missing v-belt. There were no fragments, and no other visible damage. However when I tried to start it the battery voltage was low and while it cranked, it wouldn't light off as the ECU doesn't work below 10v.

Oh well, winched it onto the trailer and back to the shop.

[1windsor1]

9.24 on first time out. Wowzers!

Is that still with the AOD tranny?

[Deaf Bob]

What he did was amazing! No doubt..
He aso took a proven engine/tranny combo to make the nbrs he ran...
But still... Built a car then run the nbrs he did... Totally AWESOME!


When is ?DRAG WEEKEND"?

[TheSilverBuick]

Ok Randall, but you'll have to step it up a little. I hit the TnT at Auto Club Dragway aka the quarter mile track we call Fontana yesterday and made four test hits. The first was 9.70@136 getting the feel of the new ride, best was 9.24@147 with a 1.44 60 ft., had a better 1.37 60 on the next pass but shifted 1-3 for a 9.33.

Car feels solid and repeatable. The traction at the hit is better than expected and I think it'll run a 1.2x 60 and a high very high 8.xx with a good run at the converter and shifts at the power peak as I've been short shifting a little so far. We'll try some 2-step hits at the Tucson TnT and see if it responds.

Rut-roh!

[mrocketscience]

Yeah I made a few hits at Fontana on Saturday with my car as well. Air was pretty bad at around 5500 feet corrected altitude, plus a little headwind. I was fairly happy it ran the same as it did back in June at the last bracket race I ran.
9.24 first time out is very impressive.

[Russell]

Alsome! Do you have any pictures from the track?

[CDMBill]

Mr.RocketScience, we have to connect one of these times as we are too close not to givern we both have Mustangs.

Russell. I did't get pictures as I was on my own at Fontana for the TnT. But I had mucho help at Drag Weekend and the photographic efforts ere much better (for me anyway) Please also see Rich Pedraza's thread in the Drag Week section.

The short story is the car ran well at the Tucson TnT, and we ran it out of gas on the official first day running 10.21 sputtering in first gear. Rich and I drove to Tucson from Phoenix in a caravan with eventual SS BB/NA winner Brain Rock, eventual Modified BB NA winner Floyd Azlin and SME runner Karl Hardesty in his bottom 12 sec. '62 Ford P/u. Our same group made the drive back to Phoenix after Day 1 with no issues despite thunder&lighting storms, rain squalls and the famously crappy roads in Tucson.

Phoenix wasn't o kind to XPursuit as on the first run the trans shuddered when I hit 2nd gear and while I was able to short shift into third and manage a 10.55@135, the trans locked up when I hit the turn out after the shut down area at Wild Horse Pass Raceway.(aka Firebird) The car started and ran fine but would not move forward or in reverse, and couldn't even be pushed backwards. So, I hitched a ride with Hal Baer back to the Baer Brakes facility in North Phoenix where we'd left the truck and trailer two days before, picked up the rig and returned to the track, Rich had broken down down our little trailer and we packed everything up and winched XPursuit onto the trailer for the ride of shame to Fontana for the final day of Drag Weekend. This was hauntingly familiar from the original DW back in '05 where the Silver Barge finished on a trailer as well. At DW "06 we managed a class win so now the pressure is on to fat least finish at DW '16.

I will update the thread here form the point I left off to document the build and go through the trans repairs and upgrades, lessons learned and the improvements we figured out from the maiden voyage.

[squirrel]

I was thinking about it...if you have to detune the motor to make the new trans live, you might want to reconsider using a 400 and GV.

And that stuff about supporting the sponsors, too