Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

speechless

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

Hell yeah Mark, can't wait to see this beast Memorial day weekend!

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

BIR went good. I learned more about setup, due to changes made over the winter. I'm still having issues getting it off of the line. I was changing boost levels that I launch with and the result was that I either over power the tires or bog the car. With the AEM series 2 EMS I have a way to make this easier. I will be tuning the launch at the MAP event in June.

This video I spun off of the line. I wanted to see the parachute opening.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S5bUsfXJkvY&hd=1

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

Very nice!

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

when it finally spooled up it looked like holy foook!!

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

Proving Grounds update:

I went there focusing on tuning my 60 foot times. It's been difficult lately since I either blow the tires off the car or bog the car resulting in making it hop. I'm working on staging power in slowly in first gear for a smooth/quicker launch.

I launch my first time only expecting to go 60 feet but the car seemed like it had made it a good 60 time, but hopped bad 2-3 times, i ended up running it out to a 8.85 @171.

http://i412.photobucket.com/albums/p...618_081047.jpg

I ran about 3 or 4 more 60-foot passes and put it away for the evening on Friday. Start the car up and Saturday and noticed noise coming from the alternator. Also the coolant system was pressurized, so another leaking head gasket. I enjoyed the rest of the weekend as a spectator and provided some help two other racers.

I'm going to toss another gasket on it for the next event, and over the winter focus on getting an O-ring block and receiver groove in the head to use a copper gasket. I should have probably done this last year as I found the limit on the MLS permatorque. I've learned some good information from others using copper gasket setups with great results.

See everyone next time!

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

I would say copper and ring is the way to go for big boost for sure. That's a really solid pass and impressive trap. Seems like your car has plenty of potential to meet your goal.

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

I love the back half this car does.

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

I have had good luck with a o-ringed block and a 3 layer cometic head gasket, .050" SS wire sticking up .008"-.010". I have thought about limiting power in 1st also, keep after it we will get our short tracks sorted one of these days.

~John

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

Time for those winter projects! I've got a lot of plans for the car this winter. Want to freshen up a motor, new turbo, fabricate a 25.5 cage, get some carbon/kevlar doors, fenders, roof, hood, bumper, dash?

I just took the cage out of the car today. So here's the starting point to the winter journey!

With all the dsm guys getting into the sevens I might as well try too!

Starting point:

http://i412.photobucket.com/albums/p...111_104339.jpg

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

PG2 was good, for the exception that I blew another head gasket. While freshening up the engine this winter I'm going to move to a copper head gasket setup with orings in the head & block.

This was one of my 8 second passes from PG2. I bogged 2nd pretty bad, but cut a 1.3 60ft. I'm going to reduce power next year off the line so it will hook better, by regarding timing just for the launch in 1st gear.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hTdnO-9cjr0&hd=1

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

that's awesome, i like the OMG at the end.

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

Awesome man, can't wait to see what it does next year

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

Thanks guys!

I can't wait to use my welding and Fabrication experience to make my new cage. The old cage suck so bad it was one of those prefab units and I had very limited experience with TIG welding. It should turn out pretty good! And I'll feel much safer going over 175 next year.

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

I am excited to see how this turns out! Probably felt good to cut the cage out if u didn't like how it fit and having some nice consistent welds will give you some peace of mind for sure. You really are tackling a huge project here this winter with all this. What are your plans on motor and turbo, I believe u have a 2.2 long rod right? Who makes all the carbon Kevlar parts?

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

Can you post the time slip from the 8.80 run? 7s would be awesome. You have the trap speed for sure for a 7 second pass.

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

Can't wait to see the progress Mark!

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

Thanks for the comments. Yeah its a huge project, I think the biggest one I've taken on over the winter.

I'm excited to build the cage the way I want. I purchased a much better tubing notcher, from rouge fabrication, this will help the tube fitment consistancy. Its a large shopping list of 4130 tubing!

I sold my pte7675 Gen 2 turbo and bought a pte 7685 Gen2. I'm running a 2.2 long rod now, I'm moving to a 2.0 long rod for more RPM, with a copper head gasket. The added rpm in 1st and 2nd gear will help bring down my short track time. I'll be able to run more boost, resulting in more mph & beter e.t. I'm stil going to run e98 this season too.

I'll dig it up and get a photo posted.

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

Nice work! Man that thing moves out.

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

Wow thats nuts! Cant wait to see more updates!

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

Are you going to paint the interior? Could look bad ass if the color of your cage matched the wheels and the rest of the inside matched the color of the car.

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

I wouldn't mind a nice finish like that! I plan on painting the inside & cage.

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

I went and checked out the rouge fabrication website and wow those are some nice notchers for sure and lots of other cool goodies. Must need at least 100' or so of 4130 for the new cage huh? I like the 2.0 long rod idea, so many different ways you can build these motors it's hard to decide the perfect setup. What were your reving in the 2.2 Vs your goal in the 2.0? Boost goal? Pretty awesome as always, gonna be fun to watch you chase a 7, keep up with the updates!

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

Yeah, I've just placed the order for the 4130, MAP helped me source materials. So 3 different sizes of tube and 100ft total, good guess! I should have the main hoop bent and installed over the Thanksgiving weekend. I reved my 2.2 to just over 9k. I'm planning on running the 2.0LR to a bit over 10k, and continually increasing the Boost. I was running around 50psi with the last turbo, but with a new head gasket set up I'm going to target a lot more. Thanks for the support, forums are losing attention, but they're way better than other digital media formats. The car, tune, and my driving are a long way away from sevens but there's nothing wrong with chasing them!

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

I've been getting a lot accomplished lately. I found more weight to shave off, I weighed everyghing out and negated the 2g carbonfiber dash & dash bar weigh. 50 lbs came out that will not be added back in! This will help offset the weight im adding due to the 25.5 cage.

http://i412.photobucket.com/albums/p...119_102756.jpg

http://i412.photobucket.com/albums/p...119_102935.jpg

I also started the cage work over the thanksgiving weekend, I'm super happy how it's all turning out! The cage fitment is 100x better than my prebent sw cage!

The rouge fabrication tube notcher is awesome too! Every joint is very tight, makes for easy and beautiful welds.

http://i412.photobucket.com/albums/p...128_064504.jpg

http://i412.photobucket.com/albums/p...128_064250.jpg

http://i412.photobucket.com/albums/p...128_064307.jpg

Next up is to finish the floor north south bars and the front floor bar. It's all coming together!

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

I was pretty proud of my cage fitment tell I saw this. You are an artist sir! The pillar bars are very impressive probably best I have seen in a 1g. I really never thought about how much of the inner skin Panels a guy can cut out. That perfect notch is gonna make the welding a little better time for sure. Easier to focus on making the welds as perfect as possible! Do you weld your chromoly with red tungsten? Well done as always, keep it up

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

I love it! That cage looks like it fits so well! And those joints are as close as you can get, you knocked this out of the park so far!

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

Reminds me of when Brent was gutting his wife's car way back when. He ended up with almost no internal structure and I think he even replaced almost the entire floor with sheetmetal. He was down around 2100 lbs as AWD IIRC. That car was so light.

Looks good! 1G love!

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

Thanks! My old cage fitment and my tig welding capability was at a beginner level. Now that I have 10 years on tig welding experience, I wanted to make sure I could be proud of this cage.

It has not been easy. The design of the cage, assembly steps, and being able to weld it has been a challenge, due to being so close to the car.

I planned ahead to use a micro torch when i made the fitment so close.

http://i412.photobucket.com/albums/p...130_074616.jpg


Thanks! I'm excited too see your project!
5


1g Love!

Some of the fab

http://i412.photobucket.com/albums/p...201_123416.jpg

http://i412.photobucket.com/albums/p...202_142846.jpg

I was able to take the floor bars out to finish weld them.

http://i412.photobucket.com/albums/p...1_132410_1.jpg

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

I have never seen a micro torch before but damn that is cool! There is so many tools that exist to make things easier. I am a little suprised you are still manually making these bends or I am at least assuming from the pics. I have seen some people have been able to mod hydraulic cylinders on your style bender before. Those floor bars are super impressive and super convenient they popped out to weld most of that up. Everything seems so tight it doesn't even look like you will have room to weld all the way around!

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

^Agreed.
I just want to watch all this in action

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

Loving the progress, great fitment so far!!

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

thanks for the feedback guys!

At this point the cage is close to being done. I just need to get the front of the funny car cage bent and welded in. I need to buy a new 1.5" bending die for this, so i need to wait a week or two until the die shows up. I also need to figure out a custom window net setup, mount the seat, and fabricate mounts for the steering column. My goal is to have it certified this month!

My chassis fabrication confidence has grown and this has been an awesome project so far!

http://i412.photobucket.com/albums/p...206_073048.jpg

It's a shame I'm going to paint the cage, not all of the welds are this clean, but the majority are good like this.

http://i412.photobucket.com/albums/p...207_172447.jpg

http://i412.photobucket.com/albums/p...209_110201.jpg

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

i feel safe just looking at it.

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

That's turned out awesome so far!

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

Thanks guys, I'm super pumped for next year.

This was a good weekend of progress. I ordered a custom Stroud window net. They produced it in 24 hrs from my order! It fits awesome. I also reduced the size off rod used to mount the net to shave off some weight.

http://i412.photobucket.com/albums/p...216_084744.jpg

Everything I do I question if I can cut weighty in the process. I also ordered a new polycarbonate formed windshield from optic armor, this will shave off some good weight too!

I made a new steering column, to reduce weight and stiffen up what I had for a solution before. I machined aluminum inserts to adapt to roller bearings. The tube is 4130 1.5" x 0.035", and the shaft is 4130 3/4" x 0.049". Turned out nice.

http://i412.photobucket.com/albums/p...218_063655.jpg

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

Those door panel "scuff plates" or whatever they're called gotta be worth a few ounces :P are you going to run interior panels or shell the doors?

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

Oh snap you're killing me!

I have a bead roller so I'm considering making thin aluminum door panels. Once I receive the carbon fiber Kevlar reinforced doors I'll figure out what to do to finish them off.

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

Free weight savings is the best kind!

Re: Mark's 1G Winter Projects
 

The cage is done! I'll be getting it certified next month. It's been an awesome project. The seat mount and belts are done too.

http://i412.photobucket.com/albums/p...229_064124.jpg

http://i412.photobucket.com/albums/p...229_064009.jpg

I also removed a little more than 10 more pounds of metal from the front driveshaft carrier bearing mount and supporting structure from driveshaft tunnel. This sucked to remove, i was drilling spotwelds for 3 to 4 hours! It was well worth that time for that much of a weight reduction. I'll need to get this thing on corner scales to see what it comes out at.

http://i412.photobucket.com/albums/p...227_080419.jpg

To remove the driveshaft support structure I had to cut out emergency brake cable bulkhead from the floor. I got to use my bead roller and made a patch panel, and plug weld at all the areas where I accidentally drilled through while removing the spot welds. I also stitch welded back in the floor section I cut for the tube that intersects it.

http://i412.photobucket.com/albums/p...227_081734.jpg