[Libertyblue]

Originally Posted by will slow gto

Pearl Jam on the radio?

Nice catch!

[old66tiger]

Anyone that has gone from carb to EFI will tell you that mileage gains are a minor benefit to going to EFI. Even if the mileage gets slightly worse, drivability and ease of tuning are major benefits. No more flat spots and changing jets. It all has become easier to make the car more drivable. I moved my old 461 from carb to EFI and it was to totally different animal. Responsive and flat out better at all operating points. Nothing beats a system that is monitoring the O2 and making hundreds of changes every minute.

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[Nicks67GTO]

A little event update since i think i'm caught up on this years mods

I got a text message from a buddy over the winter. He wanted to know if I wanted to do the big Cars and Cones trip. I thought it sure sounded fun but it was going to be pricey and I wasn't sure if my car was up for it yet. He thought we should split seat time on the auto X in his Chevy II to save some coin and just go. I got the OK from my super understanding wife and it was on. I wont go into a bunch of detail since I could write a book about this trip but it wasn't my car so ill just do a quick outline.

Fast forward to the beginning of May and we head to Jasper Indiana and unloaded his car. The next morning we were off to Concord North Carolina with the Ridetech clan. The next morning it was time for some AutoX. Then to Kodak Tenessee the next morning for some auto X at Smokie stadium. Then Bowling Green Kentucky at the National Corvette Museum lot for some Auto X. A whisky tour the next day. Then more auto X in the same place the following day and a scenic drive to Ridetech for the final party. What a blast of a week. It was scenic drives through the hills and auto X by day, good meals, shop tours and parking lot parties at night. I had also never driven a car on 200TW tires before....I found out quickly the night and day difference between my old Nitto555's and his 200tw Falkens. I'm in dire need of some decent tires. Anyhow.... The whole trip was fantastic and I would love to do it again. Saw some old friends, made some new ones. Some of the best stuff was seeing 3 of the guys I was with win some HUGE prizes and I do mean HUGE. I'm giving this whole trip an A+ and I highly recommend it.

[HWYSTR455]

I'm going to make a point of attending next year, even if I don't have something I can compete with!

The trip from Concord to Kodak, did you go 25? Or just went I-40? From Ashville? That run is fantastic, US 25, and there's the reason I went to EFI on the 442! That pass through the mountains will test a car better than an autocross, I swear!

Some of the events around the Devil's Triangle are worth going to, making a point of doing some of those too. Tail of the Dragon is popular, but some of the surroundings are better.

http://devilstriangletn.com/



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[HWYSTR455]

Familiar to that area!

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[Nicks67GTO]

Originally Posted by HWYSTR455

I'm going to make a point of attending next year, even if I don't have something I can compete with!

The trip from Concord to Kodak, did you go 25? Or just went I-40? From Ashville? That run is fantastic, US 25, and there's the reason I went to EFI on the 442! That pass through the mountains will test a car better than an autocross, I swear!

Some of the events around the Devil's Triangle are worth going to, making a point of doing some of those too. Tail of the Dragon is popular, but some of the surroundings are better.

http://devilstriangletn.com/



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I honestly don't remember what roads we took. Most of them were 2 lane blacktops through the middle of nowhere and small towns. It was a great scenic ride. As far as competition goes its kind of an anti competition. The top 3 guy everyday had to donate to the charity cup for a fellow racer that unfortunately had cancer come back on him. By the end of the run there was over 6K in that cup between all the donations. It was pretty cool. As far as winning and having to donate, you could probably forget about that too. Sam Strano destroyed everyone, everyday.

[Nicks67GTO]

One last update and I think i'm current...

I decided to do Midwest Musclecar Challenge. I knew the car wasn't really ready for it and I would surly get my butt handed to me. That's precisely what happened but hey...you cant be a pansy your whole life right? So I bought in. I was however, seriously concerned my tired old 455 would throw a rod through the block or chew up bearings on the road course. Remember this is a bone stock 455 I got on Craigslist for $800 bucks. Fearing this, I bought a used 3qt accusump setup from a guy on here. I was going to get one later on, after I built a new engine but this came up, it's in awesome shape and I got it for a great price. Unfortunately that didn't get installed and its still sitting on my workbench. LOL.

All in all, the GTO went 1100 miles, 4-20 minute road racing sessions, 8 auto X runs, a cruise and dinner at Raymond's Performance. I got a professional instructor on the road course which was priceless, that alone was worth the cost of entry and one of the main reasons I chose this as my first road racing event. I learned a lot about the driver and the car and where there are weak spots in both that need to be addressed. I also learned that a tired, stock, cast everything, Pontiac 455 can take an absolute pounding and come back for more. I hammered on that old bucket of bolts as hard as I could and it never bat an eye. Downshift decel from 4200RPM in corners? Not a problem. Flat out as hard as she will go on the straightaway? Sure. In and out of the throttle endlessly? No big deal. I almost want to run it until it blows up and kind of make a game out of it. I couldn't have been happier with the car, taking the beating it got over 1100 miles and without a single issue. The event was fantastic, everyone was extremely cool, and racing a big track like that was by far the most fun iv'e ever had in a vehicle before.



I loaded up the trunk, took off from Waterloo and made it to the hotel in Indiana without issue...



Headed into Putnam Park the next day...



Getting ready to run...







And were off!



A cruise and a little dinner at Raymonds...



Some Saturday autoX...



And a nice 7hr drive home!

[johnta1]

Congrats!

The EFI did excellent then?

[Nicks67GTO]

Originally Posted by johnta1

Congrats!

The EFI did excellent then?

Not so much as a hiccup. Again there are some little things I need to tune out but it never missed a beat. In and out of the throttle it never coughed, hesitated or did anything but accelerate smooth and steady. For 995.00 I'm impressed. If it runs this well on an old tired 455, I can't wait to see how it runs on a fresh engine with some power...now i just need to cough up a pile of money and build an engine with some power

[Nicks67GTO]

Goodguys DesMoines was a blast again. This will be an every year event. They let us run until 9pm Friday and Saturday. The track was big and pretty fast. The "Duel in DesMoines" was pretty cool as well. I, of course, was no where near making the duel portion of it but I made both time cuts to keep running, so I got to run all day both days. The highlight reel was that I got to run my mom, dad, wife and a friend around for their fist ever autoX runs. We got done and my wife said "ok that was really fun, i get it now" and my 65 y/o mom was ready to go again right away. 69 y/o dad was impressed. Haha. After all the racing, Saturday night there were fireworks to close it out and the kids loved it. This is an excellent event and a great time. If you're anywhere remotely close its worth your efforts.

[charles bledsoe]

Thanks for the pics and write up of the event. Sounds as if it was a great time for all.

[Nicks67GTO]

I just realized I haven't touched this thread in quite a while. The car is currently waiting on a forged assembly, 400 block based 434" mill with ported edelbrock D ports and a torker2. Its being built right now by Paul Knippen Muscle Motors and should hopefully be done in a few weeks. I'm also adding a dual fan Derale oil cooler/earls sandwich style oil thermostat, Bridgestone RE71 tires, Griffin electric fan combo, Accusump, recoating some stuff, repainting other stuff but its been a heck of a winter with 0 time to wrench. I'll update with pictures in a few weeks.

[old66tiger]

Update?

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[67GTONUT]

He is in the process of moving I believe, doubtful much has been done.....

[Nicks67GTO]

Troy is right it's been a circus for the last few months.

PaulK sent me a text earlier and the 433 has been fired and broken in successfully. We are hoping for a dyno session later this week. Stay tuned!

[rohrt]

Hey Nick, have you considered spilling the details on the build and letting up guess the HP/Torq?

[mysticmissle]

any more pics of the sweet 64 gto?

[Nicks67GTO]

Well....this really, really sucks.

Photobucket has gone straight up bat *****. I have over 2500 pictures and 18 videos of my build and racing on photobucket and a few days ago they magically changed their terms of service wanting a bunch of money out of me, to host and deliver 3rd party pictures. Well....**** them. Their site has become almost unusable with popups and its a pain in the ass anymore.

Unfortunately that means i'm going to have to find another way to post pictures of updates and try to pull 2500 pictures off of a ****ty website.

I guess im saying RIP my build thread and any tech threads I have out there with pics will probably be useless. Lesson learned. The reality is I will probably let this go into the shadows and just post most of my updates on facebook. If any of you care to follow along, look me up on there

[67GTONUT]

Yep..... We are all switching to - Google Photo - Imgur - Flicker ......

I hope Photobucket dies a miserable death

[linden_gto]

Originally Posted by Nicks67GTO

I guess im saying RIP my build thread and any tech threads I have out there with pics will probably be useless. Lesson learned. The reality is I will probably let this go into the shadows and just post most of my updates on facebook. If any of you care to follow along, look me up on there

this is what really sucks - ****bucket ruining documented threads like this that go back years. and now they think they can basically hold the images hostage. i can't imagine anyone using their service again that has been affected to this degree. the sad thing is, all image hosting sites will likely be forced in this direction eventually. we might all be better off just attaching images and dealing with the thumbnails.

honestly, sites like this might have to change the way they post images and forego the thumbnail. they're saving the large image anyway, why not just post it from the get go?

****bucket really ****ed up with this decision and especially by giving virtually zero warning of what they planned to do. assholes.