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What did you do to your car today?

2M views 19K replies 451 participants last post by  StarFighter1 
#1 ·
Lets keep this a continuing, never gonna die thread.

For the Toyota truck, I changed the plugs, plug wires, distributor cap, and changed the oil in it this morning. Also ran a can of seafoam through it before I changed the plugs, gotta love that huge cloud of smoke. Love how stupid easy the 22R-E is to work on. Runs a lot smoother now, and fixed my rough idle problem.

Tomorrow I'm going to wax and detail the Cadillac. Gonna be a long ass day.
 
#1,967 ·
made 2 adapter plates so I can put my 3.5 infinity (tweeters) in the dash instead of 4x6's.
I also finished one of the 2 front door speaker pods. I still need to fir out the front of the speaker pod so there isnt an obvious 6.5 inch circle sticking out of the carpet cover.
next up is to finish the other speaker pod and to prime and paint the bottom of the front doors so I can put the interior panels back on them and mount the speaker pods.
 
#1,968 ·
The Bilstein shocks and Tahoe Z71 springs have arrived. I will be removing the OEM autoride (horrible) from my Denali and converting to a passive system this weekend!
 
#1,979 ·
Added another 10" Kicker comp sub and upgraded my amp to an orion Cobalt CO500.1 velcroed a composite board on my trunk floor then carpet, then amp with self tapping screws, looks nice, will post pics tomorrow
 
#1,983 ·
Had to operate on the Eldorado - leaking brake line driver side rear. There no room under there for tools. 4 hours later, I got brakes again.
 
#1,984 ·
Autocrossed it:



It's something I've wanted to try for a long time, and a friend told me about the Emerald Empire Sports Car Club in Eugene that hosts autocrosses several times a year. He couldn't come today, but loaned me a helmet and magnetic numbers. A Tony and Jimmy's suggestion, I put a couple of marks with white shoe polish on the front tires to see how far the tires leaned onto their sidewalls.



Here's the course map:



In the grid:





I gave my camera to a couple of spectators and asked them to take some pictures of my run; I think they did a decent job. The top picture is from the slalom past point 1.

At the starting line:



Tight turn before point 2:



OK, so she leans a little. Tight turn just past point 2 where you can really step on it as you exit; here's where the Northstar excelled:



Going into the inner loop past point 3:



Tight turn on the inner loop:



Slalom before the turn past point 4:



Approaching point 5:



Last slalom before the finish:



Finish line:



I had a blast, and will definitely do it again. For a two-ton, FWD luxury touring car, the Seville acquitted itself pretty well. More than once, I was introduced as "that crazy SOB who autocrossed a Cadillac." And when they were announcing all the times and class rankings, when they got to my name, the announcer said, "Oh, yeah, the Seville. That was fun to watch." Several people said they thought it was pretty cool somebody would take a car like that on an autocross track dominated by Miatas and WRX/STIs.

However, I did not have the biggest car there. There was another guy running a '66 Cutlass convertible with an Oldsmobile 350. It had been lowered and had big fat tires, plus he had put in a faster steering box, and it had at least one run under a minute. I think my fastest time was 61 seconds, but I missed a gate, which tacked on 10 seconds. Like golf, autocross has a handicap system, so my adjusted best time was 59.15. So while I was slower overall, I was not the slowest car/driver there.

As to be expected, the majority of the cars there were Miatas and Subaru Imprezza/WRX/STIs. Most of the Subarus were modified, and a number of the Miatas too, but a lot of them were stock. There were several early 70s Datsun Z cars, plus two early 70s Datsun 510s (which have a great reputation in the autocross world), a couple of Mini Coopers, a couple of Rabbits, a Scirocco, a Beetle Turbo S, several Mustangs and Camaros and a Pantera. One Camaro5 SS. Also a '67 Corvair running four one-barrel downdraft carbs on the flat six.

Novices were encouraged to ride along with more experienced drivers, and I took full advantage of that. I rode in a '94 Mustang GT with Cobra suspension bits, a '71 Datsun 510, a '81 Triumph TR7 with the Rover neé Buick aluminum V8, a Mini Cooper and my favorite, a '67 Sunbeam Tiger with a Ford 289. That Sunbeam could really hang its tail out.

As for my own runs, I went in too hot a few times on my first run; the tight sweeping turns past points 2 and 3 were where the Seville would plow the most if I went in too fast. Exiting those turns, the Northstar would scream like a race car engine. I found the car (or maybe it was me) handled the slaloms better with less plow, and as long as I backed off the throttle and didn't touch the brakes, I could go through them pretty fast.

I talked with the guy who was taking pictures, and he showed me a couple of the ones he got when I was going through that turn with all the body lean. He said considering it was my very first time to autocross and what I was driving, I did pretty well.

The most important thing is I had so much fun. I have a better idea of what my car can and can't do and what I can do as a driver. On my way home, I intentionally took my favorite back road roller coaster route and worked on braking before the curves and probably went a little faster than I have before.
 
#1,985 ·
Very cool Gary! I never had any desire to auto-x my Regal, but I did want to take the Regal to the local 1/4 mile track sometime this summer. Doubt it'll happen now though...
 
#1,987 ·
Here's the after photos of the tires:

There's more tire scrub on the driver's side tire due to the harder right hand turns, plus the weight of the driver:







Still some shoe polish left on the passenger's side:







On this first-generation MR2, on the last slalom, the driver turned the wheel so far that his tire got jammed into the fender. Here's the resulting flat spot from that slide:







No damage to the suspension or steering, so he went right on competing — and on that tire, too.
 
#1,988 ·
And photos taken by one of the members with a gary88-caliber camera:











There was a guy who wasn't racing today but riding along with different people, and seeing my car, he thought it would be fun to ride along and see what it did. I think he was reasonably impressed.

There's a full photo album of the entire day if you'd like to see the other cars competing.
 
#1,990 ·
Wow. Gary D did something cool.

lol, the Seville has more body roll and brake dive than the antique 528e.

Recently went wheelin' with folks from the Isuzu club, good times.



Got a little tippy. What is hard to see is the already steep down slope of the trail. Steep enough that low oil pressure warning came on as the oil all went to the front of the engine, starving the pickup.







Major score on CL - premium quality suspension lift used one week. $900 for stuff normally $2800.



Currie Johnny Joints and Bilstein shocks will greatly improve the ride, handling and overall performance on and off road.



Out with the old. Full set of adjustable control arms means all sorts of neat stuff to fine tune. New driveshaft (and slip yoke eliminator) replaces the crappy factory design and also lets me run my high clearance belly skid that has been waiting.



528e turned 25yo last month, and 276k picking up the parts. Heh, range display is about range of the Jeep, on 19 gal tank. Never mind the trip odometer or that the car has a 15 gal tank. Not bad while crankin the A/C too.

 
#1,991 ·
Gary, how bad did that screw your tires up??? I'd like to auto-x my pickup truck, its fairly light but it has new tires. I really wouldn't want to chew up a new set of tires.

Also, that is pretty cool tech on the BMW with the trip computer. That was freaking spaceship technology for 1985.
 
#1,993 ·
Gary, how bad did that screw your tires up??? I'd like to auto-x my pickup truck, its fairly light but it has new tires. I really wouldn't want to chew up a new set of tires.
If you look at the pictures, they didn't get too badly chewed up, and to be honest, the scuffing didn't go as far up the sidewall as I was expecting. The driver's side front got the worst of it. On the hour drive back up I-5 with the cruise set at 74 MPH, there was no vibration or any sign of the punishment they had taken earlier in the day.
 
#2,005 ·
Really nice, Gary! You Seville looks really clean and gorgeous. Probably you need stiffer suspension and spring for this....
Thanks guys.

I expect an STS would do better with it's stiffer suspension, but I already have one automotive money pit, so I'm not going to make any suspension mods other than putting in KYB shocks when I need to replace them and tires with a stiffer sidewall; the Goodyears I have on it now have a softer sidewall than the Yokohamas I had before.

Since this is my daily driver I don't want to do any mods that screw up what a nice car this is to drive. It handles the fun roads I like to drive just fine.
 
#1,997 ·
Awesome, Gary :thumbsup:.

I can tell you're braking and turning at the same time by the nosedive accompanying the lean, which is what causes most of the push. The hardest part of autocrossing is forcing yourself to slow way down before the turns (because it feels so damn slow), but the car will be much more stable and the change direction faster when the front rubber is only being asked to do one thing instead of two.

I bet you'll go again- it's addictive. :D
 
#2,006 ·
Yes, I definitely want to do it again. There's another event in September right before I leave for vacation that I'm going to try to do. It would be fun if my friend who told me about this could go, too. Maybe we could register as dual drivers with us both driving his Honda S2000 and my Seville. I'd like to see what a more experienced driver can do with it.

And you're right about the braking. I got better by my third run doing the slaloms where all I had to do was lift up on the gas, and the Seville handled the transient maneuvers better than expected. My problem is I came into those deep turns too hot and didn't brake enough before I reached them. The new ceramic brake pads I put in the front have a nice bite; I need to learn to hit them harder before the turn comes up. On my drive home doing the roller coaster road, I practiced braking harder before the turns with greater success. On my route to work, there's a back road I take to the state highway to Corvallis that has four 90º turns in two miles; I'm going to work on my braking technique on them.

Other than having fun, part of the reason I did it and will continue to do it is to become a better driver and get a better sense of my car's capabilities. For example, the doing the slalom would be very helpful if I needed to swerve. Although I already have some experience there after a doofus in a Nissan Versa ran a red light and doddered into an intersection where I was approaching at 50 MPH (the legal limit). All I had time to do was nail the brakes, and crank the wheel to the right, then quickly back left. I know the ABS and Stabilitrak kicked in, but there was an instance where my big, heavy, FWD car handled an emergency maneuver beautifully and saved us both from what would have been an ugly collision. I probably would have broadsided the front of that Versa.

Way to go Gary! Told you it would be fun.

Aron: some locales have looser restrictions than others, but generally SCCA won't allow truck/suvs. They are a rollover risk.
Well, besides my friend here, it was encouragement from you guys that got me to do it. I told some people that I have friends in Chicago and Florida who autocross and how I couldn't wait to pass along my pictures.

There was an '88 Chevy S-10 that competed yesterday, but it was lowered. As for roll, seeing that white '98 Jetta lift its outside rear tire in nearly every turn was freaky, even though I know it's a VW trait. I wonder what it felt like in the car.
 
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