The Track and at Play:

Come April of 2007 I will have owned my GTA for two years. Up to this point I have never taken my car to the track to see what it can do. Mostly for fear that I would break something of make some of the problems that I was having worse making it even more expensive to fix them because something else breaks because of it. Now, Vader is healthier than when I purchased the car that almost two years ago.

This is my first track experience...

Sunday, March 4, 2007

I met up with my car club Fayetteville F-Body at one of the members homes so that we could cruise out and arrive as a club. It was a pretty nice day. The sun was out and it was fairly warm, but still windy. In all, we had about 10 cars cruise out to the track.

I had originally decided not to run my car and was just going to spectate. Yeah...that didn't last long and I ended up racing against a club member in his Formula 350 (Before we took possession of it as the wife's toy, Black Betty.). He was mad because I beat him from a 70mph roll out on the freeway so he wanted to get me back. What better way than to put me behind a tree on a drag strip...something I had never done.

The setting up and staging at the light...

The burnout...

The run down the track...

The timeslip...

The timeslip isn't that great. Eventhough I crossed the finish line second, I had better times than the person in the other lane. He also had a better MPH down the track than me by 2MPH. Guess I'm going to have to work on my launches and 60-ft. so I can get better. There is lots of room for improvement on my reaction time. :|

More track to come in the future once I get a few more things upgraded, but for now I'm content and have someplace to build upon. For a 19-year old car with close to 170K miles on the ticker it still performs well and that is what pleases me most...posting numbers equivilant to the 1988 Road Tests.

Run:
1/4-mile: 14.7185 @ 90.42 MPH

Sunday, November 4, 2007

This was the first time the car had been down the track since the new work had been done. There's still some tweaking to be done yet, but I was more worried about keeping the new found power to the ground. It definately felt different.

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At Play...

Went out to cruise with some folks from my car club and we decided to play a little bit.  I normally don't beat on my car, but yesterday I wanted to have a little fun.  So, that's what I did.  Here's a few stills taken by a friend. 

And the video...hosted at YouTube.com.  :)

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Page 1: Introduction
Page 2: RPO and Technical Data
Page 3: How RARE is it?
Page 4: Photography of Vader...part one
Page 5: Photography of Vader...part two
Page 6: Photography of Vader...part three
Page 7: Vader's Heart
Page 8: Inside Vader
Page 9: Modifications, Upgrades, and Repair...part one
Page 10: Modifications, Upgrades, and Repair...part two
Page 11: Modifications, Upgrades, and Repair...part three
Page 12: Modifications, Upgrades, and Repair...part four
Page 13: Literature and Awards 
Page 14: Car Shows and Events
Page 15: The Track and at Play
Page 16: My other Firebirds