deluded
Member
Hi everyone. I'm Vernon Brunges of RaVer Motorsports, builder of the yellow Galant VR4 land speed car that has gotten a little attention on this site. I spoke with Garfield today, and he said members might like some more info on this car. I do this for fun, and fun is sharing, so here goes...
The car belongs to Ron Cochran. He drove the car while we developed it/worked out the kinks, and he holds records at over 200mph at Bonneville and El Mirage driving in this car. He is past 70 years old! Nicest guy you'll ever meet and fun to celebrate with. His son, Troy, began driving the car this year, and he too has records at over 200mph at Bonneville and El Mirage in the Galant.
The car was originally put together for Ronny by a good friend, Greg Carlson (Greg owns the world's fastest 300ZX twin turbo which we sponsored). They never dreamed the car would go over 175mph let alone 200mph so we have replaced one thing after another to the point that just about the only thing remaining of the original race car is the paint.
The engine is the obvious 4G63 with minimal mods to be honest. The shortblock was machined by Ron's guys at his machine shop, Smith Auto, in Dinuba California. It has Wiesco pistons, Pauter rods, and deleted balance shafts, of course. The head has the bigger Crane STREET cams with Kiggly's conical valve springs (highly recommended). I modified the lifters so that they are more-or-less solid... I disassemble them and use custom shims inside to adjust the lash to .007". This is a labor-intensive job, but at high rpm the lifter can only bleed down that .007" so the rocker arms can't liberate themselves from the valvetrain /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif We've had zero valvetrain issues with sustained rpm above 9000rpm. I personally ported the cylinder head; it is just a very nice pocket port. Stainless steel valves are from the guys at SI Valves. Perhaps the least noticeable but most effective mod is on the front cover. Don Sprayberry, a long-time hot rodder and racer, came up with a genius mod for the oil pump (did I mention we have NEVER spun a rod bearing?). We eliminated the entire tortuous path across the front of the engine by welding an AN fitting right at the outlet of the oil pump and another at the entrance of the main oil galley. Using braided stainless lines we remote mounted a System One filter.
Turbo manifold is from DNP. First one broke after two events. Second one cracked immediately, but has held together so far. Customer service was awful, but we were committed with an up coming event and all the piping would have to be redone to change to a better one. So we purchased A THIRD ONE to change out at an event when needed.
Turbo is a box-stock GT42R provided by Limit Engineering in Arizona. Great guys who provide quality work/parts. I built a 4" side-exit downpipe that is possible in part due to the removeal of the stock oil filter/flange with the oil pump mod. Limit Engineering also provided the Tial wastegate and BOV.
3" IC piping leads to a liquid to air intercooler that we custom fab'd. It was a budget deal, but it works great: turbo outlet temps excede 500F (data logged), but IC outlet temps rarely pass 170F. Throttle body is a highly modified Summit Racing Mustang unit. Intake manifold is a Magnus street version.
Coil on plug is set up with Kawasaki bike coils and AEM twin-Fire. Engine management is AEM, also. Fuel injectors are 1600cc Ford Motorsport driven by AEM's 10-Channel injector driver (this unit IS NOT SET UP FOR THESE INJECTORS! How come nobody makes a big deal about this?). Aeromotive Pro-series fuel pump feeds race gas to a highly modified AEM fuel rail. Mauren does the fuel pulsation dampening while an AEM fuel pressure regulator finished everything off. Shawn Church of Church Automotive Testing in Los Angeles does all of our tuning on his DynoPac set up. I do the touch up tuning at the track, but he doesn't leave much work for me /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif
Oil pan is a highly modified Moroso unit. It leaked like a sieve from a seam weld as soon as we bolted it on so I had no issue cutting it up and adding 6 more quarts of capacity to it while lowering the oil level by 1".
Clutch is a twin-disk ClutchMasters unit with integral flywheel that has worked great. TRE built us an awesome transmission. NO issues with 900whp and shifts at over 9000rpm. We haven't yet installed the Evo 5th gear... maybe for Bonneville next year. Front axles are Driveshaft Shop pieces that have worked perfectly for us.
We built the cage at our shop. It is mild steel because weight is not a big consideration for land speed racing.
The engine compartment is far cleaner now, but this is the only pic I could find on my PC.
I'll add on this first post if it is okay so that no one has to dig through the thread for answers.
edit #1:
First: thank you all for the warm welcome. We had no idea there was a community of people who would enjoy our journey with us. You're welcome to come along. Those pics from Harmon Automotive are a blast from the past! That was even at their old location, I think.
Yes, the car was GREEN /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif Funny, but the Eclipse we are building is green, also. Hmmmmm.
The strut tower funkiness is interesting. In order to lower the car to its full potential we purchased generic racing camber/caster adjusters from Ground Control (highly recommended supplier, too). We modified them and mounted them ON TOP of the strut towers to gain an extra 1" of tire clearance/lowering. A lot of work for 1", but what wouldn't YOU do for an extra inch? /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif The tape is actually to seal the opening since salt and dirt can fill the engine compartment depending on wether we are at Bonneville or El Mirage.
The rear suspension got a similar treatment with some custom fab'd parts that locate the mounting point of the shock above the tower.
I appologize that I can't remember the name of the manufacturer of the head studs we are using (I'll find and post it). They were VERY expensive, but they allow torquing the head up to 120ft#s. I torque them to 110 except for the two end ones on the intake side. These I go 105 with and no more. The head design is somewhat flawed with an oil drainback hole adjacent to the stud hole which leaves the aluminum unsupported for a large part of the circumference of the hole. We've cracked a head at both of these areas thus the limit on torque. On a high note though, we've never blown a head gasket in the area secured with those studs. We have, however, blown a lot of gaskets. We've tried SCE copper gaskets with stainless o-rings with limited success. I don't like the resultant deformation of the head surface. We are currently using the OEM steel gaskets that Shepherd sells (good guy, too). Our last run at El Mirage popped it though. I haven't looked at the 'log from that run yet (AEM unit has developed a frustrating issue with dl our log files), but our tunes are very conservative so I doubt detonation. Also, we use ERC fuel with has proven to be very good.
The SnowPerformance water injection seen in the under-hood pic was never used. I endorse them for street guys, but not for what we are doing.
I will do a write up with pics on both the front cover mod and the lifter mod. The lifter mod is going to be vastly improved this winter so I'll share that project. I don't promise them in a hurry, though, sorry. One each month maybe?
If someone can host it I have a decent short video of the car at 215mph on the dirt at El Mirage. More tomorrow...
The car belongs to Ron Cochran. He drove the car while we developed it/worked out the kinks, and he holds records at over 200mph at Bonneville and El Mirage driving in this car. He is past 70 years old! Nicest guy you'll ever meet and fun to celebrate with. His son, Troy, began driving the car this year, and he too has records at over 200mph at Bonneville and El Mirage in the Galant.
The car was originally put together for Ronny by a good friend, Greg Carlson (Greg owns the world's fastest 300ZX twin turbo which we sponsored). They never dreamed the car would go over 175mph let alone 200mph so we have replaced one thing after another to the point that just about the only thing remaining of the original race car is the paint.
The engine is the obvious 4G63 with minimal mods to be honest. The shortblock was machined by Ron's guys at his machine shop, Smith Auto, in Dinuba California. It has Wiesco pistons, Pauter rods, and deleted balance shafts, of course. The head has the bigger Crane STREET cams with Kiggly's conical valve springs (highly recommended). I modified the lifters so that they are more-or-less solid... I disassemble them and use custom shims inside to adjust the lash to .007". This is a labor-intensive job, but at high rpm the lifter can only bleed down that .007" so the rocker arms can't liberate themselves from the valvetrain /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif We've had zero valvetrain issues with sustained rpm above 9000rpm. I personally ported the cylinder head; it is just a very nice pocket port. Stainless steel valves are from the guys at SI Valves. Perhaps the least noticeable but most effective mod is on the front cover. Don Sprayberry, a long-time hot rodder and racer, came up with a genius mod for the oil pump (did I mention we have NEVER spun a rod bearing?). We eliminated the entire tortuous path across the front of the engine by welding an AN fitting right at the outlet of the oil pump and another at the entrance of the main oil galley. Using braided stainless lines we remote mounted a System One filter.
Turbo manifold is from DNP. First one broke after two events. Second one cracked immediately, but has held together so far. Customer service was awful, but we were committed with an up coming event and all the piping would have to be redone to change to a better one. So we purchased A THIRD ONE to change out at an event when needed.
Turbo is a box-stock GT42R provided by Limit Engineering in Arizona. Great guys who provide quality work/parts. I built a 4" side-exit downpipe that is possible in part due to the removeal of the stock oil filter/flange with the oil pump mod. Limit Engineering also provided the Tial wastegate and BOV.
3" IC piping leads to a liquid to air intercooler that we custom fab'd. It was a budget deal, but it works great: turbo outlet temps excede 500F (data logged), but IC outlet temps rarely pass 170F. Throttle body is a highly modified Summit Racing Mustang unit. Intake manifold is a Magnus street version.
Coil on plug is set up with Kawasaki bike coils and AEM twin-Fire. Engine management is AEM, also. Fuel injectors are 1600cc Ford Motorsport driven by AEM's 10-Channel injector driver (this unit IS NOT SET UP FOR THESE INJECTORS! How come nobody makes a big deal about this?). Aeromotive Pro-series fuel pump feeds race gas to a highly modified AEM fuel rail. Mauren does the fuel pulsation dampening while an AEM fuel pressure regulator finished everything off. Shawn Church of Church Automotive Testing in Los Angeles does all of our tuning on his DynoPac set up. I do the touch up tuning at the track, but he doesn't leave much work for me /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif
Oil pan is a highly modified Moroso unit. It leaked like a sieve from a seam weld as soon as we bolted it on so I had no issue cutting it up and adding 6 more quarts of capacity to it while lowering the oil level by 1".
Clutch is a twin-disk ClutchMasters unit with integral flywheel that has worked great. TRE built us an awesome transmission. NO issues with 900whp and shifts at over 9000rpm. We haven't yet installed the Evo 5th gear... maybe for Bonneville next year. Front axles are Driveshaft Shop pieces that have worked perfectly for us.
We built the cage at our shop. It is mild steel because weight is not a big consideration for land speed racing.
The engine compartment is far cleaner now, but this is the only pic I could find on my PC.
I'll add on this first post if it is okay so that no one has to dig through the thread for answers.
edit #1:
First: thank you all for the warm welcome. We had no idea there was a community of people who would enjoy our journey with us. You're welcome to come along. Those pics from Harmon Automotive are a blast from the past! That was even at their old location, I think.
Yes, the car was GREEN /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif Funny, but the Eclipse we are building is green, also. Hmmmmm.
The strut tower funkiness is interesting. In order to lower the car to its full potential we purchased generic racing camber/caster adjusters from Ground Control (highly recommended supplier, too). We modified them and mounted them ON TOP of the strut towers to gain an extra 1" of tire clearance/lowering. A lot of work for 1", but what wouldn't YOU do for an extra inch? /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif The tape is actually to seal the opening since salt and dirt can fill the engine compartment depending on wether we are at Bonneville or El Mirage.
The rear suspension got a similar treatment with some custom fab'd parts that locate the mounting point of the shock above the tower.
I appologize that I can't remember the name of the manufacturer of the head studs we are using (I'll find and post it). They were VERY expensive, but they allow torquing the head up to 120ft#s. I torque them to 110 except for the two end ones on the intake side. These I go 105 with and no more. The head design is somewhat flawed with an oil drainback hole adjacent to the stud hole which leaves the aluminum unsupported for a large part of the circumference of the hole. We've cracked a head at both of these areas thus the limit on torque. On a high note though, we've never blown a head gasket in the area secured with those studs. We have, however, blown a lot of gaskets. We've tried SCE copper gaskets with stainless o-rings with limited success. I don't like the resultant deformation of the head surface. We are currently using the OEM steel gaskets that Shepherd sells (good guy, too). Our last run at El Mirage popped it though. I haven't looked at the 'log from that run yet (AEM unit has developed a frustrating issue with dl our log files), but our tunes are very conservative so I doubt detonation. Also, we use ERC fuel with has proven to be very good.
The SnowPerformance water injection seen in the under-hood pic was never used. I endorse them for street guys, but not for what we are doing.
I will do a write up with pics on both the front cover mod and the lifter mod. The lifter mod is going to be vastly improved this winter so I'll share that project. I don't promise them in a hurry, though, sorry. One each month maybe?
If someone can host it I have a decent short video of the car at 215mph on the dirt at El Mirage. More tomorrow...
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