1989 SC needs to run mid 12s

Awesome job of representing the SC Alan ! Hope you don't mind that I added some of the pictures from the article to your post


David
 
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So what did you win? :D

Voucher for $1,500 off of a gear vendors overdrive unit
$500 worth of Pioneer car stereo products
$50 off any one purchase from FAST at jobber pricing
$50 off any one purchase from TCI Automotive at jobber pricing
$50 off any one purchase from Comp Cams at jobber pricing

It was a pretty nice haul I think!
 
Voucher for $1,500 off of a gear vendors overdrive unit
$500 worth of Pioneer car stereo products
$50 off any one purchase from FAST at jobber pricing
$50 off any one purchase from TCI Automotive at jobber pricing
$50 off any one purchase from Comp Cams at jobber pricing

It was a pretty nice haul I think!

Hell yes! Sweet. :D
 
So what is the consensus for running E85? Obviously I need timing and more injector to take advantage but the question is, how much?

As of now, I plan on plugging in some 47 or 52 lb injectors (http://www.buyfordracingfromdpm.com/2013-14-shelby-gt500-52lb-fuel-injectors/) for the fuel side and I think I can get the AFR correct for wide open throttle just by manipulating fuel pressure once the injectors are in place. Important note, I don't really need part throttle driveability, I am just going through the burnout box.

Is there any way to cheaply advance the timing? I read in one of the E85 threads that running 23 or 24 degrees of advance is where the peak power is at. Is the only way to get there with a chip? Would it be possible to adjust the position of the crank sensor by enlarging the two bolt holes, moving the sensor and get some advance?
 
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You don't need more advance. You might run out of MAF/injectors/fuel pump though if you up the boost much.
 
You don't need more advance. You might run out of MAF/injectors/fuel pump though if you up the boost much.

Roger that. I will add these injectors and the 10% overdrive blower pulley then try to get the AF ratio correct on the E85. Next race is scheduled for October 14th.
 
We plugged in a set of 2013/2014 Mustang GT500 52 lb/hr injectors and have her running on E85 now. Being Jetronic style, these injectors are slightly shorter than the old style 36s that came on the car originally, so they required some fuel rail modification. We drilled holes in the mounting tabs of the rails to allow them to be mounted lower then bent the rails in a few stategic places and we were in business.

The napkin math proved somewhat accurate, IE we had 36 lbers and theoretically a person needs 30-40% more fuel with E85. We theorized that if we plugged in an injector with a 46 to 50 lb flow rate, we should be "close" when it comes to air fuel ratio. That turned out to be somewhat accurate as she starts up and idles really well. Idle is somewhat more rich, showing 14 to 15:1 on the wideband whereas she used to idle very lean at around 17-18:1. The only apparent issue is that it goes rich on tip in, going down into the 10s on the AFR. We are going to see how it does at WOT, lowering the fuel pressure if needed. Just as a data point, our pump E85 tested around 75-80% for ethanol content.

We also added a 10% overdrive pulley to the blower while we had it off.

Next race October 14th in the junkyard series but we might try to make Roadkill's zip tie drags in St. Louis on Sept. 16th.
 
I am a newcomer to the T-bird SC world but I have a two part theory as to why this is. The first is that the cars were slow from the factory. They looked fantastic but they weighed too much and suffered because of that. At the zip tie drags I bet I had five people come up to me and say "I had no idea these cars could run like this" and we all know my car is not really fast.

The second is because most people aren't smart enough to figure out what is going on under the hood. I have more people come up to the car in the pits and stare in silence than any car I have owned. Some of them just go on about their business and never figure out how the blower works. Others are smart enough to figure it out. I think the complexity there along with the perceived lack of performance causes people not to dislike the car but to be indifferent about it. In my mind it is a little bit like a rotary engine to a lot of people, they don't understand it so they don't bother to care about it and they discount it.

I hear 'ya. I love SC's, obviously, but one thing really bugged me in the time that I owned it........99.9 percent of people out there don't even know what it is. Even knowledgeable car guys, I've found, mostly don't know what they are. I'd get some pleasantly surprised people that seemed interested, but these cars--aside from those in the know--just pretty much have zero prestige. It's why the death march into the junkyard and the litany of parts cars in the parts for sale has, IMHO, escalated in the last two or three years, but for some reason, the last year seems to be some sort of tipping point where the floodgates have opened to the junkyards. An SC makes a cool Roadkill car on one hand (and this is coming from a huge Roadkill fan), but when it's Roadkill-able where it's cool to beat on it because it has little value before you drive the living daylights out of it, you know that time is ticking down and the curse of Anthony Kuchta seems a little more real with each passing year. :D

Edit: I've always found that the Taurus SHO has had much more recognition, and it was a fine car and engine. But the divide between the two, I've personally found, couldn't be greater in popularity. I'm really wondering if one of the major mistakes that Ford made was to not promote the supercharged engine more. Maybe they found that early on, "supercharged" was a term that they found that even in some gearhead circles, meant "UFO's" or "alien gadgetry" or something similar. I dunno. At that time in 1989, there were a fair share of old school carb guys that didn't even like fuel injection (probably mostly because it was a new concept). But the "premium unleaded fuel only" disclaimer on the gauges must have went unheeded by many owners, similar to the Olds Turbo Jetfire's problems of the methanol additive....not as destructive, but still destructive over time.
 
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Next race October 14th in the junkyard series but we might try to make Roadkill's zip tie drags in St. Louis on Sept. 16th.

Alan,

Wondering if you are still planning to be at the Zip Tie drags in STL on Sept 16th. Planning to be there with my son and grandson.

David
 
I got knocked out in the fourth round of the Roadkill Zip Tie Drags $3,000 Hooptie Challenge in St. Louis this past weekend thanks to me red lighting. My most memorable match up was in the first round when the guy next to me was in a Green Grand Prix. He was giving us the full sandbag treatment in the staging lanes, saying he had no chance. Turned out he was spraying that thing and running 13s. He tried to spray me and had a nitrous explosion at the starting line. The full story is linked below, please note the mention of supercharged V6s:

http://www.roadkill.com/roadkill-zip-tie-drags-gateway-racing-car-show-winners-and-galleries/

Just to summarize, since my last outing we added 52 lb. GT500 injectors with no changes to the ECM, mass air meter or the fuel pressure. This was done so that we could change to E85. Thanks to a great deal on here, I also added an MP2 blower, MP inlet and 10% overdrive pulley to the blower. Once I sell the old blower and inlet, I should be into these parts for less than $150. Naturally this change pegged the stock boost gauge so I have no idea how much boost it is now making.

When we loaded the car for the race we knocked the factory fuel lines loose from the passenger side rocker area and planned to zip tie them up once we got to the track. Once at the track, my partner put the ties on a little tight and restricted the return line. While waiting for my first run in the staging lanes I noticed that the fuel pressure was stuck at 65 psi. We couldn't fix the problem right there in the lanes so I made the pass anyway. I could tell the car was significantly faster at first but as I got to mid track the fuel pump was dead heading against the line restriction and the AF ratio went into the 12s, she still went:

60 ft 2.09
330 ft 5.72
1/8th 8.67
mph 82.61 mph
1000 ft 11.276
1/4 13.45
mph 103.86

Once we fixed the fuel line issue, I made a pass and the AF ratio was going into the high 11s. I added a few psi of fuel pressure, putting it into the high 40s under boost and from then on it maintained an AF ratio in the 10s for the entire run on each pass for the rest of the day. Considering my sensor is on the gas scale, I thought that was good enough. Also, on the E85 the car would barely get warm, the only time it came up to the normal zone on the factory temp gauge was after two back to back hot laps. In short, E85 is fantastic stuff in this car. Best pass of the day was a 13.06 but I appear to be missing that timeslip (will post it when I find it). Second best was:

60 ft 1.906
330 ft 5.533
1/8th 8.482
mph 84.08 mph
1000 ft 11.022
1/4 13.179
mph 104.58
 
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