v8carreragts conversion

It's coming along...

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Your car looks fantastic. Love the orange.

Moved it out of the garage on it's own power!

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I didn't take it for a test drive because I needed to adjust the hydraulic T/O bearing. The clutch was grabbing at the floor. Now that that is fixed it has been reining here every day.

Just gorgeous! I bet it drives better than it looks.

Looks Fantastic Pete!

Did you make a booth?

No,just shot it in the garage. Although I used lacquer-- only because I can't spray anything else without a fresh air mask and I don't have everything to make mine work.

I used Duplicolor Paintshop paint and mixed the color (Blood Orange) based on the Glasurit formula.

First drive! I don't have plates and full insurance on it yet so it was only up and down the block. Needs some tuning.

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This is the first time I have driven this car in almost 17 years!

Sounds Good! Louder than I expected.

Congratulations! It must have been wonderful to be behind the steering wheel again, after 17 years.

Is this something? Or did you already side swipe something?

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Awesome…and the ‘late’ flush (968) windshield on your ‘early’ looks perfect.

In the blink of an eye…17 years…a simple blink of an eye !

944-LT1 wrote:Is this something? Or did you already side swipe something?  

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Just a decal imho

You're talking about this?

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That's has been the name of my side business for over 30 yrs.

cooool....correct font....tastefully sized and placed.!

Just for everyone's information, I had my car shipped from Chicago to Tucson. (where we moved) The driver could not drive to our house so we met at Tucson Mall. This is about 15 minutes down hill from my house so the drive home was up hill. The day that it was delivered it was 105 degrees and my car did not overheat. The oil temp was 220 degrees and the water was in the normal area of the gauge. So my 944 turbo radiator and fans worked just fine.

Here's what has been happening with my car. I swapped cams to a custom flat tappet cam from Crane. The car still ran like $#**. At this point, I think that the FAST EZ EFI is only for a completely stock engine. I don't care what they say, don't buy this unless you have a stock engine. It doesn't work if you have any performance cam period.

So I am putting on a carb for now until I can put together enough cash to buy a programmable FI system.

In the process of putting on the carb I decided to swap the roller cam back in and it turned out to be a good decision. I am a little ticked off about the flat tappet cam because it destroyed one lobe. I think this problem in the past years with flat tappet cams is that all cam manufactures make crap. I have built more than 30 engines in the past and never had a problem with a cam before. I never went through the pain staking break in procedure that they say you need to do now either. I bought all the best parts, did the break in just as Crane specified, bought the special break in oil and used Cranes special lube on the lobes and the lifter faces and it still destroyed a lobe in less that 30 miles. This is crap. One lobe? Why are all the rest perfect? Because they don't want to make flat tappet cams, they make too much more on rollers.

I don't buy the business of today's oil not having as much zinc as in the past causing this. If this were true all of the lobes would be destroyed, not just one. And besides, I used the high zinc oil. Yea, right all of a sudden the oil is causing cam failure. What about every car that is still running with a flat tappet cam.

So, I got the roller back in and a good part of the car back together. I just need to adjust the rockers, put the intake and carb on, and fill it with oil and coolant. I also need to re-wire the fuel pump relay since it was controlled by the ECM and also need to change the wiring so it is controlled by oil pressure. (so it shuts off when the engine dies)

Maybe next weekend I will get it running.

a little insight as to the "flat cam lobe"-
YES, the oils now being used have very little protective zinc in them.( because the zinc kills cat converters among other nasties that are the by product of combustion...)

so you did use the proper juice, lubed the lobes, ran the thing at 2k rpm to aid in splash lubrication?

that's not enough.

I mess around in a performance machine shop and we see this all the time- the root of the problem is
TOO MUCH (closed) VALVE SPRING SEAT PRESSURE. Anything over 100# installed seat pressure will chew up a flat tappet cam.

the solution is to remove the inner spring (NOT THE FLAT DAMPER INNER "SPRING"-that doesn't add any spring rate.) Or run "break in" ratio rocker arms, lessening the load on the lifter.

The roller cams have A VERY AGGRESSIVE spring. (needed to keep the roller in contact due to the fast acting ramps the roller wheel must follow)

don't get too bent out of shape, even the "catalog said this part # will be compatible with this combo"
is not to be trusted. (again have seen this time and again).

Valve springs rates are VERY different between flat tappet (solid or even hyd.) and roller.

Now there is some extra help for preventing flat tappet cam failure- Comp offers a Nitriding process that supposedly aids in the strength of the lobe surface. ( i have NOT used or seen the end result of such trickery on a cam. Cranks yes, and to good effect.)

one other tip to keep your flat tappet cam alive: the lifters need to rotate!

the flat tappet (solid or hyd.) cam has a crown ground into it ever so slightly, so the face of the lifter is "kicked" in a circular motion as it follows the lobe rise.

We often mark the pushrods with paint, sharpie, white out or the like to verify the pushrod & lifter are moving.
you would be surprised how much rotation happens even using a breaker bar on the snout of the crank,let alone when the engine is running.

when lifters DON'T rotate, then they dig into the lobe, and it goes downhill from there quickly.

Been awhile since I have posted. My car is running great now. I'm back with the original roller cam and a Holley 650 DP. The car is unbelievable!

I just got back from a drive, and for anyone that is interested about cooling, it is 105 deg here today and the car ran less than half on the temp gauge and at 80 deg C oil temp.(176 F) with the 944 turbo radiator and fans. I also have a Derale 13225 frame rail 2 pass oil cooler mounted in front. It was running about the same temps idling afterward.

Peter,
Your car looks great!

turbobob924

2nd! Sounds like a beast!

Question are you running the bmw hydroboost

Yes. With the stock 944 master cylinder. If you enlarge the picture you can see the hydroboost and the regulator/bomb along with most of the plumbing.

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Thank you for the pic. I am doing the same set up. How do you like the brakes? What calipers are you running?

The feel is fantastic, different than a vacuum power booster. I am using early 944 turbo calipers in back and 80's Jaguar XJX calipers in front.