Abo

Sorry I wasn't there to help you.

I was down here in Melbourne Australia.

I was an IBM CE 40 years ago.

I did swap between that and working
in the automotive industry back and forth a few times however.

IBM inducted me out of a General Motors Holden dealership a few years prior. (to 40 years ago)

Abo

Nothing exceeds like excess.

Sure would be fun to drive... if you did not plan well ahead when driving,
the massive hunks of cast iron up front, could very rapidly turn the fun
into grief however.

I'd opt for the 300hp 350ci small block = shorter stopping distance + higher corner speed.
The higher corner (exit) speed means higher speed all the way down the straight,
then due to the lighter weight, later and shorter braking distances for the next
corner... followed again of course by a higher entry, mid and exit corner speed
than the Chev with the big block.

And using less "finite resources" while you were at it.

I could be wrong, but that's how I imagine it.

50 laps around Sears Point would help answer the question.

n3eg Loc: West coast USA

I like what I'm driving now - 2004 Kia Sedona mini van. Quiet, roomy, comfortable, 4 lighter plugs (I guess they call them power points or power ports now) and good speakers. Ham radio GPS tracking (APRS) and antenna mounts added along with modifying the power outlets for always-on. Way too many cup holders that are stable. Enough front wheel drive power to squeal tires on dry pavement. Only thing missing is Bluetooth and DVD, and I don't need it enough to replace the radio.

Abo

Where I live, over the last 5 or 6 years we've had a steady influx of Polynesians populating the
area. The're a very nice demographic to have around. Their kids are happy and polite;
an excellent reflection of their parents, who love Kia mini vans, we've got Kia mini vans all over the manor.
They need the big vans I guess, as they are mostly the size of Sumo wrestlers, even the 12 year old kids :-)

taxman Loc: Cleveland, Ohio

One Rude Dawg Loc: Athol, ID

A great car, usually in black or white.

Abo

Sorry I didn't respond sooner. Dunno how I missed your post.

Anyway, what a gorgeous way to travel... Jolly hockey sticks.

lmTrying Loc: WV Northern Panhandle

Fun to drive?
Never owned nor drove one.
However, the day after Thanksgiving 1970, I took home a 1971 Nova SS 350, Rock Crusher, and 12 bolt with 3.08 airplane gears. Over the years I rebuilt the springs, added frame connectors, slapper bars, BF Goodrich Radial T/As, and a '65 427. Fun to drive? How do I describe watching the pavement disappear in front of the rising hood? Or taking a turn under full power in a four wheel drift? Or listening to the nashing of gear teeth in a perfect full power shift? Or keeping up with your buddy who is driving a '68 Corvette on a crooked road? Or just feel the shake and rocking while that Crane cam idles down to 450 rpm. Fun? Oh yea.

Abo

I know a Muncie M22 gearbox is affectionately known as a "rock crusher", and your talking a heavy duty GM, maybe Salisbury? diff... that turns the back wheels through 360 degrees for every 3.08 turns of the tail shaft, however, and please excuse my ignorance, what are "airplane gears"?

Another thing I don't understand is "taking a curve under full power in a four wheel drift".
The car would be out of control "taking a curve under full power in a four wheel drift".
You'd run out of steering. You'd go to full opposite lock,
then the back of the car would pass the front of the car.

To retain control of a car in a four wheel drift the power must be modulated... especially
with 427 cubes at ones disposal. And even more especially with the weight of the massive
chunks of cast iron, a big block Chev engine consists of, over the front wheels.

The only exception to loosing control of a car taking a curve under full power in a four wheel drift,
is to have a curve of the perfect radius, plus a perfect corner entry speed to
precisely match the coefficient of friction of the TAs, which is virtually non existent, as they are already sliding sideways in a drift and spinning, as well, under the duress of a Chevy 427 with the accelerator pedal mashed into the carpet to obtain your claimed "full power". Was the mill running on 4 cylinders?

There are other factors too, that would have to be met.

Anyway the curve is a one in a million curve. If you were to live to be 100 years old you would need to drive through 27 (and a bit) curves every day, from the day you were born, to the day you died to drive through a million curves.

TAs good grief. The worst tyres I've ever used. I got heaps more grip from Yokahama 352s that were
40mm narrower!

Apart from much better grip, they were a shipload lighter, which is a double benefit being rotating mass, and the smaller frontal area, created less aerodynamic drag.

"nashing of gear teeth in a perfect full power shift" LOL I've heard it all now.

So, ImTrying, what are "airplane gears"?

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

Those corners in a drift can be controlled and made use of by someone who knows what they are doing.
Once long ago my brother and his best friend got arrested for street racing in my brother's very much modified car, just barely street legal.
Good for them they were taken in by a small town department whose Chief of Police was my Dad's friend in the Masonic Lodge. He called Dad to come get them and let them off with warning citations and required safety/driving classes.
And a little something he and Dad cooked up. Dad put them in his car* and drove them across the Mississippi to a race track in Illinois managed by another of his friends where they were in the middle of qualifications for a big race that weekend. Midwestern US Championship Semi-Finals for Super Stocks.
Seems my brother and our cousin forgot Dad used to be the backup driver for a past Midwestern Super Stock champion.
They equipped the two "wannabe race car drivers" with helmets and hooked some shoulder harnesses to the back seat belts. Clamped the two of them in as tight as the straps would go and Dad proceeded onto the track. He told the flagman and the timer to give him two laps to warm up then drop the flag on him as if he was trying to qualify for that weekend's race. He did two fast but restrained laps with everyone else passing them and when he hit the straight away to the Start/Finish line the lights and flagman gave Dad the go ahead. As the truckers say on their CB radios Dad "put the pedal to the metal". He did 3 laps with that car running right at the Red Line on the tachometer. Drifting through the curves and blasting out onto the straight away using all the power that car had. (US style race track, an oval with banked curves.) The flagman was waving all the other cars off the track and by 1 1/2 laps Dad had the track to himself at the end of lap 3 it took him all the way around for a 4th lap to slow down and pull off safely without ruining his brakes to stop. They told him he had done the fastest qualifying run that month and offered him the pole position if he wanted to enter the race that weekend. My brother and our cousin looked kind of like ghosts and seemed to be having trouble breathing and talking.
They were told if they ever felt the "need for speed" again to go to the track and Dad's friend would let them work it out on the track instead of the public streets.
They never got so much as a parking ticket after that.

Oh, Dad's car was a Chevy Caprice with a tuned 454, dual carbs, high speed transmission etc. It had so much power that once Dad took off from a red light accelerating so hard that the hat of the guy in his passenger seat flew back and landed on top of the back seat under the rear window.

My uncle drove race cars a few years also. I never did but I used to make the 26 miles from the farm to the college I went my Freshman year in 25 minutes. Most of it on little two lane country highways and the last 4 miles on a 4 lane state highway that was almost perfectly straight but an uphill slope when going to the school from home.

SteveR Loc: Michigan

McLaren

Abo

That is all well and good but having the experience I've had in motorsport, I'm hard to impress.


For example. I've lapped Winton, here in Victoria Australia, 4 seconds per lap faster than the
fastest touring cars modified for motorsport of the time on the planet.
And of course I'm talking about cars that go around bends/curves/corners... not the drag strip.

Those touring cars, my boy, were
the Ford Turbo Cosworth Sierras of the 80s. On that exact day those Fords were driven
by Australian National Champions and a World Formula One Champion.

I know you've got it wrong... and don't give me "wanna be racer"!
I may just be a "has been" but I'm a bloody successful has been.

Go watch speedway, at the very highest level with the worlds best drivers, the type where power sliding with lots of opposite steering lock is used.

They do not take a turn under full power in a four wheel drift. Once the turn is initiated power is allways modulated and the "drift" is the back wheels only the front wheels are tracking, not drifting... so is not a 4 wheel drift. 2 wheels yes, 4 wheels no.

There is a time and a place for a 4 wheel drift, HOWEVER! unless you have a very very small relative amount of power, full power will always make the back of the car pass the front of the car... period.

They, and no doubt, your dad, do/did not take "a turn UNDER FULL POWER in a four wheel drift"... as ImTrying, and now you, would have it (unless somethings gone very wrong).

This is your "Superstock" there is little to no sliding. What little there is is just the back wheels.
And there is sure to heck no full power 4 wheel drifting LOL:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPyPv0iGtIA

The following is fast and world class, from good old Jackson Speedway, there's plenty of sliding, but the back wheels only, the front wheels are always (busily) tracking. no "full power 4 wheel drift" LOL:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3DWQI6dAQJw

This is how we did it in Australia 1/4 century ago. And about 1/2 a century ago you'd find a kid
at that exact track up against the fence being pelted with dirt and lumps of clay, cheering the drivers (and riders) on... that kid was me.
In the video bruce tattnell has a moment of hubris and screws up, putting himself out of the race.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LaRbXBsElnc

The photo below is one of the Turbo Sierras that was racing the same day I was lapping 4 seconds
per lap faster, (in a different formula) than the Turbo Sierra that won that round of the Australian Touring Car Championship. To give you an idea of the difference in speed; if the Sierras and I had been on the track at the same time I would lap the Sierra, that came first, in 16 laps.

The Sierras were 500 horse power cars whos minimum weight restriction was 2425.085 lb.

Don't be braying asses all your lifes and face reality.

Abo

Bruce McLaren is dead. LONG LIVE BRUCE MCLAREN

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

I don't remember saying anything about you or your driving.

Dad did those drifts as part of a "learning experience" for my brother and cousin - ie scare the hell out of them - he referred to it as "show boating" and was well aware it was actually a few seconds slower than taking the corners in "the groove" as he put it. But again, the purpose was to scare those two teenage "speed racer wannabes" into reforming. And as stated the track was an oval with banked turns, different than flat track.
Also as stated it more or less accomplished it, they never even got a parking ticket after that. But one weekend they did pull off something - but on a track. They borrowed the Caprice because my brother's car had its motor in pieces being worked on and went to a major drag racing meet. When they arrived at the track they found the organizers of the meet were putting on a big recruiting push to get people to enter a stock factory street legal eliminator event. They had 3 or 4 leading drivers but not enough others to make for a good series of elimination races. Hey, Dad said don't race on the street-do it on a track-this was a track! They figured they could enter, do one race - get eliminated and brag to their friends at high school they raced in the regional championships. However, Dad's big Caprice with my brother driving won it's first race against another of the people they recruited at the gate - even better bragging rights - then it won the second round - huh? Then the third round against one of those "leading drivers" and found themselves in the final two for the last round - and won again. They got the trophy. Then came the hard part - how to tell my Dad what they did with his car. They opted to hide the trophy in the basement and figure out how to tell him later. About a month later Dad went down to get out his hunting gear for the upcoming hunting season and finds a three foot tall trophy under an old blanket in the corner where he stored his hunting gear. "Later" had come, they did point out "it was on a track, not the street". They never got to borrow the Caprice again.
This stuff all took place in the late 1960's while I was in the Army in Vietnam. I heard about it all as "funny" stories told around the table when I got home.

And if I screwed up some of the terminology and descriptions that is on me. I never raced, seldom went to watch races with the family and don't really like watching racing. Watching other people do things bores me to tears in general. In college the requirement for physical activity and/or a sport I fulfilled by being on the college bowling league. I got to play, not watch someone else play. As a bowler I got fairly good - but erratic due to lack of practice (it bored me). A pro bowler who was giving instruction once told me I had potential - I told him I had other things to do that I actually liked to do, not practice. One semester on the school league got me my credits and I dropped it.

Abo

I thought you were validating ImTryings; "a turn UNDER FULL POWER in a four wheel drift"

If you were not, I was wrong, I'm sorry.
May God be with you Robert.