My first track experience
 

I took my 84 SS to the track and ran my first 1/4 mile the other day. Dont get me wrong it was a blast but i was a little disappointed in my times. My quickest time was 14.94. I have a 383 stroker that is benched dynoed at 452 horsepower. I ran this comletely as it is with street tires and without doing anything like removing the air filter or any other tricks. My question is how much improvement will i get in my time with some adjustment like racing tires and more airflow. Thanks in advance for any responses.

sounds great, but I think you can bring that time down a little?, maybe more, but given that it was your first time I wouldn't be to bummed out. Your times will get much better the more you run, but you had fun and that is the best reason for trying. congrats man.....

Yeah i cant be too disappointed since it is made for the streets. Just thought my time would be a little better. The best part was being lined up against a crotch rocket twice. He ran a 9.6 at 143mph he must be crazy.

I think he was a little crazy also :eek: I had a car that I bought from a freind (74 nova) and when he owned it, it ran a 12.41 in the quarter! It was set up with mickey thompsons, weiand intake? and some great gears, wish I knew all the facts about it, but that was 20 years ago! With your set-up you should be pretty quick in the quarter? have fun :cool:

You had the 383 dynoed and it put out 452hp at the crank?

What was your trap speed and 60' time? Those will tell a lot.

I'm sure your times will get better with slicks but I can't really judge if you did well or not or if the 383 is making 452hp or not.

what rear end u have and what are the gears

and is it makin 452 hp at the FLYWHEEL or at the wheels brother

also remember that these floaters we know as monte carlos are call boats for a reason: big and heavy,
have you tried shaving off weight by doing stuff such as removing back seat and swapping heavy chevy metal parts with fiberglass body parts?
(wish i realized that before i sold my 1985 monte.)
do u have posi rear or traction bars, helps with launching?
are you using a race carburetor?
headers, straight pipes, a modded tranny that supports and works great with ur stroker?
things that come to my mind, hope they help :)

Sorry guys I am new to this. I believe it is at the flywheel that I have 452 hp since it was dynoed by the manufacturer. My 60' times were from 2.2 to 2.4 but again with alot of slipping. My rear end is a posi but not sure of the gear ration. Should i upsize my Jets when racing it kind of felt like it fell of at the end. Thanks for all the advice i am going to try and get some pics up sometime soon.

Post the entire timeslip- 60', 330', 1/8 mile ET and MPH, 1000' ET and MPH, and 1/4 mile ET and MPH.

Something is definitely very, very wrong now if you're crate engine is advertised at 452 and you're running high 14s with 2.2 second 60's. You're engine is not making 452 HP with that kind of 60' and 1/4 mile ET, unless you were towing a 21' boat or something. Post the whole slip and we'll try to help you out.

x2

Your 60' times are close to correct for a car running a high 14 second times, although 2.4 is really really bad.

I really want to see the whole slip ESPECIALLY the 1/4 mile ET and MPH.

r/t .397
60' 2.255
330 6.287
1/8 9.613
mph 72.82
1000 12.514
1/4 14.94
mph 93.39

Run 2
r/t .150
60' 2.407
330 6.842
1/8 10.237
mph 74.0
1000 13.014
1/4 15.332
mph 97.38

And here is a link to my motor set-up. Thanks again for the help.
http://www.smedingperformance.com/ch...83Extreme.html

I would call Smeding performance and raise hell. Based on your 1/4 mile MPH, you're putting down about 225HP less than advertised....for a $7000 engine, I would NOT be happy.

You should be trapping over 110 with that kind of horsepower.

Like I said I am really new to this. Im not sure if I am completely set up right. I bought the car in May and the motor had probably 1000 miles on it but looking at how some of the stuff was put together im not to sure this guy completely knew what he was doing. I probably need to take it in and have someone tune it up and then see what I can do. That is why I posted it here because I thought for sure I would be quicker then that. I will let you guys know what comes of it. But like I said before it is made for the street and I love the car just need to get it dialed in.

Agreed. That engine is NOT putting out 452hp at the wheels or even the crank unless your car weighs 5000lbs (which I know it doesn't).

This is the nice thing about having drag strips. You can test what these companies claim your vehicle has. You should take it somewhere else to a dyno to have it tested just to see exactly what it's making.

Just out of curiousity, do you have any pics of the engine?

I will take some pics today and post them. Like I said I love everything about this car was just suprised at the times. The car itself is in excellent shape looks very similar to the one in the photo at the top. Thanks for all the input. If I was having an issue internally where do you guys think it would be with that kind of power loss. Also I have AC was wondering if there was any power loss just from it being in the system but not running?

AC only effects engine power when engaged and when it does, it usually only drops it by up to 10hp, enough to take a tenth or two off of the 1/4 (maybe), but it's not that large of a drop. I'm thinking that there isn't really anything "wrong" with the engine, but to be sure you can look for leaks, check the spark plugs to see if the engine's running lean or rich, and make sure the exhaust coming out is clear.

Ok here is a pick of the engine.

And here are some more of the car. The last one is my vacuum advance if you look closely there is a plate welded on it to stop it from advancing to far what affect does this have. Thanks for everyones help.

Sorry forgot the pic of the vacuum advance.

Your Monte and your engine look great, and I'm sorry but I'm not familiar with the vacuum advance. I'm thinking that someone fudged the hp numbers on you a bit. I'm not exactly sure about how much your Monte weighs, but I would guess that it's not much more than 3500lbs max and to run a 14.9@93MPH makes me think that the engine is making something closer to 250hp. When my Monte put down 205whp (about 255-270 crank hp) I ran my 14.4@95mph. I know we're talking about different cars here but weight and hp are your biggest things.

Although, what's the elevation of the drag strip you were at? That would make a difference. Weather would as well.

Im pretty sure they wouldnt have fudged it that much. I have printed out dyno sheet from initial testing and its peak was 460 at 5500 rpm. The track I was at is at sea level. The tranny is a 700r completely rebuilt. I noticed today just driving around town that my tranny is shiffting at about 3500 rpm is that standard. The second run I posted was me manually shifting which gave me my highest MPH but my slowest 1/8 mile time mainly due to the fact that I could not grab in first. Zipper thanks for all the help.

It's no problem, I'm really hoping that we can figure this out.

When you say that the tranny is shifting at 3500rpm, was it shifting around that same rpm at the drag strip?

I am not sure what it was shifting at the track not something i was paying attention to. I did find part of my problem. Last night while checking my timing again. I noticed that one of my plug wires was sparking over to my header not everytime but frequently. New wires and it should help me out some.

If I am correct, the 700r4 is computer controlled? at the strip you should be shifting sooner and firmly. you can change this with a tune on tranny. Check you rear end gears on the car by jacking up the back of the car and spinning a rear tire 1 full revolution, count the times the drive shaft turns and that give you the rear end gear ratio. so say the drive shaft spins slightly under 4 times you prob have 3.73 gears (3.73 to 1) slightly over 4 most likely 4.10 (4.10 to 1). These are the rear gears you want, for the strip 4.10 or up street/strip 3.73 prob ur best bet. if you get a number close or below 3, thats your problem, a ratio that tight slows acceleration, but keeps gas mileage up when on the highway.

def some mickey thompson drag radials will help, and still work on the road.

best of luck!

If it's computer controlled, and the tranny won't shift past 3500rpm even when it's floored, then you need the computer retuned. 3500rpm is way way WAY too low of an rpm to be shifting at for racing. Otherwise, I'm kinda lost now, lol. Sorry.

by shifting sooner i mean the gear ratio should be close (in the transmition) as too keep the rpms in the power band. prob 3,500-6,000 rpms

Vacuum advance relates to part throttle timing. It should have no effect on WOT timing.

700R4s aren't computer controlled. Standard old fashioned vacuum/TVS cable activated transmission.

No way in hell is he ever going to want to shift a built 383 at 3500 at WOT. LOL
Shift points are going to be determined by the engine's powerband, which should be apparent on the dyno sheet they sent you. You want to shift it just after peak power starts to fall off- probably in the 6500-7000 range on a real built 383 making 500hp, though again his engine is NOT making near 500hp. Pretty easy to calculate this based on his trap speeds.

This will definitely help, but I found it hard to believe that a sporadic misfire was robbing you of over 200hp. Maybe if it was missing on 4 cylinders out of the 8. hehehehe

Get the car to reputatable local shop, it has issues that we can't diagnose from here.

I checked the rear end and it is 3.73 posi. I changed out my wires and it definintly has more power, idle smoother and accelerates better. I was just messing with the advance because I had the distributor apart. They had my vacuum advance hooked up to my side vacuum port which I think is a pcv port. I moved to what quick fuel thechnology states is manifold vacuum and it really helped with starting and idleing. I think the plan is to have it looked over this weekend and see what is happening. Thanks again for the help I believe my power curve started to fall off at about 5500 so that is where I want to shift?

just after 5,500 will give you full use of curve...i believe the vacuum advance is supposed to come off of the primary metering block, on my holly 750 at least. fool around with a vacuum gauge and see what port you get the highest reading from. A diagram from the manufacturer should point out the correct port.

i think this motor is definitely capable of making the power advertised. its an aluminum headed small block, with compression, some cubes, and a little cam to it. call them up and find out what jetting and initial and advanced timing they used on the dyno. i assume that it was shipped to you the way they dynoed it but we all no what happens when you assume. also what stall speed are you running? you have alot of gearing with the 3.73s and the 700 so hooking up at the suggested stall speed of 2500rpm is going to be tough on a street tire with a stock suspension. im running a very similar setup as you and its tough to come out at stall speed. your traps being so low theres definitely an issue but i dont think its a miss advertised hp rating.call them up and find out the deal. get the traps up then work on the 60s. i recommend a sticky wide tire and at least a set of slapper bars. good luck. and for what its worth i dont think you got robbed it just needs some tuning. and the 700 isnt computer controlled.

Im pretty sure I didnt get robbed and i too believe it just needs to be tuned. I called smeding already they told me 12-16 initial and 34-36 advance i am running about 15 and 35. I bought the car like it is with the motor and everything the tranny has a new rebuild and so does the rear end. I have 17000 in reciepts not including the "car" and the paint job. I paid 11000 so i think i did ok. Is there any thing electrically that could have caused a loss of power. I was messing with the alt connections today and afterwards the car just seemed to respond a lot different. I didnt buy it for the track but i would still like to have it putting out what it should. You guys have been alot of help Thank You.

holey cow! r u saying u have almost 30k in ur monte??? ide be pissed for anything over 10 seconds and 2nd place at a car show....lol

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I definitely think something is wrong somewhere. Part of it could be with the engine dyno- I know a lot of times they seem to dyno it like the old muscle cars- stripped of all accessories- so you lose horsepower right away putting all that stuff on (AC, PS, alt, etc)- but even then, you're definitely still awfully slow for the power, as mentioned above.

I also agree with Zipper- I think power output at the engine is probably closer to 240-250 with those times. In my GP (325 cid V8 with just intake and exhaust) I was doing 14.2's (traction limited) @ 100 in a car that's rated about 300 crank hp stock, and tends to put down about 240 hp at the wheels.

Two things I would look at- one is the arcing you saw from the plug wire. You need new wires, or something needs fixed there if its even arcing at idle; its probably misfiring like crazy at WOT. Second is, I would take it for a few WOT runs and see what the trans is actually shifting at (at least 1-2); I'd imagine you should easily be shifting over 5000 rpm- if its anywhere down near the mid 3000's like you said, that could be killing your times too (although I figure you'd notice the engine lugging like crazy and shifting super early).

If you're having trouble finding out the problem; maybe your best bet would be to take it to a local dyno shop (if you have one) and have them troubleshoot it on the dyno to figure out why you're so down on power at WOT. At least then, you could have actual wheel horsepower numbers to see how much power the engine is actually putting out without being inflated by the engine shop.

does this mean you have $28,000 in your car????

Reading comprehension? I paid $11000 the reciepts came with the car from the other guy. He put $17000 in it and that is just for the upgrades and repairs i.e. engine tranny rebuild rear end and alot of other stuff. So again I am in it for $11000.

I think it is grammatical comprehension on your part. The over use of run on and fragmented sentences leads one to believe the periods should be replaced by commas. Resulting in an association of the 17k with motor, transmission, and rear end. leaving the 11k for the car and paint. Please excuse my confusion of the English language.

"I have 17000 in receipts not including the "car" and the paint job. I paid 11000 so i think i did ok."

what i read: "I have 17000 in receipts not including the "car" and the paint job, I paid 11000 (for the car and paint) so i think i did ok." as you left a dollar value for "the car and paint" unevaluated.

A correct way to convey your idea would be: "I payed 11,000 for the car, and they previous owner gave me 17,000 in receipts just for parts!"
This would let the forum know you spent 11,000 while the previous owner spent 17k in drive train alone.


but thank you, it is more clear now. I also believe you have been had. Check the engine block serial numbers and reference the shop who built the engine, they should have record of this. The old "bait and switch"

ridiculous^^^^ you seem to be the only person who didnt get it and more importantly the only person that would have cared if he spent 30k for the car.

any updates on this situation? im curious. oh and question what heads are on this thing? i saw theyre aluminum just curious as to what they are.

Jlpete, I just read through your entire thread from the start. I think alot of people are giving some good advice and thought into why you are running so slow. One of the first things i would start off with is double checking all the easy fixes first. I would make sure that my timing is right where it needs to be. That would be somewhere around 36 total timing. But, it all depends on the motor. Not all motors want the same timing. The carb is going to be another I would check. More than likely the jetting may need tweaked due to where they tunes it compared to where you are running at. And the float levels, air fuel mixture, even the power valve. Hook it to a vaccuum gauge and set the mixture screws when you get the best readings. As for the power valve hook up a gauge and take it for a spin and see what it is pulling when under a load, then spit it in to and that is what you need to be runnning in the front of the carb. What is the spark plug gap? Pull them and check them out and make sure that they are burning correctly. If you are unsure then replace and make sure you gap them at IIRC .35 gap for a sbc. If the gaps are to tight then that can take away a ton of power, same goes for to much gap.

The 700r4 is a good torque transmission for the track they have a good low first gear to aid in your take off. I would really think that you are not running enough converter to take advantage of the hp and trq that motor is making. You need a minumum of 2500 for that motor. You already have 3.73 posi in that from the factory. You definetely need to get some Mickey Thompson Street E.T.'s for traction. I am running those for my Monte with a 406 sbc. I pull the front tires with my setup. Anyways, you can get a set of 26x10.5x15 and will lower your sixties alot. The stock suspension is not up to snuff either. You need to get some upper and lower rear control arms to take advantage of the power level when it is all dialed in. I have mine from UMI and they work great. Lastly you should be shifting that thing manually for any racing. I would shift around 5600 or 5700. This will keep you in the power band for the cam. If you work on checking this stuff over and get it right you should be in the low 12's if not high 11's with that hp it is supposed to make. If you need anymore help just let me know. I maybe new here but have been racing my monte for over 15 years now.