Thirdgen89gta's Rides.

[thirdgen89gta]

Since the 1:1 forum seems to be closed (its missing the "new thread" button). I'll just have to post my whips here!

First up is my semi-new car. I've only had it for about year now. And for a daily driver its plenty fun.

2006 Pontiac G6 GTP 6speed manual. Yep, manual. No slush box for me. Bone stock now, except for the tires I replaced because they were dryrotting on one side. That was a pretty penny.

Car was a steal though @ $13,000 w/only 10k miles on the clock. Everything else in that range was 60k to 80k miles. Nobody except me likes a 6spd I guess.

3.9L V6 variable valve timing + variable intake length.
6spd manual
240hp @ 6000rpm
240lb/ft @ 2800rpm.
Curb Weight = 3520lbs!

The VVT and variable intake produces a real nice power curve for a daily driver. Its usually happy in just about any gear and unless i'm trying to overtake someone fast on the highway I don't ever have to shift out of 6th. It'll happily putt along in 6th as low as 40mph and can still lug itself back up to highway speeds.

The heated seats, leather, power moon roof, are all nice. But I mostly enjoy the Monsoon audio that connects directly to my iPhone, and the auto climate control that makes life easy. Set it at 70* and forget it.





Ahh, snow. How I 'miss' you.


Is it fast? Moderately so. With the crappy tires I couldn't get it under 15 seconds, but the 1/4 mile trap speeds were decent for the crappy air I drove it in. DA corrected trap speeds were in the 96 to 98mph range. Top speed is a Thirdgen89GTA verified 142mph, but specs say it will tip out at 155mph. On Road America's front straight even with crappy brakes so I had to brake VERY early I was still hitting the braking zone about 138mph. Road America's front straight is 4100ft long or so, about 4/5ths of a mile. With some nice HPDE pads I should be able to brake much later on better tires.

But what is a car for if not to be driven! So I took it up to Road America in Elkhart Lake WI! My car club happens to rent the ENTIRE track out for the weekend twice a year! Yep, we rent Road America for 4 days a year. Don't ask me how it ever gets paid for, I have no idea who takes the fall if it failed. But the club usually makes enough $$$ to pay for my Hotel for the weekend.

Like everything else I have I'm simply not content to use it normally. I have to flog it. So here's the G6 at Road America.

My miss-matched numbers job. Was in a hurry to get on the track.


Doing almost a buck 20 here. crappy pic I know, but I didn't want to pay for the digital proof @ $85 just to have the digital image.


But why stop there when you can drag race it too!


Not my best time, but the best time I have recorded on video. Never did break 14's on those crappy tires. Car had a misfire too, was in need of a tune up. Runs much better now.

[thirdgen89gta]

Onto Whip #2.

This is a car I've owned for nearly 10 years now. And for the first couple of years it seems I broke it every year. Mainly because when a transmission broke, I'd put another used transmission in it. And that would break too. Ooops. Lesson learned.

Well the motor went in about 2005 or so. Over-rev'ed and lost oil pressure for a split second not sure why. But the results were pretty obvious. Immediately over heated, power was lost. And within a week the dreaded "knock, knock" noise of a rod bearing. Perhaps it was meant to be. The original engine was fairly tired and didn't like the bolt-ons much.

But the new engine was great. Found it for $1000, needed lots of work.

1989 Pontiac TransAm GTA (uber heavy option version) If pontiac made it, this car had it. 7 way adjustable power seats. Head rests alone tilt, telescope, up/down, kinda like E.T.s head really. Seats went back/forward, up/down, seat bottom could tilt forward/backward, lumbar tilt. Bolsters in bottom and lumbar were inflatable for support. Option after option got piled into this thing by Pontiac.

L98 350ci engine. Tons of torque, not much HP. But it was the 80's and in the 80's it was PDQ. Today....not so much, gotta worry about some of them honda oddesy's.

But thanks to the wonder of modding its not stock anymore. Is anything I own "stock"? Oh yeah, the G6....for now.

Came from california. This is a pic of the car from 2001, before I even owned it. But once I saw it, no matter how much work it needed it had to be mine. And so it was.


What alotta work it was. Turns out the head gasket at the time wasn't a head gasket, but instead a cracked block. Somehow the previous owner had overheated the engine and managed to crack a cast iron block between cylinders 3&5 on the driver side, and cylinders 4&6 on the passenger. When the coolant gauge is in the red, and the hood is billowing sweet smelling coolant smoke its time to STOP!!!![/b]



So I bought a used 350 cause thats what I could afford and off I went.


This car has seen about 5 used transmissions. The original one was smoked too, so I replaced that with a used one. When Transmission#4 went kaboom like the pieices of it below I decided to screw it and rebuild the transmission myself with the help of a friend. That transmission is still alive today...in another car...


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So after the used 350 went kaboom, it was time to get into something better. So I talked to a few people and found a recently wrecked 96' Buick Roadmaster. Said road master had the LT1 out of the corvette mostly, cept for iron heads and a smaller cam as compared with the vette. But still had a decent 260hp factory rating. So I added my Hooker headers, and a cold air intake. Then I used my computer and tuned the PCM up eliminating stupid emissions the car didn't need anymore, and cleaning up the wiring.

Results? Instead of making 260hp, the calculators say its now making 320hp. Since the car had been sitting so long, and especially since it sat under an oak tree the nearly 20yr old paint at the the time was shot kaput. GONE! This is what it looked like the day I took it home after getting the LT1 running. Looking at this picture makes me want to gouge my eyes out.




Not even a power washer could save the paint that was still there.





So I sayd F%*$ THAT! and swapped the panels, sanded it down, and painted it all myself. Forgot the camera on "paint" day, but I have pics of all of the body panel work and bodywork stuff. I ended up replacing the nose, fenders, doors, and hood with better panels from other cars.

The Defects:





The Body Panels:







Finally Paint Prep and body work!













Finally paint!






Ground Effects reattached.




Finally after 6 months my reproduction GTA badges arrived. The molds were destroyed and these badges had to be recreated from scratch. So it was a long wait, but so worth it. It now looks like a TransAm GTA again.


Drilling a hole in my bumper that didn't have a hole........




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Time to enjoy driving it! Turn your speakers up!




And my fastest run to date on crappy hard street tires that are nearly 10 years old I think. Got'm for free.


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But wait! There's MORE!!!! [Devil's Grin] Since i can't leave ANYTHING stock. And I feel the need for speed, I recently had a friend who's got his own speed business port some heads for me. I also bought and rebuilt a 6spd T56 transmission with a close ratio gear set. Estimated future output is about 420rwhp to 450rwhp naturally aspriated and built to handle a 250hp shot of nitrous. The nitrous won't come into play for a long while as the stock 10bolt rear simply can't deal with the torque. Heck, it may not even play nice with the engine naturally aspirated.

The heads flowed 297cfm on the intake with a 1.94" valves, and 212cfm on the exhaust with a 1.5" valve @ .600 lift. They are matched to a 1205 gasket.




The intake was ported as well with bell-mouthed entry to the runners, and the ports were also matched to a 1205 gasket. The intake fins were polished after I had the intake powder coated Arrest me Red.



The throttle body was bored and radius'd to 52mm from the stock 48mm.




I've got a 226/232 @.050" duration camshaft with .574" lift on a 110* lobe separation angle. The engine is at a local machine shop now for new bearings, ARP hardware throughout, and forged pistons. Compression has been bumped from 10.3:1 to 10.7:1 to make up for the decreased dynamic compression ratio on the new cam. This will still be a pump gas friendly engine capable of nearly 30mpg highway with the 6spd and 3.42 gears.


So congrats, if you read it all. Perhaps one day next year I'll drive this car out there for a parade so I can enjoy the cruise out in the car, and play with the R.Cs.

[thirdgen89gta]

Well, I yanked the 4spd auto trans about 2 weeks ago for the rebuilt 6spd manual T56 transmission i've had ready for install. I had it about 2 years like that, just waiting on time/parts to get all together.

The car is now a 6spd manual LT1 making 320hp with stock heads/cam/intake, aka bolt-ons only. The 6spd totally transformed the car's handling. Its so much more predictable now than it was before.

I also swapped from a set of 16x8" Kuhmo Ecsta Supra's to my 17x9" ZR1 rims wrapped in Nitto NT05 rubber.

The car is a completely different animal now. No matter what you want, its happy to do it. Wanna punch it and go like a bat out of hell? Its gone.

Wanna whip it through a series of S curves and it'll stick like velcro, the tires never want to let go.

The combination of the 6spd manual and the tires together makes for a power transformation in handling ability. The car has gone from a point and shoot Go button to a precision scalpel.

I had a chance to have the on the famous Road America last weekend. It was an awesome experience. All the squeeks, rattles, and nit picks i have with the car just fell away once I went on track at throttle.

The only picture I've found that explains the difference in the way the car makes me feel is this:


Before / After the ZR1 rims.







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Pics on track at Road America.