After what seemed like the longest winter ever, my Camaro has returned home. I would have loved to have had it here all winter, as I would have been able to knock out a lot of these little projects that need fixing. Though the alternative would have been parking my 89 Formula on the street, scraping snow and ice off windows, and sliding into a bitter cold car each day fighting off frost bite enroute to work. No thanks, I'll take parking in a garage every time.
Now, I wasn't about to simply load my car on the trailer and call it a day. My parents are surrounding by woods and corn fields, so breaking down on a back road down there is nothing like being stranded in Detroit along a freeway or rough neighborhood. That said, I fired the beast up and told dad "I'll be back in a bit, I'll call if/when I get stranded." In the back of my mind, I honestly expected to be making that phone call...and of course, I did.
Luckily, I had to make that call because I stopped by a friend's house, who wasn't home, and my battery simply didn't have the charge to crank the engine once stalled. The carb still has some serious idle issues, which is causing an overly rich condition. Cruising down the road, I dropped the hammer a few times...ok, actually only dropped the hammer about 1/2 throttle, but oh my God, this car is more hellacious than I remembered!
700 hp is like nothing you've ever experienced. As it is, with some 275 radial cheapos, you can roast the tires at any speed. While extreme acceleration is still there, I can't even begin to comprehend the kind of g-force this car is going to pull with a beefed up rear and sticky set of tires. Two wheeled launches are practically a given.
I've crossed the line. My car is loud, gets about 6 mpg highway...on a good day, is a real pain in the ass to get in and out of, it will rattle your fillings out, and the engine looks as though it will require constant maintenance to keep it cruising. I had, for a short minute, questioned whether or not I made the right decision last fall, when I realized just how far I had pushed the envelope. Today, those concerns disappeared. The 69 Camaro is by far the most popular muscle car built, and because of that, the market seems saturated with them, and you really have to do something to make the car stand out in a crowd. When I come rumbling down the boulevard, you don't notice its a 69 Camaro, the engine takes center stage, and even the purist of brand loyalists can appreciate that.
So now that she's home, the laundry list of things to fix seems longer than ever, but we'll dig into that in the coming weeks. Let's take a step back to earlier today. I had hoped to drive my car back up, since I drove it down to my parents last October. One problem, just prior to parking her last fall, I took it down the road for one last blast. While out, something seemed to have went wrong, as she began to stumble at idle, and stumble again as I limped back to my parents garage. Not sure what caused the problem, but it's still present, and seems to be causing an extremely rich at idle condition. With Emma Sue, just over 5 months old, there was no way I was going to find the time to make the 1.5 hr drive down to my parents and figure out the issues in a timely manner, so, I bit the bullet and rented a trailer and brought her up.
Now, I wasn't about to simply load my car on the trailer and call it a day. My parents are surrounding by woods and corn fields, so breaking down on a back road down there is nothing like being stranded in Detroit along a freeway or rough neighborhood. That said, I fired the beast up and told dad "I'll be back in a bit, I'll call if/when I get stranded." In the back of my mind, I honestly expected to be making that phone call...and of course, I did.
Luckily, I had to make that call because I stopped by a friend's house, who wasn't home, and my battery simply didn't have the charge to crank the engine once stalled. The carb still has some serious idle issues, which is causing an overly rich condition. Cruising down the road, I dropped the hammer a few times...ok, actually only dropped the hammer about 1/2 throttle, but oh my God, this car is more hellacious than I remembered!
700 hp is like nothing you've ever experienced. As it is, with some 275 radial cheapos, you can roast the tires at any speed. While extreme acceleration is still there, I can't even begin to comprehend the kind of g-force this car is going to pull with a beefed up rear and sticky set of tires. Two wheeled launches are practically a given.
I've crossed the line. My car is loud, gets about 6 mpg highway...on a good day, is a real pain in the ass to get in and out of, it will rattle your fillings out, and the engine looks as though it will require constant maintenance to keep it cruising. I had, for a short minute, questioned whether or not I made the right decision last fall, when I realized just how far I had pushed the envelope. Today, those concerns disappeared. The 69 Camaro is by far the most popular muscle car built, and because of that, the market seems saturated with them, and you really have to do something to make the car stand out in a crowd. When I come rumbling down the boulevard, you don't notice its a 69 Camaro, the engine takes center stage, and even the purist of brand loyalists can appreciate that.
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