Intro:
The 1999 Pontiac Grand Prix was picked up from the dealer on Oct 6, 1998. It was bought as a 12,000 mile 3 year lease and cost 359/month or 381 with taxes.
The First Race:
The fist time at the track about a year after I got the car I went best of 14.58 with the car stock on a 50 deg day; this was before I learned about the headlight removal. For my 1st mods I removed the engine cover, bought a K&N, installed a 3.5" pulley and next spring this put me to 14.25. Then I replaced the Ubend and res with 3" straight pipe this gave me another tenth or so 14.12 best. Next I gutted the air box and put on some 225/60/16 Bridgestone RE730’s. With a 2.01 60' I now had run a 13.98 best. From there I put on new rims/tires 17" and did some more minor motor things like a 160 Tstat and stuff. Then I was running 14.0's turned out the 55lb wheels were too heavy to see 13’s anymore, so I put on a 3.25" pulley and this mod alone got me a best of 13.76 last fall on a cold day. It was once that I started using this 3.25" pulley that I started using race gas and unknowingly started using ‘the PCM learning secret’. It was also last year that I put in a NOS kit and used a 70 shot to run 13.18@107.4.
The Mods:
13.76 was my best last year. Over the winter I sold my heavy rims, got a DUB setup, started working on my TB, dremeled out a little bit of my SC, did the downpipe (custom 3"), went with 2 1/2" exhaust from cat to the factory mufflers, got my brake rotors turned and scraped the rust from their insides, put in a shift kit, took off the SC and intake, matched the gaskets, trimmed the TB gasket, replaced the factory belt with a Gatorback, changed the plugs to one colder (TR55’s), wrapped my exhaust manifolds, did the work on the factory manifolds as found in the services section, put on poly bushings, installed RAT lowering springs, Buick STB’s, put in 5 point racing harnesses, removed the weather strip from the back of the engine comp, did a little more air box work including building a ram air setup out of a broken headlight, bought a Meijer battery (10lbs lighter), removed some brackets from the engine (saved 2lbs), put on water pump and alternator under drive pulleys, replaced some of my coolant with water, installed a home made fan switch that works like Caspers, switched my front mids from Boston to MB Quart to save 2lbs and did some other small stuff. These mods are what I’m referring to when I say ‘personal touches’. Sorry to disappoint those who thought I had some super secret 50 hp cheater mod but the stuff above is all there is.
Traction Problems:
With all the work I had done over the winter I thought sure I would be way faster. Then I went to the track with stock rims/tires and ran a 13.7x, same as last year! That was with the same 3.25" pulley but now with stock rims and tires. The temps were a little higher than at the track last year accounting somewhat for the same time. What I discovered that day is that mods don't always make your car faster sometimes they just set you up for a different mod and running the same time in warmer weather with taller harder tires was a good accomplishment. Traction problems turned out to be a huge issue costing me a tenth or two. And even though the factory wheels were much lighter than last years they are also 26.6" tall and my 17's were about 1/2" shorter giving me more gearing so I was losing mph with the factories. So next time at the track I bolted on a pair of Brent's RE730's in stock size and put on my 3.1" pulley. I ran a best of 13.53 with the increased boost and traction.
Throttle Body Work:
From 13.53 I knew I had a lot left because I still had work left to do on the TB and I was getting in some new tires. I also figured a run with the 3.0" pulley would give me some more boost. So I got a set of Nitto DR's on the front of my new Konig villains and went to the track with them and a little more TB work, including some modifications to the MAF. That day at the track was better than the previous as we now had a tailwind instead of a headwind. I ran a best of 13.29 that day, just over 2 tenths better than my previous best. This was also about the time that I made a new PB NOS pass of 12.72@111.84
Next time at the track I took out the NOS bottle to save weight, cleaned the car, and did a little more air box work. It was a cool day and I ran 13.25, 13.24, and 2- 13.23's. Nice runs but a long way from the 12's that I needed.
False Readings/Lessons Learned:
Next time at the track was a fiasco. I had installed Intense rocker arms, put in a new PCM with no CASE learn, switched to 5w30 synthetic oil, replaced my SC with a non ported one, put back on my stock alternator pulley and got a pair of slicks. It was 80+ deg outside and 1st pass I used the DR's and ripped off a 13.09. Turns out the car was still a 13.2X car but with a competition event they had glued the track and that 1st pass I got a 1.81 60'. The rest of the day I ran 13.2x's except when I used the NOS. I am still happy with this though because it was 80 degrees and I think that the new PCM was slowing me down. Turns out that I also am not really gaining from the slicks. When I run them my 60’ is a tenth faster than my DR’s but my mph is also lower by about 1.5 so my times still stay in the low 13.2s. I can only figure that this is due to the slightly taller tire and loss in gearing because the slicks are actually a little lighter than the DR’s. I know that with some tuning I’ll run better than 13.2’s consistently, if nothing else just from the Intense rockers. I know that these are good for a least a tenth so that alone should put me consistently in the 13.1x’s. Not to mention that I have a new pulley for my DUB just a little smaller than the 3.0 so I’ll have a hair more boost as well.
At the MIGPC meeting in Lapeer I learned a few things. One was the limitation of race gas. I was getting 4-5 degrees of KR with the 3.0" pulley on. So I guess it’s back to the research to eliminate that. I didn’t run any impressive times either but I think that was due to misfiring bad enough to set an SES light, temps being almost 90 degrees and mainly my DUB hub slipping and causing my SC to leak oil. My problems got so bad that I had to drive home with the SC belt disconnected.
Burned Out Spark Plug:
The next time I went to work on the car I found that the #3 spark plug had the arch totally melted off.
Oops, must have been the NOS but it still left me wondering. I replaced all the plugs and still had a #4 misfire at idle. I replaced the wire and it was still there. Since it’s only at idle I’m not going to worry about it too much right now. Another problem that I was having was low boost or so I thought. My SC snout had a bad seal and it was spraying oil all over. I replaced the whole SC with a stock one.
On my way to the track July 4th just after replacing the charger I was getting 5lbs of boost at WOT. When I got to Stanton Brent used his pulley tool to install my DUB hub. Even though I now have a case learned PCM and a new 2.86" Dub pulley I went to the track that today not expecting much because I have been having so many problems. After my 1st pass of 13.44 @82mph (yeah I got in the brakes pretty hard no helmet) I knew I was going to be ok. I made 2 full non-NOS passes, one with DR’s one with slicks and on the one with slicks set my new PB of 13.05 @105.34mph. Next I went to make a NOS pass and it didn’t work. The car shook and misfired. Later on I found out the problem: My rubber T vacuum fitting that connects to the intake was split and my NOS kit had no way of raising fuel pressure with the leak. Scary huh? Now I’m wondering how long this was split and if it’s the reason that I thought I had low boost. It was because of this problem that I changed the whole vacuum hose deal and you can read about this in the free mod section or purchase the setup in the product section.
Even though I did a lot of things between July 4th and Sept 21 most of them were just for fun and the majority of my time went into the ’97. Having to give the car back Oct 5th I really wanted 12’s. So I put on the alternator UD pulley, installed a ZZP polished blower and by now had a final version of the ZZP TB on the car. I also put back on the stock springs in preparations to give the car back. With the only track option being Norwalk 4 hrs away we took the car to the track for it’s final day of racing. After we drove 4hrs, bolted on some slicks, dumped in some race gas, changed the pulley it was time to race. We got in 3 runs and only the 1st and 3rd were good. The 1st was a 13.12 because the pcm hadn’t learned about the race gas yet as posted in the free mod section. The 2nd was a 14.xx (don’t ask) and the final run was a 12.94 @ 105.00. It was with this run that I retire the car as accomplishing every goal I ever set out to do. If I had the opportunity to race again I would do the race gas PCM learn and I’m sure that with this and a good 60’ the car would run low 12.8’s
Upon calling the dealer and finding out my lease was not due to return until Friday I took the car to the track on Wed and made some final runs. I set a new personal best NOS time of 12.61.
