My 87 GN. cruise, air, 10.55 ET, 21 mpg.

I get asked about my car quite a bit and figured that I'd try and put all the details in one place. First off, Here's the car.











Most popular questions I get are:

What wax do you use?
What's your combo?
Where did you get that paint, alternator, crazy intercooler, wheels, turbo shield, etc.
How did your 6 banger Montie just smoke my $200,000.00 exotic?

First off.

The paint.
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It's a 13 year old single stage acrylic enamel (No clear coat). It's soft stuff and not recomended for a daily driver. I've got over 160 hours into color sanding and buffing it out to look like this. Color sanding was mostly done with 1500 grit. Then Meguiar's #85 (danger/not for beginners) and a wool pad. Finished with 3M #39009 (great stuff) swirl remover, on a very soft, Meguiar's #9000 pad. This was done at night time, under fluorecent lights. At this point, it's as flat and shiney as it's going to get. The wax should not make it look any different. It's just there to protect it. I only wash the car about once or twice a year. After driving it, I use a CA car duster, Lucas car detailer and a micro fiber towel. I cover it with a thin cotton car cover that I can throw in the washer twice a year.

Where did you get that alternator?
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http://www.turbobuick.com/forums/fa...on/336588-my-30-00-billet-ish-alternator.html




My boost activated, drop-down, V4 intercooler
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http://www.turbobuick.com/forums/fabrication-no-solicitation/305569-how-maximize-your-slic.html




My one off, Aluminum GN wheels.
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http://www.turbobuick.com/forums/br...eels/320013-first-ever-alum-gn-rims-pics.html




Got Morel to make lifters for our engines.
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http://www.turbobuick.com/forums/en...d-roller-lifters-other-than-clicky-comps.html

Page #2 to follow

Page #2

My one off turbo shield.
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http://www.turbobuick.com/forums/fa...n/305748-my-custom-aluminun-turbo-shield.html



My one piece rear bumper fillers, and smoothed steel bumpers
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See post #8 http://www.turbobuick.com/forums/sh...air/299465-bumper-fillers-abs-fiberglass.html






How do you fit a big tire under a lowered car, without notching the frame? Also, make it ride nice, handle good, and do 1.39 60' times?
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The stance.
My car has 1" lower, Eibach springs at all four corners. Stock size wheels and tires up front. Back wheels are 8" wide with a 4 1/8" Back space. Covered with a (28" tall) 275/60/15 MT DR. This 28" tall tire brings the rear of the car back up to stock height with a big tire tucked inside. Also, gives the car a very slight rake.



Most people who try this combo have rubbing issues (with their tires). I did at first. Found out that my differential was offset to one side about half an inch from the factory. This is very common. The fix was to get Metco billet adjustable upper control arms to center the rear end under the car. This also allows you to set your pinion angle. I'll have to check my notes, but I think I've got mine set to about three degrees down. My lower control arms are from HR. I did have to grind about 1/8" off the inside of my fender lips, so as not to rub when I have a car full of people and hit a big bump. Left air bag has 10 psi. Right has 12. Bilstein shocks at all four corners. For track duty, I install cheap Comp 90/10 shocks up front, and loose the sway bar. Drag radials are run at 21 psi for street and track. This thing does 1.4x- 1.5x short times all day long on a good track. Here's it's best at Fontana last year. This was leaving off the trans brake at 20 psi.

1.39 short time.

spoolfool at Fontana - YouTube



One thing that I've done that's a bit out of the box, is that I run a 3.73 gear out back. Most gurus will say that I'm throwing away lots of performance and gas milage by doing this. On most other cars, I would agree. However, With my 28" tall tire out back, this makes the final gear ratio only about 10% lower than stock. This lower gear also alows me to run a tighter converter (2800 @ 0 boost) and still spool the turbo just fine. I run an older Art Carr 9" non lock up billet converter. I tryed one of his newer converters and wasn't very impressed. If i have to replace it, I'll probably get one of Dusty's. I leave off the trans brake with 4200 rpms @ 15 lbs of boost. slippage is only 5% at the big end. Engine is at 2300 rpms cruising at 70 mph. It gets 21 mpg. After some dyno pulls with Cal Hartline yesterday, we took it out for a cruise. Cal's comment was that "It drove just like a stocker." (other than the 500 HP at the wheels on pump gas and alky).

Happy spooling.
Mike Barnard

Very nice. can see you think outside the box!

The Fool jumps out of the box.............Just beautiful, Mike

I like the attention to detail. Nice job

very very nice!

great stuff dude

what did you do to black out ur lower marker lights? what kind of paint?

WOW
I hope my paint looks that nice when it gets done!!

Bryan

It's a grey plexi cover. I got it about ten years ago at a BGNRA show.

Thanks guys. There's lots more cool stuff on this car, but that's all I could think of at the time.

If you look at the photo above of my licence plate, you can see that it's bumpers are also the valve stems for the airbags.

Here's a show that was done a while ago that has me and my car in it. It shows me running tens with the stock heavy GN steel wheels.

A Tribute to Turbocharged Buicks - YouTube

Mike Barnard

gorgeous car

Hi
I would just like to know if your best ET with the 1.39 60ft (10.55 at 123) was with a 12lbs launch or a 20lbs. By the way your car looks great and runs great as well.
Thanks,
Marco

T-Top 86 Grand Nationals (63000km) 109 block with weisco forged pistons and 2 billet center main caps, M&A aluminum heads, roller rockers, port match lower intake ,te63 a.r .82, erson 214/214 cam, razor alky injection, 94 octane, hooker cat back with dyno max ultra flow muffers, kenne bell headers, 60 lbs injectors, extender alky chip with 21/19 timing, with a gen 2 with a LS1 maf,thdp, mease 24 row IC, PTC 3200 stall 9 1/2 convertor, Ron Custom max boost brake module, MT drag radials (275/60/15) , rjc power plate, rjc boost controller, zeitronix wideband, HRmotor mounts, Weld Drag Lites with skinnies up front, electric exhaust, hr rear sway bar, no front sway bar, 90/10 lakewood in the front and 50/50 lakewood shocks in the rear with energy suspension poly bushings all over, boxed rear lower control arms, Big mouth cold air with an AFE air filter.
(New weber stroker 245 ci, dbb pt67/76 turbo, and double pumper) No times yet cause I stripped the splines in the torque convertor on my first pass, hopefully next year.

BEST E/T= Exhaust closed
60FT=1.48 (foot brake on 4 lbs of boost)
1/8= 6.65 at 100 mph
1/4= 10.83
MPH=105.2 (letting off the gas, car was running to lean)

Beutiful car.

Marco,
On that 10.55 @123 run with the 1.39 short time, I didn't get any data. Kinda funny, but when I launched, my glove box popped open. All the tools, pens, loose change, and crap flew out, landed on my laptop keyboard that I had sitting open on the seat next to me. All this stuff was just dancing around on the keyboard while I was making the run. I knew that I was on a good run and didn't want to back out. When I got to the end, It showed no data. I would guess that I left with at least 18 lbs of boost off the trans brake. The car should have been at about 23 lbs of boost at WOT. My scanmaster showed some (False) KR threw the run. I unplugged the knock sensor for the next run. It spun the tires bad out of the hole, but ran 126 mph out the back. Still no data working, so I decided not to keep flying blind, and called it a day.
Mike B.

Going Fast with Class.......................

Love this car

Just made Budnik's car of the month for Mar 12.

Click on "cool rides"
http://www.budnik.com/

Mike Barnard

Beautiful!