sneaky98gt
10 Year Member
I'm realistic man. I know the difference between the objective stuff and the subjective stuff. For me, that doesn't make it a better car. A fox body is my dream car. Specifically, the completion of my next project is my dream car. Isn't it always? A fox was my first car as a 15 year-old. It was a car my father and I shared, and a car that my step father and I worked on together. It's a car I know every nut and bolt on. It's been customized a couple of times the way I wanted to do it. It's been both the source of amazing fun and accomplishment, and also the source of frustration/anger/disappointment. It's skull drug some guys so bad that after they stopped talking ****, they came over and searched the car because they were convinced a 302 couldn't do what it just had. It's been both overestimated and underestimated, and it represents a phase of my life. I don't care how stupid that may seem to anyone. It's nice to really want what you have. It's in-between project phases at the moment, but when I drove it around, it got all kinds of attention all the time. Attention I'm not used to in my Corvette, or in some of the older classics that my father had. I've had my tracking days, and now I'm more oriented towards straight-line stuff. Fox bodies had a well-known reputation as a fast street car, but now that reputation has passed. The older guys know they're a box of chocolates, but the younger street scene guys that don't spend a lot of time at a dragstrip never saw them as real performance cars. That's all fine with me because I like being underestimated, though now my car is so loud now that everyone knows what's up once it's running. Is it 1/2 the car that the new ones are? No... To me it's 100 times what the new ones are.
So, a guy asks what it will take to make his car faster than a new one, I assume that to them it may be what mine is to me. NVH, compliance, comfort, ride, touch screens, built in espresso makers & scrotom-massagers don't make a car better. There is actually an appeal to simplicity, and driving without traction control, ABS, active handling, launch control, etc... Frankly, I want my car to be harsh, and at least somewhat noisy. I want it to vibrate a little at idle to let people know it probably ain't a pushover.
I hear ya, man. My 98 is the car I've had since I was 15 as well, and I completely understand the passion that goes into these older cars' performance.
And I know what you mean about wanting a car that you can still feel and hear a bit. It's the reason that I still want an 03/04 Cobra one day, and not a new Coyote, even though the two are similar in price and the Coyote does nearly everything better.
Yeah, wow. Actually, your car is every bit as quick and traps as high in a straight line as my old twin-turbo combo (a small incon kit on a mild 302), which is surprising considering the considerable power difference. I'll chalk that up to your Auto not really putting all of the power it can through the dyno rollers. I'll bet you've surprised the **** outta some people with that thing. I'm glad to see that you do take pride in it, too
It actually runs quicker than that now. Last track trip was 11.9s at 121 (that was the first trip with non-stock gears [3.73s]). And since them, the blower has been ported and I'm running about 2 more pounds of boost. Just haven't been able to get back to the track in this hot weather.
And yes, it's a TON of fun to surprise the out of folks at the track with it.