Cas' 800+ or Bust Build

TL;DR Don't let your car sit for too long without driving it. Especially one that's almost 50 years old.

Well Black Friday deals are gone and I couldn't order any parts for the Mazda because stuff keeps breaking on the Camaro. A little run down of everything that I've replaced since I picked it up. First week replaced the alternator, had battery issues all week and the battery wasn't charging. Basically right after that I'm driving down the road and progressively my steering is getting worse. I'm trying to drive straight but the car keeps moving left and right depending on the bumps in the road. Well later that same week I kept hearing a lot of road noise when turning. Sure enough the tires had rubbed all the way to the wear bars on practically new tires. Get an alignment done and two new front tires. Not even a week later it starts to sway back and forth again. The guy that did the alignment said the front end needed to be rebuilt but I figured it would last a little bit longer. So I ordered a complete rebuild kit last week and saved a mere 20 dollars from a 5% discount because the 25% discount that they offered for orders over 350 didn't apply to my parts, yay me. Yesterday I'm leaving for class and wouldn't you know my brake pedal hits the floor. I had just enough fluid in the back reservoir to get it back home after class. I bought a new master cylinder today and replaced that with the help of a new friend that I met on Ohio Mazdaspeeds. Went to crank the car and battery was dead so I bought a new battery today. At this point I'm not sure my car luck can get any worse (knock on wood). I really wanted to take advantage of Treadstone's 25% off and order my TR1045 but that'll have to wait considering I've spent over 1000 bucks on this car since I got it a month ago. I was just about to start catching up money wise and I got hit with a ton a bricks with all this shit that keeps happening. I'm sure I'll get "Well what did you expect on a car that old?". The car ran fine when my dad drove it around town but the ~1700 miles that I've put on it has made all the issues rear their ugly head.

On the bright side of things, Anthony from 16w Fabworks is letting me beta test his Intake Manifold for R&D purposes!
 
It's a Chevy. An old chevy, of course crap is going to break on it. So long as the carb or trans don't shit the bed, you'll be fine.

Didn't the guys from Relentless Customs have an intake manifold from them?
 
Mauro_Penguin said:
It's a Chevy. An old chevy, of course crap is going to break on it. So long as the carb or trans don't shit the bed, you'll be fine.

Didn't the guys from Relentless Customs have an intake manifold from them?
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Haha it's more that it's been happening back to back. I guess you're a Ford guy;)

Yes they did but Javier had some family issues that came up so his car was put on hold. Not exactly sure for how long he was planning on putting the car off. I was hoping that they would of been done with testing by the time my motor was built but they weren't so that's why I contacted Anthony. I was just happy he even entertained my idea and we worked it out. I plan on having @AYOUSTIN perform a bench flow test like he did with all the other IMs in another thread on here just to have comparison data. Anthony is confident that his IM will out perform all the other IMs on the market currently, so that's exciting to me.
 
CMajor said:
Haha it's more that it's been happening back to back. I guess you're a Ford guy;)

Yes they did but Javier had some family issues that came up so his car was put on hold. Not exactly sure for how long he was planning on putting the car off. I was hoping that they would of been done with testing by the time my motor was built but they weren't so that's why I contacted Anthony. I was just happy he even entertained my idea and we worked it out. I plan on having @AYOUSTIN perform a bench flow test like he did with all the other IMs in another thread on here just to have comparison data. Anthony is confident that his IM will out perform all the other IMs on the market currently, so that's exciting to me.
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Sucks to hear, I have been out of touch with those guys since I moved 6 months ago.

And yes, very astute observation. I am a Ford guy with regard to EFI, but I am a fan of any carb domestic muscle. All those old domestics breakdown, but at least they have enough room under the hood to fix them easy. Mopar is the worst because of all the particular parts that changed every few years.
 
Mauro_Penguin said:
Sucks to hear, I have been out of touch with those guys since I moved 6 months ago.

And yes, very astute observation. I am a Ford guy with regard to EFI, but I am a fan of any carb domestic muscle. All those old domestics breakdown, but at least they have enough room under the hood to fix them easy. Mopar is the worst because of all the particular parts that changed every few years.
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Yeah I was really looking forward to seeing Javier's car in action. I saw a start up video on Instagram, it sounded and looked amazing.

This is the only old car that I have worked on and I am very glad, like you said, that they have plenty of room to work. It was a breeze to fix pretty much everything. I didn't even have to jack the car up to bleed the brakes.
 
Muscle cars suck. For real, you need a better backup car than that thing. Look around for used 90's or early 2000's Civics or Corollas (except 98-2002 Corollas) or something along those lines with a 5-speed. You can probably get a good, clean example for around $1500 or maybe even a little less.
 
I vote to get yourself a Miata for a daily! That's what I did after ZZB and I love that thing.

In regards to the 16w intake manifold, I am very excited to not only see that thing under your hood, but also to see how it flows. I wonder how similar in design it is to the JMF i.e. plenum size, runner length, etc.. and how it'll compare in tuning/drivability.

Do you have any plans for what you'll do to the head yet?
 
VTMongoose said:
Muscle cars suck. For real, you need a better backup car than that thing. Look around for used 90's or early 2000's Civics or Corollas (except 98-2002 Corollas) or something along those lines with a 5-speed. You can probably get a good, clean example for around $1500 or maybe even a little less.
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I've been contemplating getting another car, I'm determined to fix this Camaro though haha.
alexwlwsn said:
I vote to get yourself a Miata for a daily! That's what I did after ZZB and I love that thing.

In regards to the 16w intake manifold, I am very excited to not only see that thing under your hood, but also to see how it flows. I wonder how similar in design it is to the JMF i.e. plenum size, runner length, etc.. and how it'll compare in tuning/drivability.

Do you have any plans for what you'll do to the head yet?
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I was actually just thinking about a miata since I'm sure I could find one dirt cheap. Yeah I'm pumped for the IM for sure! I imagine it's better in all aspects (hopefully) haha. The plenum looks a little smaller than the JMF so that should help with my AFRs jumping around when coming to a stop if my theory about that is correct. The plan is to pay him mid-December then he'll order all of the parts to get it made. For the head I haven't set anything in stone yet. I know I'm upgrading the valve springs but I may start with a stock head and then port it later since that's not really essential to getting to car running. Kinda depends on the money situation when I get to that point or if I can give @Realgib3 enough beer to hand port it, that would be cool too. Obviously he can't be drunk and doing that at the same time though ;)
 
My AFRs jump when coming to a stop and all I have is a ported stock manifold. As far as I'm aware it's normal.
 
Why would an intake manifold cause AFR's to jump when the AFR is measured past the collector on the exhaust side?
 
Some AFR hunting is normal when driving, then going to idle, such as coming to a stop. My stock block has done this ever since I bought an AP 4 years ago. It's an ECU feedback/checking mechanism to ensure proper O2 sensor function. It should have nothing to do with IM porting, AFAIK. Otherwise Mazda ported my IM before sending it to the original dealership ;)


Sent from a BNR'd CBM Pu
 
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Gotcha well I wasn't 100% sure, this is just coming from what I've discussed with some people. When I was searching for answers Sean Strout said that it's most likely the plenum being so large that it acts like a vacuum leak. That's where I heard it and it sounded like a reasonable explanation to me so I stopped worrying about it. It affected drivability for the longest time when I had an actual vacuum leak in the PCV line but once I fixed that, it became "normal". Honestly this AFR thing could of been happening before I went BT, it's just one of those things that I noticed later on when I started become attentive to AP parameters. I got a little more than an hour of sleep so hopefully that makes sense.
 
Yeah, have had the 6266 since June/July. Just now picking up the remaining parts I still needed and getting the EM ceramic coated. Only things left at this point are ptfe fuel lines, under route piping, wire tuck, dump tube, and dyno rental.
 
@iguardflorida requested some pics of the Camaro and I didn't want to jack his thread so incoming pics. The last pic was this past weekend. Thanks to some local NATOR guys. I was able to get my suspension and electrical stuff all sorted out. I got an alignment today and it all seems solid. I'm relieved that I don't have to worry about it dying on me anymore randomly at a stop light.
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Sho said:
Man, that thing is pretty. Don't bring it to the meet up north this weekend, tho lol
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Yeah I figured as much based on the weather down here:/. I'll probably just car pool with Jeremy. Plus I don't want to take the chance that it might break down then I'd be SOL.
 
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