Phantasm Street Wars, 7/17/11

Proof, if you needed it, that amateur drag racers are a determined bunch:  They'll race even if the timing equipment is off.  It's the mentality of "I drove all the way here, I wrenched on this car all night, and I'll be damned if I'm going to let an electronic malfunction keep me from banging off redline shifts down the quarter mile."  Even though drag racing without a timeslip is a lot like TV without the remote, coffee without the caffeine, or a Rick Astley music video on mute.

Which is what happened for the first four hours and change of this month's Street Wars at Rockingham Dragway, sponsored by Phantasm Motorsports.  Phantasm is a local import performance shop that's been tuning cars since the late 90's, and now they're a major playor in the motorsports field.  They sponsor a number of these Street Wars (mainly aimed at imports) a year, and it's always a great opportunity to run whatever you want down the track - or watch other people run down the track, if you have an Accord.  (sigh.)

I'll be honest, I drove all the way out to Rockingham to watch one car in particular run: this unassuming little Civic (EG) hatchback.  As a point of reference, the last time I saw it at the track, it was running between 15.9-16.1 seconds at around 87mph.  Not too impressive.

"LMR" stands for Last Minute Racing, and it's fairly apt: this car had it's engine installed and tuned two days before this event, and snapped an axle the night before.  Rather than saying "%!#^ it" and just going to spectate, Ian Rafferty (the owner of this car) replaced the axle at 4 in the morning, and still got to the track, sorted out a shift linkage issue, and put down some times.

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YYXGmdAGx7Y

That's a 12.8 second quarter mile at 107mph - a fairly low trap speed for that fast of an ET.  Watch how fast this thing gets out of the hole; I'd imagine most passengers lose their lunch.  The question is: how do you make a Honda Civic run the quarter that fast without any boost or nitrous?  (Yes, this car is all motor.)

Answer: not any magic.  It's a hybrid motor, referred to by Honda enthusiasts as a B20 VTEC.  It's the large-displacement 2.0L B-series block from a first-generation CR-V with a GS-R (B18C1) cylinder head, extremely high compression pistons (14.1:1!), and a very short final drive ratio.  This car isn't done yet; low 12's or high 11's are a distinct possibility.

This is under the hood of a most unusual Chevrolet Cobalt SS.  This motor started out life with an Eaton supercharger strapped to the intake manifold; it later had a larger, upgraded Harrop TVS (twin vortices) supercharger in place of the original.  It now sports a ZZP turbo setup instead of a belt-driven supercharger, because the owner wasn't fully satisfied with the performance of the car, even with the larger blower attached.

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aueVKvfI-6c

The car hasn't been on a dyno yet, as it's only had a preliminary tune done, but the owner - Thomas Gibbens - estimates the car is already making more than 400 horsepower at the wheels.  Riding shotgun, when the turbo spools and the tires actually grip, it certainly feels like at least 400whp.  This in-car footage is pretty revealing: it's against a Hyundai Genesis Coupe 3.8L (6-speed) that has an intake, headers, exhaust, and a tune.  It pulls out a noticeable lead through first and second gear.  You'll notice he gets on the gas briefly in second, then lets off because of wheelspin.  Then gets on it in third, lets off because of wheelspin, and finally the tires hook and he goes rocketing past the Genesis in the left lane.  It's a fun ride, for sure.  Side note: this car was also tuned by Matt Welliver, who's Cobalt SS Turbo I've featured on this site previously.

Another one for the loony bin: these two Hayabusa riders were running down the track all day long, putting up times in the high 9's and low 10's.  This green and black one almost had a moment; during a launch the front wheel popped off the ground (despite a stretched swingarm to avoid that), and the suspension compressed so hard the rear license plate and light hit the rear tire and popped off.

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ViJ1MbRGxGI

Seeing a fast car blow up once is always sad.  Seeing a fast car blow up multiple times is just depressing.  I've seen this Evo - supposedly a nearly 900whp, 9-second car - run down the track on three separate occasions.  It's blown up on two of them.  During this run it apparently blew it's transfer case; the track was shut down for a few minutes while the staff cleaned up the mess.

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_0BenmxKyg

The silver SRT-4 in the left lane holds the record for the fastest SRT-4 in the quarter with a stock bottom end.  Even better: despite the drag slicks in the front and skinnies in the back, this is actually a street car.

There were plenty of interesting things to see walking through the pits.  How about this 1992 Nissan Skyline (R32) GT-T sedan in RHD?  Not something you see every day in this country.  Or, uh, ever.

Here it is from the back side.  I love the mild fender flares that R32 sedans have.  Not quite as aggressive as R32 GT-R's, but just imagine if they'd sold this here instead of the Maxima in the early 90's!

Look, I'm all for customizing a car to suite your needs and tastes, but there's no denying that a DC2 Integra front end looks absolutely awful on an EG hatchback.  It's not like a Jolf or a Getta; an Integra is wider than a Civic, so you end up with that "does your front clip have elephantiasis?" appearance.  To each their own.

Integra front ends belong on Integras.  This LS belongs to Julienne Hardy-Turner; it had a set of Mini Cooper S wheels on it until recently.

On 100+ degree days, one of the biggest enemies of fast ET's is heat.  People were actually complaining that the staging lines were level, not downhill, so they had to run their engines while they waited to get to the tree, causing intake temps to rise - meaning less power.  The solution to this is decidedly low-tech: a bag of ice on the intake manifold.  Or supercharger, if you have a Cobalt SS, as seen here.

This (S13) 240SX had a 5.3L Vortec V8 (from a Chevy truck) under the hood.  The Corvette (LS1) intake manifold helps high-rpm breathing; this is a cheap and effective swap for an S13, as the 5.3L Vortec motors are considerably less expensive second-hand than LS1's, and they usually haven't been beaten on as hard.  This one had serious traction issues, leading to (relatively) slow ET's but high trap speeds.  Sounded glorious, too.

I'm always disappointed by how not-that-fast 350Z's are.  This 350Z Nismo was running low 15 second quarters at under 100mph all day.  Maybe it's that VQ35's don't like heat, but I was expecting a little more.  At least they sound great.

Under the hood of K-Mod's all-motor RSX Type S.  This car uses a 2.4L Accord/CR-V block with a built K20A2 head, 13.0:1 compression and a lot of other tricks to lay down big numbers without boost or nitrous.  It's gained a new, better-flowing intake manifold since the last time I saw it; sadly they had pretty solidly broken their shift linkage before the staff at the 'Rock had gotten the timing lights working, so I never got to see a time out of it.  Sounded nasty, though.

Ever seen a Probe GT V6 with a turbo conversion?  Me neither, but there were also three Mazda MX-6 V6's (which are the same thing, mechanically) with single turbos parked around it as well.  Interesting on these setups: the MAF sensor is after the turbocharger, meaning it's getting readings of pressurized and non-pressurized air.  Must've been fun to tune that!

And finally, the car from the intro shot: this street-driven(!) E36 M3 was turbocharged beyond belief, putting down some of the biggest burnouts of anyone at the track, as well as laying down some particularly scary-looking mid ten-second quarter mile times near 140mph.  Watching this car walk sideways in third gear (on drag slicks!) was a sight to be seen.

Despite the issues with the timing equipment, the unbearable heat, and the usual plethora of cars blowing up, it was still a great day at the track.  See you all next time!