94Z28Camaro

Hello everyone i just purchased 94 z28 camaro and i am turning it into a drag car. I am basically in the proccess of taking some of it apart. I wanted to know some of the tricks to making it into a racecar. Any tips will help thanks!

joelster

Well, for a drag car you want it as light as possible, with a lot of hp, and NOT a stiff suspension or lowered suspension.

Free stuff: remove weight
front sway bar should be the first thing to go.
rear seats
brace above the panhard bar
rear speakers and bose/amp if you have one.....i leave the front speakers in because you still need some tunes.
front bumper supports---this is up to you--it's under the rubber/urethane front end part, weighs about 15-20lbs right on the nose. HOWEVER, you hit something and you will do lots of damage to the car.
rear bumper supports---again, up to you---about 15 lbs
door bars--very hard to remove weigh 9lbs apiece, don't get t-boned or you will get hurt.
cruise control module
A/C stuff--you will need to buy the A/C delete pulley kit (65 bucks) for the removal of the compressor, otherwise you can just remove the condenser in front of the radiator
carpet and sound deadener--total is around 35lbs. You can take it out and scrape the sound deadener off, it will shed about 10lbs.
spare tire/jack--15lbs
mat under rear hatch area--it's right under the carpet in the back, it's about 7-10lbs
dash--under the dash attached to the firewall is a heavy rubber mat, about 10-15lbs. It will require a lot of effort to remove and the car will be louder/hotter inside.
Get out your sawsall or cut-off wheel--there will be lots of little brackets and stuff that aren't needed ie:spare tire bracket--get an egg box and toss these things in there as you remove them. They add up quickly. There is a big section under each front fender you can remove with a sawsall, takes off about 7-8lbs each side all off of the front end, totally hidden from view.

I'll add to this as I remember stuff, but thats about most of the free stuff to remove

Free HP, unhook your exhaust after the cat-converter. Take a long breaker bar and hammer it into the cat breaking loose all of the material inside. Try to scrape it out with a long screwdriver. If you can't get it all out, fire the car up for a second, it will blow it out. Should take about 30 minutes to do. Re-connect the exhaust, the car will sound great, and pick up 3-4hp.

TB bypass--there are 2 coolant lines going into the throttle body. They pump hot coolant into it so that the throttle blades don't freeze up in cold weather conditions. This is no good for a drag car. Simply unhook eack of them, and get a piece of 8-10" heater hose and 2 fitting and connect them to each other, done. Now only outside air will be touching the tb.

3900ohm resistor. Go to radio shack and ask the geek that works there that you need one. They only come in packs of 10 if I remember correctly. Pop the hood and find the computer by the windshield up by the passenger side. There will be a small bundle of wires going down the passenger side fenderwell towards the starter. Look in the loom and grab the blue wire. The blue wire goes to the knock sensor. Cut that wire as far down as you can and then pull it away from the loom. Connect the end of the wire to the 3900ohm resistor and then the other end of the resistor to a chassis ground. When the computer sees 3900ohms of resistance from that wire it is aware that the knock sensor is functioning perfectly AND that it is not detecting any knock. Make sure you run premium gas after doing this because your car will not have the ability to detect detonation.

Thats all the free stuff I can think of. Basically you can take out 250lbs out in 1 day and add about 5-10hp. A good running car can hit 13.99's with this done.

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1994 Z28 Black heads/cam th350 drag car
1995 Z28 Teal 'Vert bolt-ons 6-speed cruiser

94Z28Camaro

Thanks for the tips but i think im going to turn it into a full caged car and not street legal but thanks for the weight tips.

SpecialK

Oh, and if you wanna budget skinnies, find another doughnut and sltap them up front, that's good for a few pounds of ROATATING mass. Pluss you get laughed at by all the rich kids till you jump the suspension up 5" in the air with street radials.

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23:23] blkIROC355: sometimes when i pee i make that sound the light sabers make
[23:23] SpecialK LS1: lmao
[23:23] blkIROC355: and play with the stream
[23:23] SpecialK LS1: that's just wrong

94Z28Camaro

I am going to make this car cheap but not that cheap. I will buy myself a pair of skinnies. Another question i have is if i should keep the stock lt1 and just freshen the motor and change some stuff but what should i change?

SpecialK

headers, heads, cam, port the stock intake. Forget buying an aftermarket one, it's not worth the price involved ulness your at the limit of the stocker.

Also, get rid of that damn optispark

I ran doughnut skinnies for a season myself. it isn't cheap, it's cost effective Hell those rims are the perfect width and lighter than your stock rims.

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23:23] blkIROC355: sometimes when i pee i make that sound the light sabers make
[23:23] SpecialK LS1: lmao
[23:23] blkIROC355: and play with the stream
[23:23] SpecialK LS1: that's just wrong

joelster

How fast do you want to go? My car runs 11.7's with a bone stock short block a set of heads and a big cam. If you want 10's N/A you'll most likely have to go 383 route.

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1994 Z28 Black heads/cam th350 drag car
1995 Z28 Teal 'Vert bolt-ons 6-speed cruiser

94Z28Camaro

I am looking to go a little faster than 11.5's on motor because then i will slow it down with timing to run an 11.50 class up at the track next to me.