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Over a year's work rebuilding my NASA TT-1 Championship-winning C6Z is coming down to just a few weeks now. Included here is a repost of Part 1, along with current updates. My intention is to highlight the lessons I've learned through this very expensive process.
Catching up:
The 2017 race season ending with a bang—literally—as my faithful Corvette Z06 blew itself to smithereens, moments after clinching the NASA TT-1 western states championship. Oil and fuel caught fire, and I had the thrilling experience of seeing how good Nomex was (it was great, btw). I took 2018 off to recover financially, only competing in a few local autocrosses to stay fresh and teaching a bit with our local PCA chapter.
Now it’s the beginning of the 2019 season, and the Vette, which I dubbed “Gurthang” back when my Tolkien-aficionado decided to commit to slaying the dragon of a national championship, is being basically rebuilt from the frame up to be safer and more competitive. The work has been entrusted to the geniuses at Horsepower Research and GSpeed in the middle of Texas. HPR engine builder extraordinaire Anthony Forney and Vette-genius Louis Gigliotti, owner of the latter, both cut their teeth working at LG Motorsports for Louis’ father, and their experiences in professional and club level Corvette competition spoke strongly to me. Forming a working relationship with shops almost a thousand miles away involves excellent lines of communication and lots of trust. While most all of us want to support our local mechanics and vendors, sometimes the knowledge, skill and experience you need to challenge the best is at a distance. Going forward, I will detail my experience, with a focus on what I learn making these long-distance relationships function in a healthy and fruitful manner.
Current updates:
It took a while for me to fully commit to bringing my C6Z to Texas; while the short block of new 468ci engine was there at HPR, entrusting tens of thousands of dollars of rebuild to people I’d never worked with before was stressful. I honestly think that, if there had been the brain power locally, I would have kept it in Colorado. But much of the top level Vette racing experience resides in the Lone Star State and Louis and HPR’s owner, Erik Koenig, had developed the 468 together for road race applications. Since it was most likely that my old LS7 had been taken out by cooling problems, I worried that trying to make it run right here at home would cost more in time and treasure than going with GSpeed. Here is the list of work and upgrades that I was asking my “new” team to knock out:
-Aero mods (carried out in conjunction with Ryan Neff, owner of Zebulon MSC Ltd)
-Brake & suspension check over and set up
-Fire suppression system
-Dyno and race prep/shakedown
While it is common for folks to stretch this amount of work out over several months—especially if they are doing the work themselves—Louis and I agreed that it should be done in a brief (3-4 week) period in the case of my car. The downside of this was that if parts were back ordered or there were other complications, we might miss the beginning of the season. And indeed, this happened. Between delays in completing work on the engine (due to there being more damage than initially found) and how crazy busy Louis’ schedule was, what with supporting his drivers at various enduros and sprint races, and running GSpeed day to day, we fell a few critical weeks behind. My takeaway from this is that it is concomitant upon the owner to do whatever he or she needs to get answers from the people they choose to work with. Hoping or wishing things will get done on time (and budget) simply isn’t enough. I know I am guilty of doing this, and while none of us want to be rude—even to those we’re giving our business to—it is up to us to be responsible. I’ve seen many race buddies have their rebuilds (or even tuning minor work) come in way past deadline, and having had this happen in 2016 and 2017 myself, I should have known better.
Our savior arrived in the form of Kris King, a 30-year veteran of Bruce Lowrie Chevrolet, and track day enthusiast himself, who has been superb at keeping me abreast of their findings during teardown. While much of the news he’s had to convey is negative in nature, such as damage to my Penske 3-way dampers and various electrical connections from the fire, his diligence and speediness has been a revelation. His willingness to be available and responsive has added tremendously to my faith that the work will be done on time and correctly. Hopefully this has lifted the burden off of Louis and will allow him to do what he does best. As a fellow small business owner I thoroughly understand the frustrations he faces and I sympathize with the challenges of building the right team. In Kris he seems to have found a critical ingredient to the continued growth and success of GSpeed.
The truth can be painful, and finding out that there was no realistic way to get Gurthang completed before my first local race with NASA Rocky Mountain was a gut punch. It meant coming up with some creative planning to get back on track (bad pun, I know) so as to not get too far behind the competition. For me, the mental aspect of racing has always been a challenge. Back in the 90s and early 2000s I’d consistently beat SCCA champions at local autocrosses or time trial-type events, only to get my *** kicked at Nationals. Sometimes it was car prep but most often it was me, cracking under the pressure.
Knowing this is a hobby that I chose to do “for fun” didn’t help much when it counted. I worked hard at this part of our sport in 16 and 17 and it paid huge dividends. Some other time I will go into how I overcame at least some of my weakness in this aspect of racing, but for now consider it merely background to how important I feel it is to go into the 2019 season with adequate prep. The revised plan that Kris, Louis and I came up with is to shake the car down April 12-13 at MSR Cresson, where GSpeed is located, and then have them finish building the car by the end of the month. Then the car will go to Circuit of the Americas for the NASA Texas Region’s “Cino De COTA” event May 3-5. This should be shear entertainment, since I haven’t driven a car in anger on a track since October 2017, will have what amounts to an all-new car, and have never driven COTA! The good news is that this will give me a chance to work with the GSpeed team in a competition environment, and (hopefully) fix any teething problems that arise, before hauling Gurthang back to Colorado.
Parts degradation and regular upkeep:
It’s tempting to skimp on boring things like regular upkeep and maintenance, especially when things like adding aero or bringing big horsepower from an engine rebuild are so much sexier. But being sidelined after spending time to drive to an event—often days away, out here in the western US—when something super-basic fails in the cooling system, or a suspension bolt breaks, or a hub seizes up, is kinda stupid.
A race weekend, which can easily cost thousands in entry fees and consumables like tires and fuel, becomes a total waste of time and money, instead of the exhilarating, joyful time with friends and competitors it should be. With this in mind, I had GSpeed check my brakes and suspension. What Kris and the team found was painful. As each text would arrive with details, pics or video, my heart would sink farther—often in inverse proportion to how my wallet was lightening—but I am very glad that we found these issues NOW, not at my first race weekend:
-brake booster: fried and needs replaced
-Penske dampers: cooked lines to two; sent to Penske for teardown
-wheel hubs: done and…done
-electrical connections: multiple replacement parts and patches
I don’t want to imply in any way that the GSpeed team wouldn’t have found these issues without me, but I am glad I asked when I did. As an example, the left front Penske 8760 “Menage a trois” 3-way damper, sourced through Danny Popp, one of the top Corvette techs and racers in the country, had fire damage, as I had guessed after Nationals. What was unexpected were the cooked lines from the left rear unit to its remote reservoir. With two out of four showing damage, Kris sent them to Penske for teardown and eval. The stock hubs had survived two seasons of track use with only one broken stud, though the need to constantly keep them nice and juicy with anti-seize compound had gotten messy and old. Louis’ recommended hubs, from SKF, turned out to be on back order at many suppliers and Kris had to source them from three different states!
Lots to report on the rebuild today! While all of these line items have dollar signs attached, in this case I only feel relief that Kris and Louis are leading the project. With only one week remaining before we take Gurthang on track for its shakedown, it’s critical that progress is made every day. There is simply no way I could do that, working full time running my business.
Here are the highlights:
-Penske confirmed one damper got cooked and one other had damage; we are rebuilding all four and re-valving them to match the specs GSpeed has found work really well on similar cars. I’ve never felt like I could get out of these megabuck 3-ways all they had to offer, so it will be great to have data from their other C5/C6s to leverage.
-The roll cage is installed and being welded. I had been feeling very uncomfortable being strapped into such a fast, cage-free car by a 6-point harness, so this is a big relief.
-Hubs, shifter, etc: Kris sourced SKF hubs, and while it’s a bummer my almost-new Hurst shifter—highly recommended, btw, to eliminate the shifting difficulties experienced while the car was under lateral load—and stock linkage were cooked in the fire, fixing these things now should mitigate against unexpected on-track problems for several seasons.
Glad you are getting back into driving and sounds like the car will be better than ever. Congratulations. I know what it's like to not be able to drive for a while and you just want to get back out there. But it will all be worth it in the end.
Can you ask Louis to take pics of the frame box/plate/mount where the main hoop attaches? What's up with the center vertical bar on the main hoop going to the sheet metal bulkhead?
Can you ask Louis to take pics of the frame box/plate/mount where the main hoop attaches? What's up with the center vertical bar on the main hoop going to the sheet metal bulkhead?
I was thinking it was a fixture to hold the loop in place during fabrication.....but I'm interested to learn what it really is.
Wow, what an extensive build. Look forward to seeing and learning how everything works out.
Thanks! It is the 468ci build done by Horsepower Research (HPR) in McKinney, Texas. Anthony Forney built my engine, which was designed by Erik Koenig, HPR's owner, with input from Louis Gigliotti, owner of GSpeed, for time trial and road race use. They've done several posts on it, but the broad strokes are that it produces more torque at lower RPMs than a modified 428ci engine like I had run. Since TT and ST classes in NASA competition are based on HP to weight, it should allow me to be competitive with the other folks who run this engine--and there are a bunch of 'em!
thank you for posting those cage attachement points! its been impossible to find any for our aluminum frame cars. it appears they went with the 3/4" aluminum block method.
please add pics of main hoop attachment too!
Last edited by STANG KILLA SS; 04-09-2019 at 09:28 AM.
Love it... aluminum blocks with studs. Gives me hope for caging my C7. Nobody has gone through the rear wall on a C7 yet that I have found. I did that with my C5 and it's the only way to do it for taller people.
The only C7 variable is the various frame materials and how to weld to them.
I dont want to get off topic much, but the C7 is still so new, there have been very few that are serious with building race cars. Lots of variables, such as the electric steering, and E diff. In order to build a REAL race car, you need to get away from OEM electronics. For diagnosis, for no street compromises (ice mode much?) for really having full complete control of the ECU/ABS/Chassis wiring.
Depending on where the C8 goes, we may skip the C7 entirely for inhouse projects.
Isaacs car is coming along nicely, lots to do, but lots already complete!
thank you for posting those cage attachement points! its been impossible to find any for our aluminum frame cars. it appears they went with the 3/4" aluminum block method.
please add pics of main hoop attachment too!
As some can attest, its much more than just an aluminum block. the underside is 3D profiled in a CNC to fit the curvature of the frame rail. There is over an inch of elevation change from the highest portion of the frame, to the lowest in that spot.
Never had ice mode on any of my C5s including my record holding ST2 car and been tracking the C7 a little over a year now and no ice mode. No electric steering or eDiff issues. In the fake racecar world of club racing I don’t know anyone who ditches OEM electronics only now that C5s are getting old are harness swaps becoming more common. /hijack
As some can attest, its much more than just an aluminum block. the underside is 3D profiled in a CNC to fit the curvature of the frame rail. There is over an inch of elevation change from the highest portion of the frame, to the lowest in that spot.
“Denver, we have a problem…” Trouble reared its head when one of our essential build team members went home sick. Louis himself has pitched in and we’re still planning for on track shakedown in just over 48 hours. Hard decisions needed to be made, so parts of the new cooling system are going to be in place, but not all, which should be fine for what we are doing. Those of you who’ve slaved away to assemble a car just before a race will relate. I cant say how much I appreciate the team pulling together to make my upcoming trip worthwhile. The biggest factor might now be weather: Between the bomb blizzard about to hit Denver and rain in Cresson on Saturday the variables are starting to really stack up.
04-03-2019, 10:08 AM
C6 Roadrace/time trials rebuild
only now that C5s are getting old are harness swaps becoming more common. /hijack
