Things I do with my C6 Z06 Corvette.

jfryjfry said:

Awesome.  How was it?  Did the car self-actuate open pipes or is that finally solved???

Oh, that is completely solved. I got a 2010 exhaust from a guy in perfect shape, including the midpipe, with like 10k miles on it for like $600 shipped and replaced everything from the cat back. There was some bending at the downpipe still required, but my buddy who rebuilt the motor and I got it done. I held the acetylene torch while he bent it back into shape. No noise, no movement, haven't had to even think about it since.

Sheesh, it's Feb 23, 2022 and it's 70 degrees here in New England, so I took the car for a little drive. She needs a wash badly.

I put Michelin Pilot Sport A/S 4 ZP tires on the stock rims before the weather got cold. The tires on the stockers were some 10+ year old Bridgestones. I usually drive around on autox tires during the season and other than for autocrossing they are terrible tires. The Michelins are quieter at all times BY A LOT and they ride better at all speeds. I haven't tested out grip, but reviews say these are essentially as good in the dry as summer tires from a decade ago.

I love the evolution of your car.   Can you summarize what you've done to it??

jfryjfry said:

I love the evolution of your car.   Can you summarize what you've done to it??

Sure.

2006 Corvette Z06 
Bought with 53,019 miles

Engine
Engine rebuild at 62,958 miles due to rod bearing failure. Engine rebuild was basically a stock performing build with reliability in mind, removing the problematic titanium rods (some of which were toasted by the rod bearing failure) and modifying slightly to make up for the added weight of steel rods.
Compstar Rods
Compstar Crank
Wiseco Pistons
Stock block machined to fit the setup
Heads are polished and ported with replacement bronze valve guides
Lingenfelter modified sump tank (increases oil capacity to 11 quarts)
Aviaid sump tank baffle

I'm running 5w30 Amsoil Signature Series at the moment for oil.

Transmission
Stock gearing
Stock clutch - Replaced last year
Shifter is the MGW Short Throw
Remote clutch bleeder installed

Suspension
Stranoparts 33mm front sway bar
Hotchkis 2284R adjustable rear sway bar
aFe Control PFADT adjustable endlinks front and rear
G-Speed Coilovers with Penske double adjustable shocks (no mo' leaf springs)

Brakes
Power Stop drilled and slotted brake rotors
Power Stop Z26 padlets
Pentosin Super DOT 4 brake fluid

Wheels and Tires
Stock wheels with Michelin Pilot Sport All Season 4 ZP
Forgestar F14 18x11 fronts and 18x12 rears, currently with Yokohama Advan A052 315/30/18 for autocross

Exhaust
Stock except it's a 2010 exhaust from the cat back with about 10k miles on it

Added Weight
Added some sound insulation to the inside rear tub to make it easier to listen to tunes on the way to and from events.

Other Stuff
Aftermarket head unit from a previous owner.
Wired up a switch to an Add-A-Fuse to make a DIY mild to wild switch that opens up the exhaust.
Added reflective head insulation to the transmission pan, keeps the heat from the trans out of the cabin.

Everything else is stock, even the intake filter. Honestly, if you didn't know what was done you would think the car was just a stock Z06. It rides like, sounds like and has similar power to a stock car it just handles better than any stock Z06 out there. Actually, with the Penske dampers it rides better than any stock Z06. The engine bay appears stock as the sump tank addition sits inside the fender well.

My latest decision is around whether I want to switch to spherical bearings. Not sure if I want to or not. It would probably help the car, but I'm not sure I could deal with it on the street and since I drive over MA/CT/NY/NJ roads to get to events there is a fair amount of street driving.

The one thing I don't want to do is make the car too uncomfortable for street driving.

That said, I don't know how bad it would be given my updates to the suspension. I could swap in the sphericals and if I don't like the feel it's not that much money to swap back to stock control arms and then I could just sell the spherical control arms. I'm considering doing that, but maybe not for this season as I'm still kind of crap at driving with this latest setup and need to work more on that than anything else.

I have a set of van steel delrin bushings I'll be installing.   Figured I'd get most of the benefits, less of the trade offs and for 1/3 the price. 
 

but, like you, the driver has the most room for improvement

Thank you for sharing all that, I took a bunch of notes.  I have an 08 that I have been driving about a month now and love.  I'm putting it up on my friend's lift monday to check it out and see if anything needs to be addressed.  

jfryjfry said:

I have a set of van steel delrin bushings I'll be installing.   Figured I'd get most of the benefits, less of the trade offs and for 1/3 the price. 
 

but, like you, the driver has the most room for improvement

That's cool. I thought about Delrin, but if I'm going to go in on changing things then I'm going all in. Most of the people I know that go to Delrin end up going spherical after a while anyway. If I'm going to get the discomfort I want no deflection. Probably will hold off and see how I do in the car this year. Mostly I just need better driving, but the temptation to tinker is there.

How is your car doing? I tried to find your build thread, but the forum search is not helping.

Wally (Forum Supporter) said:

Thank you for sharing all that, I took a bunch of notes.  I have an 08 that I have been driving about a month now and love.  I'm putting it up on my friend's lift monday to check it out and see if anything needs to be addressed.  

Mostly I would be worried about the failure points. The oiling on the pre 09 cars is poor under high g loads, even in a straight line. The 09+ cars still have some of the same issues, but because the capacity is raised the problem presents less often.

You can also get the titanium rod failure where the coating comes off and titanium shavings start getting into the motor.

Because of the oiling issues and the rod issue I would send the oil into Blackstone on a yearly basis.

If you want to offset the oiling issues you could have Lingenfelter upgrade your sump tank to add capacity. That's a good time to add the Aviad tank insert and the oil pan trap and baffle.

https://aviaid.com/shopsite_sc/store/html/access-z06-ls7.html

If it hasn't been done you should replace the stock valve guides with bronze guides.

In reply to Harvey :

Thank you, I'm sending out a sample when I change the oil. The previous owner thought the heads may have been done, we're going to pull the covers at some point to see how the look.  

I'm on the waitlist for a C8 Stingray at MacMulkin and it looks like I might get it in the spring. If that is the case this car will be up for sale.

It needs the passenger rear wheel bearing replaced, but I have a Timkin bearing for it that I will put in. It already put in a Timkin on the other side a couple of years ago.

I'm halfway through sphericals, new ball joints and new wheel bearings.  
 

Unfortunately all the stuff I'm pulling out seems to be in great shape. 
 

I have a feeling you'll love the new car.  I don't know much about what it "needs" for the track but the packages I've seen from shops are crazy expensive!  

I'm just going to drive it as it sits until I can get a Z06. I'm on the list for a C8 Z06, but that's probably going to take a few years.

I ordered the Stingray with Z51 and magnaride. Most I will do is put different tires on.

My journey with the C6 ended this past Saturday when the new owner came to pick it up. It was one of the coldest days of the year in CT and it snowed. Luckily the snowfall was not heavy and those Michelin all-seasons were up to the task, because he and his buddy made it back to Ohio with no issues.

We kept conversing via text as I asked him to update me on his journey with the car. 

One thing he pointed out to me that I did not notice is that the seat padding on the driver side was getting a bit less than supportive and he had plans to get it redone. I of course didn't really notice this because it came on gradually, but 20/20 hindsight looking at the pictures of the seat I realize now the the leather was a little loose, indicating the padding had given up a bit.

I don't think she liked being driven through salt and snow (I had never done so) because at one point he got some warnings flashing up on the dash due to we think one of the wheel speed sensor getting blocked by something. He stopped and restarted the car and everything was fine after that.

He also noticed the car likes to be a bit lazy about starting when it is warm and thought maybe the starter was going. This seems to be a normal characteristic of these cars though. They have a small battery all the way in the back connected via relatively small cables and firing up that 7 liter motor is a bit of a chore when the engine is warm. I let him know that this was how the car acted for me the whole time I owned it and as long as the battery had a good charge it never failed to start. That said, the started is original so who knows, it might need to be replaced at some point, but for now he is just going to roll with it.

We had some good times over the last 6 years.

Congratulations. Do you have a replacement in mind?

That was a smoking deal for that car.  I wish I had talked to my friend about cars 2 weeks previous because it would be on its way to california instead.  
 

where did they find the car? (What site)

In reply to Harvey :

I had a warm starting issue most of last summer. It finally turned into a park on a hill if it's warm issue at the end.  A new GM starter and a blanket seems to have cured it, the slow cranking is gone for now. The wheel sensors do seem to not like snow and salt.  Neither did the summer tires. It's an experience in surprise snowfalls. I almost parked it and took the train home last winter. 

Woody (Forum Supportum) said:

Congratulations. Do you have a replacement in mind?

C8 with Z51 is being built as we speak. I should be picking it up in two to three weeks. giggle

jfryjfry said:

That was a smoking deal for that car.  I wish I had talked to my friend about cars 2 weeks previous because it would be on its way to california instead.  
 

where did they find the car? (What site)

I wasn't getting a lot of good bites. Had a guy lowball me on it for $30k and then got the guy that actually bought it that came in right around my final asking price. It was in great shape overall mechanically and the paint was original. Had some chips etc, it was not a garage queen, but if you wanted a car that was ready to run this was the one.

He came from CorvetteForum. I linked this build thread from there in my ad though.

Wally (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to Harvey :

I had a warm starting issue most of last summer. It finally turned into a park on a hill if it's warm issue at the end.  A new GM starter and a blanket seems to have cured it, the slow cranking is gone for now. The wheel sensors do seem to not like snow and salt.  Neither did the summer tires. It's an experience in surprise snowfalls. I almost parked it and took the train home last winter. 

If it needs a new starter I'm sure it's just as cheap as most everything else on that car. The guy got a great deal.

The Michelin Pilot Sport A/S is what I had on the stock rims and it got him from CT to Ohio on Saturday without an issue.

I bought Harvey's car.  He made the transaction a pleasurable experience, and there was so much extra stuff with the car that my buddy Ben and I brought my Grand Caravan to CT so we could haul it all back to Ohio.  I'm not exaggerating when I say the van was mostly full.  Harvey gave me a very helpful guided tour of the car, and afterwards we had lunch.  I like to talk, and Harvey is an excellent conversationalist.

Harvey encouraged me to sign up here and start my own thread to continue the history of the car.  I think I'll do that.  I haven't autocrossed in many years, and I'm not (yet) into tracking (though a track friend wants me to do a novice day at Mid-Ohio) so I'm not quite a grassroots motorsportser.  But I like to drive in Hocking Hills and Ohio's Triple Nickel, and I have an annual trip with friends at Tail of the Dragon, so I like to hustle my car a bit.

This car is so much more potent than any car I've owned that I will enjoy the time required for "the game to slow down" as the sportsball players often say.  In fact, I'm going to take it for a spin tonight because... Corvette!

I'll look for your build thread.  That car was very well bought.  

In reply to DaveInColumbus :

Congratulations, you've got a really good car.  They're crazy fun, I take mine out as often as I can.