Zoiks, nice work.
Zoiks, nice work.
JohnRW1621 wrote:Esoteric Nixon wrote:Can you realistically be away from Ohio from Thursday - Sunday Oct. 22-25? (weekend before Halloween) Don't let the entry cost keep you away, I'd be happy to pay that. The entry fee feeds you for all day Saturday as well, so that's covered. The hotel provides breakfast every morning so no expense there either. We would have room to slide you into our room too but even if you don't want to hear two other guys snore, your comfy wagon would have ample room and then you can hit our shower.JohnRW1621 wrote: In reply to Esoteric Nixon: Really!!! I'm right here in Sandusky. You really should be part of this!I've wanted to, but I've always been too chicken.
Thank you for the extremely generous offer, but until I know for sure whether or not I will need surgery on my shoulder, I can't commit to anything. :/
In qualifying for the aristocrat class how much can we rip the car apart? I just don't think it's aristocratic if someone shows up with an aluminum seat in their stripped out interior luxury car.
The lexus may be drag raced with a milk crate, those seats are at least 60 lbs each.
WillrunifChased wrote: In qualifying for the aristocrat class how much can we rip the car apart? I just don't think it's aristocratic if someone shows up with an aluminum seat in their stripped out interior luxury car.
You can be an aristocratic boy racer? My build might be slipping toward that anyway...
This class has my attention. I've seen a few early 2000s jaguar xj8 under budget. I could always use another car to sit around and not work on.
Please, nobody bid against me on the LS400 on copart in PA.
Shipping it Monday...
Things have been really crazy and busy here. To give you an idea of how behind I feel, I wanted to write this post on Sunday and here it is Tuesday! I have not updated this posting for a month.
I have put 268 miles on the Q45. It now has exactly 68,500 miles.
The really rare, 20mm rear sway bar has been sourced and installed.
New rubber is RE-71R's on these same 16" rims.
Brake pads are fresh.
Still unchanged, yet, is the ECU or I could try the NOS option but as you can understand, I have my fears of blowing up another. It really is a cool car to drive. At this point, I have probably driven this one as much as the last one. I really would like to keep it (but I also want to compete.) Somewhat torn.
I am planning a "shakedown autox" on Sunday Sept 27th with Mid-Ohio Group
https://sites.google.com/site/midohioscc/calendar-of-events
Looking good!
There is something to be said about stock reliability - posting a good result in all three events would likely net much higher results than astonishing performance in 2 and a DNF in the third.
Especially with 68,500 miles, that thing would be my new daily driver!
In reply to rcutclif:
I've still got my eye on you. I have been writing less but I am still watching from my phone.
I would like to have Hoosiers like you do on the V12.
I need to get moving on our trophies, etc.
The concepts has been submitted to the overlords and they are cool with it.
As it stands, there will be 4 seperate honors bestowed onto The Aristocrats:
Best Autox finish
Best Drag finish
Best Concourse score
Then, an Overall to the Highest Finishing Aristocrat.
These awards will not exclude you from winning the offical GRM awards also (if you still have an interest in those) 
As for daily driver... Yes, now that I have addressed the replacement of some old things on a 25 yr old car, I will be pushing this Q45 into my sunny weather daily driver. It really just seems too pristine to subject to the winter salt around here.
One of my yet to be executed plans is to unbolt the rear muffler. Let me say that again, UNBOLT the rear muffler. This is new territory for me. I have never had a car with a muffler more than 6 months old that could actually be unbolted much less a 25 yr old car!
Edit: bolt 5x114.3 Just like the Lexus'
In reply to JohnRW1621:
well, I think your bolt pattern is very likely not 5x120 otherwise i'd say run my hoosiers.
My post yesterday has lead me to a revelation...
This morning while out running errands, I see that the odo is still at 68,500.
Seems the odo is not working.
Bizarre. How does a digital odometer stop working?
Digital tripometer but analog odo. Tripometer is working.
I have executed a multi step repair procedure (repeated thumps on the dashboard) and we seem to be back in the numbers game.
seems like that is really more a 'resale value defender' feature than a problem. NICE!
In reply to rcutclif:
Upon "fixing it", my first thought was similar. If I knew it was that easy to fix, I should have waited. I'll keep that idea for the next round.
As for the future value, there is no mistaking that this is a low mile car even if that was 80k miles vs 68k miles. I have had fun with the car. My favorite questions are, "what kind of car do you think it is?", "have you ever seen one?", "how old do you think it is?"
No one has answered all near right (both car guys and non.)
Most people place its age somewhere in the mid 2000's
No one guesses that this car was built as Reagan was coming out of office. Before 2 terms of Geroge H, 2 terms of Clinton, 2 terms of George W and 2 terms of Barack
This hail damaged car from an Insurance Auction did come with a Clean (not Salvage or branded) title. However, I think due to its age, the auction company listed the miles as Exempt even though the title showing State Farm as the owner had a mileage number of 68,xxx
That's okay. I'm not in this for the resale.
I also meant to mention... One of the recent errands was a run to the local landfill with a trunkfull of household garbage bags. This requires driving the car onto their scale. The empty weight was 4,300 lbs.
I read that the car weighs 4020 lbs. I go 250# and a 20# baby with 10# of car seat, etc = 4,300# so that sounds about right.
There's about 40lbs taken off my otherwise 4020lb car. Proud to say now under 4,000lbs at a svelte 3980lbs!
This car has two cats(one off each side of the engine) leading to two mid-way mufflers and then both pipes lead into this giant single rear, driver's side muffler. I suppose all this is to keep her luxuriously quite. With this final muffler removed, the car has just the right rumble and sings the song I find more appropriate for 8 spark plugs!
I am still amazed that the whole thing just unbolted. This is unheard of here in the rust belt and even more so unheard of from a 25 yr old car.
These pictures are from page 3 showing the cats and the mid mufflers. Just out of view from the mid muffler picture is the flanges/clamps so these short pipes off the mid mufflers are where the whole thing ends now.
Nice, and thanks for the shipping lead, it worked out great, had it in my hands the next day.
So can a P71 run as an Aristocrat or is it too much of a commoner?
your politics is broke. 1 term of HW. you're adding 4 years to your car's age.
Next Day!
You go an entire car quicker than Fed Ex could get you a box without the use of a plane!
Was my price guess about right?
As for the P71, I would say commoner. It's not like it's a Town Car or anything like that 
I do have the pending Esquire Class https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/forum/grm/aristocrat-class-luxo-barges-overwhelm-the-2015-ch/105027/page8/ but not much chatter on that topic.
patgizz wrote: your politics is broke. 1 term of HW. you're adding 4 years to your car's age.
Correct. I wrote, " No one guesses that this car was built as Reagan was coming out of office. Before 2 terms of Geroge H, 2 terms of Clinton, 2 terms of George W and 2 terms of Barack."
The moral remains the same, no one seems to know what the car is or how old. I did have a pretty good guess of Olds Aurora but even those were launched in 1995.
I took The Q to a local drag tonight. Due to someone elses mechanical failure and the whole event coming to a stand still, I only got one pass before I left at 10pm with no hope of another pass any time before midnight.
Glad to say, that was not my mechanical failure.
Earlier today, my replacement Elec. Trans Controller arrived and I installed it before I left. You see, for the '90 & '91 Q45 the factory set the car to default launch in 2nd gear and then if you stomp on it it does go back down to 1st. This is sort of like the "winter" trans mode that some modern cars offer. It does make the car launch very "gentleman-ly" but not really quickly unless you manually more the gear selector to 1st gear before starting. In '92-'96 the trans controller launches the car always in 1st. I installed this $22 used part tonight. Much easier. Just mash the pedal. I still have the stock ECU but reflashed ECU has been ordered $250.
The weird thing tonight that I experience in both corn field country road runs as well as the track is that in 1st gear, the car is bouncing off the rev limiter before it is shifting to 2nd. I know this cost me time in the drag. I suspect the '94 trans controller and the '90 ECU have a little bit different settings. I expect that the reflash ECU with higher rev limit will solve this issue.
15.586 seconds on this stock car with nothing removed (like still had the spare tire in) and even had a kid car seat buckled into the back.
I really hope the expected 40hp bump from the reflash can get me into 14 something.
I was lined up with this red foxbody. Though the body appeared stock there was a roll bar and an unstock sounding engine.
Your car really pulled on him on the back end. He had a 9 mph lead on you at the 1/8th. He only got you by 5 at the end.
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