TRD Ferguson - Race Car

Hello all!

I am a member of a team building a car for the ChumpCars series. The rules are pretty simple, buy a $500 car and race it in a 24 hour or 7x7 endurance race.
Well as you might have guessed we have found ourselves a $500 ST162! Specifically a 1989 3S-FE.
Currently we are in the middle of bringing everything back up to stock and have removed everything but the engine. We picked this car in part because the engine and transmission were so strong. Unfortunately nearly everything else was awful.

The CV joints were bad, the wheel bearings were bad, the steering rack had cracked boots and was spraying steering fluid all over the place. The floor pans had holes in them, the roof had small rust holes in them. One part was rusted so badly that it let in enough water to completely fill the driver’s rear speaker (see pics of us changing the speaker fluid). It had been in a front end accident which bent the bumper and destroyed a lot of the protective plastic. And the rust! The RUST! SOO MUCH RUST! It attacked and destroyed all 5 fluid lines running under the driver, spots on every floor pan, both rocker panels, etc.

What we have done so far:

In the process up to this point we have purchased (and then scrapped) an automatic 1987 GT-S. This GT-S had a seized engine, which happened to be a FE head on the GE block and a wiring harness that was Frankensteined together. From this we got rear wheel disc brakes, a new steering rack, backup radiator, backup distributer, GT-S exhaust manifold, backup intake manifold, replacement cams, new rocker panels and exterior metal, and new floor pans.

So far on TRD Ferguson we have gutted and scraped the interior, removed all of the bad parts and started re-welding new floor pans back into the car.
Specifically we have (in no particular order):

1) Swapped the 4 lug GT hubs with the 5 lug GT-S hubs
2) Removed both axles ordered new axles
3) Removed the steering rack
4) Removed all gas and brake lines heading to the rear.
5) Removed the A/C
6) Removed Cruise Control
7) Removed the A/C radiator and condenser
8) Dropped the gas tank and fuel filter
9) Completely removed the e-Brake
10) Removed the moonroof and all of the moving moonroof parts and welded the roof back in place.
11) Started to remove all of the side glass (all in excellent condition)
12) Removed the spoiler though we probably will re-install it.
13) Cut out the rust in 3/4 ths of the floor pans
14) Welded in 2 new floor pans
15) Replaced the front and rear shocks (kept the old springs. One was missing a bump stop if you know where to get a replacement)
16) Cleaned a lot of the parts we had to remove (lower cross members, etc) for crap-free re-installation.
17) Pressed in two new hubs and wheel bearings for the front.

That is about it so far. Our plan is to return TRD Ferguson as close to its mechanical showroom state as possible. The other things we are planning to do are:

a) Reinstall new brake and fuel lines (including new fuel filter)
b) Install functional steering rack
c) Install new axles
d) Install a roll cage, racing seat, and 6 point harness
e) Mount the IP and IP Shade
f) Create an instrument panel complete with push button start
g) Install the plastic back to the blower so we can still have defrosting functions
h) Remove the rest of the rust and protect it with rustolieum spray paint
i) Replace the cracked windshield
j) Flush and refill the radiator

A few questions we have for you all:

This GT came with an engine heater in the block. I have no idea if it is going to impede coolant flow and cause us issues on the racetrack. Does anybody have any experience with this that can offer some advice?
Aside from the timing belt, what else might wear out this late in the game that is crucial and cheap to just replace now?
Does anybody know where we can get pre-bent brake and fuel lines? (if we cannot get pre-bent, because of the criticality of the pressure lines to safety and racing and our lack of experience with flaring the pressure lines, we are looking at joining shorter lines with couplers)

And of course we have some spare parts we are interested in selling to help lower the total cost of our car for the comp that we have verified were functioning before we removed them. Lowering the value of the car will allow us to spend more on go-fast parts!:

i) A/C compressors (from both cars), functional
ii) Cruise control units (from both cars), functional
iii) All windows excluding the windshield. No cracks in any side or rear windows. Rear defrost works.
iv) Either seat, both are in fair to good condition. Cloth seats, no rips.
v) Center console
vi) A/C condenser
vii) E-brake lever
viii) … and pretty much anything not required for racing.

SO
We have done a lot but still have a lot to go. Pictures are below but they are really nothing special. I can take specific photos if you would like of anything and I will post them here.

Does anybody have any tips or advice for us while we keep going on this project?

Thanks for looking!!
-TRD Ferguson

 

The days with the Parts Car

As i mentioned earlier we had a parts car. Here is are driveway shots of all the work we did with the parts car. It was in and out in under a week!

 

And here is the speaker fluid:

 

Engine heater = engine block warmer. This car came from Minnesota and I think they installed it to warm the car up before starting it to prevent wear and help it start in the winter. it literally is just a plug wire that hangs off the bumper ready for an extension cord. Wire leads to a 3 pronged adapter on the block. Ill take a photo tonight, but I am 99% sure its an engine block warmer.

24Lemons is a competitor to ChumpCar in a sense. They both run the same style races with similar rules. We decided on ChumpCar because it had exempt rules and theme is less important, though we started going down this path by looking at 24 hours of Lemons first.

The rules include a 2x rule where you can upgrade some parts like the brakes and other safety equipment up to 2 times what they were as stock but no further. (the language in the rules describes this better than I did) But basically our GT to GT-S conversion on the axles and the brakes we figure pretty much maxes us out for now.

Poly bushings count as performance parts and thus count against our value.

We took out the auto radiator from the parts car and it looks no thicker than the manual radiator. The biggest difference I can tell is with the fan configuration and of course the two holes at the bottom for the transmission fluid. While I am on this topic, in the auto car we noticed a high pressure line running from the power steering tank to the A/C radiator. Is this normal? Our manual GT car did not have this.

Sump baffles are a good idea, and should be fairly easy to take care of. Do you have a photo of a baffled sump so I can weld in baffles to match.

We have been looking at spending money on performance slightly lowering springs. We have about $95 of value to use.

Finally about weight, we've removed about all that we can, but I am concerned that we wont have enough weight in the rear for balanced handling, so I was debating putting the spoiler back on for weight. Thoughts on this?

 

Assuming you have the same mounting points it would work, and I don't know why they would cast a different block for a non-A/C car. We have all the components working except for the front radiator. I damaged the crap out of it when I removed it as the front end collision wedged it in there.

 

We were looking at removing the thermostat all together. What is the advantage of a restrictor over just running with a plug in the thermostat hole?

 

What specific recirculate pipes are you talking about?

And I am still trying to understand why would I still run a restrictor? Wouldn't the increased coolant flow decrease my need for additional cooling? From what I've read, these engines have problems with 3rd cylinder cooling, wouldn't a higher volume help alleviate that issue?

Also, by plug the hole, I meant any hole to the outside of the system. Obviously I wouldn't block the coolant flow, I just want to keep it from squirting out of the hole where the thermostat used to be.

 

Here is an up-close shot of that heater plug. This doesn't change anybodies mind about it does it?

Also, what hoses in the engine photo you posted would you remove, and how would you block them?

 

Slowly is right, we were shooting for a late August race date. Hopefully we have it back on its wheels by then.

My biggest concern is not winning, but finishing the race. I dont want to destroy our car after working on it for so darn long, so these upgrades I am most interested in this time around is in cooling and reliability. If I can reduce the engine temp while I am out there, excellent! I did have a question about the thermostat and how the water flows through the block. Assuming I remove the thermostat, but I keep the pipes, will I get water stuck in the system that cant cycle out without the thermostat? Also, is the temperature sensor in the IP wired up to the thermostat, or is it a separate device?

 

The lower temp thermo is a good idea, but I am trying to do this on the cheap, so I will probably just remove it and keep everything else the way it is. Regardless of what I do with the thermostat, I will still be able to flick on the heater (which I will need in winter races) as I am not removing the heater core bypass on the rear of the engine.

I mentioned in this thread and the gas/brake thread that I have removed the 4 lug hubs and associated brakes and replaced them with the 5 lug GTS hubs and brakes, so I do not have the puny disc/drum setup any more. It is also because of my larger brakes, that I do not need to save every 100g. If the situation were reversed, saving weight would be slightly more important, but yes 2 small tubes filled with water are not that crucial; they were only discussed as a method to improving the cooling system.

Back to the cooling system, yes I will probably not initially be generating as much heat as a GTE, however, I will be running for 24 hours and a lot can happen in 24 hours of driving. Getting the most out of your cooling can mean the difference between overheating in 20 hours of making it all 24.