So I bought a track car. Well, okay, two track cars.
01-13-2013, 03:19 AM
#1
Archive Gatekeeper
Rennlist Member
Rennlist Member
Thread Starter
So I bought a track car. Well, okay, two track cars.
I don’t know what it is about December, maybe it’s the 928Intl half off sale, or something, but the completion (more or less) of Dan Hebert’s Turquoise project left a hole in my garage. The stroker is more or less done, the GT is just taking up space....
I have been thinking for a long time about buying a car that I could slowly transform into a track car, and Rob Rossitto’s car has been sitting at Greg’s shop for a while. It seemed like a good candidate- engineless, but has Devek L2 headers, 993TT brakes, Ott links, big bars, etc, all good ‘bones’ for making an HPDE/track car out of it. But it’s missing an engine. I figured I would pick up a used motor from Mark during the December sale for use as an ‘interim’ motor while Greg and I put together a new 5L engine around one of his new crank/rod/piston sets , and swap the dry-sumped heads’ oiling stuff off my stroker to the new motor.
So back in the fall I bought Rob’s car from his widow, I joined POC and alerted Jim Bailey that he’d have a new newb for the slowpoke run groups in 2013.
Meanwhile, some you know that Mark Anderson has been floating the idea of selling his White Zombie, precipitated by the demise of its engine (https://rennlist.com/forums/928-foru...an-engine.html) . He had a couple of nibbles but no takers. When I mentioned I'd bought Rob's car and laid out my plan, He handed me his file of receipts on his racer, and suggested that I figure out how many hours’ labor he’d paid to transform a street car into a full-on track car. Turns out the number (at least from the receipts that are actually in the file folder) is about 400. And that’s just the cage/chassis/suspension/mounts/bracket fabrication/basic build. I don’t even want to think of how many hours Mark put into this car between 1995 and 2005.
Mark then suggested that it might be better to ‘dumb down’ his racer, rather than ‘build up’ Rob’s street car. And we worked out a deal, Rob R’s old car + some cash, for Mark’s old car + the necessary parts to dumb it down back to its 1997 (or so) state of prep.
The title came in the mail today, so I guess it’s official!
Along with the car was a huge stack of SCCA, POC, Speed GT and WC race results, records, pictures, receipts, etc., etc. I have been working on consolidating it all into a chronology so that I can reverse engineer the car back into a street-legal, CA-smoggable track day car – for the time being! All the trick bits will go up on the shelf and I can slide down the slippery slope as my skills (and time, and trailer storage space) allow. Mark has kept the car registered Non-Op in California since 1997, there was no problem with registering it Non-Op again.
I also picked up a used ‘interim’ motor from a ’91 which is getting a refresh (timing belt, WP, etc) and will get the oiling stuff from the stroker, post smog. I had Greg mod its oil pan for the scavenge stuff, and put windage trays and a pan spacer on it. I have a full factory GT exhaust, cats, air pump, charcoal canister, and all the bits to get it through smog.
The plan is to add back stock doors, front bumper cover, hood, and hatch so it can be locked/left in a parking lot. Mark had this car down to 2640 lbs with 1/8th of a tank of gas in June of ’96, so I’m sure adding stuff back will cause him chest pain…. He had a nice Cup Car seat in it, which I cannot get my fat *** into, so I’ll be swapping in a seat out of Rob R’s car.
For the history buffs, the White Zombie is a Black/black 1988 5-speed bought by Mark in late 1995 with 77K miles on it. He immediately poured 200 hours of labor into it in January ‘96, and went racing, driving it to the track for the first two years, before turning it into a dedicated street car.
Some early pics:
Fast forward to some of the recent prep for the interim engine:
The dead stroker race engine will go to GB’s for a proper autopsy (when I have time, sometime this spring), and whatever survives will be reborn on the forthcoming 5L engine.
Anyhoo, I’m hoping to get it buttoned up in time to do some POC events this year. I’ll update with progress towards getting her back on track, even if only in the novice run group, for now.
I have been thinking for a long time about buying a car that I could slowly transform into a track car, and Rob Rossitto’s car has been sitting at Greg’s shop for a while. It seemed like a good candidate- engineless, but has Devek L2 headers, 993TT brakes, Ott links, big bars, etc, all good ‘bones’ for making an HPDE/track car out of it. But it’s missing an engine. I figured I would pick up a used motor from Mark during the December sale for use as an ‘interim’ motor while Greg and I put together a new 5L engine around one of his new crank/rod/piston sets , and swap the dry-sumped heads’ oiling stuff off my stroker to the new motor.
So back in the fall I bought Rob’s car from his widow, I joined POC and alerted Jim Bailey that he’d have a new newb for the slowpoke run groups in 2013.
Meanwhile, some you know that Mark Anderson has been floating the idea of selling his White Zombie, precipitated by the demise of its engine (https://rennlist.com/forums/928-foru...an-engine.html) . He had a couple of nibbles but no takers. When I mentioned I'd bought Rob's car and laid out my plan, He handed me his file of receipts on his racer, and suggested that I figure out how many hours’ labor he’d paid to transform a street car into a full-on track car. Turns out the number (at least from the receipts that are actually in the file folder) is about 400. And that’s just the cage/chassis/suspension/mounts/bracket fabrication/basic build. I don’t even want to think of how many hours Mark put into this car between 1995 and 2005.
Mark then suggested that it might be better to ‘dumb down’ his racer, rather than ‘build up’ Rob’s street car. And we worked out a deal, Rob R’s old car + some cash, for Mark’s old car + the necessary parts to dumb it down back to its 1997 (or so) state of prep.
The title came in the mail today, so I guess it’s official!
Along with the car was a huge stack of SCCA, POC, Speed GT and WC race results, records, pictures, receipts, etc., etc. I have been working on consolidating it all into a chronology so that I can reverse engineer the car back into a street-legal, CA-smoggable track day car – for the time being! All the trick bits will go up on the shelf and I can slide down the slippery slope as my skills (and time, and trailer storage space) allow. Mark has kept the car registered Non-Op in California since 1997, there was no problem with registering it Non-Op again.
I also picked up a used ‘interim’ motor from a ’91 which is getting a refresh (timing belt, WP, etc) and will get the oiling stuff from the stroker, post smog. I had Greg mod its oil pan for the scavenge stuff, and put windage trays and a pan spacer on it. I have a full factory GT exhaust, cats, air pump, charcoal canister, and all the bits to get it through smog.
The plan is to add back stock doors, front bumper cover, hood, and hatch so it can be locked/left in a parking lot. Mark had this car down to 2640 lbs with 1/8th of a tank of gas in June of ’96, so I’m sure adding stuff back will cause him chest pain…. He had a nice Cup Car seat in it, which I cannot get my fat *** into, so I’ll be swapping in a seat out of Rob R’s car.
For the history buffs, the White Zombie is a Black/black 1988 5-speed bought by Mark in late 1995 with 77K miles on it. He immediately poured 200 hours of labor into it in January ‘96, and went racing, driving it to the track for the first two years, before turning it into a dedicated street car.
Some early pics:
Fast forward to some of the recent prep for the interim engine:
The dead stroker race engine will go to GB’s for a proper autopsy (when I have time, sometime this spring), and whatever survives will be reborn on the forthcoming 5L engine.
Anyhoo, I’m hoping to get it buttoned up in time to do some POC events this year. I’ll update with progress towards getting her back on track, even if only in the novice run group, for now.
Last edited by Rob Edwards; 01-13-2013 at 04:27 PM.
Trending Topics
T
01-13-2013, 02:51 PM
#12
Team Owner
Rob, CONGRATS, now your going to be knee deep in the hoopla ,
more than you could ever know,
Goodluck on your new path.
more than you could ever know,
Goodluck on your new path.
