Project Silly Celica.....*it runs, vid page11*

[Steve Groenink]

So excited for all kinds of video!

Back to the candy apple, or are you planning to switch it up?

As of right now there's no plans on painting it, it's kind of all part of the story at this point. Eventually the combination of my OCD and inability to leave **** alone means I'll probably end up painting it, thinking somewhere between viper blue and the Ford F-150 blue with a nice satin clear over top

[Steve Groenink]

After going into the garage at 10am Thursday and not leaving except to pee until 8am Friday I slept for two hours then back up at 10am to go get an alignment done on the car and finish a few last little bits needed. We went and picked up the 5th wheel and enclosed trailer, loaded the trailer with everything my sleep deprived brain could think of.

Hit the road at around 4pm and got to the track at 6pm just as the tech line was opening, hurried and got the pit all set up, made sure all my safety gear was in order and headed over to get the car tech'd and get set up for my NHRA licensing passes. Let's just say it would've been nice if he'd at least bought me dinner first LOL

After some last minute thrashing to make the tech inspector happy I lined up in the staging lanes for my first licensing pass which was supposed to just be a short 330' hit to make sure the car went straight. 4000rpm and 5.3psi of wastegate boost netted a 60' of 1.65(which was the best I'd done with the old setup), my next pass was a 10.72@132mph on the same 5.3psi!

On Saturday I swapped in some new colder spark plugs and decided to turn on the boost controller and turn it up, no matter what I tried it would launch great and then lay over after a couple seconds and I could hear it missing. After a lot of testing and changes I narrowed down the problem to be a wiring oversight on my part as originally I was going to run normal GM truck coils but instead switched to the badass IGN1a mercury smart coils and didn't think about the considerably higher current draw of the new coils and the grounding strategy of them.

All-in all it was a great first time out considering the first time I'd even driven the car more than idled around the block was noon on Friday, car launched straight as an arrow and dead hooked on the radials every pass and netted a weekend best of 10.02@128mph on 8psi of boost with a 1.45 60' that looked sooooo slow and uneventful. Little bit of rewiring and tweaking a few things here and there and I'll turn it up and see what it does in a couple weeks again!

[clay72]

So super sweet. I saw the videos, and like you say, so drama free.

Are the headlights forward a bit for clearance? I like the look. Charger 500 or Torino Talladega-esque. Can't wait to see some 8.9 passes!

[Steve Groenink]

So super sweet. I saw the videos, and like you say, so drama free.

Are the headlights forward a bit for clearance? I like the look. Charger 500 or Torino Talladega-esque. Can't wait to see some 8.9 passes!

Yup, I basically had to put the headlights wherever they'd fit LOL the intercooler exit pipe is right behind the drivers side inner headlight

[77Celica]

I didn't realize until now that you put the later model fenders and hood on to gain more wheelbase and room under the hood. It looks Great!
Must be a different beast now.

[Steve Groenink]

I didn't realize until now that you put the later model fenders and hood on to gain more wheelbase and room under the hood. It looks Great!
Must be a different beast now.

Yeah it's a completely different car now, considering it's quicker now on 5-7psi than it was before on 30psi, just goes to show the efficiency differences in suspension and transmission choices!