Brett's 95 Dragon Slayer

[importsdontlikeme]

This car deserves some recognition. It's been in the family for close to 15 years now but rarely mentioned. It was always just the "extra car". It was very useful to me over the years when I was building the tuck&shave coupe.

My dad bought it for $750 and it only had 60k on it IIRC. It was pretty beat though, spent its whole life in Washington DC before we got it. Dad put a SDA street head/cam package on it probably about 12 or so years ago. I helped him put Electromotive on it about 4-5 years ago. Car has repeatedly gotten 45mpg on the highway with the tuning I did. He left the car to me when they moved down south. It became my daily.

Over the last 3 years I've been upgrading here and there. Car now has Raceland Optimos and Eibach springs. 22mm rear bar with the beefy brackets and Energy suspension bushings. Car is extremely dialed in and performs exceptionally well. I wasn't expecting it to drive like it does but I'll take these Racelands over my old AMR's any day. Ride is reasonably comfortable for coils yet so planted and about perfect neutral.

Engine was pretty much all SDA stuff for the time we've owned it. It's now going to be undergoing some pretty sweet upgrades once I get my wagon back up and going as the daily. The plans for the engine going into this car is a massive overbore (my old GE block from the SC coupe and the TC wagon) which brings it to 2.22l, high compression and supporting mods to make it a very capable N/A set up for auto x and the dragon.

[importsdontlikeme]

So don't do what I did kids.. Ordered some pistons (that would have worked (barely)) then CP gets back to me and says they can't get rings in the size I asked for. So they asked can you go to 3.5" bore, I called my machine shop and they said yes. Machine shop goes to do the final hone and we put a hole in my GE sleeves 😞 So now I have to send the block out to see if GE can custom make sleeves that are thicker at the bottom to accommodate the larger bore pistons.

Long story short this big bore engine would have already been together and in the car if it wasn't for this pretty major hiccup. I spun a rod bearing at the dragon last fall (oil starvation, need baffles) so I needed something to get the car going again. Longer story short I'm currently borrowing RJs engine 😅😂

Fingers crossed I can get the sleeves redone and use these beautiful pistons that CP made. Future plans for that set up include a sheet metal intake (or ITBs) and custom cams, possibly solid lifters. Already have forged rods and the full Ferrea valvetrain.

[leighv]

I think that 3.5 bore should bring some good Naturally aspirated things to you. maybe give the valves some more room to breathe (shrouding), and in general lots of NA engines were successful with 3.5" bores. Bless your wallet for the expense, many of us shall live vicariously through you, haha.
Definitely do some oil baffles, i made some horizontal ones that I cant prove work, but nothings blown up from them. Accu-sump as a backup, maybe? (that is probably very low cost in percentage of your modifications costs'!)

what rod length are you using?

love the update!

[importsdontlikeme]

1st/2nd gen scats are what I was planning to run. I have a set of crowers too but I'm thinking that's a bit overkill for what I'm going to do with this.

If I do a version 2.0 I'll probably go higher compression (depending on results) and 3rd gen rods.

It's definitely a pretty major set back putting a hole in the sleeves. I've had that GE block for over a decade now so it paid for itself in a way. I enjoyed it supercharged in my grey coupe, then turboed in the wagon. I thought I would retire it to a nice life of N/A use and it would only cost me the price of the pistons. Now that all went out the window 😔

So yes.. this is going to cost a lot of money for less gains then a stock LLO with a small turbo would produce but I want to try something different. Also N/A power is just fun 🤷🏻♂️

My buddy keeps telling me to K swap the car, I just don't know how I feel about that haha. I love how the LLO produces torque in the lower RPM range to pull you out of the corners. I spend a lot of time in 3rd gear (MP3) on the dragon and this set up should fatten up the mid range power band where I spend the most time already.

[leighv]

Crower will make the longer rod length ( that's what I have). I think they offer a lighter weight rod compared to their standard (crower) offering . I know i over paid but...
I think we're reaching a timeline where unless you have virgin OEM rods, it is not worth the risk unless beater/shitbox duty.
Also, it (hopefully) encouraged them to keep offering them , by me buying them.

Anything cars is a money pit - its a hobby anyway, get your money in smiles!

[importsdontlikeme]

Crower will make the longer rod length ( that's what I have). I think they offer a lighter weight rod compared to their standard (crower) offering . I know i over paid but...
I think we're reaching a timeline where unless you have virgin OEM rods, it is not worth the risk unless beater/shitbox duty.
Also, it (hopefully) encouraged them to keep offering them , by me buying them.

Anything cars is a money pit - its a hobby anyway, get your money in smiles!

Are yours the lighter crowers? Or the standard crowers?

Also when the BFG Rival's are on the car there's definitely no shortage of smiles. I really hope they continue to make those tires for years to come. They are phenomenal. They grip like the RE71R's but they stay in the game so much longer (they don't get greasy nearly as quick)

[leighv]

I am fairly certain I failed to specify the lighter rods even though I think I remember that I was aware of them. I dare speak no more of that misstep, even though it was three or four years ago now...

I had a set of Rival S's and indeed they were very nice. that was some years ago. The guy in the yellow s2000 in our region who is competitive nationally raved about em.

[leighv]

To clarify on that I had the short block built by a trusted contact in South Carolina who circle tracks (or did at the time) S-series. I was tired of dealing with harbor freight bore gauges and i wanted someone who cared to take care of things like line boring and just making sure everything is truly square