This is the story of my 86 SVO.
The car is the Accidental SVO because I accidentally bought it when I was visiting another shop in town. I popped in to the shop next door while I was there and well ... you know. Come to think of it there was also an accident in my truck that helped shape the project too. More on that later. I got it so cheap I'm embarrassed to tell you. Then the DMV decided to crap on my parade .
Now I have this SVO and I have to figure out what to do with it. I spent the afternoon troubleshooting the no start condition and had it running by the end of the day. Good so far. The test drive didn't go so well. There were all kinds of weird problems with this thing. I spent the next year and a half discovering a multitude of problems, at least half related to the previous owners mad wiring skills.100 ft of wire, 2 weak fuel pumps, a misguided electronic boost controller install and a box full of crap pulled off the car later, I had something to work with.
Once I sorted out the issues I started driving the thing on weekends and to work on the odd Friday. Everybody thought it odd that the 40 something year old dyno tuner guy was driving an old 4 cyl. My thought on that is "any dumbass can make 400 horsepower with a V8". I had it running pretty well and started carving up the back roads between Clayton and Brentwood. This was a lot of fun. I started making this drive at 6 am on Sundays to get a clear track..er road. I should have realized I was getting out of control when I started taking the 35 mph turns in 4th gear. Needless to say I had a real close call. Turns out at 45 years old I was still too immature to be driving this thing on the street. It was time to go back to the racetrack. After my wife got done rolling her eyes, I took it to a track day at Thunderhill.
The car ran pretty well. Turns out the suspension had been worked over by Maier Racing down in Hayward back in the day. It came with 800lb springs up front, 325lb out back with Koni yellows. Yes it was a bit rough on the street! The stock brakes completely sucked of course. After a few hard laps I had to cruise for a lap to cool them off, so all the guys i worked so hard to pass just cruised right on by. On the way home the car just didn't feel right. Just before getting on Interstate 5 for the 100 mile trip home I decided to pull over. The right front brake was stuck and the wheel was smoking hot. I pulled into Walmart and wandered around for an hour while it cooled off. Then I pulled it apart and beat the ever loving crap out of the caliper while squeezing the piston with a huge pair of Channel locks. No problem, just drive the 100 miles home with the e brake.
to be continued after I read the rules for posting images...
Chris