I sold this car in November 2001 but the page & pictures will be left up for the heck of it..
A FEW QUICK FACTS ABOUT MY BUICK...
I bought the car in January of 1998. It is a Regal Limited that was ordered with the Turbo T package. White exterior [the paint is still original from 1987] and burgandy velour interior... Buick only built 1035 of these cars, which makes mine pretty rare. It also has some very unique options such as: the soft padded landau top with the very rare coach lamps, lower stainless trim, front cornering marker lamps, lower interior door panels are lighted as well.. So, my car was sought after car as far as the turbocharged Buick automobiles go, due to the old person looks but monster drivetrain. [police would never give the car a second glance] As well, it's fully loaded with every option you could order it with, with one exception.. that being the power moon roof which I would rather not have anyhow due to problems with leaks. Since the day I bought this car, it has been my daily driver, weekend warrior, track racer and I have put over 40000 KMs on it since I bought it.
MODIFICATIONS:
SHORTBLOCK: The block is 30 over, TRW forged pistons, Speed Pro rings, stock connecting rods - (resized, shot peened & polished, installed using ARP rod bolts), block was align honed, crankshaft was cut 10 thou on the mains, and is still standard on the rods, H-series rod and main bearings used, as well as Durabond high performance cam bearings, rotating assembly was balanced, ARP main studs were used to hold it all together. Camshaft is stock (bought a brand new one from GM) using the correct GM lifters, upgraded heavy duty cam button, Speed Pro stock replacement timing chain with the steel gears, front cover is the stock one, oil pump is the stock one rebuilt...I added a magnetic oil drain plug from ATR a few weeks back.
HEADS: Heads are stock UNported low milers (40000 miles) that were given to me by a buddy when he bought the Champion Iron heads. They now have Comp Cams 980 valve springs installed.. TURBO: Stock turbocharger fully ported and polished by me. As well I added a billet inlet bell from a TA 49 and opened up the inlet of the compressor housing on the stocker to match the larger TA 49 inlet bell. Wastegate hole is opened up to .900". I ported the daylights out of the stock cast elbow and installed a larger 1.300" poppet valve.
Wastegate is the factory style adjustable actuator, with an extra helper
spring that hooks from the swing arm to the wastegate bracket. I
added this to compensate for overtightening the actuator rod to
achieve high boost.(20 + PSI). INTERCOOLER: Stock intercooler which has the larger 2.5" inlet installed. I built a custom intercooler scoop using the top half of the factory scoop and a custom bottom half that I built out of fiberglass. DOWNPIPE/EXHAUST: Modern Musclecar two piece 3" downpipe that hooks up to the stock (highly ported) elbow, Hooker 2.5" dual exhaust kit (nice to have tailpipes again). I ditched the Hooker muffs and used Straightline Performance mufflers which are a straight through design. FUEL SYSTEM: Red Armstrong XP PLUS high flow intank fuel pump, BGC adjustable fuel pressure
regulator W/ Auto Meter guage, Casper Electronics fuel pump hot
wire kit, stock 28 lb/hr fuel injectors. INTAKE / THROTTLE BODY: Stock
lower intake port matched to the heads by me. Stock modified upper plenum made by a friend of mine, which has a diverter plate welded in the the top of it equalize airflow to all 6 cylinders. This is used with a 1/2" aluminum plenum spacer to regain some of the volume lost in the plenum by welding in the diverter plate. Throttle body is a stock one bored out from 55mm to 62 mm, some minor port work by me, and throttle blade is knife edged to help airflow. SUSPENSION & BRAKES: Front sway
bar removed, stock coil springs, stock shocks, No
Hop traction bar system that relocates the upper control arms
(brand unknown - these were on the car when I bought it). Front brakes are brand new stock, rear brakes have the S-10 wheel cylinders and long brake shoes made of softer material. I added these to aid in powerbraking the car into higher boost levels while trying to stage my car. REAR END: Stock GM
8.5" with posi trac and factory 3.42 gears. TRANSMISSION: Is a rebuilt unit with ALL the better internal parts, such as a 10 vein front pump, better clutches, hardened input shaft etc.. Currently using a Transcrafters Red Stripe 2900-3000 RPM stall speed torque convertor. Also have an Art
Carr transmission cooler mounted in front of car. ECM/CHIPS: Stock ECM with
Red Armstrong R93 street chip, Joe Lubrant 110 race chip with 28* timing. MISCELLANEOUS: K&N
air filter, ATR stainless MAF pipe, driver and passenger side valve cover breathers - (K&N), Auto Meter 20-0-20 boost guage, BGC lightweight front
bumper brackets, polyurethane motor mounts on both... driver and passenger sides, engine tie down strap, Magnecor 10mm spark plug wires, Custom rear seat brace that I designed and built, Prime wheels
(wish I had the original ones...), 26x10 slicks at the track,
Modern Musclecar Scanmaster scantool for tuning, TPS sensor @
.40/4.62, 1 screen removed from the mass air sensor, coolant
lines to throttle body plugged, I no longer use the factory boost
solenoid and use a Modern musclecar dial a boost (in car bleeder valve). I think that about covers it. TRACK TIMES: Got to the track on September 22, 2001. The car ran 12.19 @ 108.90 MPH w/a 1.69 60'. Backed that up with a 12.20 @ 108.18 MPH w/a 1.66 60'. On the 12.19 pass I ran 22 PSI boost and the car ran strong with no detonation. So, for the last pass of the day (12.20 pass) I turned the boost up to 24 PSI, which slowed the car down a tad as indicated by the ET and MPH. The stock turbocharger is simply out of efficiency even with a 1 hour cooldown and a bag of ice sitting on the intercooler.. The runs were made with the Joe Lubrant 28* 110 race chip, C16 fuel, M/T 26x10 slicks, and uncapped exhaust. SOME LINKS:
THANKS FOR CHECKING OUT MY CAR!
