Mad Wagon II, '79 Cutlass Pro-Touring Wagon

[Longroof79]

Ben,
We'll keep tuned in on your progress. I'm sorry to hear that the insurance company is still dragging their feet on Roman's settlement. It's typical how they operate.

So the Mad Wagon will be your daughter's car, or will be your street cruiser? The Monza wagon might be a nice entry level car for her.
I hope your body guy is able to iron out that 1/4 panel like he said he can.

 

[SRD art]

When we went to AZ we also stopped by another G-Body wagon guy's place and picked up his old frame. He's doing an independent rear suspension full build with a different frame on his Malibu wagon and setting it up for the Silver State Classic. I read a while ago that back in the day drag racers liked the Vega wagons because they were more stable at speed, so maybe there's something to that.

Here are some pics of the old frame. It's been clearanced for rear brake calipers, dual exhaust and has a thrown together trailer hitch. I will be starting the frame notch and boxing it after work today and then building a better hitch. At that point I'll get on to some bracing. Over all it's in decent shape, no real bad rot or anything. More soon...

 

[liquidh8]

I'd love to take a road trip and visit some of you guys and go to some events. Not a whole lot good shows and events on the east coast.

 

[SRD art]

Jack- My Pumkinator now has my Nova's 12.5:1 drag race engine in it. I did a lot of research on how to make it run on pump gas and bought an MSD timing control, knock sensor gauge, wide band O2 gauge, and have put together a water/meth injection kit, but the engine is still pretty nasty and I wouldn't expect that great of mileage and streetability out of it. Also with the BFG Rival S 315-18 tires I don't want to put too many street miles on them to try to stretch their life, one set cost almost as much as what I initially paid for all 3 Cutlass wagons, lol! So a decent more street friendly daily driver is in order for me. I plan to use a tow dolly and tow Pumk with the MWII to events as well.

I put a lot of thought into building the Monza wagon, ultimately my daughter would've used that car to autoX. It already has a torque arm which is real decent for handling but there's only one company that I could find that makes aftermarket improved geometry control arms. Even with that the front suspension clip is held together with sheet metal and there isn't much room for improvement for good handling. What I came down to was planning on grafting in the front section of an S10 frame. They're pretty much the same track width and S10s and G bodies share suspension parts so there's plenty of aftermarket support and I could use some parts I have laying around. A V8 S10 swap is fairly easy and it would be converted to 5 lug in the process. I had also planned to use the 16x8 Trans Am GTA wheels I have on the Monza too. Had I not decided to build the MWII the Monza would've gotten built with the 5.3/4L60. Ultimately my daughter wants a lowered Cali style old VW Beetle so I'm not sure if building the Monza will fit in our game plan after all. I'd take a reasonable offer at this point for it but I'm not at the point of officially advertising it just yet.

 

[SRD art]

Liquid- We're in south western Utah, right near the AZ border, and we have to travel down to Vegas or SoCal for events. If you ever do take a trip this far out we can plan it around an event. 🙂 I think it'll be a real hoot to see our 3 '78/79 Cutlass wagons show up to an event, 4 of 'em would be even better. 😉

 

[clean8485]

I really like the rendering Ben. I'll be tuning in on this one, to see how it turns out. Kinda wish my '81 Cutlass Cruiser hadn't been such a rust bucket.

 

[Turbo Zach]

I really like what you have done with your builds so far. I have been following them quietly, till now. I have a question. How did you make the knock gauge work? Do you have some sort of stand a lone knock monitoring system?

 

[SRD art]

I haven't actually hooked it all up yet so I can't testify of it's accuracy and functionality yet. I did a lot of internet research tracking down the info but didn't save it, my bad. I got sidetracked from the car's rebuild a while ago so IIRC I bought an led knock sensor gauge, a knock sensor for a TPI 350 Chevy, and you use the ESC electronic spark control module used on certain carbureted non computer controlled Chevy trucks. It's really a pretty basic set up.

I already installed the knock sensor on the engine so I don't have the box or a part number. It screws into the coolant drain port on the side of the block. I read all engines have unique harmonics so a sensor for a 305 per say won't have a correct signal on a 350, you must use a 350 sensor on a 350. My engine is a 400 SBC but they were never used on them as far as I know so I bought the 350 unit and am hoping it works ok. With the MSD timing control I can play with timing to make it ping to test the gauge.

This wiring diagram will give you an idea, although IIRC the gray wire C goes to the gauge instead of the ECU-
http://www.jegs.com/installationinstructions/500/510/510-534-136.pdf

Knock Gauge- https://www.summitracing.com/parts/...MItf2C_Pe_2AIVEdtkCh1fEAPYEAQYASABEgLGrvD_BwE

PT-ESC-A ESC Module pigtail -https://www.ebay.com/itm/Electronic-Spark-Control-Module-ESC-Connector-Pigtail-84-95-GM-TBI-HEI-A-/262011340467

ESC116 Borg Warner ESC Module- https://www.oreillyauto.com/detail/...5/module/esc116/2599950/1991/chevrolet/camaro

Casper's Knock sensor instructions-

 

[UNGN]

He's doing an independent rear suspension full build with a different frame on his Malibu wagon and setting it up for the Silver State Classic. I read a while ago that back in the day drag racers liked the Vega wagons because they were more stable at speed, so maybe there's something to that.

At high speed with a crosswind, a car with with the center of pressure behind the center of gravity wants to turn into the cross wind instead of go with the cross wind. Its like an arrow: heavy arrowhead keeps CG forward, feathers keep the CP rearward.

The back glass our 2+2 not only makes the car more aerodynamic, it moves the CP more rearward and makes the car more aerodynamically stable. On Drag cars or Sports cars where the weight bias is moved rearward, it is very important to make sure the CP stays behind the CG or the car will want to swap ends... like shooting an arrow backwards.

 

[Turbo Zach]

Thank you. Very helpful. I have a knock sensor and a ESC box, because it is a draw through turbo car. No one has answered my question if I can tap into that yet. You did, so thank you. If it doesn't work I should be able to do what you did and it will work. Sorry for the hyjac, back to awsome wagon builds!