Living with a G8 GT

Maverick Man Carbon Fiber Hood!

After a year of planning and waiting it has finally happened… I am the proud owner of a Maverick Man Carbon Fiber Hood!

Two years ago when I purchased my Maverick Man CF Spoiler, I knew I was in love with the way Carbon Fiber looks with the MGM body color of my G8. I wanted to get something for the front of the car (to balance out the spoiler), and a hood was towards the top of the list. Unfortunately, no one produced a CF hood for the G8!

After some persuasion Maverick Man agreed to attempt a CF hood, but first he needed a stock hood to make the molds. I had been looking for a good quality used G8 hood on eBay and other websites, but was having a really hard time finding one. Eventually I was able to track down a hood from a G8 owner (who had just finished a Holden front-end conversion) and had it shipped to Maverick Man. The shipping process was crazy (have you ever tried to ship something as large/heavy as a hood across the country?), but it all worked out in the end.

A couple of months ago Maverick Man released a few teaser photos of the hood, and it sparked huge interest from the G8 community. Fortunately, having been involved with the creation process, I was at the top of the list to receive a finished hood. Unfortunately, when the hood was ready to ship… I was on travel for work!

Well, there was no way I was going to pass-up my chance to get the hood, so I made a few calls and arranged for someone to receive the hood while I was away. Not only did they receive the hood, the even did a test fitting on another G8 to get some photos that I could share with the G8 community!

During the test fitting on the other G8 it was observed that some modifications would be required to get the hood latch to fully close. When it came time to install the hood on my G8 a couple of minor modifications were made to the hood latch mechanism such that it could be mounted ~ 1/4″ higher… and after that, the fitment of the hood is just awesome!

One of my favorite features of the hood is just how subtle the CF looks compared to the MGM body color. From a distance, or in anything other than direct sunlight, you can hardly tell that the hood is not stock… but when you get up close, you’re like “WTF, is that Carbon Fiber!?!”

Now I just have to get my act together and install the matching Maverick Man Kidney Grill Surrounds and Lower GXP Grill Surround!

Tilden Park Pre-Cruise

Next month the NorCal GOATs are having a Picnic in Tilden Park, and before the event there is a cruise. This year there was some debate if the cruise route should be changed, so a few of us headed out in the morning on Father’s day to Pre-Cruise the route.

Having been away from California for so long, and not one to shy away from a “spirited” drive through the hills, I decided to take a Pre- “Pre-Cruise” -Cruise of my own.

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The Pre- “Pre-Cruise” -Cruise was nice. This was the first time I had driven Redwood Rd. since performing the modifications to my G8… and it was a little disappointing. I was not disappointed in the car, rather in the driver! Pushing the car to what I felt was a safe speed on the road, I didn’t even make the car break a sweat! I’m sure I was going at least 5mph faster in the corners than the past, but it just didn’t feel like the car was working hard at all. What kept me from pushing any harder was the risk of cyclists on the road and blind corners… I guess I really need to get this car to the track!

Five of use met in Martinez and headed out on the route towards Tilden Park.

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While I have driven many of these roads before, I had never taken the trip around the reservoir on Alhambra Valley Rd. and Castro Ranch Rd. While not as fast/sweeping as taking Bear Creek Rd through the reservoir, it was very enjoyable with rolling hills and lots of great views. It really reminded me why I live in California!

After the Pre-Cruise we headed down Wildcat Canyon Rd (which was fun as always), over the reservoir on Bear Creek Rd, and into Concord for some lunch. Unfortunately we got stuck behind some slower traffic, but it gave me the perfect opportunity to test out the new brakes with some repeated 60mph-0 stops… There is nothing like the feeling of having your eyes thrown through the front of your skull!

In Concord we got lunch at a local pub, and talked about all sorts of car related things. It was really great to hangout with some NorCal GOATs, for the first time in a long time, and I can’t wait until July for the actual Cruise and picnic in Tilden Park!

CHC: Gene & Jude’s

Well, it was the last weekend for me in Chicago where I would be able to hang-out with the guys from the Chicago Holden Connection. Over the past several months has been really great to get to know another group of G8/GTO enthusiasts. I know I’ve had a bunch, and even picked-up some mod ideas!

After some hot dogs and fries from Gene’s & Jude’s (you don’t want to ask for ketchup!), we headed off to a local park for an impromptu “show & shine”… followed by a cruise and some donuts. I put together another teaser video for the CHC guys, hopefully I’ll have some time soon to work on the final video from all the events I went to!

I really have to thank all of the Chicago Holden Connection members for allowing me to be part of their club for the past few months. I’m sure people wondered what the heck an SUV (my rental car) was doing hanging around with all the G8’s/GTO’s!

CHC: Tsukasa of Tokyo

Another week in Chicago, and another meet with the Chicago Holden Connection. I seriously have no idea what I’d do with my time if I didn’t have a group of car guys to hang out with on a regular basis… especially being stuck in a Ford Edge rental car!

This week everyone met for a cruise around the country side, followed by lunch at Tsukasa of Tokyo. Not only did we get some great food, but also a great show (and some singed eyebrows!).

On-Track Video Reprocessed

After processing the video from a recent track day at the Autobauhn Country Club, I was a little disappointed with the results. I couldn’t figure-out a good way to do the track map… so gave-up. I did clipping back/forth between the various video feeds, but it resulted in a hard to follow video.

After some additional thinking… and nearly 20hrs of processing (boy I need to get a desktop for doing my video work) I have something I’m happy with:

I still have one more camera worth of video that I could add… maybe a unique shot for the session (driver’s feet, front/rear wheel, etc.). I’m thinking I could make the rear-view camera smaller and have a third video at the top… but I guess I’ll have to play around a little more in the future. At least for now I know I have a decent plan for when I hit the track!

HOD: Autobahn Country Club

Participation in track days are one of my main goals once I get back home, so when I heard a few G8’s were going to be attending an event an hour outside Chicago… I had to attend!

Hooked on Driving, one of the groups that puts on driving events in California, was running this Track Day… and it turned-out to be a great way to learn about what is required when doing track days.

HOD rented-out the Autobahn Country Club, a 3.56 mile 19-turn road course. There is little elevation change on this track, but the wide variety of corners makes it quite challenging.

I only took one lap around the track as a passenger, but I would imagine it would take me quite a while to learn the track. Fortunately there are cones that help with the process… marking turn-in, apex, and turn-out… and I thought they were just there to get in the way when I’m taking photos!

One of the reasons I wanted to attend this event was to see what others were doing at the track when it came to preparation for the event. The equipment people are using, tools people bring, etc. I was able to get quite a few ideas about harness bars, brake cooling, etc. I was actually quite surprised to see that most people drove to the track on the tires/brakes they used on circuit… I really figured I’d see more people changing these items out in the pits before the day started. I definitely learned a bunch spending the day in the pits!

The other reason I wanted to attend the event was to get some data! I’ve done some data logging on public roads, but have never done anything on a race circuit. I’ve really wanted to learn how to process data with laps, sectors, etc. I was lucky to have a G8 owner (CntryClub007) who allowed me to hook-up my gadgets to his car!

I’ve hooked-up the Race-Technologies DL1 to my car before, just with some Velcro on the dash, but had some difficulty on the super clean (and protected) dash of CntryClub007’s G8. Fortunately I had some of the stick-on mounts for my GoPro cameras… and with a little modification, I had a new mount made for the DL1. I’ve even ordered another suction cup so that I have a portable mounting solution that doesn’t require sticking something to a dash.

I had hoped on gathering data from multiple cars, but that didn’t work-out. Regardless… there is more than enough data to keep me busy for a while!

In addition to the data logger, I also had my GoPro video cameras mounted in/on the car.

I tried some new angles this time, but still think I need to find a few more to add some variety to the resulting videos. It is also quite difficult to clip together video/data from multiple track sessions to make an interesting video. I also had some difficulty getting the track map data from the data logger integrated into the video… I eventually gave-up this time, but I hope to figure it out.

My most difficult challenge this time was the audio! For some reason, when the car I was filming reached higher RPMs the audio recorded by the GoPro just went crazy. There was a high pitched “tinny” whistle sound. It turned-out that I had to remove selected frequencies from the audio… fortunately I have access Soundtrack Pro, which allowed me to pull-up a spectrum of the tones. I was able to match the noise to a set of harmonics starting around 1k Hz… and once I removed them, it sounded much better.

I have to say that I learned all sorts of things from today’s activities. I can’t wait to get home and put all of this to use with my car on-track!

CHC: Texas Roadhouse

I’ve been spending some time in the Chicago area, and after the 3rd snowiest blizzard in history (dropping over 20″ of snow in a 24hr period) the weather has finally started to warm-up. As the weather gets better, all the “garage queens” are starting to make their way out onto the roads.

The Chicago Holden Connection (CHC), the local G8 and GTO car club, has started their weekly meets. Despite not having my G8, and being stuck in a Ford Explorer for a rental car, everyone has been very welcoming of me.

Today I worked from 2am to 2pm then drove an hour to the meeting location… a Texas Roadhouse. I knew I was going to be late for lunch, but I wanted to get some video footage of the group. Before everyone else finished eating I took some time to get video of each of the cars there… nothing too fancy, but just some details, etc.

Once the guys finished eating we headed out on a short cruise to get some photos/videos. The road wasn’t very photogenic… basically two lanes of traffic. I had pair of cameras mounted on the back of my rental car and another one on the front. I was able to get a few clips, but the cruise was a bit unorganized… I found myself at the back of the pack and separated from most of the other cars after a few traffic lights.

After a pit-stop to regroup we headed off to a park for some photos. I was able to keep myself towards the front of the group and it allowed me to get some good footage of the cars I hadn’t shot earlier. There was also a brief stretch of “winding” roads that looked really good on video.

I’m going to a Track Day in the area tomorrow, so decided to get a hotel room out here… rather than driving back/forth to the city. I figured after the long day… sleep would be a good thing, and I was right. The hotel worked out well, but for some reason I just couldn’t help staying-up way too late putting together a teaser video.

I plan on attending a few more events with the CHC, so hopefully I can put together a nice video for them.

Better late than never: Mt Hamilton Videos

Almost a year ago a few of the NorCal GOATS got together for a cruise up Mt. Hamilton. Recently another group of GTOs headed up Mt. Hamilton, and it motivated me to finally process the videos I recorded on the first cruise.

Part 1:

Part 2:

Wednesday Night Drags

Infineon Raceway has weekly bracket racing events on Wednesday nights. The weather in California has been rainy for the past two weeks, so there were quite a few people who took advantage of the nice weather. Temperatures were up to 80 degrees, which didn’t help the DA, but made for a enjoyable evening. Unfortunately there was a 10mph head wind most of the night. I know I didn’t setup my car for drag racing, but I have been curious to see what it can do in the 1/4-Mile.

I headed to the track alone, but met-up with another G8 owner and a couple of his buddies. Having never raced at Infineon I was a little out of my element (I’m normally behind a camera at the racetrack). I figured things out fairly quickly and staged-up for my first pass.

This was the first time to the track after the extensive modifications had been performed. Specifically the supercharger and the rear end/suspension bits. Unfortunately, tires (drag radials) were not on my upgrade list… So, with the low-end torque from the Maggie, the 3.45 gears, and the stock tires, I knew traction was going to be a big concern.

For the first run I decided to just let the car do its thing (didn’t even air down the tires). I left the transmission in ‘Drive’ and left the Traction Control enabled. I launched at idle and the car pulled-out the best run of the night… A 12.98 @ 108.09 mph.

In the subsequent runs I tried launching from 1st without Traction Control, launching in 2nd at idle, and finally launching in 2nd at 1100rpms. I was able to get 60′ times in the 2.0x second range, but there was quite a bit of wheel spin whenever I jumped into the throttle off the line.

It seems all the rear-end bits did their job… As despite having traction issues, I never once developed any wheel-hop (which was killing me before).

While the times weren’t what I was hoping for, I was really happy to test out the car and try a couple of launching ideas I’ve been thinking about. I think any future trips down the strip are going to require a different set of tires!

Suspension Upgrades Continue

The last time the G8 was up on the lift I found that in two days of driving I broke the front Sway Bar End Link. After a temporary fix (just popping the back into the socket and inverting the End Link) I ordered new replacement BMR parts. Turns out it was a good idea, as after yesterday’s drive on Mines Rd. I broke it again. Today I had the BMR replacement End Links installed.

They are adjustable in length, which is really nice… although, it would have been nicer if they were “counter-threaded” so that adjustments could be made with them still on the car (Heck, my RC Car can do that).

I can not feel a difference between the stock End Links and the BMR replacements, but time will tell if they hold-up to the abuse better.