Lidio
01-06-2004, 04:12 PM
Happy New Year to every one.
I just want to say that I’ve never been so jealous of my customers and their cars before until I dove into this whole Marauder thing in the last 15 months or so. I see and get to drive and tune a lot of very fast, good looking and respectable cars here at my shop. It has its good days and it’s very fair share of head aches too.
Getting to drive all these cars for testing and tuning purposes is a lot of fun but it’s still not the same as parking it in YOUR garage at the end of the day and giving it your version of TLC. We’ve installed several of the Trilogy kits now and I personally put the raps on all of them and insure that their running correctly. This is very painful for me not being one of mine. Well that’s gona change! Along with purchasing my own MM a couple of months ago…..
The day after X-MAS Jerry personally delivered my Trilogy kit for my own Marauder!
Next to watching my kids opening gifts this past holiday… this was the second most exciting thing for me these past holidays :)
As aggressive as I might seem to some people with my own cars, being a performance shop owner and Mustang racer, I recognize the limits of what makes a true street car that’s fast and truly driveable and a highly modified/compromised car that’s only tolerable on the street to its owner.
Most of you who are into cars know what I mean by this. As a teenager or a younger car-guy/girl, you don’t mind rattles, clunks, loudness, exhaust smell, compromises, primer, heavy clutch pedal effort, poor header clearance… you get the picture. As a more responsible adult we want the performance but not the compromises and problems, at least that’s what I demand. I’ve learned the balance between really, really fast cars and where to stop with radical mods before the car is no longer a true street car. It just becomes “Street Tolerable”, and not truly trip worthy or dependable.
I have a ’88 LX that has seen a ton of mods and ups & downs in the last 15 years and now it’s come full circle and it gets no more from here. It has a 392cu in stroked 351W with a 4-bolt SVO block. The car is extremely fast all around. It has all the sway bars intact and normal, nice every day slightly beefed up suspension. It has gone a best of 9.71 @ 146 in ¼ mile in full street trim with the exception of slicks. No gutting, and all the sway bars and all that normal road stuff not removed to achieve this. It puts down 650RWHP with 18psi of Vortech boost and runs on Turbo-Blue race gas full time but can run on pump premium in a pinch for normal driving. It’s gone a best of 9.49 with the sway bars and all of the exhaust removed. This car has a lot of history and helped put me on the map. Most won’t understand or believe how truly a street car this is until they drive in it. It even has four mufflers in an effort to make the 3” exhaust sound good and quiet. This car has an AOD-E (similar to out MM’s 4R70W’s) and has had no problems running high nines for over four years now!!
The reason I mentioned my ’88 LX here is because I want people to under stand that I’ve seen and am cable of some very fast small block and modular Ford stuff. My Marauder even though I’m going to try to get it to run very good…
I or it (my M.M.) won’t fall victim to the competition that may be stirred up by other Marauder owners and vendors. I will not turn my MM into a rattle trap with loud exhaust and compromised drivability just to try and be the hero MM guy and tuner. This is the same attitude I’ve had in the last decade. I am one of the few who didn’t bucth my true street cars just to be a hero and find speed every weekend to try to sell/promote parts & service and in the end had a car that was way past what the average guy wanted to see or could relate to.
I intend for my MM to go very low 12’s in the ¼ mile and hopefully high 11’s with the stock un-opened motor as long as it will go. And it will all be done with a Trilogy kit and possibly a 30-50HP shot of NOS on top of it all to get that 11second ¼ mile out of it. I want to be able to still take my family and my folks somewhere in the MM and make sure they don’t think or feel it’s a raded out tin-can of a car. I have Mustangs for that, not my yellow ’88 although - others less streetable.
Now for the recipe and plans for my own MM this spring and season;
Of course it will have a Trilogy bower and the boost will be bumped up to about 13-14psi if their supplied blower will do this when overdriven with different pulleys. It already has 4.10s and it will also have the widened rear rim thing we do and Nitto drag radials. The exhaust for now will be left completely alone from front to back. I don’t know what it is about my personal MM, but it’s the loudest stock MM I’ve ever heard. It’s very noticeable how much louder it is than most other stock exhaust MM. Every time I take someone new for a ride the first thing they say “Oh… you did something with the exhaust”??. And because the Trilogy blower seems to not respond with big gains to just a cat-back system (about 11-15RWHP), for now I’m going to leave it all alone. It sounds like it should sound with the stock stuff…. Noticeable, Nice, but distinctively not a “Kid Mustang” type sound. This could change later but I’m confident it will go high 11’s and then some in the ¼ mile with all of the stock exhaust components.
I’ve attached some links to Video & PIX of my yellow ’88 LX… I hope they can be viewed.
Yellow LX At The Drags (http://www.alternativeauto.com/lidspix/88LX.wmv)
Thanks for taking the time to read these long posts.
Just trying to let people see that we’re not a hot shot performance shop that just throws a bunch of parts at cars only looking at peak RWHP numbers and forgetting about the customer’s driveability demands and requirements of a true street car.
Thanks
http://www.alternativeauto.com/lidspix/yellowfront.jpg
http://www.alternativeauto.com/lidspix/yellowengine.jpg
http://www.alternativeauto.com/lidspix/yellowrearside.jpg
I just want to say that I’ve never been so jealous of my customers and their cars before until I dove into this whole Marauder thing in the last 15 months or so. I see and get to drive and tune a lot of very fast, good looking and respectable cars here at my shop. It has its good days and it’s very fair share of head aches too.
Getting to drive all these cars for testing and tuning purposes is a lot of fun but it’s still not the same as parking it in YOUR garage at the end of the day and giving it your version of TLC. We’ve installed several of the Trilogy kits now and I personally put the raps on all of them and insure that their running correctly. This is very painful for me not being one of mine. Well that’s gona change! Along with purchasing my own MM a couple of months ago…..
The day after X-MAS Jerry personally delivered my Trilogy kit for my own Marauder!
Next to watching my kids opening gifts this past holiday… this was the second most exciting thing for me these past holidays :)
As aggressive as I might seem to some people with my own cars, being a performance shop owner and Mustang racer, I recognize the limits of what makes a true street car that’s fast and truly driveable and a highly modified/compromised car that’s only tolerable on the street to its owner.
Most of you who are into cars know what I mean by this. As a teenager or a younger car-guy/girl, you don’t mind rattles, clunks, loudness, exhaust smell, compromises, primer, heavy clutch pedal effort, poor header clearance… you get the picture. As a more responsible adult we want the performance but not the compromises and problems, at least that’s what I demand. I’ve learned the balance between really, really fast cars and where to stop with radical mods before the car is no longer a true street car. It just becomes “Street Tolerable”, and not truly trip worthy or dependable.
I have a ’88 LX that has seen a ton of mods and ups & downs in the last 15 years and now it’s come full circle and it gets no more from here. It has a 392cu in stroked 351W with a 4-bolt SVO block. The car is extremely fast all around. It has all the sway bars intact and normal, nice every day slightly beefed up suspension. It has gone a best of 9.71 @ 146 in ¼ mile in full street trim with the exception of slicks. No gutting, and all the sway bars and all that normal road stuff not removed to achieve this. It puts down 650RWHP with 18psi of Vortech boost and runs on Turbo-Blue race gas full time but can run on pump premium in a pinch for normal driving. It’s gone a best of 9.49 with the sway bars and all of the exhaust removed. This car has a lot of history and helped put me on the map. Most won’t understand or believe how truly a street car this is until they drive in it. It even has four mufflers in an effort to make the 3” exhaust sound good and quiet. This car has an AOD-E (similar to out MM’s 4R70W’s) and has had no problems running high nines for over four years now!!
The reason I mentioned my ’88 LX here is because I want people to under stand that I’ve seen and am cable of some very fast small block and modular Ford stuff. My Marauder even though I’m going to try to get it to run very good…
I or it (my M.M.) won’t fall victim to the competition that may be stirred up by other Marauder owners and vendors. I will not turn my MM into a rattle trap with loud exhaust and compromised drivability just to try and be the hero MM guy and tuner. This is the same attitude I’ve had in the last decade. I am one of the few who didn’t bucth my true street cars just to be a hero and find speed every weekend to try to sell/promote parts & service and in the end had a car that was way past what the average guy wanted to see or could relate to.
I intend for my MM to go very low 12’s in the ¼ mile and hopefully high 11’s with the stock un-opened motor as long as it will go. And it will all be done with a Trilogy kit and possibly a 30-50HP shot of NOS on top of it all to get that 11second ¼ mile out of it. I want to be able to still take my family and my folks somewhere in the MM and make sure they don’t think or feel it’s a raded out tin-can of a car. I have Mustangs for that, not my yellow ’88 although - others less streetable.
Now for the recipe and plans for my own MM this spring and season;
Of course it will have a Trilogy bower and the boost will be bumped up to about 13-14psi if their supplied blower will do this when overdriven with different pulleys. It already has 4.10s and it will also have the widened rear rim thing we do and Nitto drag radials. The exhaust for now will be left completely alone from front to back. I don’t know what it is about my personal MM, but it’s the loudest stock MM I’ve ever heard. It’s very noticeable how much louder it is than most other stock exhaust MM. Every time I take someone new for a ride the first thing they say “Oh… you did something with the exhaust”??. And because the Trilogy blower seems to not respond with big gains to just a cat-back system (about 11-15RWHP), for now I’m going to leave it all alone. It sounds like it should sound with the stock stuff…. Noticeable, Nice, but distinctively not a “Kid Mustang” type sound. This could change later but I’m confident it will go high 11’s and then some in the ¼ mile with all of the stock exhaust components.
I’ve attached some links to Video & PIX of my yellow ’88 LX… I hope they can be viewed.
Yellow LX At The Drags (http://www.alternativeauto.com/lidspix/88LX.wmv)
Thanks for taking the time to read these long posts.
Just trying to let people see that we’re not a hot shot performance shop that just throws a bunch of parts at cars only looking at peak RWHP numbers and forgetting about the customer’s driveability demands and requirements of a true street car.
Thanks
http://www.alternativeauto.com/lidspix/yellowfront.jpg
http://www.alternativeauto.com/lidspix/yellowengine.jpg
http://www.alternativeauto.com/lidspix/yellowrearside.jpg