Sorry for the hi-jacked thread...
I didn't intend for this discussion to transpire to this extent here, I will add the following, then if more info is desired, I will start a separate thread.

atteberry,
addressing your first question, the forged crank from the early cars is much more durable then the later cast cranks... however they are significantly heavier!

Be careful stripping weight on cars, especially an '83 or '84! Once we built up the shop demo car and weighed it, we discovered we needed to add around 40-50 lbs of extra cage material to get close to legal weight (even with a 210 lb driver) And I would recommend waiting to pull that large battery until you get to corner balancing... It sometimes plays a very nice role as driver counter-weight!!

--end hijack sorry--

Any weight displaced to a lower position will make the car handle better.

I have 60 lbs of ballast in my car with a 230 driver with gear and 1/3 tank of fuel.

I can still remove about 40 more pounds from my car when I find the time.

The Braille battery I have is 7 lbs. Starts the car fine but does not have much in reserve.

The other side of the battery issues is that full size battery will run a car for an entire race with no alternator charge. So if you have issues with the alternator you can still run a 30-40 minture race on charge full size battery. That is handy when you have issues and need to make a race. The small ones don't have that capacity.

So if you are running for a season championship a DNS/DNF does not help much.

Atteberry wrote:


As cool as that sounds I am broke and cheap. I scrape together funds to race as much as I do. I know $600 for a good dash isn't a ton, but, to me, that's a race weekend and a tire. For that money, I'll do better improving myself with a cool shirt, data logger, or coaching. Not knocking your suggestion in any way, just explaining why it's a bit much for me now.

I've got a 924s, and I'm relatively young and thin, so cutting weight isn't as huge an issue. I'm looking to find free methods to get myself down just a bit more. I think the door bars are out, but I really should remove the passenger seat. I could probably remove some superfluous wires.

Rubber bumpers are easy, quick, and significant. I'm more worried about mass on the end of that long lever arm than I am by mass a bit high up.

I don't thing removing the stock door bars in the driver door is good idea. That thing is part of the standard crash protection. Sure the cage bars are more critical, but I would rather keep that in the door. The 2-3 pounds are worth it to me.

Gauges. You can still use the stock gauges and ditch the dash and fab simple light cover. Personally $600 is too much to spend, but it is your choice. It won't make you can faster, but might be less time.

Remember some cars cost $12-15 to build not because they are faster, but because they are prettier and neater. The good thing about this class is that a 8k can still do very well. It may not be "nice", but nice gauges and paying shop labor won't win races. What will is good planning and great driving.

Work smarter not harder!

And then there is the $3,500 Guards LSD. The $3,500 Rusikoff motor. Cages can run alot depending on who does it and what time line. I unfortunately had to pay to much since I needed it in a hurry and had limited choices.
The Hanksville cage is a great deal. Well thought out, pre fit and at a large discount. Definetly the way to go for a new Spec build.
Lots of things add up to a top car.
A solid driver can still put a decent car on the front row and win races.
Joe is the proof of that. It is still a drivers class.