Thinking about GRM

jaguar cone killer maybe? Maybe an older Xj6 with SBC?

bluej said: also, just to be clear, I think we all realize it takes time for stuff like that to happen and be in the mag, so we don't expect it next issue. I think we're just trying to put bugs in your ear for future stuff. i'm sure we're not going to be cancelling our subs if it doesn't happen.

They have got me on the hook for at least 8 more years...unless things get dramatically worse over that time, I will be buying 10 more years.

GRM should buy my Saturn SW2 and drop a second drivetrain in the back, powering the rear wheels, creating a 250+hp AWD 2700lb WRX killer.

OK, more seriously, a basic build article or two for the S series Saturns may be worth looking into. They're getting on in years, they're a dime a dozen, and the aftermarket has changed a lot since the last time they were covered (James Walker Jr's article a while back). GRM has said repeatedly that these make great sleepers, and you're right. So how do we do it?

(If you would like me to write such an article, drop me a line... )

maroon92 wrote: They have got me on the hook for at least 8 more years...unless things get dramatically worse over that time, I will be buying 10 more years.

Yesssss. Me too.

I've been a reader since 94 and subscriber since 97 and I think the mag is doing just fine. In fact I think it's better than it's been in years. There was a point about 5-6 years ago where I let my subscription laps as it was feeling old and there seemed to be 3 Mini articles in every issue but nothing else, but it's in great shape these days.

I get tired when people complain about the $$'s of the cars in the magazine, I think they are forgetting several things.
First, remember the reader demographics discussion from last week? 87% of readers have an income of over $75k a year and 31% have an income over $125k. With that group a $600 exhaust and $1,000 remap doesn't seem so out of the ball park.
Second, while those same things seem expensive in isolation, I guarantee a car like the project 330i as do it all (DD and weekend toy) car is in the long run cheaper than a used daily driver come tow car and a full on Street prepared or Street Mod cone crusher.
Third, the car is still cheaper to buy (including the mods) maintain insure, title than an M3 that they are using as a benchmark. All in all I call that project a win.

That said I think there have been some great requests for articles in this thread. The roll bar / roll cage article has been called for a number of times in different formats, I think that's a must. Please don't make it just another installation of an off the shelf bar, or building a specific cage for a single car, you've done that to death. Let's have a discussion of what's needed for different types of events, what's rational, a daily driven occasional HPDE car doesn't need a full WC cage and a rally cross car doesn't need a full Rally America cage. But what happens if you have a car that you want to autocross, run Hillclimb's with SCCA and do time trials with NASA? Can you build a cage or bar that meets all those requirements but is still safe and practical on the street. Also the big issue of the broomstick test on popular cars such as street driven Miata's/Boxsters/S2K's

Another article I'd love to see is the diminishing returns of suspension upgrades. You sort of did this a couple of years ago with a Scoobie where you started with a stock car then upgraded tires then wheels and tires, then added sta bars then coil over's etc.

I'd love to see a test where you have the same car on the same wheel's and tires with the same driver.
First set up is stock, but with the final wheel's and tires.
Second is the same car, but add off the shelf affordable parts. Upgrad the shocks (Koni/Tokico/Bilseitns or similar) paired with OTS 'lowering springs' but specifically NOT coil over's and OTS sta bar upgrades. That's the kind of package you can get all in under $1k for most cars with a couple of clicks at TireRack or one of a million marque specific vendors. It's also the type of package run by thousands of people.
Third is same car but with mid/high level coil over's set up specifically for ST type rules added to top end adjustable sta bars, rod end type end links, good camber plates as applicable etc This package could easily run $5-6k or more.
The benefit of this is that people can see what a diminishing rate of return you get. I think a lot of people get trapped into thinking that they absolutely have to have $5k shocks on their Miata to compete in STS or similar. It would also be great to have an occasional driver and a National level driver to show how it takes experience to make the most of high end equipment. I would bet that the results would come out something like this

                          Stock            Off the shelf               High end

Occasional driver 50 seconds 45 seconds 44,5 seconds
National driver 46 seconds 43 seconds 41.5 seconds

But I'd love to be proved right or wrong wither way.

Just my $0.02

I just got to read the CRX article last night. High hopes had me all excited. BUT was a tad disappointed as it to fell in to the could have been stories.

First off yes it was an interesting read BUT basically it was a swap a computer into a car that has a strange motor that some one almost completed properly, and have it tuned. No real value to anyone unless you have that car. I will also say that it really sounded like a commercial for the shop that did the tune. (not really that bad but just saying. . . . ) How come you guys did not do the tune? Maybe that is the difference here. Most of us would have to research the thing and lean how to tune it. Then take it to the dynamo and use the results to get is correct and go back or if we are lucky you get it correct. Also I have noticed that as of late GRM articles are siting others for stats or benchmarks of what should be. What is the GRM stance? What is the GRM benchmark? What is acceptable to GRM when building a car?

What would have been interesting is to start with a stock HF CRX and research and then do a / the swap. Document the pitfalls and options. Why not got turbo versus a HO JDM motor. What are the trans options and in turn how does that affect your choice of motor and what about the half shafts. You may have the perfect motor and trans for the car but can you get the power to the wheels. Obviously what are the cost implications with the options? Then document the build (more parts washer and pressure washer photos are a good thing but I did like the photos of the O2 bung welding) . ..

You know I think the problem is that most of the projects were probably conceived when the economy was doing much better. The easy way out most of the time is just through money at a problem. The reality is that with the current economy most can not do that. Especially if it is a decresinary expenditure.

The other strange thing is GM's biggest claim to fame is probably the 20xx Challenge and it is all about spending as little as possible and putting as much elbow grease blood sweat and used / home depot parts into a car and putting a heaping helping of whoopass on the shinny new BMW. However the magazine seems to be getting away from that exact line of thinking.

As I noted before it has been about just getting on the web and purchasing this and that and then bolting it on and putting it on a dyno. Yes it is a tried and true recipe for an article but the pattern is starting to repeat its self. How about building something and not putting it on a dyno? Tell us what GRM thinks when they are done. Choose a part based on how you like it how it makes you feel how it makes the car actually drive. Period!! I really don't care what a dyno says about an exhaust I want to know what GRM thinks.

Since I am on a bit of a roll here I may as well go one more place. Installations and working on cars. It seems that most of the time GRM is having pro's and shops do everything. I have always equated the staff at GRM as regular folks. I want to know how installing the short shifter in the car went from a regular person... . . . A GRM staff member! Now I know that as GRM grows time and commitments to sponsors and advertisers as well as promotion of the GRM at various events and lets not forget seat time at events makes finding the time to get elbow deep into an engine compartment very difficult. I equate this to GRM being successful. Tim as well as everyone else at GRM deserves a huge pat on the back. They have worked hard to get there! I know a thing or three about starting a business. It is the hardest thing you can ever do! PB&J gets old fast but you keep your head down and keep eating them! This is why I don't bash the articles about the new BMW and listening to Tim talk about his son's driving hits really close to home. I really like that!!!!! The whole point of this is to have GRM add content back in and not take the current content out.

Again I am rambling on. I am sure that some of the things I have said here are going to be annoying to some and I may have actually insulted a person or three. Well bash me back!!

You know what else I'd like to see? Some decent forum software with a few minor issues cleaned up, you know unimportant stuff like numbering, bullet points, basic formatting. Nothing important!!!! This forum is the 2nd worst in the known universe to use, the worst being Rally Anarchy.

Adrian_Thompson wrote: You know what else I'd like to see? Some decent forum software with a few minor issues cleaned up, you know unimportant stuff like numbering, bullet points, basic formatting. Nothing important!!!! This forum is the 2nd worst in the known universe to use, the worst being Rally Anarchy.

Oh Man.. . . Start a new thread for this one. We have been down this road and covered that. The GRM gods have spoken. The forum is what it is. LOL

i guess this is all a matter of perspective. i personally think that GRM does a much better job than other mags at being practical in how they approach builds. it is inevitable that some articles just arent going to appeal to a particular reader. but there are some good ideas in this thread i'd like to +1. those are: more articles were the work happens in someone's garage or driveway. these are the kind of builds i can do and i think they give a lot of general ideas about how to approach a problem (even if you dont care about the 80's honda, miata, subbie, neon they are working on) the roll bar requirement article is an awesome idea. personal suggestions are autocross, maxton mile, and nhra comparisons. judging by the thread about the rules changes i think a lot of people will be interested in this. more articles on challenge cars. the dirty 30 and the cop car with the old school body were both interesting, but maybe elaborate more on the actual build side like team gutty's thread they posted. anyway, keep up the great work. it is still by far my favorite magazine to read!

You know I was thinking about what I just typed and the problem is that it is hard to get a off the shelf standard exhaust pipe supplier to put the money up and take an add. Further more if you your advertisers are say (insert high end muffler MFGR here) and then your article says that the off the shelf escort GT muffler is better you may have issues. Or in this case you may have less "issues" of GRM.

This is a real problem. A dance that I am glad I don't have to do.

Adrian_Thompson wrote: I've been a reader since 94 and subscriber since 97 and I think the mag is doing just fine. In fact I think it's better than it's been in years. There was a point about 5-6 years ago where I let my subscription laps as it was feeling old and there seemed to be 3 Mini articles in every issue but nothing else, but it's in great shape these days. I get tired when people complain about the $$'s of the cars in the magazine, I think they are forgetting several things. First, remember the reader demographics discussion from last week? 87% of readers have an income of over $75k a year and 31% have an income over $125k. With that group a $600 exhaust and $1,000 remap doesn't seem so out of the ball park. Second, while those same things seem expensive in isolation, I guarantee a car like the project 330i as do it all (DD and weekend toy) car is in the long run cheaper than a used daily driver come tow car and a full on Street prepared or Street Mod cone crusher. Third, the car is still cheaper to buy (including the mods) maintain insure, title than an M3 that they are using as a benchmark. All in all I call that project a win. That said I think there have been some great requests for articles in this thread. The roll bar / roll cage article has been called for a number of times in different formats, I think that's a must. Please don't make it just another installation of an off the shelf bar, or building a specific cage for a single car, you've done that to death. Let's have a discussion of what's needed for different types of events, what's rational, a daily driven occasional HPDE car doesn't need a full WC cage and a rally cross car doesn't need a full Rally America cage. But what happens if you have a car that you want to autocross, run Hillclimb's with SCCA and do time trials with NASA? Can you build a cage or bar that meets all those requirements but is still safe and practical on the street. Also the big issue of the broomstick test on popular cars such as street driven Miata's/Boxsters/S2K's Another article I'd love to see is the diminishing returns of suspension upgrades. You sort of did this a couple of years ago with a Scoobie where you started with a stock car then upgraded tires then wheels and tires, then added sta bars then coil over's etc. I'd love to see a test where you have the same car on the same wheel's and tires with the same driver. First set up is stock, but with the final wheel's and tires. Second is the same car, but add off the shelf affordable parts. Upgrad the shocks (Koni/Tokico/Bilseitns or similar) paired with OTS 'lowering springs' but specifically NOT coil over's and OTS sta bar upgrades. That's the kind of package you can get all in under $1k for most cars with a couple of clicks at TireRack or one of a million marque specific vendors. It's also the type of package run by thousands of people. Third is same car but with mid/high level coil over's set up specifically for ST type rules added to top end adjustable sta bars, rod end type end links, good camber plates as applicable etc This package could easily run $5-6k or more. The benefit of this is that people can see what a diminishing rate of return you get. I think a lot of people get trapped into thinking that they absolutely have to have $5k shocks on their Miata to compete in STS or similar. It would also be great to have an occasional driver and a National level driver to show how it takes experience to make the most of high end equipment. I would bet that the results would come out something like this Stock Off the shelf High end Occasional driver 50 seconds 45 seconds 44,5 seconds National driver 46 seconds 43 seconds 41.5 seconds But I'd love to be proved right or wrong wither way. Just my $0.02

I would personally be enthralled by this. Maybe start with cars that have a minimal initial investment, and try a bunch of cars? Kind of a "Hey, want to get into Autox on a budget, but want to be semi fast? Start with this, this, or this."

I think there's a lot of cars out there that people ignore because they just either don't know that there's potential, or haven't seen anyone else do them.

I'm sure most people if i pointed out that an EGT actually has decent potential in ST, would laugh. Just an example.

And to parrot everyone else's thoughts, i thoroughly enjoy the magazine as is, anyways, so my subscription is going nowhere.

93celicaGT2 wrote: And to parrot everyone else's thoughts, i thoroughly enjoy the magazine as is, anyways, so my subscription is going nowhere.

I hope no one thinks I started this to imply I was upset with GRM and I was not going to re up my 10 year scrip. Far from it!!! GRM is still top of the heap in the car mag world. In fact I have let all the other ones laps (and I don't miss them). I would re up but I think that would put me with something like 15-16 years of GRM to look forward to... . . Holly #@*& (yes I put those symbols in there) this means I could be reading this when I am 60 years old!!!!! Will there be a third mag called "GRM's AARP"?????

I would love to see a "caveman class" build from start to finish. Bonus if you do the work in an actual cave.

Or how many projects are beer induced. Motorcycle engine in a .. . . . .. Wait

Junkyard_Dog wrote: I would love to see a "caveman class" build from start to finish. Bonus if you do the work in an actual cave.

That would be sweet.& I know where y'all could get an old IROC-Z for the build.

GRM is the only mag I subscribe to. I do the 2 year plan so I can get a new favorite shirt with each renewal.

The magazine and the board have inspired and encouraged me to take on projects that I might have paid someone else to do or just given up on with out you. Keep up the good work & thanks for the support and inspiration.

David

I'd like to see more builds of older American iron: Falcon/Corvair/Nova/Barracuda/Vega et cetera. I think there's a lot of untapped corner carving potential in these cars, and most are surprisingly light.

My subsciption isn't going anywhere else either.

dean1484 wrote: A whole bunch of good and important opinions, but too much to really leave in and still post.....

Dean, From what you say, it sounds like you want to see GRM build their own challenge car, does that summarize it? Do it as a multiple issue set up?

To counter that- I would suggest that GRM contact one of their more common contributors to do that- knowing how much effort the team down at GRM's head quarters already put into the challenge + all the rest of the years events, we have to keep in mind, they have a finite amount of time to spend on stuff, too.

AFAIKT, for the most part, picture Andy and his family- that's the effort the Tim and Co put into the magazine already. Hard to put more.

But I do think it's realistic to "support" a regular writer to build and compete a car. Or if they know of a decent builder who can write and document pretty well- it can be a good long term plan. If I were the one to push a direction, though- I would go with the KISS concept, and not the wild swap concept- at MOST a supercharger(that's blower or turbo) or NOS add, for sure a simple engine swap (Honda upgrade or something), but not V8 into major fab.

We do have to bear in mind that there are already two caps to pretty much the entire Motorsports Marketing team- Grassroots and Clasic. Time IS a problem.

Eric

alfadriver wrote:

dean1484 wrote: A whole bunch of good and important opinions, but too much to really leave in and still post.....

Dean, From what you say, it sounds like you want to see GRM build their own challenge car, does that summarize it? Do it as a multiple issue set up?

Yes and no. It is a possible article or group of them but not the only story. Others have put up some great potential stories. But more fab and design with a bit more of a eye for value for money. I fall into the demographics that are typical to the readership of this mag but just because I have the scratch to get a new stainless steel exhaust for my Porsche does not mean I want to spend it when for half or 1/3 or 1/6th that price will get me something that will do the job. Ya I would expect to have to add a little under the car time but hay I did not get my money by spending it!

alfadriver wrote: To counter that- I would suggest that GRM contact one of their more common contributors to do that- knowing how much effort the team down at GRM's head quarters already put into the challenge + all the rest of the years events, we have to keep in mind, they have a finite amount of time to spend on stuff, too. AFAIKT, for the most part, picture Andy and his family- that's the effort the Tim and Co put into the magazine already. Hard to put more. But I do think it's realistic to "support" a regular writer to build and compete a car. Or if they know of a decent builder who can write and document pretty well- it can be a good long term plan. If I were the one to push a direction, though- I would go with the KISS concept, and not the wild swap concept- at MOST a supercharger(that's blower or turbo) or NOS add, for sure a simple engine swap (Honda upgrade or something), but not V8 into major fab. We do have to bear in mind that there are already two caps to pretty much the entire Motorsports Marketing team- Grassroots and Clasic. Time IS a problem. Eric

As I stated earlier it is the result of GRM becoming a sucess. They only have so much time. I compleetly understand.

In reply to alfadriver:

hmm... so Per's dad and Tommy should team up for a challenge build? That sounds fun.

kreb wrote: I'd like to see more builds of older American iron: Falcon/Corvair/Nova/Barracuda/Vega et cetera. I think there's a lot of untapped corner carving potential in these cars, and most are surprisingly light. My subsciption isn't going anywhere else either.

Great idea! But while it might seem logical to put this in CM I'd rather see it in Grassroots. I'm talking $5000 total budget not $5000 just for the engine rebuild. Let CM make it pretty later to get the most from the subject matter.

Junkyard_Dog wrote:

kreb wrote: I'd like to see more builds of older American iron: Falcon/Corvair/Nova/Barracuda/Vega et cetera. I think there's a lot of untapped corner carving potential in these cars, and most are surprisingly light. My subsciption isn't going anywhere else either.

Great idea! But while it might seem logical to put this in CM I'd rather see it in Grassroots. I'm talking $5000 total budget not $5000 just for the engine rebuild. Let CM make it pretty later to get the most from the subject matter.

Was that a tongue in cheek about the MG engine rebuild in CM? because that was crazy...

tuna55 wrote:

Junkyard_Dog wrote:

kreb wrote: I'd like to see more builds of older American iron: Falcon/Corvair/Nova/Barracuda/Vega et cetera. I think there's a lot of untapped corner carving potential in these cars, and most are surprisingly light. My subsciption isn't going anywhere else either.

Great idea! But while it might seem logical to put this in CM I'd rather see it in Grassroots. I'm talking $5000 total budget not $5000 just for the engine rebuild. Let CM make it pretty later to get the most from the subject matter.

Was that a tongue in cheek about the MG engine rebuild in CM? because that was crazy...

Never read that as I only get CM occasionally, but the builds I've seen a a tad out of my price range. Lack of space made me pass on several Falcons this past year. One was a really nice 67 4 door for $1200. Take one unloved generation and body style for cheap and add modern/Mustang bits for a practical sleeper? Sounds GRM to me!

Never read that as I only get CM occasionally, but the builds I've seen a a tad out of my price range. Lack of space made me pass on several Falcons this past year. One was a really nice 67 4 door for $1200. Take one unloved generation and body style for cheap and add modern/Mustang bits for a practical sleeper? Sounds GRM to me!

Exactly. Only I'd go for '61 to '65 because they were a little more compact and I prefer the way they look. The fabrication skills needed don't grow on every corner, but it could be done cheaply.

The stuff I really liked over the years.

1) Spec E30 build race project 2) Shock tunning/suspension guide and info from Joe Stimola (I keep that one in bag off stuff that goes to the track) 3) Tire testing - Although I careless about autocross vs track stuff.

In general I don't care that much about the 200x challenge or UTCC either. The 200x cars are interesting to a point, but done right take hours to build despite the cost. Plus concour, drag and autocross leave me flat. I just can't get excited about drag racing.

As for UTCC.. it is sort of interesting, but being just time trial format leaves me a litte cold. The fast cars are really just bought and some of the slow cars are... well slow.

The BMW 330 article was not bad despit being a more pricey car.

Maybe it all has to do with where I am coming from.

I race a cheap DIY car in NASA road racing. So what I find interesting are ways I can learn to better prepare my car or keep it running. I really like the SM Pro-shmoe comparison. It would be nice to see Pro tips on building a car to class rules on a DIY budget.

My goal on track is to maximize performace while also minimizing cost and prep time. Tips & tricks to help me do that are really apprerciated. That and seeing other guys who attempt to do that with sucess.