To Jimbo, Jim Craik, Alan, other friends and interested souls,
Six months ago the components that would become SPF #2285 began the fabrication and assembly process. *See bottom of this post for more build details.
On 28 May it was placed on board for its journey to N.Y. Harbor. It arrived on 23 June, cleared customs on 26 June, and was placed on a rail car on 28 June. It arrived, and is on the ground in Los Angeles, and will be trucked to Superformance in Irvine, arriving most likely on Monday or Tuesday, 16 or 17 July.
I did decide to go with the RBT or ZF transaxle. I still wanted a sequential, but most are made overseas, and those made here are mostly for off-road vehicles, and basically, no one knows too much about the paddle wheel computer controlled shifting mechanisms. No one that is except the companies who cater to the million dollar racers who have $45k budgets for the sequential tranny, and another $35k for all the shifting mechanisms.
There are both decent sequential trannys and shift systems made for far less than the NASCAR ones, but no one mechanic (nearby) either knows how to join the system, or has ever installed one. I really don't understand these circumstances too much, but I just had to move on. And yes thank you, I know the demand for such is not high. However, there were many who expressed interest in such systems, along with me, but they too were wary.
I went with Roush Performance Engines, and they agreed in principle to build a custom engine that is expected to be north of their top of the line 576 H.P. GT40 crate engine. It will feature a solid roller with additional valve train girdling for added strength at 7k rpm. I had to accept the idea that it would take longer, cost more, and have a 90-day warranty instead of 2-years.
The extra build time will consist mostly of intake polishing and bench flow testing of the exotic, relatively new FI intake, which has its own pros and cons, and may cause traditionalist unintended pain and suffering. They also agreed to use a different ECU of my choice, which also really pleased me.
Since this ride has the wider of the two wide body clips, it required the custom build of the two rear 15" spinner wheels. At the moment, I can't remember if they will be 13.5" wide, or 15" wide, but should learn that soon, as I hope to be there in person when they remove my ride and three others from the 40' steel container. The cars are shipped without wheels and tires, but I’m certain the wheels are already at Superformance, who organized their making. I hope to take video and picts, provided Superformance gives me advance notice, which they have promised they would.
I suspect its months away from becoming registered and driveable, so I'll continue to grin and bear it.
*Following from 12 May:
You are correct Jim. Just yesterday I was notified it is tentatively scheduled to be shipped in two weeks, but one never knows. In addition, it will supposedly take six weeks to arrive at either the Long Beach or San Pedro harbor, left coast. They sent me a few picts as the body clips were just coming out of paint and being moved to final assembly, and that was three weeks ago, or so.
I guess the personality of this roller would consist of these elements: (going back six months from my significantly compromised memory remnants due primarily from the journey through the sixties): It's a MKI, Gulf livery (Special paint on Gulf orange is Lambo orange pearl [One can hardly discern the difference of color under diffused ambient lighting, but in direct sunlight the pearl alters the highlights from the normal Gulf orange to yellows and golds], it's the more extreme of the three body widths available and will require wider 15" wheels and tires, Gurney bubbles each side, leather upgrade, illuminated roundels, there is another upgrade to the interior with the door jam molding, carpeting, or some such components? Well, there may be other smaller items, but I can't grasp it just now.
Robert
