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First kill.... glad it was against something worthy...

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Grand_87_national

I lika... do da cha cha.
Joined
May 1, 2016
Messages
234
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After owning my gn for a few months, and fighting through some tuning issues and neglect from the previous owner, I caught a light with someone yesterday. Unfortunately, I had turned my boost down to 20 psi (from 25) for cruising around. I had just dropped my son off at my folks house to spend the night and I was headed home when I spotted a black 4th gen camaro ss waiting to turn northbound onto the "belt hwy" in Saint Joseph, MO. It's the main drag (no pun intended) right through town, all 4 lane with stoplights-a-plenty. Continuing north, I spotted him a few cars back, but traffic was heavy. Several miles later, traffic had thinned out to the point where he was beside me on my drivers side, and he gave a couple blips of the throttle, (presumably to let me know he was packing a couple more cylinders than me) and it sounded great. I have owned 3 Ls1 cars including a cammed '02 camaro... I have a great deal of respect for that marvelous powerplant. As he pulled ahead (there was a car in front of me), I noticed that, at the very least, it did have aftermarket exhaust exiting at the center of his rear bumper, and he had a temp tag.... oh yeah! He's in the "honeymoon period" where you simply do not turn down a challenge! The car in front of me turned off, leaving just he and I, and the very next light turned yellow! My nervous butterflies turned to outright muscle spasms as I held the power window switches up to close off the interior. I wasn't positive he was wanting to get busy.... but I was sure as hell going to be prepared for it. So, watching the east to west stoplights turn yellow, I started to spool up, only to about 5 psi to keep the 275 drag radials hooked, and of course, only the turn lane turns green. Ahhh! It's killing me! I let off. Then as the turn lane changes to yellow, I bring it back up to 5 psi... I'm not going to hit it on green, in case he isn't willing to play, so I'm spooled and ready (now with plenty of unnecessary heat built up) waiting to see what he's going to do. The light turns green and he's all over it, as I watch the muscular SS leap out to a 1/2 car lead... I release the brake and smash the skinny pedal to the floor. He continues to pull away as my Nittos claw for traction, but I can feel them starting to hook, and I'm reeling him in.... fast. By mid second gear, I'm hooked well and shooting past him like crazy. By 3rd gear, I look back to see if he's still in it, and he is, so I continue to lay it on. About mid 3rd gear we are 3-4 cars apart and we almost simultaneously decide enough is enough and both let off. At the next light, he passes me with his thumb up, directly in front of his female passengers shocked face. My turn is coming up as I pull in behind him in line to turn left, then after the light turns green, he pulls a u-turn and heads back south! The whole time, he was hunting me! Thanks for reading.
 
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You GN guys have it made...the menacing black car lets people know whats up.. A white t-type can hardly buy a race around here...lol

Kidding but not. My DD is a 13 Focus hatchback. In the Focus its a Mustang on the right and a ricer on the left. In the Buick its a minivan on the right and a Taurus on the left.
 
You GN guys have it made...the menacing black car lets people know whats up.. A white t-type can hardly buy a race around here...lol

Kidding but not. My DD is a 13 Focus hatchback. In the Focus its a Mustang on the right and a ricer on the left. In the Buick its a minivan on the right and a Taurus on the left.
Ha. I get that too, up until this point the only would-be challenger was a pair of 16ish year old kids in a mid-90's Cherokee 4x4. Didn't count it because it was over by the time the light turned green.
 
You coming to the kci airport show today? Need Buicks! I am in south Blue springs area.
Negative.... had I known, I'd be there! But, I took my vacuum block and egr valve off, trying to fix (what I hope is) a vacuum/ boost leak. Sometimes I'll pin the throttle and the boost will drop and it'll kinda fall on it's face. These cars are frustrating! My son has a football game in Platte Ciy this evening, so we probably would not be able to be there long, even if we knew about it. Plus, I'm a little self-conscious about car shows, because it has some nicks, dings, touch-up and cracks in the dash... my friends tell me not to worry about it, but it does bother me. Thanks for the heads up.... just a bad day for it! Are there ever any turbo buick meets in the kc area? Even small ones? I'm about 30 miles north of Platte City, and my entire life, I've never seen a Grand National on the street around here.
 
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Negative.... had I known, I'd be there! But, I took my vacuum block and egr valve off, trying to fix (what I hope is) a vacuum/ boost leak. Sometimes I'll pin the throttle and the boost will drop and it'll kinda fall on it's face. These cars are frustrating! My son has a football game in Platte Ciy this evening, so we probably would not be able to be there long, even if we knew about it. Plus, I'm a little self-conscious about car shows, because it has some nicks, dings, touch-up and cracks in the dash... my friends tell me not to worry about it, but it does bother me. Thanks for the heads up.... just a bad day for it! Are there ever any turbo buick meets in the kc area? Even small ones? I'm about 30 miles north of Platte City, and my entire life, I've never seen a Grand National on the street around here.
We used to meet up quite a bit, not so much anymore ;) put your car in the show, it's 30 years old and expected not to be perfect.
Hemmings has a list of all the local shows online, if you had checked it then you would have seen the Buick event in independence mo this summer
I go to the mustang meet in Overland Park every 2nd Saturday of the month, I see that's a little far to drive for you.
Might see you today Spicer :)
 
We used to meet up quite a bit, not so much anymore ;) put your car in the show, it's 30 years old and expected not to be perfect.
Hemmings has a list of all the local shows online, if you had checked it then you would have seen the Buick event in independence mo this summer
I go to the mustang meet in Overland Park every 2nd Saturday of the month, I see that's a little far to drive for you.
Might see you today Spicer :)
Hemmings.... I'll have to keep an eye on that. I'm new to this stuff, only had the car for about 4 months, and spent a good deal of that time getting it to where it is now.
 
We used to meet up quite a bit, not so much anymore ;)
:)

That's the problem around here. We had a pretty active core group. We used to get together about every other month or so and twice a year we would do Autofair at Charlotte (Our group even organized the first meet a RC's place). As far as Autofair, we would all show on that Saturday. Everybody would come from all over the state and we would make a day out of it. When they changed their rules and required a two day show commitment we could not get enough people to meet their club limit for both days. That seemed to be the death knell for our little group. As far as I know, our little core group hasn't gotten together for anything but the National meet in about three years. Now at the shows you may see the occasional Turbo Buick or Sy/Ty but nothing like the numbers we used to have when we would hit a cruise or the drag strip. I miss my GM_Turbo 6 brethren.
 
Thank you... there are plenty to hunt, as I found out, sometimes they'll make themselves easy to find!

That's one of the benefits living here in New Jersey/New York, we get challenged at just about every damn street light. It gets to a point where you start looking to dodge everyone lol. Track night is the worst, everyone leaves the New Jersey track heading back to New York like some Fast n Furious movie. Nice kill by the way, I had an 02 SS back in the day followed by an 02 Trans Am, very nice cars...
 
You GN guys have it made...the menacing black car lets people know whats up.. A white t-type can hardly buy a race around here...lol

Kidding but not. My DD is a 13 Focus hatchback. In the Focus its a Mustang on the right and a ricer on the left. In the Buick its a minivan on the right and a Taurus on the left.
I know what you mean by hardly buy a race..never get 2 looks but when its on it gets a long hard look...lol
 
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