Tips and Tricks

Rough Riders
Bottoming out is not only aggravating and jarring, it’s a not-too-subtle sign of an improperly set up coilover suspension. According to Gary Heidt at Heidt’s Hot Rod Shop, who knows a few things about independent front suspension, bottoming out is caused by a number of circumstances. The ride height may be adjusted too low, or you may be using too soft a spring. You may not even feel it, but the potential result is damage to the lower control arms or coilover mounts.

Here’s Gary’s tip to determine if your shocks are adjusted for adequate travel: Fasten a small, nylon tie-wrap tightly around the shock shaft just above the shock body on both shocks. Take the car for a couple of spins around the block and check the position of the tie-wraps. If the suspension is set properly, the tie-wrap will only have moved approximately halfway up the shock shaft. If the tie-wrap has been shoved all the way to the top of the shaft, that indicates that the shocks were fully compressed—which means bottomed out. Correct the problem by raising the adjustment on the coilovers or by upgrading to stiffer springs.

This tip works for suspensions from any manufacturer, and can also be used to check conventional shocks. For more information, contact Heidt’s at 847/487-0150.

Car Care 101, the Movie
Building your car was easy. Keeping it clean is the tough part. There are a bazillion products on the market for washing, waxing, polishing, and protecting paint, vinyl, tires, rims, chrome, and glass. Knowing what product to use and how to use it can be mind-boggling. Which is why Eagle One put together this new Detailing Guide video, which provides basic how-to information on cleaning and detailing your automobile. The video covers it all, from what products to use to techniques and tricks for getting the best results. We learned important stuff—like never use mag wheel cleaner on polished wheels, as it’ll etch the aluminum!

Contact Eagle One, Carlsbad, CA, 760/931-0712. The company’s Web site also has a cool feature that will design a package of detailing products for your specific car’s needs—see www.eagleone.com.

How Wet Is Wet?
The wetter the better if you’re talking about wet-dry sandpaper. We’ve been told to soak the paper in water for several hours before using it. Don’t have several hours? Give it at least a 15-minute bath, and you’ll see better results.

Safeguarding Your Garage
One rodder we know heard that most accidents occur within five miles of home, so he moved. Now we find out from Hagerty Classic Insurance that many street rod accidents occur right in the garage. How can you prevent that? Hagerty offers a few suggestions.
•Store lawnmowers, bikes, lawn furniture, garden tools, and other instruments of destruction far away from the car to prevent them from falling against it. Store power tools, paint, spray cans, and flammable or toxic material in a locked cabinet. Add foam padding to columns and walls near the car.
•When storing the car for an extended period, protect it from dirt and scratches with a good car cover. Set the alarm and remove the tires and wheels as theft deterrents. Place fabric softener dryer sheets on the seats, floor, and trunk floor and drop some mothballs in the engine compartment on or near the wiring harness to keep away rodents.
•Keep critters out by repairing and sealing all cracks or holes in the garage walls, doors, and windows. Stuff copper scrubbing pads into the lower corners of the garage door to form a seal. Remove all potential rodent food and nesting material such as paper, towels, string, old Rod & Customs, and pet food. Keep the car’s doors and windows closed.
•When building or remodeling a garage, use fire-retardant materials such as tile, slate, and metal or asphalt mat shingles instead of wood and other flammable materials. Install a smoke detector. Review your insurance policy to make sure you’re covered in the event of theft or fire in the garage.
•Lock your car and set your alarm even when it’s in the garage. Don’t be paranoid, but do be smart and protect your rod. For more info, call Hagerty at 800/922-4050 or hit www.hagerty.com.

Geometry 101
Time to review the Ackerman principle, that well-known but frequently forgotten geometric law that makes for proper wheel alignment. During a turn, all four wheels turn around a common point. The inside front wheel turns on a slightly tighter arc than the outside front wheel. If the Ackerman is incorrect, it causes tire scrubbing on the pavement and inhibits steering and traction while chewing up tires. It took the first car builders a while to figure this out, and a few home builders still haven’t got it yet. When setting up the steering arms, angle them so that the two lines intersect above the center of the rear axle, not parallel to each other as some street rodders try.

We Tried It!
In case you hadn’t noticed, we’ve been on the itch to go land speed racing. With a car as yet uncompleted—OK, as yet not begun—we decided to get our jollies with the Bonneville Pro 3.1 computer program from Racing Systems Analysis. While not as slick as some of the other Windows-based performance programs we’ve toyed with, this is the only simulation we know of that can estimate speed runs at El Mirage, Muroc, Bonneville, and even Maxton.

Bonneville Pro makes advanced calculations based on input as simple as shift points and gear ratios to as complex as drag coefficient and clutch slippage. It even compensates for wind speed and angle! Sadly, it told us that our car is going to be much slower than we expected. Happily, we were also able to mess with inputs to determine the best angle of attack for making improvements. Each time we made a change, we were able to plot the results with graphs of rpm and mph over time, acceleration and distance over time, rpm and mpg over distance, and acceleration and time over distance.

The more you explore, the more hooked you’ll be. It’s not the easiest program to maneuver through, but the results are compelling. There’s a ton of valuable information on aerodynamics.

Bonneville Pro 3.1 is $195 from Racing Systems Analysis, which also produces programs to predict horsepower, dragstrip performance, and setup for clutches and four-links. Info: RSA, Phoenix, AZ, 602/992-2586, www.quarterjr.com.

Optima Battery Facts
The guys from Optima—the cool spiral-cell battery people—recently dropped by to tune us up on battery technology. Here are a few random highlights:
•Confused about the different colors of Optima batteries? Here’s the poop: red-tops are the standard model, and they have 830 cold-cranking amps. The yellow-tops are deep-cycle batteries, and the best choice for batteries that will frequently get severely discharged. The yellow-tops have lower cold-cranking amps (750), but last far longer than red-tops in deep-cycle conditions. The blue-tops are marine batteries with extra 5/16-inch stainless steel terminals for boats. You don’t really need one for your rod. Finally, an all-new orange-top is identical to a red-top, but the position of the terminals is reversed.
•If you do happen to deep-cycle your red-top Optima until it seems like it won’t take a charge, try hitting it with a big-amp charge rather than a slow charge that you’d use with a lead-acid battery. Use the start mode on a big charger, and you can probably recover the battery.
•Order your Optima battery with dual terminals—one set of top posts and a second set of side posts. The side posts are excellent for adding power accessories.
•Metra Electronics’ Tsunami line has a new custom lid for Optima batteries that includes an integral digital voltmeter. Tsunami also has designer gold and platinum battery-cable terminals that drop your jaw. Call 800/221-0932 or see www.tsunami-autosound.com.
•The whole thing about not storing a battery on concrete because the voltage will creep across the concrete and discharge the battery is a myth. The low temperature of the concrete makes the battery cold so it seems weak, but warm it up and it recovers.
•Short on room? Try wiring two of Optima’s tiny 6-volt batteries in series rather than using one 12-volter. Wiring batteries in series doubles the voltage, but leaves the cold cranking amps the same. Wiring in parallel is like jump-starting—it leaves the voltage the same, but doubles the cold-cranking amps.
•There’s a new Optima trolling battery coming for fishing boats. The neat thing is that it’s just two batteries in one huge case. Might be cool if you plan a dual-battery system. For more information, call Optima at 888/8OPTIMA or go to www. optimabatteries.com.