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In this project I plan on kicking ass with class. In need of a replacement daily driver I decide that I wanted something V8, rear dive and a manual transmission and less than 20 years old (for insurance purposes). That left me with Camaros, Corvettes, GTOs, Mustnags, Challengers, a handful of European cars, and Cadillac CTS-Vs. I knew I wanted to stay with GM because of the availability of performance parts as well as overall cost. In the GM field of contenders I didn’t want to do a Corvette because of the overall uselessness as a daily driver, and I threw out the GTO because the styling isn’t enough for me. Between the Camaro and CTS-V seemed like the obvious choice because they are comfortable, useful, easier to see out of, and there are far fewer CTS-Vs out there.
I was able to find a very nice low mileage ’04 in black that has had just a few things changed. Best of all it was close enough to home I could look it over in person. But even better, it was in my initial price budget.
Anyone who knows these cars is aware of some of the shortcomings that GM allowed out the door. The previous owner replaced the troublesome motor mounts, rattling dual mass flywheel, lowered the car, installed urethane bushings in the driveshaft, and added a MagnaFlow exhaust.
As it stands, I will be doing the most major “fix” for a problem GM allowed to happen: fixing the fragile differential problem. Fortunately the aftermarket has come to the rescue. I will be installing a Creative Steel Ford 8.8 differential.
Once the rear end is in shape to properly hang on to some power. I’ll be doing a cam, headers, cold air and tune.
Lastly some pictures of the car
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These are very cool cars. Kelle almost smoked a clutch on one on the way to a dyno tune once, but that’s a different story.
You’ve now had the car for over a week, do we have a list of mods made and planned?
Check out:
V8 Radio Podcast: https://www.v8radio.com
V8TV YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/V8TVIn the first week of owning the car a couple things have happened.
I installed the tint on the front fog lights and turn signals.
I found out the the starter was past its prime. There is a weatherpack connector that had melted on it, so I replaced it with a starter for a 6.0 Truck motor, the benefit is that the truck starter has a good old fashioned stud and ring terminal that is much less likely to fail.
I’ve also pulled the tune using HP tuners, I will be doing some datalogging to see where I can make some adjustments to extract a little more power until it comes time to change some parts on the engine.
So far I’ve purchased the Creative Steel 8.8 retrofit kit. I also purchased and begun work on my Thunderbird Supercoupe 8.8 donor. I chose the t-bird because it uses an iron housing. The Ford irs 8.8 was aluminum in most of the Lincoln Mk VIII’s as well as the irs Cobras from the early 2000s. Iron seems like the better choice because it should be stronger.
This is what my donor differential looked like when I took it out of the box. I took the time to blow it apart and painted the main case cast iron grey to keep it looking nice.
There’s plenty more to come on the differential swap! After that the car should easily be able to handle more power. As time progresses, I’ll be installing BMR rear anti wheel hop control arms, a cold air intake, either a Comp Cam or a lingenfelter cam, valve springs, retainers, headers and a cold air intake, and using HP Tuners to get it tuned up.
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Looks great, what wax did you use?
Check out:
V8 Radio Podcast: https://www.v8radio.com
V8TV YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/V8TV
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