before i bought the firebird, i was looking at picking up a T-Type from an older fellow, the turbo was done and there were some vacuum leaks and didnt run well. but he was only asking 1500 for it. id surely get it now if i had the money.

 

$1500 sounds like a good price! I paid $3000 for mine 5 years ago from the original owner. I thought that was a seal.

 

thers a black GN near down town ST. pete... and i remember seeing a white T-type somewehre else around here in town, i forget where.

i originally wanted to get a GN, but i could NOT get over their brick-shape and dump-truck like handling... so then my train of thought said "well, i like the 3rd Gen F-body and they handle prety good.. what if they had a Turbo 3.8 SFI. Oh wait! they did!"
1989 Trans Am 20th Anniversary/Indianapolis 500 pace car: the ONLY car to ever pace Indy without requiring performance mods (up to that point in time anyways).

but they were anywhere from $12k-$20k... i wasnt about to spend my cash on that... then i asked myself... whats better than a Turbo V6... a Turbo V8!!!! so i was gonna buy an 87-89 Trans Am GTA and build an LT1 350 for a T66... but i put that idea on the back burner cuz i wanted 500 RWHP now, and want a turbo NOW... so i bought a supra... for $1800

anyhow, i had friends back home in ohio w/ a pair of GN's. one had an upgraded turbo w/ stock intercooler, and the other guy had one w/ a stock turbo and upgraded intercooler... they both laid down ~500 RWHP. one was like 478 and the other was like 530 i think... quite bad ass. its actually father and son... the dad is about 60 and the son is like 40 or somethign. VERY fast cars, i would never even dare talk shit to those guys.

 

I have a friend that just got done putting a "stage2" motor in his GN that was 1100hp capable, but the machine shop screwed up and put the wrong cam bearing in AFTER he gave them the correct bearings !! He asked if they would be "ok" and they said "sure"... Come to fing out that machine shop didn't have a cam line boring machine and used some 70's buick V8 cam bearing in it.

His $15K motor lasted 50 miles. The cam bearing spun and chewed the $3000 race block up "beond repair"...

The block waited 19years, never even machined to be built until about 6 months ago, and the block was destoried by a careless machine shop..

Anyway, his car BONE BONE BONE ( like 1987 factory air filter still in the car stock ) with 28K orig. miles on it made 275Whp and 375 ft./lbs. of torque !!!

With ONLY welds and BFG drag radials we ran 12.8 at bradington..
His car now has 32K miles on it and the factory motor ran 11.30's with a T-66 on the same DRs. The motor never broke. One guy in Orlando runs a BONE STOCK GN block in his car and it runs 10.00 without a stand-alond EMS!!!

I'd say, that's a bad ass car... I still think they are ugly though.. Ugly badass MoFos !!!

 

You're right. My bad

 

You guys need to get out more.... seriously.

turbobuicks.com


There is an active Central FL group who do meets all the time, and plenty of them are daily driven 9 and 10 sec cars.

 

Yah, I know. They're over in Orlando. I have talked to a few of them when I used to go to Old Town on Friday nights. They used to meet all the way over in Altamont Springs.