Silver03Snake said:I got one of the first 03's in the country delivered on June 8, '02. It got a Bassani catted x-pipe and catback the same day I got it. I installed mods as they came out. I installed JBA headers and a 4.10 gear about two weeks later. Then came the pulleys. I got beat up pretty good by a couple of members on running a gear. I later dropped to a 3.90 gear. I will tell you this, I'd like to see a 3.55 gear beat me in any race with both cars having equal power. I ran some 03's at FFW in Richmond a couple of summers ago with some making quite a bit more power than I and I had the fastest pass for an 03 that weekend running 11.39@122 on a 100 degree day carrying a full tank of pump gas.
I installed a KB this past November. I am relocating to a new job in a few weeks so I was going to wait and race it after I moved but the racing bug hit me. I bought a set of 17 inch ET Streets. It took me a few passes to learn a little bit about these new 17's. I thought I was having traction problems. I wore out two sets of 16" ET Streets on my 03. It turns out that the 17's are very, very unstable with 8 psi unlike the 16's. I ran 8 psi on the 16's with no problems. I found this out after loaning my tires to another 03 Cobra owner with a lot less power and he nearly wrecked going down the track. He wanted to run them. He thought that there was something wrong in my rear end. I haven't had a chance to run them with more pressure. I ran it at Rockingham before I found out what my problem was with 8 psi and I had to get off the throttle in second gear but it ran a 1.64,7.2@103,[email protected] on the first pass with very little cool down and I backed that up with a 11.18@130 with the car at full temp. It appears the 3.90 gear is a perfect gear for 614 rwhp SAE and 569 rwt.
I drove it to Fla from NC this past Christmas and it got 23 mpg running about 5 over the speed limit going down I-85 and mostly four lane the rest of the way. As far as the street, they are a blast. I don't street race so I could care less about traction. I run 315 BFG KD's on 17x10.5 AFS wheesl and they are heavy slugs. In second gear at 60 mph I can give it about half throttle and the car will go sideways and won't quit till I let up. I had to replace my mufflers because the baffles broke loose and were rattling horribly so I had the shop weld in some straight pipes in place of my mufflers till my new mufflers got here. The other day it was a cool day with a cold front passing through. I bumped my boost on the KB from 17 to 19 psi. I took it out and in third gear at 60 mph it was all over the road. I peddled it to 80 psi and them slammed it to the floor. For a few seconds I thought my clutch was slipping until I realized it was getting sideways. When I looked back I had laid down two solid black stripes from 80 to 100 mph. When some turd messes with me I'll pump the throttle rolling the tires like they were on wet pavement and it scares the hell out of most of them.
Why would you get 17" ET Streets? The more sidewall the better for drag racing.
It has been proven time and time again. The fastest 1/4 mile cars are geared to use all of the 1 to 1 ratio trans gear right at the 1/4 mile.
