My new Fiberglass Pin-On Deck Lid

[Mike Gaines]

I have now had my fiberglass pin-on deck lid on my car for a few weeks.
The overall quality is great and the fitment is perfect.
The finish when received was paint ready with very little, of any, prep required.
I has withstood my 131+ MPH runs with no problem.
I attached it with 4 "hood-pins" in the 4 corners.
My OEM deck lid weighed a whooping 69 pounds compared to about 9 pounds for the fiberglass unit.
Good fiberglass suppliers are hard to find. I purchased my Pin-On fiberglass hood and 5" RO hemi style scoop from GlassTech and the quality was great.
This fiberglass Deck Lid was from Larry at Sled City and the quality was great also.
The lead time for the shipment from Sled City was much shorter than GlassTech

 

[66383]

Hope tit's good for 1/2 a tenth!

 

[Endangered Species]

Thanks for posting... just asking a question, no disrespect intended.
We're you not just posting that you needed to add rear weight back into the car? Why the glass deck lid then?
Heck I know a guy who runs S/S DA with a 67 RO23, You can barely lift his deck lid it's so heavy. LOL

 

[glassman]

Thanks Mike for the unexpected compliment on my Sled City Fiberglass trunk that we made for you. We have had quite a few orders for the 65 Plymouth parts here lately. Whole packages for both s/s and a/fx cars, and even sold 5 65-66 Fury hoods. Yep C body. Busy as usual.

 

[Mike Gaines]

Thanks for posting... just asking a question, no disrespect intended.
We're you not just posting that you needed to add rear weight back into the car? Why the glass deck lid then?
Heck I know a guy who runs S/S DA with a 67 RO23, You can barely lift his deck lid it's so heavy. LOL

Well, I kept looking for new ways to lower my ET's. With the addition of the fiberglass deck lid plus some other weight savings out of the trunk area I took 120lbs out of the car from the rear axle back....BUT....IT DIDN'T WORK....With the weight out I lost my combination to get traction and just spun the tires.
I left the fiberglass deck lid on the car and put 120lbs of ballast back into the trunk area of the car and regained my normal 1.40 60 foot times.
I guess when you keep experimenting you sometimes hit the brick wall. This is a good lesson for the other guys on here.....unless you have 14" wide tires and a 4 link....don't take weight out of your trunk area.
And, yes, my stock steel deck lid weighed 70 lbs.

 

[rumblefish360]

Thanks Mike for the unexpected compliment on my Sled City Fiberglass trunk that we made for you. We have had quite a few orders for the 65 Plymouth parts here lately. Whole packages for both s/s and a/fx cars, and even sold 5 65-66 Fury hoods. Yep C body. Busy as usual.

I tried to pm you but your box is full so I’ll ask here, do you make/have fiberglass parts for a ‘79 Magnum?

 

[glassman]

I tried to pm you but your box is full so I’ll ask here, do you make/have fiberglass parts for a ‘79 Magnum?

Here at Sled City , we do the 62-68 s/s parts, mostly b bodies and some a bodies and the lonely 65 Fury c body. But for the right price, mericals can happen. Give me a call and we can go over it. The Fury guys did!

 

[dvw]

Trust me, you can make them work when nose heavy. You just haven't made the correct adjustments yet.
Doug

 

[Cranky]

Well, I kept looking for new ways to lower my ET's. With the addition of the fiberglass deck lid plus some other weight savings out of the trunk area I took 120lbs out of the car from the rear axle back....BUT....IT DIDN'T WORK....With the weight out I lost my combination to get traction and just spun the tires.
I left the fiberglass deck lid on the car and put 120lbs of ballast back into the trunk area of the car and regained my normal 1.40 60 foot times.
I guess when you keep experimenting you sometimes hit the brick wall. This is a good lesson for the other guys on here.....unless you have 14" wide tires and a 4 link....don't take weight out of your trunk area.
And, yes, my stock steel deck lid weighed 70 lbs.

Don't remember you mentioning what's in the back seat area. If there's room, I would have laid down 50 lbs of ballast in the floor right where the rear bottom goes and taken it for a test. Weight out on the ends of the car slows down your pitch rotation (don't get that confused with roll rotation) and even though a slower PR can be helpful, I always go for a quicker one and then adjust the suspension for it. If 50 lbs would do the trick, then you would be 70 lbs lighter.....but that's me and I'm always up for making the car lighter instead of making more power which is usually more costly.

 

[bobtile]

I'll probably be adding back some ballast as well!

 

[Fizz66Coronet]

I want a new hood for my Coronet. Who should I call? With a hemi hood scoop. 1966

 

[Mike Gaines]

I want a new hood for my Coronet. Who should I call? With a hemi hood scoop. 1966

Larry at Sled City

 

[Mike Gaines]

Don't remember you mentioning what's in the back seat area. If there's room, I would have laid down 50 lbs of ballast in the floor right where the rear bottom goes and taken it for a test. Weight out on the ends of the car slows down your pitch rotation (don't get that confused with roll rotation) and even though a slower PR can be helpful, I always go for a quicker one and then adjust the suspension for it. If 50 lbs would do the trick, then you would be 70 lbs lighter.....but that's me and I'm always up for making the car lighter instead of making more power which is usually more costly.

So, are you saying take out the 120lbs of ballast I put into the car AT THE REAR OF THE TRUNK AREA and instead put in 50lbs (or so) into the back seat area (which would be right in front of the rear axle) and this would be the same as the 120lbs at the very rear of the trunk area....
The 120lbs I took out of the trunk was:
1) Deck lid...70lbs
2) Trunk area carpet and sound deadener..10lbs
3) Fuel Cell "tub"...30lbs ( this "tub" was a recessed tub that was about 9" deep and 16" square made out of 3/16" plate steel that the 12 gallon Jaz Fuel Cell sat down into. I put an aluminum floor in this area in the trunk in place of this tub
4) I replaced the 12 Gallon Jaz fuel cell with a 5 gallon aluminum fuel cell and saved 10lbs.
5) Total out of 120lbs.
My 60' times had always been in the 1.40 to 1.42 range with 16lbs air and 3600 transbrake chip.
When I did my first run with the 120lbs out with my same setup as above the rear tires just "broke loose" and car went nowhere.
I then put 18lbs and then 19lbs of air in the RR tires and it didn't make any difference
I then put in a 3000 transbrake chip with 16lbs of air and the car "hooked" normally but with the 3000 chip my 60' times were only 1.45-1.46
Then, at the next race, I put 120lbs of ballast in the trunk at the very rear of the trunk area and put my 3600 transbrake chip back in and 16lbs of in the slicks...and....got back my 1.40 60' times with my normal 10.16-10.18 ET's.
Just to see what would happen….I then lowered the rear tires to 15lbs and put in a 4100 transbrake chip and still got a 1.40 60' time and a normal 10.16 ET but it pulled the front wheels about 3 feet in the air on the launch rather than the more normal 2 feet.
I only had 1 run with this last setup but I kinda liked the 3 foot in the air launch...so I might keep this setup.
(I am going to make a more permanent ballast setup by using some 5" wide X 36" long X 3/8" thick steel plates bolted into the threaded holes where the rear bumper brackets used to attach....I can use more or less plates for more or less ballast. There are 2 bolt holes on each frame rail with nuts welded into place inside the frame rail on each side...I can use grade 8 Bolts for affixing the ballast plates.

 

[dvw]

I wouldn't add any. My bet is proper shock adjustment/shocks will hook it with the front end heavy. What is your weight distribution? Mine dead hooks at 335 lbs heavy on the nose. It still has adjustment left in it. My sons is way nose heavy also. It has Cal-Tracks and leaves on the brake at 4000. I would expect you to be able to run high 1.30 60ft at your power to weight w/o spin.
Doug

 

[Cranky]

No, not saying 50 ahead of the axle will take the place of the 120 you have in the trunk but I would give sure give it a try. I rather have a car that pitch rotates quicker than one that PR's slowly. Even if it took 100 lbs ahead of the axle to make the car work like it is now, you would still be lighter by 20 lbs and imo, would rotate better off the line. There is a limit to everything though and testing and trying things is one way to find out. I've always been one to try and think out of the box and doing what everyone else does just give you the same results that everyone else gets. I've never have liked putting weight out on the ends. Think of a bar bell with the weights out on the end and see how hard it is to rotate it. Bring in the same weights closer to the center of the bar and see how much easier it is to rotate that same bar. The car will do the same thing.....and bolting weight on the very tail might give you even bigger wheel stands. Remember, you want to spend energy going forward and not up unless you want to put on a cool looking show

 

[67MPRFAN]

[QUOTE="Cranky, post Remember, you want to spend energy going forward and not up unless you want to put on a cool looking show [/QUOTE]

Wheelies do look cool especially on b-bodies but I remember racing against my buddy his car was hanging in the air while I was spinning I out ran him in a 1/8 race

 

[Mike Gaines]

DVW,
I 100% believe what you say BUT right now I do not have the budget
for Viking Shocks....and I have no way of weighing the car for front and back weight distribution.

With the 120lbs out of the trunk area the car does not hook, like I said.
It "unloads" the rear end, I believe is the right terminology, and feels like it is actually bouncing off of the line.

And, like I said above, when I put the 120lbs of ballast back into trunk it hooks normally and gets my normal 60' time of 1.40.

PS: I also agree with Cranky....

 

[Cranky]

At the track if they have scales, put the front end on the scale and note the weight then put the rear on the scale and do the same. Not sure if it's as accurate as having separate wheel scales but it'll at least tell you something. Separate wheel scales will give you accurate corner weights etc but doing it like I just mentioned will give you a good idea of your front to rear weight bias.

 

[Mike Gaines]

At the track if they have scales, put the front end on the scale and note the weight then put the rear on the scale and do the same. Not sure if it's as accurate as having separate wheel scales but it'll at least tell you something. Separate wheel scales will give you accurate corner weights etc but doing it like I just mentioned will give you a good idea of your front to rear weight bias.

At my home track (Famoso Auto Club Raceway, Bakersfield CA) believe it not, the scales are ALWAYS not operating...even for the giant NHRA HOT ROD REUNION last month.
Maybe they will have them fixed for the upcoming MARCH MEET where there be in excess of 1000 cars entered.

 

[dvw]

I'm going to say this one last time. Tighten the shocks.
Doug