Drag Race Build Kratos V2

[92AWDHX40]

Yeah I got other things to sort out

 

[Brandon Mau]

I’ve still been playing with transmission pressures, I’m hoping tonight after some more valvebody changes the pressures are where I’d like to see them. Went ahead and through a diff locker in, this I have no idea if it’s going to improve anything at all but willing to give it a try. Also the new rear billet clutch basket has arrived. This is a re-incarnation to Jeff Bush retiring his program for the auto dsm world. Super excited I was able to get one and no more worrying about a cracked basket at the splines anymore. Back in December through a normal conversation with Jeff I brought up the input shaft and he said he actually had one sitting in the garage so I went ahead and purchased that off of him. The circle d bolt together torque converter should be done by August and with kiggly bringing out straight cut planetary gears we are well in our way to a truly bulletproof transmission no more weak links left. Now if someone wants to lend me $2+ k for Magnus billet tcase gear set . Boost on

 

[97egl]

I’ve still been playing with transmission pressures, I’m hoping tonight after some more valvebody changes the pressures are where I’d like to see them. Went ahead and through a diff locker in, this I have no idea if it’s going to improve anything at all but willing to give it a try. Also the new rear billet clutch basket has arrived. This is a re-incarnation to Jeff Bush retiring his program for the auto dsm world. Super excited I was able to get one and no more worrying about a cracked basket at the splines anymore. Back in December through a normal conversation with Jeff I brought up the input shaft and he said he actually had one sitting in the garage so I went ahead and purchased that off of him. The circle d bolt together torque converter should be done by August and with kiggly bringing out straight cut planetary gears we are well in our way to a truly bulletproof transmission no more weak links left. Now if someone wants to lend me $2+ k for Magnus billet tcase gear set . Boost on



View attachment 727114

I would really recommend against the "diff locker" unless you have extra carriers and spider gears. It presses the spider gears against the sides of the diff and the washers that sit between the spider gears and carrier wear out quickly and then will damage the carrier and gears. I run one of those devices in my dirt track car. It does help with traction on the dirt but wears the washers pretty badly within 1 season. I replace the washers every season and have several spare transmissions so I'm ok with the wear but I don't think it would be worth it for most people. Just my .02

 

[Brandon Mau]

I would really recommend against the "diff locker" unless you have extra carriers and spider gears. It presses the spider gears against the sides of the diff and the washers that sit between the spider gears and carrier wear out quickly and then will damage the carrier and gears. I run one of those devices in my dirt track car. It does help with traction on the dirt but wears the washers pretty badly within 1 season. I replace the washers every season and have several spare transmissions so I'm ok with the wear but I don't think it would be worth it for most people. Just my .02

I’m going to give it a try for a tnt session then pull it out to check wear. If it improves my 60ft it will be worth it but I know the open diff is just fine into the 7 second zone. I appreciate the info though and will pay extra attention to it.

 

[Brandon Mau]

I tested a whole lot of stuff with the trans but something seemed off so I ripped the trans back out. Oh yes this is getting old. But the good thing is the new billet basket and the billet input shaft are going in.

 

[Brandon Mau]

I am behind on updating my build thread but incoming updates from the past 5 months. The good the bad and the ugly.

 

[Brandon Mau]

I’ll need to take this back because a lot has happened the past year. After last years shootout, I think 15 total passes on the car we smoked a thrust bearing on the car and it took out the crank bad. Slapped new bearings in it before the final 8.76 pass in November last year. It was time to monitor transmissions pressures which for 2 months before any track session took place I was playing with the transmission pressures. Remember I installed the race valvebody stuff based off of kigglys shootout tech talk from 2015. Well in factory line routing my converter charge pressure was 180psi and line pressure was 270psi which is way too high. Hence the smoked thrust bearings. Went ahead after having some in depth talks with Aaron Gregory about target pressures and played some more. I have the good old rd port mod a try with a regulator to try and hit the targets he spoke of. Still not much luck, once I hit the pressures he talked about the car would foot brake stall to 4000rpm like nothing which on the new 6785 was definitely not right. I ripped the valvebody apart again and put the trusty basic translab shift kit in with standard line routing. Back to the 3100rpm wall on the foot brake. Had some discussions with Jake Montgomery because he races his car more than any 7 second dsm guy out there and he said my pressures were inline with his and don’t focus too much on conveyer discharge pressure because that’s just how the precision converters react. While testing with the jacked up pressures I cracked a bearings race on one of the transfer gears and also wiped another thrust bearing out in the process and we hadn’t even hit the track yet yikes. We have got pressures in the ideal range for my setup with a line pressure averaging 205 psi and converter charge pressure of 115-120 psi range going down the track. These are the upper limits I would suggest and make sure you test your setup before following mine. I tried the whole shim thing on the pressure spring but the best one to use is ipts pressure spring it’s perfect and no shims needed.

 

[Brandon Mau]

We went ahead and slapped a 6785 on the car, tons of fab work and thankfully Matt Morrison gave me some tips on how to weld the upper radiator inlet to clear the 5” intake tube on the car. Fabbed up the ic and ic pipes for new vanjen flanges to get rid of the silicone couplers as well. Ditched the magnus mechanical bracket and red aero pump for the ffwd bracket and the big boy magnafuel 1000. I also upgraded the valve cover to a frontline fab v2 unit and this is where things get interesting. I also included a picture of where to preload the thrust when torquing it down for proper alignment. Make sure to smack the crank a few times to get it set on both ends.

 

[Brandon Mau]

Jumped ahead of myself almost forgot we bought some wrap for the car and went for a completely different look. I love the new color. It took about 3 days not perfect but good enough for me.

 

[Brandon Mau]

First pass of the season I should say attempted, I have no videos but 1/8 mile and the carbon door ripped apart at the seam about 140mph it was scary. An expensive break.

 

[Brandon Mau]

On that first pass on decel the car smoked when I let off a lot. No oil in catch can. We attempted 4 more passes over from June to August all with the same results. Scratching my head. Added a -8 vent to block and a -6 to the dip stick tube. Still smoke and a crap ton of oil from those line. I tore the engine down thinking cracked rings, possible head issue. The hg was perfect, I didn’t see anything wrong with the head outside of the valves were tired. Pulled the rockers and I was starting to see signs of valve float. So with the Curt brown head past service limits, I got ahold of a virgin head cleaned the ports up, did a pocket port and some combustion chamber work. Went ahead and put some rings in the engine for peace of mind as well. Did a test pull a week before the shootout and again smoke on decel. Now I’m like no way what in the heck is wrong. Pulled the lines off the vc blew through them clear. Pulled the fittings clear. Installed fittings and blew through them air tight…… dang found the problem. This was a day before leaving for the shootout. The fittings were bottomed out on the vc baffle. Had to shave them down.

 

[Brandon Mau]

Ah we finally made it the shootout. Friday rained out. Not bad though because i still had to mount my catch pan. We entered st32 untested on a fresh motor and still needed to seat the rings and see if the decel smoke was gone. The track was super tricky with the million oil downs.

Saturday the car just wanted to get crazy out of the hole going towards the wall on the launch. We only got 2 qual passes in. I ended up qualifying 6th. Sunday rolls around and we waited forever to start racing. The ladder was messed up having the fastest 8 on one side and the slowest 8 on the other made absolutely zero sense. First elimination round I got lucky another blow the tires off on launch pedaled and moved on. 2nd elimination we gave the car some more power in the other lane again blew the tires off but still managed an 8.8@163MPH. 3rd elimination I had a split second to open the laptop and turn down after the launch power and it stuck finally pulling off a 8.58 a new pb. Final round I didn’t touch anything slightly slower 60ft but clicked off an 8.60@161mph. Last year we were runner up in st32 this year I walked away the winner. It was a field of titans with 5 World Cup driver/cars and boostin and RRT backed evos that were flying with more HP and way lighter than my 2900lbs race weight car. At the end of the day that’s racing and lucky or not we came out with the W. I haven’t had a chance to go through the car yet but I only have 20 days until fl2k and need to get back to work and adjust some things. Weight being the biggest, the goal is to make this a consistent 8.5 machine and the turbo has more power in it for sure. The pot was not $12k cash, RRT donated a used ecu and a offer of a tune valued at $5k. Unfortunately the link ecu they donated does not have capabilities to shift the auto transmission in our cars and the fueltech has been working great so I’ll be throwing that in a teammates evo as a good deed for all the help the past year. I’ll try and get better at posting more in here, stay tuned for more updates the season isn’t over.

 

[LaserRS92]

Wait, they had you take a photo with a big check that said $12k but you didn't actually get $12k for winning???

 

[Brandon Mau]

Wait, they had you take a photo with a big check that said $12k but you didn't actually get $12k for winning???

That’s correct. $5500 from the Mitsutimes side pot and $1500 from the actual idrc payout for 1st place.

 

[Brandon Mau]

So, we have fl2k in less than 3 weeks. I did forget to post above I also got ahold of a frontline fab oil pump and installed that. I got the pressures set on the jackstands the best I could via the remote oil filter housing. The 2 qualifier passes the pressure was good up top at 9500 RPM 95-100psi. Looking at the logs yesterday I didn’t have time because of how fast they were going through eliminations from the first pass on my oil pressure was like 45-50psi through the rpm band!!!! I’m hoping the 7 year old pressure sensor is going dead or I have some serious issues. Either way that’s what I’m about to start diagnosing today because time is of the essence. I entered Nitro vs the World for FL2K. Also a video of how bad the valves were leaking with just a simple water test and some compressed air.

 

[Brandon Mau]

 

[Brandon Mau]

Well the verdict is in. I spun my thrust bearing the first round of elims at the shootout. Don’t know how the car survived but it did. Block is toastada. Dropped my back up 85.5 block at the machine shop Friday they’re going to do their best to have it machined by the end of the week. Going off of last years issues that came with the tau race valvebody I’m sure the jacked up converter charge hurt the mains over a year ago. I believe I put that block in the car February/March 2019, roughly 2-3k miles of actual street driving and no less than 200 passes easily. The block didn’t owe me anything.

While having some down time I decided to tear the trans apart and inspect everything. I’m glad I did because the input shaft was twisted as well. Clutches looked great so now we’re officially putting the billet input shaft in. Jake Montgomery and Kiggly did tell me when they got to 8.5 second power and faster that’s when they started having issues twisting/snapping the splines on the input shaft. So for now we wait for the machine shop to call this week and pedal to the metal 10 days before I’m supposed to leave for FL2K yikes.

 

[Dusty Landrum]

Thank you again for letting me borrow the sharpie in the pits at shootout .

 

[Brandon Mau]

Thank you again for letting me borrow the sharpie in the pits at shootout .

No problem at all!

 

[92AWDHX40]

Team work at it's very best my didn't run and I borrowed tools.

 

[Brandon Mau]

Decals came in, I don’t believe I’ll be attending next years shootout but I have them on the car regardless.

 

[Brandon Mau]

I got a fresh block in the car last Thursday night. Took a look at the weather for FL2K and decided not to go. I would have had to make 1 pass wastegate to seat rings make sure everything was good, then a a-b tune up pass. They only ran 2 qualifying passes and ran 2 rounds of eliminations before calling the event. I really wanted to go and represent the dsm community but it’s been an expensive year for sure.

I hit up Rix racing for a manual window setup, trying to cut as much weight as possible without hacking the car up. Doing both sides and removing the wiring saved me a total of 5lbs, not a ton of weight but I’ll take it. I wish I could find some of the OG carbonetics doors that function like factory because it’s the biggest weight loss hands down you can do without cutting the car up.

 

[Brandon Mau]

Final build thread update for 2024. We made it to a test and tune and hit another PB with the car all while seating the rings on the new block. It was pretty awesome to hit 3 8.5’s passes in a row.

I was feeling good about racing the Nitro vs World class at Rockingham before Thanksgiving so we loaded up and went for it. We took home another win and ended up getting another personal best!

 

[Brandon Mau]

Here is the 8.42 pass

 

[Brandon Mau]

Now for the unfortunate news. Knowing I won’t be around for the 2025 race season, I had a chance to make one more pass after the races were complete. I added a few percent to the wastegate still not even 50% yet. The car hooked and felt good, hit 2nd gear and all hell broke loose. The car is still strapped in the trailer but I pulled the plugs out and number 3 piston isn’t moving, so my guess is a wrist pin snapped or the rod. Either way when it let loose it blew out every freeze plug there was and temps were low 50’s, even with my catch pan that water got on the slicks and then something locked up in the drivetrain. I did my absolute best to save it but I hit the wall at probably 60-70mph.

I haven’t really looked hard but the body has pretty good damage that’s going to need professional hands to see if it’s worth fixing. Rims are done, slick is done, hoping the rear subframe isn’t tweaked, rear axle, the diff, when it hit, my wing hit the wall and ripped off. This is not going to be a nice to the wallet repair. It’s been one hell of a wild ride to say the least going back 20 years of messing with these cars. I never thought I’d being running mid 8’s and winning against big name shop built cars. I’m pretty happy with what I achieved out of my home garage with a full wetblock and this video 2800lbs race weight.
While I’m away next season I’m going to reflect on everything and either part out what’s salvageable and retire from DSM’s or fix everything and continue the adventure. As of right now I’m figuring $10-15k to fix and repair everything and it’s been a very expensive 2 seasons.

Then the question is if I return do I keep it in mid 8’s form….. the turbo has plenty of juice left and the car could use some weight reduction but that 25.5 cage upgrade is expensive as well if the quest to go for 7’s is next. I really don’t see more than a handful of the current DSM’s achieving it as our platform is continuing to dwindle. Lots of time to think things over though. The forums have been awesome and I’ll continue to stay active. Boost on