Remember that ABS is REACTIVE while a driver can be PROACTIVE.

I have been doing Track Days for years in my Corvette with ABS and most of the time mashing the brakes works fine. If the track surface is CONSISTENT in the braking zone it works great.

If the pavement is VARIABLE in the braking zone all bets are off. An example would be at Buttonwillow raceway in California. When I run the track CCW with the full back straight, I am going about 130mph when I hit the brakes at the end of the back straight and slow to about 60 for the next corner. The ABS cycles at about 10 cycles/second. 130mph is 190 feet/second or 19 feet between cycles. It can take a few cycles (60 feet or more) for the system to decide what to do next, remember it is reactive.

In that braking zone you cross an area with a patch that has low traction, another section of track joins and has a lot or rubber, also there is a sharp crest followed by a dip. Since I can anticipate the changes, I initially mash the brakes, ease up for the patch, brake hard again for the join area and up the crest, off completely at the crest and push like I am going to break the pedal off in the dip.

If I braked at the same point by mashing the pedal and let the ABS do the work it happens more like this. Initial braking is hard. When the car hits the patch the ABS lets off the brakes but by the time it senses the higher traction join area and increases braking again, I am past the high traction area and it lets off the brakes again. It reengages again about the time I am going up the rise, but at the crest it completely lets go of the brakes and does not reengage until the end of the dip and I am heading off the track because I am about 20 mph too fast.

In that case I can beat the ABS by a significant margin.

At the end of the front straight, the track is very consistent so I just mash the brakes and the ABS light is flashing all the way to my turn in point.

Cheers,

Lawrence

Lucky for us most if not all cars on the road are not race cars.

Maybe I'm just too dumb, but I thought ABS was about control of the vehicle during braking, so you could turn if you had to.

Did Pacers have ABS?

I might have to buy a Pacer. Hmmmm....... or maybe a Gremlin.

Oh, if you're going AMC, I don't think you should settle for anything less than a Matador Barcelona II. Ai Papi!

My X wife had one of those. She told me that she was leaving me, and speed away in her Mach II.

Not far from the truth. I wouldn't mind an ex-LAPD Matador:



Funny thing - only one genuine LAPD Matador is still known in existence, and I still classify it as a clone, for it's an undercover car done up as a black-and-white patrol vehicle.

-Kurt

That would be called "Vehicle Stability control" works with ABS, PCM and power Steering modules.......I'll get to it in a bit.

Never sold very well south of the border.

Matador in english = Killer in Spanish

Huh - I had no idea those are rare beasts now. They were common as dirt when I was growing up in the San Fernando Valley.

If I had a nickle for every time we scattered when one turned the corner.....

One Adam Twelve, One Adam Twelve...

Not on the coast eh?

With 534 cars in the fleet, I'm not surprised.

Find me one.

-Kurt

Nope.

Actually, I could do without it, most days. But, there is a long, sad story about why I will never own another car that does not have an excellent, reliable A/C - climate control system, and it is centered around a 1966 Mercury Comet that I was forced to drive one summer under the lovely inversion layer SFV is famous for. Traumatized at an early age, I was.

That rules out convertibles, and I hate sunroofs, too.

Don't live down there any more.

A lot of the kids in high school and beyond would buy surplussed squad cars at the police auctions. I forget what those were at the time, but I'm thinking Polaris's and Fury's? What ever they were, they were pretty fast with those police special top ends.

I myself bought a surplus '66 Comet from the DWP for $300. Bare bones, but reliable with a 289 and a C4 transmission. I drove the wheels off that thing, then gave it to my sister. She drove the wheels off it again, and then gave it to my brother's girlfriend. I swear it was like a Varsity - you just couldn't kill it.

Mine was a red 1970 fastback I wish I'd gotten rid of the first wife and kept the car.

In my era, my friend Lyle bought a used highway patrol Fury III, I think it had a 440 Magnum. He left it as tattered and faded as it was, but spent another $500 or so on the motor (a lot of money in the 70's). Blue with a white top.

One night, as I left the local bowling alley with a friend, we heard the sound of a full-on race. Lyle came by first, head down, well over a hundred, and next came the patrol car, full on. It seemed like they were outrunning the siren.

We hopped into a souped-up 340 Magnum Charger to give chase. We couldn't even get them in sight, until the highway patrol pulled over. Everyone knew who Lyle was, but the patrolman said he coudn't keep him in sight, so he couldn't give him a ticket. He said the whole patrol was dreading when those Fury III's hit the used car market.

I remember seeing them for sale, lined up at the local AMC dealer in Barneveld, like an invitation to some secret cool place.

Elanor..

I got you a matching driving suit.....

Kurt would look rather sweet in that outfit. Great choice Mike!

I'll throw in a "Campagnolo" belt buckle.

this is why you never buy a used rental and confirms my belief that the Mustang II stands high among the low of all time bad cars.

I wonder if they made Campagnolo rims to fit that Mustang? I had some on my old 75 model Mercedes. Without tires they weighed 8 pounds each. Talk about unsprung weight! Yes, they had the full script logo, I am not making this up.,,,,BD

I know that the MACH I is going to look great. It's all there and mostly original, a good auto body metal man can have that fixed in less than a week. I know one that can.

Good, because I have a lead on an NOS RH quarter.

Mind you, that'll have to wait. Going to try to get it started up this week on the 4300 carb just to check everything out, then swap the 4300 for a Holley 4160 600 CFM or Carter AFB 600 CFM. I also have to drain the tranny fluid as well - guess what the original owner had under the hood:



ATF+3 synthetic in a Dextron/Mercon-only transmission. Brilliant. I wouldn't be as worried if the original owner had a Dodge sitting around in his driveway, but all that's left sitting there is a 1992-94 Lincoln Continental, and the vehicle he used to get back up to Kentucky was a Ford Explorer. No chance that this is just a mistake...

Also, I have a slow leak that puddles in the passenger's floorwell. It appears as if the heater core is leaking through the two halves, but I suspect there may be rust holes in the cowl.

In good news, I discovered:

• Cooling system holds pressure @ 15 PSI
• New points and condenser, dizzy cap, and rotor
• Oil and PS fluid look good - very clean
• Master cylinder isn't losing fluid when pedal is pumped hard

-Kurt