Paul Vasko's new Dmax RailCar makes its Debut Technical info Thread!

MarkBroviak

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May 25, 2008
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This thread is a technical inside look at what we are doing and how we are doing it with this new project of Paul's! I hope you guys enjoy it!


This is Paul Vasko's RailCar that weights roughly 2600lbs with him in it and 11/14/21 he went [email protected] coasting from the 1/8th on his first time to the track with it and his first full 1/8th pass. It has the old liquid motor from my ProMod that set the allison record last year. It is rocking the Rick D'Lance/ProFab custom light weight Stainless Header manifold and pedestal setup which is an absolute work of art and function! It is an LBZ with Oval Cast 17.5:1 pistons with with a 4L80 transmission setup with our PMT 488/96 SS V-band 1.0housing and some spray. It was supposed to go in his Chevelle streetcar but he found this rail for sale and decided to go this route with the project! This was his first time to the track with it to get his feet wet on a 500hp tune in it. I tune it and we are using the dsp5 switch for staging limiter and burnout mode. He let off at the 1/8th and coasted to this time which means it is going to be really fun when we turn it up and run it out the back. This car has a ton of potential in it and he is already ahead of his goals with it so can't wait to see where it goes next season!

Paul Vasko first 1/8th hit in his new Duramax railcar! [email protected] on 500hp tune. - YouTube

Paul Vasko.jpg

Paul V. Rail.jpg
 

MarkBroviak

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May 25, 2008
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Danville Indiana
Ok, so to dig into the data on this machine! This car is rocking 3.25 gears with 33x14.5x15 Hoosiers on a hardtail chassis. The 4L80E trany is a 2.482 1st gear 1.482 2nd gear and 1.0 3rd gear. He is leaving in 2nd gear and the converter lockup and shifts are done on a timer off the transbrake release. Converter lockup on the first pass was started at 32mph and locked up solid by 67mph with the 2-3 shift happening at 90mph. Well this was the breakin tune to get him comfortable with the car and to get everything sorted out with it and see what or where we needed to go with things on it. The base tune is roughly 500hp range(1200us on 100% over injectors on a single 12mmcp3) and I had the fuel limiter at 4600rpms... Well it was on the DSP5 staging limiter(I will explain this more in depth later) at 2950rpms and roughly 1 second after he let off the button is was pinned on the limiter and sat there for a solid 2.5seconds before it dropped into 3rd and start fueling hard again til he lifted at 127mph and 4600rpms in 3rd. This means that for the 2.5seconds while sitting on the limiter it was injecting enough to sit against the limiter so my best guess is 400-450hp range. The mph and et at the weight says it averaged roughly 650-770hp so the 500hp tune is probably making closer to 850hp peak power. Now since this is running on a factory LBZ ecm we decided to use the AEM CD5 Carbon dash standalone logger assembly to log everything and give him a display for reference on everything which works really nice! It is a cheaper alternative to the big standalone systems like Bosch and Motec. With this setup we are able to read some of the Can-Network info from the factory ecm and add a bunch of external stuff sensors to log egt's, boost, drive, intake temps, lift pump pressure and so on. The dash also has a GPS unit built in to give us actual grounds speed, elevation and other data. Here is a screen shot of it. Important take away data from first past is boost was 53psi drive 59 peak, egt's 1100* and with no intercooler intake temps only got up to 255* at the big end which isn't too horrible honestly. This thing is going to fly when we get it dialed in!!! Stay tuned for more info!


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Aug 22, 2009
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Awesome thread Mark! Like you said, this build is an open book. So, feel free to ask any and all questions. Your description and the log explains so much. Now I know why the car took off when it shifted to 3rd gear.
 
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Yngdmax92

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so your using the dsp5 switch with a position being staging limitier, so foot to floor and just turn knob to go ?
 

JoshH

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so your using the dsp5 switch with a position being staging limitier, so foot to floor and just turn knob to go ?
I'm guessing he has the DSP switch wired through a relay so that when the trans brake or stage button is held down, it switches to the staging tune by opening or closing the relay (depending on how it is wired), and when the button is released, it switches to the tune he wants to race on. When I had the dumpster going, that's how I did it. Made it easy to hold the accelerator to the floor and hold the trans brake button, as soon as you let go of the button, everything goes.
 
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MarkBroviak

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May 25, 2008
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so your using the dsp5 switch with a position being staging limitier, so foot to floor and just turn knob to go ?
Basically yes, he has a burnout mode in one position and staging limiter in next then 3 power levels to choose from and it is wired into or controlled by the trans brake(more complicated than that but easiest way to explain it).