[binz]

With the car putting out a fair amount of power, we had a days time to make sure everything was bulletproof before the car was to be loaded on to the truck.
The only worry was the plugs - which were at the end of their life and we didn't have spares with the required heat rating.

The state of tune on the car meant that we needed 97 Octane to be on the safer side and I filled in 20liters keeping in mind that we would be doing a maximum of 8 runs on the strip at full throttle.

Karthik had set the launch limiter at 7000rpm and the plan was to launch with my foot flat on the floow where the car made a little over 4psi of boost. Keeping this in mind I arranged for a spare gearbox, you know .. just in case ! Little did i know that the gearbox would be the least of my worries track.

With no issues on the car, we had the fluids changed and replaced engine oil with Motul's 300v Competition line. Heat is our biggest enemy and without an oil cooler, we needed an engine oil thats proven to hold up against extremes. We had seen and head about a lot of the other brands failing on the track and it was a risk we just couldn't afford.



All that was left was to put the car on the trailer and see her again directly at the strip. The forum rules don't allow me to mention how the drive to the trailer was, but take a look at the roads in the picture below and use your imagination The car felt quicker than I've ever known it. The weekend was looking good!



The trailer with the cars was to reach the venue two days later, but soon we realised that the operators were out to take us for a ride and we were finally able to unload the cars at 7a.m. on the second day of the event! To make things worse, we didn't have the time to wait for the truck to reach the airstrip and we decided to unload at the bottom of the hill and drive to the top. This meant that out of the 20l of fuel in the car, a whole bunch of it was going to get burnt up in the 20+ km drive to the top - unless I drove conservatively. But with 300+ horses under the hood, Koni suspension and 215/45/17s there was absolutely no way that was going to happen!



At around 11a.m. we were finally on the strip. Rims swapped with the Hoosier Drag slicks and the car was set. I did contemplate removing dead weight like the rear seat, passenger seat etc but we had always insisted that this was a full weight daily drive and decided against it.



This was my first time on drag slicks and getting the pressures right was an interesting learning experience. The only two people I knew on the track who had used slicks before were Madhu and Jitu(Ford_Rocam) so I asked both and got two completely different numbers. While I'm sure it worked for them, every setup is different and I decided to start at 20psi and see how the car felt before going down further. In hindsight, Jitu's recommendation would have been perfect for me, nevertheless I'm glad I got to try out 4 different pressures.



The valley run now in its third year has been the only consistent effort to promote Drag-racing in the country. Kudos to the organisers for that! At the same time, it does seem to be heavily biased towards the imports with the Indian Cars being pushed to the end year after year. While I can relate to the organiser's priorities, exceptions HAVE to be made especially for dedicated race cars such as Joel's Honda City which was forced to do its run in the dark despite not having headlights!



We were given our first run at 5pm, which was to be a final run for the category. With no practice run given, there was one shot to get the launch right for the forced induction category! Pulling up beside me was Revtech's Turbo baleno - interestingly, his car had my earlier turbo setup and still is quick!


The video below is of the first run, 7000rpm launch, lots of wheelspin with the engine bouncing off the limiter, The v-box data pulled off the car shows it was perfect with the car accelerating right up to till the shift.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPkQiTDkpWo

That run, the very first run - 12.930! I expected the car to be in the 13s, but breaking into the 12s was something I didn't believe at first. From the time I first attended a speedrun, I've seen teams, drivers and cars struggle to break 13s with a handful of cars setting 12 second times with practically no weight and massive engines and here the humble little baleno weighing in at over a ton breaking into the 12s?! Unbelievable.

The excitement quickly wore off, time was running out and we had to go faster!
Shabbir drove the next run, and off the line the car audibly began to miss. The time was really bad - 15+seconds. The plugs had given up.

We had 10 minutes to change plugs, and get the car back for my Indian Open run. Sanjay and the team from Tvara pulled out the HKS M45s from the honda just in time for us to stage. I dropped tyre pressures to 15psi(Hot unfortunately) and got set for the run. This time I lined up on the left lane and had Joels super lightweight turbo Honda pull up beside me. Got a great start off the line, shifted to second, 6000rpm and the car bogs down. The honda flew past and baleno accelerated again to its 8000rpm limit. Shift to third, same problem. There was just not enough fuel! As soon as the Gs build, fuel would get pushed to the back and the pump would starve causing the car to bog down. With all this drama, the car managed to post a time in the late 13s. Got the car back to the pits and filled 10 litres of 97octane. We had one run left, Shabbir had his Indian Open run and we knew the car was capable of going atleast 3/10ths of a second faster. Dropped tyre pressures further to 10 psi and stood by watching Shabbir stage for the last time - this time against the Race Concepts Honda again.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYN4D0ebxyc

His launches are always good and this was no less, both cars together really got the crowd going and we knew the run was going to be quick - indicated by the v-box as well. However final timings pegged the run at early 13s, the v-box indicated otherwise but on comparing the data back home, a short shift from 1st-2nd and 2nd-3rd led to almost 6/10ths of a second being lost. There was nothing to feel bad about though, with a time of 12.930, the Baleno officially became the fastest Indian Streetcar, proving what I said in the first post of this thread - this build would be special.



Its been a very long and exciting journey, but it isn't over yet!

Originally Posted by rohan_cherian

Hey binz,
The pleasure's all mine. Building the fastest Indian FWD car is no small feat!

I'm surprised that the stock SGP head gasket can actually withstand 20psi from the GT30.

Thanks again. That distinction lies with Joel and his race prepped turbo Honda, the Baleno on the other hand is the fastest indian streetcar.

[b16h22]

Breaking into high 12s with a street able setup and keeping the expenses fairly low! Sir you are an inspiration to many. Breaking many myths in tuning scene. This thread has been an amazing read.

[binz]

Originally Posted by b16h22

Breaking into high 12s with a street able setup and keeping the expenses fairly low! Sir you are an inspiration to many. Breaking many myths in tuning scene. This thread has been an amazing read.

Thank you!

A lot has happened since that last event, the car was stripped down for a complete rebuild but somewhere down the line it took a backseat to other things.

But its back! The car has just been completely resprayed by the guys at bumper.com and complete engine assembly should be completed in the next couple of days.

I get asked by too many people about the car and I'm looking forward to finishing this story and documenting a lot of mods that weren't mentioned earlier!

[paras211]

How much time did the slicks get you ?

[binz]

Originally Posted by paras211

How much time did the slicks get you ?

Barely anything. The Aamby valley strip is too dusty to see much gains from slicks. In our case we probably would have had quicker 60ft times with the 17" wheels and tires the car normally runs - at the risk of damaging some part of the drivetrain. Keep in mind we were launching at 6k Rpm.
The 13" wheel/tyre package is half the weight of the 17" setup - per wheel!

[paras211]

Originally Posted by binz

Barely anything. The Aamby valley strip is too dusty to see much gains from slicks. In our case we probably would have had quicker 60ft times with the 17" wheels and tires the car normally runs - at the risk of damaging some part of the drivetrain. Keep in mind we were launching at 6k Rpm.
The 13" wheel/tyre package is half the weight of the 17" setup - per wheel!

Thanks. Hope to meet you this year.
I have a 220hp corolla did a 14.7 last year without seats and spare wheel. Road tires , was wondering how am I so slow compared to you.

[Pranay J Pandya]

Originally Posted by paras211

Thanks. Hope to meet you this year.
I have a 220hp corolla did a 14.7 last year without seats and spare wheel. Road tires , was wondering how am I so slow compared to you.

Hey Paras,

The car's weight & gearing alone can play a huge difference in a quarter mile time.

Take for example the weight:
The Baleno weighs nearly 1 Ton in stock form (980kgs IIRC), Binz's car maybe a tad heavier because of the additional parts.

The Corolla per wikipedia weighs 1,280–1,330 kgs

Quite a significant difference in weight, add to that difference in power, traction, gearing, ambient temperature, etc. one can see why there would be a variance in the quarter mile times.

[Pranay J Pandya]

Originally Posted by binz

But its back!

Gearing up for Jakkur are we?

Always nice to see people reviving their builds, cheers!

[paras211]

Baleno gearing is similar

[69turbos]

Hi all, Hope you all are doing great and revving the engines!
So lately I have been very curious about doing a drag car build which is either AWD or a RWD.

I have chosen MS Baleno ( 1st gen Sedan ) for the purpose, because it has everything that I feel a drag car Should have, i.e- Ample space in the engine bay to support a engine swap. Body and suspension are known to perform well under high speed.
I want to turbo the G16B it has and do some mods to the engine like bigger bore size, bigger pistons and better cams, good port and polish, a good full exhaust system, either a piggy back or a standalone ECU and Yes, Complete weight reduction with only 1 or 2 racing seats.

What are your suggestions on the same and how can i make the build better. Waiting for your inputs, Cheers

[ralphin_rj]

Just wanted say that even in 2023 as I am reading this, its a great feat!

Nice to see a budget build start and then become a no compromise build with the absolute foresight needed which translated amazing on those runs! (a full weight car)!!

This has definitely gotten me getting into some research to try to build something thats atleast half as good as this car! Which means it will be twice as good as what it is now!