haven't seen one like that, but I saw a mid 80's camaro parked under a cover, I was able to see the door, and it said "Paxton Iroc Z" on it. car was white in color too.
Looks like they didnt make too many. 19 cars all together. Yenko's last attempt at building another supercar- http://www.yenko.net/dealers/yenko.htm#81Camaros
Don Yenko was also looking at doing something with the Cosworth Vegas. I worked for the company that made the heads and intake for them for Chevy. Went to Cannonsburg in '77 or '78 and drove a Demo back to Canton, Ohio. Met him there, nice guy. I think he was killed in a plane crash a couple years later.
This very car sat in our shop for a few years...was our buddy, Mo's, car...we took our truck/trailer to PA to pick it up...was completely original, and in unbelievable shape...the stripes were starting to crack a tad due to age, but no one ever felt the car should be touched...except for the guy Mo sold it to, who promptly painted the car! DOH!! Anyway, thing rode/drove like a dream...one of only a couple Stage II cars known to exist. As for the Vega projects, his initial plan (in '71) was for Chevy to install forged pistons @ factory under a COPO, and then he'd hang a turbo on the car in Canonsburg...the EPA got wind of it, and considered him a manufacturer, which meant he had to complete a 50,000 mile emissions test w/EPA on hand, which was asinine 'cause a turbo *helped* emissions, but Don initially agreed, had a track secured and had Goodyear lined up to supply a butt-load of tires, but then he figured up the man hours and other logistical nightmares and the plan fell apart. He then sold the turbo kits over the counter...in fact, we have turbo number #0001 & a close up picture of Don holding said turbo...and even have a Yenko Vega project in the garage! Anyway, we've also got a stack of Cosworth paperworth, engineering drawings, etc, in the original Yenko folders...might be some of your handiwork, huh, Frank?!?
The Yenko Z28 "Turbo Z" was pretty interesting and was written about not too long ago in a muscle car magazine (can't find it right now). The car in the article I read was red and had all the same graphics. From what I recall, it was Don Yenko's last real performance effort with (some) assistance from GM. I think the block and internals were standard Z28 parts for the day. But, the difference in this case was that the turbo technology had really advanced by the mid-to-late 70's compared to the 60's and early 70's efforts. I remember reading that the turbo'd Z28 had a water injection system scavenged from the wiper/washer reservoir to control detonation while using the stock compression ratio and that this set-up solved a lot of the initial problems, yet was simple. I think the performance gains were pretty impressive for the day and it even got as good or better fuel economy (the article claimed) than the stock Z28. This was no Phase III rocket by any stretch. I think Don Yenko had great affection for the possibility and efficiency of turbocharging engines relating all the way back to his early days in the 60's with turbo Corvairs on the road racing/rally set. I remember some other connection with the Turbo Z28 and Goodyear performance tire testing as well as Don Yenko trying to convince GM about turbo charging and producing a Camaro Turbo Z28 in-house. I think GM's position was something like "What about the Corvette?", and, Zora was apparently not a fan of turbocharging. I don't intend to change the direction of the thread, but one has to consider how the Pontiac Turbo Trans Am came to be a couple of years later (in context of the Yenko Turbo Z28) and why that model had a turbo on such a small engine, i.e., whether Pontiac's Turbo Trans Am was sparked by the Yenko Turbo Z28 yet wouldn't be allowed by corporate brass to out perform the Corvette? I know Buick had been working with turbos for some time (back to the late 50's) and indeed had a vibrant turbo program already in place at the time (3.8 Turbo Regals & LeSabres of the late 70's), but Buick had no more performance models at the time, at least not like the F-car platforms of the time.
You could get a turbo'd 301 in the 1980 Pontiac TA's...the Yenko Turbo Z's did indeed use a water/methanol injection system...was typical early '80s fashion, with 3 lights to indicate fluid level: green light, yellow light, and red light...I can't help but think of the potential locked up in one of those cars, they weren't much from the dig, but once it got rolling it felt pretty dog gone strong! We shoulda never let that one out of our shop...
yup John, in the same bay your Explorer was in. The current owner is freshening up all the dried up gaskets and getting some minor things fixed on it. We were hanging around tonight going over the water injection system and marveling at the simplicity of the engineering. We have it for one more day so I'll take the camera with me tomarrow and get some more pics. Its pretty cool no matter how you slice it. I believe this one will be in the October Mecon(sp?) auction at Pheasant Run in Saint Charles Illinois. D.
well, kind of....at least one of us does.... but not the one with the ASE certs ou: D. (and the snap-on guy hasent been in for over a month)uzzled:
Sure...click here. Article says 14.5s @ 97.9...but more importantly, 22+ mpg! LOL!! Not bad for no overdrive... Darn shame that car hasn't found a permanent home instead of just making the auction rounds...
Actually, I think Yenko was a little behind in the turbo V8 arena. DKM produced the turbocharged "Macho T/A" using the Pontiac 400, as well as the "Macho Z" using the 350, way back in 1978. I believe they only made a handful of 78/79 Firebirds with the turbocharged 400 option. H-O Racing also used to produce the Turboforce Kit back then too, which was a bolt-on blow-through system for the Pontiac 400 or Oldsmobile 403 powered Firebirds. I've seen one Macho Z "back in the day" (around 1980), and a kid I knew in high school bought a red/white stripe 1978 Macho T/A. I remember he showed me the uninstalled turbo kit that was sitting in the trunk. He didn't know what to do with the car, and he was embarrassed to drive around a car that said "Macho T/A" on the rocker panels. It was the age of disco, and the word "macho" conjured up images of Ponch from C.H.I.P.S, and guys that looked like John Travolta wearing silk open neck shirts and gold chains. :blast:
Anyway, we've also got a stack of Cosworth paperworth, engineering drawings, etc, in the original Yenko folders...might be some of your handiwork, huh, Frank?!?[/QUOTE] Might be a few of our castings. I was up to my eyebrows in making the Cosworth tooling work. The quality levels were a little questionable at first. Yenko contacted us about some castings, but I don't remember what happened from there. It was a neat little engine, sounded like a cross between an MG and a Motorcycle. A turbo would certainly have made it fly, for the time. That was a difficult period for Detroit, the "Smog police" were loose, we had the first contrived "Gas Crisis" going on. Nobody really knew how to meet the smog standards, so you had a whole bunch of gimmicks and poorly tuned junk coming from Detroit. Turbos were about the only answer that actually maintained some perfomance. Electronic or Computerized controls and sensors were pretty sad at that point, with nowhere near today's capabilities. We all bought Motorcycles for the performance and to avoid dealing with the Smoggers. You could buy a used musclecar for pennies on the dollar, if I had only known then what I know now about what would happen to the values. ou:
