Naturally-Aspirated Shootout - Natural Causes

Chris Winter
Florence, NJ
'89 GT

To say it has been a long time since Chris Winter took his '89 Mustang GT to the track is an understatement. "I was going to use the car to race in EFI Renegade in 1999," he says. "They changed the rules so many times, I gave up on the car, and it sat for 10 years."

With the N/A shootout being announced, Chris wanted to bring a car, but didn't know which one. Thanks to his friends, he was able to muster up the parts and pieces to ready the Fox-body for battle. "We stayed late and worked pretty much seven days straight to get the car ready to run," he says.

Unfortunately, Chris made only one run, with the result being some decided engine damage. While he cranked off a 12.25 at 114, Chris knew there was something wrong with the 306ci powerplant. "I took it easy at first and left off the footbrake because I wanted to see if everything would survive," he says. "I hit the 1-2 shift, and she was pulling like an animal. All of a sudden, the car kind of got lazy midway through Second, and when I hit the 2-3 shift, it just laid over."

Upon inspection and a subsequent compression test, Chris found that six cylinders measured 150 psi on the compression gauge. The other two didn't even move the needle. "Basically, it all stemmed from the car sitting as long as it did," he says. "The valvesprings were supposed to have 250 pounds of seat pressure, but in actuality, 8 out of the 16 had only 180 pounds. The clearances are extremely tight in this motor, and the pistons have a huge dome on them. When the engine got warm, everything expanded, and the pistons kissed the number 3 and number 6 cylinders' exhaust valves enough to bend the heads on them. They weren't closing all the way, which is why I had no compression in those cylinders."

While it may have been a one-shot day for Chris, it wasn't a total waste of time. "Now that it's together, I'll go to Englishtown with it on Wednesday nights and just have fun. I was planning on leaving off the transbrake at about 4,000, so when the heads get repaired and are put back on the car, I'll take it out and see what it does." That's what it is all about.