Once-Injected '61 Corvette Will Rise From The Ashes With Twin-Turbo Power
From The June 28, 2010 issue of Corvette Fever
By Scott Ross
Photography by Richard Prince
How does that old saying go? "Old Vette Rods never die . . . they get rebuilt into something faster, quicker, and cooler." That may have been made up as this story was written, but it definitely applies in the case of Tommy Vinciguerra's '61 Corvette-based Vette Rod.
Tommy bought this car back in 1977. Like many Vette Rods-to-be, it was in a far-from-drivable condition, but perfect to start working on. "I brought it home with a complete drivetrain, but I really couldn't afford it at the time," he recalls. "A friend wanted to buy the engine, tranny, and rear out of it, so I sold that to him. We'd bought the car together, so I wound up with the body and frame, and he wound up with the engine, transmission, and rearend." But Tommy did have a powertrain available. "I had a '55 Chevy at the time, and I sold that without the engine, transmission, and rearend, and I used those parts in my Corvette. It took just under a year to get it running."
Running, yes-but painted, no. "I drove it around a while in bare fiberglass," Tommy says about the '61's pre-paint colors. "We stripped it down in the front of my friend's shop, and we drove it around in bare fiberglass for four and a half years before I got it painted." A coat of black lacquer went on sometime in the '80s, followed in 1988 by the multi-colored lacquer graphics you see here.
Fuel-injected small-block was strong enough to power this '61 into the 10s on the quarter-mile, and 105 on the Pocono oval. Aluminum Griffin radiator kept the Enderle-injected small-block running cool.
Jim Meyer front-end components replaced the original '61 Corvette hardware.
Enderle fuel injectors went into the Edelbrock intake, while an Enderle "bug catcher" scoop went on top
Under the 'glass and lacquer, Tommy was keeping busy, too. He's a chassis builder by trade and the proprietor of SuperPro Performance Chassis in West Islip, New York, where a lot of this car's hand-fabricated pieces were manufactured, like its rollbar, fuel cell, underhood pulleys, and other one-off parts. He prepared the OEM '61 Vette frame for a later and stronger powertrain that included a Dana 60 rear axle. "I moved the rear framerails inboard 6 inches a side," he says of the foundation work he did out back. "That's because back in 1983 when it was done, there weren't very many aftermarket components for the 9-inch rear axle, and the Dana was the choice rearend at that time." He also installed ladder bars and Koni coilover shocks.
He kept the front suspension basically stock, and eventually a Jim Meyer front end went on in place of the well-worn OEM pieces, joined by a rack-and-pinion steering setup. Despite the changes, Tommy kept the engine mounted in the stock location rather than moving it rearward. "Those (C1) Corvettes are great with the engine set-back they have," he says. "It hooked up real well, and it did a nice wheelstand about 6 inches to a foot off the ground each time it left the line."
The engine seen here is a far cry from that small-block that Tommy swapped in from his old '55 years ago. Gary Sharky built the 355-cubic-incher at The Engine Shop in West Babylon, New York. Inside the bored 0.030-inch-over block went 12.5:1 TRW pistons, a stock steel crankshaft, and a Lunati roller camshaft. On it went ported cast-iron Chevy heads with Manley valves, Comp Cams double valvesprings and Crane lifters, plus an MSD crank-trigger ignition. Tommy crafted the electronic fuel injection system in his own shop out of an Edelbrock intake manifold, Enderle fuel injectors, and an Enderle "bug catcher" scoop. He turned to A.J. Berge of Massapequa, New York, to sort out the electronics and tune the engine. Without him, Tommy says, that EFI system running a "bug catcher" scoop would not run well.
Behind the small-block was a Muncie four-speed at first, later swapped for boxes with more gears in them. "I first got rid of the four-speed and put a five-speed in from Gforce," says Tommy. "Then, I took it out and put one of their six-speeds in. That made it a dual-purpose car-I could get on the highway at 2,400 rpm doing 77 miles an hour, with 4.10 gears in the back, too. It was faster in the first four gears with the T-56 than it was before with a Muncie and 5.38 gears in the back!"
Auto Meter Cobalt 10,000-rpm tach replaced the stock unit.
Restored '61 buckets wore leather upholstery by Dondi under the RJS safety belts
Black leather upholstery on the '61's door panels was stitched by Dondi, who also did the bone leather/black python skin-accented seats.
The best quarter-mile run that Tommy made with his '61 in the configuration seen here was 10.63 seconds at 129 miles an hour. He had some good times with it on a nearby oval speedway, too. "In September of last year, we took it to the Goodguys show at Pocono Raceway, and actually took it around the track," he recalls. "I was doing 105 (miles an hour) in Turn One, and they couldn't believe it."
Later that show weekend, one of the Goodguys show officials came up to him and asked Tommy if the car handled well at speed. "I said, 'Yeah-it handles pretty well,'" he says. "The guy then said, 'I was driving the pace car, and I was doing 85, and I noticed that you wanted to go much quicker than that.' I said, 'Actually, I laid back the second and third time around the track.'" The crew in the tower also had their eyes on Tommy and his Vette, seeing him taking the high line around the track and passing just about everybody!
Unfortunately, the car you see here no longer exists, at least in this form. "On December 21 of 2009, I had a fire in my garage and I lost the car," Tommy says, adding that the frame is still intact and that he has another '61 Corvette body.
What happened? "I was draining gas out of the gas tank, like I do every year when I want to make improvements to it," he says of the first step he was taking in a planned revision to the rearend to fit lower-profile wheels and tires. "I had it up in the air on jackstands, and some gas hit the floor. Some vapors ignited in mid-air and hit the liquid and ran to me within a couple of seconds." Fortunately, Tommy was able to get the fire out, but not before the car had sustained heavy damage, especially on the body's right side. "The resin on the body would not stop burning," he says.
Some might despair of their loss, but Tommy didn't-for very long, anyway. "The frame is fine, and it's back on the jig," he says, optimistically. "Fortunately for me, I had another body." Turns out that Tommy bought a second '61 Corvette body and frame back in the late '80s, then sold the frame while turning down potential buyers' big-bucks bids for the body. Says Tommy: "I said to them, 'I'm going to hold onto it, because I'm going to build something else.' And now I'm glad that I held onto it!"
In the works for Tommy's '61 is another small-block. "We're going to build it bigger and stronger, but we're not going to need racing fuel anymore," he says of the twin-turbocharged engine that Andy Jensen is building as of this writing. "I've got the turbochargers, and I'm building the headers as we speak, right now on the jig," says Tommy, who adds that he just scored a set of Brodix 11X heads for it. How strong will it be? Says Tommy: "It's going to make 1,100 horsepower on pump gas!"
It'll look different on the outside, too, but will still have '61 Vette styling cues. "There's going to be a completely different paint scheme on it," Tommy says. "I'm looking for an aqua or a teal color that was originally on the '56-'57 Corvettes (Cascade Green? -Ed). We're going to keep it modern at the same time, nothing gaudy, and we'll lower the car, too. Adding to those new looks will be a set of Evod Industries wheels that are also under construction-18x7 inches in front and 20x12 inches in back.
Tommy's got plenty of advice for Vette Rodders (current and potential): "Don't give up on it, because you can't find 'em like you used to be able to. Don't sell it if you can't afford it at the moment. Just park it, and leave it alone for a while, and get back to it when you can. Because times are tough and the economy's tough, don't give it up. It's better than money in the bank. If I didn't keep this one, I'd have to be looking for another one!"
DATA FILE ::: '61 Chevrolet Corvette Owned by Tommy Vinciguerra, West Islip, New York (NOTE: All data is for car as seen in these photos, before the December '09 garage fire that heavily damaged it.)
BODYProduction '61 Corvette body
PAINTBlack acrylic lacquer with multi-colored lacquer graphics; painting/paint prep by Kolors by Ken, West Babylon, New York
BODY Production '61 Corvette body
PAINT Black acrylic lacquer with multi-colored lacquer graphics; painting/paint prep by Kolors by Ken, West Babylon, New York
INTERIOR Modified production '61 Corvette
MODIFICATIONS Flaming River billet steering wheel, black/bone leather door panels, bone leather shifter boot, hand-crafted rollbar, RJS safety belts/harnesses
SEATS Restored '61 Corvette buckets upholstered in bone leather with black python-skin accents by Dondi, Huntington, New York
CARPETS Mercedes-Benz black wool cut-pile
INSTRUMENTATION Production '61 Corvette 0-160 mph speedometer/fuel level/ammeter/oil pressure/coolant temperature gauges, plus Auto Meter Cobalt 0-10,000 rpm tach
SOUND SYSTEM SuperPro Performance custom-fabricated sound system (also doubled as exhaust system)
HEATER Stock
A/C None
Here's where Tommy keeps this injected Vette Rod under control.
One of the very cool modifications inside the car was the hand-crafted rollbar.
Modified production '61 Corvette frame
MODIFIEDSuperPro Performance, West Islip, New York
FUEL CELLHand-fabricated, 16-gallon capacity
SUSPENSION(Front) Jim Meyer (Rear) Moroso ladder bar
STEERINGRack-and-pinion, non-power-assisted
BRAKESWilwood four-wheel disc brakes (14-inch rotors in front, 13-inch rotors in rear), non-power-assisted
WHEELSTeam III wheels, 17x7 inches in front, 17x14 inches in rear
TIRES(Front) Toyo 215/45ZR17 (Rear) Hoosier 31x16.50R-17LT
ENGINEChevrolet overhead valve small-block V-8, cast-iron block
ENGINE BUILDGary Sharky at The Engine Shop, West Babylon, New York; engine and fuel injection system tuned by A.J. Berge, Massapequa, New York
MODIFICATIONSBlock de-burred and bored to 4.030 inches, cylinder heads ported, hand-crafted underhood pulleys, and upper radiator hose
DISPLACEMENT355 cubic inches
COMPRESSION RATIO12.5:1
CYLINDER HEADSChevrolet cast iron, with Manley 2.05-inch intake/1.60-inch exhaust valves, and Comp Cams double valvesprings
IGNITIONMSD crank-trigger ignition with 6A control module and Blaster coil
INDUCTIONEnderle electronic fuel injection on an Edelbrock intake manifold with Enderle "bug catcher" scoop
CAMSHAFTLunati roller
EXHAUSTCustom 17/8-inch diameter headers by Super Pro Performance, 2½-inch stainless steel exhaust pipes, and Sonic Turbo mufflers
COOLINGGriffin aluminum radiator with a Meziere water pump
HORSEPOWER398 @ 6,800 rpm (rear wheel on dyno)
TORQUE368 lb-ft @ 4,500 rpm (rear wheel on dyno)
TRANSMISSIONModified T-56 six-speed manual transmission with Long shifter
TRANSMISSIONModified by G-Force, Cleona, Pennsylvania
REARENDDana 60 with 35-spline Moser axles and a Detroit Tru-Track limited-slip differential with 4.10:1 gears
