If you’re anything like most of us here at LSX Magazine, you love crazy ideas, and we’re excited to announce we have one. Project 899 is a straightforward and somewhat simple goal on paper until we decided to really put ourselves to the test and condense the build time to just over a week.
Project 899 is starting as a mostly stripped-down 1969 Camaro that will be built into a complete car that’s ready to race in only nine days. The goals are to make at least 899 horsepower at the rear wheels and run 8.99 seconds or quicker in the quarter mile.
To help us meet our deadline we are performing the build at Big 3 Racing in Hinckley, Ohio. As seasoned drag-and-drive competitors and owners at Big 3 Chuck Stefanski, Bob Hess, and Rick Trunkett are used to building and wrenching on top-quality cars under pressure. Four of our experts will join the guys at Big 3, including LSX Mag Editor Jeremy Nichols, Street Muscle Editor Brian Wagner, Videographer of Power & Performance Chris Friend, and our Director of Content Brian Havins.
Aside from achieving our goals, we want Project 899 to perform as trouble-free as possible. To do so we’ve partnered with Summit Racing Equipment. Luckily there’s a Summit location just a short drive from Big 3 Racing’s shop. So getting many of the parts needed to complete this build can be done quickly. We are also working with many of the top companies in our industry including Late Model Engines, Whipple, Katech, ATI, Wegner Automotive, Strange Engineering, QA1 Suspension, RC Components, and Mickey Thompson Tires, and Holley, among many others.
We plan to debut the car at Holley’s LS Fest East September 8-10, 2023. There we will attempt to achieve our second goal of running 8.99 seconds or quicker and have the car available for all of the LSX fans to see Project 899 up close and in person. Stay tuned as we bring you 30 straight days of content starting mid-August documenting every aspect of the project from the build process, why we chose the components used on our Camaro, to the challenges and obstacles, as well as the shop shenanigans.