shots from the garage...
well Famoso in September didn't disappoint. The forecast up until a week before was calling for low 80's, so of course, it was 98 to 100 by Sunday afternoon. We got in on Friday, got a parking spot lined up by some friends, and set up camp. I'd pre entered for the Heritage Series race, but also went to the tower and opted in the Mopar Race for $40. Figured it was free data if nothing else. Made 3 test hits all at 9.53, so we called it good and waited for eliminations for the Hot Rod class. At $125 a day for entry you were pretty much guaranteed the there were no "ducks" in the lanes. I treed my opponent, grabbed stripe, and on came the win light. Cool! Picked up my slip and cruised back to the pits and started cool down stuff when suddenly I noted this stream of red coming from under the car. Looked under and fluid was dripping at a pretty good rate toward the back. Tailshaft? cooler line? Trans hot and pushing out vent? I pulled the trans tunnel out and all was dry from the top. No cracks noted... Out came the jack and stands. Got it up in the air and to our amazement... the low/reverse band anchor pin was MIA.... yep, GONE. I've NEVER seen this happen. Most the time it can't happen as there is a casting on the tail shaft that won't allow it, but somewhere in this trannys life it had been removed. Well... the trans had shifted fine, but there was a pretty good film of fluid on the back of the car, so I had to have happened at speed. In the golf cart we went to the top end. We asked the top end safety team if they had seen anything and described what we were looking for. He allowed us between cars, to walk the wall and look. About 5 minutes into this he yelled that they had it at the starting line... Ok, that would be odd. It would have been leaking pretty good and seems they would have shut things down. On the golf cart we went and up to the starting line.... where he handed me a hood pin. Crap! Back up to the top end we went where just before the 2nd turn off we spotted the pin. Grabbed it up and headed back to the pits. We dropped the pan, retrieved the parts and I started trying to assemble them. Getting the low/rev arm set up on the bench is one thing, but laying on your back attempting it was not working out well. After about the 10th time I'd pretty much given up. I grabbed all the parts, went to the bench, brake cleaned them, and taped the strut link to the adjuster pivot.... yes, tape. Crawled under the car and slammed it home. Got the pan up, cleaned up the underside of the car, topped off the fluid and still made round 2! My .003 light got me the buy so we got a good test hit. We're moving on! grabbed the 3rd and 4th round and met #2 in points in the final. I needed this round BAD!! I knew my opponent had gone to another final and red lit, so I was betting he wouldn't be pushing the tree. We had run a 48 in the third round, and back to a 53 in the fourth. We mulled over the data and decided a 50 would be the call. We launched and I a .30 light to his .60.... I was reeling him in when the front left corner of my hood lifted.... at that point about all I could do is stare at it and hope it would..... BAM!!! there went the hood, and I broke out by a bunch.... I had him.... I had him. Grabbed the hood from the top end and got back to the pits and we called it a night. Luckily we had lined up a motel for Saturday night. After that day it was shower and bed.... we hadn't even had dinner.
Sunday we made two time passes after utilizing the same roll of Gorilla tape that repaired the trans to make the hood usable, but after the previous days events we started looking things over. The night before in the lanes we had to back up as there were two cars in the wrong lane. I noted something didn't feel right, it like grabbed backing up, but all was well going forward. Jacked it up and our inspection found a caliper bolt was MISSING!! yes.... we were making 140mph passes with a caliper loose. Luck was on our side and we did find a racer with a bolt. At that point we wrenched on a whole bunch of things checking and rechecking. We passed on a couple test hits and pulled the valve covers and ran the valves and checked the springs. We made it past round 1, and #1 and #2 went out first round. This gave me a mathematical chance to actually win this thing, so we skipped round 1 of the mopar race. We had business to take care of. 1 more round would have got me back into #2, but it wasn't to be. We gave up .15 at the tree and ran a 49 on a 9.50 dial. As hot as it was, I didn't think it had it in it. Third place is where we landed. It was a fun run. As of now there is no way in L I'd do it again.... but we'll see.
If nothing else, Sunday morning we ran a 9.464 which was a new personal best.... and the air wasn't even that great. Would be fun to hit that track when the DA was respectable.
Big thanks to Tony (70aarcuda) and his daughters along with the central valley mopar guys (Mike O, Mike C, Mark B) for the help and general support.
well Famoso in September didn't disappoint. The forecast up until a week before was calling for low 80's, so of course, it was 98 to 100 by Sunday afternoon. We got in on Friday, got a parking spot lined up by some friends, and set up camp. I'd pre entered for the Heritage Series race, but also went to the tower and opted in the Mopar Race for $40. Figured it was free data if nothing else. Made 3 test hits all at 9.53, so we called it good and waited for eliminations for the Hot Rod class. At $125 a day for entry you were pretty much guaranteed the there were no "ducks" in the lanes. I treed my opponent, grabbed stripe, and on came the win light. Cool! Picked up my slip and cruised back to the pits and started cool down stuff when suddenly I noted this stream of red coming from under the car. Looked under and fluid was dripping at a pretty good rate toward the back. Tailshaft? cooler line? Trans hot and pushing out vent? I pulled the trans tunnel out and all was dry from the top. No cracks noted... Out came the jack and stands. Got it up in the air and to our amazement... the low/reverse band anchor pin was MIA.... yep, GONE. I've NEVER seen this happen. Most the time it can't happen as there is a casting on the tail shaft that won't allow it, but somewhere in this trannys life it had been removed. Well... the trans had shifted fine, but there was a pretty good film of fluid on the back of the car, so I had to have happened at speed. In the golf cart we went to the top end. We asked the top end safety team if they had seen anything and described what we were looking for. He allowed us between cars, to walk the wall and look. About 5 minutes into this he yelled that they had it at the starting line... Ok, that would be odd. It would have been leaking pretty good and seems they would have shut things down. On the golf cart we went and up to the starting line.... where he handed me a hood pin. Crap! Back up to the top end we went where just before the 2nd turn off we spotted the pin. Grabbed it up and headed back to the pits. We dropped the pan, retrieved the parts and I started trying to assemble them. Getting the low/rev arm set up on the bench is one thing, but laying on your back attempting it was not working out well. After about the 10th time I'd pretty much given up. I grabbed all the parts, went to the bench, brake cleaned them, and taped the strut link to the adjuster pivot.... yes, tape. Crawled under the car and slammed it home. Got the pan up, cleaned up the underside of the car, topped off the fluid and still made round 2! My .003 light got me the buy so we got a good test hit. We're moving on! grabbed the 3rd and 4th round and met #2 in points in the final. I needed this round BAD!! I knew my opponent had gone to another final and red lit, so I was betting he wouldn't be pushing the tree. We had run a 48 in the third round, and back to a 53 in the fourth. We mulled over the data and decided a 50 would be the call. We launched and I a .30 light to his .60.... I was reeling him in when the front left corner of my hood lifted.... at that point about all I could do is stare at it and hope it would..... BAM!!! there went the hood, and I broke out by a bunch.... I had him.... I had him. Grabbed the hood from the top end and got back to the pits and we called it a night. Luckily we had lined up a motel for Saturday night. After that day it was shower and bed.... we hadn't even had dinner.
Sunday we made two time passes after utilizing the same roll of Gorilla tape that repaired the trans to make the hood usable, but after the previous days events we started looking things over. The night before in the lanes we had to back up as there were two cars in the wrong lane. I noted something didn't feel right, it like grabbed backing up, but all was well going forward. Jacked it up and our inspection found a caliper bolt was MISSING!! yes.... we were making 140mph passes with a caliper loose. Luck was on our side and we did find a racer with a bolt. At that point we wrenched on a whole bunch of things checking and rechecking. We passed on a couple test hits and pulled the valve covers and ran the valves and checked the springs. We made it past round 1, and #1 and #2 went out first round. This gave me a mathematical chance to actually win this thing, so we skipped round 1 of the mopar race. We had business to take care of. 1 more round would have got me back into #2, but it wasn't to be. We gave up .15 at the tree and ran a 49 on a 9.50 dial. As hot as it was, I didn't think it had it in it. Third place is where we landed. It was a fun run. As of now there is no way in L I'd do it again.... but we'll see.
If nothing else, Sunday morning we ran a 9.464 which was a new personal best.... and the air wasn't even that great. Would be fun to hit that track when the DA was respectable.
Big thanks to Tony (70aarcuda) and his daughters along with the central valley mopar guys (Mike O, Mike C, Mark B) for the help and general support.