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And this is why I don’t do car shows anymore. I have people telling me constantly I did it wrong as the very first words coming out of there mouth. They look, make a frown face, proceed to tell me how bad of a job I did.
(Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight....)
Then tell me how they would do it of course. They assume I have absolutely no clue of what I’m doing and even less of what I did. Any who ask a question I answer. Then they follow up with half the information and no idea of the intention of the build and proceed to tell me it makes maybe 300 HP and how I screwed up really bad.
It gets tiresome fast.
And that’s one of many reasons I don’t go to the drag strip any more. Unsolicited bullcrap from fence leaning morons.
In 1990 (I remember the year because it was the first year the car had the 40 spline Summers Brothers axle and spool in it rather that the twisted up 35 spline Strange junk) I was getting my jacket on and I told my brother 6.25 in the left tire and 6.50 in the right and some idiot says “WTF are you playing with a quarter pound of air pressure for??? There is no way you can tell the difference”.
When the fact was, and still is I could feel it in the gear changes, especially the 3-4 shift. Of course, I had rolled out those low quality junk Firestone slick that everyone loved and the right tire was smaller by about 3 inches.
By 1995 I had a main bypass, a high speed bypass and what everyone called a pump loop, but it was really just a second bypass because if I didn’t get rid of all the excess fuel by about 7000 RPM at 7500 when the high speed opened up it couldn’t get rid of enough fuel and it went pig rich up there.
And a local idiot lectured me for 15 minutes on how stupid I was and that I didn’t really need a high speed bypass let alone the “pump loop” and I was going to go lean and kill parts. Then I got another 5 minute lecture on why moving the nozzles up from the valve cover rail was *** backwards and he told me there are plenty of good books out there on mechanical fuel injection and I’d do well to read them.
The guy had never looked at one of my plugs. Never looked at any of my dyno pulls. Had no clue what my pump flowed, or what nozzles I was using. He had no idea how much each bypass flowed and at what RPM they opened at. Had no idea I was running 85 pounds of fuel pressure at the nozzles. And yet, just by looking at the lines going to the fuel tank he surmised I was doing it wrong.
The best part was this clown was the track whizz bang in gym shorts and was sporting about in his mid 12 second car.
That’s one reason why I started roping off the car. To keep the idiots further away.
I had a customer that made 585 on a carb and gasoline. It was built to run on alcohol and MFI, but the stooge bought a tune up from a “well known” MFI guy. When the junk showed up at the shop I told the customer the pump is way too big, the nozzles are way too big and you’ll need 3 bypasses and an under drive set of pulleys to make that crap work.
He ignored the fact I had been tuning and using MFI since 1985 and I was taught by one of the best. So off to the dyno we go. We spend all damn day there and we can’t get a single pull on it. We wasted 24 quarts of oil and 3 filters because there was so much fuel moving thought the system it was literally going past the rings and killing the oil.
We had no less than 6 calls to this MFI “expert” trying to get some help on how to tune his junk up. He finally said we were stupid and we should go back to carbureted gasoline.
So I borrowed a dyno carb they had laying around, bolted it on and in 3 pulls we were at 585 HP. Then we were out of time.
Here’s the classic part. My customer decided I was stupid (cant argue with him on that...should have never had him for a customer) and put the injector back on and tried to tune it the way the MFI guru told him, which was lay on the transbrake, read the RPM and keep going bigger on the main jet to lean it out until the RPM stops going up.
So the moron was using his converter as a dyno. And he killed the converter. So off to the track he goes. And it’s running 11.90’s. And the MPH is way down. After a couple of weeks I start hearing that I’m stupid, can’t build or tune anything and I’m the second coming of satan. But I let it slide because my boss said it would work itself out.
A few more weeks go by and the word is he is now back to carb’d gas. And my boss says go to the track and see what he’s doing. Off I go.
When I get there I stroll into his trailer and there are 4 different carbs on the bench in there and another one on the engine. The guy proceeded to tell me the engine was junk, and that I should refund his costs because it was junk from day 1. Didn’t matter that it made 585 on a third party dyno. It couldn’t be his car was junk. Or that he was stupid. Of course, I didn’t know he was using the converter as a dyno at that point.
So I watched this guy make a pass, change a carb and make another pass. It would print time slips. They were all slow and down on MPH. He puts the car in the trailer and leaves totally pissed off. The next day I get a call from the shop that did the dyno for us, and he tells me this clown is trying to buy his dyno carb.
The next week I go back to the track and I find another customer of mine is there and he is trying to help the first joker. Neither one can read a plug. Neither one can tune a carb (the second customer still can’t do either) or anything else. And I watch for the first 3 passes with 3 different carbs that what he had for the last week. And here is the fun part.
This guy is literally screaming at the top of his lungs in the pits that he needs an actual good carb! He offers 1k to anyone who will give him a working carb! That did it. Weeks of getting trashed by this dickhead, watching him for 2 weeks blame everything and everyone for his slow junk except him and his moron son who was his “crew chief”.
I went on a full on Tourette’s style explosion on him. It was 5 minutes of 4 letter words and me telling him his converter was junk. There wasn’t a carb on the planet that can fix a junk converter and if he had the IQ of a house plant he would realize no carb ever in the history of the world would pick up 130 HP, because that’s what the time slip said he was making. And I made sure all the bystanders knew it wasn’t my engine, my tune up or the dyno owners stuff that was junk. It was him that was the issue. Too stupid to figure out he didn’t have a clue, and too moronic to think HE might be the problem.
Several weeks ago by and we don’t hear a thing. Then he pulls up to the shop and stills in and says “you were right, the converted was toast”. And I said “did you scream at the top of your lungs in the pits how retarded you are? How bull headed and ignorant you are?” My boss was absolutely aghast.
Them I told him not to come back until he went to the track and told everyone who loaned him a carb that he was the reason why the car was slow. I told him to tell everyone it wasn’t my engine or my tune up that was the problem, and until he did that I didn’t want to see his sorry face.
He actually told a few people he was the issue. But that was it, and the damage was already done. When he brought it in a year later for updates and a freshen up I told him to take it somewhere else. He couldn’t believe I wouldn’t help him. And I explained to him having a customer as arrogant and idiotic as him wasn’t worth any money. I couldn’t undo all the damage he did at the track by him shooting off his mouth.
About 12 years later I ran into him at a swap meet and he didn’t say a word to me, and I didn’t care.
The point is it’s not just car shows and such that have ding bats and ne’er do well wisenheimer’s bleating out there idiocy. It’s everywhere.
Again, just a couple of reasons I no longer go to the track. I’d rather shave my head with a cheese grater while chewing on tinfoil than go to the track just to go.
