No rain forecast for the entire weekend. Barometric pressure was falling very slowly all day. Temp was in the low 20c and humidity was 22%.

The car's performance is off about 50 corrected hp based on the mph and the track conditions are terrible. I struggled to get a good 60' but only managed a best of 1.674 when last fall I was getting low 1.6 and high 1.5's. The poor 60' time really showed in the ET because I couldn't get back into the 10's. Best mph of the day was only 126.29 at altitude.

It was a points race tonight and we were only given 2 time trial runs and I was still changing things trying to find lost performance. I was running low 11's at 5000 feet density altitude and still have a 10. on the windows. I dialed in a 10.99 for the first round and ran a 11.128, the best pass of the evening however I also got a red light with a -.001. Oh so close to perfect. My opponent had a .062 light and would have broken out by .062

I also managed to get the car weighed today. Race weight is now 3042 pounds. Taking out the 6 point 1-3/4" roll bar and installing a full 1-5/8" roll cage plus taking out the rear glass and deck lid and replacing it with Lexan and a sheet of aluminum shaved 100 pounds off the car. That's only an estimate from the changes because I never got the car weighed last year after I took out the TH400 and put in the powerglide. My goal is 2800 pounds race weight and I'm getting closer.

Since last weekend when I was fighting to get out of the 12's I did a bunch of changes to the car. I yanked out the 4.30 gears and went back to 4.56 (4.71 will go in next if I can find a set). I installed a different fuel filter that is compatible with alcohol. I took out the MSD adjustable timing control. I think it was screwing up my timing.

I'll take a bunch of new pics of the car tomorrow. I forgot my camera today. My web site needs a bunch of updated pics anyway.

 

Bah! I spoke too soon. It started raining at 6am. Off and on rain and sprinkles all morning. I loaded the car onto the trailer at 11:45 and the day was called a rainout at noon.

With all the Lexan I have for windows the only thing that doesn't leak is the T-tops since they're the only ones that still have seals.

No pics today because everything was so wet.

 

Your having terrible luck up there Yesterday the racing gods pulled through and overwhelmed mother nature. Beautiful blue bird day with no call of rain. Temps were 68-69*, humidty 34-35%, BP 29.51 and a DA of 1350 most of the afternoon. Made for some of the quickest back to back passes the truck has to date.

The weather was passed along to the driver as well making the quickest R/T too Try literally four .463 R/T in a row. I was a little pissed to say the least. So when I bought back for 2nd round waited for the yellow and a tick longer, .575 ended up breaking out by .002, ran a 10.688 on a 10.69 dail so the other guy got the win, he ran on his dail so it was a pretty good race since both our R/T were close-and they stunk, lol.

Stuck around for some time only runs to fine tune for R/T, dropped from 8psi to 7psi in the rear slicks before we even took the truck up for anything that day, seen a .03 slow down in R/T was always .430 red then going to 7 pounds went to .460.
Tried dropping Tbrake pill down to3600 from 3800 and did'nt see any difference. Put the 3800 back in and dropped rear tires to 6psi and went a .497 and .498 back to back. Never got a chance to try the 34-3600pills for the brake since it was late and they were finishing gambler up. Might be able to actually go a few rounds next race we have.

When from kickin **** for 2yrs straight to this year Cant wait to get back in my car!!

 

The US is calling 1994 the worst drought in 500 years and it hasn't stopped raining in Canada for 6 weeks now. Maybe our wheat sales will offset the loss of beef sales.

There was a sad note last night just as I was leaving the track. An oval track IMSA (open wheeled) racer died in a really bad crash. They don't know if he died when he hit the wall at 100 mph or when he was T-boned coming off the wall but they figure it was instant. It was during a qualifying race for an annual memorial race later that night for the last oval racer who died in 1996.

In the 19 year history of the race facility there have only been 4 deaths. 2 on the oval track and 2 motorbike riders on the road course. The drag cars are pretty well built to survive accidents. 2 years ago a mid 10 second Capri broke a ladder bar and tumbled many times at 130 mph totalling the car. The driver crawled out and was able to walk away. You should see his new car. Late model Probe that looks like it could be a Prostock car.

Unless I decide to travel, I now have to wait until July 10 before I get on track again. After only 3 passes this weekend, I have nothing to fix It's becoming a cheap season so far. I'll let the car sit for a week then drain the water and alcohol out of the oil pan but that's about it.

 

Jeez, that's terrible news. It's bad enough when a guy hits the wall or ruins a major part of the car, but death is just so unexpected. I do agree after seeing a few mishaps at drag stips in person, the cars have looked like somebody should've died, but have walked away with minor scraps and cuts.

Funny how the older you get the safety issues we have to follow when building our stuff start to take on alot more meaning than they did when we first started playing with cars. Alot of my buddies still have that "mud-packing" mentality as far as do as little as possible to save money and skimp by, but I'd rather be able to see my family if the unexpected card drops on me some day.

Well, hopefully our race *** with find it's way north of the border and put mother nature in check up there too I'm just looking forward to taking next year off....dont know what I'll do everyweekend with all my time and money I'll be saving, but sure I'll find some way to waste it We're already talking about a boat again, said I'd never own them again, but memory is getting shorter with age, lol.

 

Stephen - I sent you an e-mail this morning about our Jet Car Feature race in Saskatoon on Saturday.

Since you've hardly got to run your car this season, you should bring it out here!

Trevor

 

You paying for my gas to get there?

 

Will you pay my gas when I come to Race City later on this summer then?

 

I'm not inviting you Are you sure you want to come here? Everyone hates the track surface.

 

You were launching off the box, I presume.

 

I'd like to come sometime although I've heard that Bud Park is far superior to Race City. As for the track, I heard that lots of guys were running extremely well last Friday. Toma from Dynomotive ran 11.11 @ 133 on BFG Radial TAs in his stock 5.0 short-block mustang.

 

BudPark in Edmonton has a much better track surface but then IHRA also brought their track groomer up from the US to shave the track smooth last year for their national event. If all goes as planned, Race City will rip up the track this winter to get everything ready for an IHRA nationall event next year.

five7kid: Of course. Now that I got a delay box I'll use it whenever I can. The trick is to find the best delay setting and keep releasing the button at the same time I see that first bulb light up. I just need to get into the habit of having the revs up as soon as both stage lights are come on then concentrate on that first yellow light.

I've been told a possibility in my lack of power is a bad torque converter. There's a good chance the sprag inside the converter is slipping too much and I'm losing ET because of it. I haven't decided yet if I'm going to rip out the converter and have it fixed before the next race or not. I'd hate to waste the rest of this short season knowing I'm running slower than I should be with a bad converter. I wouldn't mind getting it a little tighter.