What is your future long term plan for your race program to do better??. Big picture.Not a parts additive,but overall.

 

to continue schooling old farts in my stock suspension small tire car

 

OK-I get that poke Matt.I don't know how that will help your race program which is the topic and sprite of the thread.
BTW Matt,I'm a big fan of what you are doing small tire wise.

 

i'm not sure what you want folks to say. most of the guys on here are not looking to make a career out of this.

i want to eventually do dragweek type of stuff, but there is no money in that at all, only glory and magazine coverage.

 

Depending on the results of the 6.0 onto the TA, I will like to try the 7.0 index or evil street if the car rolls quick enough, but that will require more weight called a roll bar. Might go ahead and weight reduce the TA as well.

 

my long term goals are to get my rearend built, rollcage done, and swap to a turbo eventually. i will be paying for this by working my *** off 50+ hours a week and doing sidejobs after work. once i get it running, i will basically be competing with myself as well as an occasional local class if my car fits. x275 is well beyond my means, so i wont even be able to run that.
i have no idea how to create income off of this.

 

I need a different delay box that has a pro tree function but I'd like to try my hand at SuperComp/QuickRod or SuperGas/SuperRod. The only real difference is the index. My car should have no problem making the 8.90 index as it's altitude corrected to 9.10 at my track and my last engine allowed me to run 9.0. New engine hopefully will drop me into the 8's. Throttle stopping the car 2-3 seconds to slow down to a 9.90 index gives a lot more tuning range. Throttle stop it 4-6 seconds and drop down into the 10.90 class of SuperStreet/HotRod

Brackets are always nice to race in but to get any kind of decent purse money, you need to go into the tougher, faster classes.

 

I have similar aspirations as diggler.

 

As for me.We will continue to follow the formula over all we found works for the partnership/race operation.Independent of that,I sure would like to get back to racing a street/heavy ET car.I have very fond memories of when I drove cars in those brackets.Something like a mid 13 to 12.99 car dedicated race car only on a simple open trailer.That would get me back driving again where the current car honestly is over my head at my age and physical condition.I am frustrated having to deal with compression ratios with today's gas so I would build a engine with like a 12.5 c/r.I'm not sure it would be a "F" body.I passed on a auction Malibu mid 60's wagon roller that had all the good parts on it with a dash full of electronics that sold for $1,800.I've been kicking myself since then.Those hook on ice.
As for sponsors,I believe there is a relationship between how fast you go and the amount of money you can get and the costs to run a car.But that shouldn't exclude slower ET cars from develop sponsors.One trick is to look at businesses in close to that track.Given the bracket,there is nothing wrong with local sponsors because I wouldn't be looking to travel much.I would want to get for this pc photoshop program to pitch concept cars.I would be looking for two or three sponsors.Maybe I'd work on that winter.I would just use some of the technics we have used on the race program.

I would want to use the open trailer to scrap impound cars.Kind of a dual purpose.The last one was a Astro van that grossed $560.The impound auction is once a month so I would buy two a month and scrap them over a two day period.Plan on a gross of say $600 a month.

 

this is what i've been wanting to hear from you. actual examples. this actually would be a great deal, and i may try to get into some of it in the near future. problem is, most everyone around here knows what scrap value is now. its nearly impossible to find a $500 car now. i have a gutted civic hatch shell i will be scrapping next week. should weigh 1000 lbs if im lucky. lol not much money there.

 

as for a 12.90's car, i would look into an LT1 car. they are a pain to work on, but you can find running ones in the $2000 range. gut it, swap a th350 in there, headers, and some slicks/drag radials and you will have your 12 second ride. and it will still run on pump gas. we went 11.90's with a 6 speed '97 z28 with nothing but bolt on parts.
http://www.myspace.com/video/vid/2221856

 

At the impound auction you are looking for old luxury cars that say aren't running or like I did with the Astro which are very heavy vans.This one was over 4,000 lbs.They take off for tires and wheels,so you get it on the trailer with one or two lugs on each wheel and then take them with you.

The first ones are the hardest and then the buy money comes from what you scarped before.About 6 months of scraping and the trailer is paid for.

The part about making money with this would happen after the seed money was invested and that seed money can come from our sales of used hard core race parts.Well my haft of it.Mostly no out of pocket money.

I talk about a race operation and that isn't limited to just on track activities.Buy/sell parts gotten at good pricing at auctions,sponsor personal appearances with the car,using parts of the racing equipment like the trailer,big picture.But I want to be very clear,the partnership racing operations has never ventured beyond racing and buy sell cars and sponsors.

 

 

I honestly thought I was.Surely not to argue your point sir.But in summery I am considering retiring from the race partnership and how I would retire to a brake peddle 12.99 car of my own.
I have been apart of that partnership and very pleased to watch it grow over the yrs.We developed a real class act driver that has is share of time in the light and could handle alot more in terms of a car.Actually I wish for him that someone would pick up on him and hire him as a driver.He has paid his dues long enough and would be a great find for a race team.
The 12.99 engine for me I would want a dome 12.5 c/r with a solid roller lifter and I could use one of our contacts for discounted race fuel.No strokers here.Just a forged pistons 355.Dedicated strictly race car.And a totally N/A engine.

 

Sounds like a solid 11 sec car unless it weighs 6000#

 

Not knocking your plans, but seriously you could just go to the junk yard and grab ANY 87+ 350, put a small hydralic roller in it with the stock lifters, upgrade the springs, a dual plane intake and any small carb of your choice and run easy 12.9s in a 3000 lb car and never have to so much as pull a plug for literally thousands of runs. Its 9:1 compression would allow you to put any pump gas you want in it.

 

Matt.If that would end up being the case,I would have to find some serious woo to dial it back to 12.99.LOL.

 

Thing is GT I am soooo disgusted having to deal with the emissions low c/r engines.All the time,it leaves me with what if.

I hear what your saying and agree.Just I want to build a race engine and not a 9.90 car or anything like that.Just a race deal that is in the bottom of a 13 second car.Foot peddle racing.A engine that is a HP engine for mph so given I am in the bottom of the class I can chase someone down and decide to take the light or not without breaking out.

 

stock LT1 or stock LS engine. thats what i would run. either of those would go 12's with ease, or 11's if the car is setup well and light. as stated, you would never even have to open the hood on the thing. and no $7/gal race fuel. heck, you could drive it to and from the track!

 

I take it your foot brake class has a 12.99 breakout?

 

Well you dial what it would run.

 

I wish our footbrake class was like that. It's the only class run on the full 1/4 at my local track, but has a 12.00 cut off...

 

13.99
NHRA requires a DOT, SNELL or SFI helmet for any car quicker than 14.00. There are a number of different specs so you should check with your local tech inspector.
For cars that run e.t.’s between 12.00 and 13.99, all of the above requirements apply along with the addition of a driveshaft loop. A new-for-’95 rule exempts cars running 13.00 and slower when equipped with street tires. Since traction is the key to going quick, this places more strain on the driveshaft. To prevent the driveshaft from breaking at the front U-joint area and perhaps coming into the interior of the car, or digging into the track and pole-vaulting the car, NHRA mandates that a steel loop be placed just behind the front U-joint of the driveshaft. A universal driveshaft loop is available from Lakewood that bolts to the floorpan. A rollbar is required in this e.t. bracket only if the car is a convertible.

 

What does that have to do with anything?

 

It's the NHRA bracket.I have been away from it so long that I forgot the bracket.So the car would have to run low 12's to 12.0 to be in the lower haft of the class for me to be the chaser and needing a mph engine.

 

What class? If its just heavy or mod et then its 9.00 and slower. Unless this is just a class your local track has?

 

12.001@142. lol

 

The brackets I remember was Street ET,Heavy ET,Super street,Super Gas.It is Heavy ET that I want to run.We have spent so much time in Super Gas and Super Street and beyond,the rest has turned into a faded memory.I posted NHRA rules because of that.

 

yeah, heavy is a decently quick class if i remember correctly. we don't use those rules, but i think they allow down to 9.00 or 6.10 in the 1/8. if you want to be in the bottom of the class in a foot brake class, you need to look at the street et (we call it sportsman here).

diggler, i thought about doing something like that. i could slow down to about a 12.00 @ 116+, lol...just pull timing and ramp it back in, but they might get caught up on too much "electronics" since it's a no-e class

 

Matt-n/p with race gas.I'll tap into the deal we got for 110 and 114 gas.Well really not the 114.We use that for when we use nitrous.

 

it just seems like an expensive operation to go so slow....

 

My long-term plan is to have fun.

That means not chasing sponsorships, because that changes it from a hobby to a business.

That means not having to win or people around me suffer.

That means not spending what I can't afford just to have what someone else has.

That means giving up a race or even a race series to spend more time with my wife and family.

That means not sacrificing other opportunities in life just to race.

That means I will always give more to my church than I will spend on my racing hobby.

That means keeping my racing a "hobby" and not a "program".

That's my long term plan. That's my definition of a big picture of doing better.

 

ack...your arrows are fast and true five7kid!

 

That means I need to remind myself of these things from time to time as well.

The '57 has been down for over 2 years now. If I had 10 bucks for every time I was asked when it was going to be back at the track, I could probably afford to have it running again. As it is, I really don't miss it much. Would I like to have it going? Yes. Do I think a lot about what I need to get it going? Yes. But, in the meantime, the Camaros are doing just fine.

 

I've got a lot of unexpected expenses right now. If I manage to make it to any of the last 3 races in September, I'll be happy. If not then the car never went down the track this year. To me it will always be a hobby. It's just that I'm lucky enough that I can afford to go faster than others who also do it just as a hobby.

This hobby is no worse than other hobbies. The cost of a fast car is always going to be expensive but for an example, look at golfers. Those who pay an annual membership to a club or go golfing a couple of times each weekend. Their annual expenses for their hobby is probably higher than mine. There are other non motorsports hobbies that are just as bad. You can also race cheaply with a basic street car and have no more expenses other than gas.

Because it is a hobby and my only sponsorship is for fuel, my main goal at the end of a race day is to be able to drive the car onto the trailer and put it away in the garage when I get home without having to do any major repairs. For me, that's a win.

 

I'd like to get my current combo lined out to see what she'll run then build a Twin 76mm Turbo power plant so I can smoke the tires at 150mph on the highway if I wanted to...

And lots of other fun stuff.

 

Five7.There never should be any doubt in your mind that I respect the hell out of you and what you have done.We have two very different approaches to drag racing.And it is very true about having to make a hobby into a business.It is what you don't want and I respect that and what we do take some pride/have been very very lucky to have been able to do.

I personally have lived in part by"the same people you meet on the way up,you'll meet on the way down". I do think with what I have done with this team I have been on a journey on the way up.We never,never,expected to be racing what we are now yrs ago.But it has grown way pass anything in my wildest dreams I could drive now.That is a honest assessment.I am pretty sure you would understand that the slower classes you might have raced before and the people that are still there have been racing at the same track.But you get so focused on what your doing,you miss out on being involved in the slower classes.I do miss driving and the people in the slower classes.So that will be my way down using what I learned on the team.I don't mind treating it as a business.Really don't have any family.For me,it is a really good semi retirement of sorts.And I can still,from the other side of the track, watch in awl what we got done.My partner and I are just like family after being together for so many yrs.It's like we sometimes do not get together and we think so alike that when the next time we see each other we just seem to pick up the conversion like it was the day before.So me leaving to drive in a slower class will not change that.

One other thing.Our driver has what I think has it all.He is good looking,media savoy,knows the mechanics,lighting fast,knows how to win,has paid his dues and has a proven track record.I would hope for him some major big time team would pick him up and hire him as a driver. I've watch him grow up since he was a baby.Again to me family.Anytime we allow him just to go alittle faster he has a huge smile afterward on his face.I am very sure he would do well and fit right in a Pro team.

 

just getting my car to the track is going to be my plan right now but my goal is a 12.75 dial in

 

goals for me are simply to blow the dust off of it, get it out & race........lol. I'm with five7kid though, no want to push it to anything beyond a fun hobby. When I start getting stressed about the car or a race is when I take some time off/away from it. - My 4 wheeler & I get along real well.

 

most of the way threw my first year racing so here are my plans for the future.

1st of all continue to smile every time i see my little girl explain the car to her friends or even people at the track. or clean the rubber off of it or the wheels or spray the motor to cool it.

continue smiling every time i get out of it after a run. i watched from the stands for 10 years to get to this point.

now on to the racing stuff.

i look to finish this season in the top 15 in the stick shift class at the local track.
then move on to a top 10 or better in the fall bracket series.
furthest i have made it so far this year is to a third round loss to 57kid a few weeks back. super chevy weekend i won 3 out of 5 first rounds and lost all the second rounds.
that will make this year a success for me in the racing perspective.

next year i want to run for points in a few classes at the local track. with a possibility of maybe a few travel races within maybe 300 miles.

the long term goal is to get the car consistent enough to watch my little girl win some highschool drag races in the car.

my plan to achieve this is
put full slicks on the car.
purchase a weather station and dial off of it.
put an electric water pump in my car with a cooling buddy to keep the water temps consistent.
start recording and tracking tire tempeture before burn out and after aswell as track temp on all runs.
we have started recording video from the starting line and watching it in slow motion to check multiple pieces of the launch and how i do on the tree. (man that camera calls me out every time)

buy a pocket tree and use it daily to get my lights down to low .01x to .02x consistently.

if anyone has any other ideas i am always up for suggestions