Previous updates for the 2004 season

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12-30-04

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all.

what have I been up to? Working on my daily driver.

I have a VW Cabriolet that was in desprate need of a new top. So now I do tops. What a pain in the you know what. With a lot of neglect of the daily driver because of the race car, I have had my cab in the garage for almost a month. New top, repair a rust spot, all new brakes in the rear, general clean up and currently working on cv boot replacement. I think I need to remove the whole axle with outer stub just to change it. What a pain. .

This is my old 1912 craftsman compressor. Its been extreamly reliable but very small and lacking volume. Actually this is a hand me down from my friend John Jalbert from the 80's. My wife got me a small compressor for my birthday a few weeks back and said, "Its just what I could carry out and you can return it and get what you really need"

So after a lot of research, I finally came up with this unit. It's a 25 gal ,150 psi unit that can deliver 6.8 cfm at 90 psi. Best pressure for its size compared to every one else with this pump configuration. And actually comes with a 175 psi rated tank for that extra margin. This unit is actually made by Devilbiss who makes compressors for a lot of companies such as Craftsman like this, Porter Cable, etc.

A whole lot bigger then my old one.

One of the main reasons I picked this unit was for the real oil cooled/lubricated piston pump. None of this oil free, I cant hear over the pump, ware out quick set ups. I actually looked at some stationary stand up 60 and 80 gallon compressors, some with piston pumps and others with oil free pumps on Ebay that were cheap for the size, but I realized, I like the idea of the portability for doing house projects, pump up the tires on cars away from the garage, etc. I found another manufacturer that uses this pump head and they have it listed at 79db. thats plenty quiet, considering, OSHA limit is 80db for continuous occupation with out hearing protection. You can actually talk over the pump running and makes less noise then my old compressor. Some of the other diaphragm and piston oil less pumps I saw were in the 89-90db range. don't want to piss off the neighbors either. there is a twin stage oil free pump that is rated at 40% quieter because of the lower rpm, but not sure what that means. The oil free piston pumps run a teflon coated piston with a plastic cylinder liner. I like the idea of Cast Iron cylinders with standard rings.

 On other news, I got my set of Forged AA pistons and cylinders.

Nice cylinders. looks to be powder coated like a century cylinder. Have not measured for roundness yet. But for sure I will.

Got to love it when the Wife and Dominic the burn out king conspire to get gifts for me. Thanks guys.

Brian!!!! you forgot to take home your aluminum parts the other night. You need to stop by and pick them up or :)

11-18-04

This update is heavy in pictures and a little off subject on some items.

But since we are all GEAR HEADS at heart, I thought I would show some other stuff too.

First few picture below are a Model T motor. But not just any Model T. Can you say High Performance Model T?

I had my camera with me when I visited EMS (Engine Machine Service) a few weeks back.

 This modle T motor has a Billet crank made over at Castillo's

The side of the pan needed to be heated up and pushed out for rod clearance.

Cuninngham Chrom Moly Rods.

Dick Nuss had to make his own lifter retainers to make the Harley Davison lifters work.

This even has JE pistons that have an extra thick top and the tops will be reshaped to fit the combuston chamber.The the motor configuration is completly different then normal. Its called a 2 up, 2 down. This changes the firing order so one piston doesnt rob the intake charge from the next one in the original firing order. Now it cycles from somethign like a 1,3,2,4 order instead of a 1.2.3.4. order. The original configuration  was developed by Ed Winfield  WAYYYY back when. The motor has more high dollar parts then your average performance VW motor. LOL.

Ok, back to the VW stuff. This is Paul Woodhead's motor almost complete. The header was hand made by Dick Nuss at EMS. They had the NEW RLR car over at the shop for the fit up of the header.

the Pauter intake manifolds were extensivly modified. I got to see them one time when I didnt have the camera and there was actually an extension put in to these and then reshaped to change the volume of the runner it self.

Huge Porsche cylinders. either 102 or 103mm i think.

Just freggin awesome.

Just look at the support these Pauter rockers get. This helps hold back that 700 lbs of spring pressure over the nose.

Not your normal exhaust flanges.

Bigger then normal flange end.

Not quite complete on the manifold as the car was coming over and that part was held off to fit up the header.

this is probably my favorite picture. the valve is  extending open, but if you look closely, thats the piston wrapping it self around the valve and pushing it self into the combustion chamber.

Other things around the shop. and extreamly clean single port turn key motor on the dyno.

Yes they do type 4 stuff as well.

type 4, porsche, etc.

The line bore machine. EMS uses this machine to open up a vw case for type 4 center or all mains too.

Dont know what you call this.  I guess a big fly cutter for blocks.

Can you say Rod Ratio??? LOL. this is one long rod.

Back to my stuff. In the clutch combo search, I was playing and expramenting. I tried to lighten up a cintered iron disk by adding holes and taking down part of the center hub just outside of the rivets.

Now, this is a fairly new item out. Its a forged piston by AA. it looks similar to a wiseco but i think it might be the better bet for a naturally aspirated motor. Why you ask? It uses a thinner ring package then a wiseco. It is my understanding that if you go to thick on a ring, it can have a tendency to flutter and float at high rpm's. (sort of like hydroplaning) This piston uses a 1.5mm top, 2 mm second, 4mm oil. The same set up as a Cima. And if you use a Cima set, you will notice that even the second ring has a step down to 1.5mm.  Wiseco uses a 2mm top  and second ring.

I did a weight test on them. and my findings, with the lightweight wrist pin, the AA piston was 50 grams lighter then a Cima. (light weight wrist pin is a $5 extra option, and more then worth it)

It has the same compression/pin height as a Cima witch for me is a good thing. I can take out my Cima's and drop these in with out having to change the motor width/deck height.

Graphite coated just like a Cima.

Even did a crow thickness check. best i can tell, it has a .250" thick top with an extra .100" at the valve pocket area. You can do some seriously deep notches with it.

Oiling hole directly from the oil scraper groove.

The light weight wrist pin option compared to a cima pin.

Part of the weight savigns is the pin being shorter as well.

These pistons are made of a 2618 alloy  with a T-6 heat treat, just like a JE. I think these will probably replace the Wiseco market.  I will be running them my self for next season. Go check em out and tell him I sent you. click on link below.

--------AA TRUE Forged Pistons-------

11-17-04

I went out to Palmdale over the weekend to the IDRC event to do some clutch testing and just play around.

I went up with one combo, by about 3pm saturday, I was on combo number 3.

On sunday, it was just normal bracket racing and easy pickings for the most part. I tree'd every one I lined up against through the entire weekend. But come round 3 of eliminations, I ran up against a subaru wrx type car. I picked out the hints of him being decent. So, I steped up the program a touch and put up a .019 light against my opponents .060someodd. So i made the right call that this guy might actually have somethign for me. But it was for nothing. About 3-400 ft out in third gear in the left lane, the car felt like it made a light twich to the right. Witch was fine, but it was the heavy twitch left that got my attention and suddently, it felt like I was inspecting the guard rail. so I had to lift off the gas and coast it back to the center of the lane. I did go for the chase down but it wasnt enough. i missed the guy by .08. I ended up running a 11.60's on my 11.12 dial in.

The pictures I have below, I just havent had a chance to show until now.

This is what I found right after the vegas race. At the base of the weld, it cracked and Safety wire was the patch. this little crack slowed my car down about a tenth.

And last month i had a chance to finish up the clearance on Jim's cam. Gives you a pretty good presepctive on how big this combo of rod, journal and stroke is.

Actually had to cut into the thrust surface area just to make it clear.

Next up, I have a bunch of pictures I took at EMS of all different things. One thing that was cool there was this Model T, 2 up, 2 down motor with a billet crank, whammy rods etc. stay tuned.

11-4-004

ATTENTION!!!!!!!!

My buddy Brian's car has been stolen.

Pro Eliminator racecar. Primer Gray, CCC fenders, white decklid with a chilly willy portrait painted on it, lexan windows with "P/E 595" on the quarter windows and the front and back windows, 1965 Standard Bug, JCl rollcage, simpson equipment, 48 ida'd 2275, transwest tranny, stainless muffler rollin on black and white smoothies. If anyone has any information leading to the ass kickin of these punks, you will be handsomely rewarded. The car was last seen in North Torrance. You can contact me or Brian at stndrdvw@yahoo.com

10-25-04

NHRA Sport Compact series at Pomona.

Well this is where I went over the weekend.

I went for the New Quick 16 class. The rules of this class is still handicap start on a full 5 tenths tree, the dial in will be your fastest qualifying time. (not chosen by you) BUT, you are allowed to brake out. The catch there is you are only allowed to brake out by half a second from your round 1 dial in. And any time you brake out during eliminations and win, that number becomes your new dial in. but the window for brake out shrinks. So if you were sand bagging a little, then you can use a little each round. Use too much and you loose any advantage you might need.

My intention was to go out and run about an 11.30's number. I thought I had the proper tune up for that, but good air, no bogging, a proper call on tire pressure, shock settings and it up and ran a 10.96 in round 1 of qualifying. DAMN! I knew I could pull off some 10.80's since I have done that before. But 10.40's-50's?

Well that number was good for the number 2 spot of 18 attempts. (Number 1 held by a street tire class type RX-7-Carl Martin, with a 10.31, fully knowing he was probably playing the same game)

Knowing I have nothing to loose since I was at the top of the heap, I sat out the rest of the qualifying. In the end, I remained number 2 and only 9 cars ended up making the minimum 11.99 cut off. The ladder was posted and for some reason, I was put in the same side of the ladder as number 1. But if do race him, it will not be till the semi finals.

Round 1 is on Sunday morning. Time to put on the game face, add a little to the tune up and to my surprise, my assigned competitor never made the call to the staging lanes. So I got the single.

Round 2 was a scheduled bye round for me.

Round 3 and sure enough, the RX-7 is still going. But he burned off almost a tenth off his allowable brake out. I still have all my half second. Knowing sure well, this guy still has plenty on tap. I had to play the same game. So I stopped by his pit shortly before to talk lane choice and we could both tell we were about to use it all up in this one round. I turned the knob enough for about 4-4 ½ tenths extra. About 23-24 lbs. of boost. The problem is I have never taken it this high before. So either I was going to take this guy out or something ugly might happen.

Well the ugly showed its head. I found the limit to my clutch set up and went past it. I could not keep it hooked up in 3rd and 4th, so the RX-7 blew right by me for the win. So my chase for a "Wally" ended there for the day.

Good news for the weekend. 5 of the 9 cars in my class were VW's.

Fellow racer and friend Troy Smith went on to the finals where he would meet up with the Mazda only to brake a rocker stud right off the line. It could have very well have been an all VW final.

Other Fellow racer and friend Jorrie Estrada ran the All Motor class and duked it out with the big boys and made it to the finals but was put down by one of the new BIG GUNS in the class and couldn't keep pace.

So that was 2 in the finals so far.

Then one of my direct competitors in the PRA and friend Allen Wiess tried out for the quick 16 but had all kinds of fuel delivery issues and couldn't make the field. He went home Saturday night and switched everything back over to gas. Came back Sunday and hopped in the ET-1 class. Went 5 or 6 rounds and on to WIN his first "Wally" whooohoooo!!!!. He got one for the team.

Having one of my friends pull off a win is almost as good as getting it my self. I went through my emotions just watching and could only imagine what he felt like when he saw that win light come on.

So now its time to find my self a new clutch combo and do some more testing. The carbon fiber padded disk was awesome for shifting qualities. Super light, but just doesn't have the friction coeffiecnt needed. Even on the stage 3. And I am not stepping up to a stage 4. Back to the options of maybe retrying the cintered iron disk now that I have a pro ring. Maybe a standard 4 puck on a stage 1 or 2. Maybe even a multi disk. But not likely, since I have limited funds.

I was going to call it a year, but maybe, I might have to try a new combo before year's end.

10-5-04

Las Vegas and the Lucky 777

WOW!!!!!!! Id rather be lucky then good any day.

Best race of the season for me. Started out slow by sitting in construction traffic on I-15 Friday night. But got better as the weekend went on. Took my son Matt over to Circus Circus on Saturday morning and put him on some rides and sort of celebrate his 3rd B-day. The only down side to that. He did not want to leave.

Got out to the track Saturday afternoon around 3pm and rolled right in with out a wait. They had some Super E competition and regular brackets. My plan was to run Super Comp again. And at Vegas, there is a corrected factor index of 11.10. So I thought, run the brackets  on Saturday and make sure I can get in the ball park.

Off the trailer, I run an 11.03. So I thought, good enough. No need to beat it up any more, and put it away for the evening and hang out with every one else.

Sunday morning and it was time to qualify. I make my needed adjustments and thought I was conservative. But first round of qualifying was an 11.05. A tick too fast still. Second qualifying and I put up a slowing 11.17, but good enough to be a decent qualifier (#3) but on the way back down the return road, I heard a funny noise. It's an exhaust leak. Turns out, the header developed a good size crack around the number 1 thermocouple bung. (EGT sensor) I debated weather to make another run since I was qualified decent. But after much thought, if this class is any thing like Super Gas, I could be left out in the cold. Not to mention, I don't know how much this crack is affecting me. Sure enough, the crack slowed the boost build down enough to cut just over a tenth off my time.

Round one of eliminations, and some safety wire to hold down that EGT just in case. I Raced Cliff Whitham. I believe he has some problems off the line as he was no where to be seen at the top end for a while. BUT, I backed off just in case and out of the corner of my eye, I see him charging and had to get on the gas again. I squeaked by on that one, almost throwing it away.

Round 2 was Pat Downs. He took me out at Sac, so it was pay back time. Sure enough, for some reason my reaction times were ON all weekend. I put up another good RT against Pat. Even though his was good as well. Then I managed to push him out by running ON the index with a 11.109. So basically, I left him NO room to spare and was able to take the win against his brake out. The only down side to this round was I am not a contender in the points and Pat was the points leader coming into this round. I ended up screwing up his points chase by taking him out. For that, I felt bad. But that's racing. Not to mention, it was also up to Nick Wharton who was in 2nd to determine his own fate by having to continue past round 2.

Round 3. Now I am facing the NEW 2004 PRA Super Comp Champion. The pressure was off Nick and now we can both go out and have fun. But this is my first PRA final round of the year and I think I was a little more wound up then I thought. I put a light on him, his car left much harder then mine and he is out about 2-3 car lengths. I'm thinking, I have to grab the gears on the money if I want to catch him and put up a good number. But then the unthinkable happens. I MISS THIRD GEAR. How can that be? I never miss third. (ok, maybe one other time I have back in 1998) but to my surprise, Nick is watching me like a hawk and backs out of it. And as I get it back in third, I notice he is not pulling away, so its time to stab the gas again. To my surprise, my car sets me back in the seat in third and I just literally rocketed by him before he realizes what had happened. And the chase is on again, but this time, I am in the lead. I totally expected him to come flying by at the top end, but it was not to be. In the end, we both had the same identical ET's of 11.777 to a 11.777. NO Joking either. Fortunately, I had the better RT, so this equals a WIN for me. I was excited and relieved at the same time. And after seeing the ET's, both Nick and I thought we need to go gambling tonight. (We both lost money that night) What a way to end the PRA season. This was a very sweet win because it's a different class then I was working on and it's the first in a LONG time.

For complete results. Go to http://pra2000.com

Next up is ????????? Drag Day or NHRA sport compact at Pomona. I really want to go for the "Wally" so I am pretty torn between what to do. More then likely, its going to be a Wally attempt for me.

9-15-04

Jim's motor continues.

Recently the subject came up about installing cam gears onto the crank. Well since I was sort of on that part, I thought ,why not whip out the camera for this and show how easy it is. (sort of)

Since I like to just drop the gear on, I found the best way to hold the crank is set  the end of the crank in the flywheel. Don't have to make it mate, but just locate the holes and it will just sit in place ready for the gears.

I use this old Betty Crocker hot plate I got when I traveled a lot and needed to warm something up in a hotel room. I typically set it up to about 3/4 heat, drop my gear on and leave it long enough to have a quick refreshment.

Grab the gear with some channel locks and eyeball over the top and usually drops right on. once in a great while, I will have to tap it all the way down.

But this time, it didn't just drop on.  Come to find out that the key, that was already installed was boogered up from a hammer hit on the edge. I caught the part on the front of the key and whipped out the trusty files, but it took me a couple of times to figure out that it was also messed up down the key too. But nothing a file couldn't take care of. This is what I get for assuming the key was installed properly.

the other problem is my old gear puller was not quite doing the job and felt like it was coming off wrong. So out came the big guns. Yes, that is a big puller. I use it to pull flywheels off with.

ole reliable is starting to show signs of old age. its starting to bend the lip. all those aftermarket gears that it has pulled off has really worked this puller.

But once the key was taken care of, the gear just dropped right to the bottom like a big rock in water. Yes, there is no number 3 bearing on yet. Why? because this is only the mock up stage. if I put the bearing on, I might mess it up with the puller when I take the gear back off for final cleaning of every thing before final assembly.

Cam gears. if you loose your instructions , its pretty easy to remember how they do go on. Typically, there is some sort of mark on the gear and that is usually lined up with the slot of the cam. Only one way it can be.

 Then during cam drop in, there will usually be two marks on the crank gear where the mark on the cam gear will go between.

 First, the cam gear gets dialed in. Making sure that the cam opens and closes the valve at the proper crank rotation. This particular combo needed to be advanced just to get it in the range that it is designed to be. Then its time for cam clearancing. Die grinder and carbide rotory file is pulled out and grinding comencses. Getting mighty close here. This is 86 stroke on a Scat I-beam VW journal rod.

So it turned out to be a fairly good size notch. but nothing more then if you used one of Scat's H-beams either. between the two notches, I was left with about .720" thickness. I put a little red dykem on it so I know witch side I finished. As one does this, you grind one side, make it clear, then move onto the other side. Well, I like to do a lot of trial fit and only remove a little material at a time. And sometimes it can get confusing when the cam comes back out and is put in the vice to be ground on some more. So this is the simple fix. Mark the one you are done with.

Here is something you might not see every day. This is how much the piston is pulled into the case using the 5.5" rod.

From the top side. you can see the edge of the cylinder before the shims. Piston does drop out quite a bit out of the cylinder.

9-8-04

VIDEO....

Mike Soliven was out at the track and took some cool video of some of the races. He sent me this video. click here and it should download.

Some of his other vids from the weekend are here as well.

9-7-04

Sacramento.

By no means was it a perfect weekend, but not bad at all.

Since I am so far out of the points race in the Super Gas class (11.90 index) I thought I would have a little extra fun and put my hands in the Super Comp class (10.90 index.)

I went up on Friday morning, thinking I would need some testing Friday night to get my self close to the index. But at 2pm on Friday, half way to Sacramento, I get a call. Track will be closed due to high winds. Oh well, time to slow down and take it easy the rest of the way.

Saturday is test and tune and first round of Qualifying. I figure chances are, it will not be a full field or just full and I shouldn't have a real problem getting in. Sure enough, there were 7 cars for the 8 car allowed field. I managed to squeeze in a few practice passes before first round of qualifying. So I decide to slowly creep up on it. First pass was an 11.45. Make an adjustment, and second pass is an 11.22. I'm pretty happy now. Round 1 of qualifying is next, and I figure I will make that next adjustment and put up somewhere close to an 11.00ish. Then there was a delay in the program and the sun fell rapidly. I even had to turn a taillight on. But there was no 11.0something. It was a 10.80. OOPPPS too fast.

Then it was time to do some BBQ'ing with friends and enjoy the night.

Sunday morning and its time for round 2 of qualifying. At first I figured, don't touch it and it should come to me. But I touched it just incase. And I made the right call but it was not quite enough. I then proceeded to put up a 10.893. OOHHH I'm getting close. At that point, I figure, don't touch it for last round of qualifying. And with a bit worse 60ft time, I came up with a 10.98 for number 2 qualifier. But I'm in. And that felt good. Round one and I race Anton "White Russian" he has had some problems all weekend and made it a fairly easy race to win. And to my surprise, I was doing quite well on my reaction time. Putting up a .043 and .049 in the morning sessions. But against Anton, I put up a killer .038 light. I'm on it. I'm thinking, I have a chance today. I ended up getting Pat Downs in round two. This is where I fell off a touch. I think I got more tire spin then expected and had a slower .09something light against Pat's .07something. Witch wasn't the worst part of that, it was coming around Pat at some 15 mph faster that got me. I ended up just braking out. But all around, fun none the less. I even got to collect a few bucks for my troubles too.

Next up, Vegas………. No changes needed to car. Just go and race. Will most likely do the SC class again.

9-2-04

Jim's motor is slowly but surly moving along. Last weekend, I was drilling and tapping all the plugs and setting up for full flow. A little trick I learned from some of the machinist at my work. Use alcohol when tapping aluminum. works great and isn't messy. I thought I would try this on a mag case. (did it to Troxell's motor first) and it works great. Really clean thread cut. easy to clean up. And when doing pipe threads, it is nice to tap a little and then check how deep the fitting goes. So I will tap a little, pull the vacuum out, suck up the chips because the alky dried fast and doesn't hold the chips in place. and test fitting.

3/8" npt tap going in for the full flow and the plug below..

Then its off to Earls to get the high dollar fitting. this is a 3/8" npt to swivel  90 degree dash 8. easy to install and goes where you need.

then the rest of the plugs. this half of the case will use 2-3/8", 2-1/4" and 3-1/8" plugs. I like to use 1/8" instead of 1/16' as it is easier to acquire from a tap and plug perspective. This is also on a single relief case, so when putting in the plug below the full flow return, I had to be very careful not to punch into the control port and use a modified bottom tap. If this was a dual relief, I would have went right into the port as that would only control flow into the cooler. And on a race motor, its not an issue. although if it was a street motor, id probably do the same so not to mess up the flow. single relief cases have the cooler and pressure control in the same port. And after looking at where the relief hole was, i felt i needed to not protrude into the area.

I have also been asked in the past on how my car fits in my Toy hauler trailer. Well there it is. with a 102" wide trailer, there is a lot of room down the sides. Once I get it over the edge of the door, I stop and can actually open the door and climb out. Then push it in the rest off the way. I do have to back the car in to maintain the tongue weight on the trailer. otherwise it can become a hand full to drive down the road. Tongue weight should be in the 10-12% of total trailer weight. And sitting at just shy of 10,000 lbs total weight when fully loaded with car, water, food, and all the other stuff, I should have at least 1000 on the tongue. But I'm still short of 800 on the tongue. So I have to run two different sway control set ups on my rig. But since adding the second sway control after the first trip (a dual cam sway control) it is pretty easy to tow with out getting pushed around by the big trucks.

The cargo area is in considered 13ft  long in my trailer, and that' is measured from the rear door to the stove. But since the car is not that wide and is curved, it does pass that 13ft range, but there is still plenty of room.

The down side to not having any extra room is the hold down points not being able to be in front and behind the car, or at least far enough to have some room for the latch as well as the tie down webbing. So I do the criss-cross configuration on my hold downs. front to back and back to front to hold the car in place. I also added in some 5000 lb tie down eyes that are tied into the frame below. The trailer comes with a bunch of 2000 lb'ers, but I just didn't trust them, so I added the overkill to it. Just didn't want to open the side door to find my car in the front bed.

This weekend is the second Sacramento race of the year. I am actually loaded up a little early. Hoping to have a better outing this time. I am crossing my fingers for some extra luck. I will most likely be doing some friday night testing out there and get a head start on the rest.

8-12-04

Denver........

I just can't get any luck lately. It started out great. Got to hang out with John Redding and Eric Madson early on before getting to the track. Even did some motor thrashing at John's house on Thursday afternoon. Went out and did some testing on Saturday afternoon. Got the car dialed in by the second pass. But instead of leaving it, I tried something new and the car went even faster. So I started from square one again the next day. Not really too bad. but was sort of all over the place when qualifying. But plenty good enough to be in the field. Round one, and I'm paired up with Mike Lawless. Looking back on it now, I think i didn't have enough faith in my car and gave it a little extra before the round. I put up a good reaction time against Mike, but when it came to the top end of the track, I caught him fairly easy. As a matter of fact, too easy. I took too much when taking the stripe and I wasn't aggressive enough with getting out of it. I end up braking out with a 12.63 on a 12.65 index. It didn't help that Mike was on it. He ran a 12.650000000. leaving me as little room as he could possibly give me. But that's racing. So at the top end of the track, I get out to give my congrats to Mike and tell him to go on and win the event. (this way I don't feel so bad if I loose to the eventual winner.) but Mike Lived by the sward and then died by the sward and did a similar situation in round 2 where he got the good light but broke out. So he and I were over in the "Kick our self in the butt" club during the semi's and finals. In the end, there was 12 guys to really race in our class. I know for sure 10 of us were from California. It might have been 11. But I just cant remember every one. Not to bad a class. VERY competitive. In the end, it was AJ Sims vs. John Schuerger in the finals with AJ taking the advantage off the line and holding on for the win. I know AJ had a nice ride home. Congrats.

Then the only time I even think to get the camera out was on the way home. This picture really doesnt do it justice. But the drive can be an increadible sight. Here I am following John Schurger as he is winding up to pass a big truck up this hill. On the left and right of this picture is all this rock at an angle. It really is amazing and gets you wondering how the world was being developed. This streach of the drive lasted over 13 hours for me.We drove from Grand Junction to the LA area with only one stop. 785 miles on my odometer. this gives you plenty of time to think about what happend during the race. So thinking about the earth and how it was developed does help take  your mind of things.

On to other things. This is a little more on my data logging capability.Its kind of hard to see, but there is a pick up sensor on the top of the trans case that picks up on 2 magnents that have been placed on the input shaft coupling. This shows me the relation between engine rpm and input shaft rpm and will show me clutch slip.

This is a linear  position transducer used at a suspenion travel sensor. this way I can actually see how the rear of the car goes down and if it rebounds to much or not squat enough.  Then I can make shock absorber adjustments with out just guessing by the seat of the pants.

Another item i was using was this throttle position sensor that is hooked up to the vacuum secondary side of the carb. This way, I can see when and how much the secondaries are opening up during a run vs. launch and boost levels.

I also have exhaust gas temp sensors  or EGT's (type K thermocouples) in each of the exhaust ports.

Unfortunately, a thermocouple is NOT a linear milivolt output. So with out having the proper algorithem in the data logger, the next best thing is to use a converter that turns the signal into a linear 0-5 volts.

Then to top it off, I am also using an Innovate Motor Sports wide band sensor. this is also feeding into my data logger. this unit does have its own data logging capability, but then i would have two things to read. So its fed into the primary unit.

But with all this super whammy high tech gizmo's, they still dont win races. But I have been able to tune the car a lot more. Now I just need to re-learn as a driver how to race again and stop making stupid mistakes. Had i not made the mistake in Phoenix and even the Denver race, I would probably have more then double the points I have now and I would still be in contention for the championship. Also, all these gizmos have actually found my bogging problems and made my car go too fast at the Last Sacramento and I had nothing left to slow it down with me, thus making me guess on how to slow the car down by my foot and not even qualifying.

7-28-04

Up Next. Denver Bug-In.

A few pictures from the VW Panic in upland. The race cars are out. I got a pretty choice spot on the corner up on the sidewalk.

Marty Staggs lastest butt puckering ride.

Back to my stuff. During some normal maintenance, low and behold, I find this. a broken keeper. looks like it just started to pull through the retainer and falling out the bottom and just sat in there wrong. Well this stiff is probably older them some of the readers here. LOL. So all new stuff went in this time.

Jim Hagethorn's New Motor.  We  had Dick Nuss at Engine Machine Service (EMS) open up the new CB 044 heads  (42x37) to help keep compression down.

And after some chamber reshaping, and un-shrouding the valves, He got them up to 70cc's and still have something that resembles a real combustion chamber. one of the nice things I picked out on these heads is they are starting to do a Siamese seat type set up on the them. a big plus in my book.

Then its on to the case. Yea, thats some welding that was done to the top to get the bigger stroke to clear and not brake through the top.

Gets mighty thin up there.

One of the causes of the case needing welding is this DMS crank shaft that sits at an 86mm stroke.

But the kicker was, the I-beam rods with a VW journal size. Why did we decide to use these? Jim got a smoken deal on them and some times that prevails over what you might normally use.  Not to mention, the larger diameter of the journal helps keep the crank a little more rigid. If one had to pay full price for these, the cost of welding and extra time spent on clearancing, could have been saved on a smaller journal h-beam. But in reality, these things are not really any bigger then my old Pauter steel rods on the cap side.

Jim also picked up this little turbo. yes, this is going on. the over all plan is to make 200 stump pulling low rpm hp.

Even got a hold of some Kolbenschmidt bearings. Why these are nice? its the center main bearing being solid on the back side. So if the crank try's to pound it self in the case, it has a little more support then the bearing on the right and doesnt leave a ridge from the oiling groove. But its a catch 22 on that part. then you loose bearing surface on the crank side. But since the crank is much harder then the case, I opt for the case to have an easier time of it.

7-27-04

I have some pictures of stuff, but havent had a chance to download them off my camera yet. so stay tuned.

In the mean time, I had made up another page on John Troxell's car and motor build. Just took the content from the updates for the page.

There is a link to the left.

7-13-04

Look!!!! and update.

But at the moment its really not much of one. Since the last update, I got sick the following weekend and have only fully recovered in the last few weeks. PLUS, my wife is pregnant and is having a real hard time with morning sickness (actually hyper-emesis) and I have had to do a lot of the stuff she would normally do. So the VW stuff got put on the back burner for a brief time. But I did go out to the VW Panic show. That was a lot of fun.

Good news is, I have Jim Hagethorn's motor parts back from the machine shop and will put some pics up soon on the build. (86x94, 2387cc)

6-1-04

AAWWWW MAN!!!!!

Sacramento Bug-o-rama.

It felt like, if it could go wrong, it would. It wasn't quite that bad, but sure did feel like it.

Weekend started off kind of bad. Heavy traffic getting out of L.A. Check engine light came on half way up to Sac in the tow vehicle.

But did get a decent spot in the pits.

Went out for Saturday afternoon practice to make sure I was in the ball park of 11.90 index. But was WAY TOO fast. 11.50. Car is really working much better then normal. But my alternator takes a big dump. Take all the boost out of it and squeak in another practice pass and still an 11.70. Take all the timing out of the motor and go for first round of qualifying. 11.75. still too fast. And during these three passes, I could hear my throw out bearing whining and by the third pass, the clutch adjustment started to change. I thought, no problem. I have all night to change it. Pulled the motor, swapped TO bearing, have dinner, bolt motor back in, and problem solved until I was actually trying to adjust the clutch. With car on jack stands, I was adjusting and finding gears. Get under car, go back and try a few times until, I couldn't find any gears. NOOOO!!!!!! After a little investigation, I found my hockey stick wasn't really moving. So motor comes back out, and TRANS comes out. Pull the nose cone, and find the 1-2 selector pushed partially in, but the hockey stick is in the 3-4 selector and because the 1-2 is in, this keeps the others from moving. How does a piece of 3/8" steel squeeze between a 3/16"gap? I have no idea. I even tried to duplicate it with the nose cone off. But I got it all fixed and back together. And made sure I did a real H pattern when finding gears.

Sunday and round 2 of qualifying. I decide to back pedal to slow the car down. Never had to do that before. Well I was way off and ran way to slow with a 12.64ish. I really have to pull one out of my, you know what if I want in. there were 21 cars trying for 16 spots. At that point I'm number 20. Last qualifying and I do my best to get it right and no game. I ran a 12.42. And by this time the bump was a 12.11. I GET MY FIRST DNQ. (did not qualify) so I went over to Pro Eliminator class and tried to bracket race. It's pretty difficult to change from a pro tree to a full tree. But I did it. Round one there and I pull off a .050 light. (.550) and that's good and respectable and plenty good to win. Go to round 2 and I will do my best just to be conservative on the lights like the first. But I also run into Bud Wittfield. Long time veteran racer. Raced him a few times in the past and know he is good. But at the same time, he knew me pretty good too. I do my own thing, put up a .042 light. Not bad. But Bud puts a big tattoo on me with a .004 light. And sure enough, at the top end of the track, when doing the math, its comes out with him on top. He broke out by .05 and I broke out by .11. I crossed the line about .02 in front, but the math dictated that he had .04 on me at the start. So that loss was pretty easy to swallow. I did my job, but just got out driven. I went out and congratulated him afterwards and his comment was, "I knew I had to step up against you" Great!!!!!

Now, I need to do the math on the points and see if there is any chance left for me to do something in Supergas. If there is no chance. I might jump ship and run the Supercomp class. 10.90 index. We will see. I don't want to quit, but I kind of like the idea of going faster too. Until then, I just have to ponder what I really want to do.

5-27-04

I was doing some last minute check outs, and other stuff. and was pulling my gas tank out. I ended up screwing up the fitting on the bottom of the tank. the two pieces began to gal up and proceded to chew the threads apart.

this is on the bottom of the stock gas tank. i use the original cap that normally holds on the small tube. Hog it out and weld on a bung.

in this case, i went into panic mode and found in my stash of junk a new 1/2' npt to -8 fitting. cut the threads off, ground off the anodizing, cut the old one off, weld the new one on, and watched the blue anodizing turn black. but you can't see it from your house. Thank god I have a welder.

New 90' was put on and im back in action.

now its time to pack up and go to Sacramento Bug-O-Rama this weekend.

5-25-04

I was asked by a fellow racer if I could make another one of those clutch controls like I have on my car. So this has been my latest RE-creation. My version of a Washington Anti-shocker. But works in first gear only. I call it more of a clutch management, then a shock reducer. This can allow me to run much more clutch then I need for the start, (dial in the slip) but still have enough down track.

One of the differences was the use of a Berg shifter. I use a Hurst shifter that has a built in lever for revers, and thats what I use to engage this unit. But the Berg shifter has nothing like this, so I had to make a lever/release handle for the shock. The handle is strictly a clamp on unit, so there will be no drilling, cutting, welding, etc, to the nice shifter. (thanks to John Troxell for letting me use his old shifter for the mock up)

I ended up putting the handle somewhat far away, as the person who is getting it, uses a staging brake and will be having to grab for the shifter, so I thought, dont put it too close, other wise, he will be grabbing this handle too. But even though its far away, I would feel comfortable with it. (Pre-stage, slide hand forward and pull handle once and release) I typically leave my hand on the shifter during staging, and this would work out great. I guess if this were mine, I would bring it in maybe another inch closer.

 There is the new clutch release arm with extension and support bushing.

If you are not familiar with quite how this works, I made it so, it is disabled during normal use. Pull up on the handle to release shock absorber during staging, and when the shock returns from the first gear launch, the latch grabs on again and renders it disabled again for the rest of the run. Unless you pull the handle again.

This is mine, installed.

5-19-04

Last friday, I made a stop at EMS, just to hang out and low and behold a customers stuff was in disarray. So out came the camera to just show what happened. Be warned, its kind of ugly.

These were the destructo parts.

What the chamber should look like.

What the chamber ended up looking like. This will get fixed and look like new again.

The bouncing of the foreign object against the piston.

 Upon forensic inspection, the culpret was a 6mm nut.

And it even took out the cylinder. WOW!

Here you can get a look at wall thickness on one side of ths 94.

 the other side is quite thick. but after looking at thes pictures my self. I did not really examine the cylinder my self to see if they broke on this side at the thinnest spot or they areally are that far off. Most likely, they did NOT brake at the thinest spot on this side.

 Then we move on to other cool things.

 You ask, what in the heck are these? Believe it or not, they once started life as a Pauter head, most of the cooling fins have been cut off and these steel disks will eventually become a combustion chamber. Finish product picture below.

this is Paul Woodhead's (hope I spelled that right) New motor in the mock up stages.

Pauter case, Moldex crank, Childs & Albert rods, porshe cylinders that will require some mods to make work. But are quite big. If i'm not mistaken, they will be a 102mm.

Rods that can be checked with out dissasembly of the long block.

Whats wrong with this picture? look how big the OD is around the seal surface compared to the bolt patern. there is a 2.750" main journal behind this, so the end of the flange must be that much bigger to compensate. HUGE!!! I think the journal size is off of a Ford 351 clevland motor.

This is Chihiro Abe's MPH record holding super street motor. Porsche cylinders. actually two cylinders per hole, pressed together to make them longer. $$$$$$$

  What easy access it is to the rod and main bearings with out the need to brake the long block down.

These are Abe's Steel chamber heads widdled by Dick Nuss.

not much to really say about them except $$$$. Thats a lot of head. Port shape reveiled.

And the finished prodcut of what the other heads above will eventually look like. There are no valve seats in these as the chamber material acts as the seat. With a bigger chamber, wouldnt these be the ulimate  full race TURBO HEAD!!!!!!!!

5-3-04

 Race car central. Troxell's car has now made it to my garage. He was having some small issues with his shifter at Phoenix. The original shifter box was a little flimsy and he wanted to change it. He asked me to help, and I thought, easy, he already has a mig welder at his house, we pick up a box and knock it out. What I didnt realize was what kind of box we would be using, that would instigate some fabrication more then I would have thought. We found out that my trans guy Kevin Pirtle at Trans West has been making  an ocasional shifter box for his off road buddies. So it was off to pick one up from him. And that is where the suprise came in. He is use to having some off angle shifting linkage (witch by the way is what we were dealing with any ways) So his box has a different support system in it.

 Instead of the standard plastic bushing, this thing has two pressed in bronze bushings where my fingers are. We used a piece of 7/8 od DOM seamless tubing that fits perfectly into the bronze bushings. I cut the old cup off the other shift rod and welded it to this. Notice this shifter is not on top of the tunnel but on the side.

Then to take care of the angle, John picked up a small u-joint from a steering lingake that is splined on each end so we have plently of rotational adjustments as well. Weld the splines into the tubing and wha la.

When I first picked up the box, I thought, I needed a head start and had John bring his car over a few weeks earlier then I had planned so I can look at it and figure it out. Come to find out, it was a lot easier then I thought it would be, and we knocked it out in one evening. His shifter is now nice and positve and finding every gear real easy. And what use to be a multi bend, once piece, wrap around the seat belt mount and some times rub it, has now become a two piece, very positive, don't interfere on any thing shifting linkage. hopfully, its not so positive that we start bending things in the gear box.

4-30-04

  Dom has a new web page, click here and check it out.

Its not to often that you will see a picture of my car on my own web page. But fortunatly Lyle Clark took this picture and gave me permission to show his work off. Thanks Lyle. Sissy sticks (wheelie bars by TG Fab.) are working well. keeping those big wheelies in check.

4-20-04

Phoenix Bug-O-Rama.

A bad day of racing is still better then a good day at work. But I did get my car to actually work consistantly good for the first time in a long time. The bog issues are worked out for the most part. What was it? After tilting the carb forward at palmdale and things go better, on some advice from the EMS guys, I vented the float bowls of the holley outside of the air filter.

So it was off to test on Friday night to make sure every thing was ok. First pass off the trailer at 9:30 pm was a Huge wheelie. Haven't done that in a long time. It was one of those pull up and ride out wheelies. But the reports I got afterwords was, HOLLY COW, you were throwing sparks all over. Come to find out, I was actually dragging the apron. The other problem was, it started to turn right, so I had to lift and then bottomed out on the front of the pan. MORE SPARKS. And it only ran a 12.31. Bog problem solved. So my reasoning, not the greatest take off, because of the lift off the gas, and if I can keep it on the ground, I should be right there on the 11.90 index. So out come the sissy sticks. (wheelie bars) I know, its no fun that way, but I want to win more then I want to put on a show. 11:30pm and with bars on, it keeps the front end down and suddenly my car is going way to fast with an 11.40.

Sunday morning. Round 1 of qualifying. 11.73. a little too fast. Time to make some more adjustments. Round 2. A little jump to the left off the start, but an 11.940. good for number one for round 2. YEEEHAAAAA, im finally in the ball park. Round 3 of qualifying and the car really rockets out of the hole strait and its back to an 11.72. But my qualifying number doesn't hold up. Doug Berg squeaks in an 11.90. But my number was still good for number 2. Right behind that was Lawless at 11.944, Schuerger at 11.945, then I think it was Wiess at 11.95. Man this is tough. Over all it was a full 16 car field.

I go into round 1 of eliminations with some confidence. My reaction times in the morning were very respectable, and that made me very happy. But that was short lived.

I put 3 tenths on the tree against my round 1 opponent, get half track. Get a little loose, lift a little as I know im way ahead. Get back in it. Find out where my opponent is, start lifting again, get on the brakes, cross the line way ahead of my opponent, but my win light is not coming on!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WHAT!!!!!!! I broke out. Apparently my car really came out of the hole, and just kept getting faster. When I lifted after I got loose, I though, there was my et loss and I shouldn't have to worry about braking out any more. Then lifting again and getting on the brakes should have been a slow run. Boy was I wrong. As a driver, I know better and should have reeled my opponent in, but I think I was a little gun shy of lifting too much when getting that close as I just recently lost a race that way. So I second guessed my self and thought id be safe either way. Time and time again, I give my self a new lesson to learn. That will not happen again.

4-2-04

 Dominic "the burn out king" had arranged to get my helmet painted.

 Including some Steve Feinberg lettering and muffler up front.

Even got one of those blue lenses.

The squid on the back to represent Team Squid. (dont ask. its a long story)

All done up at Fluid Tip. My helmet is mild compared to some of their other work. Go check em out and if you want your helmet or other stuff painted, go there.

3-30-04

IDRC West Coast Nationals, Palmdale Ca.

A weekend that started out crappy, and got better as it went along. But the final results where exactly what I was looking for.

Data logger went in for a check up on Thursday and I picked it up Friday. Edelbrock has some good customer service. But still has some problems when trying to make it work on Friday night. As I eliminated things, and was getting real close to figuring it out, my laptop took a dump. Hard drive crashed and burned. Called Dell up yesterday and new hard drive is in the mail. No questions asked. Now that's more good customer service. Good thing I didn't use the laptop as a frisbee. So at 8:30pm when that crash happened, car is still up on jack stands, wires all over and not even packed up for the weekend, I was about to say F it all and wait for another weekend to play. But, the Wife settled me down and said, take the desk top with you. HHMMMMM, I guess that will work. Funny, I can't race with out a computer, doesn't that suck? But that was the whole point of me going out again, was to get some more test and tune data. If I win an even, that's just a bonus.

Saturday morning and I'm off to the races. With a brain storm on the way out, I decide to go right into downtown Palmdale to find a serial extension cable so I am not having to drag a complete computer out to the car. Staples is open at 9 am and gates open at 10am. That works for me. 3 6ft'ers later and I am back on track.

Go out and make 3 passes on Saturday only to come to the conclusion that the new carbon fiber clutch disk needs more pressure plate. It would chatter between gears trying to hook back up. But that's why I came to this race, I can test it, if it doesn't work, I have all night to change it out. I took my time and pulled the motor in the pits after 5pm, put ole trusty reliable in, and went and had dinner with the JCL crew. Still having some bogging problems at the same time, trying to work that out as well. The other good news about Saturday was, the data logger recording only rpm and input shaft and o2 sensor stayed working the whole time. This told me that I just have too much noise in the engine compartment and either need to do some serious shielding, or need to move some sensors out of the compartment.

Sunday, the car count is still low at this event, I went out and got 3 more practice passes in. (could have had 2 more if I pushed it) But in the morning, I had another brain storm. Lean the carb forward. Sure enough, it seem to help out the bog problem. OK, I feel better there. I guess, when I get it up on the rear wheels, and the added G forces, must push the wall of fuel way up beyond the level of the rear auxiliary booster venturies and floods it. This was the reading I was getting shortly after launch from the o2 sensor. Another idea I picked up from Dick Nuss last night was to tie the fuel bowl vent tubes that sit inside the air filter, have them plumbed outside the air filter, so there is no vacuum or any dumping inside.

The only other problem I had was ole trusty clutch disk was slipping. And I had to turn the boost down and settled with an 11.76 dial in for eliminations. There were a small hand full of us VW guys, and we managed to stay away from each other in the first round. Most of us stayed away from each other in round 2 as well, but by that time, there were only 3 of us left. Round 3, 5 cars left and I draw a bye run. Round 4, 3 cars left, Jim Gillum in the orange Ghia gets the bye, and I race a Toyota Celica. It comes to an All VW final round. Its Jim and I in the finals. We stall about as long as reasonably possible to cool down, and we are off to race. Jim is one of those seasoned veterans that typically like to beat up on the v8 boys. And I know he is good. And this is about 2 weeks later then we wanted too. Would have love to do this at Fontana. Any ways, I did my job as a driver and stepped up for him. And if I didn't, I knew my chances were not good. I was either going to have to red light or cut something real good. I slowed my dial in by a 10th because my last run showed that my hot motor was falling off by that much, so with an 11.86 dial in, I put up a good .518 (on a .500 light) reaction time against Jim's .550ish (witch is good to beat most any one) and caught him about 1200ish feet out. Jim runs a 12.80 on a .79 dial in, and I run a 11.88 on 86 dial in. Needless to say, it was close. And as we collected our checks, even Mike Ferrera, the head IDRC dude, said that was a close one. That felt real good to win. Not to mention, a big feather in my cap for beating one of the best in the finals.

After 3 strait weekends of racing and 25 passes later, its time to take a small brake and wait until Phoenix Bug-o-rama on April 17th. In the mean time, I will do some re-wiring for my sensors, do some more clutch selection, and just make sure all my ducks are in a row for our PRA season opener.

3-26-04

 One of my newest motor building toys. a Dial Bore Gauge. This one is a Mitutoyo, series 511, 2-6" range. this has an +/- .0002. but you can find ones that are .0005 on ebay pretty cheap now a days.

this thing measure in .0001 increments. That's right, 4 digits right of the decimal. Extreamly accurate. Well only as accurate as the setup device such as a micrometer. So one revolution of the dial is only .001".

typically you would set up on a check right or a micrometer, then measure your subject to see the difference. it self centers, so its easy to get a reading. (a whole lot easier then my old telescoping gauges.) this is going to be good for checking rods, main journal bores and how round they are. (the real reason i got it) and even check for roundness in a cylinder. Ex: put a micrometer on a crank, then use that measurement to set the dial bore gauge up and then check the bearing that is crushed in a case, and you could see the difference or clearance betwen journal and bearing.

 There was a day, that life was simple and I only needed once clutch combo. Now I am making a collection of different combos. The combo on the left, the green old 2300 lb unit is good ole reliable. After trying some other things a few weeks ago, I bolted in ole trusty with the same manufacurer stock type disk I use to run many years ago, and was good to go.

Don't exactly know who makes this simple stock disk, but my last one was used 7 years, won 4 championships, and never gave me a problem. the symbol on that disk is DK with some wings around it. This thing is gold to me.

But I refuse to learn a lesson and want to try something else, yet again. This is the Mystery Carbon fiber padded clutch disk.

This is one of those, here, try this out and let us know how it works. If it works any thing like the carbon brakes that the company I work at makes for F1 racing, then its got potential. But it might take a few different trys before I  figure it out.

Per instructions, I was told, this unit must be used with a pressure plate a step higher then what one might use with a standard puck. As the friction coefficient is not quite the same. So, now there is a stage 2 on it. And as I some times like to be technical, I checked the brake away torque of this unit ahead of time. my old 6 puck on a stage 1, brakes loose at 190 ft pounds. this unit under the stage 2, brakes away about 205 lbs. as a reference, my old stock disk under my old 2300 was braking loose somewhere above 250 lbs. To check this, I just welded a 1/2 drive socket on the end of an old input shaft, put a torque wrench on it and check.

So now its on to Palmdale this weekend and see how it works. there is an IDRC import race this weekend.

3-23-04

Drag Day at Irwindale.

Well once again, not what I would have like to see.

But finally did start to make head way. With last weeks bogging issues, I came to the conclusion that I might have been running rich with the new cam. So my question to my self was, how do I run lean it out out of the hole, but still have the rich feature on real boost? Light bulb went off and it was to isolate the boost referenced power valve. So with a little plumbing, I had it shut off for the first few pounds in first gear only. Well it bogged again. Went to go look at the data, and there was none. WHAT! Do a simple test and the data logger does record. HMMMMM! Good thing was, I hit the record button on the O2 sensor (Innovate's LM-1) so I got to see a real lean spike right off the line. Ok, that was the wrong thing to do.

Pass 2. Change every thing back to original configuration and put in a smaller main jet in the primaries. Actually got data out of it this time. And actually got to see that I was running quite rich in first gear but was starting to feel better. But then it was time for eliminations. Yes only 2 practice runs, because of a lot of oil down issues and some ill advised riding of an atc by an $%&#@ that was doing a wheelie, fell off the back, hurt himself, and required the track ambulance and fire department to come in and stop the entire show for an hour. This also put into effect, no riding scooter, atc, etc at the track. Everyone must now walk.

Well, eliminations where now here, and I went with another smaller main jet, and it picked up another .05 off the 60ft, but it was also at the cost of a RED light. I raced Troy Palmer in this round. He was dialed in about a 10th slower. What was weird but old hat was ever thing went in slow motion. I saw his lights coming down too and noticed he was late off the line, not big late, but late enough that made me think, I can back off on my reaction. BUT the new LED lights, must have got to me, and what I thought was going to be a soft light, turned into a .493 red eye. And you know the saying, "that's racing" And my 60ft times are still not near where it should be.

Monday morning came round and I got a call that might change a few things on my car again, and maybe solve all fuel delivery problems once and for all. So stay tuned.

3-15-04

Just one of those weekends.

NHRA compact racing. I figured this would be a good test session, and even try and get a Wally to boot. So I have been thrashing to get every thing done to go play with my car this past weekend.

Put a few new things in the car to help me solve some problems. IT ALL FAILED!

I tried a lighter clutch disk that should have grabbed better then my last one and I can manage it with my own shocker. That was the first thing to not work at all. Every time I banged a gear, it would not grab at all. Let off the gas until the motor and clutch came to the same speed and then it would hold.

Hooked up one of those cool LM-1 wide band 02 sensors, this started to fail on the first pass, tried to re-calibrated and it went wacko again by the time I got back to the staging lanes.

Got the new qwikdata data logger set up. (wow this is a cool tool) but it stared to cut off data half way through the runs, and got worse each time I used it. Sunday morning, it completely stopped working.

Sunday morning I found that one of my pressure switches that try and hold the waist gate closed till the last minute wasn't working either.

I could not get the car to get out of its own way off the line all weekend.

But sunday moring, I picked up Dom and showed up at the track early and did manage to swap out to an old tried and true, rusty, made in 1990, 2300 lb pressure plate with grooves in it, that won more races, back in with a good ole fashion (same manufactorer as my old 4 championship disk) stock disk. Clutch slip problem solved Sunday morning. Car still bogged but it did it consistantly, as long as it was consistant, I can do something with it. (11.70's at 116 mph, with mph vs the et, shows car not moving very well) I did manage to get a few passes in Sunday morning for practice, put up 2 11.72 and then later an 11.78. I dialed in on an 11.78 and in the first pass, my opponent red lit, so I knew I had the win and ran it out and ran an 11.780, right on the dial in.

Needless to say, I got to the semi's where I had the guy covered by a mile (with in the ¼ mile at that). Caught the guy, passed him. Blip the gas a few times, was still moving out ahead, so I gave a full off throttle blip and the motor caughed, and my opponent went right around me. Probably crossed the line in front by a few inches.

So we will try it again next weekend at Irwindale.

3-8-04

The recent motor I built for John Troxell, finially got a decent work out over the weekend. After one attempt to go out a few weeks back, and running into some new car blues, We put 8 passes on it over the weekend.

We didnt change a thing all day, and just worked on bringing the driver up to speed. He started out doing a slower shake down pass with a mid 8 second 1/8th mile pass, and slowly but surely picked up the pace quite nicely. closing in on the end of the day, I was put in the car to see what can happen. I ended up putting on up a 7.18 at 95mph. A little massaging to tire pressure, and the last pass of the day John put up a cool 7.20 at 94 and some change. So he is defintily right where he needs to be.

Now, John will need to bring up the shift rpm, and find the sweet spot. then start working on suspension tuning  and carb tuning a touch more, and I definitly can forsee some 7.00's, maybe some 6.90's. (low 11's, high 10's in the 1/4 mile) Right off the bat, had my pass got the 60ft time he did on his last pass, I would have been in the 7.0X's my self. but it does help, that I am probably about 40-50 lbs lighter then John.

I think if John can get the shift rpm up in the mid to high 7000 rpm range, he might  just be puttin up some 7.00's at drag day in a few weeks.

3-4-04

 Im working on my car again. This picture gets a very small caption. "Toys" The latest addition to the car to help take some of the guess work out of tuning. On semi-perminant loan from the guys at EMS. This is an Edelbrock Quik-Data, data accuasition unit. all it is designed to do is record what ever you want, such as fuel pressure, oil pressure, exhaust temps (EGT's) or what ever you can think of. My purpose for this primarily was to measure clutch slip. I will be reading rpm vs input shaft speed. other items that I will measure will be EGT's on all 4 pipes, boost pressure, hopefully throttle position. I am  thrashing to get this all done in hopes to do some testing/first outing at NHRA import race at Fontana on March 13-14th. This weekend, I hope to get the transmission in. I dropped off the input shaft sensor at Trans West this week and this is what I have been waiting for to have the gear box put back together. Input shaft sensor? Yes, it is a set of flying magnents that have been put in a piece that has been pressed on to the input shaft coupling.  (thanks to Dick Nuss) Then the pick up sensor will be pushed through the roof of the trans case. BAM! instant rpm reading of input shaft. So after a pass down the track, I can hook up a laptop to it, upload the info, read and make an adustment based on what I can actually read instead of what I thought I felt.

Dont forget, Drag Day at Irwindale is coming up soon as well. March 21st.

2-27-04

Unfortunately, I didn't get the pictures I wanted. This pic was in the early stages of mock up.

I wanted to get some step pictures in here, but my wife was using the camera for work. So I can only write about it.

First off, I add a little dykem (machinist dye) around the collar of the spring plate where it is welded. Then slide the retainer over that to see if any thing is hitting. Usually you might find where they stop the weld around the collar is a touch high, you will see this if it rubs with the dye on it. A grinder solves all. Once there is no other rubbing issues except where it is suppose to, its on to put things on the car.

With no preload set, I slid on one side of the spring plate, only to find that the oval window housing was smaller then a later model. So I had to trim off the back side of the spring plate about ¼". Once that problem was overcome, I slid on one side and bolted it down, making sure nothing was binding.

I went to the other side, pushed in the torsion bar (27mm) and then tapped on it lightly to make sure it was bottomed out against the other side and then slide on the other spring plate and then the retainer. This would show me weather I could bolt things right on or need to space it out. Sure enough, I ended up having to install small washers under each retainer to keep things from binding up.

Once every thing is good to go, its time to wind up or set up the preload on the bars. I use my handy dandy craftsman inexpensive protractor and get the angle I need. Ex: with these 27mm bars, with car level, the spring plate is applied to torsion bar with about 8 degrees down before I wind them up. My 30mm bars were set about 5 degrees. Then I did the Bling Bling job for Dom and welded in some stops in the stock area, so he doesn't have to deal with limter straps any more. When setting up the stops, I was looking for about 2" of down travel from about the 0 camber. I ended up with stops that are set about 5 degrees down on the axle tube. This gave me the down travel I wanted. The down side to this was it stretched out the job an extra day.

Last night, I put the sand bags in the driver seat to simulate driver weight and motor is back in to add weight in rear, and will let it settle in overnight and see if I need to do any adjustments.

2-23-04

 This is one of those rare times you will see some one elses, other then my car in my garage. But for the right people, its not an issue. Dominic the burn out king is getting an upgrade.You can see him sitting in front of the tv watching a PRA video, making  his spring plate retainers into BLING,BLING. polishing those bad boys.

 Dom is stepping up in suspension components with new superwhammy Jimmy Larsen  (JCL) shocks. (picture here) the great thing is, when coupled with the right combo torsion bar, and that sweet spot is found in the shock adjustment, the suspension works great. The down side, the shocks can be set stiff enough to move or even bend the shock tower. So, I went in and did the triangulation of the shock towers to the down bars to stiffen things up. (same thing I did to my car) But as I was fitting and wedging in the tubing, I could actually move the shock tower around, witch tells me, what we did was a good move. Just a big pain in the ass to get up in there and weld. Now I understand why Jimmy Larsen will bitch and moan when he works on a street car. If this is something you need done to your car and want me to do it, just make sure and bring that wheel barrow full of money to convince me to do this again.

Today it will be on to changing out the spring plates and torsion bars.

2-10-04

Nothing to do with my car. But cool none the less. I went down to EMS (Engine Machine Service) to chew the fat, but this time I brought the camera.

Jimmy Larsen at JCL made these cool billet aluminum valve covers that have  an O-ring seal and extra deep so they will clear the Pauter roller rockers that are bolted on to this type 1 head. All part of a turn key motor package.

 Another part of this turn key package was a custom baffled breather box that Dick Nuss fabbed up with -10 lines. Ready to bolt to a firewall. And yes, that is a flanged crank. Somebody is serious about their street motor.

 Dick also whipped up this very cool stainless steel header for this motor.Can you say cha-ching?   A one stop shop for a turn key motor.

 Then there is this motor in the build que.Things are being mocked up with a roller cam in this Pauter block and Moldex flanged crank.

More Items going in the motor above. Aluminum rods. Notice the bolt placement. You can do this with a Pauter block. And next to that, a roller cam billet blank, waiting to be ground to spec. $$$$

 The shop guard Cat.

Then there is Hobi Osequers' new motor. Pauter blocks are a beautyful thing.

NICE AND BIG  Moldex 94mm flanged crank. Can you say torque? Both motors are to be coupled with some Porsche aluminum, nickasil lined cylinders in the 102mm range and both with a steel chambered heads similar to what is on Chiro Abe's superstreet motor.

Then there is Hobi's other motor after a quick freshen up, on the dyno waiting to go do some racing next month.

Since we mostly look at VW stuff, I didnt take any pictures of all the other cool stuff they have and are working on down there. There is always Porsche heads and cases around, Alfa Rameo, Ferrari,  MG, GM,  Ford, Chrysler, you name it, its probably  is or have been through there. There is even a v12 block that looks like it came out of the very early years of automotive and looks like it might weigh 400 pounds. HUGE. I have even seen some kind of big steering nuckle for pusing in and out 747's at LAX ,go through there.

Next time, i will grab some pictures of other things you wouldnt normally see, like a 3 foot long, 4 cylinder crank, or a connecting rod that is 12 inches long and must give a 7:1 rod ratio.

Also, if you want to see these pictures in a little more detail, I still have the high resolution versions on my computer, but will probably toss them out in a couple of weeks. I can email them over to you.

2-3-04

My motor is finally back together and ready to tackle a new season, but first, I must brake in the new cam.

Since I had it off for disassembly, and clean up, I thought it would be a good chance to show a decent picture of the TG Fab header I use.

I also made my self a new skid plate, I mean sump cover.

I use to use a stock plate, but it always seem to seep oil after a while. I didn't like the idea of buying one of these, so I just got off my butt and made one up my self. we will see how it works.

For this year, I will also try out some JayCee push rod tubes. Just like the ones we put on John's motor.

 The only think that worried me about putting these things on when installing on John's motor was the fact that the tapered seating surface for the seal was cut strait in on the head. My heads are the same way. If you look at the case side, they are angled so the seal seats good, but on the head, it doesn't look perfect because unlike a stock tube, that will flex and be forging in this area, (all i used in the past and always worked great) this makes the seal come in at an angle. But nothing a small bead of black, oil resistant rtv silicone cant fix. Why did I switch to these. I got them at the right price, and I was tired of remembering i needed new tubes at the last minute on a sunday night after 5pm during a rebuild.

In other news, John Troxell got his car all done, and took it out to Irwindale last week. After a brief shake down pass, we found a problem with the suspension, so it was back on the trailer to return another day.  

1-21-04

 My motor stuff continues. Tore it down only to find every thing is perfect. or as perfect as can be expected. If I wasn't so worried, I could have left the case together for another year. Bearings looked that good. Exceptionally good actually. The case is holding up great so far. But since it is apart, I went ahead and ordered a new custom cam. I had Bill Duncan from EMS order it for me, Bill is in pretty tight with Engle, he ordered it Thursday morning, stopped by Friday to pick up some other stuff and it was already done. WOW! thats some good service.We also went for the pre-clearanced version. Yes, they now offer a pre-clearanced cam. I think this cam will clear a lot. It cleared my stuff by a mile.

If all goes well, cam will be broken in by this weekend. :)

 1-7-2004

Un-believable. Happy New Year.

I dont know abou the rest of you, but time seems to fly by faster and faster every day. Just not enough time in the day to get every thing done.

John's motor is done. Cam is broken in and ready for pick up. As we brought this thing off brake in rpm, I gave the throttle a quick rap, and John's eyes just open wide as this thing rocked my car in place. Shortly after brake in was done and a nice idle was established, the motor was pulled and the inner valve springs were installed. John has also ordered a larger pulley for the alternator to slow the rpm's down out there.

I even whipped up the muffler for him. Its nice to have a welder. John stopped by on the 1st to collect his new toy. And when I talked to him last, he was finishing up some wiring on his car and this thing should be going down the track shortly.

Now its on to my stuff. Just last friday, I finally started to tare down my motor. Heads were dropped off at EMS last night for a clean up valve job, Every thing else looked perfect. Case looks to be holding up nicely. Still need to do some quick measurements to confirm that. A new cam will be ordered today. A case of Torco oil was also ordered. (OUCH!! its not cheap, but some good stuff)

In other news, Jim Hagethorn has picked up a new car for him self. Right before x-mas, we took a road trip up to San Jose and picked up a second owned 66 bug. Second owner only had it for less then a year and only did a little clean up on it. Otherwise its all stock. Never been hit. Stock items we have never even seen before. So the idea will be to keep it stock appearance and have a 2387cc monstor in the back with a small turbo. Can you say "Stump Puller"? Still collecting a few motor parts, but that will be next on the agenda after my motor and stuff are back together.

Dominic "the Burn Out King" is also getting ready for the season. Last weekend, we took his car out to Carlsbad to play with his VW Paradise prepped motor. And in bad track conditions, he produced an 11.90 time slip. He is so "Hooked". I got a new vid camera recently and as soon as I can get a new input card for my computer, I will try and post a small video, or better yet, maybe pay a visit to California Racing Grapevine. June has a few vids from Carlsbad and might post Dom's latest vid.

Come March, there are 2 import races (in Fontana and Palmdale) and a Drag Day at Irwindale. So time is of the essence. get your stuff done and lets go play.