Woeful Night at the Drags
 

My day at the races sucked! Didn’t break anything or wreck, and got in for cheap so its wasn’t all bad, but I couldn’t get the car to go fast. First four runs, on gasoline only were 11.90s-12.0s and only about 108 MPH. Couldn’t figure out what was going on. The car would launch hard and carried the front wheels almost out to the tree, but it wasn’t making any top end power. The fifth run I finally gave it a spray of nitrous for 100HP and went an 11.43 at 115MPH. Still ‘way off the mark that I’d done the last time I had the car to the strip. The only change was that I’d replaced the 800 CFM Edelbrock with an 850 Holley. I thought it should go much faster than it did. Did lots of tinkering with the timing and couldn’t make power. Pretty frustrating since I’d really been looking forward to running the car. Had been hoping I could get it into the 10’s on gasoline alone since I’d run an 11.44 before but it wasn’t to be.

Great relief yesterday. I pulled the plugs and they all looked fine and then I noticed that the throttle linkage bracket was a little cockeyed. Had my wife press the accelerator to the floor and found that the throttle plates were not opening al the way. The primaries were maybe 2/3-3/4 and the secondaries were maybe 1/3 open, at the most. I’m thinking that could make a bit of a difference. Ha. Now I’m all hot to get out and try it again. Probably won’t now until fall. The temperature Saturday night was only about 80° but its warming up quickly. Its also hard to find a day that the track is not having some sort of special thing going on and I’d much rather go when its not busy. Lot less time waiting in the staging lanes. Oh well.

Did you go to Speedworld or Firebird?

Speed World got my business. Heck of a drive, but much more "user-friendly" and the track is in better shape, from what I've heard from people that go both places.

Karl...

Sorry to hear about your woes... At least you did not get tossed.

Let me know when you plan on going in the fall and we will try to get others to go out with you.

Mike

I do not believe I will wait till fall. Soon as I get the small oil leaks and a few other odds and ends resolved I will try to get a baseline 1/4 mile time before I start changing carb.s etc. So if anyone else has an idea about when would be a good time to go, probably by the end of the month or early next month.
mannyjoe

If you're thinking about Speed World, they have a web site that lists their schedule of events. I can definitely recommend NOT going when they do the jr. dragster thing. Really takes a lot of time away from getting to run your car. BTW, they've nicely upgraded the place by paving the pit area. Much better!

I went to Speed World a few weeks back. The Scottsdale Exotic Car Club rented the track, and welcomed anyone that would like to go to help pay for the day. It was really cool with several 700++ HP Porsche and Mercedes. There was also a twin turbo Viper, but he was on street tires and traction limited. They'll be sure to have another drag day next fall.

I ran about 20 runs with the track in the 80Fs, 28.7 barometer and about 30F dew point temp. There was a brutal head wind, but it was fun and the same wind for everyone that day. I beat the twin turbo Viper twice. :) My starts were close to idle to be easy on the drive line, but that was good for 1.7 and 1.8 60fts on the Mickey Thompson ET Street drag radials. Times were just shy of 10s with a number of 11.1xxs LOL Speed was around +/- 125 range.

My third gear syncro is gone, so that costs me a couple tenths.

This always makes me feel better when I can't hit a 10. LOL
http://www.modulardepot.com/density.php

If I could figure out how to convert my DVD video to the internet I'd post.