It has been and exciting race season and we reached some goals

11/9/04

s most of you know by now we started the “Project 4-Link” tech series about four years ago. It is the longest running series of tech articles on one dragster. We have gone from the stack of tubing to the national event victory. It has been a fun trip and continues to be so. I can’t thank our many supporters enough for without them I would still be trying to finish it up …

I left you last summer with the last installment being about going to a race at Byron and the oil filter problem at an IHRA race in Top Dragster. Well, that ended up being more than blown o-ring on the filter. We damaged a bearing and did some minor damage to the crankshaft and a couple of rods. Needless to say we were down for a while and we got back to racing in July. Special thanks to Jay at Roeder Performance Machine for freshening up the 572” Mopar. We replaced the Eagle 3-D rods and had them put ARP L-19 rod bolts in them. The crankshaft was repaired by simply grinding the rod and main journals .010”. We stuck a new top ring in after a quick hone job to make sure the cylinder walls were “clean” from any small debris. Flat-Out Gaskets made up a set of rubber-coated solid copper head gaskets and we were ready to go again.

I had several inquiries about the “screen" I put over the carbs in the last article. It is simply 1/4" galvanized screen. Easy to form over a lightweight aluminum frame. Be sure to either lock tight any nuts and bolts or use silicone to prevent them from coming loose. If you race where you face the car doing the burnout or have a pit area with a lot of rocks, like we do, this could prevent a disaster. We hope to figure out a way to use air filters next season. The scoop limits them a little, but we have some ideas on using two flat panels. Our scoop tray was cut out my Tuff-Paw Trailer accessories and we used flat .125 aluminum for the "tubes" from the carbs. We used a roller to form them and had them Tig welded into the tray. Been trouble free all year, we just used our old single four barrel Goza tray for a pattern.

The first event was in 90-degree weather and our first run was 7.70 at 177. I think we were too rich in the heat but at that point I was thinking “better safe then sorry”. The car was deadly on the dial in and we went to five finals at the next eight events and two others were semi-finals. Part of the consistency came from a change we made in the ignition programming on the MSD Digital 7. We took 4 degrees of timing out of the car on the shift. From 29 degrees to 25 degrees. I know this isn’t much total timing but the engine loves it, although the dyno said different. The car responded by running 7.50s almost everywhere we went and was repeating 1.06 to 1.07 60’ times like clockwork. Part of the repeatability is the BTE 10” converter. With 1.06 60’ you know it leaves hard but it isn’t violent and believe me there is a difference. If you are not trying to tear the tires off it is a lot easier to repeat and the BTE converter helped us accomplish that.

WE HIT THE 7.40s!! It is something I never thought we could do with this setup as the car is basically heavy and we do not lean on it to get better e.t.s. I would rather be consistent than the fastest car … but being the fastest and consistent … that interests me!

The weather was cooler now and we richened the pair of King Demons up to 79 at all corners from the 77 we were running. The first run of the day was a 7.485 at 179 mph. I had now officially exceeded my license and chassis certification! We’ll get both of those problems fixed before next spring. We went to the Monster Mopar race in St. Louis and hoped to qualify for the Quick 8 dragster side of the ladder. The weather was pretty warm, about 75 degrees and while we were the fastest dragster “on motor” and definitely the fasted Mopar on 440-1 cylinder heads without nitrous, we ended up qualified tenth, only .06 away from qualifying. We tried more timing on one run and it slowed down and we even put a lighter driver in; Andy is about 40 lbs. lighter, but the car spun the tires after 60’. We were satisfied with the outcome and went a few rounds in the bracket race but being a part of the Quick 16 (8 door and 8 dragster) would have been cool. Just for your information the dragster bump was 7.47 and the door car bump was 7.12! Who says those Mopar door cars don’t run?