I wouldn't know the first thing about building a float. Looks labor intensive. Not to mention creative, artful, etc. So cool. Must give you a feeling of great accomplishment to work on it. I'll limit my float building to putting ice cream in root beer.
City of Sierra Madre should be real happy. The float is looking great. Bob, that's a good one, Root Beer float ( State Drink For CA Summers)
Congratulation on your Rose Parade Float and the Trophy. Great work by all the volunteers that put out this peace of art for all to see.
Here's a video on Facebook from our killer music man, James Dyer. This's at our post-parade performance. Here 'tis on YouTube, for those of you who don't do facebook.
Thanks for the YouTube video Dick. My wife and I watch the supposedly "uninterrupted and commercial free" coverage on HGTV and they never showed the Sierra Madre float.
Great You Tube Video with music. Drivers area looks to be about the same as your dragster but with tons of flowers in your face.
"Tons" is correct. Well over 60% of our floats' total weight is flowers, and this one came in around 18 tons. That's the "Animation hole". She's a crew-serve vehicle, and takes a driver, a co-driver/audio man, and an animator, to run'er. I have driven on occasion, but am usually buried there, in the "A"hole of the float , as it's the most complex position to run. Yeah, not sure why HGTV passed on us this time. They've been pretty good about the self-builts in the past.
OK, I finally got time to dig into the mill. Looks like at some point the oil pressure went down, #1 rod bearings were pounded out, and the rest were lightly damaged. Also, the oil rings were all worn down (and hadn't been clocked correctly either), and one top ring was in two pieces. No damage to the crank, rods, or cylinders though, so the block's good. Guess I shut'er down in time. I'll deck'er some, poke'er out a bit, and pop in new slugs. Then the new cam, and back together for the season. Also doing away with the cooling system, charging system, and going to solid engine & gearbox mounts, in an effort to cut some more weight off'er. Hoping to get'er below 1350 lbs, so this year'll be on just block water, and battery.
Don't worry too much about the oil rings being clocked improperly. When I was doing RnD dynomometer work we built some (V8 Ford) engines and very carefully installed the rings such that the gaps were spaced apart from each other. After running these engines on the dyno we tore them all down and recorded the orientation of the ring gaps. The compression rings moved around - rotated - on many of the cylinders. The oil ring rails stayed as originally placed on the rail expanders, but the oil ring assemblies also drifted about. I do not think this is nearly as big a problem as making sure the end gaps are held close to minimum specs. Blowby numbers for engines' cylinders did not seem to have a strong correlation to ring gap orientation. Nevertheless, we still specify staggered end gaps as good technical practice. A far worse situation is when the ring stops moving due to it being pinched or gummed up and ring flutter eats away at the ring lands, causing ring land failure and broken rings. Detonation can also do similar damage.
No sweat, I haven't noticed any particular need to clock'em either over the years, just noting it for "the record". Still, I put'em in that way as well, "just in case". The one broken top compression ring on #3 looks to've been the victim of something other than a tight gap, no scraping on the walls or other indications, and the lands were good. I don't recall hearing any pinging, but it's possible a single cylinder may've escaped my attention.
...... and I'll take any excuse I can get. Here's a 14 minute long video of what I consider to be the best race I had in 2015. Everything, lanes to the pit return, just for anyone masochistic enough to watch.
I'd love to be able to come over and race with you. That looks like a hell of a lot of low key, no bullshit fun. My jalopy wouldn't be able to match you blokes in heads up racing but, who cares, it's the smile that matters.
I finally watched the video, Dick. It is obvious that you are with kindred spirits, enjoying to the max, the way it used to be.
Often, when we choose each other of, we'll spot a car length (or two, if brave or tipsy ) at the start. The spotter just waits 'til the spotee's past the line, then hammers it as usual. The audience usually thinks someone was asleep at the flag, but hey, it's OUR race, and we run it the way we want. 'Course then time slip R/T's don't count, but the rest still works. Yeah, Eagle Field's "where it's at", as we said in the 60's.
Ok, I finally managed to watch the video before I went to bed last night. I'm thinking that you need to slack up a little or the fun police are going to be knocking on your door.
Well!! That video certainly brightened up my morning. You guys are having FUN and that's what its about. My partner(trans planted northern calif guy and no were not gay)and I goal is with our new SDRA car come run Eagle field with you Fun guys. That is if you will let us run with ya.
Tom, I pay off the Gods-O-Speed with broken offerings regularly, and they in turn kick back 10% to the Fun Nazis on my behalf. Keeps'em off my back. Mr. Mac, you're more than welcome. Looking at your build so far, it looks like it'll be fun just looking at the back end. Haven't had any pink cars with Peter Max florals yet, but hell, we'd race'em.
Mr. Mac, Let us know when you are coming west. Maybe we can get some of the nw guys to come on back also . Ran with them last year and it was big time fun. All of us that were there ran pretty close so it made the racing that much closer. We had one sdra car and two nw cars and me ( I`m not legal ). One other sdra car broke.
So far Rocky has been running two weekends each year. Info can be found here. http://eaglefielddrags.com/ He started out just Saturday and Sunday, but he's adding a Friday night race this May with day and night meets on Saturday. It just keeps getting better every year. Here's the poster for this year's meets.
Thanks for the info 64 we will talk it over, Probably would be in the fall by then we surly will have this thing figured out.
Finally got around to watching the video. Miss-lead us all into thinking you're one of us muckers, then show us the mega bucks fifth wheel trailer and tow rig. Shame on you!
Trust me Brother, Old6Rodder doesn't have a fifth wheel tow rig, Just an old Dodge pickup and a single axle trailer with a home made cover to keep the weather off the race car and when he isn't at the track the race car and trailer sit outside because his early 1900s single car garage is too small to even put the pickup in.
be aware it`s 1/8 mile, no prep, no time, heads up stuff. any class organization seems to be informal
Extremely informal. Took me a minute to get that one, TDB. For anyone that missed the gag, that rig at the beginning was along side the lanes, where I started the video. Definitely one of the bucks-up players. My "rig"s the brown sunshade at the end of the vid, and a tad smaller.
The only comment that I have on the video is that you really know how to make a Midwest winter seems a lot longer. Thanks for sharing.
The Jalopy Journal
