With your fly in -fly out are you going to have the car ready for Willowbank Nostalgias next year, probably April? I've had to let my IHRA licence lapse. It is due on the 31st October and if I do it now with the Australian/ American dollar exchange rate plus overseas credit card charge it will cost Aud $250-300 for a Super street licence. In contrast, the ANDRA super street was $144.
Should have it done by Xmas (famous last words) as I have a couple of weeks off. Fingers crossed the April event will align with my r and r. If not I'll have to see what date it falls and see what juggling I can do with my back to back. The whole andra and ihra thing is a joke. When I had the roll cage dramas, after speaking to steve and jeff I was so close to not bothering with racing at those tracks and leaving the cage as is. Bloody expensive for a sportsman class licence. Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk
Belated Xmas wishes all! Just a quick update. While mucking around with my 5yo son on his trampoline last r and r I badly reinjured an old footy injury (aussie rules, I am a sandgroper by birth afterall). Its been a curse and a blessing in disguise becuase while the recovery and physio/rehab has sucked the injury itself has stopped me from persuing other physical activities that usually distract me from finishing building this bloody car! I've had family staying doing the Xmas thing up until boxing day and now that is out of the way I've been able to spend a bit of time each day since reassembling the car. I'm down to a throttle assembly to go in the parts pile so getting closer! To top it off the weather has been quiet mild for this time of year. Its usually stinking hot hot and very humid which is not great for time in a tin shed so overall cannot complain. Anyway, I hope everyone has an enjoyable and safe holiday. Stay tuned for a proper detailed update with pics soon. Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk
Keep tacking way at it. Willowbank Nostalgias are one week before Kooralbyn in February. Reckon you'll make it?
My roster doesn't line up with either event so I'm tossing up what to do but yes I think it will be done prior. Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk
Well back to work and my offsider has asked if I can swap shifts the week of Kooralbyn so it looks like I'm in!!! Now to finish this bloody thing. Nothing like a paid up entry fee to get you motivated. The next two r and r's will be busy. Are you coming up? I know Brian from the Goldie who just finished his car is racing. Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk
I've already entered but something has cropped up that might interfere with it. It might require finish racing, pack up and overnight it 10 hours home. It's doable, 40 years of truck driving prepares you for it. Get your finger out and get it done. Looking forward
Time for a quick update before I fly back to work. After stealing the clutch slave off the Hambster to keep the fb wagon on the road I finally got around to replacing it. Clutch is now bleed and adjusted. I ran a kbs "fuel tank seal kit" through the swap meet special ally fuel tank I'm running. This was full of mud wasp nest and other bits of shit from when I cut the original bung out to replace the missing cap. I was very impressed with the first 2 cleaning and etching steps of the kit and was almost going to leave it as that but I followed onto running the actual sealer which I'm not real happy with. I'll have to keep an eye on it and make sure it doesn't fail. I've never had much luck with these kbs/por15 products and suspect the QLD heat and humidity doesn't allow them to cure properly. Once inside the tank was taken care of it got a quick trip to a local metal polisher for a tickle up. Polished up way better than I thought it would. I'm scared to get finger prints on it now!! I managed to rummage through my parts stash and get a couple of "late model" holden grey motor dizzys down to Dave at vintage racing developments to work his magic on and sort the advance curve to match my engine specs. Once I get this back the car will be right to fire up for the first time. Other little jobs done were to sort some carb spacers out for the scoops to suit the downdraft holden stromberg carbs I am running. My mate Scooter has an unreal setup of lathes and milling machines under his house so a few jack daniels later they are now properly fastened as opposed to just sitting on and being bumped off everytime I go near the bloody intake. I also ran the oil pressure line and accelerator cable through the fire wall with applicable grommets to keep everything sealed up. The water temp line I managed to fit through an existing cable gland in the floor to keep drilled holes to a minimum. Finally, for this swing I've bitten the bullet and dropped the car off to a local exhaust shop to make me up a set of headers. I'm under a pretty tight schedule if I'm any chance of having this car ready for Carralbyn so outsourcing this task is my best chance of meeting the deadline. I've basically got one more "r and r" in 2 weeks time to finish off the following in no particular order: Fit new rear brake drums and shoes Bleed rear brakes Wheelbearings and diff seals All fluids Break cam and engine in Tune 100% bolt check Wheel alignment Purchase all the safety gear for myself and fit the safety gear to the car( harness, roll bar padding) Plumb in the engine breather system Make a bracket for the accelerator cable at the carby end Prob 100 little things I've forgotten about and not listed above... In saying that I think I'm still on schedule. Certainly getting excited and this next swing of work will no doubt feel like an eternity. Anyway ive got a plane to catch. Until next time. Cheers Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk
The car is looking good there mate. Man how many hours you got in polishing that tank and what kind of polishing compound did you use?
Local metal polisher did it for me. I have No idea what he used but took him about a day and cost me 70 bucks. Was hard to argue with that price for a days Labour. It was pretty rough. Especially after I had tarnished it with acid from cleaning and etching the inside. I was not expecting it to come out as good as it did. Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk
I used one of those KBS tank kits through my original converted LPG steel tank. I cured the final stage using the covered bbq as a drying room. I do the same with small painted parts. Any idea who else is running at Cooralbyn?
Yeah i don't think it liked the humidity. It seems to have adhered ok but I'll keep an eye on it. One of those things where you know you should leave it but can't resist touching it and it bit me on the bum. Anyway I'll watch it closely. As for carralbyn I think it's just Brian, yourself and me. I don't think Steve and Jeff are running from when I saw them at Christmas and not sure about any of the other QLD cars. Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk
Well it's official. Car is through tech. To say im over the moon is an under statement. It's been a couple of very stressful days/weeks trying to get the car done by my self imposed deadline. Still lots of little things to tidy up and redo but it's through tech and has been fired up. Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk
Back tracking a little since the last major update. Before I took off to work a few weeks ago I took the car into a friend of a friends exhaust shop. After playing around with a few designs we ended up running with a 2x 2into1design keeping everything tuned length. The ceramic coater they use dicked around and took twice as long as what making the pipes did but they have come out mint. Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk
While the exhaust was off being coated the diff got a birthday courtesy of harts transmissions. Suprisngly it was in pretty good nick for a 200 buck wrecker special. New seals, bearings and longer wheel studs to ensure it keeps the inspectors happy. Threw a full spool in for good measure and to save a bit of weight. Makes it fun to push in and out of the shed now.. Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk
Bringing the car home we have had torrential rain here on the east coast of oz which is not ideal in an open dragster. Crazy to think that some of the places that a few months ago were ablaze are now flooding. Pretty extreme, so in perspective a car getting a bit wet while not ideal wasn't that big in the scheme of things although it was stressful at the time. A solid day of cleaning, wd40ing things and making sure water hadn't got into anywhere it shouldn't have and we were back on track. Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk
In parallel I had a couple of spare late model grey motor dizzys I had lying around sent to Dave at vintage racing developments. Dave is next level mad scientist when it comes to ignition systems. The level of detail he went to explain the process of what he is doing and documenting the rebuild taking photos along the way was full on. In the end he took an average old looking pair of dizzys I've had sitting on the shelf for years and turned them into a work of art. Advance locked to suit my engine and cam specs, fresh plugs and leads and the ignition system was sorted. Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk
Once I was back from work and had everything in the same post code it was time to start getting the car back together. Trying to be as methodical as possible I went through the car system by system. First stop was the fuel system including intake and exhaust. When everything was mocked up I wasn't running any nitrile rubber insulating the tank from the fastening straps. No big deal when the tank was rough but after having it polished to the final finish it needed some protection. Add some nitrile rubber and then the strap bolts were too short. Down to the local hardware shop for trip 1 of about 40 over the last 3 days chasing bolts.. apart from that and some minor adjusting of the fuel lines the fuel system went back together ok. Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk
Next was the cooling system. Went over everything and double checked everything was tight. Break out a fresh bottle of non glycol corrosion inhibitor "race coolant", mix it to the specified level and proceed to fill the cooling system up. Oldest trick in the book. Don't fill a fresh cooling system with coolant. My 30 bucks worth of "race coolant" ended up on the floor.... Pull the brand new water pump off and realised when I pressed the impeller off I didn't reset the seal properly. My bad. Applied some pressure to the spring to hold the seal in, chucked a few tack welds on to hold it all in place, refit water pump, fill cooling system with another dose of race coolant and once again watch it piss out the water pump onto the floor... again... yes I'm a slow learner.. Send the mrs off to rare spares which is no mean feat with a 2yo, 5yo and 30min drive each way.... Flick some paint on the new pump, leave the impeller on this time (will make a blank/outlet to delete the water pump down the track) and fill it with demin water only this time.. No leaks! Will drain some demin water out after it's been run in and add a dose of the non glycol inhibitor. As spanners mentioned ally radiator, iron head and block not going to mix too well with plain demin water Finally cooling system check. (For now) Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk
Next on the list was fill the fresh grey up with oil and prime the oil system. All straight forward, no leaks (yet). Built oil pressure quickly with my coach bolt primer and got oil to the top end. Happy days. Final lot of fluids to be filled was the steelcase Toyota box. Grab the 17mm socket (Yep metric) proceed to try and loosen the fill plug and jeez it's tight. Readjust, get some leverage happening and phaaark me it was tight. Busting my arse swinging off this bloody plug and then bang! Multihex socket rounds the shit of the fill plug that seems like it's been cast into the housing!!! Lots of bashing, smacking of smaller sockets, chisel and every other trick in the book and an hour of burned Labour later and all I've managed to do is completely destroy the fill plug. Tired of this shit and about to burn it to the ground I drag the mig out, find an old wheel nut and proceed to glue the nut onto what's left of the plug. Not pretty but it worked. Fill the box up, put the wheel nut/Fill plug in without using the rattle gun this time and it's all now "fully wet" and almost ready to try fire. Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk
Congratulations on the final tick of approval. It feels good, doesn't it? Don't forget to post the fire-up video or it didn't happen. Unfortunately I won't be racing at either Willowbank nostalgias or Kooralbyn even though I've already entered for Kooralbyn as we are shifting house that weekend. I tried to work out a way to be at one of them but when you have 40 years of accumulated stuff to sift through and transport 560 kilometres away to another house, the logistics got in the way. The removallists won't touch heavy engine blocks and bench grinders and stuff like that for some reason so I've been loading the 10' x 6' tandem trailer up and doing 2 round trips per week for the last 5 weeks. Six hour drive down, unload in the daughter's spare shed around midnight and drive straight back home 6 hours. Good thing I used to be an interstate truck driver. I'll definitely be at the next Nostalgias and the Six Banger Nats in September so hopefully we'll catch up then. Don't forget we need video from you or Brian. John Gallagher is selling his Slant six powered HAMBster so if you know someone looking for one, give me a yell and I'll pass on his details.
It does feel good. Possibly more relief than anything else. That sucks you won't make either of those events. I'll be working the nostalgia weekend but will be making the first shakedown runs at Kooralbyn. Where are you guys moving to? Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk
Once everything was full of fluids and triple checked it was time to try and fire it up. Get the engine on TDC, wrestle the dizzy in, final electrical connections done and reluctantly hit the start button. "Tick".... hmm starter isn't playing. Battery is charged but hook up a jumper to double check. "Tick"... fresh tight engine was too much for the old starter. Rummage through the parts box find a spare in unknown condition, throw it on and this time it cranks, albeit a bit slow for my liking still no fire. Stand back and have a look at what's going on. It's getting fuel but no spark. Then I realised that id wired the bloody coil earth to "earth" and not the dizzy. Whoops! Rectify that issue and now we have spark. Try again, cranking, getting spark now, getting fuel but no fire.... Dammit! By now the starter is hot and battery and jump packs are flat. It's hot as hell, super humid, I'm tired, frustrated so throw in the towel and call it a day. Bearing in mind I haven't got this thing started and the tech inspector is coming around first thing Sunday morning for the final tech inspection... Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk
That night I had the worse sleep ever, literally dreaming about tech inspections and fresh engines that won't start... in all this madness I then had a light bulb moment. When I set the engine to TDC to get the dizzy in I used the factory timing marks instead of having a good think about what was going on. Factory timing marks aren't going to work on this engine with this cam... Fresh start in the morning knowing what had to be done, measure this time top dead center ignoring any timing marks, reset the dizzy, hit the starter and bang it instantly fires into life. A hell of a lot louder than what I was expecting well before 9am on a Sunday morning. Sorry neighbours. Lucky they were all cool with it. At that point there was another bloody coolant leak (only demin water this time) but the engine had good oil pressure and built temp until the thermostat opened. Check the clutch, seems to be working and selecting gears ok, play around with timing and idle and shut it down. A grin from ear to ear and a massive weight of the shoulders. Literally within 5 mins of shutting it down and moping up the water (again) the tech inspector rocks up. Apart from the obvious cooling system leak and a nut that had to be changed to a nyloc the car passed with flying colours. While the inspector.was doing his thing I take a look at the leaking coolant filter, unscrew the cap and realise there are 2 o rings in the cap.... rip one out, tighten everything back up, fire it again and this time no leaks!!! Happy days, tech inspection passed, car now running and not leaking any fluids time for a celebratory beer. Even if it was before 10am on a Sunday!! Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk
We are moving to Temora. Five acres, bigger shed and a house that doesn't have 11 steps up to it. The area we live in at the moment is turning into a retirement village with people turning their good sized blocks into medium density ghettos so we figured, move to the country. Gunnedah will be about a 5 hour drive and Bodangora 3 and a half. I'm not interested in racing at Sydney anymore with their shitty attitude to sportsman racers but there's Mildura and I'm now closer to the Victorian tracks. It's hard to avoid that initial start up grin but you wait till you've done your first full pass. The grin gets bigger. I still can't see the start up video.
Sounds bliss! It's a shame about Sydney. Considering the numbers we have in the sport down here with only an hand full of "professional" teams you would think sportsman racer would be greater valued considering they make up the vast majority of licence holders. To be honest if I had any dramas on the final tech I was not going to bother with IHRA for the hand full of times I can run at willowbank. Luckily it all went smoothly in the end. As for start up video I'm trying to figure out how to post. Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk
Still lots of finishing touches to before I take it to be run in on the dyno and tuned. I need to dump some demin water out and get some more inhibitor in now it's not leaking, extend the fuel tank breather, chuck a few spring washers on the manifold bolts and pull out my redundant coil earth.. In the meantime my wife who as well as being a fulltime mother to our 2yo and 5yo dabbles in a bit of screen printing. She is the creative mind between us and was chief colour chooser and design consultant during this build. When I mentioned I wanted some sign writting done she volunteered to have a crack. Totally in the spirit of these cars and I knew shed be able to do it. Anyway, after getting what she needed, watching a few YouTube videos and putting a heap of pressure on her self she jumped into it..I might be a bit biased but I think she nailed it all things considered. Plus did I mention it is bloody hot an humid.. she's a trooper. Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk
The Jalopy Journal
