Projects Bad Banana Resurrection - 55 Chevy Gasser

11.10

 

im not a "newbie" and im not attempting to change the HAMB to suit myself so i'm not sure where thats getting pulled from. This car recieved 17 pages of attention from everyone here on the HAMB. If it wasn't HAMB friendly or HAMB accepted; everyone couldve thrown a hissy months ago and the moderators wouldve pulled it. He had what he had to work with and returned the car to the track to enjoy with his father. its one more saved from rotting away. now leave it alone. ifyou have an issue; take it to PM's or confront the mod's. from my standpoint it sounds like of bunch of crybabies and it honestly sounds rude in plain daylight....ive seen a lot less HAMB friendly on this board.

 

It's why I don't post pics or anything else here anymore.
It's more headache than its worth.
But I LOVE your 55, and I've had my dad help me on almost every single car Ive ever done.

 

that sucks!!!
I for one hope that you continue to post up in here .
the build up of the car was very inspiring to say the least.

hey...your always welcome at www.saginawstreetandstrip.com

 

WOW !!! I have not checked back to this thread for awhile, did someone crap in someones Easter basket or what.
What you have done is remarkable and an insperation to us, keep it going.
When you get that first pass under your belt there is nothing that can take the smile off your face, nothing !!!
Be careful and keep the shinney side up.

 

I say 11.25 et

 

hey man don't sweat it! just keep on doin what you're doin! the car came out great! the fact that you got to bring the car back for your old man wayyyyy outweighs a few internet forum cry baby's opinions.

 

Way to screw things up zman, like usual, you ruined a great thread with your b.s.

I say the bad banana will run a 10.78 by the way.

 

KEEP ON POSTING !

My guess is......................10.26 ...................

Thanks for a good read so far,

I hope the dicks on this board don't screw it up for ya.

Good luck and like some others have said ,get some videos

 

o.k. so far I've seen..
10.80
11.50
10.24
10.73
11.00
10.02
9.99
11.01
10.01
10.28
11.25
10.78
10.26

o.k I need results...come on back..

 

hey it looks great i say 11.17 and if u need any help to get this printed ou for ur dad i will be glad to help

 

pm sent

 

Dont forget 10.65.

Jon

 

I am glad to see the weather is going to be good Saturday for Rusty and the Bad Banna, the Detroit Dragway Reunion is a great spot to show off all his hard work and its going to be a hit there.

Jon

 

Rusty, you said so yourself in your first post, that you were not looking for input...stick to your guns and ignore the haters. What you have done, most wish they could. I am looking forward to meeting you and your 55 on Saturday. 10.55!!!!!!!!

Steve Timoszyk

 

i have to say, this car and the whole story are amazing! and do not let some lame ass comments get ya down!!!! there will always be some jerk that has to ruin it for everyone.

 

I can't wait to see your car at the Detroit Dragway Reunion on Saturday. It looks great! I'm going with a 10.60. Matt

 

been watching this from the start, keep it up, piss on the bored ass zeros...

 

How is this guy being a jerk?? How is this negative?? Yes, it's still 100% bad ass with an injected small block and a glide (and a Dana w/5.13's) but it looks like something outta '78 with the super tricks on it. There is absolutely no look, trend, or innovation from 1978 thats worth remembering in my opinion. Remember, just my opinion.

The 60's rule, and all those pics you posted of this car in the 60's (and even early 70's) are what the HAMB is. The birth and peak of common man hot rodding. I idolize that era, and what your Dad was doing then inspired me to build what I have now. So when I built my car, I used parts that were readily available in the late 60's. period.

If that stuff doesn't matter to you thats just fine. I guarantee a set of super tricks won't get you booted from here. Your 55 is one bad ass machine and it's not any less cool because of those wheels. Run what you have and if it's cost prohibitive to run anything else, hell no we won't grill you for that. Thanks for posting this build. It is, as said before, very inspirational.

 

Amen brother

 

This car and the story that goes with it is incredible and thank you for sharing it with us. The picture of it moving under it's own power again is inspiring and the pictures of the finished product is amazing. Thanks again for sharing this with us and if you decide to continue documenting this journey elswhere, please let me know so I can follow it. Thank you.

 

Me too!

 

I'm in at 10.87. If I win I wanna donate the prize to your stepson. He deserves it.

Job well done. I wish my Dad was still around to enjoy me and my boys' projects. He'd be having a blast.

Kevin

 

love this story---cant wait for more updates

 

i just want to publicly apologize (although not to zman because i've never been so horribly treated via PM in my life ) to everyone if i created a stir here. I was equally frustrated with the fact that people were trying to deface this thread, the car, the story, and all the hard work dedicated to getting this old chevy back out there, in the name of his father.

I've been following this thread since it was started and like everyone else here; i am always looking forward to more history and more updates. Just seeing the photo of it moving under its own power puts a smile on my face. I wish you the best of luck with the Banana and I hope you can make many more memories with it

now lets carry on and i'm looking forward to more!!!

 

The average here is 10.60 which sound like a good number to me. Ultimately if tuned n tweaked correctly 600HP would put it in the 9's, however any thing in the mid to upper 10's would be a respectable start.
As for the comments on you car become "uncorrect", I think that person was thinking to far foward, as if you kept updating it, you'd end up with a Super Gas car and not history left. I don't think they were ripping you on the cars current state. I also think you took the comment a little too personal bud, ease up and have fun with it. I recently found out that our car is not our dads old car, but it was a fairly famous E/Gasser belonging to Dennis Coker. When he sold it in '65 it still had stock front suspension, the original full interior etc. Now its more of a serious A or B/Gas or even an altered type car. I'm sure not gonna return it to its E/Gas state. I am going for the '68-'70 vibe cause I have that type engine/speed equipment. If someone thinks I'm doing it wrong, thats there opinion, no harm no foul, I would rather have a 9-10 second gasser than a mid 12 second gasser.

 

Boy what a wildcard. The car is amazing. For first day shake down runs I would say 11.10.

 

I'll go with a conservative 10.50's, with lots of room for improvement when you get the car dialed in and get used to it.

I can't find anything on the wheelie bar setting (doesn't mean it's not here), How high do you have them set? I'm starting to work on some and looking at around 4" clearance, looks like yours are somewhere around that. Maybe?

BTW, I think the car is in the spirit of the site. And if you are planning on running the car (which is obvious that you are), there is no way ANY tech guy is gonna let a 10 second car built to 64 specs anywhere near the track.
Larry T

 

And?

I've been waiting since I subscribed at page 2, I must know...

 

It was dead in the middle of these two. The actual number was 10.938. Doing the math to the third decimal, claymore was off by .062 and Ray C was off by .068. Since it was so close, I'll send both of you guys a PM and we'll discuss the prize.

On a personal note, I want to thank everyone for their encouragement and support over the last few months. Without that, I probably would not have finished this thing in the time it actually took. This last week was tough for me. I had so much on my mind not knowing what was going to happen when I actually ran this bucket of bolts. My concerns likely clouded my judgement and I probably mis-read some stuff on here. Sorry about that. I realized that all of the good here far outweighs the bad (at least for now...LOL) and there are folks who have offered a lot of encouragement who are too far away to ever see this car in person that deserve to at least see this to completion.

That being said, I'll probably keep updating this for now but if anyone ever feels that this thread is too far off the "spirit of the website" I would appreciate a PM instead of posting directly on this thread. I would hope I deserve that much consideration.

To anyone who sent me PMs in the last week, know that I read them all even if I didn't respond to all of them. Thanks again for all of that as well.

Austin took a lot of video. I haven't really looked at it yet. Plan is to download it today. Not sure if I'll get it posted or not today but we'll try to soon.

As for what happened and how it ran, we were only able to make 3 runs before the rain came (effin' rain...). The first run I stabbed the throttle from a fast idle, it picked up the front about 6 inches and when it set down the car went into a violent front end shake. I mean it was to the point I was not going to be able to hang onto it with both hands. It was out of control. Fortunately, it was still going fairly straight. I finally stabbed the brake pedal and it straighened out. I rolled it on through at 23 seconds and change at 70 mph.

Came back to the pits and looked at it. Talked to some folks about toe and caster. However, the caster was the same as it used to be and the toe was about 1/8" in which in my opinion would not do what it was doing. I started looking closer and I could see the front axle rear spring eye bushing was moving in the frame bracket. When we took this car apart, those bolts were rusted into the spring bushing and we had a hard time getting them out. We cleaned the bolts and lubed them and now the springs could actually move about a 1/4" side to side inside the bracket. The springs were just flexing and bouncing back and forth on the bolt.

We needed to take that play out and Falcon Gasser was next to me and came to the rescue. He had a big selection of flat washers and were were able to shim the bushing to make it tight in the frame mount. Went back up to make the second run and that was when we went the 10.93. It looks like it popped the front tires about 6 inches again and this time it had a very minor wobble to it. I breathed it a little and it smoothed out. I rolled back in it again and it felt fine. I short shifted it and by the time I got to 1000' it was truckin' pretty good and I started worrying about getting this ol' heap stopped . It was going 114. 53 mph at 1000' and it only was 115.64 at the 1/4 mile mark. My worries were moot as it stopped just fine.

That was all of the time runs we were getting for the day. Running with the Great Lakes Gassers, they run on 1/2 second indexes and Austin and I decided to put it into C/G (10.50 index) for the first round. I got paired on the ladder with a 12.50 car. For the first round I put the car up against the 2-step at just 3000 rpms and let it eat a little. I have not seen the video but Austin claims the front wheels were much higher and it drove right through the slight wobble. I went by the 12.50 car somewhere between the 330 and the 1/8 mile at a pretty good clip and thought "I could win the round if I stay under 10.50" so I pedaled it quite a bit and rolled through at 11.50 and got the win light.

Got back to the pits just in time for it to start raining. We hurried up and loaded up and it didn't stop raining so we headed home. On the flip side, this car is now undefeated in almost 30 years!!

I am completely pleased with how it turned out. The engine is awesome. The short numbers on that last run show this thing will go deep into the 10s and that is right where I would like to see it. Faster than 10.0s you get into licensing, chassis certs, etc and I don't need that. Besides, this car does not need to go that fast. It holds your attention the whole way down the track at the speed it is capable of now.

I think we are done running it until Beaver Springs in a few weeks. I need to go over it and tighten up the front some more and get ready to go down there. Hopefully, we will create some good memories and relive some old ones down there. I know this old bomb knows it's way down that old piece of pavement..

Stay tuned for video later..