We have come up to run a little Flathead powered 32 coupe at the USFRA Bonneville meet....they have a class that is "HAMB" friendly as it can be run with "street legal" cars with a minimum of changes to fit the rules.....shoot fire, my 32 passed with flying colors!!! If you are out here, come by and say Howdy....we'll have a cold bottle of water waiting for ya This group is "the answer" for those of you who have the "Salt Itch"....yes you can run a car on the salt....whoooo hoooo I'm trying to attach a picture so you know what to look for....chopped 3w with "3232" on the sides
Skot, saw you bitchin coupe on landracing.com today and noticed the hood sides (something I am doing) and the Alliance tag and wondered if that was yours!?!?!?!
I wish I could stop by and say howdy. But I spent waaaay to much at SpeedWeek and now have to sit on my hands until the funds recover. Hope you have a great time and get some good runs in. Watch out for the salt itch. It usually turns into full blown salt fever!
Just checked the results, and Skotz needs another 4 1/2 mph to get in the 130 club. Sounds like it's time for a gear change Skot! Here's a link to a live audio feed from the Salt: http://www.meridix.com/everywhere.php?liveid=landracing They are running until Saturday afternoon.
I switched from 3.19 to 3.33 yesterday and got the rpm up a little along with the speed by 1mph....it's hard to push a "barn door" very fast!!! I've got a couple of things to try this am and try to get a run or so in before the rain starts.....arghhhhh I'll check back in tonite
Hey, good luck from your only Yankee friend. There, that should get you another MPH at least Now go borrow a pair of little headlights - they say that they have to be legal but not that they have to be HUGE
Heh, my wife and I just got back to the hotel after checking out your basses coupe, the channelled roadster, and flathead-powered pickup. My wife loved the sketch of the flathead on the hoodsides. If you're out there tomorrow, I'll be sure to say hi. -Dave
Flathead Fever Update!!!!! Starting out at 120 mph on the test run, I figured that 130 was a piece of cake, nuttin to it......well then I go 123.? and start scratching my head....dang, this "might" be a little harder than it seems!, and yes it is slippery on that salt. So lets put a smaller blower pulley on top(more boost) and figure that'll do it.....HA!....125something.....change rear gears....another 125, but faster....Hey, this is supposed to be easy! Ok, change air cleaner element, change some front wheel spacers, add air to the tires, check points, etc....."now that'll do it".....HA....128something!!!! dangit.....what happened to the "piece of cake" part? Make some more changes add a grill insert with an opening for some air to go thru the radiator and a "little faster" 128.....arghhhhhh Find out that they will let me use a "tow vehicle" on the return road....so we let out all the stops.....full grill insert, and about "32ft" of black duct tape, along with some rags to "smooth out" the area on the rear of the side windows.....HEY, we are getting an old barn door streamlined!!!!....even if it gets hot quickly....lets see....130.348mph.....WHOOOO HOOOOOOOO!!!!! Made it!!!! The guy at the timing building "says leave it alone and go for it again to qualify for the 130 club".....do I listen?.....noooo, I want faster(this is a symtom of "Flathead Fever", by the way) So....another gear change.....check all of our speed secrets tape job....good to go. Lets see.......132.645mph.....DOUBLE WHOOOOO HOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!......we've done it!!!!!!!!! What a great feeling, running a car on the historic Bonneville Salt Flats!!! I drove out here in 1973 in the orange 32, and always said that I was coming back to "run a car".....took a few years....but what a great feeling it is!!!!.....and the reason that I was able to pull it off with out building, yet "another car" was the fact that this USFRA group has this "street car class" so a lot of folks can get to "taste the salt"....granted that most cars are late models.....but, our cars are welcomed with just a few modifications.....soooo, here ya go.....you too can run a Hot Rod at Bonneville and live the Dream Thanks for all the cool comments........I'm still on Cloud 9
Congratulations on going over 130 mph, sound's like you had a blast. Even though you had to do a lot to figure it out you got there and that seem's to be at least a quarter of the fun.
Congrats! In sad news, Saturday is rained out and the event is over. Mike Cook is out there working to get things ready for his Top Speed Shootout next week.
Here's a shot I took of him doing his gear swap. It was great to meet you and glad you made the club! I'll be there next year with my roadster.
Congrats on your 130.. I know just what you went through. My son and I took his O/T turbo Porsche out to the USFRA event 2 years ago to try for the 150 club...we ran 150 point something right off the trailer..first run! Then the back-up run was hell to get. The wind changed and picked up...we went 147---148...stripped out the entire interior..went 149. By now it's thurdsay.. We pumped up the tires...taped up everything except a small hole for the intercooler and one for the radiator...went several 149s. By now it's friday afternoon and the wind is wrong and the salt is breaking up....runs stop at 5 pm.. At 4.50 I look at the wind sock and it's pointed the right direction..finally! I get Jeremy back in the car and up to the line...we're the last car in line. At 4.59 we come off the line and bust off a 157.998!!!!! Did it! Took all week long but we got the magic 150. I know what it's lilke. It's a blast!
Congrats Skot! It's great you have been able to fulfill this dream. See you when you get back to Texas
Yep, it got rained out today.....luckily I(we) loaded up everything on Friday when we saw a big ol storm coming up....didn't want to chance getting the car trapped out on the salt. So my "newest, best friends" Billy and Jim, who DROVE their Flathead powered 32's from Florida!!!and Teri Lynn, helped me get everything packed up. We headed into Wendover for a steak dinner(ya know, celebration time....no hamburgers tonite!!!)and in the morning we all went to the Wendover Air Base where in WW2 they trained with heavy Bombers, including the highly secret Enola Gay and Boxcar B-29's that dropped the "war ending" Atomic Bombs....what an interesting place of History tucked away here, well worth a side trip. Teri and I just had to go back out, on the way out....and that's where the shot of "Lake Bonneville" comes from. Now we are on the way back to Texas, by going North....huh?....well Yellowstone National Park is just 500 miles "UP" the road....and it "seems" like a good idea, while we are up in this neck of the woods....soooo....... And if everything works out as is planned Billy and Jim will be meeting up with us back in Texas just in time for the Day of the Drags, where we switch Flathead cars and take the FED over to run, yet another Flathead.....ya see....Flathead Fever is a hard disease to get rid of.....hahaha Hope to see a bunch of y'all at DOTD..... I'm still giddy about being able to run on such a historic place.....Bonneville.....WOW
The Jalopy Journal
