hmmm......after some closer inspection and measuring of my 4 link intersect point, a few changes were deemed necessary: shorten the upper bars and re-weld the adapters, so that the intersect point could be relocated to a more manageable length ( now at 50 1/2 inches, down from its previous 101 inches
)....
Friday night, we took the ol' nag to the track for some test and tune. (What a waste of time).......It had rained pretty hard in the late afternoon....the gates opened at 6, we pulled in about 7:15 and they were trying to dry the track.....NO Problem, says us...we'll wait a little while........nearly 3 hours later I finally got to pull into the waterbox..... Tim had told me he wanted me to do a short burnout and then pull to the line. Seeing as how he is bigger than me (not all that hard to do
) I followed his hand signals to the letter.
I eased into the beams, set the tranny brake, put the pedal on the wood then launched when the tree flashed its permission......the front tires lifted a few inches into the air as the Mickey's on the rear were spinning (about a car length or so ) to a 1.33 60 ft clocking. The car went a little to the left on the hit, but not so bad that a little input to the steering wheel couldn't ease it back in the groove. Everything was going great as I was being pinned to the seat pretty hard, and then the rpm switch informed the shifter that it was time to go to high gear. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed the shifter move forward and felt the acceleration increase. I glanced down at the tach to see the needle at about 6400 and then all hell broke loose.....the car made a hard move to the left and I immediately lifted my foot off the loud pedal and put a little in put on the steering wheel to avoid scraping any shiny off on the guard rail.
Now keep in mind, I was probably only under power for 200 ft (or so) but I was rewarded with a 6.7349 e.t. @ a paltry 74.89 mph.....which tells me one of two things.....either I was on a hell of a pass, or this damn thing rolls pretty dadgum easily, or (more likely) a combination of the two.
After getting back in the pits and noticing the dew on the roofs of all the tow vehicles and also noticing several other cars aborting runs before half track, I am pretty certain that the track was just not "there"....(I "could" be wrong, but I don't think so)
Tim and I are going to tinker with the pre-load on the rear end to try to nip that little going to the left issue in the bud.....because all 4 passes that I have made with this car (well....three passes and this latest attempt) have moved to the left at the hit......which, as I think about it, "may" have attributed to me going to the left again when the ol' nag was trying to get up on the tire, albeit on a marginally dew plagued track........Stay tuned.
