Hi Bob, Those are my Hankook street tires on there as my "rains." They've been on the car since 2003 with probably around 25 to 30 hours of track time on them! The car now shows around 5100 miles on the odometer, but some of that is skewed by the fact that I didn't have the correct speedo drive in it after the rear axle change.

I left my "race" Hoosier TD's in the trailer. I don't think I could have gotten them warm enough to do any good for me. And, bias belts in the rain aren't the greatest tires!!!

The wet grass was slippery enough to let the front end slide faster than the rears when the two front tires went off the pavement. That is the only thing that brought the car back to straight down the hill! I had "both feet in" and was ready to bring it out at the 180° spin point about one microsecond later. Then the front started to come back! I've never caught a 90°+ rotation and brought it out straight before!

Just after Turn 3, first session of the day on Sunday with track temps around 35° and damp I again stayed off the "dry line" in the hope of being able to put some power down in a straight line. The car did a full 180° with just a nudge of the throttle! Needless to say I "behaved" after that!

Talk about slow Lap Times. Saturday in the rain, I turned a 3:56! That's a minute and 5 seconds slower than my usual dry track speed! Sunday AM "warm-up" when I did the 180, my best lap time was 4:04!!!

Yesterday it was nice here, so I bathed the Pumpkin, anti-freezed it and put it in for a nice long winter's nap.

Best regards, Tom

Tom,

What an excellent sequence!

Hmmmm.... 38 degrees, wet, open car without even so much as a windshield, snow/ice all over a Mustang in the paddock...

The only word that readily comes to mind is "certifiable".

If I remember right, aren't you running the Firehawks for rain/street tires? If so, I'd be reluctant to even call them "good" rain tires. I found them to be fair dry tires and that was about the extent of it. And I'm sure yours have been heat-cycled more than a couple times...

After having tried many different tires on the WRX and a couple on the STi, I'm quite fond of the Bridgestone Potenza RE070's. They're great in both rain and dry. Though as soon as my suspension's up to snuff, or at least I have caster plates, I'm moving to Hoosiers, which should yield sick lap times in the STi. Would expect that combo to make the STi a 1:45 car at MAM.

Who can say, "Slippery When Wet?"



Sometimes we get surprised by conditions. Here, with the car pointing straight ahead and my on the "wet" line after Turn Seven at R.A. I brought on the throttle only to have the arse end decide it was in a bigger hurry to get downhill to Turn 8 than the front!

I was driving with an eggshell strapped to the bottom of my foot, too! Amazing what 38 deg and rain can do for traction (or lack of it!). Further, nothing like doing it in front of your buddies who decided to go watch the race and happened to have their camera with them!!!



Best regards, Tom

Weekend Report at:

http://www.investorshub.com/boards/read_msg.asp?message_id=14225217

Best regards, Tom

Wear long johns.

LOL

Have fun,
Phil

A lot.... Just a guess..........

I'm here at Road America for the NASA race weekend starting on Sat. thru Sun. I'll have race reports and maybe some photos next week.

I wonder what the wind chill effect is in a roadster at 125 mph and 35 deg. F outside??????


TV

I would think a 10 second streetable drag car would have to be on laughing gas when on the track

Phil

nah, bf goodrich makes great drag radials for the street....
go to ls1tech.com and see some 10 second lt and ls1`s in 10s on street tires....http://ls1tech.com/forums/showthread.php?t=562754&page=1&pp=20

I haven't kept up with drag-racing in ages. Doesn't 10's require something severely tubbed so it can handle extremely fat tires that would be useless on the streets and even if you changed to street tires/wheels? With about a 20" offset? <g>

bob, not production stock,lol..boltons/ turbos or s/c...plenty of gn`s, stangs, t/a`s, chevelles,nova`s etc doing 10`s on pump gas that are streetable

10 seconds and streetable?!?

Only thing that comes to mind for me would be a Kaw ZX14 Ninja.

ANYONE GOT 10 SECOND MUSCLE FOR SALE? MUST BE STREETABLE!

Bob, This weekend's vintage races were a treat again at Road America. About 500 cars there for competition from pre-WWII through quite recent Ferrari F1 cars. What a blast.

However, not everything went well as this article relates:

http://www.vintagemotorsport.com/show_news.asp?id=711

I think the mechanic was working toward his Honorable Mention in the Darwin Awards.

Best regards, Tom

I will. Did you check out some of the other options you can get? There's a cockpit mounted switch you can get that'll open a line that's plumbed to the back of the car. Perfect for giving your pursuer a bigger challenge.

See ya on the track!!! And don't forget to empty the special tank on the side!!!

TV

Dang! Okay, count me in! I'm selling my beloved one-owner, low-mileage 16 year old Mustang to help finance my doing that!

Hi Folks,

I know some of you have expressed concern about my racing hobby in the past. Heck, there are risks, even if not like 50 years ago. Modern cars are far better designed than the old Vintage Race Cars I drove for so many years.

I have a line I like to use with some of my buddies, "I started back when Racing was Dangerous and Sex was Safe!"

Well, leave it to Skip Barber Racing to come up with an entirely new series, and it seems to be exactly what I've always wanted for competition. I started racing when I was 40, nearly 17 years ago and now, finally there's this new program that's just right for me.

So, it looks like I'm going to sell the Cobra Racer and use the proceeds to join the Skip Barber series.

Take a look and let me know what you think:

http://www.harrisonvideos.com/vids/banquets2006/rt40plus-4.wmv

Best regards,
Tom

Thanks Bob, sounds like it's beyond my capabilities. May have to find a good mechanic.

On any engine I've worked on, you don't necessarily have to remove the crank all the way to replace the rear seal, but it's basically the same amount of work.

Unless you can get the pan out (unlikely in most RWD vehicles) with the engine in place, you're yanking the motor.

Technically, you only have to get the main caps loose and the rear cap off to replace the rear seal, since doing so will allow you to pry the rear of the crank just enough to do the replacement. The weight of the crank might just be enough to have it give you the slack you need.

If it were me, I might be tempted to tear out the old seal any way I could, after removing only the tranny and flywheel, and very carefully tap a new one in. It's how we replace seals in motorcycle forks. Destroy the old one taking it out, and drive a new one in. But seal-drivers are readily available that put the new seals in quickly and without any risk of damaging them. I've never seen one large enough for a car's rear main seal. And wouldn't swear it's not locked into a groove in the journal anyway. If memory serves, I don't think I've ever encountered a rear seal that was any more than a press fit.

But if you find that you can't replace the seal this way, no harm done because you're yanking or at least unmounting/raising the engine anyway.

If you attempt the easy way, the most important thing is to make sure you don't turn the crank at all once you've loosened the mains, as one or more of the bearings may've stuck to the crank instead of staying put in the crankcase, and you could have a real mess if it gets out of place. If at all possible (assuming you're trying the in-car replacement and have loosened the mains to make it easier or get around a locking-groove or too-tight fit problem), make real certain all bearings are where they belong when you retighten the main caps. You'll know pretty quickly if one is out of place because light torque on the nuts or bolts won't close up the gap between the cap and the crankcase. More than 99% of the time, the bearings will stay where they belong, but don't thumb your nose at Murphy.

Got a question about some work on my truck that I'm going to have to do or have done. Heres what happened, last week sometime I added a quart of oil to the engine and somehow forgot to put the oil cap back into the valve cover. Yesterday I was coming home and driving on the interstate doing about 74 mph when the oil pressure gauge dropped to zero. Luckily for me I had two quarts with me, but noticed the missing oil cap. I was about four miles from a Ford dealer so I went there and bought another cap, cost $10.00. After it was installed, no more oil leak, well a lot slower leak. I suspect I have a crankcase seal going out, but haven't looked yet. If thats the case, am I'm going to have to pull the crank to be able to replace the seals? It's a 1999 Ranger 3.0ltr engine and I love the truck!

... article about quiet hybrids and how people walking can't hear them.

... a Bill in Congress requiring hybrids to have a construction equipment beeper
to go "beep beep beep" when in reverse and when moving forward.

Here is a cartoon for Darth...


doug

Hi G, Nope, not even taking my helmet with me.

Well, maybe a bit of track touring during lunch in my Avis Racer!!!!



TV

Wow! Are you racing this trip?

I can't comment on the track condition, however, you're right about things being improved for the spectators. Lots of changes in the last decade or so. There's a sizeable hotel virtualy track side, some bleacher type seating, box seating, ect...

The town of Sebring has grown tremendously, too. My family has been going there since about 1971... So many changes over the years.


Once again, have a great trip-

guerciotti

Hi G, I raced there a lot in the '90s with my XK 120 Jag in Vintage with HSR. Great place for driving and I hear it's improved a lot for spectators as well. It's been since about '97 or '98 since I was last there.

Thanks for the tip on Chicanes. Not been there.

Best regards, Tom

Tom,

It's been broadcast LIVE on the SPEED Channel in the past, and I hope it will be this year, too.

You'll have a great time. IMO it's a great venue in terms experiencing any race! I was scheduled to go to their vintage event last fall... Alas, my flight was cancelled.

It's a great track filled with incredible race history... Enjoy your time there-

Kind regards,

g

PS- Check out Chicanes on US 27... Great Pub with pretty tasty grub.

http://www.innonthelakessebring.com/

Hi G, Is Sebring going to be broadcast on Speed or ESPN? I'm heading down to see the Sebring Vintage weekend soon, but won't make it to the pro race.

Best regards, Tom

The 12 Hours of Sebring is an incredible international event... Fantastic access to the race paddock, too!

Check it out: http://www.sebringraceway.com/

Best regards-

g

Hi Bob, Re: Road America and Northwoods Shelby Club.........

Yes, I've now run with them three years straight. Incredible amount of track time and a good, relatively sane group. I usually run in their 2nd fastest group.

I converted the rear gears to 3.55:1 so it's not too far off of your car. Also, remember that my brakes are your brakes!!! Mine are off a 1991 Mustang GT, so, for better or worse, we're supporting the same amount of friction material. The difference is that I'm stopping 2550 lbs with me in the car and a full tank of gas where you're stopping maybe 3400#?. They work quite well and with fresh fluid, they don't overheat.

I'll be there again this year assuming no conflicts. Maybe we'll both put on helmets and go drive some country roads!!!

Best regards, Tom

Do you ever do RA with the Northwoods Shelby Club?

I'm planning to this year and will probably haul my Mustang and a friend's, to get some help with the drive.

They're pretty sure they're doing it the first weekend of August this year.

I don't know why it never occurred to me to time you in the Pumpkin then have you drive my Mustang and see how your times compared. If you're running 2.73's, I'd think you could go a bit faster in my Mustang as long as you keep in mind it's basically only got front brakes and they're small. It can take only a few 100% (my 100% laps) before they fade. I suspect you'd only be able to really cook about every other lap.

Anyway, think you can make it in August? And want to do some car-swapping?

I seriously doubt the 07 GT500 Shelby Cobra (or the name du juor) will be in my grubby mitts by then, but one can always hope. <g>

Edit: Two weeks prior to the RA event, the MCCI will be having an event at MAM. This is a must-attend for me because though I invariably end up instructing, I don't typically have more than one student and even then I don't get them for very long. Their's is the only local event running that's open-track rather than a driving school, though it's still got run groups.

And always funny to hear them on the PA calling the "Fast group" to the grid, and I'm not only part of it, I'm the only one with a stock engine, seats, restraints, and no cage. Fun to pass full-on race cars driven by people who don't get to that track much, but once they check out my car and realize with my setup I must really know how to *drive* that track, guess who gets to be the mouse in the cat-and-mouse games until they figure out what I'm doing and absolutely run away from me? <g>

You would immensely enjoy that track, Tom. It's extremely technical and the safest track I've ever seen. You can go absolutely nuts and know that hurting yourself or your car is nearly impossible.

If you want to do that track but don't want to haul the Pumpkin, feel free to fly in (I can pick you up at the airport in Omaha) and use my cars. The Mustang's faster than the Scoob on that track, but the Scoob's a lot more fun.

And that goes for anyone else reading this thread. If you want to go play on the racetrack just south of Council Bluffs, let me know and as long as you cover your own registration costs, etc, you can use my Subaru.

Bought my daughter a 2006 Honda Civic Hybrid the day before yesterday.

It was really fun surprising her with it, seeing as how she went on the test-drive with me and was doing her homework at the dealership while I was taking care of business.

The key was met with mixed emotions until, get this.....

She made sure it didn't mean I was trading in her beloved SHO. Then she became ecstatic with the new car.

And was even more so once she drove it about 30 or so miles to get home. After she pulled it into the garage, she told me that she doesn't think she'll drive the SHO anymore after all, so I don't need to keep it registered and insured, though she'd be really upset if I ever sold it.

As it turned out, it was cheaper to keep the SHO insured with her as the primary driver (liability only) and have her as the secondary on the Civic than it would've been to make her the primary on the Civic.

The difference in premium was so huge that knowing what we know now, if we didn't have a cheap liability-only car to make her the primary driver of, we'd have bought one. The difference in premium would buy quite a bit of car!

And though she'll drive the Civic more often than either of us will, we'll put more miles on it than she will since her school's only 2 miles away, but we're going to use it as a family pretty often.

She got 38.7 mpg on her way back from the dealership on back roads without even trying.

I actually saw a Monte Carlo well over a decade ago that someone was using as a daily driver and from which they'd removed both the radiator and the water pump. And they claimed that at the time I saw it, it'd been running for over a year that way.

Edit: I've had cars in my youth that'd freeze up from not having enough antifreeze. One was a Datsun 510. It'd start but the belt would screech something fierce until the water pump would finally start turning and it wouldn't idle until then, but once the water pump broke free, everything would be just fine.

Hi Bob, I think I have an answer to the antifreeze problem for us.......................................



Why use antifreeze and water when we can just cement the sucker???????


http://www.hardblok.com/info.html

TV

Surprisingly, we're in about the same boat down here. It's 34 right now and supposed to get to 18 tonight.

I really hate the cold. Hate it!!! So much so that every year the temptation grows stronger to move further south.

And for some reason, the first words of a book that was my daughter's favorite when I was still reading to her nightly are stuck in my mind.

"Way up north where it's always cold there lived a great herd of walruses. The biggest was Walpole. Walpole loved the cold."

That book became a staple at our house (and I can't wait to read it to grandchildren), due in part to my doing Walpole's voice as a "Bullwinkle with a speech impediment" kinda thing.

We have a beany-baby walrus we call Walpole and whenever I'm off to the track, he sits at my spot on the couch.

Hi Bob, Re: Ice tires....

Don't you hate it when the laws of physics get in the way of a good time???!!!!???

Temp's been dropping all day here. Started at 34°F this AM and now down to 29°. Supposed to be in the teens late tonight.

Best regards, Tom

I just need to fill up the Mustang's fuel tank and I think it'll be ready for the winter.

Still need to put the original tires/wheels back on the Subaru and re-align it. One of the dents in that car was a result of my learning the hard way that even a good street tire makes an extremely poor ice tire when it's been through several hard heat cycles.

Hi Bob, Our two cats do a fair job of mousing, too, but it seems in the Fall that we have a migration take place. Between the cats and the traps we clean them out pretty quickly. I don't have a clue where they get in.

I think I'm all freeze protected for the year. There's fresh antifreeze and oil in the Pumpkin, the gray Jag is tucked away. My buddy with the red coupe Jag is coming from Florida in the next week or two, so I'll get some shop space back.

I think I'll park the Passat W8 for some of the winter and get the final use out of the mini-van. It's 8 years old and has been very reliable, but I'm the only one who drives it. It's nasty enough now that it will make a great winter car. Just need to rotate the tires before the snow flies.

The W8 loves the snow, but I hate to drive it in the salt brine we create here in S.E. WI.

Best regards, Tom

Among the things it's speculated moths don't have, I think it's pretty much universally agreed they don't have woolen underwear either. <g>

We have yet to see a mouse or any droppings in our house. Or near the house. We do the see the occasional field mouse, shrew, snake, or rabbit offered to us on the welcome mat as a gift, though. And we live in the country on acreage. With a cat population that fluctuates between about 6 and 12. We're a little low now and need to reload.

I prefer to get female cats and not get them spayed until they've had a litter or two. They're consistently good mousers. Although we've got one now that's never had kittens and is a very aggressive mouser and is smart enough to have eluded the other predators for about 3 years so far.

I'm trying to come up with a Lucas joke to go with your chewed insulation, but am coming up empty. Of course, all the Lucas jokes have already been written and should be put in a book. There are certainly enough of them.

This past weekend, my "big project" was to move everything out of the workshop that didn't have to be in there and could winter under the 20x120 overhang. Which is a lot of stuff. My son had already unburied all the motorcycles and neatly lined them up along a wall in the front half of the building. Looks cool. Will have to get a picture.

Remember that old black Taurus SHO? It had sat in a corner of the front of the building all year because I haven't gotten around to fixing a flat tire on it, it needs a new battery (batteries and tires are a constant fight when you have too many things using them) and because it's leaking oil onto the exhaust from some location I have yet to find.

The door hadn't been opened in at least a year.

But when I got in it, I noticed that an unopened pack of smokes in it had been chewed through. I didn't inspect, but am sure the immaculate upholstery has issues, too.

I know the door and trunk seals need replacing, but really didn't think they were bad enough to allow mouse entry. I guess I thought wrong.

That reminds me (the tie-in is a previous post that was a gag email to a track bud about selling him my Mustang -- come to think of it, you met him and took him for a Pumpkin ride -- Gary), I hope Water Wetter isn't real, real harmful stuff.

We had our first hard freeze last night, and the Mustang, being the largely neglected track ho' it is, was the first to go under the overhang the other day.

Last night, it couldn't get out from under the overhang. A slight incline, wet grass, and Hoosiers. I don't remember if you were around to see how much trouble I had getting it in the trailer at RA and how close I came to t-boning it on the back of the trailer.

So I just opened the tap on the radiator and drained the water/water-wetter mixture onto the ground and started the engine and ran it long enough to hopefully cook away most of the water in the block.

Wasn't quite ready for it to become Winter yet. I spent a lot of time last weekend sealing the major air and bird entry points into the building but have a LOT left to do before I'm ready to try heating the building again. And need to get done because I've got a lot of projects (mostly motorcycle restorations) slated for this winter.

Another project I'm considering is rather than the original plan of putting the old A-Sedan Mustang back together and putting it on eBay, instead finishing it up and using it as a driving school car and/or getting back into SCCA but only doing a few regional races. Like at MAM and HPT. Would think I'd do alright on those tracks (especially MAM, since HPT is being rebuilt right now) since I know of only 2 people who have more laps on MAM than I do.

But as with all projects around here, it all hinges on 2 or 3 other things that have to be done first. And sealing up the building better is one of them, as is getting a couple of propane furnaces in there to help out the wood furnace. And trying to think up a way to loosely partition off the front half of the building since that's the only part I actively use right now. The rest is "storage". At least, that's what I'm calling the huge mess of stuff covering most of the floor back there.

You know those clear plastic strips often used in the entrances to big freezers? Wonder if they're available in huge rolls. They'd do the trick if I can cut them to the 16-18 foot lengths I'd need. I don't need or want to completely seal off the back half of the building. I just don't want to waste BTU's heating it as aggressively as the front half.

Thanks Bob, Re: Mothballing your car.............

I didn't think to look at Google for such references. The links were pretty good, I thought!

In a former life I was a combustion products sales engineer. Most of the products I fiddled with were fueled by natural gas, but there were others fueled by napthalene, "city gas" (mostly carbon monoxide from coke ovens), propane, hydrogen, and various fuel oils.

I went back to my combustion hand book for the references to napthalene's characteristics. It didn't occur to me that there were any moth balls that weren't napthalene, but then again, I don't wear woolen underwear!

The idea of adding napthalene to diesel is interesting. I'd experiment in a clear jar first, to see if it will dissolve in diesel fuel. Diesel is already a composite of very much heavier hydrocarbons than gasoline. The disbursal rate might be quite a bit less in the heavier fuel.

Also, remember that napthalene is a "solid" at room temp, so it's going to probably increase the overall fuel viscosity at any particular temp. and that might not be good heading into winter.

Finally, I'm not sure there's a cost benefit to either gasoline or diesel with moth balls. I can't remember what they cost, but adding them would only increase the overall cost of a tank of fuel. If there's a compelling reason to use napthalene in either gas or diesel, it would be a change in apparent octane, not a cost benefit. The diesel engine really doesn't need an octane increase and most modern gasoline engines wouldn't know what to do with it.

The best use of moth balls with automobiles might be winter storage. Critters don't like the smell of mothballs so putting a bag or box of moth balls in the interior might keep them from nesting in a stored car. I've had experience in the distant past of having mice eat the insulation off wires while nesting in the dash of one of my ancient English cars. Obviously they were Lucas mice!

I put a hand full of moth balls in my window wells around the house in the late Fall. It's helped to keep the field mice away when they're looking for a warm place for the winter.

Once, in a house I lived in as a bachelor, we had a problem with a momma skunk and her kits taking up residence under one of our porches. The whole house wreaked of skunk all the time. We thought we could scare them off with fire crackers - BAD IDEA!!!!! Guess what skunks do when they're scared!!!! So, after living with the windows open in the house through much of that season, I asked the county game warden what he might suggest. Guess what? Moth Balls!!!! He told us to toss big handfulls of them in anywhere we could under the porches. If we think skunks stink, apparently skunks think moth balls do, too!

It's hard to tell exactly, but they were most definitely gone after two days. They might have left earlier, but the stink didn't start to dissapate for a couple of days. Phew!!!!!!

Best regards, Tom

Something in the nether recesses of my mind is very vaguely remembering hearing something about moth balls in fuel, but in a negative context along the lines of pouring sugar in the tank.

The first item I found in a Google search was decidedly anti-mothball.

http://www.newton.dep.anl.gov/askasci/chem00/chem00485.htm
and
http://askascientist.binghamton.edu/nov-dec/04nov04ask.html

Sounds like you pretty well nailed it in your response. Just like with high-octane fuel, I wouldn't expect it to do a bit of good unless the engine were purpose-built to run the kind of compression it'd take to take advantage of the octane boost, in addition to advanced timing.

Now I'm kinda curious whether mothballs might increase the power of a diesel engine, which has a ton of compression.

Hmmm... Ran across a few places saying this very topic was covered on MythBusters. Can't find details, though. And I don't consider MythBusters the final word. Often I've felt like they've left out important elements.

Like the one where they disproved the myth about if you're in a falling elevator and jump up just before it hits bottom, you'll survive.

I've never believed this one, and was pretty sure that it's impossible for a modern elevator to go into freefall even if the cables snap.

But an issue I had with their test was they did it in an old building with no walls around the elevator shaft. I'm pretty sure that with complete walls and doors, even if an elevator managed to go into freefall, it'd fall much slower than the one on the show. The difference between dropping a piston on the floor and dropping it through a cylinder.

So, I'm taking with a grain of salt what I've seen said that the show "proved" that it increased octane. That's a given. And doesn't answer the question.

Hi Bob, Here's an interesting question from a friend of mine. Ever heard of this being done?
------------------------------------------------

Hi Tom,....Moth Balls to boost performance??

You're a racer....is there any truth to dropping a few moth balls in the gas tank?

"Yeah actually I've heard that from a few of my old school racer friends too. They say it ups the octane level or improves the power and fuel efficiency of the fuel. They used to drop a whole bunch in the tank before hitting the tracks or when they knew they'd be drag racing."

Don
---------------------------------------------------------


and my reply................


---------------------------------------------------------
Hi Don, Re: Moth Balls.................

I always thought that was a disease one got from dressing in wool underwear!!!!!

I've never heard of this being done. Napthalene is the main component of moth balls and that should be soluble in plain old gasoline. However, I'd have to look at the combustion characteristics to see what it would do. A quick look shows it to be a very dense fuel. It requires an Air/Fuel ratio of nearly 58:1. That compares to about 13:1 for street gasoline. So if your carbureted car was set up a bit on the lean side, this might "enrich" the overall A/F ratio giving you more potential power.

In modern cars with fuel injection the A/F ratio is maintained by a feedback loop from an oxygen sensor in the exhaust to the computer that controls the fuel injection. If it runs a bit rich, it meters back on the fuel and visa versa. So, adding something like napthalene would just get added into the equation being monitored by the oxygen sensor and A/F computer. If the napthalene raised the apparent "octane" rating of the fuel, then the computer might allow the timing to advance a bit more giving a boost to maximum power output.

"Octane Rating" is a funny thing. Almost more alchemy than chemistry. If you run high octane gas in a lower compression motor, it usually just goes through as unburned or partially burned hydrocarbons. That will "soot" up one's exhaust pipes in the days before cat. converters. If you run low octane fuel in a high compression engine it will usually be all right under light loads. Under heavy loads the engine will have problems with detonation and eventually self destruct.

Adding ethanol to gasoline improves the apparent octane rating. Natural gas is a very high octane fuel. One can run very high compression with natural gas as the fuel. That makes for greater specific output for an engine so designed.

I'll have to ask some of my race buddies about this. It's an interesting idea. If they didn't dissolve, then it might be a bit annoying listening to the little marbles rolling around in the tank!

Where's the quote from?

Best regards, Tom
---------------------------------------

Love that pumpkin graphic!

Next time I'm at RA, let's swap cars for a session or several.

Did we tell everyone here the story about your broken rotor and resulting trip? It was the only thing you could do, but it still cracks me up thinking about it.

"Ummmm, excuse me. Can you tell me how to get to Canada Corner from here?"

Initially, I could've seen myself stopping to ask that of a corner worker.

I think you should tell the story if neither of us has yet.

Hi Bob, The Northwoods Shelby Club rented the new track at Joliet, IL last weekend. Edgar Boles and I drove the FFR Pumpkin for a total of six hours during the weekend. Total gas consumption was around 52 gallons!!! Glad it was just Pump Gas and not 110 octane!

Note the Custome Graphics on the side of the Great Pumpkin! Just the thing for Halloween!


(Tom Veale, South Track)


(Tom and Pete Wilson, North Track)

So the Great Pumpkin enjoyed its last outing for 2005. Antifreeze is topped up, fresh oil and filter in place. Not too much to do for next season. I have a bit of a rear seal leak on the trans to fix is about all. What a great workhorse this car is. Sure wish you'd driven it or taken a ride with me at R.A.

Best regards, Tom

Reminds me of one time when the Stang was especially dusty/dirty and it wasn't until I was pulling the car out of the trailer at the track that I noticed my daughter had written "Pass me" in the dust on the back window.

You pass!

test

Looks more like my passenger's getting ready to bail out to help me with my ballast disadvantage.

Man, those Carerra GT's were impressive!!! Makes the Viper a real snooze.

Hi Bob, I think I see tears in the Porsche driver's eyes 'cause he can't keep up!!!

TV

Just got my RA pics from the Audi club event. Only one picture of the Mustang and it's hidden in the trees, so not gonna bother with that one.

The Scoob being VERY rapidly reeled in by what I'm pretty sure is $460k worth of Porsche Carrera GT. Two of which attended the BMW club event.

Hi Bob, Apparently he was unphased by the experience. Here he is after the race...............



Yep, he seemed to have quite a head of steam going there, didn't he?!

TV