MadMike's 'Casper' 76 bug

[Ol'fogasaurus]

I just gave away a pair of "Wrinkle Walls" the other day. They had been sitting on the shelf since the mid 90's. Had a couple of good passes on them but basically I got dollared out of having fun on the track. Too much money needed to be competitive; I ran against a guy who had blown up his car and borrowed a friend car at launch he got reaction time of .0001 and at the finish time of +.001 from his dialed in time. He had gotten perfect times at both ends the two runs before I ran against him. The fun was gone!

The 1 minute runs were more fun. Launch hard then git to the finish line in the closest time to a minute to win.

[madmike]

Pulley seal is good to go, no leaks
I don't race to become a champion ,it's just for bragging rights know it all to well O'fog,, their's a guy up here at a local drag strip that 'rents' a cheby malibu "Knows what it runs and dail in B.S. slowass time and cleans house $$$$$ ,, not fair at all to the guy who bleeds & sweats over his hand built race car

[rubenski]

Shoot me for asking but what is dial in?

[Ol'fogasaurus]

As he said, Ol'-tyme BS hanky-panky. Not sure what they do now days but at one time you posted the time you are going to run and that is put into the strip's system. Then you try to match it: launch using the light and run the posted time against your competitor's posting. Winner moves on; looser leaves... embarrassed usually .

Lee

Additional thoughts. When I got interested in cars drag racing (the late 50's) was still using the flag but not like shown in the race scene shown in the Grease movie. As I remember, the cars were staged on the line (no burnouts) the flagger would point the flag at each driver who would nod they were ready, the flag end was put on the ground, RPM would go up then the flagger would quickly raise the flag and it was "hi-ho Silver" (in reference to the line in the TV show "The Lone Ranger" : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lone_Ranger). We did have classes then but many less.

Once the lights came in things got more and more complicated and the electronics were introduced as well as the trans brake and all the other things. It got to where the race was not between drivers but they were just about were limited to steered the cars.

It wasn't so much of an ego thing but about the build ending up with having fun (got dangerous at times until the tracks were allowed). One of the reasons I got out of it was the fun was gone. The same with other forms of racing: money got to rule the world of racing.

Of all the forms of racing the one form (based in Auto crossing) was when you went through the cones like regular Auto crossing but they added in a couple parking situations: "backing in" parking where the distance you were off centered in the lane was points added and parallel parking where you were backed in, centered and the distance from the curb (1/2" was the set standard as I remember) away from the standard were points added. Skill rather than just "go for it".

When "cruising the village" in a rod: if there was more than one there would be a police officer tailing behind or as you left town for each vehicle (the one I am thinking of was when there were 3 of us with street rods). When leaving the downtown area heading out to go to the next of the three stops in the "cruise" we were all stopped and told: "take 'em home guys, your finished for the night". Street racing was what they were trying to stop.

Sorry about the extra dialogue but things were different then but in some ways... the same as now days too.

Lee

[madmike]

damn Lee u are OLD life before the "Tree" (flagman)
That's about it for 'Dial-in'

[rubenski]

Okay, got it. Thanks for the info.

I would like to organise a dragrace.
We did it once 2yrs ago. ( we organise anual meet and greet meetings twice a year)
Many cars showed up but only 8 drove our 200m sprint .

After the sprint we gathered some more info about insurance and stuff they told us we were'nt allowed to do it on public roads. Eventough the mayor and city council approved it. We even had a safety and evacuation plan. 12 marshalls on and next to the road to ensure safety.


But because the insurance company (only 1 allowed to insure these events in the whole country) dont want to cover this on the public roads we had to abort further sprint meetings.... verry sad....

The rules were simple.

You look for a opponent, ask him to race.
Show up to the line and wait for the flag to drop.
The fasted speed possible at that event was only 130kmh. And that was a Porsche 911 aircooled.

Soooooo many guys want us to do it again but we just cant afford to... if something serious happens or worse, if one dies or gets hurt for life we are liable for everything. They can ruin your life.

Sorry for me ratteling on and on but it was soooooo much fun.

Just normal guys, normal cars and bragging rights.... there wasnt even something to win like thropy's....

[Ol'fogasaurus]

The "track" in our town was the WWII taxi way for aircraft to the bunkered storage areas for parking aircraft (I forget their name) at the local airport; its still in operation now as it keeps the airport from being an auxiliary/emergency landing field for the large airport across Puget Sound. Operations' of the airport itself was not affected during the racing other than a couple of selfish pilots would try to land on the strip just to be ornery enough to try to shut things down. The track was parallel to one of the legs of the landing strip. There were a couple of times the airport was closed and the road racing guys were allowed to have "events" there.

Do you have any unused airfields around where you live? Most of the old tracks we had were just that; a bunch of guys (usually a car club) would go to the "city Fathers" and request usage. There were some limitations given, usually dealing with noise and how late in the day, but they did get the "occasional use" permits.

I've even heard of abandon roads being used as long as they were safe and there was a separate return road. There was a short lived track kind of like that where the racers stopped at the end of the track then when the area was filled the racing was shut down while everyone headed back to the staging area.

Look hard, you never know what you might find. Good luck with your search.

Lee

[rubenski]

Yeah we have an military airport at 40km from where we live and organise our meetings. But you need verrrrrrryyyyyyyy good connections to get a permit to host an event there.

You need to get permits all the way up to the army....

No bueno.

The road strip we did it on 2yrs ago is a dead end road. Only some cyclist use it. Its perfect to close off. The end of the 200m sprint is the start of a bridge. So even with brake failure no car could ever get over it....

Im gonna give the insurance a call. Maybe some regulations changed. Hahahaha

[madmike]

We use a local Airport too, but they made us pour a separate off the runway concrete Pad just for the 'Burnouts'

[Ol'fogasaurus]

We use a local Airport too, but they made us pour a separate off the runway concrete Pad just for the 'Burnouts'

A good thing too for there is concrete and then there is CONCRETE.

Lee

[madmike]

Well drove the Buggy for the last time this year put bug in storage.
won't feel 'Boost' till May, that's 6 frickin months

[buguy]

That sucks! There are things I miss about having seasons, but winter isn't one of them!

[madmike]

Ugg, That's it ,I'm officially" Hibernating"

[buguy]

Weird. Shirt was soaked with sweat today at the show. Almost forget weather isn't like this everywhere.

[madmike]

Mine too was soaked from loading 'Firewood for Deer camp' Pete if u see this we have a Band up here called 'the Yoopers" check out the Deer camp song,,