Well our first house purchasers had the sale of their place fall through.....etc etc. so I'm still here in sunny England.so what can I do? I know go drag racing! But before that we had a problem to solve, I did mention in the last post that we may have a gearbox problem as we seem to be having trouble with the transbrake and also a small leak. A couple of weeks back Steve went up to the trailer along with Dave and one of Steve's friends an they took the gearbox out which is a big job that requires the back axle to be removed and the under-tray, all in the confines of the trailer so not much room to work in.
Steve took the gearbox apart and found..well lots of problems, the tail piece has a bronze bush in it but for some reason the exit of the tail had elongated gone egg shaped and the bush had broken up and bits had got in everywhere including the pump the front bush wasn't looking too good either.
This was why we were having problems not enough line pressure, replacement parts are not cheap and it was looking like the team would be sitting out the rest of the season then Steve got a call informing him of a complete gearbox for sale that had all the right bits in it, So Steve purchased the item from Paul Marston, I had to collect it for Steve as Paul lived around 35 miles from me a lot nearer to me than Swindon. So as arranged I turned up at Paul's place on a miserable English summers day in Romford, Essex. Gearbox was then transported to my place until Dave picked it up the Thursday before the Redline Rumble.
Dave took the newly acquired Powerglide to the trailer where he and Steve set about installing the box the day before the event.
Once the gearbox was installed another problem reared it's head the drive train was out of alignment when the slicks were turned the prop shaft was turning in an elliptical motion which is what probably caused the initial problem, this was going to take some time to sort out so we were not going to the Rumble, then a little while later I got a call from Steve to let me know that he had managed to shim the gearbox up and that has sorted out the problem and we would be going to the Rumble! Ten minutes after that I got another call telling me that the Flex Plate (fly wheel) was bent and there was nothing we could do about it so we would not be going to the Rumble. Half an hour later another phone call, Steve had phoned Mike Oates our temporary / full time team member who said we could borrow the one from his engine for the time being so we would be going to the Rumble. A little while later Steve rang me to tell me that while putting the transmission shield on he had caught the gearbox inhibitor switch and broken it, this switch stops the engine from being started while in gear, so now we were not going to the Rumble.
I had a little think about it and phoned Steve back and managed to explain to him that we could in fact do without the switch for one meeting if we were careful so we were now defiantly going to the rumble. Thank god all that was sorted but!!!!! he then phoned me back to let me know that the oil pressure gauge wasn't working and nor was the transbrake and that he had just about had enough for the day and wanted to set fire to the car and we were now not going to the Rumble....again. Around about ten to eight passed and he phoned me back to say "Sod it" we were going and he would sort out the wiring at the Pod in the morning so the Rumble was back on and I was getting giddy. I then got another call to let me know that he couldn't get out of the storage depot as all the gates were now locked so I had to make a couple of calls to get him released.
A quick bath and some clothes packed and the alarm set for 4:30am I managed to get to bed for some well earned sleep. We met up at the storage depot to find the place was still locked up at 7:30am so we waited and then more people turned up and the gates were still locked so I phoned Graham the owner who was on Holiday!! he had to give me the codes over the phone so I could open the place up, we got to the Pod a little later than we had hoped for, Mike was already at the gates waiting for us, we unloaded the trailer and the team got to work sorting out the electrical gremlins. They found out the transbrake switch on the steering wheel was broken and so Steve borrowed one from the Brown twins, It was a good job our first run was not till lunchtime.
This was Steve's first meeting as a driver he took to it like he had been doing it all his life, we had four runs booked in for the Wild Bunch on Saturday the first run wasn't brilliant but it was Steve's first full pass in the car it got better from there on in. More fettling from Mike on the fuel system and Steve was getting the hang of it I was getting worried he would break into the 8's straight away and with the lovely Diana backing him up he got close, real close.
Saturdays Runs
We found another small problem, Steve was managing to get the car into Neutral on the burnout and on the run. There is supposed to be a "gate" to stop this but when the gearbox was installed and the linkage adjusted it moved the gear selector position, So on Sunday morning this was solved by Dave and then the backlash was checked and an oil change done and we were ready for the days competition.
Sundays Runs
To say I was impressed or even proud would be an understatement not only did Steve not get beat once but he even managed to pull a red light and his reaction times were more than impressive. beat me hands down, he ended up with a best time of 9.05 seconds on a 9.1 dial in on the last run but he also managed a best of 0.07 reaction time, he only went and finished 4th out of 22 original starters and got a trophy and...another trophy for best reaction time of the event...bloody nora.
Trophy boy
So all of this on his first meeting as a driver on a borrowed flex plate a borrowed transbrake switch no gearbox inhibitor switch, problems with the gear selector and reaching the throttle peddle properly, Two trophy's and unbeaten, that will do to start with!
