rebuilding after the crash

Thanks. We will be in your area twice this summer. Dallas and mo kan. I hope to see you at one of those.

 

Are you racing out in California at all?

 

Not this year. I'm out of vacation time. A few years back i did run it at the march meet.

 

Sounds great Brian, my face hurts from grinning for 14 minutes.

 

Yeah, that lack of hearing protection....
I suspect there are more than a few veteran racers who are dealing with the results. I'm really surprised at how often I've seen that.
@racer-x is right - these cars are no joke. This is a whole new chapter! Looking forward to following along.

 

I wear hearing protection all the time. I have enough ear muffs for the whole crew. Some chose not to use them. I remind them hearing loss is permanent. There is only so much I can do. It's well over 125 decibels. That's the most you can hear. It reaches a point where it doesn't sound louder. Especially in the shop. I play it safe.
In the car I wear ear buds that plug into the radio. They eliminate alot of engine noise.

 

I was fortunate enough to have been taught boiler and turbine practice by a number of returned Royal Australian Navy (RAN) veterans. None of them ever wore hearing protection when they served, and many were as deaf as posts. They pointed out to me early that it was a wise idea to wear them.

Cheers,
Harv

 

This Wednesday 2-26 I will be part of the nitro chaos live show. It goes live at 8 pm est. I will be in the studio sometime after 8:15. To tune in go to one of the following.
You tube nitro chaos
Facebook funny car chaos
Facebook nitro chaos.
When the show starts live the feed starts. It should be fun.

 

Brian will it be available to watch on UTube after the live stream? I have it saved to watch later because I will not be available to watch it live.

 

They have all of the shows set up to watch at a later date. You can go back and watch them all.

 

Link to tonight's interview:

https://www.youtube.com/live/jiaaO516X00

 

Thanks for the link. Watching now.

 

Nicely done!

 

I come into the studio around 37 minutes into the show. It was a honor to be chosen to be on the show. It will be fun to meet new fans at the track that were introduced to my car listening to the program.

 

The link Justin posted will bring you to the show. It can be viewed at any time.

 

I took the weekend off to go meet my son in Detroit. We go to the autorama each year. I took Mark one of my crew guys with me. He always wanted to see the show. Saturday night I received a call late. I was asked if I had any interest in doing a photo shoot for RPM Magazine. The photographer was in the area shooting two other cars. So I headed back early Sunday to get the car ready. We also fired it up again to see if a oil leak was fixed. It's all good.

 

Very cool!

 

And here I am dealing with profound hearing loss for most of my life through no fault of my own (can't perceive any noise unassisted lower than 91 db) and these guys are just pissing their hearing away. It should be a requirement to wear muffs or at minimum plugs to be a helper around that thing, no ifs ands or buts. I'd gladly trade them my fucked up ears for theirs, at least whatever is left of them.

 

I provide the protection. It's up to them to use it. For years I never used it. As I started to have hearing changes I'm very proactive now. I encourage everyone to protect themselves.

 

^^^^^^^^^^
Still USA
Should be Your Choice ,
I grew up around this all my life so far
Standing beside Drag Vehicles around
8 -10 feet between wheels ,
Not all of ar body's same ,
I shot a Hand Canon few years back
That rung my ears for several months ,
I also suffer / deal with some issues not
Incurred upon my self , But I am not going to Force regulations onto others,
I would let other's aware danger of thou ,
@Pocket Nick if your hearing loss is do to Serving , I am One to appreciate your Service and Sacrifice !

 

Brian, can the crank trigger be used to now feed a second ignition that fires the second plug holes ? Something with similar gusto of course. Assuming they could be accurately paired to the Mag ?

 

The answer is no. I only run one mag.
I do have a switch box that allows two timing setups.
The crank trigger can be set at what I want.
The second timing is off the base of the mag. The timing between the two can be different. A switch allows me to pick what one I want.
If I'm on the mag base it's a fixed timing.
If I'm on the crank trigger I'm on the grid with programmable timing.
So let's say I'm on the mag. It's set up hot with alot of timing. I'm belted in watching the cars in front of me. I see that all the cars in my lane are spinning the tires. I just flip the switch to the grid timing with a programmed retard. Just like that it's timed down to get down the track. This is a very brief explanation. It gets very technical after this. Check out msd timing switch box and read the directions. Also do the same for msd 44 nitro grid. Full explanations are there to get the full story. It's very cool technology.

 

I'm only using one spark plug at this time.

 

Thanks but I am not a veteran and won't claim to be anything of the sort. My issues are due to unknown natural causes since I was a kid. I bet those guys would change their tune if they went a few weeks with what I have dealt with on a daily basis for the last 35 years. It sucks sometimes.

 

Out with the old in with the new. The chassis tag was going to expire this year. It was a blue sportsman tag good for 6.0 in the quarter. I not only had it recerted today I had the tag upgraded to a pro tag. This red tag is a unlimited speed and et tag. It needs to be recerted every year compared to every third. Getting a pro tag is a big deal. Its hard to get. The chassis has to be perfectly built. As you cert faster there are more rules. My car was built from the start with this tag in mind. Ted Peters did the inspection. He has been with the NHRA for years. He is also a Mopar guy owning several vintage pro stock cars. One of them is Darrell Aldermans old car the Daytona.

 

Congratulations on the red tag.

Good tech inspectors are a blessing.

Not sure about NHRA, but the local version of the IHRA regulations are horrible to read. My education is good, but I found it difficult to jump between the base document and local guidance. Suspect it has been written by very seasoned racers who didn't realise that some readers need a bit more background (or clear logic). It is good if you want to nitpick a single issue (e.g. how thick does the scattershield need to be) but less so if you are trying to see the bigger picture when building from scratch.

I was fortunate to have a very seasoned chassis builder, and a great tech inspector. Both take the time to pick up a phone, explain the logic, decipher which rules are not strictly enforced and which additional requirements will probably keep me alive (or racing more reliably). They do that without making me feel like a durn fool idjit. It has helped me learn a lot.

Cheers,
Harv

 

@racer-x just asking & curious
Why did you go to Red unlimited
That has to be Recertified each year instead of keeping the
Blue tag which is a three-year tag,
Not putting your car down ,
What the chances of running
Under 5.99
I could see if right around 6:20s all ready , but 2 tenths big jump , to 5:99.
I'm assuming the tag a 1/4 mile tags
Also been awhile seenIng rule book, doesn't Red Tag only
Allow so many runs on the chassis then has to be replaced or downgraded
To lesser certification ?
I try calling NHRA , talk to main
Rule supervisor because seeing quite a few driver / cars disqualified for wired Reason's Not in rule book ,
Trying find if there another Superseding rule book not in Standard NHRA book,
Sort of like NASCAR

 

No limit on the runs. It's not painted for easy crack inspections. We're we are going we will need the red tag sooner than later. I was at a race and a racer had his guy covered in the final by a few tenths. The slower guy saw his tag and protested him that he didn't have a legal car. They didn't let the faster car run. I don't want to be that guy getting bounced out of a race. We put way too much effort into this to take chances.

 

^^^^^^^^
Understand on race you mention above,
Was it a Sanctioning race / Event rule in Book ? If so in book & Et was faster then Tag, Yes,, but there Gray areas depends on the Event /meet,
Sanctions Rule's

 

If you think nhra rules are hard to understand and super strict try getting a car through scta tech for bonneville to me the rule book was as bout as clear as mud but one thing that was nice if I had a question all I had to do is ask them and when the made a ruling it was law also we had to keep a record book of all parts used and if any rules I had questioned and got a ruling on if you had that in you book no one could protest it when I built the Flatcad car there were several things that book saved out bacon on our car was certed to 250 mph