Who cruised Van Nuys Bl in the 70's?

Man you guys don't forget much do ya??

 

Some things are really worth remembering! I remember YOU after 30+ years. PS-glad ya fixed your screen name. Who in the Hell is Mr Goms?

GOT'CHA!!!!!!!!

 

#99. it was a 5 window coupe, canary yellow, powered by a nailhead Buick, Joe DeLuca. "GOT'CHA"

 

Someone that wouldn't mind working with you but just on any Fords that might find their way to your garage because your THAT good!! GROUCHO!!!!!!!

 

Hey Bob. Do you remember Jim had his Vette sold in the morning, and you decided to race it one more time the night before @ Lumber City? Blew the hood off testing the unit. Me and Lironis ran over, and as you were trying to "square" the fallen hood over the engine compartment, you were screaming get back, get back. We were histerical. That thing must've idled at 3K from the mangled throttle plates. I kinda remember you hitting the throttle plates with a hammer and screwdriver til it'd idle down to about 1500, and drove off

 

YOUR WISHES ARE COMING TRUE #102. "GOTCHA" Feed me some memories.

 

Ah, Joe Deluca. Badass 41 Willys truck. Built 409 and 4-speed Hydro. That thing made the most eerie resonation going into 3rd(?) gear at Sepulveda and Plummer one night. Hard to explain, but man it sounded WICKED. I was gonna race it. I had a 61 Falcon. Roller cammed SBC with a clutch-turbo, Pont rear and straight axle on big slicks sticking out radiused wells. I'm doin burnouts and dry-hops on Sepulveda uncorked and my heart's beating itself out of my chest. When you're uncorked, on the street, in the middle of a quiet night, it makes you very self conscious. Joe's having some heating issues. While he's tending to the issues, I get nervous about having already made too much noise and hook my car back to the tow-bar. But, man, to do repeating, uncorked burnouts in front of a couple HUNDRED kids in the middle of the night? WOW!

 

One of the coming stories will be "Orange Sunshine" blowing its hood and CARB off on saticoy south of Van Nuys Blvd.

 

JEEZ, what the Hell's wrong with NOW?

 

Very cool , keep them rolling.

 

I'm old, sleepy and haven't been laid yet this a.m. (and they call YOU Grouch, excuse me, GROUCHO! hee, hee!

 

And besides, get your dam ass to work Groucho, you got a few more LLLLOOOOONNNNNGGGGGG years to go before ya get to rest on your Laurels (that would be Laurel Canyon, dam I kill me!!)

 

The Tale of Bottle Bob's Vette(4 pics to follow, so start reading)
We'd "test" at LACR during the week back then. Bob asked if I wanna go for a pass. Sure. The Frankensqueeze (SIXTEEN solenoids) is hooked to the horn button. So, Bob's steering and squeezin with 3 fingers on the hub of the wheel with his left hand, shifting with the right. Mid 9's, a bunch of MPH later and we're on the return road with smoke comin in the car. Me, sitting passenger reaches in the back for the fire extinguisher. Bob says, calm down, it always does that after a hard pass. Then, in the pits, he says, you take it for a ride. I put fresh plugs in it and 2 fresh 20LB bottles. I finish a shitty pass and the smoke is back as expected on the return road. Seems a bit worse this time. As I glance over at the fire extinguisher, still sitting on the passenger seat, a fireball comes from under the dash and singes the hair on my arms. The car's in flames and I can't get the seat belt off this thing. I'm staring into the fire as I'm struggling to release the belt. Finally I look down to see the belt buckle's way off to the left instead of centered. I exit the car and we watch it burn to nothing. Tires popping, Centerlines melting into the asphalt, tail lens dripping, etc. It melted the heads, roller rockers, seats, everything. We only salvaged the 3rd member out of the whole car. The melt marks remained in the asphalt on the return road next to the scale for some 20 yrs until they closed the track. I have video of the whole event. It was sad to see the car end that way. Bob comes up to me after and asks if I'm OK. I say yes, and he says YOU'RE FIRED! He hires me back on the way home. After it's flatbedded back to the shop, and all the burnt fiberglass blown off on the hiway, it's just an eerie looking skeleton.

 

Man...these are some great stories. I just want to say thanks, as a youngster I could only dream about the fun you guys had. Keep em rollin!!

 

What does it say on the door under the window. Razzie, Razzle?? What is the story on that??

 

My nickname then (Razzle). Razzle ryhmed with part of my last name, Randazzo. Groucho came a couple yrs later, stuck like glue, and noone ever called me Razzle again

 

Weekly to-do list 1974 to 1979 - Van Nuys - Wednesday Night, Colorado or Valley Blvd. -Friday night, Whittier - Saturday night, Foothill drive-in to sell stuff to pay for parts broken during the week - Sunday morning. I used to have a primer 1957 Chevy Sedan Delivery and we ran once and a while of with one of the kings of street racing SOCAL, Boyd (not THAT Boyd), mustard yellow vega, ultimate street sleeper. Race on San fernando Road, the box factory, OC, even raced the brothas in inglewood. Damn they had fast cars! Women, cars, burgers, great weather.....we were spoiled....

 

Oh, and yes, Scotty's Burgers was the place on Whittier Blvd. to hang out on the corner, check the ladies out or run out and lift up the occasional VW bug and turn it sideways just for fun. But Stick City was at the just before Beach Blvd, not across from Scotty's, it was Street Rods that was across the street. Bought my 57' Chevy at Stick City and yes, it did have a stick in it.

 

Do you remember the twin Novas Boyd built after his Vega got too famous? The stock looking one with the "two-barrel" and flat black paint on the motor to mimic oil leaks would run 13! Never knew what the fast one would actually run.

 

Groucho:

Yeah, I remember that one. I don't think that was the time he was selling it as I believe it was my engine that was in the car - that's why *I* was driving it. But anyway, I'm doing a burnout in low gear and hit the button to purge the system and BLAAAM it back fires real good through the carb. And the hood like BOWS in the middle and pulls off the hood latches, flies open all the way forward (this is a '69 Vette where the hood opens from the back toward the front) and then it bounces back closed again. I shut the engine off pull the hood latch and get out to assess the damage. I open the hood and happen to notice a MASS MOVEMENT of humanity coming toward the car from the Lumber City parking lot. I start waving my arms yelling: NO Looky-Loos, No Looky-Loos. They respect that and back off.

Now this is one of *MY* carbs. An 850 that I've milled (I'm a machinist by trade), the choke air horn off of, and spent days grinding all the casting flash out of the venturis as well as smoothing & polishing the whole top of the carb for the purpose of minimizing inlet turbulence. I've "slabbed" the throttle shafts (milled them as thin as they can be and still hold a butterfly screw. I've ground the butterflies about as thin as I could and still have them function. Essentially the butterflies are like potato chips riding on tooth picks - metaphorically speaking.

The backfire has folded those "potato chips" around the "tooth picks" in a "U" shape. So you're absolutely right, I'm trying to whack them down so they close off most of the throttle bore. I start the car up to see how much success I've had and it's idling fast but probably drivable. I limp it home for further repairs. Nothing is hurt too bad. Replace a coupe of power valves, put the base plate from my other 850 on it. I had originally made two identical 850's as I was thinking of running a tunnel ram, but never did.

I've blown a few mufflers right off due to leaky solenoids, but I've never blown a carb off a motor. This incident is about the worst of this nature that ever happened. Although on one '84 Vette, I did blow the top of the manifold up. But that was years later.

--
BottleBob
http://home.earthlink.net/~bottlbob

 

GOT'CHA - - I'm Lightning - - Jim R. - was just crusing through the posts and saw the V.N. thread. Wasn't much into racing at the time, '63-'68,but into motorcycles and low riders. But my '47 Ford woody was a little hopped up with 3-97's - Offenhauser heads and a La Salle trans - wasn't much compared to the racers,but it did surprise some people. Nothing special in paint,just a Navy Grey with chrome wheels. I left the valley in '68 to go play with the USMC till '72 then got heavy into building Harleys again.Rode with a long time club in the valley till '83,moved to N. Nev. This thread is great, I may not be able to remember alot about the racing parts [CRS], but it's great to read.Keep them comming.

 

#257 Your Sunday then was spent on sacred ground, the old San Fernando Drag Strip. The Box factory, wow, date yourself dude, I was riding there in my cousins (Danny Axe, goody, Goody bakerys, Lakewood, Downey, Bellflower, also owned Performance Associates with actor Bob Denver and partners with Gas Rhonda) '58 Ford Police Interceptor with one of the first after market floor shifts, learned my lightning fast shifts from him and my other cousin, Gary Goms. This was in 1959. And I used to hit Scot's in Downey which was caddy corner to the Downey cop shop. The Valley had Andy Andrews Stick City on Van Nuys Blvd. at Ventura. I'm building up to the "Orange Sunshine" race. (My hood AND carb left the car) Then we'll talk about the races out on Glenoaks and Penalton!!! Bitch's. =))

 

Damn this is a good read!
I was too young, (and on the other side of the planet) then, but after reading this I'm ready to head up to the valley tonight!
CraigR

 

Then we'll talk about the races out on Glenoaks and Penalton!!! Bitch's. =))[/quote]

WOW, what brought this on. I thought we were just reminiscing here. How about some PROZAC.

 

WOW, what brought this on. I thought we were just reminiscing here. How about some PROZAC.[/quote]


Seghi:

Nawww, GOT'CHA'S just pissed that all he can race right now in Washinton State are SNOWMOBILES.


--
BottleBob
http://home.earthlink.net/~bottlbob

 

#264, Ok Segi, got some?????? That'd pretty much hit the spot, the liver spot. LOL.

 

Don't forget the quirky races if things were slow and no one would race. Oxnard and Sepulveda, Bob's legend has gone far and wide. No one wants to race. Bob talks a van into racing, except Bob's vette will be facing the wrong way, he will be out of the car on the other side of the street, engine off holding his car keys. Van takes off, Bob runs across the street, starts the vette, turns around and catches the van before the 1/4 mile. Now that was funny.......

 

How I met Jim G. Hanging around the Jack-n-the-Box on Van Nuys Blvd, Jim would cruise by in his '69 Vette and jump on it. One night, I see him parked in front of a car lot on Van Nuys and Oxnard. I'm in my '65 Chevelle so I stop and ask if he wants to race. Jim has a 435 hp 427, 4 speed and 3:73's. I have a 350 hp 396, 4 speed with 4:88's on slicks. We set the race up for Woodman and Saticoy.

I'm giving the vette 3 cars. We take off and I'm surprised, the vette is pretty fast. By 3rd gear, I've only made up 2 cars. Hit 4th gear and he's holding me off. Screw it, hit the nitrous. Now I'm shooting ducks because I haven't changed the plugs in awhile, but I'm slowly passing him.

Turn around and head back to the start. Jim wants to see the motor, I say no, even though I have to put the fan belt back on (it always tossed the fan belt). Jim leaves, I pop the hood, replace the fan belt and close the hood just as Jim pulls back in.

Jim's a real nice guy so I pop the hood (he doesn't believe it's a 396). He looks but I don't think he knows what a nitrous unit looks like (only Bob is known to be on the juice). I point out the solenoids and tell Jim it's on nitrous, but I only needed it in 4th gear.

Then a light bulb goes off. I tell Jim his car is as fast as mine. We can make money on his vette if we put my nitrous unit on it. The following week, we juice the vette, but it's a 10,000 RPM unit which used a 4" tall plate. The rear of the vette's hood has to be left unlatched to clear the unit, but it works.

A year later, I spin a bearing and take the car down to Jim's shop (we are roomates by then). His crew pulls the motor and he finally realizes it's a 396 with cast pistons and a cast crank.

 

Hey John, Joe told me a story on that Willys Pickup. He said he was driving around the valley and saw it parked in a front yard with a for sale sign. He stopped and spoke to a lady. She said it was her son's but he was killed in Vietnam. She wanted $300. He bought it, changed the fluids and took it out to Irwindale and ran 11.17.

 

The fast one was in a magazine. On motor only, it was a 10.70 car on 9" slicks. Following the article, I saw him at OCIR testing and tuning that Nova. Man, that guy was a wiz with sbc........