the dumb ways we've blown our stuff up...

Russ Parker started this, so...

I already posted this once before...

First qualifying run at the Winternational's in 1996. Over the winter we had the fuel system on a flow bench and then put it on the car. The nearest we can tell, someone snuck in our trailer the night before and stole all the bypass jets out of the fuel system. I launched the car and it went into a wheelstand. It hit the wheelie bar so hard it smoked the tires. It blew all the rod bearings out, hammered up all the pins and knocked the ring lands out of the pistons before I got to the 60' mark. Thankfully, the blower stayed on the manifold and the burst panels never opened up.

If I ever catch that guy,... yea, right!

The rest of the blow-ups were always someone elses fault

[ August 12, 2003, 04:45 PM: Message edited by: Randy G. ]

 

My brother built our first alcohol funny car which we ran locally only in 1990. At our last race of the year we had a chute malfunction which led to a crash. I took a section of the frame (just ahead of the engine area) that he cut out and used it as a start for a home built go cart. I built my own hubs, spindles, axle, etc. and added a Yamaha 125 with a 6 speed (air shifted, actually used Lenco shift buttons with the detents pulled out, momentary one way for upshift, momentary down the other for downshift feeding a dual action air actuator). It ran on alcohol, then I fed it a small percentage of nitro (used Blendsall to the fuel - vacuum impulse pump to feed the carb). I was running it on a blocked off section of road, wide open in 6th gear and decided to lean it out by partially closing the fuel shut off that I could reach while driving the cart. The engine seized shortly there after and locked up the rear tires. I didn't crash but you should have seen the flat spot on those tires. I didn't even bother to open up the motor, just found an old Kawasaki 250 to put on instead.
May not have been as spectacular as Randy's deal but it was certainly dumb on my part. All my blow ups in the funny car were "routine" parts slingers.

 

I would say that one of my better blow ups and i have had a few was when we bought a used block off of a fuel team and took it to atlanta as a spare without checking the line bore and of course put it in the car. The crank turned freely so we thought we were okay not. It made it to about 1100 feet when it locked up split the block horizontally all the way down one side about an inch wide. We ended qualifing #2 and had to weigh it and had to use boards to get enough clearance to get the car on the scales. Then ofcourse it was border line on weight with thrail of oil following us to the scales. They let us go lucklily. Just another fun day at the races

 

Russ:

I bought a brand new Tony EXTREME shifter cart in 2000. It had a RibTek carbon fiber seat, 125CC Mitox, disc brakes, the whole deal. It did about 70-80 MPH down the straight away at Willow Spring's kart track and was still accelerating when you slammed on the brakes and downshifted for the left turn.

So, I let Daniel Oliver (current Super Comp racer and my former clutch guy) drive it for a few laps at Adams cart track in Riverside. At first he laughed at it until I told him to be very carefull because it will eat you up and spit you out faster than you can say it.

So, on only the second lap he takes the hairpin turn to the main straightaway. While entering the turn, he brakes and wacks the shifter down 4 times to put it in first gear. Half way through the corner he floors it, and the kart hikes the front end about 8 inches in the air and shoots full blast into a stack of hay bails. The bails become an explosion of hay and out of the middle of it 3 feet in the air doing a pancake spin is Daniel. The kart bounces off the ground twice and finally comes to a stop. The lanemaster-dude runs over to him and tells him to stay in the kart and leave his helmet and neckcollar on because he might have a serious back injury.

So, the front wheels are now pointing east and west in opposite directions because it took the front end off the kart. And Daniel, he was OK until he got the bill to fix it. He decided he's better off in Super Comp than a shifter kart.

Shifter karts are about as intense as driving a TA/FC. Russ Conroy and I used to go to Willow Spings once or twice a month to race and those things wear you out in a hurry.

RG

 

AHRA World Finals- 1983 - we are pitted across from Don Garlits and all weekend we are getting a lesson in marketing- He sold everything that could possibly come from a race car and he had hundreds of items (pistons were autographed and sold for 5 bucks- plugs 50 cents etc.) Come sunday we both lost in the semi finals and Don towed back right behind us with a car still smoking and full of glowing embers. He jumps out and throws a beauty of a fit (using all the same words he used at the RFC meeting that morning- just with a different tone of voice!) He rips the chute of his car (still smoking) and throws it in a trash barrel. Me still in my fire suit walk over, pull the chute out and stomp out the embers. Tantrum ended immediately as he was shocked at my actions. I STILL HAVE THAT CHUTE! I was scared to ask him to autograph it though. I think this was 1 year after his spectacular wheelstand at Spokane Raceway Park where he blew over backwards at 1/2 track.

 

Russ Speaking of your brother Randy, What is he up to lately. If I remember correctly he drove the Got Milk Car for the majority of the time and then you started driving. I think I saw something about him driving another funny car and tuning a dragster that I think his wife drives.

 

Randy works for Brad Hadman (started there in 1998). He drove the NHRA events from 1991-1996, and then in 1998 when we ran 2 cars. I got my license in 1993, drove match races in 1995, a little TAD in 1996. Then in 1997 I drove NHRA events for the first time, and drove through 2000.
When Randy moved north to work for Hadman he took one of the cars and ran it through last year while at the same time tuning his wife, Kim, in her TAD. Earlier this year Randy sold his funny car, and is building a new one. I'm not sure if it will be out this year or not. Meanwhile, they are concentrating on the dragster, which did run 5.50 at Woodburn where they were runner-up at a match race.