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Topics - cjshaker

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16
Non-FE Discussion Forum / Sealing trunk area for NHRA requirements...
« on: December 29, 2020, 08:13:53 AM »
NHRA requires the trunk area to be sealed from the interior area when the fuel tank/cell is inside the trunk area. How do guys seal up their trunk areas, like in a Mustang? I thought about making a plate that went over the tanks recessed area, sealing it from the trunk area, but the fill would still have to be accessible from inside the trunk, so depending on how high the filler plate extends up, that could get a little complicated, and I'm not sure it would pass.

Making a plate to go over the center area between the trunk and interior wouldn't be difficult, it's a pretty flat, open area. But the wheelwell areas are pretty convoluted with braces and rounded areas that are hard to reach, like between the wheelwell and quarter panels. What's the best way to seal those areas up? Has anyone had issues with a tech guy over this subject?

17
Non-FE Discussion Forum / Self driving race cars off to a great start....
« on: November 13, 2020, 12:51:12 PM »
Time trial finished in record time..lol

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x4fdUx6d4QM

18
Non-FE Discussion Forum / Bench racing.....1/4 speed camshaft
« on: November 11, 2020, 08:51:43 AM »
Just bench racing here, and I'm no engineer, so I'm probably missing something obvious.

Why hasn't anyone attempted to use a 1/4 speed camshaft?

I was looking at the design of vintage radial airplane engines, and they use a 'cam' that has a much slower rotational speed but has multiple lobes. The design is pretty much mandatory for radial engines, but why hasn't something like this been attempted on automotive or drag race engines? The benefits (as far as I can see) would be pretty significant. A slower speed would mean that you wouldn't be trying to "launch" the lifter off of the lobe, so I think that a much lower spring pressure could be used. That would be a huge benefit for multiple reasons: mainly, less rotational drag and much better valvetrain control, which is the main failure point on most race engines.

It would require a cam with 2 'risers' per lobe, and a special gear set that would reduce cam speed to half of what is currently used. I realize that would have a packaging issue to stay under a stock type timing cover, and maybe it's not possible to fit it, but it would be a non issue if a remote water pump were used and a spacer were used behind the cover (or a deeper cover was used). Of course this isn't really possible on your normal street car without some fairly significant reworking of the front radiator support area, but not on a drag only application. With electronic ignition systems, distributors aren't even needed anymore, but one could still be driven off of the gear set if desired (think front mount distributors, readily available through MSD and others).

One of the issues I can think of is the diameter of the gears needed to reduce the cam to 1/4 speed. But with a vastly decreased load on the valvetrain from less spring pressure, thinner gears could be utilized, so the gears could be double stacked to get the proper reduction. I'm also not sure how a 1/4 speed cam lobe 'riser' would look. Maybe the ramp would be too aggressive to get the valve open fast enough, since it has a shorter time in rotation to match the movement of the piston? And yes, a dry sump oil system would be required, but I'm talking about full race engines here.

What else am I missing? Surely this has been thought of at some point through the years? Heck, it was used on radial engines dating back over a hundred years ago.

19
I got a bottle of Permatex Sleeve Retainer at work to attempt to reuse a gearbox that has some slight damage to its output shaft. The shaft was damaged when the pulley came loose and slightly grooved the shaft (this is on an $18k mower). The pulley uses a taper-lock hub, so it needs good contact with the shaft, so I decided to give this a try in saving an expensive gearbox. When reading the directions, first thing stated is "Clean and dry parts using Permatex Surface Prep activator".

Is the "Surface Prep activator" a requirement for the sealer to harden? I've never used the sleeve repair liquid before. Permatex Red and Blue do not require an activator, so I'm wondering if this is just a selling point for another product, or if it's actually required. Does anyone have any experience with this stuff?

20
Non-FE Discussion Forum / Drag Week canceled...
« on: July 15, 2020, 08:37:02 AM »
I just got a notification on my phone that Drag Week has been canceled for 2020. I'm expecting to get a notification any day now that 2020 has been canceled.

21
Non-FE Discussion Forum / Charlie Daniels died today....
« on: July 06, 2020, 12:29:54 PM »
Sad to see this American legend and iconic figure pass away. He was 83, and one of the few musicians who regularly wrote songs about America, and its greatness, and beauty.

My Beautiful America: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2AEkfjc6-o

In America: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8kB7OR161-U


22
Several people were wondering if it would ever be available as a crate engine. Apparently Ford heard the masses and responded quickly....

https://www.foxnews.com/auto/fords-godzilla-v8-crate-engine

23
Given the repair on the rail, I went ahead and dropped the price.

I changed my mind on using the Road Race pan for my new engine and went with the deep pan, since it'll be more drag oriented, so I'm selling my used pan.

It has one repair on a front corner, where it's been welded and ground down. Worked that way without any leaks. No dents anywhere and all the trap doors work fine. Rails are straight. The finish has oxidized some, so it would need painted to look nice. The matching pickup and a magnetic drain plug comes with it. Never been bashed on the bottom. Clean inside but needs a cleaning for dust and dead bugs. This is a 6 quart pan, which is considered a 7 quart system once you add a quart for the filter. Canton only advertises what the pan holds.

$175 plus shipping


















24
It's been 30 years since I've messed with small block engines, so my memory is pretty foggy on this stuff.
Why did Ford change the offset balance on small block engines in '82 (it was '82, correct?)? Did they change crank designs, piston weights or what?

I'm asking for a friend who has an '82 Capri with a 302 and standard shift. The car has had lots of backyard mechanic stuff done to it over the years and he's trying to undo all the crappy work that has been done. After having to pull the tranny, he discovered a 28oz imbalance flywheel, when it supposedly should have a 50oz balance. When he talked to the previous owner, he was told that he just used parts that he had laying around. I've been trying to help him out as needed. He needs to verify the engine year, but I'm trying to remember why Ford changed the imbalance in the first place. 22oz of difference is huge.

25
Because I'm tired of driving 40 miles to buy Turbo Blue, 5 gallons at a time, I'm looking at buying a 55 gallon drum, or possibly several 5 gallon cans of race fuel. Where do you guys get it at? How do they typically deliver it, or will they deliver it at all? Looking online has not been much help.

And while I'm on the subject, what octane rating would be required for a 13:1 compression ratio, with aluminum heads and modern chambers? Or what fuel in general would you recommend? Looking at VP's website just creates more questions than answers. Like why are most of their C series race fuels leaded, when most race engines these days have aluminum heads with hardened valve seats? Or why does C14 and C15 both have recommended compression ratios at 14:1 (there's only a difference of 1 octane), but C12 is rated for 15:1 (with an octane rating that is 6 points lower than C14??), and C16 at 17:1? Looking at their Master Fuel Table just creates more questions than answers, so I figured I'd ask the guys who actually use the stuff.

26
Non-FE Discussion Forum / Confused about NHRA seat requirements...
« on: April 20, 2020, 08:42:29 AM »
I had planned on adding some racing seats to my Mustang for 2 reasons; one being to shed some unwanted weight, the second being to satisfy NHRA's rule on the seat being braced to the roll bar crossbar, the one that goes behind the seats and that the shoulder belts typically attach to.

Surprisingly, there are very few rules that I can find in the NHRA rule book that covers seats. About the only rule that I can find is the one stating that the seat must be braced to the crossbar. That seems nearly impossible with a factory type seat that has no attaching points on a stock seat back. But I also notice that it seems like a lot of guys just run stock bucket seats (or even bench for that matter), even in some of the quicker 10-11 second cars.

Since I'm right at the 11.50 rollbar requirement point, and my car is only going to get quicker, I wanted to make sure I was legal for tech at Drag Week, which goes by NHRA rules. I'm getting ready to start installation of the rollbar, and I bought a race seat, but the factory seats are so darn comfortable, I hate to switch to something that has almost no padding, especially considering the street miles that are required during Drag Week.

So how do the vintage car guys that retain stock seats get by without complying with the "bracing" rule? And how is it that a bucket or bench seat that doesn't even go above the shoulders (like pre-69 Mustang seats for example) still seems to be okay in most of the classes? Does NHRA just ignore that rule in those classes or ET frames?

27
Non-FE Discussion Forum / This is a great site...
« on: April 09, 2020, 09:36:45 PM »
And it probably doesn't get said enough, but thanks to Jay for hosting a great site for all FE fans (and even you guys that like the 'lesser' makes 8)), and for doing a great job as moderator.

28
FE Technical Forum / New slicks, but which ones?
« on: January 26, 2020, 02:05:41 PM »
I've always had a problem with getting no smoke off of my burnouts. I run MT ET Streets, and even when they were new I would get very little, if any, smoke during my burnout. I started out using 1st gear (newbie, so wasn't familiar with using 2nd), but even when I changed to using 2nd gear, they just will not smoke. I currently have 4.30 gears and would wind it up to about 5000 on the burnout. Is that not enough wheel speed to heat the tires up?  Nobody else seems to have that issue, so I don't know.

It makes me wonder if my tires are not heating up enough to get full traction on launch, and most of you know that traction on launch is an issue I have. Even though I'm still sorting out the Caltrac adjustments and shock settings, I think the lack of smoke on my burnout is telling me something, so I was looking at getting a set of full slicks for racing this year. Looking at Mickey Thompsons' website, the ET Streets and full slicks use the same compound (M5), so that doesn't explain it. I was looking at Hoosiers' website, but they don't have much info about compounds, or at least it's very confusing, so that doesn't help. They also don't state anything about stiff sidewalls for stick cars (which mine is). So can any of the racers here give me some helpful tips or information to help me make a good choice? Hoosier seems to be a popular tire, but I've seen plenty of guys running pretty quick with MT tires.

29
Nobody has mentioned it, so I thought I'd post the websites for it.

http://www.fairlanet.com/FE/

http://www.beaversprings.com/2020-fe-race-reunion/

Seems it's going to be a 3 day event this year, with another TnT added on Thursday. Fridays TnT event will be shortened to only 3 hours, due to a "Gamblers Race", whatever that is. Early arrivals are also no longer free, there's a $30 fee for "Early bird arrival", even though it says camping is "free". So does that mean if I drop off my trailer the day before, which is what I've always done in the past, that it'll cost me $30? Can't say I like that ::)

30
In my small town in Ohio, population about 5600, we've had a Ford dealer that has been in business since 1909. They started out by assembling Model T's from parts that were shipped to them, which I never knew Ford did. It was a cool historical business, with a cool story. Unfortunately, they just couldn't hang with the mega dealers that have taken over, so they closed up the business this September. It was sad to see the place shut down, especially since I knew the people there and dealt with them regularly.

A friend of mine asked the owner if we could get a group of cars together and take some pictures of them in the front lot. She is a very nice lady and was gracious enough to say yes, so the 4 of us set up a day to do it. Word got around and next thing you know, we had a big group of cars that wanted to get in on it. It turned out to be a pretty nice day, and we got a few decent shots.

You can see the original building, built in 1915, behind the addition that was added later on. They have some really cool pictures and signs of the business with cars sitting around it from the teens and twentys, inside the garage area. I wish I could have gotten one of the old porcelain signs, but I think they're going to auction off the stuff, and I'm pretty sure it'll be outside my price range.




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