part 72 a 21st century tale
here's a late model story. back about '08 or '09 i'd just bought my 1st racingjunk.com car. the former owner said he ran 11.90's with it. i had it shipped down from kansas on a truck for about $450. if i remember, gas was about $4 a gallon, so we figured it would be cheaper than going to pickm it up. especially if you count time spent. everything looked o.k. it was obviously built by someone who had done it before. i was well pleased & could'nt have built 1 like it nearly as cheap. if you don't have a car & plan to start from stratch, you can probably save a lot of $ & work if you buy a car thats already built, or at least a roller. there are some real nice cars that come thru at reasonable prices. the worst thing i found wrong with my car, the front wheels were bent. they must have come off a car that did tall wheelstands. & it had tall moroso front tires. i'd learned years before that we could'nt cut decent lites with tall front tires. so i got some 15x4 cl's & bought the shortest street tire i could find. i think it was a 185, & just under 24" tall. the 9" slicks were almost gone, but i figured i mite get by with them for a couple of races. i'll have to admit after the traction problems i'd seen caused by a 455 i was skepticle to say the least. but the guy i bought it from said it hooked good. he was right. after a decent burnout i pulled to the line, fully expecting to have to lift when the tires broke loose. but to my great surprize, it just nailed me back in the seat & blasted off.it was a little quicker off the line than T.J.'s quickest ride with a 60' time in the low 1.60's. every pass i made it hooked perfectly. now to me thats a real testament to how well ladder bars work. & then what really blew me away, a couple of days later, i jacked up the rear end & noticed when i turned the right wheel forward, the left wheel turned backwards. this thang was a 1 wheeler! once again i thought, what if we'd had ladder bars back in the old days. how many more races could we have won? but thats water under the bridge--you can't go back.
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