Vitamin C – Seeing What We Have

I’d raced the Vitamin C for about 8 years, sold it about 4 years ago, and bought it back earlier the year. It’s been five years since she last went down then track. I’m wanting to prepare the car to run in the Super Stock class of NMCA.

A racing bud from Maine is working down here for a couple of months to help me with my race cars and collector cars. The car was running in the 11.0 Index when I last raced it, and it needs to run at least 10.5 to be able to qualify in Super Stock. I’ve already replaced the carburetors, bought (but not yet installed) a set of lighter wheels and 30X10.5 radial slicks. I know I need to replace the hood with a stock – without a scoop. Plans are to replace the heavy drum brakes with race disc brakes. However, we needed to take the car to the track and see how the car runs after five years of dormancy. Yesterday, there was a TDRA NSS/NMC race at Xtreme in Ferris, TX. That’s about 220 miles from the shop.

The track was to open the gates 11, the Driver’s meeting was to be at noon, so Jerry and left at 7am. We arrived at 11 and unloaded the car. It was in the 40s, and people were dressed more for a duck hunt than a drag race. The Driver’s meeting went as scheduled and we were the first to go down the track at 1pm. I thought it best for Jerry to race the car for him to get his impressions, and I would handle the weather station and video the launches.

The first pass in the car had it leaving real soft and I saw a 6.87 on the board. When he got back to the trailer, Jerry told me that the torque convertor is all screwed up, and that the car won’t go over 6000 RPM. Looking at the slip, the 60′ was 1.51 when it formerly was 1.43.

There was an index for 6.89, so we declared that and just ran the car without changes. The 2nd Qualifying Jerry did a 6.890 and was #1 Qualifier. There was an even number of Racers, so no Bye for first round. He ran a slower Wagon in the first round, While the car only ran 6.91 all out – the wagon red lit. The second round was a bye, and the car got slower yet with a 6.93 all out – despite better weather. For the third round, Jerry ran a Duster 340 that was a slower index, but Jerry couldn’t run him down. The car did a 6.96.

We got back home at about 9:30, with a list of items needing to be done to the car – including ordering a new torque convertor.

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