Re: NATS and Akron Don's Race Recap

I'm going to an 8 point roll bar. I'm trying not to mess up the body to the point I can't convert it back to stock since I think race cars are much harder to sell at a good price. Can I do more and not damage the body?

Tires are currently 29.5 tall and new ones won't be anything less than a 28.5.

Now that the car is back to where it needs to be (12.00) every launch is a meaningful practice on the tree.

Akron Don Gallimore

From: mike creglow <mcreglow@xxxxxxxxx>
To: "1962to1965mopars@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx" <1962to1965mopars@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, August 17, 2017 12:04 AM
Subject: Re: NATS and Akron Don's Race Recap

don,

sounds like you had a better time than i did this past weekend.

couple comments from your wrap up:

- nothing beats seat time -- get your routine down from burnout, pre/stage, and the way you count down the tree so it becomes muscle memory -- and --- focus, focus, focus

- when you T&T, test like your in eliminations

- agree with your assessment on steeper gears, but i would go with 29 - 30" tires. taller tires will give you better traction.

- go with a roll cage instead of a roll bar: it will stiffen your chassis for better, more consistent 60' times and most important -- safety (more on that in a later post)

have fun, enjoy you car and you'll start going rounds.

mike

On Mon, Aug 14, 2017 at 6:16 PM, Donald Gallimore <dongallimore@xxxxxxx> wrote:

Took my '65 Belvedere to the NATS and ran it in MAX Wedge in the 12.00 index. Here's a recap of the weekend:

Thursday and Friday Summary After two days of racing at the NATs and 7 runs, I'm 0-1.Lost in class eliminations. Tomorrow everyone starts fresh with Nostalgia SS Eliminator. The car is right there being within .013 of the 12.00 index over the last three runs. The driver needs a lot more seat time. Cut some sub .040 lights but did a 0.125 red in class eliminations. These guys are good and none of that will win. Still, having fun, making friends and car and I are getting better.

Sunday Summary
Only time trial today was a 0.03 under 11.970. But not a red light this time with a 0.087 light. Not good but at least I'm on the right side. Next is Nostalgia SS eliminations. Did add some weight to the car to slow it down plus the warmer weather will do that, also.

Eliminations over for me. One and done. Car fell off on the 60 foot by 0.13 and that and a slightly better light by my opponent ended my weekend. Everything else about the run was like the previous so I'm a bit befuddled - maybe it spun the tires for once.

Wrap-up Most of what I did was played around with the launch RPM. It really does not like 1500 or 2500 RPM Launches. Seems like the sweet spot is near 2100 RPM with this 4200 stall converter. Messing with the weight by adding gas, a spare tire and other stuff we won't mention didn't seem to make any difference likely due to weather and wind changes. Oh, well, on to the next event. Really need to put in a steeper gear and shorter tire for next year if I want to get the car to launch quicker and go faster. Slicks need replaced anyway. And, just for safety sake since I run cars running up to 145 MPH, I’m putting in a roll bar.

Akron Don Gallimore