Spring Nationals Report!
What a weekend! Earlier this year, Todd and I had planned on going to Spring Nationals in order to get some early testing time in Lincoln. We loaded up Friday and hit the road, planning to drive through the night and get in Lincoln early on Saturday in order to catch some practice time to scrub tires during the Pro Solo. We arrived in Lincoln mid-morning, unloaded the cars and scrubbed in our new Goodyear tires.
We’d hauled a two-car trailer up just like Nationals last year, this time with Tye’s ’01 ESP Z28 as well. It helps on the fuel cost to have 4 people in the truck, but it’s a little on the uncomfortable side for 14 hours!
On our way up, Janish had called us and told Todd that Mike Maier and Frank Stagnaro were there. Mike and Frank had missed Nationals last year due to a last minute problem with the car and usually don’t make the trip east to Tours, so we figured Kurt was messing with us. Much to our surprise, Mike and Frank were waiting for us at the practice course, already working on their Mustang. (more…)
Spring Nationals Day 1 – Ready to Race
Waiting for Heat 5 and keeping our fingers crossed that the rain stays away!
McLaren Technical Center Tour
This was simply too cool not to share.
You have to admire them for taking design so seriously in all aspects of the company. The building fits so well with the character of their cars and I think that speaks volumes for their image as a whole.
Source: Jalopnik
Dissection, More Grinding, More Paint, and Shiny New Parts
Been rolling on the progress on the Mustang. On the word of the shop, I went ahead and ordered myself a new differential. Deciding it was time to quit cutting corners I went for the same one we have in the CP Camaro – a Detorit TrueTrac by Eaton. These are a helical gear type differential and they absolutely rock.
This is a sexy piece of hardware and is a fair bit beefier than the factory Ford Traction Lok unit. (more…)
Mustang Axle Housing Progress
Well, the situation isn’t quite as dire as I thought with the housing. First thing today was to check out whether or not the caliper brackets really were destroyed or not. Luckily, the one that was completely drilled out actually did bolt up just fine. I didn’t get around to drilling out the second set because I didn’t happen to have the right drill bit handy… This was lucky, because let’s face it – I don’t have the tools to pull the bearings in order to replace or redrill the plates on a drill press (just in case you were wondering, have a look at the Autozone Repair Guide – RearAxleBearings Page 4).
The housing was looking a little sorry after years of recoating, dents, and scratches… (more…)
Mustang Axle Re-Work – Or “Do I have sucker stamped on my forehead”?
If you’ll remember a few weeks ago I had decided to pull the rear axle out of the ’67 in order to get a few issues fixed, namely new bearing housing to replace one that was chewed up, new spring perches, and to fix a “hop” that the car did in reverse, something I attributed to a too-tight differential repack not too long ago.
Well, so begins a bit of a saga… I’m not going to blast the shop that did the work just yet, because I’ve only picked up the parts and haven’t had a chance to confront them about it (I broke one cardinal sin of having other people work on your stuff – inspect everything BEFORE you pay and leave).
This is how I got everything back (housing loose and unassembled). Now I can’t complain too much, because I told them to stop work when the bill started reaching exorbitant levels, but I’m getting ahead of myself… (more…)
Console Progress
Been slowly working on the console when I have some free time. I’ve semi-solved the edging issue by using some Self-Gripping Vinyl Edging from McMaster-Carr (part #24175K31 if you were interested). It conformed pretty nicely to the edge and covered up the sections that I couldn’t get the leather to make the corners.
Sorry about the poor photo quality, but I was too lazy to grab a good camera. The aluminum insert is a first pass effort, the shape is right, and it clears the shifter but it got a bunch of scratches in it during the cutting process. I’m considering getting a piece laser cut that I’ll come back an bend once I figure out whether this will work out or not. You can see some places where I didn’t get the leather down far enough… still debating on whether I want to try to re-wrap it or not (have plenty of material luckily).
I still need to wire the console for some switches, figure out a shifter boot, decide what to do about edging around the console opening, felt/cover the inside of the box, cover the console door, install the alarm and other boxes in the front, and finally work up a fuse-box mount on the driver’s side. A ways to go, but a little progress is better than nothing! With all the time invested, I can see why the Shelby reproduction consoles run >$600!
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