Drag week Road trip pictures

My 31 Plymouth coupe didn't get finished in time for Drag week this year again. Last year, I took my 67 Olds, and Mopar Billy or someone was giving me a hard time about wearing my Hemi Joel racing jacket, while driving an Olds. So this year I decided that I for sure needed to be driving something with a Hemi. Every Hemi powered car I own is in a state of disassembly, restoration, or broke, except my 67 GTX Hemi/torqueflight convert, so that would have to be the one. I had never had it to a dragstrip before, and was concerned that it would be embarrassingly slow if there were any unknown problems, plus it was bone stock with 3.23 gears.

Jeff (Jerico GTX) had signed on as Trunk Monkey, and we packed up and left on Saturday morning. Before we left, I put new points and condenser in the original dual point distributor, changed the oil, and swapped in some head pipes that had exhaust dumps on them.

ready to go:


We decided this was going to be a fun Tommy Boy road trip, and that we would see the sights on the back roads. Jeff brought some M&M's and set them on the dash, and the jokes and Tommy boy quote flew back and forth.

Owatona MN:


We stopped for lunch at Arbys in Iowa and discovered a leaky valve cover gasket. My Trunk Monkey in training promptly tightened the bolts and stopped the leak.



In Brandon Iowa, we discovered an amazing attraction, the largest fryin' pan in the state, real cast iron and over 9' diameter!


The first night on the road, we enjoyed a beautiful sunset.



Sunday was tech in for drag week, which was held at the oval track at gateway. I had purchased a tachometer, and used the time in line to install it, as well as visiting with old and new friends and checking out a bunch of cool cars. Also while I was in line, a videographer from Hot Rod asked me to put the top down, and he would film the car for a youtube video. I forgot to take the boot out of the top well, so the top wouldn't go all the way down, then I had to put it halfway back up, dig the boot out, and then put the top down. He filmed the whole bungled up procedure and put it on Youtube. Yippee, I'm gong to be a star!



As usual, the line was long and slow moving, but the weather was great!



I had previously corresponded with Tricky Steve from the HAMB, and when I saw this coupe, I knew he was here at Gateway, I sought him out and introduced myself.


Later, after tech, we moved to the dragstrip, and I made a pass. I was cautious, launching just off idle and shifted at 5700 rpm, and was pleasantly surprised with a 13.70 timeslip at just over 101 mph. Not to bad for a bone stock car with a 4225 race weight I thought!
My Friend Jay Brown (whom I have Trunk Monkeyed for 5 times) brought his FE Cammer powered 69 Shelby, and had a new Trunk monkey, Steve Peasly. My Trunk Monkey from last year, Kevin Rolf, brought his 428 Cobra Jet powered 68 SHelby GT 500, and was running solo with out the benefit of a trunk monkey.

Left to right: Jay Steve Kevin Jeff, Jays Shelby behind.

You will notice that Steve has a beer in his hand, and has never been know to not. When we were discussing titles, such as Trunk Monkey in training, Trunk Monkey extraordinaire, etc, Steve announced "I'm the Drunk Monkey!" We all had a good laugh over that and the name stuck.

Kevins Shelby has a cool snake on the hood from back in the early 70's.

I told Jeff that I hoped Jay would get his Shelby into the 8's, and finish the week. Jay has DNF'ed or didn't make the event for the last 4 years with a string of bad luck, and he had yet to lay down a good pass since he built the car. Jeff said no way would the car go 8's. But this is Jeffs first Drag week, and he doesn't know Jay, so he took a bet with me on it. We bet dinner.

Jays first pass earned me a nice plate of shrimp and ribs! Here is Jays time slip: (left lane)



More to follow.

Glad you put a tach in it.Good to see you again and you introducing me to Dudek.Caught up to Jay on Friday.Talk about a happy camper.Now to get that Dusey done.

The Barnyard Viper showed up at the time slip shack, while the Drunk Monkey and I waited for Jay to show up so we could congratulate him on the 8 second pass.



One of the best things about Drag Week is seeing Friends from other parts of the country that I seldom have the opportunity to see.

Here is my pals Dave Dudek and Rick Callahan, working on Ricks Road Runner.



This is the Road Runner that Dave used to own, the first F.A.S.T.
legal car to run 9's.


Monday I made another pass in the GTX, I launched a little harder, and shifted at 6000, and it went 13.42 at 103. That was too quick to be legal in a convert with no roll bar, so I had to make another pass and sandbag to get a timeslip slower than 13.5 to turn in. Each day at Drag week, we have to turn in our fastest legal time slip. If the slip shows an ET quicker than your safety tech, they won't accept it.
So I figured I was in for a week of sandbagging. But never the less, I was very pleased with the car.

Backing up a little, Sunday night I noticed that the amp gauge on the GTX was indicating a lack of charging. A little diagnostics revealed that the problem was the voltage regulator. Tricky Steve, the guy with the blown Hemi Coupe, offered to help me find one when the parts stored opened in the morning. I made it back to the motel on battery power. At 7:30 AM Monday the phone rang and it was Steve. He had called every parts store around, and the nearest regulator was 30 miles away. He hopped in his coupe, and drove the 30 miles to get it, then back to the race track where I met him. I tried to pay for his gas to go get it, but he adamantly refused. What an awesome new friend I have!

At drag Week, we have to photograph our cars at various checkpoints to prove we followed the route. One of the first was a cool space ship!



I think I saw heffalumps and woosels there too. Or maybe the Drunk Monkey took this picture?


This is the back of my Trunk Money in training, and the Buick has a 455. It belongs to my friend Randall from Ely Nevada. Randall was following us to the checkpoint, and we made a wrong turn, going onto the freeway instead of the frontage road. So then we had to go north 6 miles to the next exit, then south 12 miles to the next open exit, then back north 6 miles to get off the freeway and back onto the proper route. Randall didn't follow us anymore after that.



Another check point:



I phoned Kevin to see how his Shelby was doing with the 4.56 gears and no overdrive. He didn't answer, but then 10 minutes later we caught up to him, and he was stopped and checking the car over. He had heard a weird noise while driving, but could not locate the source of the noise, so we continued on, and the noise was gone.



The next time I phoned him, the same thing happened. The car made a weird noise, but then it went away.



The next day, when I phoned him when he was stopped somewhere, he figured out that the weird noise was my ringtone that he had programmed into his phone!

No Drag Week is complete without at least one stop at wally world for supplies:



more to follow

Cool picts Joel. Jeff had some fun posts on Facebook throughout the week too. Good stuff!

When the sun came up on our motel near Indy, we saw this 2012 Z28 in the parking lot. They say that it has all the stock accessory's like air and power everything, but still goes about 180 in the quarter mile.



They were checking the valve lash:



A pair of Hemis in the pit at Indy:



My trunk monkey was awesome In 10 minutes he'd have the trunk unloaded, the slicks on and the mufflers uncorked. A new rule at Drag Week this year is that NO street tires are allowed on the track, so I brought some old DOT stickys that I had laying around.


This AMC Javelin was going over 200!



I liked this 57 because it has a Lenco:


At Indy, Jay made another 8 second pass, but the car died on the return road. It turned out to be an electrical issue. Jay is an electrical engineer, so he builds his cars really complex in the electronic department, but he knows how to fix it. Give me a set of points any day.




The Drunk Monkey thought he was dumping drain oil into a proper receptacle, but it turned out to be an upside down trash barrel! Oops.



Jays 8 second SHelby:

Ricks Road Runner developed a gas tank leak. A major thrash ensued.



Even though we felt welcome, we didn't want to stay TOO long.



You can't stop at a gas station without seeing another Drag Week car:



Another check point down!




The biggest little red Radio Flyer in the world!



I tried to make friends with this cow:



She even let me ride her:



But when I tried to milk her, I found the she was a he:



He got mad and gored me pretty bad:



Mighty mouse on an elephant.
So there is 2 elephants in the picture, plus one mouse and one trunk monkey.

This is a great post Joel thank you for sharing. I never get tired of looking at '66-67 B cars...especially convertibles.

Quick question - does your car have subframe connectors? Our '66 Coronet started to have signs of body flex with a mild 440 running low 13's.

Also, how in the world did you become friends with someone from Ely, NV? I think the entire county has about 50 people in it lol.

Carry on and thanks for the fun read!

The GTX needed a bath very bad by the time we got to Kenosha. My dutiful Trunk Monkey made good use of the Hotels hose. Kurt Johnson, Winner of Street Race BBNA, is in the back ground with his BBC powered Mustang. Runs; low nines/high 8's.



The sign says it all:



Jeff needed a challenge, (among other things)and my car was easy to deal with, so he helped out Jay a bit. Jay made about 8 passes at Great Lakes Dragaway, because a loose wire was shutting the car off at half track. Finally he found the problem, and went out for another pass in the 8's. At this point, he was leading the big block naturally aspirated modified class.

Somebody left their tank parked alongside the road. A Kodak moment for sure!



Another cool check point:



We came across this memorial park with a big shooter.



We drove through the little town of Lanark Illinois. It had some neat old buildings from the 1800's, so we had to stop to enjoy the scenery and read the dates on the places.



We got off the path a few miles to see downtown Mt. Carrol.



They had another big shooter there, too. Is this thing loaded?



This is a haunted house called the Ravens Grin. We were too scared to go in, it was creepy.



After Union Grove, we went to LeClair Iowa, where I had booked a hotel room because it was close to Cordova.
I had asked for a room with 2 beds. The desk clerk looked at me and looked at Jeff, and said "how good of friends ARE you?" The only room they had left was the honeymoon suite:


Jeff offered to sleep in the hot tub, but they found him a roll-away bed. Lots of comments about Myrna Feltcher and a John Dear letter.


We ate at a place called Sneaky Pete's. The crew from Hot Rod was eating there too, so we had a chance to chat with them for a bit after supper.

At Cordova, rain was coming, so they tried to rush the program. The staging lanes were packed.





Somebody stole Ricks racing Jacket out of his car in Leclaire, so I lent him my Jacket so he could race legally. I didn't need it, a racing jacket is only required if you run quicker than 11.50 ET.



After we raced at Cordova, we stopped at the American Pickers shop in Leclair.



Another checkpoint down:



Jeff was perhaps getting a little weary of all the stops for silliness, so on Thursday, he offered up a bet that there was no way to make it St Louis by 6:30. Well, a free dinner sounded pretty good, so I laid into the secondary carb every chance I got. Jeff was starting to see that dinner tab money fleeing his wallet, so he said "look Joel, a castle!" He knew I couldn't pass up a castle! Then, when I slowed down and circled back, it wasn't even a castle, and Jeff admitted that he tricked me.


We saw Tom Baileys car at a little gas station in a little town.

When his trunk monkey had to crawl back into the car, he said "well, back into the sauna" The TH400 trans sits right between them, and he said the trans temp has been running at 200 on the road.





We made it to St Louis well before 6:30, so I got to collect on another dinner. We even drove past the arch, but couldn't find the parking lot to go in it.



At Gateway on Friday, Rachel Gebhart and I ended up side by side in the staging lanes:



I started thinking, since I can't accomplish anything with a 13.50 ET, maybe I should try for a killer reaction time. We run a .400 pro tree, and they do not use auto start. It seems that the moment both cars are staged, the starter presses the button to activate the tree. That would make it pretty hard to deep stage. So I asked Rachel if she would mind pre-staging first, that would give me time to deep stage before she staged. When we got up there, She pre staged, I went in deep, then she staged, and instantly I saw the yellows come on and I turned the Hemi loose. I expected to see Rachel blow by me, but it didn't happen. She broke a u-joint on the starting line. Bummer. I was pleased to see a .038 rt on the slip, even though my et fell way off to 13.90



More later

Awesome pics!!

Thanks, for all the great pics, and play by play. Really fun read! Say, is that "Felix the cat", Steve P? Good to see ya put Jeff to work😃

Yes that is Felix the Cat Peasley. He had us laughing all week. Wouldn't have been the same with out Steve there.

See that receiver hitch on Jays Shelby? While dumping the race gas to switch over to pump gas for the drive to Cordova, I firmly planted the side of my head into it. My first thought was "Who the F*%# puts a trailer hitch on a race car?" Oh yeah we were on Drag Week... I looked at Steve and said "That hurt". "Sounded like it" was Steve's reply.

Reading this, I can't stop laughing at all the fun things we saw, heard and did last week.

Jeff

Awesome pics, what an adventure. Very cool.

Think I'll retire from Drag Week story telling... no way I can top this! Joel always brings the best attitude possible to this event, and somehow maintains it throughout the entire week!!

Great read, thanks for all the pics!

Great pics, looks like a good time. Cant wait to give it a try when I get the Demon built.

Billy, your write-ups are a Moparts must. Retiring is NOT a option. Besides, Joel and I just goofed off. You and your family WORKED all DragWeek. That story needs to be told.

Jeff

Great pictures! Thanks for posting them.


You were only about 10 miles from my house. I've never stopped by to look at that though.

Great pics and the write up Joel.. looks you you two
had a great time... I sure wished I would have made it..
how were the roads on the trip... were there many pot holes
(like our crap roads here in Mich)

Joel if Jeff was thinking he could have told you to turn around and get your picture taking with my hemi cuda when you saw it on your way to St. Louis. Might have won him dinner. It was nice to meet you and Jeff at gateway.

I'm glad you all liked the pictures, thanks for the nice comments. It was truly a fun time. Jeff stopped over today, and Drag Week is all we could talk about. Jeff gave me a Callahan Auto T shirt that he had ordered, but it didn't show up in time for the event. Thanks Jeff!

Jeremiah, No on the frame connectors. The car is a bone stock survivor. I was a little concerned about running slicks and the resulting body flex. But I didn't launch it too hard, and I only made 8 or 9 passes total. I for sure am going to have a real street/strip car ready next year, so the convert is officially retired from drag racing.
Randal from Ely? Well I kind of knew him from Bangshift, he is a prolific poster there. Then on drag week in 2011, a group of racers all had dinner together in Topeka, and I met him there. Now I run in to him at every drag week.

Billy, I'll never post an epic story like yours! I always look forward to reading your account of the Gephart drag week. I am working on a Drag Week song for you though...
Tell Rachel sorry if I messed up her game at Gateway.

Mr. P: We missed you there. You would have had a fun time, the weather and the tracks and the route were the best!

Second 70, that was yours? We should have stopped!

Burdar, I can't believe that you live that close to the legendary fryin' pan, but yet you don't hang out there. I suppose the big crowd there to see it could be a hindrance.
We live about 30 mile from the Worlds Largest Ball of Twine Wound by One Man, and the adjacent Twine Ball Museum. Summer just wouldn't be complete without a visit to the Twin Ball.



More to come when I get time...

Rick Callahan is a buddy of mine... plus
I sold him my mega block and B1m/c heads
and rockers... I thought he was building
a 572 out of it for his other (maroon)
road runner to run DW... but he does like
his hemi's

When Jeff smacked his head on Jays trailer hitch, He asked me if there was a mark. I think he was imitating Tommy Boy, so I just said nope, no mark. Ship shape.

I found the video of when I was trying to put the top down. Jays car is shown right beforehand at 4:53

https://youtu.be/-8PTsK5VX6g?t=4m53s

At Gateway on Friday, I saw Tricky Steves coupe parked by the winners circle, so I drove over there for a picture of both cars.



Worlds largest Catsup bottle in Collinsville, Ilinois:



Attack helicopter:



This giant was trying to imitate my pose, but he couldn't get it right. He needs to get a life.

Somehow, the fluid in the front brakes got low, maybe from rapid wear from using them hard. Some air got into the system, and the pedal was spongy and low. We stopped at a parts store, and got some stuff to bleed the brakes. We got the job done in the parking lot, and had a steady stream of visitors who all wanted to talk about cars.



Now something you need to know about Jeff, is that he is one of those tightwad Swedes. Like me, only tighter. And that's tight. I noticed a one way valve on his wallet, and I saw the second dollar he ever made rotting away in there. Why am I mentioning this? Because while I was working on the brakes, he heroically tried to put out a fire under the hood of a Ford. With MY fire extinguisher. Which was the right thing to do. But all I could think of as I laid under the car and watched him trot off with my FANCY CHROME PLATED fire extinguisher, is that if that was Jeffs fire extinguisher, he would have been saying "it's just a Ford, let it burn. Call the fire department. Anybody got a bucket of water". The fire department showed up a minute or 2 later.

In Hannibal Mo, we found a statue of Mark Twain:



I love looking over the big GTX hood!



We saw this old Packard in Hannibal:



There is a BIG mug of root beer there too:

LOL...... the fire extinguisher story was epic.

How in the heck do you find all this stuff? I'm Hemi Joel's trunk monkey next year, and Jeff will have to babysit my brothers!!

www.roadsideamerica.com gives you all the places to stop. While in route I was always looking for the next local attraction worth stopping for.

Oh and I'm not THAT cheap... I have priorities.

Looks like you had a great time, Joel! Great pics, and well done. Makes me want to take a stab at this deal some day.

I have to give you credit. Unlike Jay, you didn't insist on eating at Taco Bell when you lost the dinner bet.

I will not eat Taco Bell at home, let alone on the road.

And since I know NOTHING motivates Joel more then a free meal, We already have a bet for 2016 Drag Week. I say his Hot Rod will not be ready for it... If it is I owe Joel a Steak dinner, and get another cool as road trip out of it. Win win if you ask me.

Yep that's a win either way.

Nice pics! thanks for posting!

I found this thread...yay! great pics Joel

and great to see you again

At union grove I told my Dad that unless we went to the Mopar Nationals or something it was very unlikely that we would see TWO HEMI convertables at one place again.

Very Cool Car! I shared this to Facebook on Day 5. Thanks for getting old rare muscle out and USING it.

Fantastic writeup, and it's just awesome you ran a real Hemi 'vert on Drag Week. Do you have any higher res versions of some of those pics?

I was incredibly jealous watching the pictures roll in on Jeff's facebook posts! Also laughing at the "I have to poop" t-shirt.

Everyone tells me to stand somewhere else when I wear that shirt.

Cool pics and write up, I really need to run Drag Week, its got to be a blast.

Awsome pics! Looks like a good time too. I thought I was doing good driving 90 miles to the track today, making a few passes and driving home in my 68 dart, I couldn't imagine what drag week would be like!

Squirrel! You're here! Your 2015 drag week story is Epic, driving your gasser from AZ with your son, changing the fragged blower without breaking the seal on the hood, winning your class! You have got be on cloud 9.

Nick, all the pics were taken in high resolution, I just shrunk them down for uploading to the internet. I can email some, or if there is an easyer way, let me know.

This Hemi powered Cuda rumbled by when we were parked in Hannibal, so we had to track him down and talked with the driver for a while.



There was a statue of Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer there too. (they are the 2 upper guys on the slab, not the lower in front of the GTX)



On the way home, the GTX turned over to 50,000 miles. There goes the resale value.

Still amazed To see a rare classic getting used the way God, and Ma Mopar intended!

Awesome post and pics ! Thanks for this post. Your car looks great and runs good for its combo. I would love to see some pics of the Shelby's cammer eng and here some of the specs on that cammer's build. You dont see many cammer's today but they are a cool eng and make a ton of power. Thanks again for the story and great pics. Ron

Ron, there are tons of pictures and details on Jays web forum. www.fepower.net.

Joel's GTX convert is by far the quietest convertible I have ever ridden in. Not a squeak, rattle or any flapping from the top. We put on 2366 miles that week, and while riding shotgun you would have never guessed a HEMI was under the hood, until a free dinner was at stake...

Billy, I just cant not drive it. I love driving cool old cars. The car is very well cared for, I don't want any harm to come to it. But I would feel worse if it sat in a dark garage forever unused than if something bad did happen to it while being used the way it was intended.
I'm more scared of leaving it overnight in the hotel parking lot than going down the drag strip. But I took precautions when parking it overnight.
On the track, I never lined up against one of the berzerko overpowered cars. If I had, I'd have held back and let them make a single.
Thankfully, everything went ok.

Yeah, it was quite a trip! and it starts over again at the end of October...Drag Weekend! starts in Tucson (my home track) and ends in Los Angeles. Of course I signed up as soon as I could. and missed out on the $50 discount they gave us in the goody bag at DW.

mopar content...fired up my wife's 70 Dart on Monday, and we drove it to the car club meeting. It still runs.

I shot a short video of Tom Bailys winning Camaro leaving the small gas station. What a hoot to see a car that has gone mid 5's at 250, driving on the street!

https://youtu.be/uDTkD9DGles

Backing up a bit to a couple pictures that didn't upload right before, here is the Lenco transmission in the 57 chev. There was a twin turbo LS under the hood. (too bad it wasn't a Hemi!) Someday, I hope to have a Lenco in something that I drive.



All the tracks were awesome, but Great Lakes stood out for it's historic look and abundance of fans. The old tower stands in contrast to the mega towers with their air conditioned suites at the more modern tracks.



On the way home, we passed up Kevin and his Shelby. Jeff was hoping to bum a ride in the Shelby for a short segment of Drag week, as Kevin was running sans trunk monkey. But that was not possible. A GT500 does not have much of a trunk, so Kevin had the slicks, most of his tools, supplies, spare parts, and luggage all crammed into the interior. I applaud him for running without a trailer, that's cool. It was out of necessity that his setup looked like the garbage car of a poor homeless guy. He had only a little cocoon like hollow spot to sit in, every other square inch was crammed!



When we finally got back to our home town in Minnesota, I made a turn that Jeff wasn't expecting. But he figured it out about a minute later. After all the fun stops taking pictures of various out of town monuments and oddities, it wouldn't seem right not to stop at our own:



This is my last update, I'm out of material. As usual, now I wish I would have taken more pictures. Drag week 2015 was great! The tracks were top notch, and very well organized, the routes were great, with very little freeway time and lots of back roads, the weather was as good as it's ever been for Drag Week that I can remember. And of course the cars, the racers, and all the people involved are what really makes it great. I can't wait for next year! Joel

I did get to ride in Kevin's car when we dropped off his truck and trailer in impound. Not too often you get to ride in a 67 HEMI GTX convert and a 67 GT 500 in the same day.

67 was a good year...

Well... To inform Moparts members on 2016 plans. Joel is making me buy my own seat to sit in his HOT ROD. And he calls me cheap...

Well, not exactly. I did offer an upside down milk crate...

Here is the interior of Kevins car, ready for the road!





Here is all the stuff that he squeezed into that little Shelby:

Does anyone around Columbus know if there is a Texas Roadhouse near by? I have a feeling I have a steak dinner owed to me...

There are 4 locations in Columbus

Isn't there like 3 whole months to go? Billy can pull a shell of a car out of a field 2 weeks prior to the event and be in the tech line with 5 minutes to spare! Joel's car is way further ahead!

Let's see... Windows, seat mounts, floor pans, windows, wiring, brakes, get the 392 running, plumbing, build headers,etc. With roughly 120 days to go, that is a tall order. Joel is sending the car out for most of that stuff next week. He is super busy with work, family and driving his parade cars across the country. As much as I should be helping him, I just do not have the spare time. I'm really just trying to get him busy on it, as I know he wants to take the Hot Rod to Drag Week pretty bad, and NOTHING would be more heart breaking then having to buy me a steak dinner.

I took 5 weeks off of work in January - February to try to finish the 31 coupe for drag week 2016, and to beat Jeff out of a dinner. I was going to spend a week or so assembling and dynoing the 392 hemi, then 3 - 4 weeks making major progress on the chassis and body. As usual, lost parts, (launched a circlip, never to be found, had to order a new one from diamond) stuff that didn't fit right, machining the rods for side clearance, cutting the main stud girdle for stroker clearance, remodeling the oiling system, setting up my ridiculous 8 carb intake, etc slowed down the assembly, and I took way more than a week but I got it done, and put it in Jays dyno hoping for big power numbers. (BTW, Jays 427 SOHC Ford headers fit with just re-drilling some holes )



Made some check out pulls, then some full throttle pulls, increasing the rpm a little more each time. The oil got milky, changed the oil. After the 1st 6000 rpm pull, I cooled if off an lashed the valves. Went to restart it, and it hydrolocked. Found water in #8. Pulled the head and #8 cylinder wall was cracked. Figured it was a head gasket issue. Pulled it off the dyno, tore it apart, found shot rod bearings from the wet oil, had the #8 bore sleeved, pressure tested the block, took great care with the copper head gaskets when re-assembling, put it back on the dyno, made several pulls, but again milked out oil. Pulled the heads, brought them to a head shop and had them pressure tested and milled .003 for flatness, put heads back on with thread orings around each water hole in the heads and block, put it together, filled it with water and pressure tested it, leaks, pulled it apart, new custom head gaskets with all the un-needed holes gone, extra-extra carefull assembly with permatex red coppercoat. Mounted a radiator sytem on the dyno to use a closed cooling sytem so I could put moroso ceramic seal in it. Pressure tested with no leaks, made some pulles testing 3 intakes and dialing the carbs on the 8 carb intake. filled the oil pan with water again. Now my 5 weeks was gone, no work done on the car, and a broke motor.

Last night I finally started working on the motor again, and found a crack in the #8 intake port in the head that leads to water. I poked it with a probe, and it went right thru. Why didn't the head shop that did the pressure test find this and save me 3 weeks of chasing a head gasket problem????





Sent the head off today to get repaired. Like jeff said, I'm going to pay someone to get stuff done on the car that I had planned to do on my time off, while I re-do the motor. Will it be ready for drag week? Who will buy dinner? And what about Naomi?

Thats a bummer Joel... but I've been there on
my junker