Wednesday afternoon trudged on, and the brake lines eventually ended up mated to the master cylinder, albeit not without drama. It seems the 9/16 to 3/16 line fittings in the cast iron MCs are not readily available. Luckily Dale has a mopar buddy who manages an O'reilly store and is aware of this situation, so he crawls through junkyards on a regular basis to build up a stash. We were thankful, it's the little things that trip you up when you're in a time crunch.
I threw the shredded spare, and the worst one of the remaining mounted tires, in the 1 ton, and decided Thursday morning was going to be tire day for me, just didn't want to continue this trip waiting for the next problem to show itself, I needed to be pro-active at this point.
As I walked back into the shop, I noticed Dale had taken up his normal spot, on his back, under the dash of the BarnYard. Boone was busy bolting the exhaust under the truck. He had painted it all high heat white earlier in the day. The idea was for the 3" exhaust to run high up next to the floor pan, and virtually disappear, allowing everyone to only notice the large, bright headers exiting the fender. This was easier said than done, Since a sweptline cab hangs considerably lower at the back than the floor pan and bed, it required drilling 4" holes in the cab to snake the exhaust through. The headers end about 6 inches short of the fender, then an extension is V-banded on the end of the 4" collector that sticks through the fender and features the signature pentastar 5 bolt cap with the Mopar M plasma cut into the center which quickly became the feature point of the whole truck when it went public. The exhaust attaches to another 3" V-band coming off the back of the collector as it turns for the fender. Great care was taken when collaborating Boone's ideas to the header builder that as much of the header tubes as possible needed to show between the gap of the tire and fender. The design for the cap came to Dale in a dream after a session with the header guy and Boone, he had sketched it out the next day as seen in this attachment.

Speaking of the tires... I forgot my 4 way lug wrench
at my up north house and didnt remember to get something
to change the trailer tire with... we had to dig
through the 52 for the tool box and get a ratchet
and assorted stuff to get that tire off and back on...
in the mean time breaking the extension..I either
need to buy another or bring the one back home for
the trailer.. I think I'll buy another

The header builder had marked the extensions left and right with marker, but that didn't survive the coating process, so Boone had frantically moved them side to side to get it right, and at long last the header and exhaust installation was a success. Boone and I turned to bleeding the brakes, and nearly every union and fitting I had screwed in leaked! We always give Dale a hard time about "Strong-arming" every bolt he tightens, but on this night he was able to give it back.
He was literally falling asleep under the dash, but told Boone, "You better work me as much as you can tonight, I'm spending all day tomorrow on the Gremlin!"
"I thought you had to work tomorrow?" I interjected.
"Nope, took it off, only way I could see us making it", he surmised.
My phone rang, it was Darren, "Dave, what's the number or e-mail where you tell HotRod you aren't going to make it?"
"DragWeek at HotRod.com, I believe", I deadpanned.
"Alright...I'm just not gonna kill myself, this is ridiculous, I've spent 2 hours just to build one fuel line! I'm not going to stay up every night this week just to half do this thing!" he exclaimed
"I understand, I don't blame you...just send them a maessage so they can let someone else in." Dead level, no emotion, he could shake that worm in front of me, I wasn't biting.
"OK, talk to you later", he hung up.
"Who was that?" Boone asked.
"Darren", I stared at him, "Said he was giving up!"
"Blatant call for help!", came Dale's muffled voice from under the dash, "Did you fall for it?"
"Not this time", I sighed, "maybe tomorrow".
I excused myself and headed for bed. Boone grabbed up his pile of papers and proceeded to call out wire colors and pin numbers to Dale.

The header caps, the chief inspector approved.

Thursday morning found me up early, but Dad was already on the back porch reading his Bible.
"You want to help me get all these tires over to Robertson?" I asked him.
"Sure what do you want to do?".
"You take the 1 ton over, and I'll follow you in the '66".
We pulled into a packed parking lot, and went inside. I explained to the salesman that I wanted 2 trailer tires, mounted; two new tires on the rear of the 1 ton, mounted(rain in New Mexico had convinced me a little more traction might be beneficial); and 4 tires swapped to different wheels on the 66 Satellite.
"You may want to leave it all with us, if possible", he smiled, "You're about the 10th ticket in line already".
"What are we talking, 30 minutes, an hour?" I feigned disbelief.
"Naw", he laughed nervously, "You may want to get a ride, it's going to be longer than that!"
Dale picked us up about 45 minutes later, and we popped into O'Reilleys for another of the seemingly endless runs for shop consumables, paint, fluids, and hardware. Back at Dale's house, Mom and Rachael were putting the finishing touches on a massive breakfast, and we sat around the table contemplating the best uses for the last 60 hours of available time before we had to be on the road for Bowling Green.

Below is part of the background of another photo I shot on Wednesday afternoon, which shows the Barnyard's doors leaning against the fence, one still in primer, vitually untouched since last year.

Damn, its amazing you guys even made it at all, you're nuts, that why I like you all

Hey Billy,gotta say those exhaust caps are very cool,and so far it seems like DW prep is standard operating procedure!..Always look forward to your DW exploits,great writing,{and reading}.
You and Daryl coming up to Fall Fling?

They are not alone in the last minute thrash. Frieburger often refers to drag week as the "Largest collection of cars that weren't running 3 days ago"

Awesome write up as usual Billy. I love the play by play you give. Very well written.

Thanks for the comments guys, Thursday morning was actually the last time things seemed normal and orderly! Pretty much after that it was "all hands on deck", and we started talking in code! Things on the To-Do list were getting shuffled to AT (After Tech) and ADW (After Drag Week). Expediency overruled diplomacy, polite behavior, and good taste.

As promised, Dale assumed the same position under the dash of the Gremlin, that he had previously occupied on the truck.
For Boone, the Calvary showed up on a gleaming black Harley. Terry Vicena had helped Boone work on the Truck last weekend, and decided to come back for another round. He was one of Boone's co-workers that he had been crying to about not making it without some help. Terry is not a master mechanic, or a master fabricator, he's just a guy that's not afraid to jump in the middle of a project, and tackle what appears in need of doing. Thursday, he decided that black roll of carpet needed to find it's way into the floorboard.
He was well into that project when Boone finally decided it was time to tackle the windshield! That brought me in from changing the oil on the Belvedere, Dale out from under the Gremlin dash, and Terry put down the carpet knife. Boone equipped 2 of us with plastic knives from a picnic set, and the other with a spray bottle full of soapy water. We wrestled with it for a good 45 minutes before we had it in place, and more importantly, without cracks! Boone decided to put the locking ring off another day.

Next up, Boone delegated the remaining painting to Mom, and Rachael. He handed them 3 rattle cans of satin white to finish off the door, and then 2 rattle cans Cobalt Blue Metallic and the stencils he had made up, to put the name, cubic inch call-outs, and class designation on with. "Don't worry about exact measurements", he implored them, "Just put it on there and spray it." I guess the best way to emulate a backyard built Gasser of the 60's, is to build it in the same fashion, with family and friends doing the work that should be left to professionals!
Dale's new balancer showed up via Fed-ex around 1pm, so at that time he really began to re-assemble the Gremlin in earnest. At 4 pm, we stole Rachael away to take Dad and I back to pick up the 1 ton, and the Satellite at the tire shop.
When we returned from there, Darren's truck was parked behind Dale's house. Dad used to try and hide the fact that Darren was his favorite, but as he approaches 70, it's much more blatant than ever before. "What do you need, Son?" he asked as soon as he pulled up.
"I need to use Dale's truck, and a trailer to bring my car over here...they've been saying If I'd bring it over here they'd help me, so I guess that's what I need to do!"
Dad sprung into action, and in a matter of minutes, the two of them headed out in Dale's truck, to pick up the Charger.
I was mad enough to chew nails. Boone and Dale spent 24 hours straight last year to get the Charger done, after they had given up on their cars. Now, with 1.5 days left, and both of them under the gun, he expected them to do it again?
Once the Charger arrived, Dale pushed the Gremlin off the concrete pad, and allowed Darren to put it in that place, so now it was not only forcing Dale to work on his car in the grass, at his house, but it had the BarnYard blocked in the garage. I just shook my head in amazement. To my way of thinking, EVERYONE's chance of making it, just took a step back...

Now that I know the status of things Thursday night, I think I'm even more impressed that everyone made the show Sunday. I can't wait to hear about the next 36 hours!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Scott

I gave Darren's Charger an appraising look, and was appalled at how far he had taken the disassembly. The gas tank was off the car, the front bumper, grille, and supports were off the car, and much of the underhood wiring was missing.
Last year, the car had a Racepump manual pump with a deadhead regulator, and an orange box ignition system. He had ran a 13.0, then ruined the starter. Later the car went 12.80's, but was plagued by vapor lock/ fuel delivery problems, and burned up 3 or 4 blaster coils. So he went 180 degrees in the other direction in an effort to deal with those issues. A Mallory Comp 140 electric fuel pump replaced the manual Racepump, and A MSD 6AL and new wiring were called upon to eliminate the coil problem. The problem now was that both of these conversions were only about 50% done.
Then I overheard him telling Dad, "When I'm at work tomorrow, I need you to change the brake cylinder on the right side. It's been leaking, and there is a new one in the trunk."
"Ok, I'll get to that." Dad agreed.
"Then, I've got brand new polyurethane spring mounts to replace the old rubber ones, and a pair of traction bars that will have to be modified to fit."
"Alright", Dad nodded his head.
I had to walk away to keep from losing my cool. He had major problems with axle wrap up last year, and I had told him to buy an iso-delete kit from Firm-Feel Inc. to take care of it. Now he was intent upon using a band-aid for the problem, and expecting Dad to install it?

Dale fired the Gremlin, checked to see if reverse was working with the tranny brake, then shut it off. He hooked up the trailer, and tried all the lights, it appeared that all the wiring inside The Gremlin was ready to go! He still had to wire the front clip, as it was not yet mounted on the car, but he had a pigtail already on the car for it to plug into.

I had already mounted the two new tires on my trailer, and moved the spare back to it's spot. I sat in a folding chair at the back of the shop, and watched Dale bounce between wiring on the Truck, and helping Darren on the Charger. I finally headed for bed and left the three of them to it.

Great write up Billy, I met you after memphis at a gas station I was in the gold 71 challenger. It was my first Drag week and it was a whole lot more than I expected (and hoter!!!), can't wait for next year, already started tearing my motor apart, not only to fix the valve train carnage from this year (i did finish, and to me that was an accomplishment!!) but to go faster next year! Dragweek was one of the best experiences of my life, as well as my brothers(my copilot this year). he finally got motivated to put his Cuda back togather for next year, that is how much this event will get you fired up!

Friday, the 6th was a whirlwind of activity from the very start. My alarm clock was the roar of an un-muffled 440 as Dale loaded the Gremlin for a trip to B&M Muffler in Owasso. The same shop that had finished off Darren's exhaust on the Charger at the last minute last year, and had just finished up the under-truck portion on the Barnyard Viper. By the time I had my shower, ate breakfast, and made my way outside, Dale had already returned and was wiring the Gremlin front clip.

"Is he going to take care of it?" I asked.
"Well", Dale paused, "I reminded him that he said the 4" stuff was available, and he could do it, he agreed to that, but wasn't happy he was only given 6 hours to make it happen!"
"You told him it had to be done today, right?"
"Yeah, he told me to come back for it at 5pm, he also asked how the 'Celebrity Truck' was doing", Dale laughed. "Said he's never had a vehicle in his shop that had that many admirers stopping by to look at it!"

Terry walked around the corner on his way towards the D-100, "We didn't run you off already?" I joked.
"Naw, I figure I've got another day of this left in me", he smiled. "Boone hasn't made it in yet?"
"We were out here until about 3:30AM, and then he's 22 miles to his new place in Tulsa, so I wouldn't expect him too early!" Dale interjected.
I pointed at the Charger. "Darren knocked off about 2:30 AM", Dale added.

Dad came out and started on the Charger, and I helped him get it up on jack stands under the body. He had the tires off of it, and replaced the wheel cylinder pretty quickly. It wasn't until he started on the springs that Boone showed up, almost exactly at the same time as one of Dale's buddies, Michael, and a 10AM Powwow began to plan out the rest of the day.

Rachael came out as I was bolting a fresh 15lb bottle in the trunk of the Satellite.
"We going to be loading up and leaving soon?"
"Doubtful", I shook my head, "These guys aren't even close".
"We could just go ahead ourselves." She had lobbied to spend Saturday at Beech Bend since the first day I showed her the overhead view on Google maps and she spotted the amusement park.
"It's just not that easy", I lamented. "Hey, I need you to take the Satellite into town, and give it a wash and vacuum like you did the Belvedere."
She looked at the Satellite's worn and battered flanks and scrunched her nose up, "Why bother?"
I ignored the sarcasm, "fill it up with fuel, and grab 5 gallons of 91 for Boone, hopefully we can get the cam broken in on that thing today!"
She held up her hand like a bellhop, and I produced my card..."And grab some more ice" I begged. The heat was already on the rise.

Terry was making serious headway on the interior, he had the seats and seatbelts in and out several times. Finally he was happy with the fit, and finished up the installation with the seat covers while Boone fought with the locking lace, completing the windshield install at long last. The 2 of them collaborated on the passenger's side door install, then Terry wished us luck and headed home. Without his 20-25 hour contribution there is simply no way the Barnyard Viper would have made Drag Week 2013.

When Rachael returned with the Satellite, I decided it was time for me to get organized and ready to leave. I figured with my rig ready to go, and all loose ends tied up, I could better concentrate on what help I could lend to the brothers' cause.
I went through the 1 ton, sorting out what was staying in OK and what was making the trip. Next, I loaded the Satellite, then the Belvedere on the trailer. Finally I sorted through all my tools, spare parts, and belongings and loaded them into the cars and truck. I stopped short of hooking the truck to the trailer, since I still might have to run some errands in it.

Boone had brought the remaining Holstein cowhide print material he had used for the seat covers over, and had coerced Mom and Rachael into covering the door panel inserts and the headliner in it.

At some point around 11:30 AM, Dad had received a call from Darren that he had overslept until 11 and was late for work. Several hours later we learned that he had decided not to go in at all, but he still hadn't made it over to work on the car. When I grilled Dad on it, he commented that Darren was at his place getting all the other parts ready to put on the car...All while Dad and Dale were working on the rear springs, and modifying the traction bars to fit!

Day Five at Bowling Green says a lot...

Two burning questions that remained unanswered by 2pm Friday were: Will the Barnyard Viper fire to life today, and will Darren ever show up to work on his own car?
Boone finally pulled Dale away from the Charger, and put him back under the dash of the Truck, for hopefully the last time.
I dumped the fuel Rachael had picked up into the Barnyard's 15 gallon cell, so we would have enough to make it through the break-in process.

Finally, it was determined we were ready to see If the beast would run. I crawled underneath, and clicked the transmission into neutral, so we could get fluid flowing through the fresh 727 right away. Boone rolled the starter over a few times and hit the ignition. It kicked back on the starter so hard I was sure it had broken it. Same result the second and third time.
"Good grief Dale, pull some out of it!" I admonished.
"Should have been closer than that", he shook his head.
He had to back it off 2 more times, to get it right, and by then the starter sounded horrible.
Finally it fired to life, and he set the idle to hold the desired rpm, as we still had no carb linkage. After only 4 minutes, I gave Boone the kill sign.
"What'd you do that for!" Dale gave me an inquisitive look.
"You are burning the plug wire clamp on the front header", I pointed out on the passenger's side.
One of Boone's biggest complaints throughout this entire build was that Dale, in his effort to have everything fit perfect, cuts everything too short, plug wires, wiring, fluid lines, everything. This was a case where the plug wires had no slack to allow how far he had to retard the timing to get it running.
Dale tugged on them enough to get it away from the header, and grumbled, "I'm going to have to move that gear a tooth, so they will fit right!"
"How long did it run?" Dale asked.
"4:26 to 4:30, only 4 minutes", I answered.
"4:30? Dang it! I've got to go pick up the Gremlin!"
He jumped in his truck, and headed off to town without another word. Boone got out, and started cleaning up around the shop, which is what he usually did when he wasn't sure what to do.
"Boone, let's get some time on the cam!"
"Well...Dale.."
It drives me crazy when both he and Darren constantly defer to Dale, and lean on him for everything mechanical. They are more than capable, it's just became a habit. We fired the 508 to life, and Boone checked over the gauges. The Barnyard only has 4 gauges in the dash, 2 2 5/8" mechanical gauges in the middle, oil pressure and water temp. , then a 2" inch electrical gauge on each side of those. 1 is for fuel, the second says "oil temp", but it has 3 separate sensors running to a 3 position toggle, allowing him to choose between engine oil temp, trans fluid temp, and a back-up water temp. He was giving it a work-out for the next 13 minutes as we ran the cam in.

Darren made his grand entrance a few minutes later, and crawled under the Charger to install the fuel tank. He immediately began to find fault with the work Dad had done.
"The traction bar is rubbing the inside of the tire! I told him to check for that, darn it!" He started pulling the tires off as another guy I'd never met walked up.
"This is my co-worker Eric", Darren introduced him, "He decided to lend a hand tonight".

I thought to myself that it was a good thing he brought reinforcements, because he definitely needed all he could get!

Note: This pic of the Barnyard's interior is much later in the week, at this point on Friday afternoon, it still had no throttle, no steering column, no mirrors, no headliner, no shifter and no driver's door!