Probably not, unless there is a really wet forecast. I just don't have a good way to haul an extra pair of tires. Pulling a trailer with a hot rod just doesn't seem very appealing.

Doc, that natural heat in atlanta and darlington almost killed this yankee!

But I know what you're talking about. Maybe it will come to something.

It’s a looooong way to the beach from HOTlanta and Darlington vs here ! And YEAH the heat was a bit brutal here but that’s what AC is for !

Kevin at Speed Obsessed caught this shot just as we were pulling into the checkpoint.




After we left the checkpoint, the route instructions took us onto a bunch of little side streets, residential areas, small towns, and country roads, most of them with 30 to 50 mph speed limits. It also started raining a little bit, but we were following a rain system, and mostly staying just behind it. With the lower speed limits, the Coupe drove OK on the wet roads, I just had to dodge puddles. As we were cruising this lakeside road at about 45, suddenly I saw a rainbow, right on the edge of the road. No way will I drive past a rainbow without a picture! And right there was a little gravel pullout, so I hit the brakes hard and got the car off to the side of the road.



A few Drag Week cars passed us by, then we got back on the road. Only about 50 feet down the road was a low area, with about of 6" water flowing over the road. I carefully drove thru it at about 5 mph.




After a while, it dawned on me that if I hadn't stopped for the rainbow, I probably would have hit that deep water at about 35 mph, and ended up hydroplaning into the guardrail. Personally, I think someone put that rainbow there for a reason!

The gas gauge in the Hemi Coupe was not working for some reason, and I had no idea what fuel mileage I would be getting, so we stopped for gas 90 miles after the last fill. It only took 7.2 gallons in the 17 gallon tank, that made me happy.



Remember that measuring cup that we used for the Klotz octane booster? Well the inside of it melted, and the paper towel remains were all disoved into the plastic! Jeff tried to clean it out, but ended up throwing it away. That Klotz is some potent stuff.

After we left the gas station, we had no more rain, and good roads, so we were making great progress. We passed up Kohlman and Hemi Squirrel, it was an unbelievably cool sight to see 2 blown hemi, retro style race cars cruising down the road. Jeff grabbed his phone and filmed them as we drove by. But something went wrong, and the video failed.



With the big aluminum radiator and the 55 gpm Mezziere water pump, the Hemi was running at about 140 degrees. I would have preferred to see it at 180 in the highway. My car doesn't have a thermostat, but instead I had wired in a Davies Craig water pump/fan controller, that senses the coolant temp and modulates the voltage to the pump and turns the fan on and off to maintain 180 degrees. I wired in a selector switch that would completely bypass the controller and run the pump full speed for racing. Thus far I had only used the race mode, but it seemed that now would be a good time to flip the switch and get the motor running a little hotter. So I did.

After about a mile or so, the temp gauge had barely moved off of 140, but some water began to spray onto the windshield! I quickly flipped the switch to race, and the temp gauge shot up to about 225, then slowly started dropping. Obviously, the water pump had not been running, and it was getting hot in the heads, but not where the sensors for the Davies Craig and the temp gauge are located. So now I had to wonder, where did the water come out from? Did I do any damage? I hope its not a head gasket leak!

Well, thankfully the temp came down quickly, it never leaked another drop, and I never engaged the controller again. I am still not sure where the water came from, but it must have come out of the vent hole on the overflow tank.
Doing 80 or so on the freeway, we were passing a lot of drag week cars. Some of them have deep gears, no overdrive, and cruise along at 55 or so.




Then my wife Sheila phoned, and she was worried about the hurricane. The day that Jeff and I had left Minnesota for Drag Week, she caught a plane to Greensboro, NC, to visit her friend Penny. They were planning to drive to Charlotte Tuesday, have dinner with us when we got there, and watch the racing at Z-Max on Wednesday, Then she was going to fly home on Friday. This was going to be really cool, because she has never been to a drag race before.
But now, with hurricane Florence approaching, she heard that they might close the airport, and then she would be stranded in NC, in the path of the storm. I told her to call the airline, and change her flight to the soonest she could get. If it meant missing the race, so be it.

My trunk monkey Jeff had a great attitude up till about now. He is an invaluable helper. He knows racing, he knows how to wrench, has a good sense of humor, and he's a hard worker.




But today, after we left the track, I could tell something was bugging him. I didn't know if he was sick of me already, or if it was the prospect sitting in the car waiting out rainstorms all week (all because I was to stubborn to pull a trailer), or if it was the whole hurricane scare, not knowing what we were getting into. Probably the latter. He had told me that some of the racers were dropping out because of the hurricane warning, and his folks had phoned him because of all the dire predictions on the news. And we were right in its predicted path, driving towards it.





I didn’t want to force him to continue if he was concerned for his safety. So I said to him as we drove along “I spent 5 years working on this car to get to Drag Week, and I have no intention of dropping out. As long as the race is still on, I’m going to do everything in my power to stay in. We don’t know what this hurricane is going to do, so if you want out, I understand. I’ll drive you to the airport and buy you a ticket out of here, and there’ll be no hard feelings.”
He thought for a moment, and said, “Nope, I’m in.” I could see his outlook improve immediately.

I was thinking about the gas situation. I wanted to race tomorrow with as little gas as possible in the tank, but of course we couldn’t let it go empty. At about 7:45 pm, somewhere in South Carolina, we pulled into a gas station. They were open, they had gas, and there was no line. And the shelves inside were full of food and snacks and stuff. Hmm…
We dipped the tank with a wooden dowel that we were using as a gas gauge, and I calculated that we should add 4 gallons. That would be just enuff to get us to the track. Then we were off in search of the 2nd and last checkpoint for today.
At 8:45 we found it. As usual, there was a couple Drag Weekers coming and going. We were getting tired, so we didn’t linger.



We drove all the way to the track entrance, so we officially completed the day 1 drive!



Then we had to continue on another 10 miles or so to the hotel. By now, I had all of my test and tunes, day one of drag week, and this days drive on the same oil, and I decided to change it tonight before we checked in to the hotel. I also needed a metal measuring cup for the Klotz, and a couple other supplys, so we found a nearby Walmart, and pulled into the outdoor garden department for the oil change. I had brought a bunch of oil and some filters, but I had nothing to drain into, so I went inside and bought a drain pan with a cover that seals. Jeff worked on the oil change, while I went back in the store for a couple more items I forgot. Here we were in Darlington, a mere 70 miles from the coast with Hurricane Florence charging in, and it was business as usual at Walmart. Hmm...



Jeff didn’t spill a drop, and I sealed up the drain pan, and hauled it and the garbage to a trash can, and left the pan next to the trash for Walmart guy to recycle.
We packed up, and got ready to depart. It was well after 10 pm, and we had been up since 4. The thought of a hotel bed sure sounded good right now. I started the car, watched the oil pressure come up, and drove about 100 feet before I looked at the oil pressure gauge again. It was at ZERO, so I killed the ignition.

And that's pretty much how the next 10 minutes went...

LOL

The first thought that popped into my head was that the pressure relief valve on the oil pump had stuck. For the valvetrain to survive Drag Week, I modified the oil system on the Hemi to pump a lot of oil, full time, unrestricted, to the heads and rocker gear. In addition to the 4 drainback hoses from the heads, I had installed a Titan oil pump, which is very high volume. Only after the pump was in the motor did I start hearing rumors of stuck relief valves on titan pumps, leaving guys stranded with no oil pressure. . The only solution would be to pull the pan and the oil pump and get it unstuck.

Billet Titan oil pump:

I was actually very relieved when I looked out the back window and saw a trail of oil, thinking Jeff probably didn’t tighten the plug. And that would be an easy fix. We looked under the car, and the drain plug was still tight in the pan. There was no oil showing on the sight glass on the side of the oil pan, it was empty.
A little further investigating revealed that it was leaking at the oil filter base. I went back to the trash and found the old oil filter. Sure enuff, there was no gasket on it. The old gasket must have stuck to the hemi, and a 2 gasket stack will definitely leak! We pushed the car back to our work area and removed the filter, removed the extra gasket, and put the filter back on, then dumped the last 7 quarts of my Valvoline VR-1 oil in. About this time Jeff pointed out the security camera on the building that was aimed right at us, meaning that this whole escapade would be viewed by Walmart security. I wondered if I should go in and buy some kitty litter and clean up the mess. No it was too late, and we were too tired. So what if they send me a bill for a cleanup, at least I don't have to deal with it now. I fired up the ol’ Hemi, Jeff checked for leaks, then finally headed for the hotel at 11:30.

I had decided earlier that I was going to check the valve lash after the long drive, and put in fresh plugs for the race track. It is well known that one of the biggest reasons for racers to drop out of Drag Week is valvetrain wear.
After checking in to the hotel, it sure was tempting to say “let’s do it in the morning.” But I didn’t want to waste time with it tomorrow, we needed to get our pass in and hit the road. There was no telling how many hours we would spend tomorrow waiting out rain storms. The earlier we could make a pass, leave the track, and head for Charlotte, the better. So I headed down to the parking lot and checked the lash and put in fresh spark plugs. I was very pleased to see no change in the valve lash. The Niagara Falls oiling system was doing its job!
Then I got the HemiCoupe all ready for its first night in a hotel parking lot with a tarp over the motor and a boot on the wheel. At 2:00 I was finally able to get to bed. Day 1 was finally complete, and as far as I was concerned, it was a success!

Joel hard at work in the parking lot.

It brings back good memories to sift through the pictures and write the story.

Unfortunately, I didn't take one single photo at Darlington...

Usually the good memories stay a little more vivid, and the pictures bring them back. The bad ones fade...until the next Drag Week, when your back, shoulders and hips remind you how they felt the last time you were in the car for four hours straight...




For me, I'm always shocked at how few pictures we actually take, even with reminding each other, and trying to make it a priority. I get home, download everything to the PC, and just shake my head at the huge blocks of time when we have no photos!

My pictures start of heavy on day 1, and go quickly downhill from there. I usually start a drag week album on facebook and stop contributing to it about Wednesday. Even when I tell myself I will take more pictures that year haha, just so much going on.

Kind of like our first child got about 500 pictures took, then the second one about 50, then the third one about 5.

Not sure if my buddy Bob the Photo Guy is going this year.He usually takes 1,000 plus pics.