Oh Mikes car,
He had a great day. We made some minor tuning changes but very minor however I thought it was right. he drove a full pass in the morning but really doesn't have that killer instinct so it was more like a parade then a race That is Ok he drives his Willys gasser the same and he wont change so I understand. However in the afternoon he put seasoned FED pilot Pat Doornbos in the car. Pat didn't quite get his new engine in his FED so came to the track. I had told him not to come ever without his helmut as I have also had him drive mine. He did a fine job. Stretched the throttle cable on the first pass but Mike had plenty of adjustment and fixed it in a few minutes. All in all he made four passes. I saw Mikes and his first one. My pal Harry though stayed for them all and said the car worked great. Last pass Pat was pitted against a fairly stout bracket car with a 496 BB Chev. Word on the street is he did Mike proud. Pat stopped by last night for an hour. He said the car is fun to drive, has no bad manners and goes very well. He said shifter could use some work as it is perhaps too big for a rail and the engine needs some more crankcase venting as he was eating a bit of oil on the last pass in the eyes. Not a lot but enough that it showed up on the face mask. I went down to see why and found Mikey had blocked the vent hole with a rubber frost plug deal rather then install the venting device he was supposed to. So the engine now had less then half the crankcase venting relief it had when stock. I didn't say much because it was kinda obvious ;>) Mike will figure it out. Pat said though all in all it is a fun car to drive and he feels extremely safe in it. He said the early 331 hemi which is not too far from stock save a cam, some compression and that marine two single big carb manifold works surprisingly well. Mike who wants it like it was back in the day right down to the cam does not want old looks with modern performance. He wants it as it would have been. We may have to detune because Pat told me he glanced at the tach in the eyes. I wont say what he said it was because he said he wasn't 100% sure but if it is true then it doing more then we thought.
Everybody is happy here. I predict Mike will have a hired shoe most of the time. I did for about 80% of my career. Actually it is more fun to watch for some of us.
