ALMOST FAST: Excerpts From the Book
I’ve dropped the ball on adding posts to this blog as I’ve worked on putting the words into the computer the old-fashioned way. The plan is to release the story as a book – the memoirs of an ill-advised adventure that already has proven interesting.
With that in mind we’re sharing with you excerpts from the onging manuscript both to provide updates to interested bloggers and to give everyone a taste of what the book will be.
With the suspension of Shorttrack Magazine , the story has morphed from a tech series to – well – a “human-interest” story. Blecchhh! But seriously, the best part of this adventure IS the people involved. We think you’ll agree.
You can be sure I was thinking the same thing about Don I’d thought about the guys with the Granite State Mini-Sprints, the Boisverts, and Walt, but at least I knew he was trying to publicize his deal. Yet, as with Armand’s first offer of seat-time, I hesitated. I guess I figured it was only fair to give Don time to reconsider, and I did give him some time. A year later, again at the Swap N’ Sell, he again made the offer. This time I was not about to question his sanity. If I hesitated again, he’d be questioning mine.
So this time when he says, “Give me a call before Whip City opens,” and I say, “Okay,” I resolve to mean it. And when I call him, there’s not a hint of a second thought in his voice when he says, “You ready to go?”
How do you get ready to drive a midget for the first time? By now I realized that you don’t. All you can do is strap yourself in and drive the thing. Once I’d decided to do that there was no turning back, even after Don informed me that, despite the possibility of at least two drivers signing on to race for him over the course of the upcoming season, he hadn’t gotten a commitment from anyone. One of the people who expressed interest wasn’t even sure he could fit in the Ellis machine that would carry the famed Douville-number 7X for the year. Simply put, I was the only guy committed to driving the car during Whip City’s annual pre-season practice day.
That was okay with me. Now I’d have a chance at more than a couple of runs on the dirt at Whip City, and it was sounding like I wouldn’t have to watch while some real racer showed me how the car really went. By practice day I was genuinely eager to get out there.
Don’s hunch that I’d be the day’s only driver was confirmed early in the day when the car indeed proved too small for another potential pilot. That wasn’t a surprise. The guy didn’t have to be the size of a linebacker to be too big to drive a midget. These things can be as tight a fit as jeans from high school, as you put one on as much as you get in one. Years before, when I first drove Walt’s self-built midget, he’d told me that his method for designing one was to put a milk crate on the floor of his shop, have his driver sit on it, and tell him to pull his feet in until his heels hit the crate. Thus was defined the cockpit of the new car. If his feet were small then that just meant fewer drivers could could fit in the car.
Fortunately for me, I was able to squeeze myself into Don’s orange Ellis, dropping myself down through the top of the rollcage and squirming between the seat’s side-bolsters. There proved to be enough room for my duck-flipper feet, but operating the car’s throttle and brake pedals was a real problem. Both required me to hover my feet over the pedal and use my entire leg to depress them. I simply wasn’t comfortable doing that. Don set me up with wooden blocks taped to the floor so that I could rest my heels and operate the pedals by pivoting each foot at the ankle, and that solved my primary fit-problem.
Don then went through the starting procedure for the car. It was simple enough. Once the car was out on the track and the fuel-feed was turned on, I was to simply flip an on-switch for the ignition and press the starter button. Yes, the starter button. While midgets traditionally, invariably and defiantly have required push-starting at tracks across the country forever, the Quad-4s retained their factory-starters. Even if there might remain functional reasons to prohibit starters on most midgets, Don wisely realized that at a track where every other car in every division utilized self-starters, expecting them to tolerate push-trucks was pushing his luck as well.
It was no big deal. These weren’t exotic race-motors. Some competitors pulled motors from wrecks and didn’t even bother freshening them up before going out and winning races. Not that there weren’t race-parts available; they’d just been proven unnecessary – at least on the quarter-mile of The Whip. So there was no reason a stock starter couldn’t get the job done. Of course, these still were midgets. There weren’t any clutches, so you made sure no one was in your way before you fired your car up, the starter driving you forward even before the motor could.
Don offered up more good advice.
“Don’t put your tongue between your teeth” he offered. “And breathe.”
He assured me he wasn’t kidding, but he didn’t have to. I wasn’t worried about biting my tongue, but I knew at some point I would indeed have to remind myself to stop holding my breath. Hey – bad habit.
“Mostly, have fun,” he said.
The first thing I did once motoring under yellow was thank my lucky stars I was actually in a midget once again. A real, actual midget. A real, actual, full-size midget. A real, actual, full-size midget – on dirt. There was no better place to be. Of course, then I had to drive the thing. It was time to pay attention. I now was well aware that in a racecar you had to boot it. This was serious business for the other folks on the track. These were veterans of the division unwinding from the off-season and getting things together to race another year or rookies taking their first laps in cars they planned to be racing all year. They were working. At the least I needed to stay the hell out of their way.
Not that I was out here to play movable chicane. Of course I was going to give this everything I had. Still, I was not about to go flying into a corner hoping I could find my way out of it. That wasn’t my style, even if the car under me had been my own. There’s a certain amount of simple craziness required for that approach, a craziness to which many successful racers can make a claim. But my approach is more one of gradually pushing the envelope with a little more respect for the edge of the cliff that always looms just to the outside of a full-speed lap. Dare to be careful, I guess, but there are successful racers who subscribe to this approach as well. I swear.
A big problem was that I still was thinking like a pavement racer. When the car would start to slip sideways my instinct was to correct it rather than driving it sideways with the throttle and a healthy level of counter-steer. This was a mistake I kept making over the course of three sessions on the track. I knew in my head it was wrong, but it didn’t matter once I was in the car. So while I was getting the car moving like a racecar, I still wasn’t getting close to what it could do on dirt.
Still, I evidently wasn’t embarrassing myself (You have to be aware of how foolish you look to be embarrassed by it, but anyway…). I evidently wasn’t embarrassing Don, either. About halfway through the afternoon, he surprised me yet again with a new question.
“I still don’t have a driver,” he began. “You want to drive it opening night?”
Tuesday 28 July 2009 8:42 am
On a late-summer Saturday morning, Ward and I drove out to Scott Viets’s home in central Connecticut to pick up our racecar.Scott was a bit preoccupied when we arrived. His car and equipment already were packed on his open trailer, but he was not planning to drive at Whip City that evening. Through his friend Skip Matczak he’d arranged to have midget-racing icon Johnny Heydenreich drive his car. This was a big deal not only for Scott but for the Quad-4 division and Whip City itself. Heydenreich was one of the top midget drivers in the country, with victories in major midget races such as the Chili Bowl Nationals in Oklahoma and Indianaplis’s Hut Hundred. When not racing, Heydenreich worked for Matczak’s Seals-It Corporation, which created and manufactured a ton of innovative products for racing.
Not surprisingly, Scott was a bit preoccupied when we arrived, but he took the time to thoroughly dig through boxes, bins and piles in his shop, a nearby shed, and one of those portable quonset huts, which stood in his backyard. That was where the car’s frame and body panels were waiting. Scott indeed had most of the parts to build a car save for a steering box, which he’d used in his new car, and of course a motor.
Scott also had all sorts of interesting odds and ends hanging around his buildings and grounds, bits such as motors, motor-pieces and unrelated projects in the midst of attention, including a Ford Model-A roadster he was restoring for a friend.
“Sorry. It’s kind of a mess around here,” he told us self-consciously. Ward and I looked at each other and grinned. We both possessed our share of incomplete projects and pieces just too good to get rid of.
“I feel right at home,” Ward said with a laugh.
“The car” we picked up hardly was a car at all, as reflected by its three locations at Scott’s. And there was a story with every piece of it. The frame itself still bore the scars of a major crash it suffered a year and a half earlier. Scott rebuilt the Gennerton before that season as it might have appeared when it was new. It screamed “vintage” from its oval grille past its open cockpit back to its scalloped tail-section. It was so beautiful that, as shot by Shorttrack photographer John DaDalt, it graced the magazine’s centerfold shortly after its completion.
Unfortunately the car also made the cover. Before the centerfold was published Scott got into a major crash with Randy Cabral, a top driver with NEMA a year away from that club’s championship. Randy was as good a midget driver as any in New England, and Bertrand Racing, for whom he drove in NEMA competition, spared no expense in preparing his top-shelf equipment. Yet Randy and his father Glen, a former racer himself who worked on the Bertrand cars and often entered the family’s pavement-car in NEMA races with various young drivers at the helm, had assembled Quad-4 cars for themselves out of their own pile of parts.
It was an ignominious day for both Scott and Randy when Mark McKeon caught the pair mid-crash for a photo that graced the cover of the issue in which the centerfold appeared. McKeon’s wild shot revealed the Gennerton flinging parts as it flew through the air, a radius rod impaling Randy’s fuel tank. A glance at the shot might have led to the conclusion that this was the end of the line for the venerable Gennerton. But this was the Magic Car. Scott ultimately got it back to the track with the help of friends and competitors (As you might guess by now, that’s typical in the Quad-4 division). And as mentioned earlier, he even returned to Victory Lane in it.
Despite its post-crash success, there were bends in the tube-frame that God and nature had not intended. Yet Scott, Don and Walt all assured us these were of limited concern.
“The frame serves one function,” Walt explained. “As long as the axles are square with each other and the driveline of the motor, you’re good.”
The front-axle assembly itself certainly seemed square. How could it not be? The thing might have come off a Mack truck, it was so stout. Not that Scott was impressed.
“You probably ought to think about getting a new one,” he advised. “The whole deal here is to get weight off the front of the car. You want to transfer all the weight to the back wheels when you come off the corner. So you want to have as little weight as possible on the front-end to begin with. John Ferrell can make you a new front axle. He does great work.”
We already had been educated about John’s work. He had driven for Don back in Don’s NEMA days. Now he built and maintained midgets for his daughter Kelly. Kelly Ferrell had been racing with the Quad-4s from their beginning after racing karts, also with Dad’s help. John made his living working with metal in a shop next to his house. It was a sweet setup. To get to it, you strolled through the attached garage that served as his raceshop, the place where he got to play with his favorite toys. Kelly more than proved her mettle in the Quad-4 as well as in karts. John then built a midget for his daughter to race in the high stakes of NEMA, but neither was about to abandon the Quad-4s or Whip City.
One of the items Ward and I suspected would require some attention was our car’s rearend. Although Scott reported that it hadn’t given him any trouble he also admitted it hadn’t seen any service in a while. Initial inspection supported our suspicions, which was only reinforced when Ward later more carefully looked inside.
“There are metal shavings in it,” he said, “and two bolt-heads are sheared off.”
I contacted John about taking a good, educated look at it and going through it. Even with a specific request he was as amenable to giving us a hand as he’d been when he gave me his card months earlier.
Scott’s bodywork carried some interesting stories. He’d painted both pieces himself, and his work was stellar. Unfortunately the hood and tail-section had suffered the slings and arrows of outrageous crashing. It appeared that the front of the hood had been folded back at its weakest point, fracturing the fiberglass laterally. But I had a bigger problem with it. This was not the vintage-style hood that he’d used in his conversion but a more traditional modern style that Don had used earlier and to which Scott had returned after the crash. He’d painted some of the wildest flames on it I’d seen on a racecar. That wasn’t a problem if the driver was just as wild, but I’ve never been a fan of style over substance. And with the substance of this effort still open to question, I figured a little less style would be wise.
The tail still looked pretty good, but it was adorned with the number 1, and Scott’s daughter Bethany carried that number on her Charlie-Gunther owned car. The work to remove the vinyl digit and hand-painted trim would certainly mar the finish to the point where it would need a repaint.
Scott threw in a bunch of other components. He included two seats. One didn’t fit inside the frame rails, the other was too small for me. He gave us the two radiators that we understood had done time in the car, but neither inspired confidence that it still was up to the job. He gave us a couple of intake manifolds, both of them adapted to use in a midget. Radius rods, labeled to mark their destinations, also were provided.
Tuesday 28 July 2009 9:01 am
It was March. We now had to seriously entertain the possibility that we would not be ready for Whip City’s opening
day. That would be unfortunate, as this was the only full day of practice scheduled at Whip City all year. If we
weren’t ready by then we would be making our debut on a race night. That meant limited track-time and the
likelihood that we’d seriously be in the way of racers way faster and far more together.
In retrospect though, that the car wasn’t ready hardly was surprising. Usually the first steps of a build
proceed quickly, but as you get closer to completing the project the individual tasks remaining are increasingly
complex, problematic and time-consuming. Ward already had fit the motor in the chassis and returned the original
Pontiac intake-manifold and alternator to their original positions. This required cutting a piece of the frame away
and installing new lengths of tubing elsewhere to restore the frame’s integrity. He’d also installed the steering box
we’d gotten from Scott for a return to service in the Genneton, flipping it over to convert the car to right-hand
steering, which provided clearance for the motor’s original components. Sitting in Walt’s contributed seat and
clutching his contributed steering wheel, the wheel’s position was more typical of a sportscar than a midget. The
wheel in a midget typically lies as flat as a bus’s. In our car it was more up in front of me. I liked it that way.
After this second test-fit of engine, steering and suspension and original test-fit of driver, the car came apart
again so that components could be finished and the real assembly could begin. Still to be puzzled through were the
car’s brakes, electrical system and fuel-delivery. Don and Scott supplied us with a Tilton master-cylinder, Wilwood
front caliper and JFZ rear. The rear rotor was another swap-score by Don. New brackets were needed for the rear
caliper, and all the brake lines had to be fabricated.
We had the complete wiring harness from the donor Pontiac. A copy of the wiring diagram, developed by
John Ferrell, was obtained via e-mail from Jamie, who planned to campaign Rusty’s No. 72 for the upcoming season.
Ward planned to utilize as much of the original wiring and connectors in our car as possible in the interest of
reliability.
However, the computer-control box required by the division had to come from a ’91 model Quad-4 rather
than our ’90. Quad-4 competitor Dave Blaze set us up with the right stuff. He was the man when it came to the
division’s electronics. He’d invested his time and effort into reprogramming the system to provide maximum power
from the Quad-4 while burning the division’s mandated ethanol.
All this work was academic if we didn’t get a copy of the Quad-4 missing link, the so-called “button” that
connected the powerplant to the slip-yoke, which was the first component in the car’s driveshaft. Of all the parts
cobbled together for this unique application of Quad-4 to midget, this was the one piece of the puzzle that couldn’t
be bought, bartered or adapted from some other application. There were no available drawings to illustrate what we
needed, but Rusty had an extra unit he’d had made for a third car he planned to drive himself in 2009. He was happy
to loan it to me. I just knew some machinist would come to mind who could fabricate one. I should have known
better than to plan for a brainstorm.
The term button was a bit of a misnomer if applied to the piece Rusty loaned me. His version was a thick,
short, machined aluminum cup with a wide, thick brim. Inside it, at the bottom of the cup, were six holes through
which bolts would pass, continuing through the motor’s flywheel and into the boss at the rear of the motor’s
crankshaft. Along the brim of the cup were four threaded holes. Bolts would connect the driveshaft’s slip-yoke to
the brim.
This “drive-flange” was a catalog item for most midget applications, but despite days checking through
catalogs and websites, I found nobody who marketed one for a Quad-4. I then asked around among guys running
cars at The Whip, but none of their sources were ready, willing or able to duplicate their feat.
When Ward saw the piece and heard of my failure to source it, he offered that he probably could make one
if he had to. We put it on the list.
But then I had a conversation with Scott when he contacted me to let me know his steering box was
available. Our wide-ranging conversation ultimately rolled around to the button. Scott noted that Skip Matczak
needed at least two units for two Quad-4 cars he was building to run with us. Once he made those he planned to
knock off extras, as his computer-assisted equipment would have the specs plugged in anyway. I asked Scott to put
in an order for me for one of the extras. Scott also let me know Rusty’s newest car was sitting in his workshop
waiting for Scott to paint it before it was completed. So later, when I headed to John Ferrell’s to pick up our rearend
and steering box, I swung by Rusty’s and dropped off his drive-flange.
Skip was so impressed by the Quad-4 midgets when he watched Johnny Heydenreich drive Scott’s car that
he decided to build a couple of his own. He was in the midst of a tough year when he visited Whip City to watch
Johnny. Anyone in business was having a tough year, but the most crushing blow for Skip came when his wife lost
her battle with cancer.
Skip was a heavyweight in racing as a car builder and owner. He’d campaigned all sorts of racecars and
won titles with his supermodified out at New York’s Oswego Speedway, the toughest track for supers in the
business. His latest efforts were focused on United States Auto Club competition, primarily in USAC’s Silver
Crown Series for pavement sprint cars. His stuff was fast, solid and beautifully turned out. In fact, his latest car
graced a Shorttrack cover and centerfold, again thanks to the photographic skills and vision of John DaDalt.
And yet here he was, planning to run a pair of Quad-4s at The Whip. One would be home to a young driver
Skip felt deserved a break. The other would be a place for Skip’s friends to play, guys like Heydenreich himself.
You might wonder why a guy who raced in one of the premier series in racing would want to play with a
bunch of low-buckers like us. But Skip was impressed by a group of guys who, in the best tradition of the sport,
raced for the sheer fun of it in an era when racing seemed more important for its marketing potential than as a
competitive challenge.
“Besides,” he admitted to me, ” I’m tired of sitting home every night with only my dog to keep me
company. I need something to keep me busy.”
Skip was a racer of enormous passion who would bring some class to the division, provided he could curb
his enthusiasm, particularly if he began to express it in dollars. That would defeat the very purpose of the Quad-4
midgets. He promised he would honor the division’s lowbuck mission.
Before the season began Skip hosted a get-together at his Seals-It headquarters and invited Johnny
Heydenreich to conduct a seminar on the basics of preparing and setting up a midget. I looked forward to the
opportunity to check out a car he intended to have on display, pick the brains of fellow racers regarding particular
issues, learn what I could from Johnny and generally get reacquainted with my fellow competitors. I also hoped to
get my hands on one of the extra buttons Skip had commissioned.
The turnout was impressive, with as many as 40 people attending. Skip provided pizza and soft-drinks for
those on hand. Johnny’s presentation was comprehensive. One point he made concerned the advantages of trail-
braking; pre-loading the brakes slightly as you drive. It was the point I’d discovered quite accidently from the seat of
Rusty’s midget when I drove it at the end of the previous season. It was reassuring to realize I’d actually learned
something while racing.
Seals-It’s Jim Smith also gave a presentation, about fasteners. Then a gang of folks started messing around
with Dave Blaze’s sparkling car, parked on a set of scales. In the midst of this I tried to get a moment with Skip to
ask about the buttons. Finally I got his attention.
“Oh yeah,” he said, distracted from the scale readout. “They’re on the floor of the brown truck out back.
Go grab them.”
I headed out to the back parking lot. There were two brown SUVs parked there – and one gold pickup, for
good measure. I looked in one of the SUVs, but there was nothing in the back of it. The other SUV was stuffed to
the gills with a variety of stuff, including a selection of carpentry tools. I nosed around behind the rear seat and in
the back, fully aware that I had no idea if this was Skip’s truck or whose it might be if it wasn’t. I still found no
buttons. In frustration, confusion and a bit of amusement at the uncomfortable absurdity of the situation, I tried the
gold pickup for the fun of it. It was locked.
I hated to interrupt Skip again. He obviously was having a good time with the scales. But he patiently
asked that I give him a minute. We then headed outside – to the gold pickup. He hadn’t realized that he’d locked it.
Out from under the rear seat he grabbed a single button and an exquisitely machined aluminum slip-yoke. Indeed,
both pieces were works of aluminum art. Still, Skip’s “them” referred to the two different pieces, not to multiple
buttons. He handed both pieces to me and we headed back inside. I admired them in the light of the shop. Were
they for me?
“Scott said you’d be making extras?” I said to him.
“Oh no,” Skip replied. “We’ve gotten real busy. I’m not going to have the time to make any more.”
Skip stated he still had a one-inch version they’d used as a model for the one in my hand. That likely was
too short for our application, but it could serve as a sample for us, or we could fabricate an extension to use with the
shorter piece. He rooted around but couldn’t find it. He told me to give him a few days and call him.
In the meantime, there I was, the most wonderful drive-flange in the world in my hand.
Don took a look at it.
“Is that your button?” he asked. “It’s beautiful.”
I explained the situation. Don advised I contact NEMA – and occasional Whip City – competitor Mike
Luggelle about getting a one-inch flange made, as Luggelle had found a machinist to make one for his Quad-4. He
suggested we then could make an extension. I wrote myself a note to contact Mike, but I had to admit, I was feeling
apprehensive about using two separate pieces.
Three nights later I attended the wake of my ex-wife’s father. It was service above and beyond the call of
duty, perhaps. But her family always had done right by me, and I felt it was the right thing to do. Besides, he was
my daughters’ grandad, and I wanted to be there for them.
It was good to see my former brothers-and-sisters in-law, all good people. I still ran into at least a couple of
them from time to time. Some of my ex’s cousins, however, I hadn’t seen in as long as 25, maybe 30 years. It was
great to see them as well. One of them was particularly great to see. Tom Boucher might have been in high school
the last time I saw him. Now he was telling me about his two kids in college. It turns out he was working with his
older brother, one of the best welders I’ve met, and he was their company’s millwright.
“Gee, I could use a machinist right now, ” I remarked half – only half – in jest.
Why? What do you need?” he asked.
A few days later I drove out to eastern Massachusetts to pick up a five-inch-long chunk of five-inch-
diameter aluminum-billet. I took it, our slip-yoke and the car’s flywheel out to Tom’s house, where we laid them out
on the floor of his living room. Tom explained what he would do, and pointed out some features of the parts I’d
brought him I hadn’t even noticed. I thanked him, maybe 30 times.
“No problem,” he replied. “This will be fun.”
So how about that? God rewarded me for my good deed.
Sunday 28 March 2010 3:47 pm
Famous last words.
More and more this was a phrase that kept popping into my head as work rebuilding the Genneton midget fitfully proceeded. It popped into my head every time I recalled someone talking about how quickly the car would go back together once we got beyond some certain point in its reconstruction. I’d heard the claim before we’d really even begun; once we gathered all the parts it was going to go together quickly. The claim then came up once we’d cobbled the major pieces together in our initial test-fitting. It came up again once we had the rearend in one piece and back in our possession. It was uttered again as the Quad-4 motor was prepped for installation.
Famous last words.
Because nothing went quickly – nothing. Everything moved forward with frustrating sluggishness. It took us awhile to appreciate that this would be the real story of rebuilding the car. Shame on us for expecting anything different.
In retrospect, it was easy to see why the rebuild appeared so straightforward before we started. Upon first inspection we saw an almost-complete racecar simply needing reassembly save for a few missing odds and ends that had been commandeered for other cars. And filling in the blanks would be simple enough. Most of the missing pieces were available from Don, Scott, Walt or other Quad-4 competitors and were donated to the cause as soon as we realized they were missing.
Yet it seemed as if every time we went to bolt two parts together there was some reason they wouldn’t connect – or wouldn’t function if they did. One example was the rear-brake setup. We had a rear caliper but no rotor. No problem. Don came up with one at a swap meet and passed it along to us via the Pony Express established between guys like Walt and John and Ward and myself. But it turned out that the caliper we had was set up for a solid rotor, and the rotor provided was the much-thicker vented type. Ultimately a combination of turning the rotor down some and grinding meat off the brake pads created a compatible match between the parts. But that still didn’t result in an effective rear-brake setup. Individual issues of compatibility such as this never were noticed until the point when a specific system was being assembled. Then a half-assembled group of parts would have to come apart again as different solutions were considered. The considering itself always took some time. There was no denying the effectiveness of “sleeping on it” when faced with a seemingly intractable obstacle, but the process inevitably ate up time. Such was the case – again – with the rear brakes. It turned out the rotor was apparently so out of true that the wheels would spin through half a rotation and then the rotor would hang up on the pads.
Sometimes some key component of a system – some minor yet crucial piece – would be missing entirely, and a search would begin to locate a source. That challenge might be met in a couple of days, or it might take weeks to find the piece (Speaking of famous last words; remember the drive-flange bolts?).
Normally this would be part of the fun. Not that it wasn’t, really. But those guys were racing! And I was chasing around after a T-handle for the in/out gear-control cable.
“Just go to a True Value store,” I was told. But when I did, the guy I asked looked at me with that blank stare you get at a Home Depot when you ask for anything. The same response came at every hardware store I hit. So I called a mail-order distributor, the mail-order distributor for midget parts, I was told. They listed a complete cable or a “cable-end.” “Cable-end” didn’t sound right, but I called and spoke to tech-support, anyway.
“The cable-end wouldn’t be the T-handle, would it?” I asked.
I was assured that it was, but I opened a box a few days later to find the opposite end of the cable in it.
I shifted back to a local search. More blank stares at the farm-supply store and at power-equipment dealers. Finally I resigned myself to buying a complete cable. I called the distributor again. They had none in stock. Of course. I frustratingly reminded them I only wanted the handle.
“Tell him to go to a truck-parts dealer,” came advice from someone in the office to the salesperson talking to me. “It’s just a power take-off handle. They’ll all have them.”
Sure. Right. The last in a series of truck-parts places I tried sent me to a driveshaft-rebuilder down the street. It also specialized in power-take-off units. I was reluctant to stop in. The place had advertised in Shorttrack and stiffed me on payment. But this was no time to be proud. Not that it mattered. They didn’t have one, either.
I finally contacted a rearend manufacturer and ordered a complete cable. As they didn’t normally do business retail they tacked on a 20-buck service-charge. Still, at least I’d have new parts from T-handle to rearend, as I had the new cable-end I hadn’t wanted. Except that it didn’t fit the lever on the rearend. Fortunately, the old cable-end fit the new cable. See? Simple as that.
Sunday 28 March 2010 3:53 pm
We pick up the story a season later. We never DID get the car done in 2009 for a variety of reasons as the year continued to require a struggle.
But 2010 bloomed with hope ever eternal, and early news on the year was all positive. Ward and I finally began to see the light at the end of the tunnel.
As I wrote…
The season’s opener, Whip City’s only practice day, would take place on the last Saturday of April. That again served as our target date. Even with months before us, I wondered if we’d make it. Progress remained fitful, to say the least. When we got into February I got nervous.
Then Ward moved the car into a new shop in space made available by his recent expansion. That kick-started progress. For one thing, the car now was parked right next to his welding shop, so the host of projects requiring welding were knocked off thanks to the neat little tig-welder he’d had for years. These included the car’s drag link, which connected the arm coming off the steering box to the front end, and the brake pedal that completed the car’s brake system, particularly as Ward had seemingly solved the brake-drag problem by shimming the turned-to-within-an-inch-of-its-life rotor to the whacked carrier bolted to the apparently-bent rear axle. The entire system came together neatly once that problem was solved. Bleeding the system wound up taking less time than it took to write that the system was bled. It was nice to see something actually go easily.
In mid-March Don and Walt paid us a visit and appeared impressed by the progress we’d made. Don gave his blessing to our solutions to the fuel-feed challenge and the components we’d chosen to do the job. As we’d gotten the car’s fuel tank back from Artie Trahan, a longtime friend of ours who did stellar work in that department (even as he always seemed to take on too much of it) we now could complete the fuel system once I got my hands on the few remaining fittings needed. Fortunately that proved to be simple enough and the fuel system was completed from tank to throttle-body.
By the end of March the only major tasks left for us were to fit up the body-pieces and complete the car’s wiring harness. I was particularly happy with the layout of the cockpit, as least as experienced in the ship. The driver’s seat was pitched an inch or so to the left side of the car, As Jack Heydenreich had recommended in the meeting at Seals-It a year ago. Ward made up some slick foot-blocks so we wouldn’t be taping crushed soda cans to the cockpit floor. He’d also rigged up a throttle cable from a Suzuki dirtbike clutch cable. The nylon-lined cable had more adjustments available than we’d ever need, but who knew which adjuster would turn our to be crucial. Ward laughed when he pointed out the drilled-out washer he’d employed where the cable connected to the quad-four’s throttle body. It had been modified by the father of world-champion motorcycle racer John Kosinski for his road racer. We’d surely be fast now!
Wednesday 28 April 2010 10:38 am
Without a clue as to how well our new creation would turn a wheel, I saw practice day as an opportunity we could not afford to miss. A race was no place to experiment. A race was the place to be ready to go from the moment you rolled into the pits. But right now, who knew what problems we’d face once we got out there? Who knew how badly it would handle, and how much we’d be in everyone’s way? For that matter, who knew if the car would run?
It was therefore an enormous relief to be able to pack up and head to Whip City the last Saturday in April. Still, to be on the safe side, Ward and I met at the shop fairly early in the morning to pack up the tools, equipment and various odds and ends we imagined might be needed at the track and then strap the car onto Ward’s landscaping-type trailer.
“I wonder what we’re forgetting,” said Ward as we jumped in his pickup, because, of course, there just had to be something.
After an uneventful drive to Whip City (which, as anyone who’s raced a while knows, is never a foregone conclusion) we pulled in to find plenty of teams already there unlocked and unloaded. Yet after signing in and heading to our assigned pit-spot we discovered we were the only Quad 4 midget there. We were among strangers without a real clue as to how and when the fun would begin.
With time to kill I headed toward the track for a walk. On the way I ran into race director and track co-owner Dave Pighetti, whom I knew from my days with Shorttrack. After exchanging greetings, Dave pointed out the new surface put down for the season.
“It’s all new clay,” he said. “We’re hoping it holds up all year.”
The stuff certainly was fresh. As I stepped onto it the still-wet clay threatened to suck the shoes off my feet. It was soft and spongy almost everywhere. You just knew it wouldn’t stay this way for long once the cars started pounding into it at speed.
Back in the pits there wasn’t much we were comfortable doing without some guidance. We left the car on the trailer, figuring this would be the best place to block it. Don had given me instructions for doing it, but I hesitated to go forward with the task until I had answers to a couple of questions from him. In the meantime I went around the car with a set of wrenches in my hands making sure fasteners were tight. Ward busied himself further organizing all the stuff that had been tossed in the truck before we left. That done, he discovered the first items we’d forgotten.
“Some lawnchairs would have been nice,” he said as he planted himself on the corner of the trailer.
It seemed weird that no other Quad 4 midgets were appearing. At one point an older gentleman wandered by and spied our car.
“What, is everybody on strike?” he asked rhetorically. “Where are all the Quad 4s?”
Just a little while later his question was answered when Don Douville motored into the pit spot next to us. Only a few minutes later Rusty Tefft towed an enclosed trailer containing two racecars into the pits. Behind him was Vince Jacobs with a third Tefft car. Shortly after that I noticed Skip Matczak’s rig rolling in as well as an open trailer carrying a midget I recognized as the car of Don’s I’d driven two years ago.
All of a sudden the pits were crawling with Quad 4s, and Don was helping Ward block our car. “Blocking” is the way you get your basic ride-height adjustment on a midget or sprint racecar. You put wooden blocks between your axles and the frame rails below them and then set your springs to begin to support the car right at that level. Don also had brought along a set of front springs better suited to this car at this track than the ones he’d loaned us two years ago simply so we could mount shocks. We blocked the car, cranking in some extra right-front spring, set the toe as best we could at the track, and checked the stagger to find it within Don’s recommended limits.
Evidently the experienced teams who arrived late knew we wouldn’t begin practice until much later than we’d anticipated. We followed them as they pushed their cars over to be inspected. Unfortunately we’d already adjusted our tire-pressures for racing. Pushing a car with less than 10 pounds of pressure in the rear tires was not the most rewarding experience of the day, but hey, we passed.
There still was time before we had to head toward the track, but when we saw Don push the latest incarnation of 7X away, we did the same. I figured we still had some time for me to get my gear on, buckle in and otherwise get ready to see if this car could move under its own power. This also was the first time I’d climbed aboard in full gear and buckled myself in. And then suddenly the Quad 4s were being called onto the track , surprising everyone. Ward got a hand pushing me from pre-grid all the way up and over the apron onto the track. I fumbled to turn the ignition on and get ready to start the car, hitting the button before they’d finished pushing. I had to remind myself of how it was supposed to be done.
Then I was pointed downhill toward the inside of the third corner. I turned the ignition switch on, pulled up the T-handle of the in/out box and turned it to lock the rear in gear, and then hit the starter-button for real. The car’s starter drove it forward only a few feet before the motor fired up. Just that quickly we were motoring around the track, the pile of parts we’d collected over a year and a half suddenly a midget racecar.