Dragfreak

The stance looks great Niko, nice work with the straight axle too, it looks very good!

Nice job on the .003 reaction time, that's definitely something to be proud of! You'll get the car dialed in eventually!

It's nice to see you back on this one Fred, it is an outstanding build

The engine looks phenomenal, nice work Scott!

The engine and chassis look great!

Top fuel dragsters and funny cars also use gun drilled axles. That being said, the mere 602 hp my engine makes doesn't need 40 spline axles to start with, so gun drilled axles are complete overkill

Phenomenal work

As far as I know, gun drilled or rifle drilled axles are only really benificial to a drag car, it cuts a bit of rotating weight compared to a standard solid axle. They really aren't necessary and most of the time on a drag car you want to leave some weight over the back axle to get the car hooked up

Well that will depend what I can afford, I'm turning 16 in December so by then I'll need it running or to have something else to drive to school, it's worth a lot of money, an original 1971 vega panel delivery with no rust or major body damage with less than 78,000 original miles is almost impossible to find, I've had interest in it at $4000 as a roller so with that I could find a cheap hooptie to drive for a few years. The other option is buying a stock 327 or 350 to put in it and drive that for high school. It really all boils down to what I can afford, no matter how hard and much I work, I can't have a full time job this summer so that really holds me back

Fred, I bought the car as a roller because I couldn't afford the $9,000 that he wanted for the engine. The engine in my other vega will be put in this car. I can't swap the engine in until I buy a new MSD pro billet distributor since the ready to run plug and play MSD I already have doesn't work with the 7al-2 box in the car. I also have to buy a driverside dipstick kick out oil pan because the car sits so low, I need some ground clearance. Since the car uses motor plates and the hole for the alternator bracket gets used, I can't run the mechanical water pump so I need to buy an electric water pump. Also since the car uses a rear motor plate I need to buy longer alignment dowels for the bell housing and some washers to make clearance for the converter. Since I'm putting in a turbo hydro 350, I need to buy a new shift gate for the B&M pro stick since it has a 2 speed power glide gate in it. I have a lot of work to do to make $700 or so to buy all of this so I can start racing it. Here's another picture of the 357 that's going on the new car

More work done today, on the doors you can see in the previous pictures it said "ol crow racing." The "ol crow" part of it is stickers that were made to match the "racing" which is in paint. I peeled the stickers off and started sanding the blue off. Between sanding and rubbing with compound the drivers door is done so I've moved on to the passenger side. I also started polishing the wheels, even though I hate the centerline warrior wheels they're starting to look pretty good While in Las Vegas I met up with Mel who runs the Pacific Street Car Association and bought a member ship and a few shirts from him, with the member ship I got a few stickers and a windshield banner so I'll get it on soon I decided to stick a small PSCA sticker in the back window Thoughts? Suggestions? I'd like to know what you got to say

Jonathan, the GTX looks fantastic, nice work scratching those tailights, that does not look like an easy task

I've made some progress on the car. I started the removal of all the stickers on the car, I think I went through a full bottle of wax to clean up the residue left over. I also cleaned the burnout rubber off of the rear quarter I then polished the chrome wheelie bars More to come

You sure are right, he's a great guy with a big heart Thanks Jim, I hope I am successful

Niko: the way it sits right now as a roller is about 1,850 pounds with the motor/tranny, fuel, and me in it, I think it will be about 2,700 pounds Al: I have to say it's because of the older guys who give me a hard time but truly help me in the end. Bob crow who sold it to me is a great man, to save a car for over two years when he has higher offers on it is just crazy. He's not done helping me either, he told me there's more to come so I guess I'll see when I start racing it

It's just a steel crank and pink rods, from what I've heard, those pink rods don't like going past 6,000 so when I get some money I'll have to get some good H beams and a forged crank. One day I hope to have the cage certified to run 7.50 and get a power plant to get it there. Here's the power plant going in it

Rick: thank you for wishing me luck, I hope to do as well in this car as I did in the dragster Craig: I appreciate your wisdom, I know that thanks to my dad I have had a phenomenal childhood. One day I hope to do the same to my children, I hope to watch them grow into racing and have as much or more fun than I've had

Cato: The smallblock I'm putting in it makes 602, it wasn't built with the best stuff so I'll probably shift at 6,000 rpms to make sure it lives throughout my time racing it in high school, my dad has a nitrous kit for it that I'll probably use a little bit, it's just an Nos bottle with an edelbrock plate for a dominator. The biggest pill I'll give it is maybe 100/125 horse. With that I'd be happy if it ran low 10's because the cam in it isn't really ground for nitrous. Dale: thank you, I'll need it, even though I have a lot if racing experience under my belt, jumping from a junior dragster to a chassis car is a pretty big thing Ray/ Glenn: thank you as well I am a bit nervous about getting into such a fast car after a couple years off but I know things will be just fine

Thank you Andy, Fred, for these four years of high school I'll run it in the high school class and then depending on what I want to do, I can run pro or super pro with it. I'm not to fancy on the idea of racing dragsters with it so I'll probably end up running in pro

The car is a true '71 panel, one of 7,800 made. It has a newer 76/77 fiberglass nose on it and rear bumper, the car is a full tube chassis ladder bar car weighing in at only about 2700 lbs ready to race. It has the best of the best, a Mark Williams 9" with 40 spline gun drilled axles, 4.89 gears and driveshaft from Mark Williams. The engine is set back and there is 54% of the weight on the rear wheels meaning with a th350 the thing should pull wheelies easily. It is a solid car even if it looks like it's straight out of the early eighties. More pictures to come as I get work done on it

I've been racing something since I was four. Starting out in an outlaw go kart that I raced from four years old to about 8 years old when I lived in Washington, my family and I then moved to my dad's hometown in Oregon where I still currently live. The rules at our local asphalt and dirt track were a lot different than those in Washington, our carts were making too much power with no restrictor plate so they were illegal. Slowing the carts down just wouldn't be fun to race anymore so my dad looked into other things. We found a guy with an old junior dragster that was looking to get into cart racing. Coincidence? I think so, we traded our four carts, two dirt and two asphalt carts to him straight across for the ready to race junior dragster. I started racing it almost immediately after we got it, my first racing season when I was 9, I took 3rd in the points race missing 2nd by a rounds worth of points. Between the next season we cleaned up the car and built a new engine for it to make some more power, that season I took second place to the 16 year old veteran who had several years more experience than I did. The very next season was a great season for me, I won two junior Wally's and took 1st in the points race beating my much older rival. From that year on I won every championship and brought home four more junior Wally's, a state championship, and a $300 savings bond. Here's some pictures of the kart racing and the Junior Now after two years of working all summer long, I'm stepping up to a full size car, after selling the Chevy luv I bought, and selling some parts laying around the shop, I had saved enough to buy exactly the car I've been wanting since I was racing the junior dragster, a '71 vega panel delivery tube chassis drag car. I bought it from a long time racer and friend who saved the car for me until I could buy it from him, not only did he save it for a couple years, he knocked about 5k off the price that it would cost to someone else. I bought it as a roller as the motor and tranny is coming out of my high school car. The seller left all of the electronics, the fuel system, plumbing, you name it, he left it. I still have to buy a new set of slicks for it, a new 5 point harness, and a new shift gate for the shifter (because it had a power glide and I'm putting a turbo hydro in it) and a few other things before it can hit the track Pictures in the next post

Thank you for the input, after reading it I went out and looked at my dad's vega. His chute mount has a bracket that the cable is zip tied to, I will go fix this on the mustang Thank you Stan, the MSD box is just some evergreen square rod that I cut in my mitre box and painted, it's a fast simple detail that adds a lot to the build

It's some small gauge wire with part wrapped in BMF and the other part painted, I think it looks great

I'm getting this thing mostly wrapped up, soon it will be final assembly. I found a parts box steering wheel that I attempted to make a Grant wheel by painting it and cutting a dart GTS decal I scratch built an MSD 6 box and used a slixx decal, it will get wiring later I also added the down tubes connecting the cage to the chassis in the engine bay The back end of the car is finished, all that is needed is a simpson/deist decal on the chute The seats are done, they are ready for paint and a harness Lastly, I mocked everything up to see how it's looking http://i1058.photobucket.com/albums/t405/dragfreak1/Mobile%20Uploads/72C711E8-06B0-4EAF-9DB9-9D31CB2DA973_zpsvkmhtxe3.jpg http://i1058.photobucket.com/albums/t405/dragfreak1/Mobile%20Uploads/CE6E9294-A031-4E4C-9FDB-6468388A09C3_zpszotbksli.jpg http://i1058.photobucket.com/albums/t405/dragfreak1/Mobile%20Uploads/E45B60BA-22A3-4BD5-8456-2A3C16C47E49_zpstqodsl45.jpg You can also see that the trim is now painted, the back doesn't look very good but some cleaner wax should clean up the lines

The real problem is new builders, I'm 15 and I have a lot of friends. I do not know a single one that builds models or is interested in what I do, I notice most kids my age are too busy with either sports like me, or interested in things like playing video games, skate boarding, riding bikes. Etc. it's not that they don't have time for it, I have football practice everyday all summer long, when football season is over, pre season track starts. I handle all of this plus dealing with AP math, language arts, and science, yet I still find time to build. The problem we're facing, is interest in other things and zero interest in cars, mechanics or really anything automotive which in turn, does not open the door to building models. I know there is more reasons why younger kids do not start building but I started after my interest in racing and mechanics really took off.