U/SA 302 ffffford build

[goinbroke2]

I might have to car the car "a comedy of errors"

To start off with, as I back the car out of the bus, I see my toolbox slid back and rubbed of a spot on the front bumper the size of my hand...glad I painted it with tremclad and didn't pay a painter $10,000 to make it pretty!!

Fri night, first pass, leave it in drive for it's first pass since 1997. Do the burn out and see one tire spinning, then the other kicks in...ohh yeah, I have a traction loc not a spool in this rearend! Whatever. Go to stage and anything over 15-1800 and my 3000 stall converter pushes me through the lights....hmmm...whatever.
Launch at 1500 and it gets to 4000 and shifts....ok then, pull the shifter back into 2nd and hold it to 4800....4900...5000...shift but man it didn't seem to want to go over 5000. Real struggling like too much timing. First pass, a stunning 16.66@77.45mph. Wow, that's sucks. Pull the shifter and nothing?? Idle back to the pit and find the shifter dogs are gummed up with crap and after spraying brake clean on them, working good again.

Timing is..60* when I rev it??? That's weird too. Pull it back to 38-40 and make a second pass.

Seems hot to only go from pit to staging lane but whatever. Make a pass and run a 16.04@83.38mph and it's up to 200!! Apparently my fuse for the water pump blew. Got towed back to the pit and find the electric pump drive motor is blowing fuses without the belt even on. (I think I might of had the belt too tight?) Got a pump from Bruce Riley parked next to me and all is good...wait...my fan is blowing it's fuse too? I reach in and the electric fan spins easily, but I sliced my finger on something and now there's blood all over the fender.

I have a 40amp circuit breaker so I put that in and the fan runs 8 seconds and then trips....great....

Saturday is rained out so I check the timing..it's at 50* again??? I thinking maybe my timing light is broke? Do some more adjusting but it just doesn't sound right. Pull the distributor and see the pick up is touching the reluctor at the top?? Turns out, the little plastic push thing that holds the weights on has disintigrated and let one weight fly off and bend the breaker plate, which bent it, causing the pickup to tilt and get hit by the reluctor as it passes. You can't make this crap up, lol!! Pull the distributor all apart and flatten the plate out, reassemble with only one weight. Set total timing to 35*. Also saw a bit of brake fluid leaking from the new line lock, apparently the bottom plug was seeping, took 3/4 of a turn to tighten.

Sunday;
Scale the car and I'm 2993. So I'm 117# light for U (3110) and 30# heavy for T (2963)

It's running better, do my one wheel then the other wheel burnout, stage at 1500 and....start off in second gear because the shifter never put it in to first even though I pulled it 3-4 times as I staged. Lovely, a sluggish 16.29 at 85.22 at least the mph is slowly climbing, lol.
Second pass, burnout then stop and physically watch the shifter stick it in first. Good.
Same goofy looking burnout procedure which I'm sure everyone was laughing, but anyway, stage at 1500 and launch (.043 light..like that matters at this point, lol) and a clean sounding but still slow 15.54@86.54mph. On the return road...no shifter again!! I can't watch it as I drive so as I'm moving the shifter I push the cable end and...go right into reverse! That stopped it in a hurry from about 20mph! Finally got it working and went back to the pit.

At this point it's obvious I can't get within 7 tenths of the index and pull out of S/SS and stay in sportsman.

First round sportsman, I'm dialed 15.55 against a fwd buick street car at 16 something. (At least I get to pretend I'm a fast car as he leaves first and I come after him, lol) As he was a friend I told him I was going to run it out the back door to get data. He got me on the light .055 to my .080 as I had no idea where to leave. Regardless,I ran a "clean" 15.65@85.42 in the afternoon heat.



So, what did I learn from my experience and the wisdom of the others there?
1) need a new converter
2) New shifter
3) New distributor
4) instead of getting a spool, etc for the 9", I'm pulling it and going 8.8, just need, well, everything! Including new rims for the slicks.
5) my 29.5x9 slicks on steel rims are WAY to heavy/large and slow and I'll get some more fitting to a v8 with no power.
6) new fan for the rad
7) found a small leak in the tranny pan so that will have to be welded up.
8) Seperate switches for the fan/pump

There's more but that's enough for now.

Overall it was what I expected it to be, a test day. The learning was great and to listen to some of the legends speak in the evenings was priceless!!

Time to drain the bank account again! (never spent so much to go so slow!, LOL!!)

[Mark Yacavone]

Hey, what's up with that block pic and # 8?
What # pistons are in that engine?
What rear gear ?
What 60' ?

[BRETV]

When you get the distributor figured out put 30-32 total timing in it. That's all those 302's like.




Bret Velde
2003 I/SA