Joe Newbie, 20 Builds a "Stocker"' in 2023

[kdanner]

Originally Posted by Birch motor cars

We need to bring the old IHRA Crate Motor packages to the NHRA and we will have a new gen of young people filling the lanes. Right now all we have are a bunch of old guys holding the door shut on the new blood that wants in. Oh boy I can see the steam flowing now !!! LOL !!!

This list? https://www.ihra.com/competition/com...list-for-stock

How many of those are still being sold? The only ones I found are the 350/385 and 302/340. I'm not even sure if those are actually the same as were sold years ago.

[Cglrcng]

Now that as a long time lurker here, I have finally taken the leap to register last night and had a chance to read and read,...and read more this wonderful thread and many others of late, while waiting for a reply window to arrive I am going to ask a few questions, and start a thread on my recent late in life 2nd try at class racing.

A tiny bit of hisyory. (Though lived about 3 miles from Lions in the 60's early early life fan of the biggies, bracket raced starting after high school at O.C.I.R. in 1975 through the late 80's, and made the first failed but super fun attempt at class racing in 1994-1997, I was somewhat competitive but the car certainly was not, it was the absolute slowest car in the category running in GF/SA).

Who inspired me to attempt Class Racing in Stock someday? Chad Langdon, and another who drove his Stocker Pinto wagon from SoCal to Indy (racing it in Stock, then driving it back home, and lived a short dream of racing at The Big Go. And in Super Stock the original builder of my winning at the time (mid 80's time period), bracket car (a whit/blue 63 Dodge Polara), Peter Berkuta....and Later none other than GTX John Irving, and am so glad to see he and Jon are still at it and so active after all these years living the dream.

Am rejoining Yac and Nees with a very old slow sled project, last raced actively in the 1990's purchased a car in the family since new dealer purchased Feb. 2 1985 w/27K on the odometer in April of 1993 (last active Feb. 1997 Atsco Nationals Phx, AZ, GF/SA Class Finalist, and really glad the winner is still active albeit a quarter of a century later).

What is the combination? The slowest and most underpowered sled I think to ever attempt the mission, but too late now to back out, what is done is done, and this newbie decided to move forward.

A 1984 Dodge Daytona 2.2L/135 C.I. TBI (single point Upright Bosch injected...NON-Turbo snail), 2 door hatchback).

How did it become a Stocker? Mom bought the car as a dailydriver from Cerritos Dodge in SoCal Feb. 1995 (build date 3rd week Dec. 1984, Uncommon Block EFI, w/A/C...Silver/Silver), she drove it first 27K miles and was forced to retire in a AAA downsize in 1993, and was moving to AZ, I bought it for my wife (for 3K), as a daily, and 3 weeks later she asked if it could be raced in Stk. Elim.?

The next weekend I was at Carlsbad Raceway to find out....(continued).

[Rory McNeil]

Originally Posted by Birch motor cars

We need to bring the old IHRA Crate Motor packages to the NHRA and we will have a new gen of young people filling the lanes. Right now all we have are a bunch of old guys holding the door shut on the new blood that wants in. Oh boy I can see the steam flowing now !!! LOL !!!

"Filling the lanes"? Certainly didn`t seem to accomplish any such results for IHRA, did it ?

[Cglrcng]

Lost the login again...dangit.

Rough weather here again in N.W., AZ, I will continue the story in a build thread if anyone has an interest...

I get the thread fully, life is hard, the class racer game is hard, money is still king, not much has changed, building fast legal class cars is harder...But, please do not take the fire outta my pipes, as I just got em lit again (and that 1st time start up, going from (bwop, bwop, bwop, to a true Big block cackle true NHRA Stk. Elim. Sound), after a quarter of a century layoff was downright amazing!

It made this 66 yr. Old Crazy Fool feel like 20 again.

The car is 3 miles from hitting 93K, it has a correctly re-built and improved bullet in the chamber, still plenty of room for planned improves.

It has only 3-1/8th mile shakedown and ring sealing passes on it so far (Has not seen a quarter mile true prepped drag strip yet), but for an engine in its first 93K miles never saw more than 5,600 Rpm, the first 3 passes just attempting to find the new shift point, was Street Drive tires 6,400, 20" tall 6"X14" MT E.T. slicks second pass and 6,400 again 2/10ths quicker, and last of 3 passes back on the street drive tires 7,000 Rpm when at 662' I was outta track (in low gear and still pulling hard, and forced to shift and lift, due to a short shutdown).

A lot can be said for proper balancing and machine work (even with doing so in accordance with the allowable ruleset).

I know what it ran before, and what it could and could not do, it is much improved now. Vegas on the 8th I plan and hope. It is still a work in progress, and eventually some younger person's toy.

But in the meantime, I am going to finish the mission of a 2nd try with it.

[Billy Nees]

Originally Posted by Cglrcng

I will continue the story in a build thread if anyone has an interest...

It made this 66 yr. Old Crazy Fool feel like 20 again.

Well heck yeah! The world needs more "Old Crazy Fools" to get off their couches and prove just how foolish we can be!

[curtis reed]

I'm wondering why VR didn't just help him find some older parts that could probably put him 60 under, a bottle of shoe polish and send him out to have a great time???



I'm just a bracket racer but I love what you guys do. I build my own stuff but only out of necessity to be able to drive. Had I started a lot sooner I might have gotten into S or SS with a close friend of mine who is the type that is perfect for these classes.



Also, shouldn't it be JN not NB?

[Buick6]

I guess I'm also one of the foolish old guys wanting to check one more thing off my bucket list by diving into Stock. I had my sights set on a particular well sorted former record setting car for a long time but it wasn't for sale. When the man decided to sell it, it was more than I could afford. He raced it for a final hurrah and the engine developed a fatal meltdown. He knew I wanted that car and had kept my phone number. He decided to offer it to me at a price I couldn't refuse. I've talked to some old timers who have said they wouldn't race Stock nowdays, but I just gotta do it anyway. I always was too stubborn. But at least I went into it with my eyes wide open. JR Weis

[Greg Reimer 7376]

Hi. Am enjoying this read regarding getting started in Stock Eliminator.
My wife and i went to the 1980 Winternationals on Sunday only. I was not real interested in the pro classes, although it was neat to see Grumpy driving hie Pro Stock Camaro, the Modified cars running in Competition Eliminator, especially the nine second 327 5 speed Corvette or two, the Super Gas cars were still a fairly new deal to NHRA, I believe they had to qualify against a 9.90 index and there was a 64 car field with a bump spot below 10 flat, the wheel standing Super Stock cars, and Stock Eliminator caught my eye. It looked like a reasonable way to get into NHRA class racing, and it was fun seeing Cal Method get to the final in a '61 Chevy wagon with a 283 and a Glide. Many fast Stockers then were in th low 12's,high 11's, and when you consider what we had to work with then it's still pretty amazing. After a few attempts at starting by driving other people's cars, I decided in 1992 to build a car for myself. I had conferred with two friends in this sport about this whole idea,Chuck Norton and Tony Janes, So Cal well known racers if there ever were any, and I decided on a combo that would be user friendly and fast enough to be fun. I bought a roller '68 Chevelle Malibu 2 door hardtop less engine and trans for $500 from a bracket racer in Lancaster and towed it home on my black open trailer behind my 71 El Camino. I put it in the driveway behind the gate and started first removing and tossing out the stuff that needed to go, cleaning, painting,and doing a neat job resembling it. I used a set of OEM front drum brakes, rebuilt the front end, loosened the front end movement, 90/10 shocks and all, put in a manual steering box, sand blasted and repainted the radiator core support and the inner fenders, and right then my paint and body buddy from the San Fernando Valley needed an engine put in his truck. I told him I needed a paint job on my Chevelle, so I dropped off the car at his house and drove the truck home, flat cam and all, and installed a rebuilt 350 long block I had. I had removed the bumpers, grille, headlight trim and all the emblems from the Chevelle, the body was very straight needing almost no body work, so we both got done at about the same time, and his cost for the time and materials equalled the price of the truck engine, so by July of that year, the Chevelle was back on its wheels and rolling. In the meantime, Chuck and I rebuilt the 327, used a Lunati cam, whatever lifters that came with it, a set of #290 heads, a quadrajet intake and a Val Hedworth QJ. I had a set of polished Super Tricks, so on went a set of whatever bias ply tires we had and some Moroso skinny fronts. I had the OEM front seat reupholstered and got some repro door panels and reassembled the car fairly easily, a set of gauges and a Sun tach found their way to the top of the dash with a used B&M shifter and a Holley fuel pump completed this build. I fired the engine, it sounded pretty good,(Stocker cams tended to do that), and we were ready for a test and tune. The car naturally fit J/SA, little weight put it into K, but K didn't require a roll bar and harness like J did, so a little weight got me in K and out there fairly easily. A trip to Palmdale to verify this whole thing was in order. The K index at Palmdale was something like a 13.45 or so, so we had a number to shoot for. First run at Palmdale,late August about three in the afternoon resulted in a 13.09 at 99 or so. That was pretty good, the next run ws a 13.04, then a 13.05 or so, but the electric motor for the water pump failed on the return road, so we quit while we were ahead. I weighed the car and it was around 25 pounds light, so I had a 50 pound steel plate that got bolted to the trunk floor. Both Tony and Chuck were happy with my initial results. The Las Vegas points race came along in late September, so I towed up there, entered the car, fixed a mechanical glitch with the fuel system, and got to the fourth round and won a hundred bucks. Not bad for a newbie project with around $5000 total investment. Tony Janes and I took the car to Palmdale and he drove it at two Stock/Super Stock races, and he went to the fourth round both races and we came home with some $100 bills as well. Pomona came around, the Vegas grade point got me in, the index then was a 12.95, I went 12.67 twice then a 12.62 first round of class where I lost by .06. First round, Bobby De Armond showed me what the top speed of n A car looked like from the other lane. One thing for sure, back then you could still do this stuff and it was affordable. I have since then built four more '68 Chevelles for myself and for Tony, and we had a lot of fun for a lot of years. Go ahead and give this a try, listen to the right people, turn off the BS brigade, and only do what you know will work. Be ready to learn all you can as you go along, it will be a lot of fun.

[KennyAnderson]

I LOVED racing with the IHRA back in the Pro Am days and although they were not all that well attended I think they had some really good ideas that go hand in hand with this thread. When my oldest son was getting close to aging out of JR's we found a well worn 93 Z28 and build a pure stocker out of it. It had 168k miles on it and we never even took the motor out. A 12 bolt rear, aftermarket bolt on suspension, wheels and tires, a good converter, and some computer magic and we ran 4 tenths under on our first outing. I had way less than 10k invested in this car and it was a great whip. We could double it in brackets, run stock, and generally beat on it as hard as we wanted. We won several races with it and even won an IHRA Natty race. Best car I ever owned as far as dollars won vs dollars spent. We were planning on converting to a crate motor setup when the I folded up shop.

Fast forward to today we finally sold the Camaro after hurting the motor and now have 2 NHRA legal stockers in the herd. We considered converting the Camaro but decided that combo was beat pretty hard. The crate motor classes would help offsetting entry costs as a newbie could pick up a used ZZ4 or Ford combo from a circle track racer and freshen it up for a reasonable cost. I've had this conversation with many NHRA diehards and they almost stroke out till I walk over to their ride and point out all the aftermarket parts, several ONLY had an intake as the original "stock" parts. Someone mentioned using a COPO or CJ or Dragpak motor but that has many zero's attached to it. Honestly my best advice for Joe Newbie to save his pennies and buy a good used possibly lower class stocker and go have a ball.

[Cglrcng]

Billy,

I have not been on the couch, the last decade plus was spent mentoring high school students in FIRST Robotics, plus the prior 23 yrs was running my own computer repair business and as an IT Tech, and knowing that the only way to return was to fully re-build the car completely to both alleviate the issue that caused me to spend a ton of money out on the NHRA running Div. and Nat. Events full time in 1995 w/ a car with a bug that acted just like I read one of yours may have faced.

I found it recently during my 17 month update project. It was not at all what it appeared to be back in the late 90's, an ECU Rev limit feature, but a simple engineered and design issue having to do with the factory stock gas tank, and the Calif. Required clean air standards (it is a CA car), and has a vapor recovery system on it.

The locked out ECU it took me years to learn, auto triggers the vapor recovery system at about 2 seconds after you go full throttle opening the vapor recovery selenoids and sucks the fumes out of the stock tank through the charcoal cannister. And (though I was looking under hood, and under the passenger side kick panel, the actual problem was found at the other end of the car during the deleting of the stock tank and the addition of a 5 gal. Fuel cell w/required upper and lower bulkheads.

A spiderweb cracked and getting worse with time, caused a huge vacuum leak in a quarter inch by 6" vacuum line, and only after 2 seconds at full throttle, but eventually at about 5,200 RPM in every gear, that started with just 1 pop in 1994 at Vegas about 4' after the finish line, and like I said got worse over time.

When I parked the car, retired from competition in 1997, it was a solution I had to find, and was not going to spend the money to finally machine the block, head, and all the rest until I could either replace the ECU w/an aftermarket stand alone system, or find out what else was causing it.

But, a quarter of a century later, I did find it, and so far, that issue no longer exists, only 3-1/8th mile passes so far, but not a missed heartbeat yet, and instead of 5,200-5,600...same ECU and 7K and still pulling hard I have not found the Rev limiter. And that is with the stock injector, the stock regulator, and a brand new exact match but new throttle body that was found that someone purchased in 1985 and still had in the box unused and found at an estate sale last fall.

The Holley system of course and a switch to laptop tuning is the next logical step of course, but gonna re-debut it to get a baseline on just the head, block rebuild, new Ross Forged flat top replacement bullets and the Total Seal ringsets, balancing, etc., then will work from there.

I now know all the existing wiring, and mechanicals are right and working, and have no issues on either side of the firewall.

Quarter mile passes are next, just working on under load ring seating, and finding those new shift points, and how far under it will now run, once the big issue was finally resolved and taking into account all the improves the much need machining, and real go fast parts added will yield to the go slow sled.