03-01-2014, 10:40 PM
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#55
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VIP Member
Join Date: Oct 2013
Location: Gulf Breeze, FL
Posts: 1,651
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Bowling Green PukeFest
Well, things went well until I ventured on the track today. Spent some time on the return road bedding the brakes and checking out the new transmission...if I had stopped right there things would have been peachy.
Made the first pass and the car yanked the wheels about two feet high on the launch. Felt alright going down track, but I could tell something wasnt quiet right overall. When I saw the timeslip I decided to fatten the carb and make another pass.

I planned on making this pass first before trying leaving on the two-step, so I stalled it up to 2800 and was really up on the wheel this time for the tree. When I nailed the throttle all hell broke loose under the car. I've broken my share of rear-ends over the years, but I never heard anything like I heard today...like the driveshaft was coming thru the floorpan.
With help the car was pushed backwards back into the staging lanes. I could'nt believe what I was seeing once I crawled under the car. At the hit it had folded the spring perches on the axle tubes like they were cardboard sending the center section pinion/yoke sky high into the floorpan. The most extreme pinion angle I have ever seen haha!
Made good use of the trailer winch today thank goodness. On the ride back home my partner and I debated the cause of this disaster, but neither of us could come up with a plausible explanation. Everything was dead-on straight, pinion angle at 4 degrees and the u-bolts were tightened to the point of deflecting the Caltrac brackets. We called a good friend and racer Perry Simpkins and he met us at the shop as we pulled in. Once on the lift Perry picked out the culprit...it was simply a failure of the spring perches themselves. Not enough bracing on the tubes.
Long story short...don't assume just because you bought the best parts they are the best parts. I'm probably going to have the housing doctored local instead of dealing with Moser. Had I known these perches were so weak beforehand I could have easily braced them myself from the beginning. Jeebus...work on a car all winter to make one pass. 





Oh yeah Brent, you were asking about the trans crossmember. I had to drill thru the center for the cable...the only way the bracket was going to mount to the pan.

__________________
Rich Taylor
I/SA - 321
Last edited by HandOverFist; 03-01-2014 at 11:01 PM.
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