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My car was sold with only 2 options (1 in California was standard equipment- California Emissions package as it was a California Car), and the other was A/C...The Base package, not even a radio, and we added a cheap Kraco stereo w/ cassette deck after it arrived home from the dealer (which is now trimmed to only 2 ounces and 1" deep, though it still lights up! And it makes the dash tower look right, though dated) No other options of any kind were ever purchased.

Then, my parts piles and indiv. weights of everything I have taken off the car, things added back, and the weight it is right now tells me by the real math (I still have everything, incl. the original A/C, Cat Conv., exhaust system, Windshield washer/wipers/ hdwre. , PS Pump/bracket/hoses, wipers/hdwre. stock tank/Filler Neck/pump/sender, engine splash plastics, etc. (I still have everything and have weighed each individual item) and the totals. The car originally weighed in at well into the mid 2,600 lbs plus range!

Just some of my recent deleted parts pile!



It currently is the lightest (before recent ballast additions), it has ever been since it left the assembly line in December 1984, and without driver it still weighs currently (2,455), or 10 lbs heavier than the classification data shows, and all the documentation and my parts pile weights (even subtracting the A/C and the CA Emissions pkg stuff, which were the first deleted items I took off in 1993-before ever racing the car in the first Div. or National event, shows it has never once weighed in anywhere close to the 2,444 Classification guide amount for Shipping weight.

Even Chrysler Corp lied...I figure (just a tiny bit on each car, sell/ship millions of units, and billions of dollars saved over time in shipping costs alone. (On a high HP combo, you may be able to get away with that, but if you only start w/ 99 HP, and each HP is rated at 25.00 lbs....it is a flat killer!

The classification guide says I have a DF/S Natural fit (2,444 lbs. HP Factor: 105, Power /Weight Factor 23.27, wheelbase; 97", Class Min. Wgt: 1,995 -Over/Under Shipping Wgt. -449 lbs. to get to the bottom of DF/S 1,995 car only). Min wt with driver would be 2,165. And to run weighted class in EF/S 2,625 car only, and w/ driver= 2,795.

But the real life actual is not reachable staying in line with the NHRA Rulebook whatsoever. Not everything is off that can possibly come off legally, but there is not 459 lbs. more that can legally be removed or lightened period. (At least not without removing the engine and putting it on the engine stand outside the car! (What I can do further under Sect. 11A is negligible and unrealistic to ever reach the bottom of DF/S =I would have to cheat huge!) And that is not an opinion, it is factual. Based in true reality. It should only be a natural fit in EF/S. (and no weighted class any longer exists). DF/S is a pipe dream w/ this combo.

Reality is, or should be (if truth was used instead of magic rainbows, wishes, and fuzzy fake unicorns), Curb weight: 2,590, Shipping weight:2,520, HP 99.0 (2,520/99=25.45 lbs/HP....Car fits now naturally in EF/S, can run to the bottom of the class 25.00 X 99=2,475+170 Driver =2,645 (adding 6 HP onto that is another 150 lbs., but I cannot yet find data that caused the addition just before 6/2/03), and when it ran last it was 2,755 min-ran at 2,763 @110HP (and that was classified by the NHRA Tech Director in San Dimas in 1993 in person with the car there). Currently sits at 2,645 as of today w/ me in it plus 60 lbs ballast added,, and Friday I will make passes without my wife in the car, and with her in the passenger seat to see what the differences really are.

Ok, after the tour, and receiving the reduction letter, I really knew I could not afford to do at that time everything I needed to do, to make the car competitive, so I parked it in 1997! There had been no prior machining done at all, head had only been off once for 30 mins. (in a mock partial teardown, I chemically fast cleaned piston tops and chambers, valve pockets and reinstalled it same stretched headbolts and gasket), and buttoned it up, and drove it from south of Atlanta to Memphis the next morning to race a Nat. Event then back to Atlanta. It had never even had a valve job, until the head work during this re-build in 2022/2023.

25 yrs. later...NEW YEARS EVE 2021 6PM, and I am watching a no-prep video Bill Hoskinson's channel w/ the SRC Gang out of Ohio, and my wife walked by and looked over my shoulder, and said "Do You Miss It?" (we have mentored High School Robotics for more than a full decade together plus, and due to covid-19 I have had to curtail a lot of my volunteerism for more than 2 yrs. and I thought she was talking about the robotics at the time...But, I said "Miss What?"

Her answer was "Drag Racing", my simple answer was "Every day for 25 yrs so far!" and she said, you know I will be retiring in about 6 yrs, so lets do something with that car in the garage! I then explained, even on a slow sled budget Stocker just how expensive a proposition that was as I am going as far as is legally possible this time around! And 10 days later I started "The Project Jenny Craig", unburied the dirty car not touched at all in the prior 13.5 yrs. (Looked like a barn find by then and surrounded by boxes and stuff!) Started this project January 10, 2022.

Cleaned her up, put it up on skates, checked the fuel system, and everything was fine though Sunoco Purple was now more like Sunoco Red, smelled fine, no sediment, clear, still smelled like race gas, charged up the battery labeled MFG Feb 09, and fired it up, heated it up to operating temp (to help break loose threads on bolts/nuts easier later and started Engine disassembly in the car, pre-measuring and mocking up things like switching the water pump from crank driven to a Moroso Electric driven, etc as I went along so I could have the adapter machined at the same time as the engine machining.