T.R | Title | User | Personal Name | Date | Lines |
---|
10.1 | not again..... | OASS::BURDEN_D | He's no fun, he fell right over | Wed Feb 06 1991 08:27 | 9 |
| Oh well.... The Chattahoochee Rally's been cancelled. The Forest
Service suddenly claimed we had to have all the paper work submitted 90
days before the event. For all the events in the past 2 or 3 years all
they required was 30 days.
With any luck, we'll try to re-schedule it for December as the last
event of the year. More details as they become available.
Dave
|
10.2 | Tiadaghton '91 | OASS::BURDEN_D | He's no fun, he fell right over | Mon May 06 1991 15:56 | 6 |
| Chad Dimarco won the rally in a Subaru Legacy and Tim O'Neil came second in the
Rallye Golf. I don't remember the other finishers.....
Dave
(Knoxville to Atlanta in 2.5 hours? No problem...)
|
10.3 | Road Atlanta - June 15 | OASS::BURDEN_D | He's no fun, he fell right over | Thu Jun 20 1991 16:50 | 76 |
| Road Atlanta Rallysprint I & II - June 15, 1991
Father's day weekend was a busy 2 days of racing at Road Atlanta.
Regional road races both days and two rallysprints on Saturday night.
Last year Chuck McCrary swept both events, but after his crash at
Tiadaghton in May he'll need a new car before he comes back.
Ten teams entered these two coefficient 1 events with even entries from
Tennessee and South Carolina It also seems the teams are getting more
'mature' since we only had Seed 1 and 2 drivers, no Seed 3s.
Rallysprint I started at 6:41 p.m. with Ken and Lori Payne leading the
way in their Saab 99. Greg Healey and Richard Martin were next in a Dodge
Ram pickup, but only made it halfway through the first stage (less than �
mile) when the left rear axle broke. It was right after the two speed bumps,
but Greg determined previous wear and tear had caused the breakage, not the
bumps.
The second stage featured a 50 yard stretch of dirt connecting two tarmac
roads and a 3/4 mile dirt section on the outside of the track. Going into the
downhill left hander near Turn 10 of the road course, Ken Payne locked up the
tires on the Saab and started sliding towards the trees. He let up on the
brakes to try and avoid the trees when something snapped in the right front
corner and he couldn't turn in. Whack! No one was injured, but because of
the suspension damage that caused them to go off, they couldn't continued.
The long dirt section near the end of the stage proved interesting for a
few cars. Three teams opted to start on tarmac tires, hoping to make up time
on the sealed sections of the course and 'tip toe' through the dirt. John
Shirley and Kennon Rymer in a Triumph TR8 had hand grooved Hoosier
Autocrossers, Dave Burden and Paul Boehlert in a VW Rabbit GTI had 175/50x13
Pirelli P7s while Martin George and Eric Riner in a Toyota Corolla had normal
street tires. Everyone else was running some variety of dirt tires.
So, who goes off the dirt and rolls it a few times? One of the cars with
dirt tires. Allan Davis and David Howard in a Datsun 210 made it three cars
out in the first 2 stages. No one was injured, but the field certainly
shrunk in a hurry.
The transition from dirt back onto tarmac at the Turn 11 bridge was
probably the most challenging for the drivers. It is a 90� right with the
approach on gravel from between two sign boards. On the outside of the turn
are a few Port-O-Lets and then you have the bridge to contend with. Even
with all the severe drifts the cars got into, everyone kept it clean and
didn't hit anything this year.
After 6 stages the end of Rallysprint I was called by organizer Jack
Phillips. Bruce Newey and Paul Wearing won it easily, taking fastest time on
all stages. Second and third were separated by 5 seconds with Shirley/Rymer
beating out the Father-Son team of Robert and Billy Waits. Forth and fifth
were 4 seconds apart with Burden/Boehlert edging out the team of Paul Geren
and Tripp Gantt.
Rallysprint II started after a short service break and contained 4
stages. It was also time to put the lights on the cars since FCO was
scheduled for 10:00 p.m. Burden and Boehlert decided to put on a set of
Michelins to see if losing a little ground on the tarmac sections was worth
the extra grip in the dirt.
Most of the tarmac turns were getting gravel kicked up on them anyway, so
going to a more forgiving tire might help.
Unfortunately it didn't. Newey/Wearing won all the stages and the only
changes in the overall results were Dave Payne
(now teamed up with Richard Martin) jumping from 6th up to 4th, pushing
Burden and Geren back one spot each.
Alstart (Bruce Newey) and Barron Garage (Chuck McCrary) continued their
finishing fund by awarding each of the Seed 2 teams that finished $20 per
event. They paid out 7 times for these two events.
The next two events for the SEDiv are the Sand Hills PRO Rally on July
13th in Patrick, SC and then back to Road Atlanta on August 3rd.
|
10.4 | more notes from the left seat | OASS::BURDEN_D | He's no fun, he fell right over | Mon Jun 24 1991 18:41 | 43 |
| For some reason, most of the times I managed to get the Rabbit sideways
were on my side. Usually you find the co-driver's door heading for the
trees, not the driver's. The first time was coming out of the first dip,
foot to the floor in 4th gear, with the road climbing up and to the right.
The P7s were pushed a little too much and slipped a little. A momentary lift
of the throttle brought it back under control, but it caught my attention!
The other nasty time was coming out of the second dip (why did I suddenly
have problems climbing hills??) when I was into heavy left foot braking in
3rd when I decided I really needed to be in 2nd to power out properly. The
turns tightens up a bunch to the right and there is a guard rail on the
outside as well. I did a quick shift of my feet to the left (left foot from
brake too clutch and right foot from gas to brake) and attempted to jam it
into 2nd gear. For some reason it hung up in neutral for a bit (with the
stresses on the chassis at that point I could probably understand why...) and
I had to keep my foot on the clutch while I hunted around for 2nd gear. I
quickly reaquainted myself with the theory that when you are fully committed
to a turn, cutting power to the driven wheels isn't such a good idea. I took
a little more tread off the P7s on that turn, but found 2nd and pulled out.
The fun slides were coming off the back dirt section onto the tarmac just
before the bridge. You approach the turn in 3rd, on gravel, brake and
downshift to 2nd and set the car up for the right hander (by tossing the
co-driver first.) Let off the brake, flip the car back the other way around
and hit the tar sideways (driver's door first), full opposite lock and full
throttle. There is gravel all over the tar so it's just a matter of waiting
for the tires to grab, straighten the wheel out and go! We probably spent a
good 50-75 feet completely sideways, just sitting there, watching the
porta-potties getting closer and waiting for the rear tires to find tarmac so
the front end can pull the car out. Once the tires grab, it's important to
not over-correct because you then have to thread your way over the bridge. I
was very sensitive to when the tires started to grab and did my best to
correct just as they did so we didn't start the rear end waving all over the
place.
I found the Michelins easier to drive and more fun because they'd grab
once the car was sideways much better than the Pirellis. With all the chewed
up corners and the darkness, I had more confidence diving into a turn with
the Michelins because I knew they would handle whatever road conditions were
is store for us. Because they were taller (14/60x14 vs. 175/50x13) I lost
some acceleration, but they kept us on the road and I had more fun driving.
|
10.5 | Sand Hills PRO Rally - July 13, 1991 | OASS::BURDEN_D | He's no fun, he fell right over | Mon Jul 15 1991 21:01 | 235 |
| Sand Hills PRO RALLY
(Coefficeint 2 Divisional PRO Rally)
Patrick, SC - July 13, 1991
by Dave Burden
They said I-20 from Atlanta, GA to Columbia, SC would be boring
and they were right. We (myself, Diane, Anthony - 2.5 years and
Samantha - 3.5 months) left around 12:30 Friday afternoon from north of
Atlanta and met up with my co-driver for this event, Ken Sluder, just
off I-20, East of I-285. He had managed to get us some real
sponsorship (re: $$$) for this event from Owsley & Sons, Inc so the
entry fee and some travel expenses would be covered for once! Point
the van east and cruise.
Somewhere west of Augusta we saw Al Suarez hauling his white
Rabbit towards Atlanta. We also saw a white Corvette being trailered
west, both were headed to some Solo event (find out where). As we got
closer to Hartsville, SC (exit 116 off I-20) we noticed the terrain
changing and more and more sand off to the sides of the highway. So
this is the stuff we'll be racing in this weekend.
We pulled into the Day Inn in Hartsville around 6:00 p.m. and hit
the pool. No rally activities were planned until Saturday morning out
at the State Forest, so we had all evening to relax. Dick Casey and
his crew chief Skip pulled in around 9:00 p.m. and then SEDiv Rally
Steward and co-organizer for this event, Jim Kloosterman, stopped by so
we all sat around the pool and chatted.
By the time we got up Saturday more rallyists had invaded the
hotel. Dave Payne and David Gantt were there in the Barron Garage
Mazda RX2, John Shirley and Kennon Rymer had the Triumph TR8, Robert
and Billy Waits had their Mazda RX7 and Ken and Lorri Payne had their
trusty (and repaired) Saab 99. Everyone hopped in the tow vehicles and
headed out to the Sand Hills State Forest, about 15 miles away.
Greg Healey was very good about placing 'RALLY ->>' signs at
the intersections on the way to the picnic area which served as Rally
Headquarters, except for the very last turn. This omission sent 3 of
us down a 1 lane State Forest road for about 2 miles before deciding
this was wrong and finding a place to turn the rigs around. By the
time we got back to the picnic area, Greg had put the last sign up...
The picnic area was shaded with lots of trees and surrounded by a
swamp full of Cyprus trees. It was a good place to bring the family
and many did. While the husbands were off playing in the sand in their
big toys, the kids were playing in the sand with their little toys.
There was an advertised limit of 20 cars for this rally, but only
9 showed up. Tibor Von Denes brought the Group A Suzuki Swift that had
run Tiaghdaton and teamed up with Eric Riner for this run. Since Tibor
is an FIA seeded driver, neither he nor Eric would be eligible for any
Divisional points.
Bruce Newey and Paul Wearing had the Alstart Mazda RX7 and Mike
Harris and Duane Simpson were there in their Mazda P'up. Dick Casey's
co-driver, Martin Depot, arrived at the picnic area after an early
morning drive down from Washington, DC along with Bruno Bilek, who came
to spectate because his car is still being repaired.
The rally started a little late, but for a first time event, not
too bad. Casey/Depot were first on the road and as they accelerated
away down the first stage we became aware of our ever present 'friend',
Dust. The 1 minute interval was enough to let most of the dust settle
or drift away, but pockets of it lingered around at the nastiest places
on the stages. We were 6th on the road, right behind Von Denes/Riner
in the Swift. Fortunately, they were quicker than us so by the end of
the long stages the dust had almost 2 minutes to settle before we got
to it.
The roads in the State Forest featured lots of deep rutted sand,
on the straights and in the turns. The trick was keep going. If you
stopped, you got stuck, plain and simple. The first stage was almost 7
miles long and ended at a dead-end. We simply turned the cars around
and once the course opening truck (Greg Healey's Mitsubishi) ran stage
2, we headed back. During this 'transit' zone, Robert Waits had to
change the left rear tire because it was slowing deflating. He then
found his spare had even less air it so bummed a spare off Dave Payne's
RX2.
The last turn on stage 1 (and the first on stage 2) was about a
100� switchback, downhill headed in and uphill headed out. The inside
was very deep sand and it got better the wider you went. Robert and
Billy Waits found out you didn't want to go too wide though. On the
2nd stage they got wide near the exit and backed off to avoid bumping
the bank and stopped. And then dug in trying to get out. The video
from that corner shows the RX7 buried up to the read axle. They were
the first DNF of the event.
I found that most of the time I could get through the sharp sandy
corners in 2nd gear, but would have very little power on the exit.
Later one I would jump downshift to 1st going in and grab 6000 rpm all
the way through. It would kick up wall of dirt since the front wheels
would be cranked all the way to one side, but it gut us through. About
2 miles after we passed Waits and Waits in the RX7 we came upon more
triangles on the right just before a 90� right. We went a little wide
and saw Newey and Wearing standing next to their RX7. It had blown the
engine. Two down.
About this time the exhaust separated on the Rabbit. It was
caused by the rear muffler hanging coming off which gave the system too
much flex in the middle and the center joint came apart. Nothing was
dragging (or so I assumed since I didn't hear anything scraping) so it
didn't really cause us any concern. Right after the finish control we
saw the Saab of the Paynes, parked. They had vapor lock troubles and
lost 10 minutes getting it restarted.
Shirley and Rymer never made it to the end of the stage. They
blew a front tire on the TR8 and tried running out on it. After about
2 miles of running on the flat it came off the rim to the inside and
jammed the steering in a turn. John had to back off and got stuck in
the sand.
After 2 stages and over 17 miles of stages, our odometer was still
working. This is significant since I had relocated the magnets and
pickup to the right front driveshaft. The magnets kept getting knocked
off when I had them on the rear drum so I was hoping to run the entire
rally with a good odo this time.
The start of the 3rd stage was our undoing. We missed the turn on
the stage and did a quick U turn to get back to it. Because of the
exhaust noise or the missed turn or the whatever, we checked in 2
minutes too early at the start control. Our only mistake of the rally.
The stage itself went great, 2.46 miles with only 2 tulips and not too
much dust. After this stage was a 1 hour service and dinner break,
time the fix the exhaust and check the front pads.
Back at the picnic area we saw that Casey and Depot had run into
something a bit tougher than the front end of the Golf. They had
crested the hill at the end of the SS3 and found the control vehicle in
a not-so-safe place. Dick had a choice of the truck, the workers or
a tree. He chose the latter. The grill and bumper were removed and
they had to patch a small hole in the radiator, but he was back in the
rally at the end of service. We put the exhaust system back together
and wired up the muffler hanger so it wouldn't fall again. The front
pads didn't need changing even with all the left foot braking I was
doing.
Robert and Billy Waits towed Newey and Wearing in during the
service too. The Waits' opted to run the rest of the stages just for
fun and got to start at the end of the pack. They managed to get
through the corner they got stuck in two more times before the day was
over.
During the break we discovered we had the 2 road points. We
checked our score card and, unfortunately, they were correct. On stage
times we were 4th overall: Casey/Depot (22:59), Von Denes/Riner
(23:04), Payne/Payne (24:51), Burden/Sluder (24:55), Harris/Simpson
(26:01) and Payne/Gantt (28:07). When you added in the road points for
us and Saab we were still in 4th, but Harris/Simpson were in 3rd, 54
seconds ahead of us.
The 4th stage was interesting. The first route instruction was
0.64 miles in, a sweep left with deep ruts (just like all the other
turns...) But, before we got to that turn we saw a triangle off to the
right. Approaching the turn the Suzuki stuck in the sand on the
outside and right in front of that was the Golf! The first and second
place cars stuck! We zipped on by on the inside of the turn, felt
sorry for them for about 3 seconds and then back to cutting through the
dust and sand, trying to make up for the 2 minutes we lost. We did the
stage in 3:23, Harris/Simpson did it in 3:04, now we were 1:13 down.
We were also second on the road at this point, behind the Payne's in
the Saab.
The 5th stage was the longest of the rally and we really cooked.
The ruts helped on most of the turns, but did nasty things when you hit
them in 4th gear in the middle of a turn. Part way through the stage I
started to notice a lack of dust. It turns out that the Paynes took a
left at T instead of a right at T (the left was not roped off either.)
It cost them about 3 minutes. We did the stage in 14:32, Harris and
Simpson took another 21 seconds off and now lead us by 1:34. I wasn't
doing too well trying to reel them in...
One stage and 9.24 miles left to chop off 1:34. Didn't seem too
likely, but we gave it our best shot. With only 4 cars left running,
we also wanted to finish since they had cash prizes and a finishers
fund. We were now first on the road and against our better judgment,
agreed with the other drivers to allow a 2 minute gap between cars. At
the end I took 11 seconds off our deficit (11:18 vs. 11:29), but still
ended the day in second place, 1:23 down.
After the rally most competitors congregated at Greg Healey's
house for pizza, beer, sodas and Sand Hills PRO Rally video footage!
After we had properly scrutinized everyone's cornering technique we
watched some Paris-Dakar videos and then went to the RAC when we got
tired of all the sand.
The SEDiv Rally Championship is getting tighter. We have 2 more
coefficient 1 events and 1 more coefficient 2. Bruce Newey has a 38
point lead, but with up to 80 points still available, 9 drivers have a
shot at the title.
Driver/Co-driver Vehicle SS1 SS2 SS3 SS4 SS5 SS6 RP TOTAL
1 Mike Harris/Duane Simpson Mazda P'up 9:35 13:28 2:58 3:04 14:11 11:40 54:45
2 Dave Burden/Ken Sluder VW Rabbit GTI 9:24 12:22 3:09 3:23 14:32 11:18 2 56:08
3 Dave Payne/Dave Gantt Mazda RX2 10:14 14:01 3:52 3:37 16:32 13:13 1 62:39
4 Ken Payne/Lorri Payne Saab 99 9:05 12:33 3:13 3:21 17:11 11:56 10 67:19
Dick Casey/Martin Depot VW Golf GTI 8:38 11:23 2:58 DNF (stuck) DNF
Tibor Von Denes/Eric Riner Suzuki Swift 8:29 11:39 2:56 DNF (stuck) DNF
John Shirley/Kennon Rymer Triumph TR8 8:39 DNF (stuck) 1 DNF
Robert Waits/Billy Waits Mazda RX7 9:02 DNF (stuck) DNF
Bruce Newey/Paul Wearing Mazda RX7 8:42 DNF (mech.)
SEDiv Standings:
Drivers:
1 Bruce Newey 102
2 Robert Waits 64
= Mike Harris 64
4 Dave Burden 62
5 David Payne 56
6 Ken Payne 53
7 John Shirley 47
8 Greg Healey 38
9 Martin George 26
10 John Geren 22
11 Chuck McCrary 20
12 Gary D'Abate 19
13 Allan Davis 14
Co-Drivers:
1 Paul Wearing 78
2 Kennon Rymer 68
3 Duane Simpson 64
4 Lorri Payne 53
5 Eric Riner 48
6 David Gantt 42
7 Ken Sluder 36
8 Billy Waits 32
9 Tibor Von Denes 26
= Paul Boehlert 26
11 William Gantt 22
12 Rob Garrison 20
13 Greg Gerdon 19
14 Jay Roberts 14
= Richard Martin 14
|
10.6 | | WFOVX8::DOBOSZ_M | Ididn'tdoitnobodysawmeyoucan'tproveanything!!! | Tue Jul 16 1991 12:59 | 10 |
| Re: Note 837.5 by OASS::BURDEN_D "He's no fun, he fell right over"
> -< Sand Hills PRO Rally - July 13, 1991 >-
Good report. One question though...
> The stage itself went great, 2.46 miles with only 2 tulips and not too
> much dust.
What's a "tulip"?
Mike
|
10.7 | pretty little flowers? | OASS::BURDEN_D | He's no fun, he fell right over | Tue Jul 16 1991 15:20 | 13 |
| A 'tulip' is what we call route instructions. Each turn in the route
book has a line drawing of the turn with a dot at the bottom indicating
where you come in, and an arrow showing the exit direction. A 'Y' would
look like this:
^ /
\ /
\ /
|
|
0
Dave
|
10.8 | All the pain without all the fun.... | WARIOR::BURDEN_D | He's no fun, he fell right over | Thu Oct 03 1991 17:32 | 142 |
| This isn't a PRO rally story and it's not even about a race car,
but I'm sure most of you can relate.....
Just Another Weekend
by Dave Burden
This little weekend trip started at noon on Friday, September
27th. The van was loaded with household goods for a family that had
moved from Atlanta to Massachusetts, but couldn't get everything into
their U-Haul truck. My car trailer was all hitched up and ready for
the trip too. The clock struck 12:00 and I was off. My first stop was
in Charlotte, NC to pick up Ted Donlon who was going to help with the
driving. Ted's a fellow rallyist and he had to drive up from
Charleston, SC to meet me.
Ted had phoned me directions on where to meet him, and I had kind
of remembered them, but then lost them. I knew the major turns to
take and had a vague recollection of the side streets. When I arrived
at what I thought was the right house (4:05 p.m.), no one was there,
which was okay, because he said there wouldn't be anyone there. I
waited until 5:15 p.m. and up drove Ted. He had a few delays on the
way up, but we hit the road again by 5:30 p.m.
Head up 77 North and cross into Virginia at 7:00 p.m. Stop for
dinner on 81 North around 8:30 p.m. and then keep driving. Made it to
Winchester, VA by midnight and cruised into PA around 12:30 a.m.
Saturday. We then took 78 once out of Harrisburg instead of going up
through Scranton because we figured the roads would be better. At
each fuel stop I would check the trailer and ramps, everything was fine
before jumping onto 78. Just before Allentown we took 22 to Bethlehem
towards 33 North. Route 22 was very bumpy, but it didn't slow us down
much. Around 3:30 a.m. we stopped for fuel and I checked everything
again and I noticed one of the ramps was gone! No great loss, they are
only 2"x10"x8' spruce boards, but the T handle had broken a weld and
the ramp was somewhere on Route 22.
Head up 33 North to 209 North (with a 4 mile trip on I-80) and up
through the Delaware Water Gap. It got kind of foggy with frost and
freeze warnings in the area. We saw a few deer, but none tried to
commit suicide. Made it out of PA by 5:15 a.m. and hopped on I-84.
Stopped in Waterbury, CT for breakfast around 6:30 a.m. and then headed
for Hartford. Had to take a detour to I-91 north because the I-84
interchange was closed, no big problem. Stay on I-84 into MA, hop on
the Mass Pike to 290 and then 495 to Route 3 and up into Nashua, NH by
10:00 a.m. We had arrived!
I unloaded the van, parked the trailer, bought two new ramps and
then stopped in on a few friends while I had some time to spare. Ted
headed up to his old co-driver's house to help dispose of 3 Saabs that
were stripped for parts years ago. Before it got too dark we loaded
the van with a few old trunks and miscellaneous stuff from my parents
house. Saturday night was to be the last real night's sleep for 3
days.
What was this trip all about you ask? Well, I'm about the reveal
that.
Sunday morning dawned bright and crisp, about 40�. My former
co-driver (Rob Lembree) met me at my parents house at 8:30 a.m. and
with the trailer in tow, we all headed West towards Keene. Ted was to
meet us there around 10:00 a.m. My mother let us into the storage
facility and we drove around to unit #417. The lock was taken off and
we raised the door. There it sat, a 1924 Studebaker Special 6 Touring
car.
It has been in the family since around 1950 and it's all original
except for a professional paint job sometime in the early 60's. The
last time it was run was around 1972/73 and it's always been stored
inside. The tires were flat so Rob and I called up a friend in Keene
who used to autocross and borrowed a compressor and air tank. We
winched it onto the trailer and then tied it down, good and tight.
Ted finally showed up around noon and had a number of spare wheels
and tires from the Saabs so we had to repack the van a little. After a
stop for lunch in Keene we hit the road again at 1:45 p.m. Our first
stop was just over the border into MA for some pumpkins. Ted wanted to
bring some home for his kids.
We jumped on I-91 South and found 45 mph to be a comfortable
cruising speed. The car weighs about 3300 lbs. and I couldn't get all
the tongue weight I would have wanted so anything faster and it tended
to sway a bit.
Down through Springfield, MA and Hartford, CT and into Waterbury
again for gas. Ted took over the controls and got it swinging a little
going down one hill. We found 45-50 mph up hill and 40 mph down worked
just fine after that. No need to push it. We stayed on I-84 into NY
and then stopped at Port Jervis, NJ for dinner around 7:00 p.m. We
decided that since we were limited to 40-45, why not take back roads?
We mapped out a route back down 209 to 33 to 22 to 100 through Reading
and York and then I-83 down to Baltimore and into DC.
I took over from Ted after we ate dinner and ended up driving
until Gainesville, VA, just outside of DC off I-66 West. The back
roads worked just fine and driving all night again was pretty easy (we
also had a cooler full of Coke to help.) The only real problem was
trying to get through Reading, PA at 11:00 p.m. This was the third
trip for Ted through Reading and the third time he's had trouble. We
eventually found the road to York, but spent around 15 minutes
wandering aimlessly on side streets. We picked up the Dr. Demento Show
around Baltimore from 1:00 to 2:00 a.m. which helped to pass the time
and made it through the DC beltway at 3:00 a.m. We took I-66 West to
29 South and swapped drivers again. Ted took us from Gainesville, VA
down to Culpepper ("It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World"), VA where we
stopped at 5:00 a.m. and grabbed 2 hours sleep in the van. Our
destination was Charlottesville, VA and we were only 45 miles away, but
neither of us felt we could make it, so we did the smart thing and
rested a bit.
We left Culpepper at 7:30 and arrived at my sister's house around
9:00 a.m. First stop was to get a set of front pads for the van. They
had started to squeal, but after pulling the wheels there was still
plenty of pad left so we opted not to change them right then. Next
order of business was to fix the swaying problem with the trailer. We
picked up a friction-type sway controller from an RV dealer and had a
local welding shop mount the brackets for us. This little device did a
great job on the second half of the trip.
We met a friend of mine from college and spent a few hours
checking out downtown Charlottesville while we tried to map out our
schedule for the final leg of the trip. We decided to do it at night,
so we grabbed some sleep from 3:00 to 6:30 p.m., ate dinner with my
sister, husband and 2 year old son and left their house at 8:45 p.m.
We continued down Route 29 through Lynchburg and Danville and the sway
controller kept the trailer nice and steady all the way.
It took us 6 hours to get to Charlotte, only an hour longer than
normal. Ted unload all his tires and wheels and we went our separate
ways. 2:45 a.m., get back on I-85 headed for Atlanta. Between
Spartansburg and Greenville, SC I stop for some food and decide it's
been a long day so grab another little nap from 5:00 to 7:30 a.m. in
the van.
The traffic was bit heavier in the morning, but I made it back
home to Woodstock by 11:00 a.m. after a quick stop by work to show the
car off.
The trip up took us 21 hours, discounting the hour I waited in
Charlotte, NC. The return trip took a little over 27 hours subtracting
sleep stops and the 12 hours we spent in Charlottesville. It was kind
of strange on Tuesday when I realized I hadn't gotten a full night's
sleep since Saturday night.
|
10.9 | Good shocks & springs? ;-} | NYTP05::JANKOWITZ | Ready the lifeboats | Fri Oct 04 1991 16:19 | 3 |
| >> a 1924 Studebaker Special 6 Touring car.
How will it do on a rally???
|
10.10 | some advanced features! | WARIOR::BURDEN_D | He's no fun, he fell right over | Fri Oct 04 1991 17:58 | 15 |
| Big solid 'I' beam front axle, HD elliptic springs on all four
corners, *ADJUSTABLE* friction-type shocks on all four corners.
Demountable rims, the wooden wheels stay on the car (saves
weight in carrying all those spare wheels around.) Optional
hand crank for when the battery or starter die. Speedometer
and odo (with trip odo) already mounted on passengers side, no
need for those new fangled computers!
Full rally instrumentation - Ammeter and Oil pressure, that's it.
Besides, some of our rally roads are probably considered tame
compared to the roads this car had to handle when it was new.
Dave
|