Maxton June 26-27

If anyone is going, we plan to be there Friday afternoon. Green Ford crew cab white trailer GRM sticker upper left...

Wish I could, 4000 miles is a bit much.

Hope to see pictures and hear stories.

Good luck, rubber side down.

If it was 2 weeks later I'd be there! Good Luck, and give em hell!

Bring water...just going to be a hot one.

I thought about if you were going to the June event...glad to hear you're going to make it. Pack extra shocks. Just in case.

I can't make it this time. I have a Shelby Club event I'm heading to instead. Have a good time and good luck!

Best to the family.

Pat

Pat wrote: I thought about if you were going to the June event...glad to hear you're going to make it. Pack extra shocks. Just in case. I can't make it this time. I have a Shelby Club event I'm heading to instead. Have a good time and good luck! Best to the family. Pat

Pat, SDAC20?

I can't make it, but have a couple friends going. Including the one that made the Shelby-Dodge site.

I'm still hoping to hit Maxton in Sept. on the way to the Challenge.

Andrew, good luck this weekend.

-Rob

Rob_Mopar wrote:

Pat wrote: I thought about if you were going to the June event...glad to hear you're going to make it. Pack extra shocks. Just in case. I can't make it this time. I have a Shelby Club event I'm heading to instead. Have a good time and good luck! Best to the family. Pat

Pat, SDAC20? I can't make it, but have a couple friends going. Including the one that made the Shelby-Dodge site. I'm still hoping to hit Maxton in Sept. on the way to the Challenge. Andrew, good luck this weekend. -Rob

Yes, SDAC 20! I've been to 7 or 8 of the SDAC events and have a blast every time. Sorry you won't be able to make it.

Andy...170+ at Maxton!

Is the Nelson crew in Maxton yet? We got hammered with a storm here in PA this afternoon. Wouldn't want to be towing in that.

And Pat, what I had to do Sunday fell through so SDAC is back to a maybe. But we can start another topic for that.

Any word on how things went today?

Good and bad. Only one pass. Let the line and after the initial stumble and grumpiness of pulling out with tall gears, tall tires and no flywheel, the Stude was on a mission. Tach needle flew across the face, 2nd pulled like freight train, into 3rd KA....BANG........clutch in engines running, try third again...nothing, nuetral third again nothing, 4th..we got gear.....laid it on the wood 161 plus. Return road..1st, 2nd, 3rd zing nothing there, 4th. OK to the pits. Car in the air..no third. It's a Muncie big shaft and the spare is at home. It has too much value to take a chance so we loaded up.

158 miles into the trip KA..BOOM.....left rear trailer tire send traffic swerving in the rear view mirror. 2 hours, 2 tires and $220 later, we are back on the road. 380 miles into the trip... we get to 95 just North of Washington, KA...BAM....trailer jerks hard right, warning lights come on for trailer fault..nurse to the rest stop. Left rear axle is 8" forward. Left rear spring broke. Think, think, think. Jammed a chunk of wood in front of the back left trailer tire, pull truck forward to move the axle back. Grab the jack lift the trailer up enough to wedge a 2" piece of oak between front axle and frame. Take 2 axle straps and hook spare tie down to one and hook to back of trailer, then hook second axle strap around axle to come-along and pull it to the back of the trailer. An hour later...it's 45-50 the rest of the way home. In at 2:33am.

The good...1. We're home safe. 2. The boys learned to deal with adversity with out panicing. I told the little guy when he started to get a bit upset, 'Touch people deal with touch situations, they don't panic or get an attitude.' He immediately sucked it up and worked hard to help resolve the problem. I don't enjoy issues, but I am glad we have had the opportunities to teach the boys that real life has ugly moments. Deal with it. 3. The rear shocks worked fantastically. The car was very comfortable to run. 4. Met a bunch of GRM'ers who were racing various cars. Two guys there supporting another car, and they are building a liner. I suggested they mail something in to David. Four vehicles had Grassroots stickers. BTW Pat, you are front and center in the pic of the drivers meeting in the April event coverage in HR (August issue?).

The bad....1. I didn't bring the spare trans because I didn't want to buy the expensive carrying case and was going to built one and ran out of time. We race on pennys, nickels and dimes.....sometimes you get burned being cheap, as opposed to inexpensive. 2. I broke a big shaft Muncie..Ouch! 3. I got to repair the trailer in preparation for the 1000 mile tow to Maine to the Loring event Jul 31-Aug 2. If you are in the area and care to help, our to do list is now a lot bigger...

In reply to wheels777:

hey, i'm the other GRM teeshirt from saturday. thanks for tracking me down and introducing yourself. sorry to read about the return trip issues, but it sounds like you made the best of the situation.

we left about 2pm saturday, but met one of the lakester (blue a10 drop tank based) owners and learned a bit about the parachute mounting we'll be using on our streamliner.

here are a couple pics of the car from about a month ago when we rolled it out of the garage for the first time:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/51501182@N05/4738937761/ take care, george

I'm glad everybody is OK. My schedule is pretty crazy through July but if I can spare some time I'll see if I can get out there.

I bought two spare tires for my trailer last year. Haven't gotten around to ordering the rims yet. I'll be doing that this week. Then I'll figure out a way to mount them on the trailer before October.

-Rob

June 26, 2010 at Maxton, NC

Nelson Family Studebaker

Result of shifting from 2nd to 3rd gear at approximately 107mph... :(

Holy cow- that's some serious destruction.

Thankfully, you all got home safe and sound- a very trying trip, for sure.

But that trans failure is amazing. Did that happen when you applied power, or when you shifted? As in- it didn't fully relase second gear and the 3rd gear pack took the failure?

If that was power related- that's some serious grunt!

I look forward to learning something from this analysis!!!

Eric

Trans was fully engaged. Bang happened as soon as the clutch came out. Engine speed was around 6000.

Hey!! what is the Loring event in maine , any web site??

ronbros wrote: Hey!! what is the Loring event in maine , any web site??

http://www.lta-lsr.com/

wheels777 wrote: Trans was fully engaged. Bang happened as soon as the clutch came out. Engine speed was around 6000.

hmm. I just can't imagine what would hold one side hard enough vs. the other- that's just incredible destruction.

Again, please post what you learn- while bad for you, I really look forward to the new knowledge.

(BTW, am I seeing that right?- it kind of looks that the large gear was a sudden failure- since you can see the ductile "tearing" (can't recall the correct name), where the other gear has more gear left, but smaller gear still has teeth left, and shows more sign of debris damage)

E-

Ductile and shear. No fatigue. Was hoping to see something else. It was no big deal 30 years ago when I could get them at a yard. I got 2 more big shaft M20s, and may consider getting rock crusher gears. Or, if another one goes I will be looking for a Nascar 101 box. A little gun shy on this issue. The old Muncie's are tough to beat in high rear, but 1-2-3 hmmmm.

Our LSR car has rock crusher gears. aint cheap, from what I hear.

What was your estimated torque at that speed? While I know you are more than a capable engine builder, I just find it hard to belive that the box would not be able to take that kind of torque. Moreso that it was one gear- I wonder if you will find one gear tooth that had a flaw that just started a chain reaction?

Eric

alfadriver wrote: What was your estimated torque at that speed?

Andy doesn't "estimate" torque versus RPM.

alfadriver wrote: What was your estimated torque at that speed?

It was like a.... it was a lot.

In reply to wheels777: Wow that is a heck of a failure to have at speed. Glad pieces of the gear didn't jam up the trans. Could of been really ugly. I will keep an eye out for another Muncie and let you know if I see one cheap but they are getting hard to come by. Good luck at Loring.

Wow. I'm glad you and the family are OK after that trip home.

Sucks about the trans failure. It was said earlier, but I'll say it again. You're lucky a chunk of gear didn't bind up between anything else. Please be careful out there...a trans blowing apart because a piece of shrapnel pushed two gears apart could have been very bad at 161 mph.

I did see us in the HRM issue, which was very cool. You were even sporting the GRM shirt!

Good luck in Loring!

Pat wrote: ...You were even sporting the GRM shirt!.....

But of course. It's our raceday uniform. I need more white ones. It's too hot (for the grey ones) anywhere south of York, Pa. in the summer months.