Slowly Chipping Away

 As I sit down and write this post, we are approximately 375 days away from debuting the new 67 Mustang ProMod at our first NHRA national event. We have our engine pretty much paid for, our new 67 Mustang body is done and has been shipped to the chassis builder. We have our spot reserved in line for it to be built but they are running behind schedule at this point. 

In the mean time, we have been testing the Blue Banana and getting it ready to race again. Our first test session was less than stellar because we had a lot of problems with the electronic fuel injection system. We just upgraded the fuel injection system and are ready to test it again, we just have to find the time. We changed to a higher flowing system (lots more air) with two huge throttle bodies and a higher end control system. Once we get it tuned correctly, it should run very good!

In order to put the new fuels system on, We had to do a bunch of fabrication and machining. That is the stuff I enjoy most about race cars, there is always something to do!!!

Sitting in the staging lanes on a Friday night test session at Houston Raceway Park

Machining gasket surfaces of the new intake manifold to fit my engine/cylinder head combination

All machined and ready to put on my engine

New tunnel ram style intake manifold and 2 huge throttle bodies

New throttle linkage fabricated

New air scoop tray is just a blank and has to be machined to fit the new throttle bodies

Air scoop tray machined and air filter holder installed

Giant air filter for lots of flow

Trial fitting of air scoop

New machined manifold fits the engine like a glove now

All decked out with the new fuel injection setup

We are also putting The Black Hole back together with its new lightweight body. We are making quite a few changes to it and will have to start all over tuning it once we are done. It will be a much better and safer car once we are done with it but is not our solution for NHRA racing. It will just bridge the gap until we get the new car running.

Upper firewall cut and fitted to the new body

New longer 4- link bars and about 1.5 inch longer wheelbase to make the tires fit correctly with the new body

Widened wheelie bars because i screwed up the measurements when i had them built originally!!!

New wider carbon tubes. Perfect fit now!!!

Now I have begun mounting the new body on the car. I am making good progress and should get done before the new car is ready to pick up from the chassis builder. That is the plan anyway!

I have about 1/3 of the rear mounts fitted and pretty much have the design mapped out in my head (I know that is scary). Once I have a plan, it is going fast!

Diagonal brace going to the lower fender well

All of the body mounts attach to this center bar which slides into a slotted bracket. This makes the whole body removable without having to cut the braces loose from the chassis.

Rear deck lid support going from the mounting bar to the deck. This plate will be permanently bonded to the inside of the body.

View from back side. There will be 4 more diagonal braces going from this bar to the upper quarter panel and the rear bumper area

Bonding plate on the end of each diagonal brace will be permanently bonded to the body

The “Project” is starting to sink in as we move slowly toward the goal. It really hit home this weekend when Mike Janis Jr. (Mikey) sent me this. I may not have it exactly right how this image came about but I believe the NHRA was talking to some of the full time racers about what the ProMod field looked like for next year. I believe this was part of a planning exercise for schedules and logistics for NHRA next year. As a result this list was created. You might be interested in looking at #3 on the 2023 part time teams. I know that guy! Seeing this really solidified the magnitude of our project! We are committed to the “Project”.

What is really special about this is the amazingly small group of people on this earth that get an opportunity like this! I really believe with all of the people we will have praying for us and supporting us, we will accomplish a lot. We are committed, the Janis’s are committed, and Jesus will guide and protect us.

I will end my post with this picture that we took while taking Traci for a ride in our Side by Side UTV tonight. Traci loves to go for evening ride and this one was special. It was her 61st birthday today and we went to go watch the sun set on Lake Livingston.

God was certainly painting pretty pictures tonight.

HE IS AWESOME!!