Change Can Be Good and Bad, Mostly Good!

Traci and I are leaving in the morning on a trip that serves two purposes. One is to go to a trade show in Indianapolis specifically for the racing industry. It is called P.R.I. 

I have always wanted to see it and this year we just decided to do it. We are meeting Joe (our business partner) there as well, which will make it super fun! Joe is interested in machining and fabrication and there will be a big display of machinery there doing demonstrations and showing the latest CNC technology.

There will also be thousands of racing component manufacturers there showing off their latest technology. 

The only thing scary about this show is the potential to find things that I "have" to have (Centroid 5-Axis CNC mill😉😉😉)!!!! Joe will be there to be the voice of reason, ha!

The second part of the adventure was somewhat of a surprise for us. I got an email last week from Rick Jones (the chassis builder for the new car) to let me know that my chassis is finished and has been removed from the building jig. We are going to their shop (4 hours away) after the PRI show to get fitted for the chassis accessories (pedals, steering column, seat, etc.) That is so exciting! We will also iron out all of the other work that we want Rick to do before we take delivery of the car.

The new basic chassis is complete!!!

I have been thrashing on the old car to get it ready to run so I can start working on the new car as soon as we take delivery of it. That brings us to the whole point of this update and the "preachy" part of the blog.

Old vs New, that is something that all of us struggle with from time to time! Change is difficult but change is inevitable!

Most of you know that I am a sentimental person and I get emotionally attached to everything! The same goes for my race cars, motorcycles, and everything else. Being sentimental about inanimate objects makes your shop get full, plain and simple. When I started rebuilding "The Black Hole", I fell in love with it again. I am excited about the new car, but I have spent so much time on "The Black Hole" that I am excited about it just like I was when I put it together the first time. I even saved the old heavy body thinking that someone might want it for their race car, so I tried to sell it and give it away. I had no takers, so the body has been stored in the top of our race trailer for many months collecting dust.

As I work on "The Black Hole", I am coming to the realization that this is a completely different car than what it was. I am also coming to the realization that "The Black Hole" is no longer "The Black Hole" It served its purpose and now it is time to move on. 

New titanium a-arms and tie rods to save weight.

All titanium steering linkage to add rigidity and save weight.

Turning the steering wheel actually turns the front tires again.

New titanium driveshaft enclosure. Approximately half the weight of the steel enclosure it replaced.

That brings me back to the body being stored in the race trailer. I opened up the trailer today to get some hardware that I needed and saw the old worn, floppy body, sitting there drooping sadly from not being rigidly attached to the chassis. At that point I decided it was time to move on. It was kind of fitting that the day before we were headed to see the new chassis for the first time, I decided to dispose of "The Black Hole". I stripped all of the hardware that could be reused, cut the body into small pieces and burned it in the burn pit (country living thing). 

Poor "Black Hole"!

Very Floppy body like mine!

Out with the old and in with the new.

Reduced to this in less than 10 minutes.

Going, going, gone.

Fiberglass resin makes a very hot fire.

Getting rid of old baggage and moving on is something we all should do more often. I am learning to get better at it, but we can all improve on that. Old baggage holds you back, takes up space, and keeps you from moving forward! I am talking about both emotional baggage as well as physical baggage!

The only things I saved were things that reminded me of how significant "The Black Hole" was! These objects were reminders of how we got here and what we did/did not accomplish. This process was an important part of moving on. Remember how you got there, where you are going, and what were your hurdles!! Bust down the hurdles! With the help of the Janis family, our hurdles are going down, plain and simple!

Saving just the hood (not the whole front end) to hang on the wall of a man cave some day.

I could not burn these, Again, wall hangings some day.

Sorry to my cousin for posting this picture but this is something we did not achieve! We lost Kayla to cancer, but we will run 5.80s for Kayla someday soon.

For a while now, I have known the name for the new car. You all have probably picked up on it, but you have not been privy to the whole name. Now that I have left "The Black Hole" behind, it is also going to play into the Christian theme. 

The new car was simply going to be named "The Project" but me being me, I had to complicate it a bit, ha! Because one of my goals is to tell the world about Jesus, I have chosen to use a name for both cars that reflects that and peaks people's interest.

The new car will have the name, "THE salvation PROJECT". The word "Salvation will look like inserted or corrected text like it was added after the main name was done. This along with our race team entity (Luke 1:37 Racing, LLC) should either peak people's interest or drive them away, ha! 

"The Black Hole" will be renamed to "THE Resurrection PROJECT" because it is being resurrected from the dead. Fitting indeed! 

"THE Resurrection PROJECT" will be our 1/8-mile race car while "THE salvation PROJECT" will be our 1/4-mile NHRA legal national event car.

I will save the color scheme reveals until we are closer to finishing the cars up but let's just say they are going to be colorful!

So, the moral of the story is this. When your old body gets floppy and worn out, get rid of it, rename it, or resurrect it to give it new life. If you can't do it for yourself, Jesus can!! I just could not resist saying that!!!

Also, change can be exciting and give you new life, new goals, and make you feel younger.