Wow, what a weekend! We started out with Friday night breaking in the motor so we did our low-power, mid-power, and full-power passes. Our full-power passes were at 11.5 seconds and 115MPH which is much better than our last motor. Everything went as expected and we didn't have any major mechanical issues. On Saturday, we changed the oil and filter and after inspecting the filter, we found that there was a minimal amount of expected wear so that was promising. So without any test-n-tune, we went right into qualifications. Again, we ran 11.5's with Friday night being 11.5049, and Saturday's qualifying being 11.5047 and 11.5090. Our first qualifying reaction time of .5093 put us as Second Qualifier on the night. Unfortunately we lost the first round of eliminations when I red lighted in the spectator lane. That lane always seems to be a quicker light and I forgot how quick that light was. After that run though, we found that the valley pan developed two cracks and spewed oil all over the engine compartment. We brought the car home and thought we fixed it.
Sunday started out well with making my two qualification runs in the spectator lane and got my timing back in that lane. We didn't qualify too well, with us falling to 14th out of 18 cars, but that also put is in line for a bye run of we went rounds. However, we were thrown a loop with the car running faster at 11.4464 and 11.4260. There goes our 11.5 consistency! So going into first round, we threw the dart and dialed an 11.45 figuring the car would slow down in the first round. We lined up against a very good driver who has won many races and managed to take the win while braking and lifting. This was going to be an 11.43 pass based on the incrementals, so it didn't slow down as much as we expected. On the next round, we again went up against a strong competitor and dialed it down to an 11.42. He put me in the spectator lane expecting me to red light and we ripped out a .505 light (perfect light is .500) and took the win. Quarter finals we got the bye run and for the semi-finals, lined up against someone who pretty much has every piece of electronics you could have in your car, and probably more. We were also fighting our oil leak problem again and decided to stuff a rag between the valley pan and the intake to get by. Well, that came back and bit us. We had a decent light and were on a winning pass when the rag somehow went from under the intake to inside the carburetor.
Ultimately we finished 4th overall on the night, which for a new motor, new setup (gears, motor, etc.) and a rusty driver that is not bad at all!!! I am very proud of the team and how everyone did such a good job to get us to where we ended up. With a lot of effort, hard work, and luck, we managed to have a successful weekend and the car went on the trailer under it's own power. So now we are going to upgrade the valley pan and the front cover (which leaked now and then throughout the weekend), and get ready for next month.