August of 1974 had started on a high note !
I was confident that we could run on ?and set records in ? six different classes at Speed Week. So, I sent the SCTA a check for my entry fee ? and for five class changes ? a total of SIX entries??...
We moved ahead, confident as always ? and as it would prove- frequently mistaken.
My wife Ellen and I would have a friend's help for speed week. The Bike engine was ready, except for updated pistons ordered from Venolia and anticipated the week before departure. The Van engine was fresh, and even the van body had a fresh paint job in Harley colors. We had (some) cash for the trip, and plenty of vacation time scheduled.
We were going to Bonneville, and looking for Blood ! With our winding route, this would be at least 2,500 miles, and at least 5 days of driving. AND, we DID have an alarm clock !
If only we had those Venolia pistons??..
The morning we were scheduled to leave, the pistons finally arrived by UPS. After work, into the engine they go. The engine turns over, but binds near TDC.
Modeling clay told us the valve pockets in the pistons were too small for the bigger 1974 spec. valves, and the valves were hitting the edges of the valve pockets in the pistons.
It is now late in the evening, and we have not packed. I do NOT have immediate access to a milling machine, and I am NOT going to do this with a drill press. Besides, I don?t have a jig to hold the piston in the drill press.
We carefully rolled the race bike into the van and strapped it down. We then packed, and tossed everything quickly into our humble slant-six van, and off we went at dark-thirty in the morning.
As the 1960's band Steppenwolf said:
Get your motor runnin'
Head out on the highway
Lookin' for adventure
And whatever comes our way
We are one the road, and heading to SCTA's Speed Week. However, the bike is still incomplete in the back of the van. The engine is in the frame, minus the heads, intake system and pushrod gear. It has the new but interfering pistons in the bores of the special aluminum cylinders. I have had 12 months to get this program working, and now a week before Bonneville, I am dead in the water.
Sometimes you just need to have faith?
.
Being a Harley guy, I had brought a bunch of hammers and a handful of chisels. With the heads off, I used the engine cylinder, while mounted on the engine, in the frame, as a jig to hold the piston. With the piston mounted normally on the rod, and at the top of the stroke (TDC), I chiseled away the valve pockets. We?re going 65mph through Louisiana, and I was banging away with hammers in the back of the Van. Our friend spelling Ellen behind the wheel, watched me bemusedly in the rear-view mirror.
This is NOT CNC, but it IS the will to race !
As we wondered west, we wound up going through a number of small towns. Since I was lacking the HUGE carburetor jets we anticipated needing, we stopped at every Japanese bike shop looking for Mikuni parts. No cell phones, no telephone books, no internet.
Good as we made it sound and look, we were still very much a shoestring operation, even if I didn?t let it on. We had NO spare engine parts to speak of ? only one extra pair of pistons, a few sets of rings and some gaskets. NO spare engine. NO spare crank. Not even spare cylinders (which would bite us later?.) Not even a spare tire for the bike.
By Houston, pistons thoroughly ?chiseled,? the engine is now completely together. The engine spins 360 degrees with no interference, and clay confirms valve clearance. We will, however, be arriving at Bonneville with a new build, that we have never even fired up.
I am tired of sitting on the floorboards instead of a seat?
By the time we make Denver, we have all the jets, and we believe the Harley engine is ready to run ? and run fast !
Avoiding the steep climbs through the Rocky Mountains, we take the longer ? and flatter ? route north into Wyoming, and head west. Near the Utah-Wyoming border, the van gradually develops a driveline vibration, so we reduce road speed and limp toward Salt Lake City, already behind schedule. So near, but yet so far.
The now-100,000-mile Dodge driveshaft started making a fatal shudder just outside Salt Lake City, and we nursed ourselves into town. I felt like I was driving a blender set on ?milk shake.?
We were directed to the independent drive-shaft shop of one Eldon Pugh, in the industrial area on the west side of town. I avoided the Dodge dealer, afraid of the associated costs of a ?real? replacement part.
Eldon wandered out into the parking lot, peeked under the van, and remarks: ?I don?t see what your problem is, but you sure have a LOT of weight in a ? ton rated van??might need a new u-joint AND shaft.?
I am now even MORE worried about costs??..
Eldon says: ?We?ll just pop that thing out of there, and see what we can do??? I watch helplessly, while the van rises into the air on the lift.
Eldon?s men removed the driveshaft and put it into (what I now recognize as) a drive shaft balancer and aligner.
Elden reports: ? Well, for whatever reason, your old shaft has a little hop in it??(I am momentarily stopped when he says ?your old shaft,? and I am refocused instantly on the cost side of the equation)
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Trial balance weight in place
? I think what you really need is a new shaft, maybe with a little thicker wall to resist flexing. We can weld a new U-joint on the one end, but heavier duty. The new shaft will accept a more-sturdy CV joint replacement than what Dodge puts in the 100 series vans. ?
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Old bottom, new top
?We will true the shaft after we tack-weld it, and balance it for 150mph. Should be good for another 100,000 miles, and then you just being her back, and we?ll service it.?
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New shaft under construction
I am still thinking costs while I sit around in Elden?s modest office while the work takes place. We are WAY behind schedule, and I cannot concentrate on the HOT ROD magazines available in the men?s room???
There is a dusty picture of the Summers Brothers 400 MPH car on the wall, in faded black and white. Cheap plastic frame.
I asked Elden about the picture. He replied: ?Those boys towed that heavy race car on a trailer all the way to Wendover from LA. First time they drove it, the better-looking brother said it vibrated so bad he was afraid to go any faster that 200mph. They brought it to me, thinking it was drive shafts.
Wasn?t the shafts.?
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JohnBaechtel.com
?We put the car up on some HEAVY jack stands, and ran it up in top gear, and you could just SEE the vibrations. That vibration was road speed, NOT engine speed. I put my hand on a fender and said: ?ain?t no drive shafts, gotta be something else.??
?They pulled the shafts out, and I pulled out a BIG old motor we used for ?in place? tire balancing on semi trucks. We spun them tires really fast, and sure enough, it was the wheel bearings. Them boys had trailered that heavy car all the way to Wendover without taking the weight off the wheels. Brinelled the bearings REAL bad. Had to replace ?em right here in the shop.?
They got some sort of record, and they sent me the picture saying on it, ?thanks for all the help?. Been there ever since.?
I asked Elden how much all my driveshaft work was going to set me back, and he thought a minute: ?I gotta have a bunch ?a money, ?cause of that heavy-duty CV replacement joint. I reckon $55 will do it?
Greatly relieved, slightly poorer, and still a day behind schedule, we set off for Wendover. Reminded by the heat and the (now former) vibration, we stopped at Leatherby?s Family Creamery on West North Temple and bought milkshakes for the road.
With no real problems, we passed inspection, and pick a promising spot in the pit area, a quiet spot a little further from the friendly and competent Les Leggitt operation, with a nice view of the track.
Happily taking my completed inspection form to the registration trailer, I was greeting "old? friends from last year, and anticipating being handed my inspection sticker, and heading off to the staging lanes.
The kindly lady with impressively long nails in the trailer smiled and said:
Oh, YOU are Scott Guthrie !
The SCTA has been trying to get in
touch with you for some reason.
They asked me to give your check back,
because they can?t accept your entry.
PHOTOS: In the original articles, lovingly published by Wendy at the BONNEVILLE RACING NEWS, there were PICTURES !...It is a little too cumbersome for me with my 75 year old pre digital brain to post those here since it involves photobucket and things like that. IF you go to my facebook account, the pictures are attached to THAT version of these articles..........https://www.facebook.com/scott.guthrie.3154.........