From Ringer
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Going at it like a crazy person should-
This is a 2000 HP all Aluminum 632" Whipple supercharged Big Block belonging to Don Stevens. Beautiful boat. I got the priveledge of doing a major change to the boat and installing Air ride to his trailer as well.
I filled his dash in, got rid of the old monitoring system-
That was just the start!! After DAYS of prep and work, I laid it all out and nervously started drilling holes into the ten thousand dollar dashboard. All new Autometer Marine Pro gauges followed-
During the Thrash. What a Mess!!
Behind the scenes
....and the finished product
That's it for this week! I'm going to mix myself an Adult beverage!
This is a 2000 HP all Aluminum 632" Whipple supercharged Big Block belonging to Don Stevens. Beautiful boat. I got the priveledge of doing a major change to the boat and installing Air ride to his trailer as well.
I filled his dash in, got rid of the old monitoring system-
That was just the start!! After DAYS of prep and work, I laid it all out and nervously started drilling holes into the ten thousand dollar dashboard. All new Autometer Marine Pro gauges followed-
During the Thrash. What a Mess!!
Behind the scenes
....and the finished product
That's it for this week! I'm going to mix myself an Adult beverage!
WOW! Man, have we been busy! THe crew ran down in Haystack Oregon and took the 8 second trophy. My wife and I were gonna run the bus over to MarDon for the summer close party, but the Thursday we were leaving, I checked the oil on the bus and it was overfull. That's never good, so I ran the Bus to the shop and since it was warmed up, it made sense to go ahead and pull the pan, because in the 92 series Detroits, will tell you where the problem is, if the cooling system is under pressure by looking up at the liners. So I did. Kind of a mistake, but there was coolant migrating around one of the liners and that means pulling the heads and liners. That kinda put me in a rotten mood, so I went home and had a beverage. Maybe two. I cancelled our weekend party and figured I would work on the bus over the weekend.
The next day, Tony Skagen called me and told me they has a Motel room available and I said, "Screw it! Let's go boating" I hurriedly started getting ready and in my mail drop was a new Tachometer for the wagon, so I thought, hell, I'll toss in a tach and be ready. Well, we all know how easy things are in the Gbodies, it didn't go as planned, but I DID prevail and have an accurate tach now. Then it was a quick bearing check on the trailer. One bad set was discovered. Hundred bucks later and an hour, my wife says she is ready to roll
The party was great, lots of fun, saw a ton of people did a bunch of boating and a few donuts on the beach in the wagon. Came home and spent the next nine days fighting the Detroit in the bus, I did a complete in frame. Liners, bearings, all the o-rings and fire rings naturally. Runs GREAT now.
I told Finnegan I would build him a Stainless Steel Street legal dolly trailer for his new Drag Boat. So, here's what I have been working on for the last almost three weeks. I have almost $8500 in parts alone and it will be another $3K in polish before I bonzai down to Bakersfield for delivery.
Getting layed out and tacked
Initial inner frame
Coping detail
Trailing arms. Polished 304 SS
Tacking to the Axles after narrowing
Coping the fenders into the frame rail. This is a particularly cool, unique part of this build
It's coming together
Time for clean up
Mocking up the low ride
Bags and trailing initial location
Fabbing out the shock mounts and Trailing arm locations
Welding in the shock mounts
Panhard bars, 4340 Chromemoly and Jhonnie Joints
Panhard mounting points
The Ride height control valve
Upside down on the table for weld out
Starting the hard lines for air supply
...and that's as far as I got today- I will post up the rest of the build. It should be in polish come Monday!!
The next day, Tony Skagen called me and told me they has a Motel room available and I said, "Screw it! Let's go boating" I hurriedly started getting ready and in my mail drop was a new Tachometer for the wagon, so I thought, hell, I'll toss in a tach and be ready. Well, we all know how easy things are in the Gbodies, it didn't go as planned, but I DID prevail and have an accurate tach now. Then it was a quick bearing check on the trailer. One bad set was discovered. Hundred bucks later and an hour, my wife says she is ready to roll
The party was great, lots of fun, saw a ton of people did a bunch of boating and a few donuts on the beach in the wagon. Came home and spent the next nine days fighting the Detroit in the bus, I did a complete in frame. Liners, bearings, all the o-rings and fire rings naturally. Runs GREAT now.
I told Finnegan I would build him a Stainless Steel Street legal dolly trailer for his new Drag Boat. So, here's what I have been working on for the last almost three weeks. I have almost $8500 in parts alone and it will be another $3K in polish before I bonzai down to Bakersfield for delivery.
Getting layed out and tacked
Initial inner frame
Coping detail
Trailing arms. Polished 304 SS
Tacking to the Axles after narrowing
Coping the fenders into the frame rail. This is a particularly cool, unique part of this build
It's coming together
Time for clean up
Mocking up the low ride
Bags and trailing initial location
Fabbing out the shock mounts and Trailing arm locations
Welding in the shock mounts
Panhard bars, 4340 Chromemoly and Jhonnie Joints
Panhard mounting points
The Ride height control valve
Upside down on the table for weld out
Starting the hard lines for air supply
...and that's as far as I got today- I will post up the rest of the build. It should be in polish come Monday!!
That is a piece of art. You can never, ever post too many pics of stuff like that.
Once it gets delivered, will you see see if you can get us some shots of the boat on the finished trailer?
Once it gets delivered, will you see see if you can get us some shots of the boat on the finished trailer?
It'll get a lot of coverage. I have some pictures of the boat, so I'll download some. It's rumored the boat gets a big inch Sonny motor, but we'll see. Also, the trailer and boat are going into a studio for a formal shoot and will be featured in Drag Boat Review. I'm getting pretty excited to get this thing in polish now!
Awesome work as always, Matt.
You never seem to run out of interesting things to work on. Keep the pics coming...we love it. 😀
You never seem to run out of interesting things to work on. Keep the pics coming...we love it. 😀
Well, we took home the 8 second class wins from CDBA and NJBA so race season is officially over. Now we have to concentrate on fixing what we neglected during racing, gotta make some money and prep for next year. The biggest complaint I get from the immediate family is the lack of opening windows on my G-Body. It is an annoyance, to be sure. Well, as my wife is feverishly attacking the third bathroom remodel in our house, I started perusing Craigslist. Actually, I am a craigslist lurker with a PayPal account and that,is a very dangerous combination! I spied a 77 Malibu Estate Wagon for trade, a couple weeks ago. I text the guy, he has it still. I gotta go racing in Arizona though, so I say if you still got it when I get back, we'll talk. I got back last Wed. and yesterday, I tricked my Admin into taking me for a drive. I lured her with the promise of Double pay, lunch and an Adult Beverage, plus she gets to drive a C-6 Vette. The drive required a Ferryboat ride across the sound and an hour on an island. We pulled up a long driveway up to a pretty nice house and up top was the car. It needs paint bad, but it's straight and not rusty. My secretary throws up just a little in the back of her mouth. She is praying out loud that I pass on this one, because she is automatically implicated in the acquisition of this gem, in my wife's eyes if I drive it home. I am really on the fence, because it is so ugly.
But, then I open the door. The car is silver, wood grained with red guts. The seats are nice, headliner nice, power front bench, power windows, door locks, intermittent wipers, cruise,A/C, two speed defrost, tilt, posi. Now we're all fags here and we all have our weakness's. My weakness is factory gauges. Not idiot lights. The car has a full gauge pack. The guy wants $1200 with the aftermarket wheels. I tell him I'm still on the fence. He has a dual exhaust crossmember, sway bars with boxed trailing arms from an SS ElCamino and a complete spare Tach dash. I say toss in the goodies and for a Grand, we got a deal. He says we sure do. I start it, zero smoke, we pull out, my secretary is now crying, the car drives awesome! We get back on the ferry and this is the only shot I got of the car so far. My wife is going to kill me....
But, then I open the door. The car is silver, wood grained with red guts. The seats are nice, headliner nice, power front bench, power windows, door locks, intermittent wipers, cruise,A/C, two speed defrost, tilt, posi. Now we're all fags here and we all have our weakness's. My weakness is factory gauges. Not idiot lights. The car has a full gauge pack. The guy wants $1200 with the aftermarket wheels. I tell him I'm still on the fence. He has a dual exhaust crossmember, sway bars with boxed trailing arms from an SS ElCamino and a complete spare Tach dash. I say toss in the goodies and for a Grand, we got a deal. He says we sure do. I start it, zero smoke, we pull out, my secretary is now crying, the car drives awesome! We get back on the ferry and this is the only shot I got of the car so far. My wife is going to kill me....
Matt,
It sounds like you did very well on that Chevelle wagon. That's a well overlooked body style. There seems to be more substance to those cars than the '78-'83 A/G-body variety. I guess they are a bit larger in comparison.
Take some more pics of it when you get a chance. I like it.
It sounds like you did very well on that Chevelle wagon. That's a well overlooked body style. There seems to be more substance to those cars than the '78-'83 A/G-body variety. I guess they are a bit larger in comparison.
Take some more pics of it when you get a chance. I like it.
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