Whitewall Electra spanks the Young Lad's

Well I have not posted in years since my "Humbled Smack Talker in SRT4" post. But thought I would share a good memory from last summer

My 16 year old son and I took the Electra out on a saturday and heard that that north of town on a calm stretch of road they raced on weekend.. what the heck lets check it out. We go about 20 miles north an sure enough here are all these cars parked and they are running. We pull up in the ole 70 electra 2dr complete with skirts and white walls... ok better fess up (ported irons, 11.5:1, stock 60k mi original assembly, 288 94H cam, 850 q jet, stock manifolds, 9" 3500 stall trishield converter, 9" ford out of a lincoln 3.90 gears, msd ign.. thats it). So we roll up in watch for about 45 minutes and this mustang say a 2000 model? is spanking everyone. So after awhile he make a run and then pulls up behind me in this state pull off where everyone is parked an watching the cars run out on the road. I look at him and say, "Hey, you want to run my Tuna boat?" he says "That thing?" and laughs to his buddy.. I say "well I have never done this before and it might be fun" (biggest lie I have ever told). He says sure and kind of blow me off as being insignificant. So finally he follows me up to the line and some Gal is flagging... the pull off parking point is about at the 1/8th mile and is where everyone is watching. I put my Kid in the right rear seat for traction and to shoot a vid. The gal drops the hands and we launch like a banshee... hole shot him and immediately put 3 car length on him.. the best part was the faces of all the people as we passed the 1/8th mile, disbelief of seeing the the reigning Gladiator getting beat up by the Doughnut eating Fat kid on the playground. It was so bad he just shut it down as I put the 7th car length on him.

So now when we pull back into the parking lot, we are waaaaay more interesting to the crowd than we were 5 minutes ago.. Like we are the new hot chick in town!... Now they want to see what is under the hood.....Sure!!! I pop the hood to the impressive mill of rusted stock air cleaner, red valve covers, no headers, not nitrous. MSD was the only thing they could see.
What? no turbo, no supercharger?

So now the Guy in the SRT8 wants a shot at the FAT KID, surely he can take back the title and bring this party to the comfortable reality of Mustangs, ricers and late model iron.... Surely this was a Fat Kid fluke and the mustang must of lost traction, missed a gear, spun......???? We line up, we lauch.. and .... NOT! the outcome was the same, Race was over in the 1st 60'.. the ole electra launches great great on the 20 year old white walls.

One thing I could not figure out is after talking to them how can my 13 sec electra be beating all their 12 and 11 second cars? Well at least that is what they did before we raced.

 

Torque Power! :TU::TU::TU::TU:
Keep up the good work. Many happy returns.

 

The newer cars make up all their time on the back half of the 1/4 mile and beyond. The stock gears etc is set up for fuel economy and a lot of guys who modify them don't realize that.

 

Yup, I used to beat a lot of low 10 secnd Mopars and BBC cars in the 1/8th mile with the Stage when it ran mid 11's. Would run about 7.00 in the eight with the 540HP Iron head mill.. but the big mopars and BBC cars would come around me in the last 300 ft. 1.48-1.50 60' times in that 4100 lbs car will do that..

The old stage had it's tongue out by 800 ft, and they would just cruise on by..

That was 25 years ago.. many,many of the street motors I build these days would have made that a different story.

Although it sounds like the ol' Electra was still pulling away in this case..

Good Job Dennis.. now don't bring Dad's car out there, you will traumatize the youth of Fairbanks with that thing..

JW

 

Now thats what Im talking about!

 

Yes Jim I noticed that, after the initial sucker punch off the line and I put some lengths on them that I dont pull on them much if any for the remainder. Probably getting everything out of the old tank for no more that is done to it, 13.4 @ 101 is best so far on a 2 60'. I did pick up some of the bigger 68 430 manifolds I thought I might try? Do you think it would be worth the effort to put them on? I was thinking with the ported heads it may be more of a benifit than you would gain on just a stock headed car. Just a theory.

 

Oh, Jim

We picked up some 15 wheels with DR and I gave Dad some no-hop bars for Christmas. Installing this week. The 470 is ridiculous on the 14' tires, incinerates them from a 50 mph roll on in 3rd. Now we will get to finally lay the pedal down (i hope) and feel what she has. Thing is a monster, i dropped the timming back for 90 octand we have here and it is still stupid muscle.

Den

 

Ported manifolds won't hurt, be interested to hear how much they help, that has been a subject of discussion in the past.

Do a baseline run with the stock manifolds, and then get online, and figure out the Density Altitude, and correct that run back to sea level. Lots of different programs online to do that for free.

Then do another run with the new manifolds, and do the same.. then compare the corrected numbers, this factors out the weather.

JW

 

Ya, 615HP with 14" skinny's is a bit of a mismatch.. :3gears:

Have fun, should run just fine on the 90 octane with that camshaft.

JW

 

Congrats on the wins. I've had similar experiences with my Buick, once at Dragway 42 near where I live. Left my car in drive and did a couple of runs which puts the car in the low 14's. Then a young kid came by in the pits and started talking smack and it was on. Manually shifting changed my numbers to the low 12's in a hurry and lots of whining after the race. You gotta love them young'uns. They see 455 on the fender and ask "How many liters is that?" When you tell them it's about seven and a half, their eyes get big and they don't know what to think.

 

Never lost to an SRT 8.... don't want to talk about the Pt Cruiser though!:spank: Have to watch out in Michigan, you can run into factory cars and that can be a real surprise.

 

Great story, sounds like a lot of fun!

 

You would think that after the wagon put the hurts on those boys they would say away
from those big "BUICKS" !!!!!
Nothing like a bamboo cream BUICK!!

Bill

 

Welcome back I remember the NEON post like it was yesterday. Must have been a good laugh on the drive home.:laugh:

 

Hey, great story!! Thanks for taking the time to share. Sounds like a fun time and you opened some eyes.

 

Tuna boat.........That's funny.

 

I have kept the wagon low key for years now, it wore out its sleeper status so I built the Electra to be a low key sleeper as the wagon looks racey with the Gs hood. And when u hear it....secret is over..slobbering race horses begging for fuel.
Electra is the best insult to money spent on on the latest hot car. Best fun ever on a Saturday night!!

 

Typical race is they let you go and think they will walk you down...hahaha... Big mistake

 

Yeh, but funny as ****

 

I could read these posts all day long. Great story! Great car!