A new Nostalgia Funny Car license holder

[Mike]

Anyone who has ever watched a funny car race will doubtless know of the Chi Town Hustler, a car that was campaigned out the Chicago area by John Farkonas, Austin Coil (yes, THAT Austin Coil) and Pat Minick. As the Nostalgia Funny Car demand has been growing, Troy Martin has recreated the 1973 Chi-Town Hustler Charger and has been campaigning it.

Last weekend, Martin took the Hustler to Lucas Oil Raceway in Claremont, IN, so an aspiring nitro racer could get his NFC license. And this wasn't just any racer, it was for a fellow whose heart has been pumping CH[sub]3[/sub]NO[sub]2[/sub] for his entire life. This racer was none other than Mike Minick, son of the Chi-Town Hustler driver, Pat Minick.

[media]

This was Mike's final licensing pass. He was a bit late getting the car into high gear, but still ran 6.655 @ 211.33. It had to make him feel good, getting his license in that particular car.

You know, the more I see of the Nostalgia Funny Cars, the more I am enjoying them. A 1966 to 1979 body (that actually looks like a real car), a single 21 gallon fuel pump, a single points-type mag and a 6-71 blower running at 18.99% over. Remember when fuel motors actually sounded like they were going to jump out of the framerails and rip you to pieces?

Check out this qualifying shot from Bakersfield. Jeff Arend was driving Dale Pulde's War Eagle Firebird (arguably one of the more beautiful Funny Cars ever) running against Mike Halstead's Bomb Squad 1973 Duster.

[media]

5.866 @ 228 MPH? How was that pass any less exciting to a butt on a board than this pass -

[media]

Do either one of those cars look like Mustangs? Plane hangers for rear spoilers, lifting the bodies to pull the throtle stop, light the second mag and set idle speed, as well as last minute timer adjustments to the clutch logic pneumatics. Blah, blah, blah, just get to the other end of the track so I can listen to you tell me about all of your sponsors. The same sponsors' names splashed down both sides of your car that I had to sit there and watch.

Take the scoreboards away from the average fan and they would have no idea Force's Mustangs were almost 2 seconds quicker than Pulde's Firebird. The teams are griping about the expense to feed one of today's Funny Cars and NHRA is always looking for ways to slow the cars down. So why not go back to where they started and who cars about 3.99 second 1,000 foot passes?

 

[Mike]

Remember the good, ol' days, when the fuel cars did dry hops?

How about a dry hop and then backing up for a quick spin through the glue?

Dennis Geisler really wanted to cross the centerline, so he kept his foot down until he did!

And who could forget this wild bunch?

Amazing how drivers could stage their own cars, wasn't it?

 

[Mike]

And for a guy like lincolnuT, who wonders why I spent so much of my life at the races -

And if you think that's somthin' special, you should see the girls that go to the drag races! :thumb:

(Turn your speakers down, the soundtrack sux.)

 

[Mike]

For those who visit the NitroMater board, you'll doubtless recognize KingNitro's eye candy shots. For those who don't, I can sum it all up in one word - SCHWING!!!

And after all those dry hops, Prudhomme still smoked the tires?

And the, along came Jim Head to prove the burnouts were actually hurting performance and the era died...

 

[Mike]

It's good to see how the Ol' Man got so much recognition in this one.

 

[Lee_in_KC]

'Nuff said...

 

[Mike]

"Jungle" Pam Hardy. :thumb: And young people think today's drag racers can put on a show?

One simple way to check for leaks would have been for Jungle to have just engaged the reverser and started backing up. But something would have been lost, using such a simple method. :nod:

The years have been kind to Pam.

 

[Mike]

How many nostalgia-minded members do we have? Can anyone identify the individuals in this one -

If no one can get it, right off the bat, I'll offer up a clue.

 

[RPM]

I wonder old Pam is now? She must be in here mid 60s. I remember them well. They wee from southern Pa and used to come to our local track some to test (Capitol Raceway). What ever happened to funny car, top fuel and pro stock shows? All the big names were on tour at local tracks. They would come to the local tracks and you could walk right up and talk to them and meet them. That does not happen any more. All the big rigs and stand inline to wait to talk to them and get an autograph.

 

[Mike]

Ron, I'm guessing if she's 60, she's just that and not much more.

As for those shows, it got to a point where a guy like Force wanted the sun, the moon and the stars to show up for a match race. Their stuff is always set on kill, so it costs them a lot of money to come in and make 2-3 passes. And the local tracks can't afford those kinds of cars/teams any more. A tame fuel pass is somewhere north of ~$5K these days, so it takes a lot of tickets to make that up.

A guy like Jungle would scrounge used parts and run his car soft. He knew what the fans wanted. They wanted to see a Jungle Jim car (there were as many as four at one time), they wanted to see the burnouts and they wanted to see header flames up over the roof. And they wanted to see Pam, half-dressed, laid out on the track, "checking for leaks".

You have to remember, those old cars were running 21 gallon-per-minute fuel systems. Today's cars are ~80 GPM. A typical fuel car warm-up, burnout, staging procedure and 1,000 foot pass will burn over 22 gallons of fuel. Where are nitro prices today? $55? $60? You're talking ~$1200 per pass for one of the cars off the circus. Pistons, bearings, plugs, valve springs, clutch discs, floaters, tires, etc. Those guys just aren't going to match race any more and the promoters know they couldn't afford them, anyway.

Enter the Nostalgia Funny Cars. A heckuva lot easier on parts and wallets. And look at that pass of Mike Minick's. Start the car, water burnout, back it up, stage and leave. No fuss and no muss on the starting line. No logic adjustments, no air adjustments and no throttle stop to remove, so reason to jack around raising the body and risking someone getting hurt in the process.

[media]

The Nostalgia cars are starting to take on match race dates. But some of the people trying to do car restorations are getting those cars to a point where it's a risk to run them. So it's going to always be a small field, until people start purpose-building nostalgia cars to just go and go fast with, that is. If you had spent the time and dollars necessary to restore WJ's Camaro to this point -

...are you going to risk getting it into a wall, or having the guy in the other lane get into you?

And yes, if you were wondering -

...SOMEONE got a little carried away with the hood scoop on the restored car.

The problem with trying to recreate a period-perfect car is that it's going to take lots and lots of dollars to do it. There's a guy that has restored Glidden's 1978 Fairmont, which was the undefeated car. The restoration doubtless cost triple what the original car cost. And anyone who ever got close to one of Glidden's cars after a couple weekends at the racetrack could see the car was already beat to death. Not trying to disparage Glidden, because his stuff was always fast, but man, if something didn't want to fall apart and back together again, he would beat the stew out of it until it did. He ran that Monza at Indy and failed to qualify. The story went that the balancer was degreed wrong. 'Mad Dog' was thrashing, trying to get the car ready for Indy and failed to check it. As a result, he never had the right timing in the car.

He ended up selling it to Lingenfelter, who wasn't real gentle with his cars either. I saw the car at the Indy points meet the next spring and it was pretty raggedy. Amazingly enough, a Ford racer tried to run a Chevy and failed, so he sold the Chevy to a Chevy racer who promptly put a Cleveland in the car to run B/EA.

 

[Mike]

See what I mean about the Nostalgia Pro Stocks?

[media]

And if it looks as if those cars are doing their burnouts up a hill, yes, they are. Union Grove Dragaway, in beautiful Union Grove, Wisconsin.

 

[Mike]

But you've never seen a drag strip with hills, until you've been to Quaker City Dragway, in Salem, OH.

[media]

This place was a trip. I would get Brian in the car, down in the staging lanes, get the power turned on and open the CO[sub]2[/sub] bottle for the shifter. Then I would have to run about 2/3's of the way up the hill, to where they were constantly putting water down, as it was running down the hill as fast as they could spray it. He would get the signal to start the car and would drive the car up the hill in low gear. I would stop him after he had rolled through the water, where he would put the trans in 3rd. I would then back him into the water, so he could do the burnout. Thrills and spills a minute. And if you look closely, you will see the shutdown area was also going uphill.

I hated the place. We had a bicycle in the trailer to get around on, but at Salem, it made no difference where you were going. You were riding uphill. We unloaded over there for a points meet and in the first session we went to the number 1 spot. We got back to the scales, which were in the pits and they told me we were 10 lbs. light. I was madder than a wet hen, because I always ran the car 45-50 lbs. heavy, to slow it down a bit. We backed off the scales and they checked calibration. We rolled back on and got the same report. We went to the trailer and I filled one of the other weight bars with 25 lbs. of lead shot. We went back to the scales and were informed we were still 5 lbs. light. I went back to the trailer and filled another weight bar with another 25 lbs. Back to the scales, where they informed us we were 5 lbs. over. We still qualified number 2 or 3, but that was with yet another 50 lbs. in the car. Come Sunday's eliminations, they suddenly had a new set of scales working, back on the return road. After the first round, they weighed us three times, before they were satisified we were legal. Of course, they wouldn't let us look at the scales when we were weighing. Bastirts! We went to the final that day. Some really good friends from the Detroit-area beat us, stepping up over a tenth over their fastest run. At the Divisional awards banquet, they admitted they were using propylene oxide in the final round. Flippin' cheaters!

And wouldn't you know, at the very next race, we unloaded the car and took it to the scales before we even went through tech. And we were 95 lbs. heavy. I pulled the two weight bars back out and we rolled back up on the scales, where were were just 45 lbs. heavy. Amazing how the people at Salem saw that 50 lbs. as being just 20.

We burned three pistons at Salem, one year. The car was running like Jack the Bear, but it was eating itself in the process. One year, we had a starter lock up, at the head of the staging lanes, trying to start for round 1. The temper tantrum Brian pitched was quite a sight from the top of the hill. I ended up having Andrea drive the truck forward, so we could get his helmet un-wedged from under the rear axle of the truck. When we still had the Chaparral trailer, we used a dragster track to load and unload the car. There was a track that ran down the center of the roof, with an electric winch on a trolley. When you pulled the nose off the car, there was a threaded bung welded to the front of the chassis. When the car was in the trailer, there was an eyehook threaded into the bung. When it was time to unload, we would winch the front of the car up in the air. The winch cables were fitted into a trailer plug, with sockets at the front and rear of the trailer. Winch the car up, unplug the winch and then roll the back end of the car out of the trailer without having to lift the nose of the trailer. Plug the winch in and lower the nose of the car, then roll it down the trailer door. We had rolled into Salem and pitted. Brian left me and a slag to unhook the trailer and unload the car. And the slag forgot to unplug the winch, ripping all the wiring from the plug. It must have taken me an hour to sort the wiring combination out. With Brian yelling and stomping around the trailer, all the while. Quaker City, I do not miss thee, nary a bit.

 

[putz]

She actually has her own site with tons of pics.
http://junglepam.com/ facebook page that is open https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=297101073638277&set=o.48818662953&type=1&theater

This was at woodburn napa day this september 30th.