Postcards From the Edge 2007

July 14, 2007, July 16, 2007, July 17, 2007

Love that red car!! :}

To all the Convention Attendees:

Every years we ask those that are attending, in a quiet sober moment, to send us daily updates. Include pictures and narratives of all the shenanigans. I will post a thread on the website for the 2007 Postcards.

This is a way that you can help the rest of us manage our withdrawl. If you can't reduce your pictures, then send them directly to me off list. I'll take care of the reduction. Don't forget your smell chekker, it's a lot faster if I don't have to correct drunkin irrors!!(TIC)

Have Fun - Write Often.

Larry Eck
97TR
Mods
Cam Failure #425
96MG
Almost Bone
Webmaster www.v8sho.com
LMIR
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Looks like the next few days will be a little busy. Making a last minute run to WalMart. Daughter's wedding in 3 1/2 hours. Reception until 8:30 PM. Finish packing as time allows. On the road about 3:30 AM tomorrow. About 17 hours to just Northeast of Des Moines, Iowa where I relax Sunday with a retired Navy buddy. On the road again about 3:30 AM for the supposedly 7+ hour sprint to K-zoo. Just saw on CNN that Kansas flooding problems have driven up midwest gas prices. Nebraska and Iowa are on the listed states. Looking forward to meeting everyone. Everybody have a safe trip.
Lucien
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Well, congrats on "unloading" your daughter ;)) You never mentioned that to me hun! That was timing huh? Just guess she figured you needed just ONE more small thing on your mind huh?

Well, my flight yesterday was smooth as glass and no hitches at all. The Portland and Atlanta airports are a bit bigger than I wanted to walk though ;(( Made the short hop up to Nashville in nothing flat, and we are just chomping at the bit to leave now. Things are great so far!

God speed Lucien, give me a call when you head out, but I think we are probably leaving to arrive on Saturday, as we are just too darn excited and wouldn't sleep here anyway ;)

Also looking forward to meeting new people and meeting up with olden buddies again!

Larry, I will try to compile a "postcard" every day or two and send it off, but if anyone has anything specific they want a picture of, drop me a line and I'll take request photos for ya! I'll do my best to include names too! I know how much those meant to me in years I was unable to attend.

Christina Casselton
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I'm jealous!! wish I was there.

k mier
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7/14/2007

The parking is tight at the host hotel tonight, seems
the bowling alley is going full steam. They should not be there
Sunday or most days, we just need to make sure that the hotel lot is
saved for us, and I have requested that of the hotel, we will see how
good they do.
Also, people need to be careful around the construction areas, there are
reports some gaps in the road and drop-off's around new curbs being
installed.

I know this is going to be less than ideal, but nothing I could do
about it at the time. There is another parking option that we may be
able to use, I will contact them when I get in.

Don
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7/14/2007

Larry, would you please post these. I'm laying over today outside Des Moines, Iowa. I'm sure I'll take a few more shot before arriving about mid-day tomorrow.
Thanks,
Lucien

SE ID sunrise SE ID sunrise. Green River Wyoming Wild life

West NE N. Platte NE Rare Sighting of the Invisible Bus.
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July 16, 2007

A little bit over sized, but this is from Porter's golf outing this morning.
Having fun. Time to get to the lot!
Cheers,
Seth

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I haven't been back to Kalamazoo since I left there in August of 1979. No reason why not - I'm not wanted for any crimes that I know of - fathered no children (that I am aware of!). ... Just never went back. I'm sure it's a lot different today.

Maps show familiar streets - I lived on WMU campus and also just off S. Westnedge.

Mike Frey
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Project Rowboat and I arrived about 7PM just in time to register and catch some of the reception. Caught up with Kirk, Chris Archer, Ian, Ron Porter and many others.

Ian and I Ran out with the MTX and picked up some groceries and the like. Then later Willie and I went out...

It had sprinkled a small smattering of rain, and when the car was put down in second and opened up there was some of the notoriously evil wheelhop.. followed by that "spinning metal on metal" sound...

Rowboat is disabled for now, about 5 miles from the hotel, we will pick her up and bring it back here for disection today. Outlook of fixing it here is unlikley but I won't know for certain until I can see what failed, I suspect the splines on one or both of the axles are trashed.

Really I am fairly upbeat as I had one heckuva fun drive here, and picking third at 60 and hanging on until 95 is priceless...

Scott

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July 17, 2007

Here's a few more pics from last night.
The evening started with the welcome reception - highlighted by Don's highly detailed description of the week's events, which everyone paid attention to as evidenced by Ron (MI) catching a few z's and Kurt (IN) and Dave (IL) studying the table cloths. Don, if anyone doesn't inflate their tires properly, you know why :-)
We then went to dinner at Cheeseburger In Paradise. In the dinner photo, clockwise from the head are James (MA), Shruthi - my wife (OH), myself (OH), Ron (MI), Kurt (IN), Dave (IL), and Dan (IL?).
The final picture is of me and Christina Casselton (OR) hanging out in the parking lot. All was going well and then the rain came. I can't believe I gave her 2 bottles of Arrogant Bastard :-)

Seth "Beer Guru"

*You outta see the naps taken this afternoon after the car sho at the Drivers meeting prior to Gratten!!**
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FWIW - The BEERS are where you find them sometimes.
Had a lot of driving to do today, couldn't imbibe. Had to find another
outlet for BEERS.

Near the Michigan border on 94, caught this sign this morning.

Eric Lehmann
97 Ebony 42k Welded - With the Angels Now so that I don't have to be.
Long Live the Garage Queen !
96 Medium Willow Green Metallic 103k Resurrected, Welded
96 Rosemist 72k 2006 Best Of SHO, Popular Vote, Welded
96 Medium Graphite 120k - Resurrected, Welded
97 Pacific Green - Parting this one Out

*It was taken at sunup, I had to lighten it up a bit. *

U.L.
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Departing Group shot from theSHOw

Eric Lehmann
97 Ebony 42k Welded - With the Angels Now so that I don't have to be.
Long Live the Garage Queen !
96 Medium Willow Green Metallic 103k Resurrected, Welded
96 Rosemist 72k 2006 Best Of SHO, Popular Vote, Welded
96 Medium Graphite 120k - Resurrected, Welded
97 Pacific Green - Parting this one Out
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Funny how the most visible cars in that shot are a Ranger, a Solara, Mustang, Crossfire and S4... lol... OH... and the 1 SHO in the foreground. Good turnout today and some amazing cars!! Really enjoyed the cruise, guys! Thanks for a good first Convention.

Charlie Miller
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Now there are TWO Gen 3 MTX cars in Kalamazoo.

The weld is what broke, but not the one on the small shaft, it was the one that I never would have expected to break, the one that was seam welded to the inner CV joint. The weld didn't penetrate into the Mazda half.

I have pictures but the camera is in the car, I am leaving for a truck stop to see if it can get welded up by them.

Scott
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How were the original welds done? MIG or TIG? I recall pictures which
SHO'd raised, smooth welds, but not the method.

Is there a lot of chrome in the Mazda shaft?

*why is it that Beaker always has tranny problems at conventions??? That is pop quiz for old timers*

We of course only wish Scott the best as he has slaved over this project for almost 2 years. Blackhawk - puked tranny fluid, Thunder Hill - puked tranny fluid in a fine display of smoke, Putnam - aww c'mon guess!! BEEP Wrong - he was an instructor at Putnam, kept good ol #13 in the pitts.

Love Scott like a brother.
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07/18/2007

If I expected either weld to break it was the one that carter was questioning if it would interfere with the tranny seal as it is much smaller in diameter and hence has more torque load exerted upon and has less linear area to be bonded to.

Attached are the pictures. If Larry could actually show up I would pay my nickel in person - I kept the size down as best I could.

The "crippled" picture actually has some intriguing things along the extreme left edge.. You can see the Ford emblem on the other MTX V8, you can also see the broken CV sitting on the cooler.

"Weld2" shows where the weld apparently didn't flow into the corner.

"reworked" shows what the result of some money and a visit to the truck stop for welding and dinner netted me, the picture is kinda crappy as I had to use flash...

Got to autozone at 9:59 (they close at 10) and got another boot clamp, and a packet of CV grease. Finally got the bugger to snap into the tranny. I will finish up in the AM.

Things are looking up for certain.

Scott

Drivers Inner Reworked Truck Welds
stop style welds!
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She moves....

We had a hard time getting the axle to clip back in last night but with three people, one holding the strut out of the way, one holding the CV straight in the starting splines and one on the hammer it popped into place and I just finished assembly this morning and took her for a brief test drive. I will test out third again on my way to spectate at Grattan, but will be nice to the shorter gears.

Scott

*Ya know I was just sittin here thinking while posting this, it's usually Josh that has his car up on jack stands every night in the parking lot. How's his beast been fairing, especially after a spirited day at Gratten??**
U.L.
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Funny how many volunteers you can find in the parking lot that will work for beer, eh Scott???? I got some cuter pics of Scott himself as he didn't want to dirty his t-shirt ;)

Christina
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Back home tonight
100s of SHO's, what a sight
Dread work: its a blight

We had an uneventful trip home, but I had a great time for the day I got to spend with SHO folks. Next time I will be sure to take the whole time to spend in the parking lot... and at the events. Here are my brief highlights:

1. Golfing with Ron. I was in a group Kirk D. and Tony Fullone. A wise word to golf course managers: If a group says that they are a here for a car convention and order beers at 8:30 on a Monday morning, do not give them golf carts :-)
2. Getting to the parking lot after golf and seeing all the SHOs. Every now and then I see one and it looks like crap (that is, outside of Garber's as they look great). Even the dirty ones at the convention were nice. I saw Ryan Pasch's MTX
3. Meeting folks I chat with on this list (and other lists) like Lucien, Christina, Carter, Kirk, Willie and some that I never met before like Kurt, Dan, and James.
4. Giving Christina 2 large bottles of Beer - one Arrogant Bastard and one Ruination IPA. Now if any of you have had the pleasure of meeting her, you will find this entertaining! Don't drink them all at once, Chris, I don't want to be responsible for the aftermath :-)
5. Capturing the essence of a speech by Don and getting a great snap of Ron catching up on his z's.

If anyone is heading back east on Rte 80/90 through Cleveland and needs a break - let me know! What a great group of folks! Next time I will be present for the whole damn thing, hopefully with a SHO.

--
Cheers,
Seth
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Today at Grafton was beautiful; weather was perfect, temperature was great and other then the swimming pool issue, the facilities were very nice.
Several cars made off-track excursions at 5 or 6 after getting light at the rear entrance they had them using to enter the track. One of the most spectacular was Rick Glass who in the last session when while he was hauling the amazing transmission-less (another good story that delayed track usage for an hour) Willie Orput (when he proceeded to spin off the track ending up back in the truck in a reverse direction facing oncoming traffic which managed to avoid him completely but leaving what resembled a huge pile of $hit from either Rick or Willie just in front of the corner forcing the flag man to indicate debris on the track.

Other exciting moments from my vantage point from the back of the track included an off road excursion by Ian and at the same area followed by a couple of the V6 guys.
The highlight though had to be the entrance of Willie as the center of the days attention when he came out of 5 smoking spewing transmission fluid through 3 corners before he coasted of the track onto the grass. After the wrecker came and removed him the track crew came out with a sweeper and several bags of oil dry. Poor Willie was the victim of an apparent torque converter seal failure. When I last saw him after the event he was deciding weather he could get it repaired locally for $650 or have it towed back to Lima for $450.

Well I am off to watch one of the V6 guys who spun a bearing on the track swap his engine in the parking lot tonight.

Carter Fuji
Latitude 35.23948924537855, Longitude -94.30673988764765
'97 ES Whoosh CarDomain Site
Supercharger Video Link
Greenwood, AR.
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Willie's car is in the parking lot here in the hotel but I have no idea if he has made a decision on what to do.
As far as the motor swaps, it turns out that two V-6 's have had issues involving lower ends. One from California however turns out that it broke a connecting rod and jammed it into side of the block locking it up. I understand a local club member donated the use of his garage while another had the tools and hoist to do the work. The other is being handled by a local wrench.
Still quite a crowd around one of the supercharged V6 SHO's but I am not sure what is being repaired.

Carter Fuji
Latitude 35.23948924537855, Longitude -94.30673988764765
'97 ES Whoosh CarDomain Site
Supercharger Video Link
Greenwood, AR
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First convention for me, and I'm having a blast. It's really good to get some faces with names now.

Willie... Where to start? At least he's not 1000's of miles from home. If there's one thing that he can't be accused of, it's pussyfooting around the track. The Gen3 cars gave 'er hell out there. Someone feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, but I think Willie accepted the offer of a tow home.

We're starting the v6 swap in the morning I think. I'll be there helping as I've pulled Gen2 motors 3 times now, whereas the owner has less experience. Good news is that the donated garage is only a few blocks away.

The blue Gen2 S/C car shredded the serpentine belt somehow at the track and was running (somewhat) when it started to rain just a bit ago.

Alan Ridge
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So much destruction! Was it like this in Memphis? I don't seem to remember it being like this at all in Indy...
Roman
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Just talked to Scott. Rowboat hasn't yet torn off it's 1/2 shafts, and in heavy air is running 15.5's but he complains of crappy 60' times. As a baseline the freak sho is only running 15.4's and the black GIV running about 15.9's according to Scott. He couldn't remember what Carter was running.

He was on his way to get fuel for the bracket eliminations coming up later in the day.

Scott also mentioned that he has eaten a few GII's but I failed to ask if MTX or ATX - if MTX that would be fairly cool.

Stay tuned.
Larry Eck
97TR
Mods
Cam Failure #425
96MG
Almost Bone
Webmaster www.v8sho.com
LMIR
__________________________________________________________________

Back at the hotel...

Ryan and I ran head to head "three" (really two) times. The first run his missed a shift so we agreed a rematch was in order. Right before the brackets began Don graciously allowed a X8 MTX grudge run. We were both staged and the lights started, my tree went from one yellow to one red. We suspect that I was staged VERY shallow and with the clutch in rolled back far enough to roll out of the stage light. I sat there confused, Ryan did a pass, then after watching Ryan finish the run they started the lights for me so I ran, and we ended up doing a rematch after the first round of brackets was completed.

It was on the bracket run following the botched attempt that I finally figured out that the car needs to be launched with more revs and more clutch slip than I was giving it, and I shaved my 60' times down into the 2.3's from the 2.4 and 2.5's. On that bracket run with a 15.65 dial I was WAY ahead and hit the brakes pretty hard at the end and advanced by running a 15.66.

The run with Ryan I believe was my 15.09 Time of the day. Ryan's time on that run I think was like 15.7, his TOD was 15.5 on his first run. Freak's TOD was 15.4. I didn't really catch much of Carter's times as I was making lots of passes (probably 15 or 20) and thank god nothing broke as I wasn't being gentle. I know Carter at one point had a 15.4 dial time, and Ian thinks he dropped that down to 14.9 but we are unsure. I tried a few more times to get a 15.0x and failed, and even fell back to 15.5 until I launched at a higher RPM. The launch engine speed is hard to set as the PCM I believe is trimming the IAC some making things difficult in that respect.

The week is a smashing success for me, the broken Axle Monday was a huge blessing as I am pretty confident I would have broken it today otherwise.

I'll start pulling pictures off of my camera and resizing them for posting now.

Scott
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Any idea on how Ryan's MTX is doing? I think he and Scott should go head up for a couple of runs.
Seth
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Ran a 15.4 but my reaction times were all above 1.0 except for the first one and I didn't get it to start shifting into second until the last 2 or 3 passes of the day.
The highlight of my day though had to have been the second pass this morning when I looked at the boost gauge going from 2 psi to 9 as I revved into the 4,000 range then suddenly a loud "POP" that was heard in the stands and the boost went to zero with the engine quickly falling silent. My wife and father in the bleachers started discussing with Christine how we were getting home as I coasted without power past the stands to the lights. I ended up jumping out to push it the last 100' or so to the turn out lane. After the guy in the timing shack came running down he helped me clear the end of the track since I couldn't push it up hill that last 40' around. After I cleared the track and caught my breath I opened the hood to reveal what I pretty much expected to find, the intercooler tubing had blown off the intake since it didn't get tightened down enough from the previous weeks servicing. A couple more turns of the screwdriver and she was back in the staging lanes next to Glen's Marauder.
After several more passes I dialed in at 15.4 for the first run-off which turned out was way to conservative after playing with the X-Cal2's programming at the lunch break and nearly broke out having to take my foot completely off the pedal at the 1,000' and even step on the brakes before the lights since it was certainly running better. Staging for the 3rd run-off I dialed in 14.5 and still had to get out of it before crossing the finish line. I was eliminated on the second to last run when I blew the reaction time though I came within 5/100 of my dial-in beating the other guys 9/100.
Did a couple of fun-runs but couldn't better my 14.5 as the day and car were both getting hotter.

Carter Fuji

Latitude 35.23948924537855, Longitude -94.30673988764765
'97 ES Whoosh CarDomain Site
Supercharger Video Link
Greenwood, AR
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Yup he was I remember. I think it's a combo deal Roman, very high humidity and crappy track. IIRC I thought Don said it was a "fast" track. Hmm

Larry Eck
97TR
Mods
Cam Failure #425
96MG
Almost Bone
Webmaster www.v8sho.com
LMIR
_________________________________________________________________
Several signs at the track advertise "the fastest track in the state".
Tony had a serious traction issue with the Lightning. Could spin them for half the track.
Carter Fuji
Latitude 35.23948924537855, Longitude -94.30673988764765
'97 ES Whoosh CarDomain Site
Supercharger Video Link
Greenwood, AR
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2007 SHO Awards
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07/19/2007

Some Pictures from Eric:

Love that # Seen that Be4 Make Them Pretty GIII's

If you have to ask OK so what? Barney in the Stall

Bra - ready to rock
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Just talked to Scott. Rowboat hasn't yet torn off it's 1/2 shafts, and in heavy air is running 15.5's but he complains of crappy 60' times. As a baseline the freak sho is only running 15.4's and the black GIV running about 15.9's according to Scott. He couldn't remember what Carter was running.

He was on his way to get fuel for the bracket eliminations coming up later in the day.

Scott also mentioned that he has eaten a few GII's but I failed to ask if MTX or ATX - if MTX that would be fairly cool.

Stay tuned.
Larry Eck
97TR
Mods
Cam Failure #425
96MG
Almost Bone
Webmaster www.v8sho.com
LMIR
_________________________________________________________________
07/20/2007

Rowboat is at home

Well the project car completed the trip home after a slight detour through Lima to drop Willie off as his car was being trailed back later today.

After I got home I had some dinner and got called into the office. Over the last 800 miles I was finally getting a good feel for the car and generally was happy, but most of my time behind the wheel was driving the endless interstate from Columbus to K-Zoo and back.

Since I got called in I had the pleasure of taking the car on familiar roads where I know the traffic issues. Don't tell my wife but I think I've found a new love. Second gear near the end of the freeway on ramp makes slotting into whatever open space there is a piece of cake and if 65 or so isn't fast enough third is begging for the punishment.

Cruise doesn't work for my car or Ryan's - I gotta figure that out as it will drive me crazy.
I have a slow leak from what looks to be the rear main.
I may have the drive line too stiff in the engine bay (nice problem to have actually).

The objective at this point is to whip the snot out of this thing for a month or so while working out the tuning before I drop the SF again to repair the oil leak.
Scott
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Can't wait for another ride in it, in oh about 365 days ;)) Very nice job Scott--loved your car my friend ;)

Christina Casselton
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Ya Know you can tell a Krietemeyer, you just can't tell him much!! Freakin bravo for your efforts sir. You are now part of SHO history that will never ever go away. Proud to know you. Does this mean now Emma and Tyler are a lock?? :}

Props to both Ryan and Scott for making a dream come true - two GIII's with a clutch pedal. No small accomplishment. And they both ran!

It just don't get much better, IMNSHO!
Larry Eck
97TR
Mods
Cam Failure #425
96MG
Almost Bone
Webmaster www.v8sho.com
LMIR
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I was part of the majority, thinking it was a doomed project.
I have never been so happy to be wrong,
Hats off!

& twice as nice to prove FMC wrong, Don't make a MTX Gen 3, no one is interested!

Someone was interested enough to roll their own.

Now comes the curiosity, how does it drive? Et's? ect...

Tim *eatin crow* Wright
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Well there are two of them...

Both were severely behind schedule, I can only speak for mine, but it came in close to on monetary budget ($3K) but I don't calculate my time as any $$ amount on this project or I would be in tears. The only reason it stayed close to budget when I changed trannies halfway through is because I had budgeted for the $800 LSD for the contour tranny which I was able to sell off and that money pretty much bought all of the Mazda stuff.

If someone can get axels this could be done in their garage in about 2 months (just working weekends hard) knowing what we know now.

I am afraid this car is going to get me into trouble with the law actually...

I'll make another post with time slips.

Scott
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Well done, Scott! I know you put a lot of time, sweat, tears and cash into this, but I'd love to see a list of what is necessary to do a conversion like this. If/when the slushboxes puke on my pair of 99's, I might be interested in doing a MTX swap as opposed to 'fixing' the ATX.

Also, some pics of the job - interior, under-hood, etc, would be greatly appreciated!
Dave Garber
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+1000

Bill Tomlinson
(Trophy Whore)
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I fully intend to do a PDF document with pics embedded in the near future. There are still unknowns about potential longevity issues, but I will state where I think those are at, and future "mods" can make their own decisions, there are some areas where I took the apparent "easy" way out. One of which is having one long CV assembly and no intermediate bar. Are the bearings in the tranny really okay with this long term or not? I will find out eventually.

Scott
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07/22/2007

Here are a series of pictures donated by Scott K. Thanks Man.

Banquet:

http://www.bubbleshare.com/album/202874/overview

Drags:

http://www.bubbleshare.com/album/202044/overview
Gratten:

http://www.bubbleshare.com/album/201981/overview
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Convention Drag Video's
Lucien has taken several videos of the drags. They are currently in quicktime (.mov) format. I was was planning on converting them to wmv or mpg, but in hindsight wouldn't just uploading them to youtube be easier and solve the hosting at the same time?

Regardless I am working on something,

Scott

I have completed uploading several files to You Tube. They are under my login or you can possibly search for "SHO convention 16".

My account:
http://www.youtube.com/user/ven0msho

Scott

Contact Information