Did you see the NPPA site today??? Looks a lot better to me. I think that is the one of the guys that bought King Cobra.

So in your travels to different shops are there going to be quite a few guys in Craig this weekend?

Got our throttle done last night. Now if the new carrier bearing comes in today we will be set and should be driving the truck tonight.

 

Hmmm...That site does seem alot nicer. We'll have to see how it progresses throughout the season. Hopefully, they do a nice job of updating it.

Haven't really talked to anyone lately. Your guess is as good as mine as far as how many trucks are going to be there. Chris is up in PA/VA so I know he won't be there. I'm thinking there should be quite a few 2wd's there. Not sure on how many 4wd's?? There will probably be some stuff that comes out of the woodwork that nobody even knew about. How are the guys over there with the 4wd coming along??

Hopefully, your carrier bearing comes in. You'll have to let me know how everything turns out. I probably won't work on The Wood again until Friday night/Saturday morning. I do not have any major things to do besides torching off some of my leaf spring brackets that I will no longer be using. That could always wait I guess. There is quite a few small things, but I should be able to get most of that done on Friday. After my one late night, I've been doing some things around the house so I haven't had a chance to get back out there.

Any new pics yet??

 

No pics yet. We want to wait until it is out of the shop and hosed off. It looks pretty bad with all the dust and dirt on it. Hopefully they have a good turnout this weekend. I would think that they would since our first pull in the next week but who knows.

The local guys haven’t gotten their motor back. At this point they hope to be ready for Red Oak but who knows. They have done a great job with the body work. It is a really sharp looking truck.

Hopefully they will get some good pictures of all the trucks this year for the website as that is what a lot of people want to see.

 

Well tomorrow night the trans and clutch get to come out again. Things worked good while on the jack stands but when it was on the ground it wouldn't shift again so we need to add back some more shims.

 

That blows. I wonder why it would work on the jackstands, but not on the ground?? Are you just adding shims and going with it, or are you taking measurements?? I do not remember the exact measurements on mine without looking at the paperwork, but the way we did it the last two times seemed to work. This may be the way you are doing your's also: Before disassembling, I put pressure on each pressure plate finger and place a 1/4" nut behind each one to hold them in (Using the handle of a hammer works great) Then disassemble. Once you add your shims and bolt back together remove the nuts...Make sure you do this before the bellhousing is back on. Measure the gap that you have between your pressure plate fingers and your pressure plate. This should let you know where you are at. Like I said, I do not remember the exact thousandth's measurement on mine, but your's may be different anyway. I'm not sure if that helps or not??

I forgot to tell you. We had our last Chamber meeting for the Fremont truck pull yesterday. Here is the deal with the pits. Pullers and 1 other person get in with a truck. After that, a person has to pay $20 to get into the pits. This is just the person, not their vehicle. I think the higher price will defer many away. I don't think having people in the pits is a problem. The problem starts when there is everybody and their dog parking back there.

I also had a guy call me last night asking about a possible exhibition pull. He has the tractor "The Mean Moline" I told him no at first, but he is from Valley so it's not like he has to come a long way, plus, I kind of felt for the guy. They are waiting on parts and just want to try it out once. I told him I could squeeze him in before or after the modified diesel trucks. Once again, I just don't want alot of people calling me with a request like that. I don't think that will happen though.

 

I think that is Jim Kinsyl or something like that. He is a Bush Puller but I think he hurt his motor last year so he probably just wants a test pass to see it things look/feel right.

We were taking some measurements but not the right ones. Let me ask you this. How much travel do you have before the clutch releases? This is a completely new thing for us and we are just learning about it. Thanks for the help.

On Fremont. What time do your trucks start pulling and what time do the pits open? We are planning to be there plenty early.

 

The guy I spoke to last night was named Jamey also. He seemed like a nice guy. Yes, that is all they wanted to do was a test pull. Basically to try the clutch and see how it runs.

Registration for the pull is going to be 12-3 so I'm assuming you should be able to get into the pits a little earlier than that. I'm sure there will be plenty of stuff for you guys to check out so you shouldn't be bored hanging out.

My clutch comes off the floor probably 3-4 inches before it starts to engage. I thought this was a little high, but now that I am starting to get a little more used to it, it seems to feel alright. I have probably an inch to an 1 1/2 of free travel on the topside before I start putting pressure on it to release. Is this what you were asking??

I'm definately no expert on it either. When I bought my clutch and flywheel, it was all setup so I really never had to change anything. Chris showed me how to take the measurements I described before. Once that checked out, I left it alone. It worked before, but we'll have to see what happens this time.

 

Yes I think that makes sense. I will print this off and show to Bryan tonight before we put it back together. I have been told that we should have between .060 and .065 “AirGap” which I think is between the disks and flywheel. I also emailed the RAM tech support. We will see if they are any help. One way or another that truck will be there tomorrow (even if it is pushed on and off the trailer).

I am sure that unless we are working on the truck we will at Fremont around noon or so.

 

Good to finally meet you. We found out that our cable didn’t break but when I was launching the cable flexed a lot more than expected and touched the header and burnt a big hole in the sheathing and the flexed outside in a big kink. After all of the damaged trucks got loaded we went back to Joe Smeal’s to get a mechanical linkage and got to watch the video’s. Your truck ran good but you need to find some traction (either your bars or wider streets or something). We learned a bit from watching our pull. It should be interesting next week in Fremont. I can’t believe Joe’s luck with another motor gone.

 

Yeah, it was good to finally talk with you guys. Well, first and foremost, Amanda and I had a baby boy yesterday. Cash Joseph was born at 6:53 p.m. He weighed 8lbs. 3.5 oz. It was a very eventful and well planned weekend. A truck pull on Sat., and a baby on Sunday.

I figured out a little more about my truck too. The noise I was hearing was my front driveshaft rubbing on a crossmember underneath. The high pinion 60 in the front moved the driveshaft up, but it never hurt anything until I added weight onto the front. I need to have a new tube put in, but I may have to run a spare shaft just for Sat. Also, I'm going to see if I can get both my tires pulling in the back this Sat. It's an open rearend, but I figured once I get more of the sled on it both will pull, if not, I may have to weld it or try and shim it. I was really impressed with the engine. I think there is definately some power there to play with. Nobody that I knew taped so I didn't get to check it out. From what I could tell it sounded pretty strong.

Did you guys get your clutch figured out yet, or was it in the cable. I thought your guy's truck pulled really well for the first time out on all of the changes you made. What do you all have to do before Sat.??

Yeah, that is crazy about Joe's motor. I would probably puke and s@#$ myself if something like that happened to me. Did King Cobra bite the big one too??

 

Congratulations to you both. That was some good planning and I am sure you were really busy this weekend. No I think King Cobra busted either the input shaft or the throw out bearing or both. I had to mow yesterday so I left the shop early, after we fixed the trailer and unloaded everything. Bryan was working on setting up the mechanical linkage already. I think it was probably just the cable but we won’t know until we pop it apart (hopefully tonight). We will have to find a happy medium with the shimming. Yes you need to weld your rear or put a locker in if it is open. I know that they tape all of the pulls and we just happen to be there to watch. You could see that your tires where turning good and the motor was rev’ing good but you just weren’t getting it to the ground. Hope that helps a little.

We were happy with the outing but wished that we could have made more passes. Hopefully we will get things switched for Fremont and it will work out. I couldn’t believe how well the hand throttle worked for me. I figured I would be all over the place with it. I was happy that Chris (one of the owners of King Cobra) was taking pictures of all the trucks for the website as they came through.

 

Well our clutch isn't in good shape after looking a newer one. Don't have the money to replace it now so we may run it for a while and see what happens....

I was reading on Eddie's myspace that there are no coolers allowed in Fremont. Can we bring them with water into pits?

Thanks,

Chris

 

What did you find wrong with your clutch?? Was the clutch used to begin with??

I don't think it should be a problem to bring water into the pits. I think they are trying to keep people from bringing beer in, but if you would put your cooler inside the cab of your pulling truck, I doubt anyone would know any difference.

I'm hoping to work on my truck either tonight or tomorrow. As long as one of the driveshafts I have works, it should not take me very long to get everything ready. I'll have to see how this pull goes and then decide if/what changes I am going to try and make.

 

Yes it was used. We used a cable and when I was bringing up the R's for take off the clutch pushed back, the cable bound, and touched the header. You can imagine what happened then. A nice hole in the side of the cable. We are switching to the mechanical linkage. We got some other things ordered so I don't think we will be done for Fremont. We may still come up to watch though.

Chris

 

Well we may have pulled the right strings to get some parts here Friday. Who knows. If we make it we do if not we should be ready for Humbolt. We will do everything we can to make it.

What do you have to do get a smaller diameter shaft? Hope that the little one and mom are doing well.