Forum Activity for @will-cronkrite

A Day Late But........November 20th, 1983 - Bill Elliott Racing History - Western Winston 500

Stock Car Racing History

Not much to add, but two small things:

We 're-skinned' this car when it got back on the east coast. I still have the small piece of metal that they closed in the bottom of the gas filler hole.

Dale Singleton drove my car for me at Atlanta, with unhappy results. I cannot find the big picture but here is a link to my website that shows the damage. It is the last picture on the right of the top row of pics. He was fun to be around.

http://www.mantiquesresto.com/aboutus/NascarPics/NascarPhotos08.html

A Day Late But........November 20th, 1983 - Bill Elliott Racing History - Western Winston 500

Stock Car Racing History

Nice Job Cody!

O---BY THE WAY he did it again

Current NASCAR

Tim,That was a compliment, and when reading that post of yours, I was reminded of when my Dad was alive, and I was growing up. He was smart all along, it just took my growing up to recognize it.

Have a great day.

O---BY THE WAY he did it again

Current NASCAR

I'll be darned! Tim, the longer I know you the smarter you get. LOL

Thank Goodness for The Rules of Engagement

Current NASCAR

Just random thinking here, but if they were thinking what I was thinking, I would not have gotten too excited about using a fire extinguisher either.

From looking at the time it took for the 'sparks' to cool down in the path that the car was leaving, it seemed appropriate to think it was a brake rotor failing. If that was the case, the 'stray' pieces of the brake rotor would have been dragging thru the remnants of old tirecords that were left on the car and around the axle housing from an earlier incident. This would have the possibility of cutting thru a brake line to the right rear tire. The lack of smoke from the flames while it was on the track would indicate the lack of a petroleum source of the flame, leaving the possibility that it was brake fluid. If that were the case, as soon as the driver stopped, the flames would stop shortly after the driver quit pumping the brakes, and you could expect the flame to stop at that time, but just before the brake fluid quit appearing, the heat from the fire blew out the tire extinguishing the brake fluid flame at the same time, leaving only the dust from the burnt tire and inner liner to be around.

As always, just a thought!

Thank Goodness for The Rules of Engagement

Current NASCAR

You guys are spot on! They screwed the #12 royally, and it was very evident as they were doing it, and it was on the face of Roger Penske when he received his owner trophy.

Never, Ever, doubt the impact of RR on NASCAR or the popularity of TMC Chase

Administrative

Smile, LOL

MARK MARTIN RETIRING?

Stock Car Racing History

Hey Dave, that is an interesting newspaper report. I know I am getting old, but this does not ring a bell with me going down this way. I do vaguely remember the rag, but not the name Bobby Jones? There were several of Marks friends from his short track group there at the track. Getting old perhaps???

MARK MARTIN RETIRING?

Stock Car Racing History

I do not recall the non-starting issue because of a shop rag, but that would have been my responsibility as I was the crew chief.

Regarding the single rear spring: I also recall hearing about Marks car possibly having extreme left side weight that allowed the left rear spring to be quite heavy, say 450 pounds/inch, along with a terribly weak right rear spring, say 110 pounds/inchthat was suspended from the top spring bucket. That would allow the car to have an extreme amount of bite, both entering and exiting the turns, but cause extreme front tire wear if not re-arraigned before the start of the race. That setup would also allow the crew chief to change the bump steer to have almost two degrees of anti-Ackermann to allow for the increase of slip angle caused by the increase in right front tire down force caused by apparent loss of weight at the right rear tire.

However, this remains only a rumor!

MARK MARTIN RETIRING?

Stock Car Racing History

Hey there, Dave

Thanks for posting that newspaper clipping. That car was one of my early scratch built cup cars that came out of my White Crown Engineering shop in Fort Mill, S.C. Ray Dillon sent a front clip that I got approved by NASCAR, and we build the rest of the car from that start. If you are OK with it, I would like to add this picture to my own website? Do you have any other pictures of this car at Richmond?

This car had many 'innovative' features. Instead of using sheet metal to go between the existing frame width and the lower edge of the body side panel,I added another length of 4" x 3" rectangular tubing over the entire length. It initially went un-noticed, but after the race, some one got to looking and they made us uncover the ends to find what they considered an excessive amount of lead, and after more investigation they re-weighed the car and found out that we were running 60-1/2 % left side weight. The rule book was subsequently changed to specify a maximum left side weight. (around 52% if I recall correctly). This car was extremely responsive to wedge and track bar adjustments, allowing for a lesser degree of stagger to be needed.

I have never liked stagger as I always felt that while it made the car feel better in the turns, one of the reartires was 'dragging' going down the straight sections of the track, negatively effected brake bias when entering a turn and contributed to premature heat build up and wear in the right rear tire.