Appendix operation early Sat. morning. Barbara, Lizzie and Roland, his dad, took the trip. Barbara and Liz drove back on Sunday. That’s over 1200 miles in two days, and Barbara did all the driving, both ways. Did I mention that she tows the trailer the same way!

Ryland is doing just fine. The Navy doctors had everything under control and he had laser surgery, which allowed then to discharge him from the hospital early Sunday morning.

I stayed home to complete a Photo Project at our church. This project has been going on for every week in February and I am glad to have it come to a close.

Kevin and I took the car to State Capitol Raceway for Test & Tune on Sunday afternoon after both of us attended church.

The car ran excellent. With weather conditions not quite as good as the last time we were at the track (Density Altitude) back in late January, but much better than we will have later this year. We still made some real good passes.

The 1st pass was a 9.04 @ 147 MPH. As noted, we had removed the open spacer and changed plugs to a new set, the same as we had in there. After the 1st pass, Kevin pulled a couple of plugs at the end of the track, before returning to the pits, and they were white, just like they came out of the box. The EGT was 1430 degrees.

For the 2nd pass, we put 94 jets in and made a pass of 9.019 @ 149 MPH. The car left early and we thought it was the drivers fault, but later we discovered the voltage was low going to the delay box. The box flashes when the voltage is too low. This was not the drivers fault.

For the 3rd pass, we refilled the fuel cell, and changed the shift point from 7000 to 7200 RPM. We ran a 9.035 @ 148 MPH, but this drop in ET and MPH was more a function of the weather, including a change in wind speed for this run and the next run. Again on this 3rd pass the car left well before it was suppose to leave.

We decided to bypass the normal voltage supply to the delay box to solve the low voltage problem, and we went straight from the cut-off switch to the delay box. This gave us about 1.2 volts more to the box, and stopped the flashing when the T-B button was pressed.

We made one last pass. This time the car left on time, Kevin cut a 0.019 RT and we ran 9.023 @ 147 MPH. The car went straight as and arrow and everything worked as it should have. We were very, very happy.

Monday I decided to do some troubleshooting. During the night, I had thought about the car having an alternator, and the low voltage problem should not have been possible (with everything working correct) with the car at 3800 RPM just before leaving the line. That Alternator should have been putting out 14 – 16VDC at that point.

I checked the one-wire connection from the battery to the alternator and did not have any continuity. I have a switch in that circuit, in the trunk, and although it was on, there was nothing coming through it. Upon inspection of the switch, I found one of the post broken off. Most likely due to vibration.

I installed a new, heavy duty switch and disconnected the bypass rig, but I did not remove it. It is coiled up, ready to go if needed… We are ready for the opening weekend of the State Capitol racing season.