ARCA: Flatrock-Toledo Buckeroo report

• Jack Durbin
• MNI - Motorsport News International
• Fri Jul 12 22:46:36 EDT 1996

> From: Mike Buckley 

Gang,

Finally recouperated from the busy weekend and now am ready to report our
......progress.


The Flatrock Report

The ARCA Supercars were at the tight 1/4 Flatrock Speedway, South of Detroit
on Saturday, July 6.  It was a hot and muggy day and the cars were slow
compared to the last time we were here.  Our ETS Pontiac was practicing well,
running with some of the top dogs on some very old tires.  Bolted on the new
tires for qualifying.  We picked up 3/10's on the new tires, everyone else
seemed to pick up 8/10's or better.  Qualified 16th.

The race began and I picked up a few spots.  We were racing pretty hard with
cars my own speed and hoping for a yellow before being lapped, which happens
in a hurry at this track.  Tim Steele was leading and he and another car had
just gotten around when the 1st caution flew.  Started down on the inside for
the restart and was racing hard when I was spun around going into turn 1 by
Dill Wittymore.  This killed the motor and I couldn't get it refired before
the leaders came around again to put me down 2 laps.  The spin knocked the
rear alignment out of the car and from there on it was hold on to a pushy,
then loose car.  Finished 14th.


The Toledo Report

Toledo was just as hot and muggy.  This was my first time driving this track
and it is fast.  Very fast.  We started out with the wrong gear for our V-6.
 We were the only ones in the field with a V-6 and we found out fast that we
were going to short on horsepower.  The first gear only got the car to 7400
RPM, much too low.  Changed the gear with what we had and we were now turning
9500 RPM.  Ooops.... too high.  Had to borrow a quick change gear from Frank
Kimmels team and quailfied with the motor running 8150 RPM.... much better,
but still 19th of 22 cars.

Started the race and got sorted out on the restart.  The motor wasn't pulling
down the straight and then on lap 6, I lost a cylinder.  When you loose one
with a V-8, you may still be able to pull it around, but I was now on 5
cylinders and we had to retire out of the race.  We lost a valve.  Finished
21st.

Pulled the valve covers and found that one of the Jessel rockers lost an
adjuster on the exhaust valve.  The motor was popping thru the carburator
when the intake valve opened on that cylinder.  The rocker was damaged and
needed retapping so this wasn't something we could have fixed during the
race.  The motor runs just fine now and we will prepare for the July 31st
race at Indianapolis Fairgrounds.  This is a one-mile dirt track and will be
held on Wednesday night during the week of the Brickyard.  We hear the Ken
Schrader will be in the field as he won the race two years ago as we finished
19th during that race.

Mike Buckley
ARCA #48
http://www.fdt.net/~crest/buckley.htm