Another Mopar Off My Bucket List - Barracuda Fastback
Although the Roadrunner was on the blink this morning, Spence and I still went to the car show. We loaded the funnycar and took it. I thought I was a shoe-in for an award because they had a 'RACE CAR' class and there was only one other race vehicle there. Unfortunately some of the entrants noticed the lack of competition in the class and decided to have their cars entered into that class as well. The biggest criteria for judging the cars in each class was based upon how clean they were. It didn't take much to put the funnycar out of contention. The other 'true' race vehicle didn't get any award either.
Of all the vehicles entered in the show I believe the funnycar got the most attention by far. It was enjoyable visiting with folks and we had a good time. There were 223 entrants.
When we got home we immediately got back to work on the Roadrunner. When I had it running last it was not firing on all cylinders. We weren't sure what the problem was but I believed our best course was to check the plugs first. In addition I suspected a problem with the MSD box. The Digital 6 Plus has a pot on it to adjust between 4, 6, and 8 cylinder engines. I thought it might have gotten switched or could have gotten water in it which could have made it run through the wrong circuit.
The plugs looked glazed so we cleaned them with thinner and checked the gaps. The shop in Grand Island only set them at .035 so we opened them up to .045 and reinstalled them. I took an air wand and blew through every crevice I could find on the control box.
When we hit the key it fired right up and sounded great. - Still not sure if it was the plugs or the box but it appears to have been one, the other, or both.
I got tragic news as soon as we finished working on the car. A cousin of mine was killed in Lincoln, Nebraska. She had volunteered at work to participate in a project to clean up one of the bike trails there in Lincoln. While she was doing it some woman came speeding down the trail out of control on a bike and slammed into Paulette (my cousin) and her co-worker. Paulette was thrown head first into a rock shattering her skull which resulted in a major brain injury. After a day of surgeries brain activity ceased and they pronounced her dead. She was a real sweetheart of a gal. I haven't had a chance to talk to my aunt about it yet but I know she's devastated.
