If you don't think slant6 racing isn't popular out "West" you should have been at Redding raceway this past weekend! On Friday, the racetrack opened up just for the slant-6 group and let them in to set up early under the big shaded Oak trees. Glenn Terry and Oscar Steelman from Fresno picked out the best spot and Glenn had his new made "Slant Six Racing - Killer Bees" sign out on his camper .

Our group from Chico with 3 cars in tow showed up early on Sat. The track promoter had made arrangements for just our slant6 cars to also get in early as racing didn't start until after 12:00. Right behind us was Paul Olds with his car pulling a neat little "teardrop" camping trailer. Behind Paul was new racer Randy Judge who purchased one of Doug race motors. A few minutes later, here comes Doug and Allen Dutra with two more cars and first time racer Dan Ochs (Whalemaster) with his neat slant-6 powered van. ( a real crowd pleaser) which now made our group ten slant6 cars. This is the most we have ever had and we all were in "awe" and couldn't believe the turnout! Our shaded oak spot was full of slant6 cars, slant6 racers, families, friends, tents, lawn chairs, spare tires, BBQ's and ice chests. This was only at 10:00 am....We started to tech and looked up and there was a caravan for four more slant6 cars all on trailers pulling into the pit area. Alll first time racers and all new cars.
WE NOW HAD 15 SLANT6 CARS...

Our previous race schedule was to run intermixed with the Inliner club on Saturday and only slant6 cars on Sunday. The Inliner group could only muster 2 cars so we had a field of 17 on Saturday. A anonymous donor put up the first place only $$ and two trophies were also offered.. and off we went. After the day was over, my little 65' Signet "the grey ghost" was the only car standing. They say a blind pig sometimes finds an acorn...that was my first win ever so needless to say, I will be back at Redding again next year.

On Sunday, we started time trials around 9:00 am with 14 slant6 racers.
This made a good bracket and with our own "reserved" lanes we were able to start early. After the first bracket was over, some of the favorites were already on their trailers. Aric Erickson, with his fast 12 sec "Swingin' Six" red lighted against Oscar and Doug took out my "Grey Ghost" with a .001 reaction time and near perfect dial in. Son Allen was right behind taking out any "on comers" with his also near perfect .003 light. Mike Williams with his group of four cars had his girl friend driving one of his cars and she took out another first time racer, David Erickson who was breaking in his neat 1934 Plymouth coupe using Aric's passed down race motor. David ran a best of 14.60 which was fantastic as this was a "shakedown" run using one-wheel drive 3:23 gearing. This car will be around alot and it will surely run in the 13's very soon. What a rare and neat combination. There will be a article writtne by Seymour about this car in upcoming slant6 racing news.

Very quietly, Oscar was winning round after round and so were both father-son combo of the Dutras. Doug had that Lancer running better than I had ever seen and Allen just kept getting better and better on the lights with their 66 Dart wagon "toe car". Long time racer, Glenn Terry with his new Yellow "killer bee motiff" Dart was also knocking them off. That left Glenn to run against Allen, and Doug against Oscar for the final pairing. Glenn had some fuel pump problems and again, Oscar ran his numbers. Final pairing: Oscar against Allen..

Allen got a little too agressive on the starting lights (red) and let Oscar have his FIRST WIN EVER...
What a fantastic weekend of great slant6 racing. Doug will have photos up soon and a follow up on my "ramblings". Now we need to get some sort of financial support to help these racers offset the expenses they all put out to go "slant6 racing". Thanks to Ron Parker for getting the ball rolling. More on this later. Thanks Ron..and Thanks all for the help making this and future slant6 racing a reality here in California. Wayne/Aric

Too cool!

Would anyone mind if I showed up with an old school rail like the Crooked 6? That's about all my 4 cylinder Dakota can reasonably tow!
I can just see it now. A /6 rail with a pushbutton automatic!

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Joshua

Great report, Wayne. Congrats to Oscar and Allen and all the rest. I hope to make one of the W coast races someday...

Lou

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Home of Slant6-powered fun machines since 1988

Hey, this is Slant Six Racing and the rules are simple.... run anything that is powered by a SL6 and anything goes, set it up any way you want, mount the Slant to a skateboard for all we care!

As Wayne discribed, another fantastic weekend of racing for the West Coast SL6 racers, many first time racers and new cars and lot's of "energy" in the pits and with the people at the track.... fun stuff!
If you have never been out to run your car or watch a dragrace, this is the way to do it, a great group of people and a nice location to do it.

Here are some photos out of my digital, most of my shots are on film so those will come later. Here is that great pit spot we had:



I felt bad for the Inliner racers, they had the pesty SL6 "Bees" everywhere and both cars had trouble, one had a flat tire, the other blew a head gasket. Here is a shot of one of the Inliner Club members getting "buzzed" by the Swinging Six:




Thanks again to everyone who came out to this event! As noted, it is great to see the West Coast group (The "Killer Bees") team of Slant Six racers gaining numbers and energy. Staging lanes full of SL6 cars makes me feel all "warm and fuzzy" inside!




For me, I spent most of the weekend on my continued effort to chase all of the problems out of my new racecar, the 62 Lancer. The good news is that the new long rod-stroker engine that just went into the car, stayed together, ran a best time of 14.12 at 98 mph.
The bad news, I worked on it constantly to keep it on the track. Carb. rejetting, spark plug changes, timing and distributor work to try to get rid of a mis-fire at high RPMs. Saturday was an all day thrash and no solution to the mis-fire problem.

Sunday went from bad to worst. During my 2nd time run a freeze plug pops out of the block at half track, I limp it back to the pits... not happy. (lucky for me, I just had water in the cooling system, with the Redding heat and low humidity, I think most of the water evaporated before it even hit the track!)
Think fast, jump in the wagon, go to town, buy a rubber "expansion type" temporary freeze plug and a new condenser for the distributor, run back, install both items in record time, right as we get the call for the first round of eliminations. (Wayne, thanks for waiting, Wayne and I were the last pair to run)
Guess what.... the car finally makes a decent pass, no mis-fire, no overheating, same thing for the next two runs, good clean passes. That turned the weekend around for me.

Going to the final round made Allen, my son's weekend. He is really starting to get the hang of bracket racing, the boy has good reaction times. (a little to good in the final). Here is a shot of Allen and Oscar just before getting their awards.
DD

Sounds like you guys had a great time out there.

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Official Cookie and Mater Tormentor.

Looks like I have to make a Redding race!

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Yeah....Im the one who destroyed this rare, vintage automobile.....

Hi Sandy: We will reserve a "prime location" for the Slant6 T-Pee...Doug will have the BBQ set up and I will provide the liquid refreshments...See you in 2007...Wayne/Aric et al