Congratulations to our September 2000 winner: Rich Nedbal!

Fifteen votes came from various Richmond Personnel, each with their own criteria. Voters were in Engineering, Management, Manufacturing, and Maintenance. These people encompass a large variety of interests, from the technical specifications, to the condition of the car and picture quality.

Many of our entries are listed here:

Contestants

RE: The Shock Treatment story

I (Rich Nedbal) grew up in the Chicago area and raced 64 Plymouths and Dodge back in 1964 at three tracks: US 30 in Indiana, Oswego Illinois and Union Grove in Wisconsin..  I was a frequent visitor to Mr. Norm's and I bought my original 1964 Dodge from Norm late in 1963 as I was graduating High School.  If I knew then what I know now, I would have begged and borrowed enough money to buy every car Norm  had - but that's another story.  Then came college, the war, the military, marriage, mortgages, lawn mowers, kids and pets.  I was educated as an Electrical Engineer, became an integrated circuit designer and moved my family to "Silicon Valley" California in 1976.  At the time, Fremont Dragstrip (remember Beach Blanket Bingo) was still operational in the Bay Area and I started visiting the drags again. 

In 1995, I had enough "watching" so I decided to do it one more time.  Call it a mid life crisis if you want, but always being a Mopar man, I found an original 1964 Plymouth Belvedere that was already well on it's way to becoming a reasonable drag car.  It had a built 440, 727 with a brake, roll cage, etc. and ran high tens.  At the time, it had leaf springs, but the price was right, and this was a perfect way to get back into the sport.  I call this my old red 440.  I always wanted to run a HEMI again but I figured a nice reliable 440 was the better (and cheaper) way to get back in the groove.  The 440 ran well and won me more than a few races.  After a year or so I decided to start construction of what I called the Silicon Valley HEMI.  (The Silicon Valley HEMI story ran last year in Mopar Action and Mopar Collectors Guide).  I chose another Mopar gear head, named Ron Jenkins, owner of Magnumforce Racecar Fabrication as the chassis builder for the SV HEMI.

I had always assumed that sooner or later I'd sell the old 440 and switch over to the HEMI after I got my NHRA license.  Ironically enough, just the opposite has occurred.  People find this a little hard to believe, but while HEMIs are always cool, it's actually a little boring to drive.  Magnumforce did such a great job building a very straight chassis with a strut front end and 4-link, that the car just sits back and goes without much fanfare.  The old 440 however, due to its weight (3500 lbs), higher center of gravity, much lower first gear, and lower rear gearing, lifts up the wheels, bounces a little at the shift and is just - how do I put it - a ball to drive.

Nevertheless I still figured I'd be selling the old 440. Then my niece Susanne Hovis came out from Chicago for a visit.  She made it clear that she really wanted to drive a drag race Mopar.  She drove the 440, handled the car well, and cut good lights (.508 on her first try).  So she decided it was time for her and her husband to move to California.  Next thing I know, she's living down the street and wants to do some Mopar drag racing.

The 440 was starting to show the signs of 250+ trans-brake launches and the 727 started to leak.  It looked like I was going to keep the car.  I had never really did any serious work on it and I figured it was a good time to "freshen things up".  Well, what started out as a "freshening" turned into something more akin to a total rebuild.  The 727 went to my friends at TCI who found a cracked case and other problems.  I shipped the 440 to Koffel's Place that I've heard many good things about and they found cracked heads, too small a piston to valve clearance, a very tired valve train, etc.  So Koffel's used as many parts from the 440 as they could, and built me a B1 "Bracket Bomber".  Koffel's likes to use a 400 block (my old 440 block was already at max bore) with a 440 crank, J&E pistons and, of course, B1 heads.  Koffel's uses only the best parts, and with the roller valve train, purple painted block, and Jet hotted headers, the engine itself is a work of art.  The 471 cubic inch result is an engine that not only look pretty good, but it also puts out almost as much horsepower as my HEMI - namely over 750 HP at over 650 ft/lbs of torque.  Back this engine up with a 5500 stall converter, the low first gear of the 727 and a 4.88 Dana in the rear, and you have a car that's really a lot of fun to drive.

Not being sure of exactly what my old 440's horsepower was, and sensing the new Koffel's motor would put me in the nines, I figured it was time beef up the suspension, make the car safer, and perhaps take some weight off the front end.  It already lifted the front end so Magnumforce installed a pair of stress relieving wheelie bars.  To stabilize Susanne's launches, Ron also suggested throwing out the leaf springs and going with a set of ladder bars, which of course he built, and a pair of dual adjustable coil over shocks from Aldan..

And while it started to look like a real race car I always disliked the old Chrysler K-Member and torsion bar setup. Ron Jenkins showed me a new chromoly, bolt in, K-Member replacement that used rack and pinion steering that he was about to bring to the market.  This piece matched up well with his tubular upper and lower control arms. My old K-Member was toast from years of being beat on to get pan clearance and I know how hard it is to find good Mopar K-Members these days, so the new K-Member/Control Arm/Coil-Over front end  seemed like a message from Heaven.  You wouldn't believe the weight and space that combo saves.  Along with discarding the heavy steel K-Member goes the torsion bars, steering box, ties rods and everything related.  And there's a secondary benefit - the rack and pinion steering mounts up front so there's no more hole through the oil pan for the steering tie rod.  Now I can get the pan off the motor while it's in the car without having to dismember the beast.  My guess is, I tossed between 100 and 200 pounds in the trash.  My 3700 pound 440 was turning into a 3500 pound B1 bracket bomber thanks to Koffel's and Magnumforce.  And although I run fenderwell headers, if I wanted to use normal headers the missing torsion bars would be a real blessing.

Now to the paint scheme.  I never liked the old "let's bend some metal over a pie tin" hood scoop so I replaced the hood with a glass one from Fiberglass Plus in Fort Worth (why not lose some more weight while I'm at it).  Of course this meant considering a repaint.  The old red paint was - well - red … but that's about all I could say about it.  I went back to Prestige Auto Body who did the SV HEMI and they suggested a new PPG Harlequin paint that changes color depending on how you view it.  This is trick stuff!  The car is gold, purple, copper, yellow, or whatever, depending on where you stand.  Then Josh Stokes did his thing with his air brush again (he did the circuit board on the SV HEMI too).  I had already painted the tow trailer and the Koffel's motor purple, so to stay with the purple theme I mentioned to Josh that if lightning struck the front of the hood the lightning bolts have a purple corona around them?  I left him alone for a few days, he probably looked up the word "Corona", and the next thing I saw was the result you see here.  He wrapped the lightning over the dash (no he didn't ask), and continued into the engine compartment.  The purple corona actually works.  Susanne came up with the name "Shock Treatment" since, for many people, that's just what it is.  Susanne did a little purple carpet work and used purple padding.  I bolted on the missing pieces, started up the B1, detuned it a little, and went to the "Test and Tune" night at Sears Point.

First time out it runs a 9.92 at 135 MPH.  This was with high pressure in the slicks, 3 degrees retarded timing, rich jetting, and the wheelie bars set pretty low.  Since then we've run a best of 9.42 at 138. Susanne is licensed to run in Super Street which uses a 10.90 index.  Trying to slow the car down to run 10.90 was more difficult that you would think.  We actually had to modify the throttle stop  to close the plates more.  I guess this is the kind of problem you like to have but it's weird for me.

But first it's a race car, not a show car, although it's a real show when the 4.88 Richmond gears put it in the air. But it has taken a first place trophy at every show it's been in so far, starting with the famous Spring Fling in Van Nuys California.  So one of the biggest problems is the process of racing it - then cleaning it - then showing the car - then racing again - etc.

Rich Nedbal