Topic: The Target 550 streamliner will be on display at Speed Week, 2012

[RayTheRat]

Since the following was posted here: http://www.landracing.com/forum/index.php/topic,6400.1290.html I can now report it.

"Speed Week will be a nice setting. The car will be on display many hours so there will be times when you can have a lot of time to spend looking for the parts that have been discussed in this diary. I would have enjoyed talking you to Hume's shop but he will also be at Bonneville. I look forward to meeting the people that follow this diary.

Marlo, Jim and Jason will be there to chat and answer your questions.

Thanks everyone for your interest.

FREUD"

That post was made by Glenn Freudenberger, the team's PR rep, aka Doc Freud, a nickname given to him by Ed Roth.  He's a great guy and he's also the one who shoots the photos that appear in the weekly Build Diary updates.

So, if you can come to Speed Week (August 11-17), you'll get a chance to see the liner up close and personal (but not close enough to drool on.  )  If you get there, look for the goofy old fart with the shaved head, white goatee, red Suburban and Canon cameras.  There's a good chance it might be me.   

The anticipated date for the liner's first test runs has been determined, but I have to maintain radio silence about it and several other things that I'd love to be able to report about the car.    All in due time, I spose...but it's gonna be pretty darned quick, cuz that date is approaching at what seems to be a higher-than-normal rate.   

[Ultra]

We'll look forward to all the details as they can be released.

Good luck!

[RayTheRat]

We'll look forward to all the details as they can be released.

Good luck!

Thanks.  As soon as I'm given the "green light", I'll post what I can here.  There are several areas of the car that we've avoided showing/describing, and then there's the first testing date.  I'd love to "spill the beans" about all this stuff, but I've been asked not to.  But as I wrote, as soon as I get the go-ahead, I'll post it here, on the T-550 website: http://www.target550.com/index.html and on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Target-550-Land-speed-racing-streamliner-project/183427418340703

I can hardly believe that I'm involved with this.  It all started out with a request for some help with the website...which was a mess...and now I'm "part of the team."  Amazing.  I mean, how many people can say that they're on a racing team that sets an outright world record faster than anyone else has ever gone using pistons and propelled by the wheels?  Yeah, jet cars have gone much faster, but we're gonna demolish Tom Burkland's record of 415.896 mph and become the first car in that category to run over 500 mph.  (I was on the salt when Tom set that record...a fantastic moment.)

I have faith that we're gonna succeed (I wouldn't be much of a team member if I didn't believe in it, I don't think) and really put the record WAY up there...and hope that it stays around as long as the Summer's Brothers record did....like 45 years.  I was on the salt when Charles Nearburg broke that record (normally-aspirated, unlimited displacement, single engine) and after the record was set, there was a bit of a ceremony and someone got Bob Summers on the cell phone to congratulate Nearburg.  It was a pretty significant moment in LSR history.  Here's a story about it: http://www.racer.com/417mph-run-makes-spirit-of-rett-the-fastest-single-engine-car-in-history/article/179818/ and there are a buncha my own photos here: http://www.chevyasylum.com/lsr/bsf2010/shootout/therest/01-nearburg/Welcome.html

I've attached a coupla photos....the first shot is Nearburg's streamliner and the second one is the previously mentioned call from Bob Summers....who passed away the following year.

Now...there are less than 30 days before Speed Week.  So if ya wanna see the liner on display....well, the clock is ticking....and it seems to be ticking faster and faster as I get closer to the event where I hope to run my car....World of Speed, in September.  I better get back to the garage and put the pan back on the transmission and start with the job of removing the old headers and installing the new set (larger diameter tubes and full-length collectors.)

Later,

[knightfan26917]

That's awesome, Ray ... wish I could be there for that....



Cort | 38.m.IL | pigValve + paceMaker + cowValve | "only child" 1979 Caprice Classic
CHD.MCs.CC + RoadTrips.hobbies.RadioShows.us66 = http://www.chevyasylum.com/cort
"Don't let your life pass you by" __ Sarah McLachlan __ 'I Will Remember You'