Stephen's New Toy

Albuquerque has two race facilities with a variety of tracks.  There is a drag strip at the Albuquerque Dragway at Mesa Del Sol.  NAPA Speedway (formerly Sandia Speedway), just West of Abq, has an asphalt oval, a dirt oval, and a road course where they run both cars and motorcycles.  Stephen is particularly interested in trying out the road course during the open track days.  You can run any car that will pass a safety inspection and there's no competition.  Folks who run in the competitive series use these days for practice.  Instructors are available for a fee as well.  There are separate days for motorcycles and cars.

Stephen carefully figured out exactly what vehicles would be most suited to road course racing and also fit his allotted toy budget.  He was looking at late 90's Mustangs, Camaros, and 3-series BMWs, any of which would need significant work in order to fall into his price range.  Fixing up the car is part of the fun, after all.  He watched Craig's list and went to look at a number of cars on his way home from work, but none was "the one."  A 1973 Camaro caught his eye because it was pretty and had a 5-speed manual transmission.  When he drove it, all his careful analysis went right out the window because he was in love.  The car came home on the trailer that evening.  It has a 454 big block, 4 barrel carburetor, and that Richmond 5-speed.  The body is really solid, and it was priced very well.  Stephen is putting in new seats with harnesses instead of regular seat belts, upgrading the gauges, and will eventually need to rebuild the engine (of course!).  There are a multitude of other small things to fix.  I noticed that the battery is held in with a bungee cord, the windows don't go all the way up (something Stephen discovered when he got soaked going through the car wash), there are no interior door panels, etc.

Here she is the night she came home:

 The new tachometer project snowballed, as frequently happens with projects involving old cars (or old houses, for that matter).

Stephen is hoping to get her on the track by mid-summer.  Stay tuned!