Well after a two month break the Piranha Racing Team were certainly keen as mustard to get back down to Willowbank. We hit the road at around 5am which was not appreciated by me, as Heather had me up and about at 4.13am with the premier trucking pilot “Captain Automatic Iveco” Steve McIntosh taking the controls for the first driving stint in the “Penguin’s Palace”. We stopped at Gin Gin for breakfast then headed off with Nathan taking over the controls for the second leg of our journey. We then pulled into the big BP to pick up the unlicensed Ralph Snellman the Member for Bundaberg Rum. Thank God Macca being a truck driver all be it an automatic truck driver (which everyone knows is not a real truck driver) noticed a small fuel leak. This was due a small plastic clip breaking allowing two fuel lines to rub together. Hasty repairs were made with the help of our friends at Queensland Diesel Spares whom are great supporters of Drag Racing at Burpengary with the assistance of Steve from Alliance Hydraulic Hoses who got us on the road again. It is great to have friends in drag racing.

With an early 8.30am qualifier for both cars most of the preparations were done Friday night when the balance of the team arrived. It was a great social night with Reece and Courtney arriving just after the first qualifier. The meeting was a test meeting for us even though it was a track championship round, it was our first meeting with the B Series PSI that we purchased off Paul Shackleton. We were advised by Wayne Jones to make sure we put at least 20% more fuel into it as it is a lot more efficient, so we thought we would play it real safe and drop it from 19% overdrive, back to 10%. Our way of thinking was if it made similar boosts it has to go faster with 25% more fuel in it – apparently it wasn’t enough. The first qualifier, as soon as Nathan let the startline control go it just blew the tyres straight off it.

Our initial thoughts were – the tyres are pretty old, maybe that’s the problem. So we changed the tyre pressure, went back and Nathan experienced tyre shake like no other. We again changed the tyre pressure and some other adjustments; so far we hadn’t got to 60ft. This time we made it past 60ft, into second gear and BANG! It lifted the blower. We are yet to fully diagnose the problem, all the increments on the temperatures look great on the Motec and the little sucker is making 54pounds of boost which is a whole lot of boost in anyone’s language. So I guess it is more fuel or less overdrive, we did a leak down and put in a new set of valve springs and look forward to the Nostalgias on the 20th Feb to do some more testing.

Now onto Zach and F.E.D; this was the first meeting with the trans brake, we just ran out of time to fit the startline control as we has issues with it all weekend trying to get it down the track with enough power. Finally in the first round of eliminations it ran an 8.05, but it wasn’t up to it normal standards. The trans brake just wouldn’t hold and it just kept dragging him through the startline beams. Zachary is still very much in his probationary period and is still learning and doing a great job. He proved this by grabbing the hand brake which is all he has in the F.E.D and held it on the last light but unfortunately again as soon as be begun bringing the revs up it dragged him through. We will be looking for an earth or a solenoid problem but it makes it difficult when the dam thing doesn’t do it on the stands, which is about normal for drag racing. As I often say, “you have to look good loosing because you spend a lot more time loosing then winning”.

Congratulations to the “Toad Warrior” Brian Martin on his great win in Outlaws and a supreme congratulations to Paul Shackleton and Damian Harris and their whole crew, it was an unbelievable final round run; 4.86 @ 320mph – you had to see it to believe it and we were right on the finish line. The candles were lit past the finish line and she was turning green.

Peter A. "The Legend - The Cheque Book" Peirano.
Piranha Insurance Brokers P/L
"LEXUS PIRANHA SUPERCHARGED OUTLAWS HOT ROD"

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