In my 30 years of capturing racecarson film, Robert M. Powers is the onlyclient that ever figured out in advance theprecise day and time at which the shutterneeded activation. What’s more, RobertM. informed me, there were only two daysin the year when the light would be justright. Got that?

Powers is an astronomer who has ahumbling knowledge base about howheavenly bodies run around the universe –and in our case, the Milky Way. The loca-tion was along the abandoned marinashoreline at California’s nearly dead SaltonSea where the beach is more crustaceanshells than sand and fish die hourly.

The daunting task was moving themodified roadster up and over a 15-foothigh earth berm and then across the pea-sized razor sharp shells, almost 2 feet deep,to the water’s edge. For this we relied onthe invaluable locals, Vi and HaroldHerzberg, for tribal knowledge of the area,not to mention Harold’s savvy tractoroperating skills.

After four hours of grunts, groans andperspiration, using a couple of floor jacksand several sheets of 1/2-inch plywood fora mobile road, the crew got the car intoplace just before sunset.

The Daliesque “Roadster on the Edgeof Forever” scene was chilling - the sparseruins of a once thriving nautical communi-ty were a heavily encrusted flagpole and adozen misshapen pilings. Absent wind,vivid reflections were thrown intosharp relief upon the dead-flat waterdisturbed only by the occasionalbrave duck. The scene backed outfor miles vanishing into the emptyhorizon.

I suggested interesting angles avail-able only at sunrise, so the plan was set toleave the car in place and rise before thesun cracked the horizon, just like any dayat Speedweek. That meant overnightguard duty.

Clean-cut Engine Management engi-neer Ryal C. Greenwood and Popeye-muscled, Roy Armenta, were volunteered.Former Marine Alex Richardson, wholooks like he just got back from a month atWoodstock, got the comfy bed back at thehotel.

Dawn was breathtaking, spectacularcolors percolated out of darkness, silencingus all. The surreal luminosity was befittingthe hauntingly evocative location. What awild way to showcase a Bonneville racer.The logic side of my brain noted that if thepolitical posturing doesn’t clear up soon,the Salton Sea might very well end up likeBonneville.

I was so pleased to make Powersdream a reality. My adventure was madethat much easier with an unlikely crew thatworked and played ever so well with eachother. Pro Per Racing’s #503 is a ’27 mod-ified roadster that runs gas in “F” Classpowered by a 3.0 liter Mercedes V8 out ofa 1971 300 SEL that is more stock thanyou would believe possible. They also usethe old Merc’s four-speed automatic sportbox stock transmission.

“I think a lot of this is due to startingwith a well-engineered motor,” saidPowers, who believes they are the only

team to have stuffed a Mercedes V-8 into aroadster, “We don’t need to beef it upmuch, everything is built so robust.”

At El Mirage, Pro Per Racing ran155MPH setting a new F-Class recordtwice, only to lose it the next day, yet fin-ished the 2006 season “First In Class” andexceeded the Bean Bandits record fourtimes to place 13th in Championshippoints. Powers attributes the absence ofany safety problems to the excellent CookMotorsports construction.

Donna J. Powers is crew emerita.Team mascot is Murphy, the racingRotweiller, but get a load of the honorarycrew: John La Wall, MD, team psychiatristwho ensures that no more than 50% of thecrew can be on psych meds at any oneevent; Carl M. Tootle, Esquire, who keepsthe boys out of trouble, not get them outof trouble; Michael Boren, M.D. onlybecause he approved their junk food diet.

Jack Mendenhall Lives On!

The Gold Coast Roadster and RacingClub (GCRRC) have been verybusy over the winter restor-ing the late JackMendenhall’s roadster.According to WillScott, “Wethought it ashame to allow

the

record-setting roadster to sit idle as amuseum exhibit and decided to make it aclub project to give members that havenever built or worked or maintained a racecar the experience of doing so.”

Stripped down to the bare frame,which was then straightened by DougOdom, all suspension components werecleaned, inspected and bad componentswere replaced or fabricated. Wheels andtires were replaced. New internal alu-minum panels were also made. GCRRCexpects the roadster to run around 190miles per hour. Any club member whoworks on the rebuild, and contributes tothe car’s maintenance will be given achance to drive.

The performance industry alsohelped. Thank Tilton, John Julis, TobySchwalenberg and Jim Deist for qualityparts. The core labor and fabricationgroup of Harold Martin, Richard Boumanand Don Hartshorn get some help andcounseling from Mark Mendenhall, DonOaks, Barry Shulman, Will Scott andChuck Small. Look for Jack’s roadster torun again before the end of the season.

Project 500

Marlo Treit tells me that hislong-awaited world-record

attacking streamliner will beavailable for show and tell atBonneville and then head tothe Wally Park’s NHRA

Museum in November.Beforehand, he hopes to make

some test runs at Moses Lake inWashington.

The car has a speed brake developedover a four year period by Les Davenport,who will also drive the car. Inspired by air-craft braking systems, its purpose is tobleed off the first 150 high-speed milesbefore deploying parachutes. A pair of510CID KB supercharged bullets that willdevelop 2,500 HP each on alcohol willpower the beast. Now that’s an addiction.

Hello Demonfire?

Ron Main and George Poteet werenot satisfied with setting a pair of FIAWorld land Speed Records out on the saltlast year. Ecofire, the car formerly knownas Flatfire, is being morphed into a400MPH streamliner code-named“Demonfire”. The GM engine is beingdumped in favor of the virile Dodge Hemi180CID four banger built to produce1,400 HP.

The boys are a “4 for 4 Campaign”,hoping to wring 100MPH out of eachcylinder. The fresh “stretched”Poteet/Main body is being fabricated in

14 ❙ June.2007

A Vision To Seek; ‘07 Racing Peek Photos courtesy of “Landspeed” Louise Ann Noeth, Will Scott, Randy Pierce

(l to r) Don Oaks, Richard Bouman &Vice President Harold Martin

Jack Mendenhall’s record-setting roadster ridesagain! The car is being resurrected by the GoldCoast Roadster & Racing Club.

2-17 4/13/07 9:09 AM Page 14

exhaust brake. Kevin Knox imaged thetransmission and a variety of other keypieces with a 3D scanner to create electron-ic files so that a replicator will spit out plas-tic mock-ups for the car.

The team is sharing the build anddevelopment process on-line at: www.gold-enhawk.ca A former Royal Canadian AirForce officer, Jack Frazer, who flew withthe RCAF Golden Hawks in 1961 (solo)and 1962 (slot), wished the team “the verybest of luck in your endeavours.” I do too.

“It’s hot in dragsters, especially with afire suit and helmet on,” said Pierce, “We’llcool everything until the moment we pushoff and then unplug the 110volt umbilicalcord from the a/c. The batteries stay fullycharged for the differential pump, cameraand computers and are on charge each timethe car is hooked up to the push truck andin the pits.”

Using a full-scale paper layout, themild steel chassis was built by AggressiveTube Bending, using a combination ofsquare, rectangular and round tube. TheLexan polycarbonate canopy by PLASTECand the body formed ABS composite.

“Whoaing” the ‘liner is done withfour-piston discs on the front and rear. Thecustom steel wheels were built by Green’sAutomotive. Besides the two parachutes,the team is thinking about adding an

www.good-guys.com ❙ 15

Mojave, CA at Nemesis Air Racing. If thename sounds familiar, perhaps you recallseeing owners Jon and Patricia Sharp’s airracer at the Smithsonian National Air andSpace Museum.

“The material is oven curedglass/epoxy prepreg, (pre-impregnatedwith resin and then frozen to arrest the cat-alyst process)” explained Jon Sharp, “Thismaterial features an “initial” cure of 140degrees for 14 hours in our oven, followedby a 250 degree “post cure”. The majorbody parts will go through 3 vacuum pres-sure oven cures at 140 degrees.”

The Sharps believes this process, thatincludes a honeycomb core bonding withPCF Nomex, will provide a very stable,robust body that “keeps that pesky wind offthe car.” The swoopy vertical fin is an aerotailored airfoil section with a NASA“sheared tip” – that is supposedly a provendrag reduction shape. OK for things in thesky, but we’ll see what it does in perpetual“ground effect”. The Sharp’s promise pan-els will fit to very close tolerances of .015-.020” gaps.

Make it a point to note the “trimtab”/rudder driven by a screw drive typeelectric actuator. Commonplace on aircraftto take the “fight” out of the steering yoke,trim tabs on LSR cars should prove to help

keep the car tracking straight withoutwhite-knuckling the wheel.

Golden Hawk

Randy Pierce, a.k.a., “the fastest Baliffin Canada,” is spearheading the build of aGolden Hawk, a diesel streamliner debut-ing at this year’s Speedweek and named tohonor the Royal Canadian aerobatic team.He’s done his homework thoroughly hav-ing consulted with Roy Lewis, SteveMallicoat, Art Fink, the late, great CarlHeap, Ron Ayers, Andy Green, KenWalkey, Jim Rotta and Joe Law.

They want to set the E/DS record inexcess of 200MPH and then tune toward atarget of 300mph. The front-wheel-drivemachine has a single turbocharged 3.9-4.26liter Cummins Special Duty diesel engineenhanced with Nitrous and mated to aTorqueflite 518 transmission with convert-er. The custom-built OTT Industries over-drive spins the front differential. Kool CoatCeramics Coatings Ltd. took care of finish-ing all the hot parts.

While we’re talking cool, get this:Golden Hawk will be air conditioned! CoolIt Hiway Services is installing a/c in the carin the tail compartment along with the firesystem for the cockpit. Suit me up!

Here be the bones ofthe Golden Hawk.

Note: Photojournalist Louise Ann Noethis the authoress of the award-winningbook, Bonneville: The Fastest Place on Earth,a complete historical review of the first 50years of land speed racing now in its 6thprinting. For more details and to order, goto: www.landspeedproductions.biz.

Golden Hawk plans

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