Never the Same #42 Enduring Warrior of the Speed Coliseum

Kirk quit his job, had little money, but he had a stock car and a fire in his soul albeit a kindling fire…

 

Cue: “Prime Time” https://youtu.be/3kr2NT3Yxso?si=_Y40kLQ8JgF4hma7.

 

Kirk had only missed one weekend of racing after he blew up his engine on purpose, but the two stock car tracks called to him. He hungered to be out there smelling the rich high-test gasoline fumes, burnt rubber, and hot oil. As we left Kirk last time, he had removed that old worthless engine, now only good for a boat anchor, despite some harrowing mechanical missteps and brainless forgetfulness on his part.

Well. That was Kirk in a nutshell. He picked up an old used engine from the wrecking yard, surely not a racing engine, a stone stock engine that he lacked the funds to modify. It would get him back on the track for the last gasp of summer at the racetracks. The replacement Chevrolet engine did have a few more cubic inches than the Dodge engine, but then the latter had a few minor modifications while the former wouldn’t have any because of Kirk’s dire financial situation.

Nevertheless, after his mess ups rushing to take the old blown-up engine out, Kirk ordered himself to do the replacement engine installation right. No half-assed repairs, no good-enough solutions, but still cost cutting whenever he could because he had no choice in that particular matter. If he would partake in the last two remaining race weekends, if the weather held out, he only had five days to put the engine and make sure it was sound.

Speaking of the weather that was turning cooler reminded him of the times he sat in the cool open stands with the tall dark stately girl he called Babe. Especially memorable was the one colder evening when he dressed inappropriately for the cool weather and the extended period of sitting. Babe took Kirk’s cold hands in hers and tucked them inside her coat. Looking back, Kirk wishes he had been a little older, known more, and enjoyed the inside of her warm coat…well, he did enjoy his nice and cozy warm fingers. Sorry, I digress.

We’re not going through the boring step-by-step process of installing the different engine, but only hit the points not covered before. Knowing, without checking, that the motor mounts would be completely different, Kirk rolled out the acetylene/oxygen outfit. Grabbing his tinted goggles and thick leather gloves he lit off the cutting tip and adjusted it to a blue-hot flame. He quickly burned off the motor mounts close to the frame. Then, holding the hot flame at a 90-degree angle to the frame, he heated the remains of the mount to a red-hot molten iron lava, but still kept the frame rails from melting. Touching the oxygen blast lever on the torch, he blew that old molten iron off and away from the frame. This technique is called scabbing. Just like when you peel the scab off a week-old cut. Anyway, after meticulously burning the evidence of the old engine mounts away, he ground the rest away with the electric grinder leaving nary a mark.

Kirk set the engine down approximately into place and put a floor jack under the transmission to level the combo. He had vowed to himself to do the job right and so following through he put a bubble carpenters’ level on the car. What, you say? You know by now that stock cars don’t sit level because of weight distribution and tire staggering. So he leveled the car and then carefully clamped metal to the frame up to the engine while checking periodically the level of the engine.  It took time, but Kirk got it right. This might be the very first time Kirk actually had the patience to take the time to do a task absolutely perfect. Raiding Mike’s supply of miscellaneous metal pieces he carefully fabricated clean but really strong angle iron because you never know what may happen with a stock car like crashing, going upside down, and you don’t want your engine falling out. Do you? Well, this was one night’s work. Whew! Kirk, better get on the stick.

Kirk found that Farmer Nate had pretty much caught up with his harvesting by way of Kirk’s assistance.  He went from five days a week down to two days a week. A plus that Kirk had more time on his engine install, but a minus that he had less and less money coming in. He figured that he could hold out and make due until the end of racing season. Maybe. Kirk knew he’d have to find a job soon after the racing season or become an indentured slave to his father though he really doubted there wasn’t much to be had there either. His father working at the gypsum full time and late fall and winter being downtime on a farm especially when there are no animals to look after.

 When Kirk thought of looking for a job, he’d get on edge, bewildered until he concentrated on something else. He’d end the thought with a sigh recalling his unsuccessful job search and being shot down over and over before he got the job at the dealership. He most likely got the job due to a word from Mike his brother-in-law. Maybe he shouldn’t have quit, the money was good, but he convinced himself that the work sucked and he wasn’t good with the pressure and time constraints, the tediousness nor the required overall technicality.  Maybe the old lack of hand/eye coordination equated to Kirk sucking at mechanicking to put it bluntly for his own future edification.    

The next day he got to work on his car all day. Modifying the transmission mount followed his playbook from the motor mounts and less of a hassle. Much to his relief, the driveshaft was a bit longer than he needed, so he could just cut the old splice out from the previous shortening. He did have to replace the front yoke going from a Dodge transmission to a Chevrolet. He eyed that hole in the floorboards from underneath. Yeah, he needed a new shifter. Later! He pressed on reinstalling the radiator which only required different hoses. Same thing with the fuel lines. He ran into a problem fabricating the throttle linkage that actually was thrown in a different direction. Kirk had to sit on the front tire to study the throttle situation and what had to be done to make it work. After a bit of eying it up and an hour of dinking around with several failures, he finally came up with a solution to make the throttle work in the correct direction, give a complete throw, and not bind up. Not binding up is important because you wouldn’t want your throttle stuck wide open, unless, of course, you were trying to blow up the engine.

So, Kirk hooked up the various lines and sensors for fuel and the gauges.  Recall that he just bought the engine taking Ed’s word that it was a “good” engine meaning it ran and ran reasonably well for a used junkyard engine that is. No doubt that would suck if he went through all this work to install an engine that was garbage. Yeah, sometimes Kirk’s luck went that way. Well, he ran down to the auto parts store to grab oil and filter to refresh the engine and a cheapo shifter that would be good enough for stock car use. He wouldn’t be doing any speed shifting out there because you race in one gear. He got that all taken care of and decided that he couldn’t run the engine with just a exhaust manifold. All those fumes and heat right from the engine? Not a good thing so he scrounged around Mike’s various cars and engines that littered the garage. He found a suitable pipe about four feet long that would route those fumes underneath the car. Tightening up the pipe, he tested if it to see if it was sturdy enough to not flop down during a race. He wanted to do everything top notch but deemed the pipe was “good enough.”

The weekend approached which meant two race days and of course spending all that time and effort to install the engine Kirk’s adrenaline levels started inching up. Nothing like starting up an engine for the first time, but first, something that had been bothering him ever since he quit his job. 

That something was to break another tie with his former employer. He pulled the grinder out and commenced to grind on the hood to erase the dealership’s and Chuck Westchild’s names. He knew from his experience with his van’s paint job that just painting over or light sanding won’t remove the painted printing. So he ground on the hood, long and hard. After a half hour of that noisy dusty job, he wiped the hood off with a damp rag. Actually, he didn’t care what the finished product looked like he just wanted that offensive printing off his hood. Mike had a quart of black Rustoleum Kirk found and scared up an old paintbrush. Not normally a way to paint a car, but Kirk slapped that black paint on the hood in no time. He thought it looked better all black, which matched the already existing black trim, than all that printing. Satisfied, he let it dry off to the side.

Kirk nervously changed the oil and filter in the new/used engine. Checked the levels of radiator and brake fluid. He didn’t have much else to check. He had to set the timing. Do it right Kirk just like the troubleshoot contest from high school! He pulled number one spark plug. Bumping the engine over with a screwdriver by crossing terminals on the starter while holding a thumb over the plug hole. He kept it up until the cylinder pressure blew his thumb off. Checking the timing marks on the crankshaft pully he slightly rolled the engine over until the marks lined up indicating number one was in firing position. He hadn’t fastened the ignition distributor down, but he popped the cap. The rotor pointed to number five cylinder on the cap. Can’t have that. So he pulled the distributor up a little and turned the rotor toward number one and set the assembly back in. No, still one tooth off, so he pulled it up again and carefully turned it just a smidge and set it back in. Checking the alignment on the cap it looked pretty close, so he fastened the distributor down finger tight.

Kirk took a deep breath to cogitate or was it a sigh? Kirk replaced the spark plug and replaced all the wires in correct order in the cap. There was a can of gasoline in the garage so he carefully sloshed half a cup of gas into the carburetor.  Too much to be sure. It could always spew out the carburetor with a big flash of fire, but that was only part of the fun!  He pulled on the kill switch and stabbed the starter button. With a couple engine rotations, the engine fired off, but shook and stuttered before stalling with a spewing of gas without the fire. Close, Kirk thought.  He rotated the distributor just a little, but taking him by surprise the engine jumped over with a firing of one of the cylinders! He had left the ignition on. That sort thing happens if everything lines up right, it’s the right time of day and the moon is in the right phase. Yeah. Anyway, he went back to hit the starter. This time the engine started and ran roughly for about fifteen seconds until the gas in the carburetor burned up. After giving it a couple more gulps of gas the engine ran on its own sucking its own gas from the tank. Yep, it sounded like a good engine at least. He grabbed the timing light, hooked it up while the engine idled along, and pointed the strobing light at the pulley. Just a little off, so he gave the distributor a little twist to and fro until the marks lined up in the strobe’s illumination. He tightened it up.

Kirk took a deep breath of relief.  He was almost ready to roll around the tracks again which started tomorrow night. He performed another check of all the fluids and tire pressures. The hood, now black without the offensive writing still felt a bit tacky with the new paint so he let it sit. He couldn’t think of anything else so he called it an early night and went home. He felt excited about getting out there on the track again after only one missed weekend after blowing his old engine. How would this engine compare to the old one? Slower? Faster? No noticeable difference? Would anyone say anything about his deliberately blowing his engine or would it be one of those things they just blow off and forget as something “the stupid kid” would do? Would the officials notice after they gave Mike and him flack over the oil leaks. Hopefully that’ll be forgotten by everyone. Kirk wondered: Would Mike ever return to racing? Or was he indebted to the dealership where he still worked and also obligated to Chuck’s so-called sponsorship. All questions that may or may not be answered with time.

On Saturday afternoon Kirk needed to load his car and get on the road. He fired up his new used engine which he thought sounded a bit truck-like when compared to his other engine. He didn’t know what that might mean if nothing at all. He backed out of the garage the loud exhaust note echoing off the walls. He always like that. Backing out the driveway he swung around to head onto the trailer which sat there with the ramps in place. He stopped and tried to put it into first gear. Uh-oh! He let the clutch out and the engine stalled. He pushed and pulled on the shifter, that new shifter he had just installed. The shifter had stuck apparently in two gears effectively locking up the transmission.

This ain’t good, Kirk thought. He went from an excited state to a frantic state. He crawled out of the car and slid underneath the gravel driveway digging into his back. He tried to yank on the linkage on the transmission, but it was stuck solid. Am I going to pull the transmission or at least the side cover. Already Kirk wanted to give up even though he had plenty of time depending on what the problem was major or minor. He laid there looking up into the darkness of the car’s underbelly. He slid out, grabbed a creeper and a nine-sixteenth open end wrench and a pair of pliers. Using the creeper which he kind of shoved under the car, the wheels ineffective in the gravel. Using the pliers, he removed the cotter pins and then unbolted the linkage. After removing them both, he worked the linkage arm. With clunk it popped out of its lockup. The car started rolling. NO! Not that again. He shoved the arm back into gear with another clunk. The car lurched to a stop. He crawled out and grabbed a hunk of board used as a tire stop and positioned it behind the rear wheels. Back underneath, he put the arms in neutral position. He loosened the adjustment on the linkage and rehooked them to the transmission. Oh yeah, I forgot to align the shifter for neutral, Kirk realized. He got a piece of coat hanger (there’s always a need for them in Kirk’s mechanic work) and stuck it through the little hole in the shifter for that purpose. He then adjusted the linkages until the hanger went all the way through. He tightened everything up and confidently started the car, put it in gear and drove it up the ramps. Problem solved, but he tried all the gears a few times to make sure!

Kirk cinched down the car and hit the road with plenty of time to gas up arriving at the track with plenty of time. Waiting in line at the pit gate which seemed to go faster than usual. He noticed that basically the officials just took the entry fees without the spot inspection. He figured it was probably because of the waning season and there’d be no newbies that time of the season. Well, no such luck Kirk.  When Kirk pulled up, they immediately gestured him off to the side of the line. Now what? Kirk wondered. He got out as the one official moseyed on over to Kirk’s rig.

“I thought you’d probably give up there, Uncle Kirk,” the official said on his way. “After the black flag and all.”

“Yeah, I thought about it.”

“Someone said you blew the engine up on purpose, but we took as a rumor. Never heard of anyone doing that on purpose.”

“Not a rumor, I did.” Kirk said deadpan. The Kirk gave him the “side eye.”

“Still Dodging it, I s’pose with your Dodge dealer and all.” He looked under the black hood. “Whoa! That’s not a Dodge engine.  I see the sponsor sign is gone. What happened, broke your ties?”

 “Yeah, you might say that, so I went with a Chevy.”

“Well, solved your leak problem, I imagine,” he said looking the engine over.

“Imagine so.”

“Not much done to the engine, I see.” He eyed up the engine mounts and Kirk could see him mentally check the new engine location relative to the firewall which Kirk knew all about.

“Yeah, no time, no meney.”

“Your install looks good, but hold there.” He pointed. “This exhaust pipe has to be supported towards the end.”

“Ahhhh, I don’t have an exhaust hangar with me.” Kirk pondered a moment. “Will a coat hanger work?”

“Sure, make sure it’s good and solid.”

“Will do.”

“Okay, then you’re good to go again, hopefully with no leaks.”

“Yeah, hopefully. Thanks.”

Kirk was less than optimistic about how his new used engine would perform. He knew that the engine wouldn’t be as powerful as the old blown-up Dodge. Still wondering, he unloaded the car as fast as possible, yet being mindful not to do anything stupid. He wanted to take full advantage of the practice/warm ups as soon as they became available for his class because, realistically, he only ran the engine for about fifteen minutes!  You never know might happen with a new untried engine. Kirk grabbed the ready coat hanger and a pair pliers. He snipped the hook and twist off the hangar. The exhaust pipe exited under the frame and out under the nerf bar. Kirk, not caring what it looked like, wrapped the wire around the pipe, gave it a couple twists, and then wrapped the wire around the nerf bar. He tightened the loose ends with a few twists with the pliers. He snipped off the long ends and bent the ends so no one, likely himself, would get snagged on the sharp tips. For good measure, he stuck the handle of the pliers into the two wires between the pipe and bar and gave it several turns just to sturdy the union. Good enough for government work!

In a matter of minutes, they announced that Kirk’s class practice laps were next. He crawled in, buckled up, donned his helmet, backed out, and headed to the track gate. The track steward eyed his engine compartment with suspicion but didn’t say anything. He tooled out on the track with everyone from his class, so it seemed, from the hot shots, including the unbeatable cash car, down to the slow pokes also rans like Kirk. Going around the track slowly as they closed the gate, Kirk thought the engine sounded like a truck’s. Could be a truck engine. Could be just the make do exhaust that exited differently from the previous engine. They hung out the green flag, not waving it like always as for races. The pace quickened with the hot shots streaming past full bore. Why do they bother Kirk wondered, they’re always up there in front and they never change anything, at least as far as I know. He cruised a couple laps and let his fellow slowpokes pass him. Well, let’s see how this thing runs seeing it’s warmed up from its junkyard stay. In the first turn, Kirk eased down on the power with that oversized aluminum footprint pedal. It had only been one weekend missed, but he thought the car pulled kind of hard, though not faster. He couldn’t quite tell from the seat of his pants. I’ll have to wait to see in competition, he thought, and if I come in last or not. Yeah though, it sounded like a truck, no doubt.

Still his paranoia hung on, so as soon as he parked next to the trailer, Kirk had to get out and check the engine. He found it dry with no leaks, no oil seepage. Much better than needing to wipe the engine and frame down after every time after a track run. He looked up to see Charlie heading his way.

“Hey Kirk, I didn’t expect to see you back this season,” he stepped closer. “Ah, went with a Chevy I see. Not enough power with the Dodge?”

“No, not enough power but that wasn’t the REAL problem. It was the unfixable oil leaks that drove me to change.”

“Oh, that’s right. You got black flagged over that? Right?”

“Yeah, that was it. Mike gave up because of that problem,” Kirk shrugged. “I felt that I needed to come back for these two weekends.” He grinned. “Gotta’ keep my points up ya’ know?”

“Oh sure. A top twenty season finish is pretty important out here,” Charlie grinned glancing aside.  ”Anyway, good luck with the Chevy tonight.”

“Same to you, see you out there doing the same-o, same-o.”

“Yep, roundy-round.”

Kirk went back to eyeballing his engine. After a few minutes, he decided that all was shipshape, so he relaxed to wait out his turn at a heat race. He shrugged to himself. Why did he do it, race stock cars? He recalled as a kid watching the races under the lights just like he was about to drive himself. Yeah, racing thrilled him and whether watching or participating there had to be more cars in a race than the winner and a couple others chasing him down. Yeah, it was a thrill, Kirk decided, but a commitment to build and maintain a car. A racing stock car!

            Kirk wandered down to the pit stands and sat down to watch the heats and consolation races of the Minis and Chargers. No real speed in those classes, but the minis spun out or crashed like they were in slow motion while the Chargers often made fender bending big crunches with metal and debris littering the track. Yeah, crowd pleasing mayhem from the Chargers. Kirk felt like he didn’t need to look at the board for his starting grid placement, but he looked anyway for reassurance. He glanced at his class grids, then he did a double-take. He started last in his heat the second heat running. Why last? He immediately got mad and wanted to corner an official and ask what caused him to start last.  Was it because he had been black flagged in his last race? Was he effectively blackballed until he proved himself reliable again? He looked around and of course there were no officials in sight because they were busy running races. He studied the board again. Ah! He concluded that he had missed a whole weekend so of course he’d start in the back. He cooled as he strode back to his parked overly bright silver and black car. What an eyesore, Kirk mused. 

He crawled in and fired off his new used Chevy engine. He punched down on the gas pedal a couple times accepting the fact that it sounded distinctly different than before as he donned his brain bucket. He watched the hot shots motor to the track inlet gate. Well, he had thought early on, that’s before ever being out there on the track, that he’d get a chance to be in the fast heat and be competitive. He also dreamed that he’d be a usual qualified entrant in the feature race. Well, he did get that one chance to be in the feature though it wasn’t because he had fought hard, had a fast car, and earned the spot. And he’d lead a race. Well, he did that too if for a very brief time but also not due his skills or powerful car. Good experience for a rookie speed warrior.  

Kirk backed out of his space and moseyed over in a cloud of dust to the inlet gate. His competitors already sat ready to do battle. Even though he should have buckled up before driving across the pits, he pulled to a stop in his last position in the grid and pulled on his five-point harness nice and tight.  Never can be too careful, ‘cause you never know what may happen out there. Especially on a stock car oval track. In a few more moments, the other heat filed out with the cash car and driver obviously winning once again. Kirk kind of missed not seeing Mike, his brother-in-law, mentor of sorts and owner of the matching silver car file out from the track after the first heat. So that’s just how things sorted out, he supposed.

The oft winning car rolled out as the inlet gate opened. Kirk took a deep breath as he always did before a race. He pushed in the clutch and put the shifter in first gear. His breath caught: what if it jams again! As the first cars in his heat began moving, he gingerly let the clutch out just to see. The car rolled a foot or so. He let his held breath out. As the five rows of cars moved onto the track Kirk followed along the sole car in the last row. At least I have maneuvering room. Under the retina scorching bright lights of the high banks, Kirk cruised around tailing the others and shifted up. Like always the white flag hung out. Next lap is green! How will his new engine perform, Kirk couldn’t be sure from his short time fin warmups. As they approached the flag stand the green flag fell, adrenaline, blood pressure, oil pressure, revolutions per minute, and the noise level soared.

Kirk stayed with the rocketing cars ahead of him. At first. He wasn’t sure at first, but going through the first and second turns, he pushed hard coming out of the turn to the straight. He gained on those competitors he usually dealt with on a weekly basis. At first. He almost caught Gus in his yellow Hornet, but halfway down the straight Gus started pulling away. Kirk’s Chevy engine just seemed to run out of juice as the RPMs got higher. Same thing on the front straight, Kirk gained steadily out of the turn then the engine power seemed to flatten out and the other cars pulled away. Yeah, Kirk thought, like a truck engine a lot of low-end grunt or torque, but it lacked the higher RPM horsepower. Kirk managed to get up beside Gus once, but he just didn’t have quite the horsepower at the end of the straights to make a pass. Kirk just accepted what it was, a stone stock engine. Maybe the engine needed more carburation, maybe the gearing was different in the Chevrolet transmission compared to the Dodge, more than likely it was, he never thought about it so he didn’t check.

Well, he ended up finishing last in the heat and ditto for the consolation race. He didn’t have high hopes of just sticking the Chevrolet engine in the car and doing as well as before. Good thing because it just didn’t have that extra oomph to at least compete with his fellow sluggos. He shrugged to himself and accepted the fact of the matter with three races left in the season, and he finished all three the same way�"dead last. If someone had watched him early in the season then in the end, they would wonder why Kirk continued to race always coming in last. Well, they had missed Kirk’s short-lived, minor glories So after the season will Kirk just park the car out back and let the weeds grow up around it? Who is to say? Will Kirk succumb to depression over his racing season’s results?

Anyway. So endth Kirk’s humdrum season of racing. Not all that exciting, was it? No one in his personal realm, not his parents, siblings, fellow gear heads could have cared less that Kirk was an Enduring Warrior of the Speed Coliseum. Well, one thing we know about Kirk is that he may never be a winner, but he is persistent in something once he starts, and he did persist over the racing season.

Wait a sec, he sure didn’t stick with his job at the Dodge dealership, did he? All along it might have seemed that Kirk just followed along with whatever fell into his lap or as someone might say fate presented to him. Hogwash! Will this season of racing leave Kirk Never the Same or will he be just the same old Kirk as before. Guess we’ll just have to wait to see what transpires in this long-winded semi-biopic of Kirk Biscuit.