Until Next Year?

We had originally planned on running the whole week. My parents and Derrick were going to stay through Saturday, with Grady and I leaving on Thursday afternoon. Derrick pulled me aside on Monday and said, “Gordon and Rudy are going home Wednesday morning. Do you really think that me, mom and dad can do all of this by ourselves?” I looked around. “No.” I said. “This is more work than we thought it was going to be, how about I suggest that we go home early?” he said. I agreed that it was a good idea. We brought it up tentatively to my dad and without hesitation he said, “Yes. There’s no way. We need a whole crew to do this!” That said, we knew that Tuesday was going to be our last day on the salt. And with the noise the motor was making, we didn’t know how much time we had left anyhow.

One of the biggest differences about racing at Bonneville is time. The Rat’s performance life has mostly been spent on the dyno or at the drag strip, where time has a different meaning. On the dyno the bike runs between 2000 and 7000 rpm in 6-7 seconds. In those 6-7 seconds, the bike only runs at the highest rpm for about a half a second. The same is true of drag racing; you are down the track in no more than 10 seconds. On the salt, because of the distance you must travel to get the bike up to top speed, the bike is running over 6000 rpm for more than 60 seconds. This introduces a myriad of new conditions to compensate for. Derrick noticed that the bike was slowing down by the third mile, and we had to figure out why.

Gordon’s biggest concern was the oil. The oil travels from the bottom end of the motor up through the lifters and pushrods and onto the rocker arms and valve guides to lubricate the top of the motor. It then trickles back down with gravity, and the process starts all over again. By three miles the oil wasn’t returning down to the cases. Over a long period of time, the bottom end would be starved of lubrication and cause damage to the engine. We had a couple of options, if the oil is too viscous, it won’t trickle fast enough, so we could try a 0 grade. The problem with thinner oil is that when the bike gets hot, the oil becomes even thinner. We didn’t want to leave it totally unprotected. The other option was changing the oil filter. We were using a performance oil filter that has a stainless element, which lets the oil flow fast. We wanted to slow down the flow so we borrowed a stock oil filter from another team. Stock filters have paper elements, which help restrict the oil flow up, which, in theory would keep the bottom end from becoming empty by the end of the run.

We also discussed how much the heat of the bike was affecting its performance. If we had expansion issues, that was a whole new can of worms to open. We decided to leave that discussion for home, and just keep our fingers crossed that the engine would live for another run.

Because my mom had been watching Grady the whole week at the campground, she hadn’t gotten a chance to see any of the racing. We decided to bring the motor home out on Tuesday so she and Grady could see what this salt racing was all about. Derrick, Gordon and Rudy picked up the bike and pulled it to the short track start line. We brought the motor home right there also, parking it with a view of the track. They got in line with the bike and we knew from the number of people that were in front of us that it was going to be a long wait. Grady ran around in the bus, and my dad watched the races from the front seat. My mom got geared up to stand out there with us—50 sunblock, long pants, floppy sun hat, and sunglasses. She held the umbrella and became increasingly more nervous as Derrick approached the front of the line.

We were in line for over an hour. When Derrick was three before the start so we got him suited up. It takes a second person to help him zip his pants to the jacket, and tighten his racing boots. He got on the bike and rolled it forward as each person took off. He left the zipper to the jacket open until the guy in front of him took off. He grabbed the zipper and pulled it closed with his big racing gloves. When he reached the top, the zipper pull came off in his hand and he just looked at me like “Did that just happen?” I told him not to move, because the zipper was inching it’s way open. I ran to the hummer and grabbed a roll of gorilla tape, which is a super sticky version of duct tape. There was a car waiting to go in the right line, so we had a minute. I taped down the front, and up and around the inside. I put another piece across, making a giant black cross across his chest. I was hoping that the wind wasn’t going to peel the tape off. The car next to us was cranking the engine, trying to start it, but couldn’t get it going. They tried again, and nothing. Buddy, our starter looked at us to see if we were ready. Without the jacket closed he was going to have to cancel the run. Gordon and I stuck it down as best as we could and told him to go. Buddy confirmed that the car in the other line was dead in the water and said over the radio, “We are going to go with bike number 1632, on the short track.”

I told my mom to go in the chase car with the Rudophs, and I ran back to the motor home to watch with dad and Grady. My dad watched Derrick’s run with binoculars. He had a perfect view all the way to the 2-mile marker. He said that he had been noticing that when a car or bike reaches about 130 mph you could see a rooster tail of salt shoot up in its wake. (For any of you who have owned a jet boat, you know exactly what this looks like.) It’s a spray of salt that comes off the rear tire and shoots up about 15 feet. My dad said it was a sure sign that it was a good run. At almost exactly two miles, the tail appeared.

Our radio wasn’t tuning in the results very well, so we couldn’t listen to what his speed was. We waited, and waited. Finally my phone rang--it was Gordon. “What’s the news?” I said. “163.215” My dad and I both screamed. Grady looked up from his pile of matchbox cars wondering what was wrong with us.

The team came back around and we decided to run again right away. They got the bike back in line and Derrick came to the motor home to read the laptop readings from the last run. He said that the throttle was wide open; he couldn’t give the motor any more. The record we were trying to beat was 171.667. Yes, only 8 mph away, but that can be a continent sized gap to traverse. He and my dad discussed the gearing of the bike and decided that they should think about changing it, if they do this again, but that was a major change.

The other condition we hadn’t fully compensated for was the density altitude. Because Derrick was using what is called a “closed loop” system for his fuel injection module, it should compensate for air density and altitude on it’s own, but it’s not perfect. Like Derrick’s bike, cars are closed loop systems, and they have an oxygen sensor that determines the gas to air ratio that is appropriate for the engine. That is why you can drive from below sea level to the mountains and still have a car that runs well. On carbureted bikes, or old carbureted cars you have to manually adjust the jets, or the engine will run too lean (not enough gas) or too rich, or fat (too much gas). When you run down the road it will ultimately only effect your gas mileage, but when you are racing, this curve has to be perfect to get the most out of your engine.
Derrick had written a program for the EFI (fuel injection) before he left, guessing at what he would be running based on the salt flat’s elevation of 4320feet. However, temperature and humidity affect the actual altitude, increasing or decreasing it on a mathematical scale. This phenomenon is called Density Altitude (DA). DA has the most effect on airplanes, but again, we are dealing with thousandths of mphs, it matters on the ground too. The temperature and humidity also changes based on the time of day that you run. When Derrick ran his 163.215, the DA brought the altitude from 4320 to over 6000 feet. This would mean that we had less air than we thought and the motor was running too rich. Derrick had confidence in the oxygen sensors, and decided to run the bike one more time, as is. If we decide to do this again, you can bet that we will have a better handle on this DA thing.

As he and my dad are discussing this, he is still in full gear, with sweat just pouring off of him. “You have to get out of your suit Derrick,” I said. “I can’t, if this zipper comes down, I am done.” He had peeled back the tape and he stood up. When he did, the zipper slipped down another 6 inches. “Take it off, we have to try and fix it.” Rudy came in and asked if we had any other jackets with heavy-duty zippers. Derrick said that my dad had one in the closet that he thought would work. Derrick went back to the bike and Rudy yanked a zipper pull off of a pocket of an old jacket. It looked good, but it wouldn’t fit on the suit. He tried prying it with pliers, but we couldn’t make it work. He said that you would be surprised how many zippers there are out there, and we needed just the right one to make it work. We grabbed backpacks, purses, sweatshirts, anything we could, and none of them were the right zipper.

We brought the jacket out to Derrick and told him the bad news. He pulled the bike out of line and we thought of other ways to get the jacket back together. This was a brand new $400 leather suit that was now covered in glue, leather laptop bag patches, tape and goo. “Wait,” Derrick said, “I have another racing jacket in the closet. It isn’t leather but it has a big zipper.” Rudy and Derrick ran to the motor home and grabbed it. Rudy stripped the pull and tried it on the leather suit—a perfect fit. Team HPE lived to see another run. We got back in line and waited for our turn.
My dad, Gordon and I went down the return road to get him. He was parked quietly, waiting for us when we got there. “It felt good, until the third mile, but not as fast. Oh, and something hit me in the leg at about mile 2, does anything look weird on the bike?” Gordon looked down and saw oil all over the side of the bike. “Your oil plug is gone, we’re done.” “I guess that’s it,” Derrick said, “The motor is done.”
We towed the bike back to the timing station. “Short track, bike 1632” My dad said. 158.257 mph. At 1620, on 8/17/10 our run for the record ended.

We went back to the start line to switch drivers. My dad got the motor home ready to roll and Rudy said to me, “I’ll ride in the back of the hummer to direct Derrick, Why don’t you pull your brother, and Gordon will drive our car back?” “Heck no!” I said. “I’ll drive your car, let Gordon pull Derrick back.” The day before there had been a little bit of an incident. My dad had been pulling my brother back, and he had taken a circuitous route back to the pits. As mentioned before, pulling the bike on a strap is hazardous, and if Derrick isn’t ready to stop when my dad does, he will crash into the back of the hummer. Also, if there is slack in the line and my dad drives forward too fast, the bike gets yanked. Well, my dad had to stop for some cross traffic and Derrick almost lost control of the bike. Derrick was in full leather gear and had been on the back of the bike for nearly 30 minutes in 95-degree heat. He became furious and he and my dad had some words. Derrick later apologized, but it was definitely not a highlight of the week. I am smart, for a blonde, and after that happened, you can bet that I wasn’t going to have anything to do with being the driver of the pull vehicle.

Gordon took Derrick back to the pits and I waited for my parents to move the motor home. I drove back to the trailer to find that Gordon and Derrick had just arrived. Derrick was taking off his helmet and he had a strange expression on his face. “What happened?” I said. Derrick pointed down to the gas tank. A golf ball sized dent scarred the yellow paint. I looked at Gordon and Rudy. “We had a crash.” “What!?!?!?!” I said. “I did the exact same thing your dad did.” Gordon said. “I told him I was going to stop, and I did, briefly, but then I forgot to tell him we were going again.” Derrick had his feet on the ground and was waiting for the word that that they were moving again. The line was slack, and then all of the sudden Gordon pulled forward. Derrick, needless to say, wasn’t ready, and the bike was yanked forward. It tossed him to the side and landed on his leg. He was dragged about 3 feet before Gordon was able to stop. He jumped out of the car and he and his dad lifted the 600-pound bike off of Derrick. Derrick may have gone cheap on the race suit, but not on the race boots. His $600 boots saved his foot. The handlebars bent and that is what dented the tank. Gordon felt horrible. To try and bring a little levity to the situation I said, “So what you are telling me is that we go 163 mph without a problem, and you guys crash going 1 mph? Who’s going to tell dad?” Derrick quickly pointed at Gordon. “I’m going to wait till he has a few marguerites, then I’ll tell him.” Gordon said.

Gordon and Rudy left the next morning, after a nice dinner that involved just enough drinking to break the news. (My dad took it well.) Our racing was done and Wednesday became our pack up day. It was hotter than ever and we all fried in the sun and dryness as we repacked and organized the trailer. We left Grady inside the motor home, because the conditions were just too harsh. Around 7pm, as the sun was going down, the intensity finally let up. Grady came out and spent a half hour at his favorite activity--touching the wheels of the motor home. This kid LOVES busses, trucks, and especially wheels. (Hmmm, I wonder where that comes from) We had rinsed off the bike, which was covered in salt, and it left a big puddle for him to splash in. He shrieked with joy as he jumped in it. Then he sat down. He was soaked, and covered in salt. I said to my mom, “Why don’t we let him run around a bit without the salty wet clothes?” She shrugged, and we stripped him down to just his shoes. He squealed with excitement and started sprinting across the salt in his birthday suit--free at last! Life is about building memories, and we all had some this week, but I think that Grady will have the best bragging rights. He streaked in the salt when he was 14 months old. Who among us can say the same?

Well that’s it. I am writing this from home, with my parents hours away from Chicago. We didn’t beat the record, but I think that we can all feel good about our efforts. Derrick drove it flawlessly and coming within 8 mph with a street bike, is no small feat. To give a little perspective, another bike, with a supercharger, in a totally different class made nearly twice the horsepower that we did (over 250) and had a record setting speed of 159mph. For our Lab Rat, in it’s rookie year, we really couldn’t have asked for much more.

We want to take a moment to thank all of the people who supported us in this crazy ride--we would have never made it to Bonneville without you. Our sponsors were Hemi Performance Engineering, Kaman Tool, Rob Bult at Illini State Trucking and Marigold, Dark Horse Crank Works, G.A.S., and Mysza Performance. Our team was made up of Bill Stefinisky (the builder of the Rat, and the guy who keeps everything running back on the home front), Gary Mack, Derrick Roderweiss, Ron Roderweiss, Irene Roderweiss, Grady Kaman Roderweiss-O’Brien, Louis Dalgaard, Jessie, Andy, George Jaresko (who drove out 600 miles from San Fran, and was only able to stay 24 hours), Rudy and Gordon Rudolph, Brian Truesdale and of course, me. Also, thanks to all of the friends and extended family that offered advice and support, you know who you are.

Will we be back next year? That remains to be seen. If we do return, we will certainly have a better idea of what we are doing. They say that once you get salt fever, it’s hard to stay away. I don’t know if that is true, but I do know that there is nothing in the world like Bonneville. Even if you aren’t a race enthusiast, even if you have never paid attention to anything that goes fast in your life, I recommend you go there for Speedweek, at least once. The camaraderie, the passion, the excitement, and the “other-worldness” of the salt desert cannot be found anywhere else.

Until next year…

Wendy Roderweiss

"It's just you, the salt, and the clock."-Ron Roderweiss

If you are standing out on the salt midday, or late afternoon, it is a miserable place to be. There is no relief from the sun. There isn’t anything to shade you for hundreds of miles, so umbrellas are essential. The white ground bounces the sunlight everywhere, so if you are out there without sunglasses for more than 10 minutes you have a splitting headache and border on permanent damage to your eyes. Snow blindness is common in skiing, and this is similar. Because the sun is so piercing, one umbrella isn’t enough. It takes two in order to get any respite. Temperatures reached 95 degrees out here this week, and the humidity ranged from 6-20%. It is extremely dry, and dehydration is common. We all made sure to drink plenty of water, but it’s deceiving because you don’t actually sweat very much. At least 5 people were treated for dehydration.

Early morning is different. The temperatures drop down to the upper 60’s at night and early morning on the salt is cool and pleasant. The sun is still bright, but hasn’t started burning yet. The humidity is higher, and the salt is a little wetter. It doesn’t quite feel like you are on Mars yet.

Monday morning we got up at 6 and loaded the Hummer. My mom volunteered to stay back at the campground with Grady. Lou, Jessie and Andy were due back in Chicago in three days, and planned on leaving first thing, but since we were first up they stayed to watch us run. We wouldn’t have made it this far without them, so we were happy that they decided to stay. They got to the track before us, and had the bike uncovered and ready to go. Gordon and Rudy met us at the trailer. We packed up Derrick’s gear and headed down to the start line. They ran the record runs first and at about 8am, we were told that they were resetting the track for new runs.

Derrick was nervous, we all were. He had taken the bike out to a remote area the day before, just to see what it felt like under him, but this was the real deal. Ahead of him lay 6 miles of groomed salt. At each ¼ mile there is an orange cone, and at each Mile a large orange sign with a corresponding number. The timing starts after the first mile and cuts off at 3.

Before he was allowed to run for the record, Derrick had to complete a rookie pass. He had to do a “clean run” which means that he had to keep the bike under 150 mph, had to exit the track to the proper side, park his bike on the return road and wait for the support vehicle to pick him up. He would then proceed to the timing station where he would get his timing slip to tell him how fast he went. If under 150, he would get it signed by the starter and be allowed to run for real. The key was to go over 125, because then he could get his “D” class license, but he needed to stay under 150 or he would be disqualified from running at all. The problem…we didn’t have a speedometer.
Also, before we got to the line we realized that from tow strapping the bike, salt had caked up under the front fender. It was so loaded up under there that the wheel would barely turn. Lou, punched a whole in a water bottle and sprayed the salt out from under the fender while Gordon used a bandana to clean it out entirely. Again, we are learning.

We told him to take it easy, this wasn’t about speed, it was about getting used to the salt. There were two starters on the short track the whole time we were here--again, volunteers who stand in the blazing sun for 12 hours a day. They have the greatest sense of humor. He took off steady, and we heard him shift perfectly. My dad and I jumped in the hummer and headed down the return road. 3 miles feels like a really long way, unless you are going over 100mph. We found Derrick parked and he gave us the thumbs up. We missed the announcement of his speed on the cb, so we had to head to the timing slip station to find out. We hooked up the bike and headed down the return road.

“Short track, bike 1632,” my dad told the volunteer. They handed us the slip—130.591 mph! He put it right in the pocket. We went back to the start line and had our starter, Buddy, sign the slip. He turned Derrick around and signed it on his back, one more obstacle overcome on our way to the record.

We pulled around and put the bike in line to go again. Derrick told the crew that he had barely gone past half throttle, and knew that the bike had a lot more in it. He said that it felt really stable and comfortable, but the biggest issue was that the wind wanted to pull him off the bike. He hooked up his laptop to transfer the data from the bike’s computer. Sure enough, he hadn’t gone upwards of 4500 rpm.

We didn’t have to wait too long this time, and Derrick was quickly toward the front of the line. The starter recognized him and said, “Didn’t you run already?” “Yes,” Derrick replied. “Well then get that giant ‘R’ sticker off of your helmet. You aren’t a rookie anymore.” Jessie peeled it off, right before Derrick’s first official run.

The goal this time was just 10 mph faster. We wanted to ease into this. Derrick took off from the line with a little bit too much enthusiasm. The back tire got away from him and he fishtailed. The starter shook his head laughing. “I guess he’s still a rookie,” he said. Derrick eased up on the throttle and got the bike under control. He recovered nicely and had another clean run.

When we picked Derrick up on the access road he gave the horrifying signal for “broke”. He said that the engine started making noise when he hit the third mile. We picked up the ticket-142.026 mph. Derrick said he didn’t go over ¾ throttle this time, and the computer confirmed as much. We knew the bike had more; we just needed to see what the mysterious noise was.

We decided to bring the bike back to the trailer and see if we could figure out what the noise was. Gordon started tearing it apart. He took out the pushrods from the rear cylinder, and then pulled the rocker box because he noticed a lack of oil on the top end of the motor. We pulled the lifters out and checked if they were plugged, they weren’t. We put the lifters back in and then checked if they were adjusted right. In the end we readjusted the push rods to make sure we had a proper clearance, shrugged a bit, and put it all back together. Nothing seemed wrong, but there was a slight noise in the motor. It was now near 4pm and we decided to put the bike back on the track and see what we had.

Derrick had a solid launch, slow and steady. The timing doesn’t start till after the 1st mile marker, so there is no need to go crazy at the start. This is very different from drag racing. We jumped in the hummer and went down the return road. We had the CB turned up and we heard the announcer, “On the short track, motorcycle 1632, 155.430 at the 2 and a quarter.” We all cheered. It’s a long ride out to the 4-mile marker. Derrick gave the thumbs up and we told him the good news. He said he felt the bike still had a little more in it. We headed back to the pits for some strategizing.

Next up, our last day on the salt…

Inspection

To say that we had no idea what we were doing when we got here is a gross understatement. There has been a STEEP learning curve. This whole event is run by an organization called the Southern California Timing Association (SCTA) and they have been coming out to the salt for 62 years to run vehicles as fast as they will go. Many things have changed over the years, and the most significant is the amount of safety equipment you must have. They publish a rule book every year and have very specific guidelines for what you need. Since the majority of the vehicles here are cars, the book is geared toward them. The rules on motorcycles are not as detailed. We skipped some stuff, glossed over other things, and just plain missed some rules.
In order to register your vehicle you have to attend a drivers meeting, and if you are a rookie, you have to go through rookie orientation. We ran around Saturday morning, trying to get everything ready, standing in the wrong lines, getting directed left and right. The only thing we knew that we had to do was attend the drivers meeting at 9am, and the Rookie orientation just after. Again, we didn’t prepare. It was hot, and we had no water, no food, and stood out in the sun for over 2 hours. We drove the back “roads” to the course and watched people take off from the line. We had to go through each phase before they would give Derrick is Large “R” sticker on his helmet. This sticker let the starters know that it was his first run, and that he was under strict observation his first time down the track.

After you get this sticker you have to get your bike, (or car) suit, helmet, and support vehicle through tech inspection. New bikes, like ours, need two inspectors to sign off on them. If you pass inspection, you can register your bike and get arm bands for your crew. And being a rookie driver Derrick needs to complete a rookie run, but he can’t do that till he passes inspection. Our first trip to the inspectors was on Saturday, around 12:00.

The first thing that was wrong was that we didn’t have a CB radio in our “support vehicle”. Before we left Derrick read that each “Push car” must have a CB. Well my dad replied, “We don’t have a push car, we have motorcycle, you can’t push a motorcycle. We don’t need a CB”. A push car is a vehicle that pushes the racecar down the first part of the track to get it going. Cars built for speed have such low gear ratios that they cannot slip the clutch and keep it running at a slow speed, so the car or truck actually gets behind them and pushes them till they get to a speed where they can engage the clutch and take off on their own power. Now, I admit the wording of the book should be changed, but next time we’ll remember to take it just in case. This little mess up cost us over a hundred dollars, when we were forced to buy a new one from the Pilot Truck stop. With a little ingenuity, Lou and Andy fit it to the hummer and checked that off the list.

The bike did well, we only had one problem, the battery needed to be secured to the frame. Besides that it was good to go. A word about the tech inspectors…First, everyone at this event is a volunteer. And there must be several hundred people making this thing work. These inspectors must check over minutia for every class of vehicle out there (and there are dozens) and must make sure that everyone is safe. In most racing circles, the nature of this job makes them a jerks. They are the enforcers. They read you the rules, and you have to follow. The experience here has been just the opposite. All of the inspectors are supportive and encouraging. They do not scold you, or dismiss you. They work with you so you can get on the salt. When our inspector saw the battery issue, he ran to his trailer and got us some plumber’s tape and a bolt to fix it right there. For those of you who don’t know what plumper’s tape is, look it up. It’s great stuff. (Thanks to my boss at LACMA, Elvin Whitesides, who taught me all about how to safety up equipment with this handy tool.) We had to pull the bike back to the pits and secure the battery, which took almost an hour, then bring it back in line at tech to get it approved. It passed.

Second, most of the inspectors are racers. One of our inspectors, Randall Parker, had just set a 205 mph record on his motorcycle, and had come back to the tech area to inspect bikes. He gave us all kinds of pointers, on tire pressure, brakes, and what to take off the bike and still stay in our class. Based on our horsepower numbers, he thought we would be very close to the record. We were just worried about finally getting this thing on the track.

Derrick’s suit was another issue. His helmet was approved, and his jacket, but his pants weren’t. For motorcycle riders you have to have all leather suit-every inch of it. The area behind his knees and hips were made of a mesh for breathing. The inspector only noticed the back of the legs, though, and told us we had to cover them.

The closest town to the salt flats is Wendover, NV. I use the word “town” loosely. There is a small grocery store, a small hardware store, some pawnshops, and casinos (it’s a border town) and that’s about it. Where is a Wal-Mart when you need one? (Yes, I am driving a hummer and longing for a Wal-Mart. Who am I?) Andy and Jessie found some heavy-duty needles, spray adhesive and leather gloves at the grocery store. I started cutting them up and realized they weren’t going to be nearly enough leather to cover the back of his legs. We searched everywhere for more leather, anything we could find. Derrick reaches down and grabs his Dell laptop bag. “Chop it up,” Derrick said. “Really” I said? Derrick handed it to my dad and had him start skinning it. We had just enough, taking the bottom panel on one side and the front flap on the other.

Saturday night the rest of our crew came in. Gordon Rudolph, and his dad Rudy flew in from Virginia and Florida respectively. Gordon is going to be running his bike at the East Coast Timing Association race in September and he has lots of experience with Hemis. He has had one of our kits for nearly 10 years, and has put in countless hours of research. He has placed in the Dyno shootout in Daytona for the last 5 years, and has an engineer’s brain like the rest of us techies. The Rudolphs were a welcome addition to our team. (They also picked up a new generator in Salt Lake City because the brand new one that we bought when the other one got stolen stopped working after about 2 hours.)

Sunday morning Lou and I started gluing the pieces to his suit. Derrick’s brand new, beautiful suit was now covered in spray adhesive. We got the strips of leather on it, but it was far from permanent. I tried sewing them but I couldn’t get the needles through the thick leather. During inspection, the day before, they hadn’t noticed the areas by his waist, so we were hoping that by showing them just the back they again wouldn’t notice the front. We brought the H3 with the cb and the suit to the inspectors. He looked at the pants, and was about to sign off, but then he grabbed them to look closer and turned them to the front and noticed the other section. “Not all leather” he said. We all sighed. He signed off on the support vehicle, so now it was just the rest of the suit. We went back to the pits and told the crew the bad news.

It was now Sunday afternoon. We grabbed the dell bag and started chopping again. We had just enough to cover it. We glued again, stuck Derrick in the car and ran back to the inspectors before the pieces fell off. The inspector looked at them and said, “Okay, I’ll put down that it’s a temporary fix, just make sure you get it sewed when you get back. “ He was about to send us to get our sticker when he noticed that we needed TWO people to sign off. I told him that Randall was our other inspector so he tried to find him. He was off racing. They were about to make us bring the bike over again and start from scratch when one of the other inspectors said, “You know what? Randall checked this thing, I’ll just sign as his proxy. Go get your sticker.” Hooray! We finally passed inspection!

We got our packet and our sticker and we were finally ready to make a run. The next issue was that we had no idea how far away the tracks were from the pit. There are three tracks here, a long track for vehicles that go over 175 mph, a short course for anyone under that, and a combo track for either. The long track is 8 miles of timed space and 3 miles of slow down space. The short is 3 miles timed, with 3 miles of slow down room. What we didn’t know was that you are not allowed to drive your race vehicle to the start line, it must be pulled or pushed. Well hooking the trailer up to the motor home each time wasn’t really an option. Luckily the Hummer had a huge tow ring on the back of it. An actual hitch would haven been nice, but we made due. We hooked a tow rope to it and around Derrick’s front fork. We started pulling him at around 25 mph. This is not an ideal way to get the bike from point A to B, but it was all we had. It’s dangerous and difficult, and requires a lot of communication between Derrick, who is on the bike and the driver of the Hummer, which was my dad. We start pulling Derrick to the short track at 5:15 pm Sunday evening. It took us nearly two days to get to this point.

The short track is 4 miles from the pit. When you get to the start line, you get in one of two staging lines. There are two starters that communicate with the tower, and they are the only people who can send you down the track. They alternate sending one from each line. When you are three from the front you must be suited up with your helmet, and ready to run. We were about 25 people back from the front of the line. Again, we had no idea what to expect. Derrick wanted to put his leathers on back at the pits and I said, “Why don’t we wait? “

Well, we waited, that’s for sure. The tracks close at 7pm sharp. Based on how the line was moving, it was looking like it was going to be close. At 10 minutes to 7 we were 2nd in line. They ran one from the other line and then called it a day. They had run 170 vehicles in 12 hours. We were so close! Your options are to return to the pits and get back in line the next day, or leave bike or car in line for the next morning. The people in front of us packed it up and left us in first position.
When you break a record here, your vehicle is immediately brought to “impound”. Your crew has 4 hours to work on the car or bike, to get it ready to run again. It then sits till 7am the next morning where you have to re-run on the same track, and repeat the time. They take the average of the two and if you are over the record, it is added to the books. Since they run first everyday, we would be up right after that.

Next up…our first run on the salt.

Salt

Well, we are here. Bonneville Speedway. Really, words don’t describe it. 600 square miles of salt. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Derrick, Grady and I flew in to Salt Lake City on Friday afternoon. We headed to the rental car counter and found some very angry people screaming at the budget agent. Apparently the system by which they deliver their keys to the front counter was broken. They use the old tube system like banks used to use (still do?) and the keys were jammed. People were waiting an hour and a half for their cars. People were screaming and finger jabbing. Well to accommodate everyone they gave away a bunch of their cars. All they had left was a H3. “What’s an H3?” I ask. “A Hummer,” Derrick responds. “No way!” I shout., “It will kill my soul to ride in a hummer. “ “Okay,” Derrick says, a little dejected. As I was chasing Grady down the terminal I thought about it. A Hummer may come in handy. “Okay, get the H3,” I shout as Grady runs under another stansion screaming with joy. Well, at least we did one thing right.
My parents got to the salt a few hours before we did, and were met by the first wave of our amazing crew—Louis, Andy and Jessica. Louis is the son of Paul Dalgaard, who used to work for my dad. Louis is a gear head, and drag racer and he and his two friends decided to spend their vacation out here on the salt helping out the Hemi Performance team. By the time Derrick and I got to the salt they had the entire pit set up and were on top of everything. They were incredibly helpful, and I don’t know how we would have made it without them.

How to describe the salt? It’s almost exactly like snow, but it’s dry and warm, and doesn’t melt, so once you have it, it stays with you. When you drive on it, it cakes around the wheel wells of your car just like snow and ice. It gets EVERYWHERE. The inside of the hummer is caked in salt. If you are picturing taking your salt shaker and spilling it on the floor mat of your car, like I was, you have got it all wrong. Picture instead white sugar frosting that has been left out for a week. It’s dry and hard and clumps together. It is ot small refined crystals. Needless to say we will be hitting a couple of car washes before we return it to Budget.

Driving on the salt is incredible. It grips like hard packed dirt, like asphalt. And it’s flat, for miles and miles. According to my dad, it is one of the only places in the world where you can see the curvature of the earth because it is flat for so far. Driving behind the pits, or on the entry roads is great, but when you get out to the track, out on the salt 5 or 6 miles, that’s when it’s truly amazing. You can see mountains in the distance, but that is it. It’s a plateau of white. When you walk on the salt it crunches under your feet like a frozen lake. Jessica said that when she was a kid she said how much she loved snow, but hated the cold. Wasn’t there a way to have warm snow? Well here it is.

The race entries this year are the highest in the history of Bonneville. Just over 500 crews registered their cars and bikes this year to run on the salt. Everything from vespa scooters to supercharged dragsters go down one of three groomed tracks. You complete in your own class trying to be just that record, so the speeds range from 40 mph to 900 mph. The event record so far is 417, but it’s just the third day.
However, before you can get to that, before you are allowed to run on the most famous raceway in the world, you have to pass inspection. It took us 2 days. Next up, inspection and rookie runs.

Really on the Road

Well, the day has come. Ron and Irene set out for Bonneville on Monday. Derrick, Grady and I are flying out tomorrow night. It has been an adventure so far. On Sunday afternoon we discovered that someone broke into our trailer and stole the air compressor, generator, air conditioner and impact wrench.

Much of Sunday and Monday was spent trying to replace these items. The weather reports for Utah are in the mid 90's and Derrick thought ahead, fitting a portable air conditioner to the work trailer so we can tune out of the heat. Well when I tried to find the same model I was out of luck. Home Depot is the only place that carries them and they have been out for months. They said the season is over, they are stocking heaters now. It's 95 degrees in Chicago today. This is why I will never be a business person. Anyhow, the guys had to configure a special port for the new air conditioner, but they got it all squared away and my parents got on the road that night.

All was well until Tuesday night. They stopped for Gas in North Platte Utah and my mom heard a horrible sound coming from the engine of the motorhome. The fan had come loose and destroyed the serpentine belt. Thankfully they were not too far from a Caterpillar dealer. The motorhome is being fixed as we speak, but they estimated it to be a 15 hour job. In the meantime, my parents decided to take in the sights.

What's in North Platte you ask? Well the world's largest switching station, of course. Union Pacific's Ed H. Bailey Switching Yard is where the east and west train lines meet. It sees 10,000 cars a day on nearly 2850 acres. That's the size of 3250 football fields! And there's a corn maize. I know you are all planning your 2011 vacations as we speak.

A huge extra special thanks to the guys at the North Platte Catapillar dealer who worked tirelessly to get my parents back on the road. The really went out of their way to try and get them to Bonneville on time to meet us.

More updates to come, both here and on facebook.

-Wendy

What do you do with a fuel injected bike?

So in the last episode we heard about Derrick’s search for his deuce. The story continues, again I will interject thoughts and explanations in brackets []:

From Derrick:
“Ok, so I rode it for the summer of 2003 stock. I started putting on chrome parts to make it look like I wanted it to, new front wheel, handle bars, foot pegs, grips, swing arm, FAIC pipe, it looked a lot better but I couldn’t do anything about the color (teal). [For our tech readers the FAIC pipe is a ‘Forced Air Induction Collector Header System’ Basically what that means is that the pipe has a pass through built into the side of it that sucks air in and helps to pull the exhaust out. It’s a strange looking pipe, with an opening that faces forward and one that faces backward. It ain’t pretty, but it does do a great job of evacuating the exhaust. We found that we could get an increase of up to 10 HP just by using this pipe.]

The summer of 2003 ended and I had put 1000 miles on the bike. Bill [Stefinsky-Hemi’s chief builder] tore it down and made it a 95" Hemi. Poof, just like that, the warranty was voided! We put it together, it ran but it was so out of tune that it was a joke. The fuel injection system had no idea what to do with this sort of engine modification. We knew this would be the case so we bought a Screaming Eagle Race Tuner Kit. The Problem was that we didn’t know how to use it, nobody did. Fuel injection in Harleys was new. If you did more than put pipes on, nobody knew how to tune it, Everyone that made big horsepower numbers all did it with a carburetor. [For our not-so-technical readers, both a carburetor and a fuel injector are ways of delivering gas and air to your engine. You need the proper ratio of each for your engine to run properly. The carburetor was the standard for 70 plus years and uses a simple mechanical system to balance these elements. When you want to make changes you replace “jets” which allow more or less fuel to enter the induction system. A fuel injector is infinitely more complicated. In your car, you have a fuel injection system that is controlled by a computer. It senses conditions around the vehicle and automatically makes adjustments to the fuel/air mixture. Because the technology is new to Harleys, the computer inside of them isn’t so advanced. You have to tell it exactly what to do, and you need a laptop to do it. It doesn’t self adjust so you have to create air/fuel curves that change at different RPMs of the motor]

It was a week before Daytona Bike Week and we loaded up the trailer with my bike and all the stuff for the booth, hooked up the van and I drove across the country by myself to Virginia Beach to tune the bike. Virginia is where Gordon Rudolph and Jeff Keater live and Jeff had just purchased a dyno that we were going to use to tune Gordon’s carbureted bike, and my injected one. [A dyno is short for “dynometer” which is a machine that you put your motorcycle or car on to tune it. The basic idea is that you run the bike at different RPMs while a computer tracks it’s horsepower and torque numbers. You analyze the performance of the engine and then make tuning adjustments at problem areas to try and make the bike run better.]

But like I said, we had no idea how to use the race tuner to tune my duece. When I got to Virginia we started reading and learning. Back in the day you used to be able to call Harley’s tech line, (now if you don’t have a dealer number they wont talk to you) so we would read from the manual and try things out. If we had a problem we would call Harley. Soon we knew more then most of their tech guys. By Tuesday of that week, they were unable to answer our questions, so they started calling the people who designed the Tuner, and got back to us when they could.

By Wednesday we knew that we needed to start dyno tuning if there was any hope of getting both bikes running for Daytona. We started with Gordon’s carbureted bike and that went smoothly. We got unheard of HP numbers from a 95" Harley. We pulled 130hp out of Gordon’s bike!

Next we put my bike up there. Pass after pass, run after run, we kept getting it a little closer. Like I said it was way off when we started, stuttering, spewing and ragged. The program that we started with was for a 62hp 95” Harley. This kind of stock program was not going to work for our Hemi headed bike. We kept working until 11pm, making adjustments, navigating the interface, and tuning the bike. We put the bike up for one final run of the 13 hour day and we got 127 HP! The only 95" bike that we knew of that was making power even close to that was Gordon’s. The fact that my bike is fuel injected is unheard of. We can’t even believe it. The Lab rat is officially named.

We got up Thursday morning, loaded up, and hit the road for Daytona. Mom and dad were driving the motor home down from Chicago, and I was supposed to meet them in Daytona to set up the booth on Friday. We had our own little convoy going from Virginia Beach-two motor homes and the van, all pulling trailers. When we left it is cold and raining, but by the time we got to North Carolina it was snowing. I was on the walkie talkie with Jeff saying I know it is getting bad but I can’t stop because I have all the stuff for the show and my parents are meeting me there tomorrow. He replies that I shouldn’t worry, and that he has driven through much worse stuff than this. A little while later, a full on blizzard hit. There were more cars in the ditch than on the road, and we were going 25mph when I heard ‘Hey Derrick?’ on the radio. Jeff says, ‘It is getting pretty bad, we are going to stop at the next gas station for a while.” I say, ‘See you in Daytona!’

I drove all night only stopping for gas, and made it just before mom and dad got there from Chicago. Gordon and Jeff got there on Saturday, just in time to go to the shoot out! Every year, there is a dyno shootout competition. Bikes compete in different engine classes and the bike that makes the most horsepower wins. That was the year that speed TV was out there shooting and they picked up on the fact the 95" class was the one to follow. Both Gordon and I were interviewed and we both ended up on the program. I finished 4th and Gordon finished 2nd. This was supposed to be a street bike class and the two bikes that beat us were trailer queens, they were race bikes. [“Trailer Queens” are bikes that you can’t actually ride. You put them on a trailer and pull them to competitions. They make a lot of power but you can’t actually use them on an everyday basis. Hemi has always prided itself on making bikes that are riders] Gordon was so pissed that he challenged the shootout winner to a race for money. The guy got all excited and said, ‘Where do you want to race?’ Gordon replied, ‘Let’s ride our bikes down main street and around town a bit then come back to this road for the race.’ The winner quickly said, ‘Oh I cant do that.’ and walked away.”

Next up.. The race suit is finished!

The Lab Rat is born

The Lab Rat
by Wendy Roderweiss
Portion in quotes written by Derrick Roderweiss

“If it goes fast, my dad has owned it.” This is basically what my brother and I would tell our friends when we were kids. Muscle cars, race cars, motorcycles, boats, snowmobiles, even airplanes. I was afraid of many things as a kid, but lucky for me, going fast wasn’t one of them. I think it was partly the thrill of speed, and partly it was the mechanics and engineering that excited my dad. A tool and die maker by trade, he has an unquenching desire to make things work better and more efficiently. I have always thought of him more as an inventor than a machinist. Though the tool and die trade is a fading industry in the United States, over the years, his job shop, Kaman Tool, has designed, engineered, and manufactured countless parts for light fixtures, generators, candy machines, aircraft, and burial vaults, to name a few.

There is very little division between my dad’s work and hobbies. He was souping-up anything with a motor, starting at age 15. Though, most of our weekends were spent riding on nitrous powered boats, and 100 mph snowmobiles, the one thing that was always off limits to me and my brother, were motorcycles. Sure we rode dirt bikes and atvs, but full sized motorcycles were not negotiable. Now, let me also point out that my mom’s first motorcycle was a Harley Sportster, and for years she commuted everyday to work on a motorcycle… Where was it that she worked???? A hospital!!!! But I guess parents have their lines, and this one was clearly drawn. (As a tangent, ask Derrick to tell you the story of how a promise by our mom that he could play ice hockey led to him in figure skates, and a show number called “Yes We Have No Bananas.”)

Partly due to this limit imposed by our parents, Derrick was in his 30’s before he bought his first bike. Now yes, I should disclose that he also raced snowmobiles and 120 mph shifter carts, but until he was 32 years old he had never owned a motorcycle. Below he tells the story of finding and buying his bike, affectionately known as “The Lab Rat”. But before we get to that, let me first fill in some details. Gordon mentioned in this story is Gordon Rudolph. You will be hearing more about him in a coming blog, but he is a good friend who has been a Hemi owner for years. He too has the speed and mechanics bug, and has contributed countless hours to further the R & D behind Hemis. He lives in Virginia, and is part of the team trying to break a record at the East Coast Timing Association trials in the coming months. Also mentioned is Jeff Keeter, another Virginian who has been an active player in the Hemi family for years. I will interject some other notes in brackets [ ].

The beginning of the Rat:
“Ok, it is a 2002 FSXTDI (soft tail Deuce) but I bought it in 2003. We got the injected bike because we knew that fuel injection was the future, and Gordon already had a carbureted Deuce. I wanted to buy a 2003 Model because it was the 100 year anniversary of HD but dad found out in January that in 2003 they removed the Timken bearing. [The Timken bearing was standard on Harleys until 2003. It’s a much sturdier bearing and costs a little more money. To cut corners Harley removed them. To be honest, they also didn’t really need them. You only run into problems with the newer bearings when you build a bike that makes over 100 horsepower. Seeing that a stock 88” Twin Cam makes 62 HP on a good day, why would Harley worry? Well, 62 HP is not going to cut it for most riders. With this cheaper bearing if you start to cross over into triple digits, the fly wheel assembly begins to shift and come out of alignment. This is not good.]
So it is already 2003 and Dad tells me that I have to find a 2002 fuel injected HD! The idea was that we could use it as a test bike to figure out the brand new fuel injection systems that were choking up the bikes ability to make power. We knew they needed to be tuned, but very few people had experience doing this. Okay back to the search…Since this was going to be my bike, I at least got to choose the model. Here are the criteria: I wanted a Deuce, it must be injected and a 2002.

Okay, lets analyze this, in 2002/2003 Harley made more carburetor bikes then injected, and back then people were still getting put on lists for Harleys and paying thousands over sticker. So the odds of finding a 2002 fuel injected Deuce in February of 2003 were slim to say the least! But just like mom with the 69 Honda if there was one out there I was going to find it. [This is another great story, but for another time. To wet your whistle, I’ll just say that it involves an impromptu trip to Oklahoma where large volumes of beer and tomato juice were consumed. Not by yours truly, I wasn’t even born!]

So for weeks I am looking for one and dad keeps asking me, ‘Where is the bike? We better get it soon so we can build it for Daytona’, but I cant find one and we leave for Daytona with only Gordon and Jeff at the shoot out. [There is a dyno shootout in Daytona each year where bikes compete for top Horsepower numbers]

Then in March I happen to call a dealer in Iowa and they have it, a 2002 fuel injected Deuce. The reason it didn’t sell was because they put a custom paint job that Harley offered on the bike that cost $5000. Plus they were asking an extra $3000 over sticker price. So I told them I will buy the bike site unseen for sticker price. The salesmen said ‘No way, it has a $5000 paint job on it I wont sell it for that”. So I said ‘Put the stock gas tank and fenders back on the bike and ill give you sticker price for it.’ The next weekend Mom, Dad and I jumped in the motor home and drove to Iowa!”

Next blog, taking a new bike and tearing it apart…

A bit about who we are

Okay, I know you all have been anxiously awaiting an update, so here it is. I also know that some of our followers are rather technically minded, and others just like the color, so I’ll try to make it interesting for both groups. Here goes…

I think it’s a good idea to start with a bit about who we are. Back in the early 90’s a group of friends and race enthusiasts decided that they wanted to build a Harley Pro-Stock race bike. They decided to take an old idea and modernize it. The idea was to borrow from the old school muscle cars, taking their powerful hemi combustion chamber but make it work on a Harley Davidson. After brainstorming and lots of R&D, a new design emerged.

Before we continue, let me back up and give a bit of history. To be accurate, this wasn’t the first time a hemi had been used on a Harley. In 1966 Harley Davidson replaced their “Panhead” engine with a new, more powerful design called the “Shovelhead”. (The name came from the shape of the rocker covers because they looked like old coal shovels.) This design was a true hemi and was more powerful than the old panheads but it also ran very dirty and wasn’t so great on fuel efficiency. Due to the energy crisis of the 1970’s and a few other factors, this engine design fizzled out and Harley stopped making them in 1984.

But some of you may be wondering, what the heck is a “hemi” anyhow? Well, you are sitting on one. No, I am not referring to your derriere, or that ratty old office chair. Think bigger. You are either in the Northern (that’s most of you) or the Southern (Let’s hear it for our followers down under!) Hemisphere. It’s simply a circle cut in half horizontally. Like I said, the old shovel heads were a true hemi. Picture a softball, cut around the center, or equator, making two equal halves. What is commonly referred to as a “Chrysler Hemi” is a segmented hemi. If you take that half of a soft ball and cut another third off of it, you get a segmented hemi head. This is what they used for their Prostock Sportster Racebike. (If you are wondering what the heck a combustion chamber is, well, that’s for another entry.)

What made their design different from the old Chrysler heads wasn’t the hemi head so much, but more the piston design. With a lot of trial and error the guys came up with a piston that matched the shape of the combustion chamber, and they were able to control compression by changing the flat of the piston. Surprisingly, no one had done this before. It worked really well, and the bike had a stellar first year on the circuit. In their class, They were number one in their region and number two in the country.

They decided to develop the hemi for commercial use and in the mid 90’s started Hemi Design. At the time they were modifying the D-port Evo heads, and when Harley came out with the new Twin Cam heads in 1999 they found that the application also worked on this bathtub style chamber as well. They continued to grow with Harley, taking whatever v-twin style head that they came up with and making it better.

A few years ago, Ron, my dad, left Hemi Design due to creative differences. In the aftermath, Hemi Performance Engineering (HPE) was formed. We went back to the drawing board and came up with a new design. Still using a version of the segmented hemi head we changed the piston design to better utilize the tried and true hemi chamber.

My brother Derrick’s bike, known as “The Lab Rat” has been blowing away bikes in his class with this new engine style. Three years running he took first place in the Wyotech Dyno shootout in Daytona, Florida. This past year he got the silver, but I would like to note his was the only bike in the competition that didn’t arrive to the shootout in a trailer. The Rat is fast, but it’s also Derrick’s rider. It’s street legal and aside from the flashy custom paint job and gobs of chrome it looks like a stock Deuce. After all, what’s the point of having a bike that you can’t actually ride?

In the first blog you were introduced to some of the characters in this story. In the next installment you will get the history of “The Lab Rat”. Derrick’s bike is our main character really, because it’s the bike we are taking to Bonneville.

Stay tuned for the next installment..

The Start of a Journey

Hello Harley and Hemi Enthusiasts!

We have decided to start a blog about our attempt to break the California Timing Association motorcycle land-speed record for the M-PG 2000cc class. The record currently stands at 171 mph, set back in 1999 at the Bonneville Salt Flats.

Speed week is August 14-20 this year and Team HPE (Hemi Performance Engineering) will be making our first appearance on the salt. So far the team is made up of Derrick Roderweiss: Test Pilot, Ron Roderweiss: Master Technician and Driver of the Bus, Irene Roderweiss: Chief Cook and Bottle Washer, Grady Roderweiss-O'Brien: Comic Relief, and myself, Wendy Roderweiss: Flippant Documentarian. Back at the Ranch the team wouldn't make it without Bill Stefinsky, who pretty much keeps all of us up and running.

We are encouraging Derrick to wear slightly more than Rollie Free did in his 1948 run (see picture above), but he has been known to ride his bike in flip flops.

Stay tuned, this should be fun...