Ray Alley, did he do a good job while at NHRA as Director of Top Fuel & Funny Car Racing?
AC: I think so. I think he did a wonderful job. I think what he brought to the sport, to organize things between the racers and NHRA, was better than anyone before him had even come close to doing
Have you got any opinion on how Dan Olson will do in that job?
AC: Excellent!
If you could change one thing about how NHRA conducts the racing program what would it be?
AC: I'd like to go back to having five qualifying runs, which we used to a long time ago.
Is there a tire problem? Are you of the opinion that if Goodyear quits making fuel tires that no one else is going to step up?
AC: Well, I think that Goodyear is a real good company to have making them and that there might be small companies that would want the business, but to the best of my knowledge there aren't any big companies with sufficient depth to get in that business that want to be there. I'm real happy that Goodyear is happy and I don't think there’s a problem with the tires. I haven't seen anything happen that struck me as being dangerous in a long, long time.
How many laps do you get normally on a set of tires?
AC: That varies tremendously. When the track is really cold and sticky, and you shut off early, it pulls little divots off the tread as you’re coasting to a stop. That isn't dangerous, but it does ruin the tire. When you are doing that, you go through a lot of tires. Under the best conditions, you could probably run the Goodyears four to five runs.
That's a much better number than we’ve been told in the past by other tuners. Is there any one single accomplishment that you've had in drag racing that stands out above all others?
AC: I don't know, maybe the concept of the lock-up clutch. It's kind of interesting, you know, Dale Armstrong actually had the first one. He and I were sitting and talking at the races
once about the concept of a lock-up clutch and Dale said there's got to be some way youcan reach in there and get ahold of the (clutch) fingers and then pull back on them with a hydraulic cylinder or air cylinder to add the clutch out in the middle of the track.
I said, “Well, it would seem to me to be a lot more practical to just put extra fingers in there and hold them with the (throwout?) bearing and then when you want them, let them in.” Dale said, “I don’t think that would work” and then he went home and built one. Of course, he was able to do things like that then -- like we are able to do now -- and we couldn’t then so it took us months before we had one. Anyway, that was a good one; a lot of things have come from that over the years.
I understand you guys are prototyping a Ford fuel motor?
AC: Yep.
