Back in the Saddle (Almost)

Two wekes ago when we blew everything apart under the sun, sucked. The last two weeks have been like midevil times. We thrashed all week following rockingham, overnighting just about every internal part in the engine, Got it done in the middle of the night friday night, and then they called the ORSCA race due to race. We were really bummed out at first but in the end it would prove to be a blessing. We decided that since we had a fresh motor that we would go test for the Shakedown at Etown race this weekend. Which is a 1/4 mile race, So we went down to Valdosta, Ga last sunday to do some testing at SGMP. In the back of my head I still couldnt justify as to why the motor tore up the #6 piston last week. I mean it broke the piston in half. We had to sleeve the block and everything. But we chalked it up to a broken lifter and could find nothing else wrong. So we unloaded Sunday at SGMP and made a nice smooth lazy pass. I just wanted to get some data on the motor. Pulled it back to the pits and pulled the plugs and damn if #6cylinder wasnt torn up again. One pass and smoked the same cylinder. All tune up data looked good. The rest of the plugs were perfect. Me and the boys were really pissed. We drove home 5 hours at like 90 mph. Snatched the motor back out and apart. It was worse than I thought. Number 6 detonated so bad that it egged the cylinder and split the block. What the hell? So now were up the creek again. We are supposed to leave thursday for englishtown, nj and we have no motor. Not to be detered, we scrounged around the shop looking for used motor parts. What do ya know, there in the corner was last years ez street motor. Old faithful. She needed a little freshening, and she is way smaller than our good motor, but we figured we could piece her together. Robert at Abby's Performance Engines really helped us this week. He dropped eveything like he always does when I need him, and jumped right on it. We bored the block, got a new crank rods and pistons. Basically a new shortblock. It has been a long exhausting week, but at 3 am last night, we finished up. Well almost. Guess what. Shakedown rained out also. Im so tired of rain. All this work and favors for nothing. Once again, always the optimists, we decided to find somewhere dry to race. The pushrods just came in and we are on our way to Virginia Motorsports Park. I cant belive we are taking a brand new engine 7 hours to a race and it's never been fired, but we are. I think I found what keeps breaking the engine. We will see. I replaced almost every piece of electronics on this thing. Yall keep your fingers crossed. Sorry for the short post but I have only slept about ten hours this week am due for a little road nap.