by moore1 | May 30, 2018 | News |
Meet the TorqStorm crew on the Long Haul. TorqStorm co-founders Scott Oshinski (third from right) and Chris Brooker (far right), together with their factory crew, have committed to the Long Haul option of this year’s Hot Rod Power Tour, Saturday 9 June to Friday 15. Leaving their native Michigan on Thursday morning, they’ll roam 500 miles southward through Indiana to Bowling Green on the southern Kentucky border for Friday check-in. Chris Brooker will drive the TorqStorm Cuda accompanied by his long-suffering navigator Rick Lewis! Scott Oshinski is taking the Twin TorqStorm-powered ‘69 Chevelle wagon, known as the TorqWagon, with Jeff “The Chef” Applehof, who’s charged with keeping the team nourished. Jeff Neibarger will tour in his TorqStorm-powered 2011 Camaro SS, providing social media updates along the way. Mickey Davis is taking his 2002 Chevrolet Silverado, using TorqStorm power to transport the extra necessities. Last but not least of the factory crew is Chris Beardsley, who will be driving his ‘86 Saleen Mustang, now on its 4th long haul but first time as the TorqStang. As always, the knowledgeable Beardsley will be driving and fielding TorqStorm calls from the road. More twin superchargers on the long haul Also participating in the TorqStorm group of Long Haulers are three close friends and customers, Wild Wes, Jay Mielke and Todd Mitchell. Wes is bringing his twin TorqStorm Wildcat Cougar and Jay is driving his twin TorqStorm ‘71 Camaro while Todd will campaign his 2007 Dodge Charger. The event Active since 1994, this year’s highly anticipated Hot Rod Power Tour is expected to attract over 6,000 vehicles and 100,000-plus spectators, making...
by moore1 | May 28, 2018 | News |
Courtney Force, Robert Hight, and Shawn Cowie. TOPEKA, Kan., 21 May 2018: Courtney Force captured her first career back-to-back NHRA Funny Car victories on Monday afternoon at the 30th annual Menards NHRA Heartland Nationals. Poor weather postponed track activity until 7:00 p.m. on Sunday, resulting in only two rounds of eliminations for Top Fuel and Funny Car, and one round for Pro Stock. Funny Car: Courtney Force snatched Topeka dominance by powering her Advance Auto Parts Chevrolet Camaro to a pass of 3.928-seconds at 329.83 mph to defeat defending national champion and teammate Robert Hight in the final round. Number 1 qualifier for the event, Force seized her third win of the season and 11th of her career. In the final round, they were fairly evenly matched until the 600ft mark where Hight hazed his tires, liberating Force to claim victory. Courtney Force’s incremental margins (negative if behind): 60ft (-0.012), 330 ft (0.001), 660ft (0.033). MOV: 0.1534 seconds (approximately 60 feet). Courtney Force’s incremental times: 60ft-0.894 sec., 330ft-2.271, 660ft-3.187/282.30 mph. Robert Hight’s incremental times: 60ft-0.888 sec., 330ft-2.278, 660ft-3.226/257.97 mph. Hight, who struggled throughout qualifying and consequently landing in 14th spot, pedaled his way through the first round, defeating Cruz Pedregon. In round two, he raced to a fine 3.924-second pass at 330.23mph. Then, during Monday’s semifinal round, he recorded a 3.911 pass at 330.55mph, setting fastest lap of the event and simultaneously defeating Shawn Langdon. In the final, Hight was obliged to concede lane choice to his teammate and smoked the tires towards the finish line of the trickier right lane. He ended his racing weekend with a 4.087...
by moore1 | May 23, 2018 | News |
Robots at the front desk and in the kitchen are among the fears prompting a possible strike this month by Las Vegas hotel and casino workers. It is yet another example reflecting the speed and pervasiveness of new technologies, to say nothing of software advances that will continue to disrupt most traditional industries. —<>— In 1998 Eastman Kodak comprised 170,000 employees and sold 85 percent of the photo paper used worldwide. Then their business model failed, and the company filed for bankruptcy protection in 2012. Kodak’s fate is likely to repeat in many industries within the next 10 years. Ironically, it was a Kodak engineer, Steven Sasson, who, in 1975, invented and built the first self-contained electronic camera. The first models embodied only 10,000 pixels and its development followed Moore’s law. Thus, as with most exponential technologies, it was discouraging at first before becoming superior and inevitably ubiquitous. Similarly by the early 1960s, the British motorcycle industry was in a state of collapse. The Birmingham-based Norton company won the inaugural Isle of Man TT in 1907 and by the 1930s had assumed total domination, winning 14 Junior and Senior TTs with remarkable single-cylinder supermacy in that decade alone. But after WWII, they and their British competitors refused to anticipate the prospects of superior multi-cylinder Italian engines built by Moto Guzzi, Gilera and MV Agusta, which were followed by similar advances by the Japanese. Better an emblem of progress than to perish in obscurity. The familiar process of change currently persists with advancements in Artificial Intelligence, autonomous and electric cars, health, education, 3D printing, agriculture and employment. Uber, for example, is just...
by moore1 | May 23, 2018 | Published Stories |
Grudge racing has dominated the drag racing scene in the southern US States for decades. But in recent years, the Internet has conquered every part of its frenetic life, particularly Facebook postings that have expanded its Southern origins (Georgia, Florida, and the Carolinas) westward to the Mississippi and north to the shores of Lake Michigan. To its masses, its chief dynamic is straight forward: betting. There is no maximum amount—when a dollar changes hands it’s a Grudge race. Read, courtesy of Drag Racer magazine, how a small-block hemi is the winning formula for Covington, Georgia engine shop, Coupe...
by moore1 | May 18, 2018 | News |
By Martha Maglone: Brenda Cox has a gift for drag racing. In Bracket and Index events in 2017, she won two NMCA races back-to-back at the Auto Club Dragway in Fontana, California, and conspicuously repeated the double triumph by winning the LS Fest West in Las Vegas in 2017, the inaugural event, and again in 2018. Performing two passes at 12.25sec and another at 12.26, she recorded the most consistent series of runs of the entire event. She also won Best Package in the Three Pedals Rumble LSX class. An index contest co-sponsored by TorqStorm, she claimed ownership of one of the Michigan firm’s finest supercharger kits as well as winning the title, trophy and prize money. The best package, which applied to the first round of competition, refers to the driver’s Reaction Time and deviation from Dial-in. “You add your reaction time,” she explains, “to the amount you ran over on your dial-in. Well, I was .045 over on my dial-in, and when you add that amount to the reaction time (.174), my total package was .219.” Brenda, from Victorville, California, has been participating in the sport for the past 12 years. She purchased a new GTO in 2005 and began racing it the following year. “A friend invited me to an event at Fontana and I was hooked!” “I love my racing—I was thrilled by the way things turned out in Las Vegas,” she said. But winning successive events is quite the achievement. So, how did she manage it? “My level of concentration at the lights has probably been my greatest strength,” she replied. On her last...
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