So you want to be a Street Outlaw? Part 5

It’s week 5 of filming. Neither car has made a pass on the street worth talking about in a couple months. This week is the week. Production has begged us to have the cars ready to race this weekend. Chief just got The Crow fired up late last week, and we’re still battling tire shake problems with the nova. This is going to be a long week full of extremely late nights and early mornings.

As you read last week, Chief was finally able to fire The Crow for the first time since a complete rebuild. The celebration was had, but we all knew there was still a lot of work to do before that white Poncho was ready for the streets…and we were just given the timeline in which all that work was to be finished…5 days. 5 days to have this thing wired, bugs worked out, dyno’d, scaled, and tested and ready to rock for Saturday night. No problem.

Chief spent the better part of a day eliminating, adding, and consolidating wiring inside the cabin of The Crow since it had been neglected recently due to the hectic filming schedule the show requires. Next up, we finally took it off the shelf (lift) and rolled it back on the dyno. Chief decided not to stretch its legs out on the dyno this go round, but instead just did some drivability, and part throttle tuning to get it ready for testing. Although, he did stay in it until about 6000rpm at one point and on just wastegate springs, let’s just say the little 482 is pretty impressive! Once he felt good with the way the car drove, it was time to move it to the scales. The Crow is still tipping the scales a little heavier than Chief would like, but the movement of the Precision turbo’s to their new location helped with weight percentages tremendously. After all the body pieces were added back on, the 4-link bars and ride height were set, and Chief called Monkey over to do a front end alignment before calling it a night. The Crow is ready…or so we thought…

Now it’s test day. Shawn decided to roll The Murder Nova up on the lift to make a quick rear gear change and move the 4-link bars around in an effort to rid the car of the severe tire shake we’ve been battling. After giving the car a good once over, it was time to fill the fuel cell, make sure the tires had plenty of air to make the trip to the track, and then load it in the trailer. While Kentucky was loading the nova, Chief decided to throw The Crow back on the lift for a “quick” converter change since something just didn’t feel right to him. Quick…It’s 2:00pm. We were supposed to be in Tulsa at 2:00pm to begin testing. It’s been one of those days already. We finally finished buttoning up the trans around 3:30pm and Chief and Kentucky gave The Crow a quick bird bath before loading it in the trailer, and off to the track we went.

Now, I can’t say this was necessarily a wasted trip, because Chief did record a personal best 60’ time, but he did have to shut it down early since a wiring issue kept the car from shifting. Then, on the next pass, a broken rocker arm in the burnout kept us from making any more progress. The Murder Nova shook the tires by 100’ again before having to pedal it a couple times and coasting to a mid 4.70s pass at around 160mph. Needless to say, frustration along with sleep deprivation has set in on all involved. In the video below, Chief and Shawn talk about the problems they’re having while replacing the broken rocker arms in The Crow.

We now have one night of testing to go before race night. Neither car has made full hit still, no one has had any sleep, and we have a big race coming at us in just a few hours. The following video shows Shawn and Chief making some test hits on the real streets. As you’ll see, we will be going into race night, virtually untested and basically swinging for the fences, hoping for a miracle.