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AC DELCOS DOWN UNDERWords and photos by Jon Van Daal - 9/10/2007 The 2007/08 ANDRA season opened with the AC Delco race on the first weekend of this month at Western Sydney International Dragway. With some 400 entries, the pits were filled to capacity and unseasonably warm conditions ensured that records would be broken and that a large crowd would be on hand as was the case. |
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When Allan Dobson, in the Santo’s Cranes entry, pulled into stage against Phil Read, he had already gone through five engines, nearly all with a tell tale fire streaming from the back of his rail. On this pass it would be the same scenario as both ran into problems off the line. The cooling conditions (it was only the first day of spring) saw Read go up in smoke while Dobson got a little further before his car caught fire and that was reflected in 7.74 to 12.15 time cards. “We burned it up a bit but it was the team who did all the hard work. I was just sitting there while the team put all the motors in. It was a great weekend for the Rapisarda Racing, Santos Cranes and Redline oil. This trophy is for the team”, Dobson stated.
Second generation Top Fuel racer, Mark Mariani had only just received his licence however before the weekend was out he was going to have a run he’d never forget. As he staged for this Friday night qualifying pass he had no idea of the carnage which was about to happen. It appears that the car broke some valve train parts on the burnout and then when he received the green a fireball some 100 feet long erupted from the wounded engine. The next two frames after this one were totally bleached out which attests to the ferocity of the fire. It appears the dud cylinder head torched the head gasket then got past the rings and into the breather tubes to the catch can. As such the top of the catch can was blown sky high.