 The 2.4-liter twin-screw Kenne...  The 2.4-liter twin-screw Kenne Bell supercharger put 508.7 hp to the wheels on P&J Speed Shop's Dynojet. |
 Would you be smiling if your...  Would you be smiling if your new Stang shredded a blower belt in competition and there was no replacement for 3,000 miles? John McGowan did. |
 It took some time, but McGowan...  It took some time, but McGowan figured a way to run the too-long replacement belt that didn't cost him too much boost. |
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 From burnout to glory: This...  From burnout to glory: This is the sequence of the run that gave McGowan the low e.t. of the day. |
Now what?
"I lost the belt," McGowan said.
The post-mortem revealed the factory belt tensioner was no longer in its original shape. When it bent, the belt walked and shredded.
Awesome!
Not deterred, McGowan and his crew burned up the phone lines trying to get a new tensioner and belt. When a search for a new tensioner proved futile, Justin LaMacchia from John's shop took the old one into the trailer and "persuaded" it back to its factory form--or a reasonable facsimile thereof. As the belt is a Kenne Bell-only size and couldn't be found in the local parts store, they had to make do with one that was the incorrect size and try to reroute it.
While the P&J Speed posse was occupied with this, Burcham swapped on the Mickeys and headed for the line. The recipe would call for lift-throttle speed shifts, and while this was not ideal, it beat the heck out of the alternative, which was packing up and going home.
Burcham made lots of pretty tire smoke and inched up to the Raceway Park starting line. Staged, he brought up the revs and let it rip. The result was his first clean pass of the day, an 11.482 at 117.36 (1.52 60-foot). Now we were getting somewhere. This was just 0.12 second behind McGowan's best--quite stout sans powershifting.
While McGowan & Co. thrashed on the two-tone powerhouse, Burcham gave the ProCharged GT a nice cooldown (you don't need much on a 45-degree day) and then headed back to the 1,320. Time was running out, and yours truly still had a cover to shoot. Burcham felt more comfortable and let it loose. The 60-foot time was slightly off from his previous run, but the end result was not: 11.256 at 118.22 (still without powershifting).
"Kenne who?" Burcham shouted as he rolled back near the starting line. He was elated, as were Stoval and his wife.
Less thrilled, for obvious reasons, was McGowan. Despite a myriad of different combinations, he was not happy with his newfangled belt routing. Ultimately, he found a route he was comfortable with, though he said it delivered a pound or two less boost than it was supposed to. Also, the belt was barely touching the alternator pulley, which meant he had one, maybe two, shots to beat Burcham's time before the battery croaked.
One change to keep things even was Burcham allowing McGowan to mount his Bogarts and skinnies. From past experience, we knew this would be worth a tenth, perhaps a hair more, and both cars would be competing on the exact same tires, front and rear.