Hicks Lawn Services truck racing
- Thread starter hickslawns
- Start date
Damn Phil! Glad it wasn’t any worse. You’ll probably feel it a lot more when you wake up! Any video of the carnage?
Smawgunner2
Active Member
Going to break my wallet if she is salvageable. Seeing the truck wadded up will bring a man down. I don't know if it broke my spirit, but the wind is out of my sail at the moment.
Glad you are OK Phil and I'm sorry to hear about the truck. Hopefully a day or so to let it all digest can help you see the path forward, whether that's continued racing or not. Just glad you are OK and are able to race another day if you choose.
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P8riot
Active Member
I'm so sorry bud. As stated, you are the most important thing and you're OK.
You will get it all sorted out in time.
You will get it all sorted out in time.
Got our daughter moved today on minimal sleep. Drove home. Started stripping down the truck for an assessment. One section of frame and roll bar by the left rear tire I'd like to have someone take a look at. Otherwise lots of sheet metal damage and all the metal brackets to mount the aluminum sheets. Engine did fire up. I was offered a ride for Friday and on June 16 for the double feature. Maybe I'll have her back in the track by June 16. I don't know. We shall see what the work schedule allows.
Phil, I'm guessing aero is not something you guys run into at these speeds, so are the panels purely cosmetic or do you have templates/measurements for inspection?
If frame isn't twisted, can ya just hammer them babies out and rivet them on? She ain't gotta be pretty to be fast.
If frame isn't twisted, can ya just hammer them babies out and rivet them on? She ain't gotta be pretty to be fast.
Wow! I am sure you are sore, wish I lived closer and could help you wrench on it. Always fun working on stuff
Pretty much the discussion I had with my buddy. He builds my motors. Has close to 70 feature wins in a Ranger. I was like "we are kidding ourselves if we think aero is a consideration, right?" I'm pretty sure we are just cosmetic with our metal. If it makes a difference, we are talking thousandths of a second. Not tenths of a second. More about visually stream lining everything to where there is no sheet metal sticking out to catch wind like a parachute.
@Clay Showalter not too sore. I'm very thankful my work keeps me in shape. I honestly think that has helped. A little sore in spine between shoulder blades and neck. Not painful though. Just noticeable and a little stiff yesterday. That is pretty well gone today. Lower back was sore this morning but I think that is due to 3 nights of 4-5hrs sleep and lots of physical exertion followed up by 10-12hrs last night. Not supposed to sleep that long. I suppose there could be a mild concussion but probably not. Think I was just extra tired from over doing it for the last 6wks work with no rest.
@giles for sure. This won't slow me down. If anything it gives me confidence my safety gear and roll cage will do what it is supposed to do.
I "could" probably be ready for Limaland this Friday if I thrashed. I'm not going to. I'll leave for our family reunion in Kentucky earlier on Friday. The old schedule was to race Friday, sleep a few hours, them drive to KY early Saturday morning. New schedule: relax, take a slower pace, enjoy the wife, kids, and extended family a little more this weekend.
Update: no apparent frame or roll cage damage found yet. It was revealed to me, the roll bar and frame damage was there when I bought the truck.
Need to find some time and a plan for mounting the sheet metal. That is the easy part. Fabricating the structure in which the sheet metal mounts to is the tough part. Have to measure and visualize how it will look. Part art. Part engineering. Part puzzle. Removing the roof, pillars, and door/fender/bed sides will be a challenge. They are all welded together from the body line up. I should rephrase. Removing is easy. Removing in sections, visualizing how to build supports, and rebuilding as I remove will be tough. Don't want to strip it down and end up with a truck drawing by a 2nd grader going down the track.
Definitely want to keep it light..Don't want to go to weak on structure. This structure absorbed a lot of the impact in my opinion.
@"J" I think asked about a video. There is a so so video on Facebook. Hard to tell much. If you know I rolled, you can sort of see the point where you assume the roll begins. Can see my truck sideways go up a bit. Then it really lifts about the height of the cab and slams down. Not sure if that means two rolls? It also did a 180 somewhere during the roll. When the roll started I was facing the grandstands. When I landed I was facing the infield. Looks like it rolled up the fence some too. REALLY wish there was better video out there because it was freaking gnarly. Lol
Need to find some time and a plan for mounting the sheet metal. That is the easy part. Fabricating the structure in which the sheet metal mounts to is the tough part. Have to measure and visualize how it will look. Part art. Part engineering. Part puzzle. Removing the roof, pillars, and door/fender/bed sides will be a challenge. They are all welded together from the body line up. I should rephrase. Removing is easy. Removing in sections, visualizing how to build supports, and rebuilding as I remove will be tough. Don't want to strip it down and end up with a truck drawing by a 2nd grader going down the track.
Definitely want to keep it light..Don't want to go to weak on structure. This structure absorbed a lot of the impact in my opinion.
@"J" I think asked about a video. There is a so so video on Facebook. Hard to tell much. If you know I rolled, you can sort of see the point where you assume the roll begins. Can see my truck sideways go up a bit. Then it really lifts about the height of the cab and slams down. Not sure if that means two rolls? It also did a 180 somewhere during the roll. When the roll started I was facing the grandstands. When I landed I was facing the infield. Looks like it rolled up the fence some too. REALLY wish there was better video out there because it was freaking gnarly. Lol
Side bar kept it from getting into the 3 roll cage bars that wrap around my seat. They are covered by the 1/4" plate.
And J, that is kind of twisted asking to see the video. . . . I like that about you
And J, that is kind of twisted asking to see the video. . . . I like that about you
My truck isn't ready yet. Promoter of the series offered one of his trucks (which is for sale) to let me race tonight. He offered it for the double header next Friday as well. Fairly stock truck. I joked about needing to turn off the air conditioning in order to gain enough horse power to pass people. You can see plenty of remnants of factory left in there. Drove the wheels off it. Fourth in the heat race. Started 8th in the feature. Worked my way up to fourth via attrition. Never really gained or lost any ground in the leaders in the heat race. They were pulling me in the feature but we had many restarts. Stock motor versus expensive/fully built motors. It is to be expected. Looking at lap times I can see where they were about 1/2 second faster per lap on average. There was no catching them, but I felt I squeezed all i could out of the ol girl. Can't ask for anymore than that.