The Red Ball Express has left the building!!!

[BluLightning]

Re: The Red Ball Express has left the building!!!

Ok here we go with pics.
Place we got the trailer from


WTF???


Crazy bastard ;D


What the hell were we listening to?


MMM cheese.


And the trailer said the speed limit was 45mph


Moving the Red Ball


Mall cop, watch out!


Ready to roll


Tiresmoke and Hoosier GTA


It's following me!


QSL in C-Bus


Monkey love, yeah baby!




Bicentennial barn


Almost there.


Score!!!


What the hell is that?


Oh yeah, it's a car


Oh and Seth, I've got something for you.


Well that's it, enjoy
Bob

Oh almost forgot, the killer AMC with an actual girl!! She ain't scared.

[TheSilverBuick]

Re: The Red Ball Express has left the building!!!

Great Pictures! What was up with the WTF pic? And you photographed the Mall Cop, that's good, haha.

[JOES66FURY]

Re: The Red Ball Express has left the building!!!

this is the coolest thing i have seen on the net...ever........all you guys rock...

[tiresmoke!]

Re: The Red Ball Express has left the building!!!

Yeah...that's the mall cop that I smiled and waved at... ;D.....they'll likely deploy a SWAT team if I ever set foot on the property again...LOL

The "Junkie Monkey" looks rather comfy.....would you believe that thing and another part of a "care package" from SpeedJunkee rode IN THE SEAT of that Javelin from the Promax parking lot in Indy all the way to the east-bound rest area just before Columbus? Didn't know about them until SJ called for a progress report....it was still darker than a sack of buttholes when I hooked up and took off that morning.

I credit the rag that Rebeldryver tied to the harness buckle....it had the stuff wedged tight enough so the wind didn't pull it out.

Bob, Reni, was great meeting you folks......perhaps we'll meet again on the Power Tour(no more procrastinating, and all bets are off if SpeedJunkee comes along)

[BluLightning]

Re: The Red Ball Express has left the building!!!

Great Pictures! What was up with the WTF pic? And you photographed the Mall Cop, that's good, haha.

I couldn't figure out why there was a truck laying on it's side at a uhaul place. ???

[TheSilverBuick]

Re: The Red Ball Express has left the building!!!

Great Pictures! What was up with the WTF pic? And you photographed the Mall Cop, that's good, haha.

I couldn't figure out why there was a truck laying on it's side at a uhaul place. ???

Must a been rowdy teenagers.

[KeithTurk]

Re: The Red Ball Express has left the building!!!

Brian took it for a test drive

[Brian Lohnes]

Re: The Red Ball Express has left the building!!!

Dave,

I'll do you one better and send you one of them will all the sigs on them. Afterall, if it weren't for you we wouldn't have had them! I'll get with you on that over the next couple of days.

Where to freaking start...

Just HUGE thanks to everyone involved in ANY capacity. This thing definitely took on a life of it's own and it worked out better than I think anyone could have imagined. Every leg had it's little foible here or there, but everyone got their job done like clockwork. It's still NUTS that it came off on schedule and under budget.

Neal, seriously dude, when you called, I was going to get Dr. Kevorkian on the line to head over there and put you out of your misery. You sounded awful. You can't control junk like that and I'm sure you will be roped into some more hijinks from this place at some point down the road. You were ready to answer the call, that's all that matters.

All the guys who called to say hi....that was cool. Tony was amazed at how the phone was on meltdown all weekend. Every time I'd see a bizarro number pop up I knew it was one of you guys calling to check in. Neat stuff.

So in terms of the whole "prize pack" -- I'll document the whole list over the coming days but it included:

A gorilla in pink underwear that have the words, "I'm bringing sexy back" on them. I'm going to zip tie him to the rollcage once this thing is ready to hit ice, asphalt, or dirt.

Ron send a vintage Hurst ratchet shifter which I'll put to good use and a Thermoquad carb, which I won't.

There's a Jeep repair manual...who sent that?

There's also a couple folders full of stuff.

Bob and Reni send along some GOOD IPA, which we chugged after being bounced from the bar at closing time.
There's more to list and I'll give the blow by blow tomorrow.


Some good stories from our leg?

Tony covered the very near disaster we had with the soggy parking lot...that was a close one. When the rear of the truck and the trailer are involuntarily sliding into a tight V shape, all the while the truck is actually sinking and grinding to a halt like an ocean liner on a sand bar, and your one life line in a 4WD is pulling out of the lot, it's not good. I may have been silent on the outside, but I was screaming OH F!@K on the inside.

We towed the car with my 2008 F250 gasser. It got 11.3 mpg on the way out with an empty trailer and 11.3 mpg on the way back with the car on it. Both to and fro were run at about 80mph most of the time. Lots of hill and climbing and the 5 speed and torqueless OHC motor was working to get it done, but ultimately I can't fault the truck that much. It got the job done even though it's tongue was hanging out.

On the way out I programmed the wrong address in my GPS. 1800 Peach St instead of 8100 Peach St. This resulted in Caveman and I sampling the worst neighborhoods of downtown Erie while pulling the trailer. It was hairy with people parked on both sides and traffic in both directions. His trailer's ramps do a good job of banging and clanging over bumps and there were a shitload. I think we saw a couple people hit the deck when the big bangs happened. Both of us were just praying that no one tried to return fire.

We were lucky to have no highway traffic but freaking peach street in Erie is a CF of EPIC proportions. It was a solid 1/2 hour ride from the 1800 block to the 8100 block with a couple people nearly changing lanes (in creeping traffic) into the trailer.

We get the swap done and pull the truck and trailer back over to the hotel. Tony and I are about to have uremia, I mean, our teeth are floating, so we run in to check into the room and use the head. Bob says he's going to wait for us and drive over to the restaurant. Tony and I come out of the hotel and walk to the right. He says, "I hope we're not pulling a Three Stooges move here." 3/4 of the way around the hotel we think Bob went to the restaurant so we hop back in the truck and drive around the corner, just in time to see Bob and Ron headed toward us....Three Stooges indeed.

Bob and I played giant beer chess at dinner.

Waitress: Want another beer
Bob (narrows his eyes and looks at me): Well?
Me: (Immediately blurted out) Yes!

Ever drank about 80 ounces of beer in like 2 hours? We did and then ripped through the "champagne" IPA back at the microtel.

NY state troopers, as Tony said, were crawling everywhere. I nodded off in the passneger seat at one point and woke to to see Tony white knuckling the wheel and doing the speed limit. Turns out he thought Johnny Law had him dead to rights....but the coppers never acted on it.


The car....I'm saving that diatribe for tomorrow, but man I'm an optimist. I think it rules.

My wife? Yeah she's a saint, and not exactly as in love with this thing as I am. I'm not sure if it qualifies as being in the dog house, but I'm going to be served my meals through a small slot at the bottom of my door for the next few days.

I'll try to get some photos up tonight, but I'll post a ton of them tomorrow.

Thanks again to everyone, this was just an awesome week and I hope you all had as much fun as Tony and I did.

Brian

[MOPARS RULE]

Re: The Red Ball Express has left the building!!!

Congrats!

Job well done, by all involved. TEAMWORK pays off!

[Rustang]

Re: The Red Ball Express has left the building!!!

Good Job and cheers to everyone who took part! I wasn't able to see the car in person, but I'm happy to have some of my ink on it anyway! Thanks to Cobey-Oldsman71 for that!

[SpeedJunkee's Carbs]

Re: The Red Ball Express has left the building!!!

Brain I have some more thermo Quads if you want them, about two or more big boxes full of them...... ;D

[88pony]

Re: The Red Ball Express has left the building!!!

Look at that madmam behind the wheel, clenched fist and all...

[Jimsc52]

Re: The Red Ball Express has left the building!!!

This "story" my friends... I feel is going to be in several magazines. Many thanks to all involved for doing this. It was extremely entertaining to all of us. What, I mean WHAT a group of car people...

[Brian Lohnes]

Re: The Red Ball Express has left the building!!!

Ok!

Buckle up kiddies and come from a ride with Uncle Brian and weird cousin Tony.

Here's Tone-Loc and I loading up on Saturday morning in Plymouth, Ma (photo by Tony's mom)
It was 0 out.


Here's Tony flashing me....


The ride out was relatively uneventful, aside from getting spun out in Erie, I didn't take any photos of that because it's not the type of place you want to be aiming anything at anyone, camera or otherwise.

There were a couple of things though...

NICE bumper:



Name that Frame...we couldn't.


They f'ing make a Journey R/T? :'(



Some shots from the switch-a-rusky

I mentioned earlier that Tony and I really had to use the restroom BAD by this point. Tony was working so fast he was literally a BLUR! That and the fact he was in a T-shirt and it was NOT more than like 40 degrees.







Who did this I wonder?


The heros of the day! (in order of importance! ;D)



The money shot! (Reni was holding our table at the restaurant while we were loading.


From Today:

Someone had a shitty morning.





FastEd and the Jav


The mud bogging photos....






Here's the payoff. This place is less and two miles from Lancaster Dragway.




I mean seriously....how funny is that?

Home at last (it's moving to shelter shortly)


Hope you liked!

Brian

[KeithTurk]

Re: The Red Ball Express has left the building!!!

Very fun gig...

Hmmm not exceptionally bright... but great fun all the same...