First time at PRI for me!

PRI was a cool deal, first time for me and it was way bigger that what I could imagine, to next time I need to be more prepared so I can make a plan for who to visit and talk to! 🙂

Manton Pushrods / Rockerarms.

Alan Johnson Performance Engineering.

CP Carrillo.

Neal Chance Racing Converters.

Noonan Race Engineering.

But I went by some companies and met some people I know plus a lot of new fun ones and on top of that some party of course! 😉

Thanks to Jonnie Lindberg for the hospitality and it was fun to catch up some time together and work of course, what else would gear heads do when they meet!? I will be back! =D


What a weekend!!

Got back home to Sweden this morning after an awesome race weekend at Lucas Oil Raceway in Indy at the US Nationals! Really fun and kind of crazy weekend also! Gary Pritchett that just earned / updated his license and made his debut at US Nats behind the steering wheel this past weekend in Jonnie Lindberg’s world record setting TAFC and at the same time working on the clutch on Steve Torrence Top Fuel Dragster.

Jonnie Lindberg did of course tune the alcohol car and at the same time he drove Jim Heads Fuel Funny Car!

To make it even a little more interesting Gary’s wife Leah Pritchett was the back up girl and also during the event she was driving her DSR Top Fuel Dragster and Factory Stock Dodge Challenger that she also won!! The rest of the team was me, Lars Erik Lindberg and Christian Merlid that flew over from Sweden to service the car between rounds we made a good team I think, Gary was second to third qualifier all weekend and we got all way to the semi finals!

I did for sure have a good time and made some new friends! 🙂

Of course I needed to check out the coolest shop in Indy! 😉

But now I’m back to really, got some work to do in the shop and I also need to get the last things around the Chevelle and the trailer ready because early tomorrow morning me, Max and dad are leaving the shop and will head down south Sweden for TD round 5 at Malmö Raceway, time to try set som new personal bests! I hope to see y’all there this weekend! =D


A little winter update outside the racing, back home after a good well needed no working vacation for once in the USA! But of course I needed to go by some companies and the important people that I work with to say hi and personally deliver a thanks for the 2017 season picture just to show how much I appreciate their help! Yes that’s a little work but mostly just fun to deliver it myself instead of just sending it using the postal service because you never know if it ever get there in real life… And also it is really fun to see the earlier pictures I sent the last couple of years when they are sitting there on the wall! Like I said you never know if the things are getting there or not… Except when you get some kind of reaction from the one that received it.

Went by Alan Johnson and of course my buddy Rick have a conventional BBC cylinder head in his office to look at when life feels hard! I also took the chance to pick up some parts I need, this was actually the first parts I have bought to the Chevelle since July last year! Thanks that you took your time to give us the shop tour, me and Sofi really did appreciate it!

Next stop, Manton Pushrods / Rocker arms the people here have been helping out in a lot of ways, we been trough some problems during the way with the new BBC rocker arms to the really extreme valve train to my conventional headed Chevy Big Block but they are always listening to the customer and does changes and also compensate to make everyone around happy, that’s not something that everyone does in the racing industry… I know for sure about that!… And again it’s really fun to see that the pictures I sent earlier is hanging on the wall! When I was here I also picked up some parts I need for the 2018 season that Manton helped me out with for free! Thank you Trevor that you took your time to give us the shop tour, me and Sofi really did appreciate it! And a huge thanks for the hospitality and for the great food and company we got when you invited us to stay over the night at your family’s vineyard. All aces in my book, you and Dana are the best!

Bryan aka the Piston Maker did spend around 8 weeks on me on the phone and email without that I event spend a dollar yet, I got issues with my old brand I did use and after all of that work he spent on me I got products in my motor that I am more than satisfied with! It’s fun and impressive to work with people that really love what they do, I can only say that CP Carrillo got an interest and a customer service that goes all the way to the top and that’s not something that you find at every company in the racing industry! So Bryan and the people at CP Carrillo have been helping out in a lot of ways and together we now got the fastest standard bore space Big Block Chevrolet with conventional cylinder heads in Europe, and as far as I know the worlds fastest with that motor combination. We also got the fastest and quickest car in the 2017 Scandinavia Top Doorslammer Series with our 3.84 @ 315km/h (196mph)

When I we was here I also gave Bryan some pistons and a rod that I been using during 2017, I’m satisfied with the measurements I made on it but I also want the manufacturer to check them with the correct instrument to see if we need to do any changes before we make the new parts for the 2018 season! Thank you Bryan that you took your time to give us the shop tour even that you got a really busy schedule, me and Sofi really did appreciate it!

At last, thanks to Jonnie Lindberg that hooked me up with CP Carrillo!

More friends / companies! Does anyone else think it’s time for a new Sjödin Motorsport / ÅBM Racing supporter shirt!? Well I sure do! So we went by Scott Bathurst at Classic Graphix for a shop tour and a quick talk about some coming stuff!

And just one day of dragracing, went to Pomona and biggest reason was just to see Jonnie Lindberg drive the Fuel Funny Car! 🙂 And it was nice meeting up with some people but I can say than one day was enough for me!…

And except for the stuff above, just some fun time in Cali, food, beer, sun, cars and a good good time!

My batteries aren’t fully charged but there is some more energy in me now at least… To bad there is so much snow in Sweden right now so it drains out the energy again pretty quick tho… 😉


8 weeks from today we will be at Malmö Raceway for the first outing in 2017 for some test and tune before the first race in the series 2 weeks later.

I’m also back home in the Sjödin Motorsport / ÅBM Racing shop after 4 awesome weeks in USA on a well deserved working vacation, the two main reasons to go over was to help my friend Brandon Pesz to mount a new body on his 58 Vette and also organize my own stuff for the coming season when it comes to spare parts, updates etc. Just like always when I’m in the US we spend a lot of time on the road, I would guess we ended up with 6-7 whole days…! 😀 

Best thing with going over is that I always learn new stuff, see new things, meet people I been talking to for years but never met in person and of course makes new friends! A lot of friends, and some of them will be a big part of my future racing business! Fun things is about to come, that’s for sure! 


I would also like to be able to race my car in February, that’s for sure!


Always that way expensive beer and shrimp sandwich at the airport back home before leaving to the states, it’s a must do!!

Brandon’s car turned out good with the new body that is removable of course, guess he will take it of just to check the valve lash from now on! 😉 I look forward to see the new design on it after the wrap, cool things to come I promise!!

We went up to Larry Jeffers Race Cars in Missouri to get som last things done on Keith Haneys radial car and bring it back home to Keith’s shop in Tulsa Oklahoma. Must say that the Jeffers shop was bigger and did hold way more cars than what I thought, cool place with an awesome crew working there!


Just a typical day at the office in the Reid shop in Wichita Falls! Would be nice to have the garage door open back home like this in February….

About being on the road, well here in Sweden people complain when it’s more than one hour to the track, Brandon says if it’s only 12 hours it’s almost home for me! 🙂 Well me Brandon and his wife Kimmy took the little 15+ hour trip to Valdosta and the Lights Out 8 race at South Georgia Motorsports Park!


At least Brandon got a pair of good help drivers that makes the trip a bit easier! 🙂


Lights out 8, what a crazy deal!! If you haven’t been there so just get there, you need to see it for yourself!


But this looks crazy, that’s all I have to say about that! 


Keith and Enigma did good, new personal best and also the fastest nitrous car on radials this weekend with a 3.815@198.76mph! Just awesome!!!

Did meet up with the Menscer Motorsports guys for some awesome at track service, the picture shows Craig and John service, revalve and dyno testing my struts and shocks, thanks for your help guys!


One thing that makes me really happy to being a part of now when I was over was when Brandon, Chris at Frankenstein and Jeff Jones decided to team up. Smart guys that will do really good stuff together, that’s for sure! Happy for you Brandon, this will be more than awesome!! And if you ever need LS heads and other parts Frankenstein is the place to get them, contact me if you want to buy it in Swedish! 🙂


And like I said, I did arrange all the parts for my coming racing season here in Sweden, about 250 kilos or 550 pounds in this shipment! The updates on the Chevelle will improve the ET that’s for sure, really look forward to the test at Malmö Raceway in the end of April!! 😀

More will come soon, stay tuned!


The last month have been a lot about getting stuff ready for the coming season, decide what to update on the car, ordering parts, getting safety stuff sent to USA for recertification and doing some maintenance on the Chevelle.

And right now I’m in USA visiting my friend Brandon Pesz on a working vacation to help him out with some body work on his car and also get all my own stuff together when it comes to spare parts and new fun stuff for the coming season! 🙂



I sure do enjoy being back in sunny Texas again, everything feels so much easier over here compared to cold, windy, rainy boring Sweden! 😉 

I wasn’t all satisfied with the pistons I did use last year so one big change to this year is new pistons and rods (of course special custom stuff and no off shelf) from CP-Carrillo, thanks a lot to Jonnie Lindberg and Bryan Moreland for making me a good deal on this! 


I’m also working on some updates on the valve train to make it better, the plan was that I would get a new set of much stronger rocker arms to the motor in the end of February but it looks like it will take time… Sure hope that things will start to move on really soon because I really don’t want to put the old stuff back again and continue to hurt parts every round this year also!….


The plan was to make this winter not so expensive, well it turned out that I failed once again on that part! 😀 But I think that the updates will do really good, I was aiming for a 3.87-3.88 @ 320km/h last year when we lost one cylinder 2.9s out and ended up with a 3.90 @ 307km/h and that was still on a soft tune up, going to be fun to se what the updates on the motor, driveline, suspension and less weight in the car will do to the performance on the car, I kind of want it to be the end of April now so we can go and make some test hits with the car at Malmö Raceway! 


Soon, really soon!! 


About the trailer… it’s standing totally still, nothing have happened since October or so and I guess it won’t happen so much on it before the season starts, hopefully we can get the team together in some way and put some hours in it during the summer and move forward. At least I have a done deal with Treston that will help us with all the cabinets and drawers that will arrive in the beginning of March and also that Bengtssons Smide and T.Grundstöm Plåtslageri will help us out with fabricating of whatever we need to get the work benches and cabinets mounted in the trailer! 

More updates and news will come soon, stay tuned!


It’s now one week ago since I got back home to Sweden again after spending two weeks in the Reid Motorsports / Pesz Power Performance shop in Wichita Falls, Texas. Must say that I did have a really good time with all my friends over there and I also got some new spirit to work on my own stuff again!! 😀

Since I got back I been working pretty much 24/7 to make everything ready and organized around the trailer, the boys Max, Patrik, PG and John have spent some time on it during the last week and also during the time I was in USA and that feels really good, I mean that they are working even that I’m not around! 😉

I have also almost put the whole new motor together to find out if something is missing or wrong but everything except for some small stuff is all done and that feels really good, you know it’s only about 6 weeks to the first outing for us, test and tune at Malmö Raceway in the end of April! 

  
The man and the machine!! 😀 Feels good!!!

   
 I did send my dirty laundry with UPS I did take my new Pistons in the suitcase just so I could start to put the motor together directly when I got back home! 🙂

   
   

Mounting sleeves in the block.

   
Pin the rear cam bearing.

   
Hone cylinders.

   
  
Checking the mains.

   
    
   
Short block assembled and all done!

  

Trying to get all the stuff around the new front mag drive in place…

  
Of course it needed some machining! 😉

 

In Wichita Falls with Brandon.

 
Really happy to have these people over there as my friends, feels good to escape from my ordinary life back home and go over and work on some others stuff! 😉

   
   
And it for sure was something to do, a lot of carbon fiber work and some safety updates on both cars.

  
Brandons hot rod turned out really good with the whole new interior!

   
 We went and helped some customers with there cars which was a lot of fun for sure! But I did miss the first race in the PDRA series due to the weather forecast did say it will be really heavy rain that weekend and instead of sitting in the rain just waiting they moved the race one week forward which I think it’s a really smart move so they at least can make the race.

  
Of course I did learn a lot of more stuff from this tuning genius!! 🙂 I for sure look forward to take my own car to the track an see how it reacts to all my new stuff!! 😀

  
And about new stuff, I got some coming with UPS really soon that I got and packed when I was over there!! 😉
 

 


Ok, so I have been home for about a week now after 3 awesome weeks in USA! 3 weeks full of racing, first in Tulsa with Brandon Pesz and Randell Reid, the weekend after in Dallas with the Lindberg Brothers and the last weekend in Virginia at the PDRA finals with Brandon and Randell again, I have learned a lot, did meet old friends and made a lot of new ones! This was and awesome trip, that’s for sure!! 🙂

But now everything is like it was before except for my memories! 😉 Now it’s time to get some stuff done in the shop so my customers will be happy and then get the Chevelle and our new trailer ready for the racing season 2016!! 🙂 

Stay tuned! /Andreas

   
 
  
Above from Tulsa.

   
   
Above from Ennis Dallas.

   
   
Above from Virginia.


I am in USA right now and have been here for one week, last weekend I was in Oklahoma at Tulsa Raceway Park and the Throw Down in T Town together with Brandon Pesz and Randell Reid that drives two of the worlds fastest doorslammers, Brandon is also a really smart engine builder / tuner so it is a really cool and awesome experience to know and get the chance to help these guys! 

  
   
    
 
After the race we headed to warm and sunny Texas and the Reid Motorsports / Pesz Power Performance shop to service Randells car before the next race in Richmond, Virginia and the PDRA Finals 22-24 October!

   
    
    
 
Must say that life feels pretty good right now and the funny thing is that this coming weekend will Jonnie Lindberg be racing in Dallas, Ennis at Texas Motorplex so if course when I am nearby I will go and work some on the worlds fastest and quickest Top Alcohol Funny Car between the two race weekends with the Pro Extreme Doorslammers! 🙂




 

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