[DeTomaso] Texas Fun Rally Contingent

[jtaphorn at kingwoodcable.com]

The Space City contingent arrived safely iat Wild Horse Pass Tuesday night.  Steve Hawkins and Bill Lewis's Panteras made it w/o incident.  Steve was able to tweek his Fuel injection along the way and came up just short of 20mpg on the last tank.  Not to shabby for a 411 stroker!

We had assumed if there was trouble it would be with either the two Panteras on the road or the trailers that Rob Pink and I were pulling. That was not the case.  The second day's drama began with an exploding rear tire on my truck.  Took out the splash shields and damaged surrounding bodywork.  That sucked.  We replaced that tire with the spare and pulled off at the next town for a replacement.  Lucked out with a WalMart at the intersection and they had us good to go in no time.  

Perhaps, 20 miles later, another explosion.  This time the driver's front.  AT 70 mph, the trucked swerved across the lanes and I fortunately stopped it before going deep into the median. Thankfully, no one was along side us at that time. We had that tire changed in no time; however, it also damaged my front wheel well body work.  The tires on the truck had lots of tread and low mileage; yet, were purchased in 2003.  We had little confidence in the remaining three tires the trip at this point and at that speed.  We slowed the caravan down to 60mph and continued onward w/o a spare.  I called David Bell at his office back in Houston and he scouted towns along out route to find tire stores.  Unfortunately, we were in the middle of the desert and our salvation was 150miles forward in Tucson.  No stink'in way we were backtracking to the Walmart.  Fortunately, we made it to Tuscon and purchased new tires for the remaining wheels.

WHP is a wonderful hotel.  The ambiance is nice and the Bar alonside the pool is a nice change.  The AZ Chapter has been great with attention to detail helping out with the event.  They are cycling cars to the Hotel patio for display.  Weather is cooperating at the moment.  I counted 47 Panteras in the Pantera Corral this morning.  One nice aspect of the venue change is seeing many new Panteras that had not previously been at a Rally. 

Many are beginning to pull out of the lot heading for the track at this morning, including Rob Pink.

A beautiful place - catch you later

JT
---- jtaphorn at kingwoodcable.com wrote: 

=============
The Space City Squadron, to hijack Chucks moniker, made it safely without incident into Van Horn, TX last night.  Van Horn is a historic old town of the last Indian war fought and used in the filming of many movies and TV shows including Lonesome Dove series.

We stopped in Ft Stockton for Dinner and ran into the Big Bend Open Road Race folks including Jack Hoope.

This morning, we are setting off to connect with the mid-west squadron in Las Cruces.

See y'all soon

JT
_______________________________________________

Detomaso Forum Managed by POCA

Archive Search Engine Now Available at http://www.realbig.com/detomaso/

DeTomaso mailing list
DeTomaso at list.realbig.com
http://list.realbig.com/mailman/listinfo/detomaso