Time to go fast :D

[waynehartwig]

First some history...

Back in the 70-80's, my mom dated this guy that helped this other guy race his jet boat. So we traveled all over watching the boat races and test/tune sessions.

The owner/driver was Wally Albright, of the Little Rascals and Our Gang and several other 'kid' type shows. Wally owned a tomato trucking outfit in Woodland, CA and that's how everyone knew everyone. All of his trucks were red with white lettering, so it was called the 'red and white fleat'. This also followed over into Wally's racing.

Wally captured several world records with his jet boat - 77 Rogers Drag Star with a Keith Black injected all aluminum hemi. In the 80's Wally stepped up with a new boat, motor and nitro. This boat sat for ~20 years in storage.

Wally died in ~8/99. I thought it was from being an old dude at 75, but mom says he was killed in a boating accident, while racing.

Anyway, in 2000 a guy by the name of Rick Kunze of Colusa, CA bought the boat minus engine and in 2003 completely re-did the boat with a 541 Merlin and Nitrous. He raced the boat a few times and stepped up to 25% nitro and killed the motor - I believe that happened in 2006. The motor was pulled and the boat is once again sitting.

Rick is the tuning/fuel injection guru for Team Vesco - they hold the record for the fastest wheeled car @470 mph. www.teamvesco.com I think is the website.

Anyway, a buddy of mine told me (back in the day, not recently) that Rick bought this boat and immediately my child hood came back to me. I then met Rick and expressed my interest in this boat and why (as did dozens of others I'm sure).

Well, I'm now the proud owner of big part of my childhood!

Plans? Not sure at this point... I will probably see about taking Rick's paint job off the boat to restore it back to how I remember it and how it was raced when Wally owned it. Beyond that I'm not sure if I'll start racing it again? or just turn it into a really fast lake boat with tons of history... If I race it, I'll probably go with a turboed 6.0 or 6.2 LS motor running on E85.


Jack from MPD setup this boat and said this about his encounter with Wally back in probably 1977...

A fellow looking like a homeless person came in the MPD shop one evening and asked "if we installed engines in jet boats". I told him "yes" and he then asked "if we would install the engine in his jet boat". I said "sure", thinking to myself that it was all a joke. He then left.
Several weeks later the same fellow showed up driving a nice shiny pickup with an injected aluminum KB hemi sitting in the bed and a brand new red & white Rogers Drag Star hitched on behind. He said "this is the engine that I'd like you to install in that jet boat". I almost fell over!
We built the rails and engine mounts, and installed the engine. During that era we also built some of the cav plate hardware used on the Drag Stars, but that stuff was usually installed in Roger's shop. I don't remember for sure if we did any of the other rigging on that boat, but I'm thinking that we may have done the pedals/plate controls because I bothered to take a pic of those. After Wally's boat left MPD, I never saw it again, but heard thru the grapevine about him setting the CompJet record.
I am thrilled to see old race boats like this being preserved and, hopefully, kept in top condition.
Jack

Anyway, here's a couple of before and after pics. Enjoy!

 

[waynehartwig]

Here is a video I took of the boat after Rick finished restoring it, 03.

..He's towards the end
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I believe this was before above - 98.4 MPH
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And one of it's first races after about 25 years!
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...And a couple more pictures....

 

[cruiseroutfit]

Hold my beer.... watch this...


Looks like a blast Wayne!

 

[bobmed]

Hold my beer.... watch this...

This is what I was told when I got to take a ride in a tunnel hull boat on Lake Powell.

At about 90 mph the beer began to siphon out of the opening in the can from the wind and we were still picking up speed

 

[Tacoma]

There's a lot of sexy talk in that first post there... injected this and and aluminum that LOL

That's pretty damn cool, Wayne.

 

[UNSTUCK]

It's nice that it has a gas pedal and a brake pedal. Wonder if it uses discs or drums?

 

[waynehartwig]

Thanks! I miss going fast on water. After I moved to Utah in 04, they wouldn't let me put my hotboat on the lake, so I ended up selling it rather than having it sit. Originally the plan was to sell it and make a buggy, but that never happened....

There wasn't many Rogers Drag Stars made, so that makes it a collector. Then add the fact it's a record holder and that it was Wally's making this a definate one of a kind! But as I told Rick back in 03 when I met him, I could care less if it was a Bayliner or Tahiti, if he ever wants to sell, to call me first.

In with the mix of parts Rick recieved, was Wally's old life vest and etc. Rick now knowing the history of the boat and the man behind it, made his new vest out of Wally's.

Here's a couple more pics of how it was sitting a few weeks ago when all of this started....

Oh, and my wife hates this and thinks I'm nuts!

 

[waynehartwig]

It's nice that it has a gas pedal and a brake pedal. Wonder if it uses discs or drums?

Drum, but those are on the trailer

It has 'water brakes'. Believe me, they work well. That's one of the reasons jet boat drivers WEAR parachutes. If the engine stalls at ~100 mph, you had better hang on or you WILL be ejected over the bow.


I don't think I ever had my boat over 100+, but I know (GPS verified) I had it at 88.4 mph A buddy of mine back then laughed at me and said 'I didn't need to wear a parachute, those go on the back of the boat'. I took him for a ride and simply took my foot off the gas. If I didn't put my foot back in it, he wouldn't of got tossed back in the seat!

This is all because of trying to keep the pump from cavitating. Because of it, on the bottom of the boat, there are shoes and loaders that hang down at an angle to FORCE water into the pump. The faster the boat is moving, the more pressure on the intake side. These also act like brakes when the pump isn't turning. Think of a turbo engine brake setup... There is only a few thou at best clearance between the wear ring and the propeller, making it a pretty tight seal.

 

[waynehartwig]

Friday morning I leave to go get this beaut! I feel like a school girl going to her first prom. I'm giddy as hell!!

I do intend on racing it, no more thinking about it. I'm now looking for a LQ4 that I will stroke a bit and probably be able to run pump gas - if not, I'll step up to E85, which is already in the cards. This next year, I plan on focusing on seat time and get the pump dialed in. Next year I'll pull the motor again, beef it up and probably run about 25-30 lbs of boost. Then it'l get interesting I don't really have any intentions on making anything faster than a 9 second boat, which is roughly 125 mph in the 1/4.

But we'll see how it does with the LS motor in it next year. If I'm in the 10 second bracket, I'll probably just increase the compression ratio and keep it NA....

 

[Bart]

Looks like a fun lake go fast boat. I was worried when I saw the one seat at the top. Glad it has two, but be careful with the boy in there.

 

[waynehartwig]

Looks like a fun lake go fast boat. I was worried when I saw the one seat at the top. Glad it has two, but be careful with the boy in there.

Unfortunatley it's not a lake boat. While it is kind of a tunnel hull, it is still a flat bottom and any kind of wake from the lake will make it unbearable to ride in. That said, I doubt Austin will ever ride in this boat. Or at least until he's old enough to respect the power/speed it will have.

The reason for the two seats is depending on which side of the island it launches from. Much easier to hold on to the rope if you are seated on the correct side. Depending on how important that is, I might take the one seat out. Weight= loss of ET's

Completely prepped and rigged, this boat will weigh less than 1200 lbs. The empty hull and jet the way it sits now in the pictures is about 3-400 lbs. Imagine that weight and 1600 hp :greg:

But you are right; I also need to respect it and be always prepared for the worst to be safe. I will never run this boat over 60 mph without all of the safety equpiment in place. I have 0 interest in getting hurt

 

[waynehartwig]

Just realized I never posted a picture of the bottom of the boat. It's laminated balsa