Very soon after I started hotrodding the RocketSled, I found it was too fast to pass tech. Folk’ll cheat thinking tech is something that’s more a pain in the ass than anything else. I disagree. The rules are there to keep you intact incase you run out of talent before you run out of turn.

At the time, NHRA stated that any convertible that turns quicker than 14 seconds in the quarter mile needs a rollbar. That first time the Vette turned a 13.89 was a blessing and a curse. I wasn’t going to tear up my car for safety. That’s when I discovered that some convertibles with hardtops are classified as Coupes. The important feature being an integral rollbar. C4 Corvettes qualify. It means a hardtop’d convertible techs as a Coupe, at which point it can turn 11.99 before the next crazy group of requirements. (A LONG way from 14 seconds.)

So I started lookin’ for a Hardtop. They’re not particularly hard to find. Ebay sees them pretty regularly. The problem is finding one for a) the right amount of money, b) the right amount of shipping, and c) in the right condition.

There were plenty of tops on the edges of the US..that automatically adds $250 to the price for shipping. $350 for Proper shipping, or $400 for insanely perfect shipping. Nothing would suck more than dropping a grand on a top and having it arrive in two pieces.

With the economy taking a turn, the prices dropped  a little, making the itch stronger, but the tops still always seemed to be in Cali, or Detroit, or North Carolina.

I haven’t been writing entries lately, not because I haven’t been busy. I’ve got plenty of irons in fires dealing with Linux servers, firewalls, the Jacob’s Ladder project, and the Sled.

The Sled has vexxed me with transmission cables that won’t stay unmelted, and emissions that won’t stay un-emissed. I haven’t felt like writing about it. Part of the problem was: I found a hardtop in Topeka, for a good price. A 22 hour day coulda picked up the top. The sled gets 18 mpg. That’s a LONG day, $200 in gas, and the potential for an overnight in a motel 2 1/2. And the Sled was incapacitated with a melted tranny cable.

Long story short, one _finally_ showed up in Denver. Picked it up from the nicest family, and the only sour note is the reason it became available. The donor was a 1990 that crashed and burned, seriously injuring the owner.

I’m now two brackets away from passing tech, and THIS top included something that I wasn’t even aware existed til last week. There’s a hat-rack cover that cleans up the installation and this one included it!

So, if you’ve made it this far, what would you think of painting below the beltline the same color Red as the hardtop? I think it’d look pretty snazzy, but I’ve also seen some cars that OTHER folks thought were snazzy that would scare small kids and make the elderly nauseous. I’d like to avoid that, if at all possible.