In the shop « Sjödin Motorsport / ÅBM Racing

8
MAR

Good vacation in California!

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… 😉

Written by Andreas Sjödin on March 8, 2018 at 8:51 pm

14
FEB

The 2018 Top Doorslammer Series!

Official 2018 Top Doorslammer Series! =D Spread the word people and share this! Sjödin Motorsport / ÅBM Racing will attend on the three last events in the series! 2018 is the year we gonna take the step and become the worlds fastest Chevy motor in a door car! Thanks to our awesome partners and sponsors for making this year possible for us!

Written by Andreas Sjödin on February 14, 2018 at 7:25 am

27
JAN

Thank you all for your support during 2017!

Make sure that you show your partners, friends and fans that you appreciate their support! =)

Written by Andreas Sjödin on January 27, 2018 at 3:44 pm

23
DEC

Merry Christmas!!!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New year from Sjödin Motorsport / ÅBM Racing to all of you out there, this was a fast year in many ways for sure! =) Now it’s time to spend the holidays with the family, I hope you will do the same and will have a really good one!

Written by Andreas Sjödin on December 23, 2017 at 11:33 am

22
NOV

A soft 2018 season is on the schedule, we won’t make the whole series next year!

I been on my way to write something about this year for a really long time now but haven’t found any spirit at all to do it, after the last outing at Tierp Arena in the end of July I have been thinking a lot and below is a little quick summary to start with for the 2017 season.

Must say that 2017 have been really good and a real success when it comes to the performance down the track with the Chevelle! I mean, just look at the score board below! 😀

Feels pretty good to have the fastest car in the Scandinavian Top Doorslammer series in 2017 using a Chevy Big Block power plant, numbers on the car after this season ended up with 0.9563 to 60ft 2.5770@237.26km/h (147.50mph) to 330ft 3.8425@315.24km/h (195.88mph) to 1/8 mile, this makes us the number 10 quickest doorslammer in Europe!

And we continues to move in the right direction when it comes to our performance on the Chevelle!

But it have also been way too much (once again) about up and downs before the season and during it with people and stuff around the whole racing deal that just disappoints me and makes me sick and tired of continue with this…

I am always thinking / working on stuff around the dragracing circus and I do always decide what to do for the next season before the actual season is over, and that’s even if I don’t know how I will do to afford it…

I usually would have decided by now that we are going to do the whole series but not for next year, for the first time ever I don’t feel anything and it ain’t fun, I need a big change to do the whole series next year and I know it won’t happen by itself so I decided already before the first event this year that we will not do the whole Top Doorslammer series in 2018.

If you are aiming really high you will probably or maybe even for sure hit some speed bumps on the way to get there… With speed bumps I mean things that you can’t control yourself, for example other people that tells you one thing and does the total opposite, parts you buy that you don’t get in time and doesn’t work like they should even that you pay a lot and hope to get quality… when I look back at this year it would have turned out completely different if the things above would stick to the plan, and that might been just what I needed to make it feel fun again.

I have been saying in the end of the season for many years now that “if the next one will be this hard and turn out shitty like this again it’s time for a soft season because it’s not worth it we need better structure everywhere, it’s not fun to live like this” and the time is here now.

What and how much we really will do next year depends on what I will come up with together with our partners and sponsors. After all they are the ones that makes this possible for us to do, hopefully some test passes / events to entertain and keep our sponsors and partners happy and only try to go fast and making that scoreboard put up the correct numbers to make our selves happy. Only thing I know for sure is that I will put less time on racing and on the Chevelle, instead I will put time on the trailer, our companies, repair the economy and my health to get back on track again so it will be fun to go racing just like it should be.
But we will be back, it’s a year 2019 after the season 2018, will be back stronger, healthier and happier!! 😉

At the end I would like to say a huge thanks to all the special people that always helps me out no matter what, family, friends, team and our sponsors and partners below! You know for yourself if you are the one and you mean the world to me!!
Åkes Bil & Motor • Birka Motorrenoveringar • Sjödin Motorsport Race Cars • Swecomposite • LSF Custom Lackering • Swelube Amalie Motor Oil • Sjödin Network • Winassist System • Anders Bremö Byggnads • Panasonic • Bengtssons Smide • The Parts Stop Sweden • Nicma Tools • T. Grundström Plåtslageri • Pro Tools Peter Hult • Stockholm Gourmet • Dragracing24.com • Rörmekano i Vallentuna • Eltric • Pesz Power Performance • Berga Lås & Larm AB • Loggamera • Treston • Neal Chance Racing Converters • Kaross & Lackteknik • Jeff Jones • CP-Carrillio • Jonnie Lindberg Motorsports

Written by Andreas Sjödin on November 22, 2017 at 6:32 am

25
OCT

Winter time in the shop, and motor is in pieces!

Time for an update about the Chevelle!

Last week I did spend a lot of hours cleaning and try organizing the ABM shop, it was way more than just a mess when I started but now it starts to look like I want it again! It’s a pretty big problem to have the race car and some stuff that I need to it inside a small shop were you also try to do your daily job….

Finally after some organizing / cleaning and with the Chevelle in the right place in the shop I got some help taking the motor apart to see how it looks like after the last event at Tierp Arena already 12, yes 12 Weeks ago!… time flies for sure, again!.. Anyway the motor did look pretty much exactly like I guessed it would do after how I used it in the last rounds this season.

Good night you evil women from hell, time for a pretty long nap before it’s time to check trough and service the driveline.

And that’s where I started, do you understand why I wanted to organize some in the shop…? 😉

I really don’t have any interest in building a car for someone like it is right now, and I’m pretty sure the next car that gonna be built in this jig is a new car for myself so I decided to take the jig out from the shop to make room for the Chevelle at that spot instead, feels way much smarter so I can work better in the shop with customers engines etc.

Much better, and a lot of space in the shop instead of a complete mess…

Checking leak down, it was good at least to 80% of the motor… 🙂

Sometimes all you need is a little happy and strong girl, then Sofi is the right girl for the job! 😀

Valve train and heads of the motor, and things looks pretty much like they have been doing all year since we fired the motor up the first time with the new stuff, not better just the same… One good thing with the new rocker arms is that we haven’t hurt any adjuster screws or pushrod cups this year like we did in every pass last year… we’ll ok, I did now find one cup and screw I’m gonna change just because I got plenty of them and I feel that’s more than ok after 30 passes this year on the same parts! 🙂

Rods and pistons out.

Heads apart for inspection, the job we did on them before the last outing looks just perfect! But I still got an issue that’s keeps coming back, have tried to talk with the manufacturer about it but no solution on the problem yet…

Pistons, rods, wrist pins, bearings and rings on the operation table to get measured and compared with old notes and measurements how they are new, and once again CP-Carrillo to the top!! 🙂 The parts above on the bottom picture is what I used up on the last event but I also saw that in the computer and on the spark plug but I didn’t do a change big enough to stop it, then we saw it now on the leak down check, lean is mean! Well at least I think it feels good that I can blame myself for testing the limit on the parts instead of that the part isn’t good enough for a motor like mine, I have pistons in the motor that made 30 passes this year and last year I made 4 passes and saw problems coming on them!… I think that only take out one cylinder because I’m playing around with the fuel and ignition is just fine, without finding the limit you will never know where to stop for real and I can only blame myself for it, haha! 😀

Well, that’s all for now! Now I know what I need to do and buy to get the motor complete and ready to make a pass again, next time long time from now it’s time to take the motor block out and hone the cylinders and check the mains then put it back together again. Of course we are gonna service and check trough the converter, Bruno drive, transmission and rear axle too but to them I got the spares I might need and also there is pretty much just a check and now work or thinking on them. 🙂

Organized and ready to go to bed 🙂 Sweet dreams!

Written by Andreas Sjödin on October 25, 2017 at 8:03 pm

10
OCT

The truck and trailer.

I have been quiet for a while now, time for some updates!

The off season is here for real and pretty much nothing have been made around the racing circus since the last outing at Tierp Arena in the end of July, except for the last couple of weeks when me an Max (of course, who else) !? 🙂 have spent some time unloading the Chevelle and got the truck and trailer inspected, repaired and approved and legal to use for one more year on the Swedish roads!

After that we took the rig up north Sweden were it will be kept inside a warm shop so it won’t get more destroyed during the cold and wet Swedish winter weather, and also one really good thing is that I don’t need to see it standing outside the shop every day and make me sad..! 😀

The last hours of practice driving with Kermit and the trailer is over for 2017 and the rig is inside a warm safe shop to spend the winter! It feels kind of strange that all this is ours and already inspected and done for a coming season in the end of a season, this is usually a problem before the first event to solve but I felt that I don’t wanna do like we always do, need to start get things organized from now on…

Just some normal maintenance and control, we haven’t done anything at all to the truck since we bought it earlier this year more than fill it with fuel and drive it. We did also repair the ABS system so we got the warning symbol for it turned off, thanks to Jörgen Berg for helping out with a diagnostic diagram! 🙂

Time so see some light and get out from the trailer after sitting in it for 8 weeks, now back in the shop again and hopefully soon in the correct winter location with the blanket over so I don’t have to see her for a while…

The trailer is ready for the winter and cleaned out so we don’t get any disgusting surprises next year just because someone forgot or left some food or so in it.

At the yearly control! And it turned out pretty good.

The trailer went trough smoothly but on the truck they didn’t like an ugly mark in the windshield that I did fix with a day or two of wet sanding and polishing 🙂 Not so fun but way cheaper that change the windshield.

Above you can see the difference on the windshield, been on my way doing this for a long time but haven’t got time for it and put my priorities on other stuff… but feels good now when it’s done! 🙂

And then they also found a steering rod that was in really bad shape so that one felt pretty ok to change even that it is a heavy job to do….! 😉

Then we loaded my daily Volvo in the trailer, took out all the things I might need in the shop during the winter and started our trip up north.

But first a stop at our awesome parter Bengtssons Smide to pick up some material that we are supposed to mount on the outside of the trailer during the winter when it been standing in the warm shop long enough to dry up everywhere.