Two Wheels + Nitro = a Heady Brew

A VISIT TO SANTA POD RACEWAY, home of British drag racing, in the late-’60s was sufficient to imbue steve woollatt with the notion of having a go at it himself in the future. it was 1976 when the long-time mechanic returned to the Pod, entering a “run what ya brung” event on his Kawasaki street bike. steve was rightly chuffed when he made it all the way to the final round during his first experience of the straight-line sport that—as with countless other competitors before him—quickly developed into an addiction.

Over the course of the more than two decades that Steve has ridden The Dealer, he has claimed British championship kudos no less than 14 times. Although he’d like to attempt having a go at annexing FIM (Fédération Internationale de Motorcyclisme) European championship laurels, this has not been possible to date because of the travel time and expense involved in pursuing the title.

The hard-hitting two-wheeler has been reasonably reliable, although 2014 was not a proverbial banner year for the Hertfordshire-based property developer insomuch as issues with bottom-end oil pressure were instrumental in the bike making just one appearance in the winner’s circle. That appearance being the FIA/FIM season-wrapping Euro Finals where, in the opening round, Greek opponent Filippos Papafilippou crashed into him and was catapulted onto the wheelie bars where he hung on grimly as Steve brought the now rider-and-passenger bike to a safe halt from a speed of around 150 mph. Check out YouTube for footage of one of the most bizarre drag racing incidents seen in the almost 50 years that Santa Pod has been operating.

Last season, Steve carded some incremental personal-best ETs thanks largely to the development of a reconfigured fuel flow system and air-operated piston (in place of the usual choice of centrifugally operated clutch fingers) to activate a 6-inch clutch pack; this ingenious project was undertaken by Phil Baimbridge’s PBR company. This setup ably combines use of a modified AMS-2000 multi-channel air-management system operating at a maximum pressure of 75 psi to exert a force of some 2 ½ tons on the pack. Astute team engineer Baimbridge also takes credit for installation of a Carlo Gandolfi Composites’ carbon-fiber injector hat (a weight-saving measure of some 4 or 5 pounds on a bike that currently tips the scales at 820 pounds), along with enlarged cylinder head and exhaust valves on the Opcon blown 1,327cc billet copy of a Kawasaki four-pot engine. An 83% methanol/nitro mix is forced into the motor from the bike’s 5-gallon tank using a Top Alcohol-type 14-gpm fuel pump with a Don Jackson BDK valve-based fuel system. Ignition chores are handled by a Top Fuel dragster-style MSD Pro Mag 44 unit that has four dead sparks (with just four spark plugs needing to be fired, the other four leads are simply attached as ground wires to the John Clift-built frame). This setup endows the brutal strip-stormer with a fuel consumption of roughly 2 gallons per run, power being transferred to the 13×14 rear wheel with Mickey Thompson slick through a B&J two- speed automotive-type gearbox and heavy-duty chain. Lubrication is handled by a dry-sump system with Pace pump. Data logging is undertaken through means of an iconic Racepak unit recording various performance parameters required to optimally tune the 10,000-plus-rpm powerhouse.

Although lacking the funding necessary to have a complete spare motor, Steve has been collecting a plethora of parts throughout the past several years and hopes to fully assemble another bullet in the near future.

Meanwhile, when not wrestling The Dealer on the strip (a tricky task typically involving moving his weight around from side to side in order to keep the 800-1,000-hp machine in as straight a trajectory as possible), Steve occasionally finds time to ride a couple of classic Kawasaki motorcycles: a 750 H2 that he fully rebuilt and an early-’70s two-stroke Mach3 500 H1 that in its day was disconcertingly nicknamed the “widow maker.” He also rides a custom Harley-Davidson Deuce. Steve isn’t limited to two-wheel fun, he also enjoys taking out his favorite fast toy, a Mercedes-Benz AMG procured in 2014 and outfitted with a 500-bhp 6.3L (383 ci) V-8 powerhouse, making a rather quick luxury car that the owner reckons is “definitely a lot of fun to drive.”

As far as his quarter-mile exploits astride the fiberglass-panelled, metal-flake-painted monster are concerned, Steve gives much credit to his loyal crew of the past decade— Phil Baimbridge, Phil Reynolds and brothers Dave and Mark Powell—all of whom he hopes will still be in attendance should the bike manage to surpass best numbers to date, 6.23 seconds and 228 mph, and move ever closer to surmounting the five-second barrier. A tall order perhaps, but once the bugs are ironed out of the new clutch and fuel systems there’s every possibility The Dealer will do the business should the, er, cards fall in his favor.

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