Today's Feature

Public Works Meeting.

Street Commissioner Tom Shelley reported at the Public Works meeting on Tuesday that the new dump truck has been returned from Springfield and that the work done there had cost $1,060 which is a third of what the work done on the last truck cost.

Public Works Director Chad Wampler presented the month end report for the Public Works Department which shows the total collection in the department at $9676 for the month of May. The twenty construction projects are shown to cost $4,508,700. Wampler told the committee that a large part of this total was attributed to the renovation of the Drake Hotel into a multi-family housing unit which is listed as costing $2,600,000.

Police Still Searching for Vehicle.

Police are still searching for a white 1992 Oldsmobile Cutlass with red interior and license plate number 815-YAL in connection with the double homicide of Marvin and Peggy Steverson.

Police Chief Dennis Veach reported that he has asked for an extension of the Tri-State Major Case Squad through Friday for continued assistance in the case. Police Dept: 237-7200.

Most say that they were used to it. Others talk about sleepin’ out in the park or under a shade tree in the summer. I didn’t hear many sayin’ they turned off the air conditioner just for nostalgia sake.

Nowadays most folks rush ta get inside, not takin’ the time to enjoy a casual chat or a good story or two on the porch.

Some say that the TV is what has changed folks habits, but I think the old AC has prob’ly had quite a bit ta make the TV more attractive. At least on hot summer nights. Just put the set in a room without air conditionin’, you’re sure ta get a conversation goin’ with the kids and the wife.

This is some fact, but mostly,

Just Jake Talkin’.

Dear Tom and Ray:

I was selling an old car that was starting to burn oil. One of the guys who looked at the car pulled the oil filler cap and the engine died immediately. He said a mechanic buddy told him that this is a test for bad compression. We tried it on his car, and it didn’t miss a beat. I had never heard of this before. Is this a true test, and why does it work? - Rick.

TOM: Hmm. Sounds good. But it’s baloney, Rick.

RAY: There’s no relationship between the oil cap and the engine conking out. Unless the car in question is a Saab.

TOM: For some reason, we’ve found that on many Saabs, when you remove the oil cap, the engine WILL stall. But that’s just due to an engineering quirk that produces a massive vacuum leak when the oil cap is off. I have no idea if it was intentional on Saab’s part. It is the only car I know of that does it.

RAY: There might be other cars that do it, but we’re not in the habit of removing the oil caps from cars that are running. For one thing, there’s never any need to. And for another, it always sends oil splashing all over my newly cleaned and pressed coveralls.

TOM: However, what you CAN tell by removing the oil cap is whether the car has excessive blowby. Blowby is created when the rings wear out and lots of combustion gasses sneak by the rings and into the crankcase, where the oil is stored.

RAY: If there are more combustion gasses in the crankcase than the ventilation system can expel, pressure builds up in there. When you remove the oil cap, you might smoke coming out.

TOM: That’d be a sure sign that you’d want to avoid buying that car. Maybe that’s what this guy had in mind.

RACING
By Greg Zyla
Sponsored by Curry Automotive

Southern 500 Was a NASCAR Tradition

Q: Greg, I just watched the 500-mile race from Darlington, which was sold out and run under the lights for the first time. It was great. Still, I hear rumors of NASCAR eliminating Darlington from its schedule, if not in 2006, then in 2007. What are your feelings? — Sandy P., South Carolina

A: Sandy, if ever there was a "right time" for race fans to push for the ultimate saving of the Darlington racetrack, now is the time. I feel that NASCAR should reinstate the Southern 500 on the date it should be run, Labor Day weekend. As for two races at the track, I don’t see that happening, but the Southern 500 is the second most popular and respected race in the United States, behind the Indy 500. At this time, there really is no Labor Day Southern 500, as the date has been moved to May.

First run in 1950 on the first superspeedway built for NASCAR stock cars, thousands jammed the Darlington facility and saw Johnny Mantz in a Plymouth take the win. You just can’t treat legend and history the way NASCAR has over the past few years in this Darlington situation. It would be a major mistake to remove Darlington from the schedule, and even though the race was sold out with more than 60,000 fans on hand, insiders say that Darlington is still one of the tracks that could get the "ax" in the future.