March1, 2001

Editor: Charles Reichard

www.camcraftcams.com

Dear Customers,

          March finds us very busy as everyone is preparing for the new racing season. We have many new as well as repeat customers and sales are up nicely over this time last year. Racing season is here for many drag racers and fast approaching for circle track racers.

I am recovering from shoulder surgery Feb 23^rd and not feeling too sporty. Sleep is hard to come by and pain is pretty constant. I know it will pass but that doesn’t help much today. My arm will be in a sling for at least 6 weeks and recovery will be 6 months or more.

          We are pleased to welcome 2 new employees to Camcraft. They are Cookie Johnson and Dustin Lutz. Cookie will be a grinder operator and Dustin will work a number of areas including assisting Harriett in the shipping department. Clarence will still supervise the shop but will spend more time helping Harriett and me with customer service and following through on the little things that sometimes slip through the cracks.

I recently attended two of Dave Morgan’s chassis seminars at Auto-Fab in Baltimore.  It was a long day. Starting at 8:00 am, we were bombarded with valuable and useful chassis information until 8:00 pm. It was time well spent for me. I took my Monza and had it critiqued. I learned a few things about it I hadn’t realized and plan to make some changes to it. I could have spent weeks and hundreds of dollars on track time, not to mention wear & tear on the car, truck & trailer, to discover what I learned in a day at this seminar. I constantly find it amazing that Drag Racers will throw hundreds or thousands of dollars and many weeks of track time at a problem but won’t spend a day and a few hundred dollars to learn how to properly analyze and correct deficiencies in their cars. If you’re interested in learning about chassis setup and how to analyze and correct your chassis problems or just avoid them to begin with, then look for the next National Motorsports Seminar in your area.

I found a neat new web site recently. It is “thedirtforum.com”. It has free e-mail and different forums for fans and racers as well as separate forums for different classes. Check it out. You’ll like it. If you have any problems using it, e-mail the administrator and you will get an acknowledgement in a few minutes and an answer in a few hours. If any of you know of similar forums for asphalt racers or drag racers please let me know.

Initial testing on our new SXTL series of flat tappet cams has started. The following profiles are available.

     30^th Anniversary Open House

May 5, 2001

We will be holding an open house to celebrate 30 years of survival in the automotive aftermarket. We have several commitments from suppliers and customers to put on seminars covering a variety of topics. Bubba Urban of Urban Mechanical will present tuning your engine with a Chassis dyno. Urban Mechanical will donate a 2-hour dyno session to our list of door prizes.

Well-known local racers Rick & Mary Passwaters will be helping out. Rick will be presenting how to degree a cam and Mary will give a short talk on preparing a racing budget. Their entire family of 5 are active racers including the youngest, eight year old Holly who has a Jr. Dragster. Rick has his hands full keeping all those cars running.

          We will have demonstrations of camshaft grinding, lifter grinding, how to degree a cam, How the Cam Doctor works, how to install Nitrous Oxide systems, How to tune your Holley carb. There will be special pricing for that day only on a number of items.

          Our Chef and humorist Jim Newcomb will be wielding his trusty spatula again this year. We haven’t done much planning on the menu yet but it will be expanded over last year. We will try to get special pricing from local motels and tourist attractions for attendees that may want to spend the weekend in Talbot County.

          We hope to see you there.

          Thank you for your support.

Yours truly,

Charles, Harriett, Clarence, Chuck, Cookie, Shannon & Dustin