FUEL / WATER TANK COMPARTMENT
Big Red was originally built to do one thing, and do it well: blow away all comers to the La Carrera Classica. It was built to be an open-road-racing monster. Read the history section to learn how that event turned out. Since then, the team has turned Big Red into the Swiss Army Knife of race cars. When the crew changed from Land Speed/Top Speed mode to the Road Racing mode, it was a real chore over the years. The fuel cell can/box was modified inside the car, so it didn’t come out. The bladder had to be swapped between a fuel bladder for Road Racing mode and a water bladder for Land Speed/Top Speed mode. The fuel-cell bladder can’t be used as a water tank due to the material used.
The reason it’s been so hard to remove the bladder over the years is that it had to be pulled out through the top, inside the trunk. It was a tight fit to the body. To make
life much easier, and the tank more serviceable, they cut off the bottom braces of the tank cage. Then, Tim fabricated a new bolt-in lower cage structure. With the bottom removable, a new fixed cage was fabricated on the top side. Rear shock reservoir mounts were welded to the upper
tank cage.
Since the fuel-cell cage modification, the whole fuel cell is easy to drop out through the bottom. Now changing from fuel cell to water cell is a much faster and easier process.
Big Red originally had a 45-gallon fuel tank. As the engine got bigger, it needed more fuel to run longer distances. Dave replaced the flat lid on the cell can with a four-inch taller lid and a bigger bladder. The larger cell held 55 gallons. Before the fuel bladder can be in installed in the cell, there’s a flat panel that goes into the bottom of the box to plug the holes.
