V-8 Johnson and Eliminator 21 'Daytona

[Ron Hill]

This boat ran about 92 MPH with every prop we had. Then, we took the rev limiter off and it went 118 MPH...Rod Zapf and John Castelli drove it at the Parker Enduro.

[capnzee]

The Eliminator Daytona was a beautifule boat and it ran and handled very well after we worked until 3 A.M. in the morning "non-tripping" the chine on the left picklefork and adding a non-skid fin to the rear. Eliminators at the time had a reputation for dropping the nose and hooking in a tight left turn. With the alterations made to the hull and a L/U that had been "customized" by either Ron or Castelli the resulting combination had great handling characteristics. Coming out of the Bluewater turn. the prop shaft let go and I was able to "coast" to the beach. The Hill crew replaced the L/U in record time with a standard "offshore" unit by OMC (all we had) and that was the end of the race. Blow-out was so bad that we had to run the rest of the race at "half" throttle. Seems we may have finished 5th overall. Ron, your memory is better than mine, you can make the corrections to my story. Regardless, it was one of the best "rides" of my life-I always loved the Parker Enduro!

[Ron Hill]

The Eliminator Daytona was a beautiful boat and it ran and handled very well after we worked until 3 A.M. in the morning "non-tripping" the chine on the left picklefork and adding a non-skid fin to the rear. Eliminators at the time had a reputation for dropping the nose and hooking in a tight left turn. With the alterations made to the hull and a L/U that had been "customized" by either Ron or Castelli the resulting combination had great handling characteristics. Coming out of the Bluewater turn. the prop shaft let go and I was able to "coast" to the beach. The Hill crew replaced the L/U in record time with a standard "offshore" unit by OMC (all we had) and that was the end of the race. Blow-out was so bad that we had to run the rest of the race at "half" throttle. Seems we may have finished 5th overall. Ron, your memory is better than mine, you can make the corrections to my story. Regardless, it was one of the best "rides" of my life-I always loved the Parker Enduro!

The only thing I might add to your story, Rod, would be that the V-8's weight on the back, helped to keep the bow from dropping in the corners. I don't recall where we finished, becasue I was so pissed off about the OMC V-8 having the same size prop shaft as the V-6, and they broke on the V-6. I don't think we had a real shot at winning but breaking a prop shaft didn't help. Then, when we borrowed that gearcase from Second Effort, I didn't have a cotter pin , so I used a nail and the nail broke and let the prop come loose. It was a new nail but...

You may never have known how I got this boat but I will tell you:

I'm sure you remember Ben Ellerman, our neighbor and Crew Chief. Ben was big in Boy Scouts and he met this guy named Ray Snyder who had transferred to California from St. Louis to sell AME 4000 for Ashland Chemicals. Ben met Ray through Boy Scouts and told him we were good friends. Well, Ray wanted to sell AME 4000, so he called me. I took Ray around to all the boat builders, in one day. We went to Hallett, Bahner, Warlock, Carrera, maybe Baker and Eliminator.

Eliminator bought so much AME 4000 Bob (Leach) offered to built me a boat...and that is how I got that 21 foot Eliminator Daytona. I bought that V-8, $6,300 bucks CASH!

We raced it at Havasu, Parker and the KILOS and I sold it for $6,300.

[capnzee]

As I recall, the rev limiter was set at 6725 for the Parker Enduro. The 8 cylinders sounded really great at that rpm. It must have been really sweet when running 20 mph or so faster. I have a much better picture of the Eliminator/V8 than the one you have posted. A close look shows the #9 at speed with the "trip-fin" on the rear left sponson out of the water but does not show the non trip on the front left picklefork.

[capnzee]

Walt, You are correct, it did not like to turn, it liked to hook in a turn! That is the reason we made the changes to the #9 boat. Once changes were made, end of problem, boat ran very well. Originally, when the boat was put in a hard turn, the air flow under the boat was disrupted causing the bow to drop. When the bow dropped the left picklefork "tripped", the back of the boat lifted and the right hand prop simply "walked" the boat around. The skeg alone could not hold it.

[stokerdude]

not a great shot but heres a pic of the #9 boat shot by my dad or my uncle (im not sure wich)...man i loved going to the races back then...the smell of the 2-stroke smoke was always thick in the air...