VHT is a sticky track spray used to make the road surface grip better for drag racing. It helps tires hook up so the car can accelerate more effectively.
The Ford Granada is a car model with the name “Granada.” In the podcast snippet, “Granada” also shows up as part of “Granada Hills, California,” so the mention may be about the name rather than the vehicle itself. Without more context, it’s best understood as a word connection.
A burnout is when you intentionally spin the tires while the vehicle is held in place. It makes smoke and heat, and in racing it can help with traction before you launch.
The speaker is describing how drag racing teams may use a big truck to transport the bike and also provide a lounge area. It’s like a mobile base for the team during the event.
A dyno is a test machine for an engine. It lets you measure how much power the engine makes while you control the conditions, so you can see what changes actually help.
These are piston rings designed to be smaller and lighter. The idea is to reduce friction inside the engine, but the rings still have to seal well and last.
The cylinder wall has a specific surface texture. That texture matters because it affects how the piston rings seat and how much friction and wear you get.
“Drag numbers” here means measuring how much friction the engine has internally. Less friction can help the engine feel stronger and use less energy to move parts.
This is about how many valves each cylinder has. More valves can let the engine breathe better, which often helps it make more power at higher engine speeds.
The engine block is the main metal housing inside the engine. Different block designs can change how strong and how well-suited an engine is for high-stress driving.
The cylinder head sits on top of the engine and controls the valves and combustion area. Changing the head design can change how well the engine breathes and burns fuel.
Piston rings help seal the engine so the right pressure stays where it belongs. If they don’t seal well, you lose some power and the engine can wear faster. Racing engines care a lot about this because they’re pushed hard.
A normally aspirated engine doesn’t use a turbo or supercharger. It makes power by pulling air in naturally. Since it’s not “boosted,” details inside the engine that reduce leaks and friction matter a lot.
Here, coatings are special surface layers put on engine parts to help them slide with less friction and resist wear. That can improve how well the rings seal and how long they last. Different coatings can behave differently under racing conditions.
Sleeves are like liners inside the engine block that form the cylinder wall. Builders may use them to get the right material and surface finish for the piston rings. In performance builds, the sleeve choice can affect durability and how the engine runs.
Brand
Nica seal
“Nica seal” is a named product/approach for cylinder liners. The idea is that the liner material and finish can change how well the piston rings seal and how smoothly the engine runs. It’s part of the engine-building choices for performance.
Piston rings are parts on the piston that help keep combustion gases from leaking and help manage oil. They also help move heat out of the piston. Better ring design can mean less friction and less wear—important for hard driving.
The bore is the inside surface of the cylinder. Honing is a finishing process that creates the right surface pattern so the piston rings can seat and seal well. Good honing helps the engine run smoothly and last longer.
A profilometer is a tool that measures how rough or smooth a surface is. Engine builders use it to check the cylinder wall finish so the piston rings work the way they’re supposed to. It helps ensure the engine is built to spec.
Company
QMP
QMP is mentioned as a shop or group the host worked with. It’s part of the story about learning to use tools like a profilometer. It doesn’t describe a car component directly.
The cylinder is the inside part of the engine where the piston moves up and down. The surface inside the cylinder affects how well the piston rings seal.
Instead of judging by one test, you compare results over multiple runs. That helps you see what’s really improving (or getting worse) as you make changes.
Honing is a machining step that smooths and shapes the inside of the cylinder. It helps the piston rings fit and seal correctly.
Term
fancy coating
A fancy coating on piston rings is a surface treatment designed to improve ring wear characteristics and help the rings seat faster. Coatings can also reduce friction and improve sealing consistency under different operating conditions.
Pistons are the moving components inside the cylinder that compress the air-fuel mixture and transfer combustion force to the crankshaft. In rebuild discussions, piston choice (including cost and fit) is tied to how well the rings and cylinder finish work together.
Ultrasonic cleaners use sound waves to make tiny bubbles in a liquid. Those bubbles help “scrub” grime out of small spaces that are hard to clean by hand. People use it to clean car parts more thoroughly.
Engine building means putting together an engine with a plan, not just swapping random parts. The goal is to make sure the parts work well together so the engine runs strong and reliably. “Fundamentals” usually means doing the key steps correctly first.
Total Seal is a company that makes performance car parts, especially piston rings. In this segment, they’re mentioned in connection with engine-building know-how for racing-style builds.
Cams are the parts inside the engine that control when the valves open and close. That timing strongly affects how the engine makes power—especially at different engine speeds. Talking about cams is basically talking about how the engine breathes.
A cam controls when engine valves open and close. Cam duration is basically how long the valve stays open each cycle, which changes how the engine breathes and where it makes power.
Term
piston valve
This sounds like a specific way the engine’s valves are controlled. The key idea is that how the piston and valve work together affects how well the engine seals and breathes.
In drag racing, “cut a good light” means you react quickly and time your launch well when the race starts. It’s about getting a strong start without going too early.
Vance & Hines is a performance parts company that supports racing. When they’re mentioned as an opponent, it usually means big-name racing backing is involved.
Engines have valves that open and close to let air and fuel in and exhaust out. “Adjusting valves” means setting the correct spacing so the valves open and close at the right times.
Horsepower is a number that tells you how much power the engine can make. Higher horsepower usually means the engine can accelerate harder, but it’s not the only factor that decides race results.
A wear pattern is the specific shape and location of material loss on a component after it’s been running. In piston-ring diagnostics, the wear pattern on the ring and ring lands helps indicate where contact is happening (or not), pointing to issues like misalignment, ring tension/fit problems, or combustion/heat effects.
Term
barrel of the ring
Piston rings aren’t perfectly flat on the outside—they have a curved working surface. If that curved surface wears strangely, it can mean the ring isn’t sealing or aligning correctly.
On a piston, there’s a flat area where the piston rings sit. If the rings wear unevenly on that area, it can tell you something is off with how the rings are sealing or moving.
Race tracks use a sensor at the finish line to time how fast you went. It stops the timer when your car’s front edge hits the sensor, so the exact part that triggers it can change the result.
The timing system is supposed to react to the front of the car—usually the front tire. If the car’s body hits the sensor first, the race timing can be slightly wrong.
Concept
timing beam trigger vs car geometry
This is about how race timing can depend on the car’s shape. If a body part reaches the finish sensor before the tire, it can make the timing look different—so they may check video to sort it out.
A fairing is an aerodynamic body panel used to smooth airflow around parts of the vehicle. In this story, the fairing reached the finish-line beam before the tire, which affected when the timing system triggered.
Wide open throttle means the gas pedal is fully floored. It lets the engine make its strongest pull, and racers try to time it so the bike hooks up instead of spinning.
In drag racing, staging is the “get ready at the start line” moment. You’re positioned so the race timing knows you’re set, and your launch timing and balance matter a lot.
Term
rear wheel moves a little bit
That’s describing what happens right at the start when the bike is transferring weight and the rear tire is finding traction. It affects whether the front lifts and how the bike behaves as it accelerates.
A wide rear tire gives more rubber on the ground, which helps the bike hook up. That matters in drag racing because it affects how much power you can put down without spinning.
A pro stock motorcycle is a top-level drag racing class where bikes are built and tuned specifically for straight-line acceleration under strict rules. The episode’s description of steering while the front wheel is up reflects how these machines launch and control direction at high power.
Term
front wheel comes down
This is the moment the front wheel drops back to the track after lifting up. When it happens matters because it changes grip and stability during the run.
The swingarm is the part that holds the rear wheel and lets it move as the suspension works. When you shift your weight hard during acceleration, it can change how the bike feels and how the rear suspension loads.
The rev limiter is like a safety cutoff that stops the engine from revving past a maximum RPM. If you hit it during a run, the engine can’t speed up further and it can be harder on the bike.
Promod is a drag-racing category where the vehicles are modified a lot to go as fast as possible. The host is saying it’s hard to do perfectly, like other tough drag-racing setups.
A top fuel motorcycle is a drag-racing motorcycle built for maximum acceleration over a short race. It’s one of the fastest, most extreme categories in motorcycle drag racing.
Term
stock cases or aftermarket cases
The engine “cases” are the main housings that hold the moving parts. Stock means factory, and aftermarket means a different manufacturer’s version—often used in racing for stronger or more specialized setups.
The crankshaft is the engine part that turns the piston motion into spinning power. Racers pay attention to it because it has to handle extreme stress.
Goodson is a brand/company that makes tools and supplies for building and working on engines. The host is using it as an example of the kind of shop products racers use.
“69 Cougar” means a 1969 Mercury Cougar. It’s a classic muscle car, and the point here is that building something yourself can be rewarding even without racing.
The Ford Mustang is a sporty car made by Ford. People talk about it a lot because it has been offered with different engines and it’s commonly modified for more power. In the podcast context, it’s being used as an example of a car you can upgrade for better performance.
The “69 Cougar” is a classic muscle car from the late 1960s. It’s the kind of car people choose when they want to modify an older vehicle for more performance. In the podcast, it’s mentioned as another example of a car you can build up.
Term
expander
An “expander” is a performance part that helps shape how gases move through the engine. The speaker is saying if you don’t install it correctly, it can cause fitment or performance problems.
Term
round ring
A “ring” here is a small sealing part inside the engine. It helps keep pressure where it belongs, and the speaker is describing how it’s made starting from wire.
“Winter Circle” is a place at the track where racers celebrate wins and hang out. The speaker is saying it’s where people talk strategy and learn from each other.
Term
two pounds
“Two pounds” means a small change in a measured pressure. Since it’s mentioned with launch technique, it likely refers to adjusting something like tire pressure to help the car perform better.
The clutch is what lets you smoothly connect the engine to the rest of the car’s power system. “Clutch out” means the moment you release it to start the launch, which can change how well the car accelerates.
LIVE
Hello and welcome to another edition of Hidden Horse Power presented by Total Seal Piston
Rings.
I'm Joe Castello and once again joined by the Director of Technical Sales at Total
Seal Piston Rings, Mr. Keith Jones.
What's up, Keith?
How are you?
I'm doing great.
Just here having a good time at Total Seal and working with our customers, always trying
to find the next level of power.
What can we do?
What can we make better?
Working on everything from these things to I've got watercraft stuff in here.
We're always messing with new stuff.
We're always trying to help the next guy get to the next level.
We're coming up on Memorial Day weekend.
It's not 100 degrees outside, so there is a God.
That is amazing.
That is amazing.
That's how you can tell what season it is on the Hidden Horse Power podcast, like whether
or whether or not Keith is melting down or not.
We're getting going now.
We're getting going into the season.
It's been pretty cool.
As you mentioned, Memorial Day coming up and hopefully this will air for the Memorial
Day holiday.
We wish all, you know, it's a solemn holiday.
I always say, people are like, Happy Memorial Day.
It's like, yeah, it's the people who have paid the price for our country so that we can
go grill our hot dogs and watch the ND 500.
But on this show, we have got a great guest, guy who has done some big winning on Labor
Day in the National Hot Rod Association talking two wheel stuff.
Mr. Steve Johnson, 40 years in the sport, a character, a privateer for much of that.
You work with Steve very closely.
Talk a little bit about Steve for all the two wheel fans out there.
What's your take before we bring on the guest of honor?
Well, one of the nicest guys you could ever meet.
I mean, Steve is fantastic, great guy to work with, great personality, just all around a
great guy and fun to work with, fun to work, you know, again, trying to find that we were,
you know, emailing back and forth this morning about oiling tensions and finding that, finding
that line, you know, how low can we go?
How high can we go to keep it dry?
Find that power.
Always, always looking for the next thing.
You know, we'll talk about it.
You know, Steve's a privateer.
He doesn't have, you know, that, you'll say monster budget, that monster technology,
that, you know, access to all that.
Steve, you know, he's the guy fighting the fight.
You know, he's coming in there, you know, into that ring and he's battling the big dogs
and he's winning races.
So, you know, he's my guy.
I just, Steve's just a fantastic guy and I love working with him.
No, he's one of the fan favorites out there.
And with, with staying power comes notoriety.
40 years in NHRA drag racing.
So let's bring him on the show.
Steve Johnson joins us now.
Hello, how are you doing?
It's Wally.
Hey, Wally, where's Steve?
What's going on?
He's in the dyno room in the back.
He's in the back over there.
Is there a Steve Johnson thing to do, Steve?
Very.
That is a very Steve Johnson thing to do, Steve.
Steve, you turned gold.
No, it's a show like that.
You're the only one.
You're the first.
Steve's not one of you guys to win.
Everybody like caps, pours, monster on the top of his Wally.
Steve talks to the Wally, like, wasn't that great?
Yeah, it was great.
That kind of thing.
For insight and inspiration, you know.
Besides my mom, I'm my favorite fan.
If you're not entertaining yourself, who are you entertaining?
Got to be fun.
All right, but 40 years, Steve, my goodness.
Like, you must really like this stuff.
Yeah, it's I'll tell you, it changed because in California,
you can get a learner's permit so you can drive a car with your mom.
But you can ride a motorcycle by yourself.
So at 15 and a half, you just need it.
You didn't even need a dollar to put gas in your in.
I had a Suzuki motorcycle and and I could ride around and and I got a job
to a pizza place, shake his pizza out there and
had my own wheels and, you know, then street light to street light
and it started to race and then you discover street racing in California,
which there's people talk about street racing.
We have real street racing with with trailer cars and porn VHT down
and and and doing all the stuff that, you know, we don't condone now.
It's it's illegal as heck and people died and stuff is horrible.
But I wasn't incredible.
There was an incredible accident that people still remember.
But, you know, that stuff takes you to the drag strip.
And and it's like, hey, man, I'm going to turn this passion into fun
and then maybe even into a career.
So that's that was kind of the stepping stone.
And then then I met John Asher and he taught me about all about sponsorship.
So that's that's kind of the that's the beginning.
I appreciate that.
John Asher, one of the legends, writer's opinion columnist, though.
But Granada Hills, California, that's home for you.
If memory serves me right, I think at that same time, the snake Granada Hills,
right, you have any early encounters with snake in the same neighborhood?
Was it that kind of neighborhood?
We were up in the hills a little bit about about 40 minutes north
of Los Angeles up in the hills and and Don Pradoam, you know, the snake.
And we'd ride our bicycles.
I'd ride over to my friends and then we'd ride over to Don Pradoam
and we'd just sit out front, you know.
And we saw him one time, you know, he was this racer guy
and we saw him at Lions Lions.
My dad, my dad took me and Mike Balser
and his his dad at the time to Lions.
And it was the big bigger than big.
And then and then we saw snake painting his painting his garage door.
And we're like, oh, what, what, why is he doing that?
That's not cool.
Oh, that's my dog for no story.
Saw snake paintings for sure.
That's not cool.
He would never admit that, probably.
I'm going to we're ask Keith.
Well, it's that it's that moment in time when you realize your heroes
and the guys you're looking to go, they're just real people
like the rest of us, the guys painting his door.
I've run into people at the store grocery shopping.
Yeah, and it's like, really, you don't you don't have a guy or gal for that?
It's like, no, you know, I'm racing, man.
This is too much.
It's got a guy except for the paparazzi makes it.
The paparazzi makes it fortune, taking a picture of Drew Barrymore
getting getting Starbucks, you know, in a T-shirt and a hat down like this.
And, you know, I drew and, you know, exactly.
But you got a guy for piston rings.
We'll talk about that a little bit later, though.
Two time U.S. Nationals winner, Steve Johnson.
Steve has got what?
His 12 national event wins.
You've had great success.
You won an HRAs 1000th race, but did some really cool stuff as well.
Early on in your career, this career that goes way back.
Boy, have the pro stock motorcycles changed over the years, Steve.
And you've had a snap on and you've had slick 50 and you've raced for George
Bryce and you've won in Japan.
You know, John Forrest talks about his time in Australia.
Tell me about the time in Japan.
What was that like?
Japan was so cool.
The very first trip to Japan in 89, Mr.
Fu, Mr.
Nakajima came to NHA and said he wanted to put on a big show.
And so that's where I became friends with with Big Jump Den and Dave
Schultz and I were chosen.
That was those were polar opposites.
He was so professional and so, so structured and everything.
And I got balloons hanging off my bike and he says, please, please, please
don't, please take those balloons off before you go down the track.
And, you know, Mark Pauwik and Joe Lepone.
I mean, oh my gosh, those guys sat, those guys sat in the back of the plane.
And there was a cart and had adult refreshments on there.
They cleaned the whole cart out.
There was nothing left on the cart for adult refreshments, but we went
there and had sushi and and but we got the race at Fuji International.
And we we were starting to do a burnout right before the drag
strip that they made.
And it was in the straightaway and they didn't want us doing burnouts there.
So they went and we went back the second year because we were putting divots,
you know, obviously in their in their Formula One track.
So the next year they figured it out.
And so they put to the equivalent of, of, you know, say you're at the
through and OK, well, that's the starting line.
This visual to give you.
And, you know, typically the boxes were and if you if you went down
to the Home Depot, which was four blocks away from the McDonald's,
that's where they put the concrete burnout box.
Oh, wow. You did a burnout way over here.
And then you had to drive all the way to the starting line, which, you know,
you just we explained that that really wasn't good.
But anyway.
Check out the bunch of clag and and whatnot.
Now, if we're going to burnish your reputation as a racer and I assume
everybody knows you, but not everybody.
We've got an international audience.
We've got people from all disciplines of racing that check out
hidden horsepower, engine guys, you know, Steve, not every engine person
is a racer or a driver either.
But you've been you've been doing this a long time.
You once shipped your bike to the track in a shipping container
and raced out of a shipping container because you didn't have a truck in trailer.
Tell that story.
Well, the first picture that you saw with that weird looking motorcycle
that has no body work, that was in 1987.
Look at all those sponsors on my wheelie bar.
We were we supposed to get a ride from Los Angeles to New Jersey
for the English town race and the guy called on on Monday and said he couldn't go
and blah, blah, blah.
So I called a friend, Craig Burns, who was a famous racer.
He said, just put in the box and ship it.
So we made a wooden box and and shipped it there and we shipped it there.
So we all showed up and we were it's our first race.
We're just happy to be there, you know, and all my friends are about six
of my friends, Rusty came and Harry Gunnison and and my brother and Rusty
Gil and Eddie Alvarez, all these, you know, friends and just still friends
today, believe it or not, and even my brother.
And and so I remember going there, the Macintosh in and going to eat right next
door and Connie Coletta was there and Connie was, you know, this is 87.
So he was a little bit zippier.
And I knew of him and I said, Hey, Connie, I shipped my motorcycle
in an airplane to the racetrack.
And and he was like, yeah, I got I got to go get back to my table.
That was my brush with fame because Connie knows about airplanes
and you used an airplane.
And so there was a connection.
I I always said I just wanted to be part of the paternity.
The people in that George Bryce and Terry Vance and and Dave Schultz.
They were the superstars in our in our class.
Matt Smith is trying to get seven championships.
You know, Hector is one and Geno Scali is one.
And and I'm going to get in trouble here.
So this is so many so many people have won all the Vance and Heinz, Andrew
and Eddie have won.
But I just wanted to be part of the fraternity.
And and, you know, when I got to bring my, you know, this was one
of the first pictures of doing burnouts at a school.
And, you know, I really believe that, you know, my initiative there
of educating young people about skilled trades, even before 89.
You know, I feel like the yes event unfolded with with some of the things that we did.
I know I introduced Ken Pyle to to NHRA.
But my point with the story is, is we just want to be part of the fraternity.
And when we got to the race, we won first round.
I had a problem in the second round.
I lost and I just talked to the guy that I got beat by.
He was at Bruce's Speed Shop in in New Jersey.
The Alan Prasinski owns and they called me and everything.
But we didn't we finished the race.
I didn't we never thought about how to get the bike home.
I'm I know that's hard to believe it's my story.
You know, so Team Team Torch, I told Torch and he knew everybody
and he knew everything and it could make anything happen.
He got Alan Johnson, Blaine Johnson and Everett to put my motorcycle
in their tractor trailer on the steps going into the lounge.
You know, if you're not aware
of a tractor trailer in drag racing, it's like that big beacon's truck
or any transfer truck, you know, but there's a there's a bottom floor.
And then what goes over the tractor is where they have the lounge
and there's stairs that go up that and he put pillows and padding
and they put my bike in there and Everett Everett Johnson drove my motorcycle
and their tractor trailer to Bakersfield, California, where I showed up.
They would not take any money.
I still I have this brush with all the famous people in our class
in our in our sport, like a lot of the fuel guys.
I have relationships with just more than just knowing them at the racetrack.
So it's I brought him this bag of Oreos and planters, peanuts and beer
and all this stuff. But I'm still grateful for every opportunity
that that the special people and anybody, even the fans they offer,
you know, it's it's a wonderful place to be to have a lot of gratitude
in your heart for just anything that you do.
So I want to bring Keith in and I want you guys to talk some engine
stuff, right, because it's hidden horsepower.
And there are people that are going to learn.
But you mentioned brushes with famous people.
I think we need to continue to burnish your your reputation
as a two time US national winner.
As someone who's been around a long time, 40 years,
you have seen motorsport of all kinds grow.
Tell us a little bit about your relationship with this guy.
For those of you listening, audio only, we're showing a photograph
of an autograph session with Steve seated next to Dale Earnhardt,
the late great Dale Earnhardt.
And it is my understanding that Dale really helped you out in a couple of big ways.
Yeah, I had a small, very, very.
Hey, Keith, I had a very, very small heyday financially.
And it wasn't from sponsorship.
Dale taught me how to sell diecasts.
So well, when action came in,
you know, everybody got their royalty.
The the owner got five percent and the racer got five percent
and the sponsor got five percent.
And and so if you if you were the owner, you got 10 percent and the rider.
And if you could finagle a little bit with Suzuki and people, you got 15 percent.
So it was a pretty nice little paycheck.
And but Dale told me in that autograph session that was in the Bahamas.
And Doug Herbert was there, too.
Doug and I were our real good friends.
Oh, gosh, I'm going to forget drove the 31 for Mike Skinner was there.
And but it was a snap on function and Richard Childress.
And that's where I got the, you know, later on, I stayed at Richard's house
and cooked and and had just he was a very, very, very nice man.
Great team owner, a lot of fun.
But Dale told me, don't don't take the royalty on the die cast.
And I'm like, OK, he says, you've got to buy them all.
And I'm like, I did the math in my head real quick.
I'm like, buy them all.
There's like 5000 of them or something.
And he says, you've got to buy them all and then sell them all yourself.
And I'm like, how am I going to sell all these?
He says, you've got to work the partners, work your sponsorships,
you know, what Dale did.
And so he explained that whole process to me.
And back in those days, I had an American Express gold card.
It wasn't a black card.
It wasn't any of this, but it was old school and there was no limit.
So I I told action.
Here's my credit card and they took it.
So I bought the I bought all die cast.
And then I left somehow I Oh, Bob Creek helped me.
I leveraged all the die cast with snap on.
And I knew all the people, all the dealers that snap on.
And then a year after that, they they made a die cast bike
and you had to buy the toolbox to get the die cast.
So the point is, is there's there's everybody here
is not really interested in the stories.
They're interested in horsepower.
And I want to set you up because what Keith is going to
share with you and that I absorbed is the process that's
not everybody's process of how to make power.
You have to have fundamentals for sure.
But gosh, darn, you guys, we got to think special.
We got to how to get ring seal, how to born home, how to
to write stuff down so you don't have to keep calling Keith about
the same thing over and over Keith jump in there.
And I think that's a perfect moment to it's a segue.
But I want to say, Steve, I mean, I love the stories of the back story
of buying all the die cast, leveraging stamp on getting that out there.
That's that's a whole podcast in itself, just teaching and instructing people
how to take what you have and make it into something bigger.
So you can take that money, put it back into the bike, put it back into the team,
pay your bills, buy the dyno, do all the things that it takes you
to develop that engine and to push it forward.
You know, that in itself is a hidden, let's call it hidden financial power.
You know, that, you know, that it's great.
You know, it's like, buy them all.
And then you made your money off the sale and now you get to make the sale again.
You know, so we're double dipping.
We're making some money and that's that's fantastic.
But but working with Steve is, you know, I mean, you know,
we started working quite a few years ago together and just trying to, again,
move into the thinner, lighter, shallower rings, develop that ring seal,
work on bore finishes, you know, get those, you know, the drag numbers down
and to find that, you know, to find that little bit of power.
It's like it's like everything else, you know, our, you know, the low hanging fruit
is gone, you know, the fine in 10, 15, 20 horsepower and anything is gone.
We're looking for the ones, the twos, the threes, because those add up to four,
five and sixes and, you know, and anything that Steve and I can work on,
you know, we're working on, you know, we've talked about even thinner rings
and what he's running now.
Let's, you know, what's the next step?
Because, you know, these guys have got the challenge.
I mean, and Steve, you know, I'm sure we'll talk about the, you know,
two valve versus four valve, the, you know, the block differences, head differences,
the, you know, the disparity, Harley to Suzuki.
I mean, you know, every time I see a leg upcoming, something gets changed.
And, you know, you guys are, I mean, it's a challenge.
I mean, that's a serious challenge.
Yeah, it is.
And, you know, George Bryce has a school, a high performance school.
And I went to that and I got his phone number, Austin Coyle.
I have his phone number.
He's, he's, I don't know if he'd admit it, but he's on my advisory team.
And Chris McGay, Bill Meropolis, Lee Schwartz.
There's, there's just a, you know, that's why I'm just such a proponent of
education, whether you need to talk to rings and you and you might not get Keith
on the phone, but I mean, they have a staff, you know, the people,
the infrastructure of total steel, you could, let me tell you one thing.
I hope I don't get in trouble.
But you can buy a cheaper ring.
You can Keith, I don't think he'll get mad at me or Matt will get upset to say
that you can buy a cheaper ring out there.
But my gosh, you think about it, y'all, for those of you that haven't,
think about the piston at 14,000 RPM or just, or it's 7,000 RPM.
The piston goes up and when it comes to the top, it stops.
OK, but what does the ring do?
Joe keeps going a little bit.
Yes, yes, the trophy, hello, hello.
So the ring keeps going and then when it keeps going, it's not controlled.
And now you don't have ring seal.
And that's an important part of the area of trying to make the kaboom and a
normally aspirated engine, especially so
not only do you want a good sealing ring, but I think it's really important.
As I've learned, is is having one that's lightweight, low friction, all these things.
And then the coatings, Keith has so many different coatings that you could put on
there and and are you going to use an aluminum, aluminum block with that has
aluminum sleeves, like a Nica seal, or do you use, you know,
sleeves from from from Darden or or advance or or L.A.
sleeve, you know, all these people that make sleeves are
gosh, darn this, there's just so much technology in just the middle section
of our engine, the piston, the rings.
Yeah, and the bore and the hone.
Yeah, so that's that's a big deal.
It's I learned about it.
I don't know how to spell a profilometer, but I know how to I know to use one.
OK, that's that's the mandatory tool of the last 10 years, right?
Like, when did you buy your first profilometer, Steve?
When did you start doing that?
Believe it or not, it's been a while or it's not been very long.
It's about two years ago that I got in a Brad over at QMP.
He we grew up together.
So Magnum.
Yeah, right. Yeah.
So, you know, we're back.
It was at a race.
So far and Stover and Jack Beckman, all of us were.
We'd all hang out at the windshields and, you know, I'll tell everybody how fast
we were going to be someday and blah, blah, blah.
But I think when I learned how to use the profilometer,
it's one thing to know how to use it.
It's another thing to convey
what you want, the bore in the home, the home.
It's so important that I think that it's
no idea why you've got this echo going on that just started.
I'm going to meet you and unmute you.
You've got that Lucara echo going on something weird.
But now it's gone.
I hear it with you.
Yeah, it's come out of nowhere.
I have no idea.
It's bizarre.
I think we've got to just fight through it.
Keep going, Steve.
You were talking about the profilometer.
My apologies for stopping you, our through our through.
So with a profilometer, you may learn how to use it.
And basically, you just put it in the cylinder and turn it on.
And then it does all the work.
It's helpful that you just read those numbers and there's the peak and then
the horizon and then the valley.
And so when you learn that, that's one thing, but it's getting somebody somebody
to produce what you want or what you think you need.
You need based upon people who go fast and will share numbers with you.
So you want to do you want a valley that's really deep, that holds a lot of oil?
I don't know. Maybe you do.
Do you want peaks that are real tall?
So so when the ring goes by it, it's
it's scraping, you know, there's just
I only know this much of I can read the it and I know what I've got.
And that's where my biggest thing that I want to convey is no matter who's helping
you, no matter what you're doing, no matter what you get from a dyno,
you got to write this stuff down, man.
You got to look for a trend.
And and having stuff clean.
You know, my buddy at Ultrasonic, how about that for a commercial?
Yeah, as I feel as yeah, it might look corny as a commercial.
But when you clean the cylinder as just a regular guy that doesn't have all the
fancy machines and there's lots of people out there like that.
You know, when you have the ability to clean something, you clean it with oil or
there's tide or dishwasher, so whatever.
And then you go in there with the oil and the wreck.
If you put it in an Ultrasonic machine,
it just pulls all that honing stuff, all that grit and grime that's in there that
you can't that I struggle getting out of there without that machine.
And and it's corny because it looks like an ad, but it's not it's not an ad.
It's like that is inexpensive.
And when you're a normally aspirated guy and you want ring seal, you buy again,
no disrespect, but they're very, very good rings.
They've got fancy coating on there.
You've sent your cylinder out to get it honed, bored and honed.
And it comes back and you've got, you know,
300 and fifty dollar pistons, you got 500 dollars in
400 dollars in rings and you got all the and then the boring home, all this stuff.
And then you put it together and it's got dirt.
It's like, are you kidding me?
That machine's dirt cheap with that.
So again, I'm not trying to sell that.
I'm just trying to say, give yourself a chance.
Give yourself a chance.
You got the education.
You got the parts.
Give yourself a chance to have the best power possible.
Keith, what about that?
And with a little echo, Keith, you know, for everybody out there, look,
we do these live, the Internet is amazing.
Like how on earth is Steven, Alabama and Keith is in Arizona and I'm here and it
sounds great. We have the most minor delay.
So I'll just be muting your guys' mics when you're not talking to make it
throw away and that'll solve the program.
But Keith, what about that?
Like the cleanliness, the ring, I agree with Steve.
I mean, this is something I did a video just a couple of weeks ago about my wife
actually even commented about it, just talking about dirt, about being clean,
you know, and, you know, all this work, the honing, the pistons, the rings,
all these expensive parts and we've got to clean it.
We've got to get rid of all the abrasive, all the dirt, all the junk.
You know, I showed some stuff and it came out of an engine, you know,
that looked like you poured a sands through it.
It was so nasty, even though the guy had all the filters on there and I'm a big
believer, you know, I'm pointing right at that in the ultrasonic.
I've seen blocks come out of ultrasonic, you know, big blocks,
shabbies, tanks big enough to put that in.
Absolutely sterile. You could eat off this thing.
But then I'll go to my personal thing.
I'm a record guy. I'm a vinyl guy.
And we all know, you know, we get the needle on there,
we're listening, we got the ticks and the pops and the noise and stuff like this.
I bought an ultrasonic record cleaning machine.
Unbelievable.
All the noise is gone, the ticks, the pops, the wishes, gone.
It just shows you as clean as I thought that record was.
It wasn't that clean and I have other cleaning machines.
So that ultrasonic technology is incredible.
I just absolutely believe in it.
I think it's it just it does things that you wouldn't think that little tiny
bubbles could do that, but they do.
That's wild and you don't drink the ultrasonic cleaner.
Oh, that's something different. He's got a different.
That was ice tea. That's ice tea.
But it's just ultrasonic cleaner and then takes a swig out of a jug.
It freaked me out, Steve.
Sorry, sorry, sorry.
I had no idea what's in that thing.
And again, I want to segue into the fact that fundamentals.
We all have so many stories.
You know, Frank Holly teaches talks about fundamentals and in reaction times.
And George Bryce's school is about fundamentals.
And I see when when Total Seal did a deal and they talked about the fundamentals
of engine building and stuff and
who's the famous cam guy that everybody knows that I wish I knew.
It's Marion Billy God, who are we talking about?
Well, he was he was at comp cams forever.
Billy God, Billy.
Yes, yes, yes, fundamental.
I talked to him about cams and I was I'm like kind of giddy because I understand
what happens, you know, when the valve intake valve closes and and you get a cam
with a little less duration, but you still got to deal with with piston valve.
And and so, you know, you got to protect the the opening number, you know.
So when you're changing stuff.
So anyway, it's fascinating to understand that.
But the fundamentals and there's all kinds of stuff that you can put in that machine.
But I'm here to tell you.
Use the stuff that's designed when you paint a car, you don't use R.M.
And then and then House of Colors and then mix a little of, you know,
some other brand in there to make some concoction.
It's all it's all designed to work with itself.
So I'm a big believer in the fundamentals and whether you're
trying to get ring seal, trying to get a clean cylinder,
trying to cut a good light or
or just following up on a sponsor or just being a human being.
You met somebody follow up with a text and a phone call.
It was nice to meet you.
You know, it's so simple, so simple.
So let's let's talk a little bit about Steve back in the day versus Steve now.
You won the U.S.
Nationals twice. We'll talk about that.
But recently you went through a period and you made this public.
That's why I'm bringing it up.
You're going up against Vance and Hines.
You're going up against Matt Smith, like these guys do it every day.
You had the big fight, not a fight, a discussion disagreement with about hobby
racer, right? Like you're a hobby racer.
You don't do it every single day, but that's not true with you.
But I think the point is that you're going up against factories.
You're going up against people that are like got resources and you have resources,
but maybe a little less and that you had to double your effort.
You had to realize, like, I've got to work harder.
I've got to look in places I'm not looking and it works like you got faster.
Talk about that, Steve, and how did working with vendors, like, how do you make
that call to like a Keith and be like, I know I've been buying rings,
but I'm not I'm not doing something right.
I got to do more help me.
How does that how does that go?
Yeah, I think I think, again, it's knowledge.
I encourage everybody to, you know, I like I said, you know,
you got to experiment, look for trends and stuff like that.
But my gosh, you got to find a mentor, man.
You got you got to and it's not easy.
There's so there's so many great people out there in so many different
fashions of faucets, facets of racing.
If you're a round track guy, you go find the engine guy over there.
And, you know, George Bryce was always the not not always.
But when I merged away from John Asher and sponsorship with Slick 50 and
and snap on and and K&N and just all the lovely things that I I've been fortunate
to, you know, we had 70 people at the racetrack and and entertaining them.
And I always thought that was the most important because I knew I couldn't go up
against Vance and Heinz. It was it was lofty.
I raced I raced, I think, 17 years or no, it was probably longer.
In 2004 from 87 is when is when we won our first race.
And my mom kept telling me, you know,
they're hiring as a box boy down at the grocery store.
You know, they make good money and I'm like, I want to do this.
I want to do this racing thing.
So, you know, to to to hang out with John Forrest or at least do do deals with him,
Richard Petty, you know, all these people you hear and you follow up.
And if you're just polite and smile and
and especially today, it's not hard to get a hold of people.
But that takes you down that road of of education.
And I started learning about engines
called Keith one time and I needed some rings and he said, OK, what size?
And I'm like, hold please.
We all got a Larry Dixon told me,
don't don't even worry about asking questions.
He says, because Don Perdome got to learn how to adjust valves from Keith Black
at some point in his career.
Right. So, you know, thank God we have
people that have nice demeanors and they will help you.
And and so Keith knew that I had been somewhere and learning stuff because my
my questions were a little bit different.
And and I don't mean to just keep saying with Keith because the cams
are the same thing with with with all the cams and the pistons.
I'm talking, you know, our pistons have 38 different boxes you got to fill numbers
in, you know, back in the old days when we were in school,
we'd go to super shops and there was three.
There was a there was a flat top, there was a street piston,
and then there was a high compression and you'd pick one.
And that's like, oh, I'll have that one.
It was like, you know, and Miropolis.
Bill Miropolis is real famous in our
and congratulations to Bruno.
Gosh, I don't know.
I'm a three-time Compleminator World Champion.
I connected with Bill actually on the show at some point.
Yeah.
Bruno's dad was at the race when he won and he was an engine builder.
He did everything on there.
So I think still the point is is
no matter how smart you think you are and George thinks he's pretty smart,
I'm sure, but he learns, he learns he when he does his schools,
he learns because people ask kooky questions and then it makes him think.
So everybody's learning.
So don't worry.
Put your pride in that in the back pocket or something and ask these people
because there's nothing greater than my story to me because I'm my biggest fan
is knowing that you can't compete against
Vance and Heinz or Dave Schultz or,
you know, Matt Smith and all these people.
It's Hector Hector does a great job, you know,
but you've got to develop something and and we did.
And we were we were pretty fast for in 21 and 22
We were we the fastest.
So it was one thousandth NHRA race.
Keith, what about that phone call from Steve Johnson?
And you're like, what's his and he's like, I don't know.
Well, you know, what Steve said was, you know, and very fortunately,
you know, Steve's not, you know, I can ask you a question who doesn't know the answer.
He's going to find out and he's not embarrassed that he didn't know the answer
to the question. He goes out and like, oh, Steve, no, I need to know this.
I need to know what about this?
What about that? What are we trying to do here?
What are you trying to do there?
We, you know, like Steve says, you know, we're big on education.
We do tech conferences.
We do the NRA shows.
We do the track side tech talks.
And the one thing I find it, I'll say this, you know, people,
don't be embarrassed to answer the question.
You know, I've done a conference in front of 125 guys and it's all said and done.
And they're all looking at you.
OK, we're opening up for questions.
Crickets, crickets.
I'm like, not one person out here's got a question.
Not one, not one simple question like, what should I use for a break?
You know, and then once you burst that bubble, the question start and that's where
you really get into it, because that question leads to this question,
the things that we never even thought about.
And we get a whole conversation started.
I've done tech seminars.
You know, we did an hour seminar and we did an hour over the questions
because the question just kept rolling.
But there's times where we'll, you know, we'll do the seminar.
We'll get done.
Anybody any questions?
No. OK.
They all leave next thing like a 10 guy standing in line when I ask a question.
Yeah. And it's like, I love it.
But, you know, ask the questions, you know, it sparks that conversation,
you know, because you'll mention like Steve, you know, he throws out a question
to Billy about a camshaft and then maybe somebody else.
Well, no, no, I did that once, but this didn't work and I did that.
And then Billy answers that question about why that didn't didn't do what it
wants. And then Steve goes, aha, now I got it.
And this just keeps that cycle rolling and it keeps us all asking questions
about how to push this to the next level.
And we pick up little pieces from the other people that are asking those
questions and we pick up pieces from the answers.
I can't tell you how much I've learned about balancing just sitting in with
Randy Neal on his seminars, you know, I mean, I would never even thought to ask
that question, but he already answered it and I never even thought to ask it.
Yeah, the the obviously chat GPT is I I I don't have that.
Unfortunately, I should, but it's another $20 a month or whatever it is.
Listen, I got it.
Listen, Chad, Keith, wasn't it last our last guest, like figured out a big
problem with chat GPT about like time with Dan with the triple back and and he
threw some stuff out and it answered the question and it got him where he wanted
to be with a little, you know, with the three cylinder midget engine that we
thought ought to be in comp, you know, I think it ought to be in Steve's bike.
This thing's beast, you know, 150 horsepower a whole still,
still the point, the point is, is it's education.
We have a Batman scholarship that's all about education and one of the famous
things that I think you both probably have heard Keith for sure.
But when you're when you take your engine apart,
people will say what I always remember is look at the pistons, they'll talk to you.
All the parts will talk to you.
Keith, when I when I was for it, when I was transitioning from the marketing guy
into the the wannabe engine builder,
he he would say, look at the ring, Steve, they'll talk to you.
And and I grabbed I grabbed one and I
it was metaphorically, it talks to you.
So you look at the rings budding up next to each other.
You look at where the where it's wearing.
I thought it was fascinating to find out if you feel like your ring is not wearing
on the barrel of the ring, if I'm getting into scary territory,
you can order your pistons and you can have that top ring land
put at an angle so you can, you know, if for some other some reason, you know,
you think that you need to move the the wear pattern up or down on the ring.
You know, you can do that because if you pay attention,
it will talk to you and tell you what's going on, it tells you how it's wearing up
and down the ring lands all beat up or not.
You know, it's it's fascinating when you can when you understand the language
of the parts, you can make changes, you can express the need and the manufacturer
in most cases supports your need and then and then it shows up over here.
Thank you.
Thank you, Brad Lagman, because he made some really cool stuff for me
and and and he helped so just so you know, Bryce has been on hidden horsepower.
Lagman's been on hidden horsepower.
Godbolt's been on hidden horsepower.
Like I'm fortunate to have gotten to know these guys through Keith and Hartford
and Lake and being able to do all of this and it's crazy that all like those
Southern California go fast guys have spread out throughout the world and are
doing great things.
Keith, yeah, I know you wanted to say something about that.
I'm just working on just commenting on what Steve said, you know,
looking at rings and looking at how they're wearing in the land,
where's it on the better old center line?
You know, I'll run the ring through a comparator, you know,
through our optics over here, you know, through the kids, I can see the barrels
right where it should be, but yet the wear lines off on it, you know,
in the soldier that tells me you've got ring groove problems.
That tells me your groove is bending under load and maybe you need to put a
degree of positive tilt in the group or a half a degree negative.
Like Steve said, you know, forensically looking at all these parts coming apart,
tells a lot of stories, reading bearings, looking at, you know,
inside the retainers where the locks go.
I mean, it's always been said, we said this before,
you need to take as much time taking it apart as you do putting it together
because every part in there is telling you a story.
Very, very cool.
All right. Look, we lost Steve.
I'm looking, no, no, I'm looking, Keith, Keith is so technical.
I'm looking up forensic.
That's a fancy word, man.
CSI.
You need to find the Granger catalog though.
It was metaphorically a dictionary.
Not one of your sponsors.
The chat GPT, it'll tell you.
All right.
So let me talk to Steve about one of the greatest days in his racing career,
but it happened not on race day.
This is a photograph of the final round of the 2004 US Nationals.
The biggest drag race on the planet, the big go,
which Steve on Monday lost to Matt Smith.
But then upon further review, they reversed the call and Steve won it.
And there was speaking of forensic evidence that was utilized to determine
who got there first and it changed your life because you went from, you know,
guy racer who had won a couple of races to US Nationals winner.
Since then you have won again.
You're a two time US Nationals winner.
But talk a little bit about that day, Steve, like becoming the winning
the biggest race that is available for you to win and becoming someone
that will always be known as a US Nationals winner, even in a weird way.
That's a good build up.
And it's the biggest race that any drag racer can win is in my eyes.
You know, duck's got some fancy races and I'm really my gal Emma and I love
watching pro mod and we're really big fans of all that whole class.
But the US Nationals is this special.
It's the Daytona 500 of drag racing.
It's the Indy 500 of drag racing.
So to to to win there.
Shane Maloney was my only crew guy and just blessed to have met him.
He's a great guy, just a worker.
He drove my tractor trailer and we had two guys.
It was me and him and a tractor trailer.
It made no sense.
But a lot of things that I do, that's what my gal says.
A lot of things I do doesn't make sense.
But Keith would say that in the early days.
But the point is, is we raced and I beat Angel that day.
I beat Joey, Joe DeSantis first round.
I think I beat Angel in the second round.
I don't know who I beat in the third round.
And then I raced Matt Smith in the final and somehow Matt was late on the tree.
And we went to the finish line and there's a beam, y'all.
There's a beam that shoots across the track and it's supposed to catch when
your vehicle breaks that beam, it stops the clock and it does what it needs to do.
So somehow we went through the finish line
and the beam didn't see my tire, the leading edge of the tire.
It saw the leading edge of the fairing, which is about just about 14 inches back.
And Matt went through and he he got the wind light.
So Mike Dunn in those days with ESPN, there's a camera at the finish line.
They said, let's watch that.
It was a close race.
Let's watch that in the instant replay.
And they they do it in instant replay of the people in the booth.
They stop it at the finish line and I'm on the line and Matt's not on the line.
And Mike Dunn's like,
ah, well, you know, so that started the motion.
And then and then that went to Graham Light, who was the in charge of competition
at the time, and then then he got in, you know, and then, oh, gosh,
I'm going to forget his name.
I try a famous, famous announcer, Brett, Brett Kefner.
He said the finish line.
I came down the finish line and I make my left and he's like,
you want to pull over and I'm like, you know, I can't understand a word he's
saying, so they come get me and they take me into the ESPN booth with Shane.
And they said, we want you to watch this and give us your reaction.
And I'm like, I'm not I don't know nothing at this point,
really, and like my early days in engine building.
So it's it's they got the camera rolling and Shane's in there watching and they
stop it and and Shane says, we bleep bleep one and and he storms out of the trailer.
And we we F F being one and it storms out of the trailer.
And I'm like, it kind of looks like we won.
And so then they interviewed me and that's right when we had Katrina.
And I said that I go, look, you know, I know you can't.
When you leave the track, that means it's final.
You've you've submitted to to whatever the or whatever the reality is,
whatever the results are, you've left the track, you're good with it.
So I I just said, I wasn't leaving the track.
And I said, but in reality, you know, we just had Katrina and there's people in
Louisiana and Florida and I said, Missouri that don't have water right now.
So, you know, how how much of a how big of a thing am I going to complain about?
You know, when these people don't even have water because of the hurricane,
it's it's attacked their their livelihood.
So blah, blah, blah.
It's never gotten more response on the internet even back then.
It's shut down HRA's website.
And I called the president.
They wouldn't call me back.
And two days later, they they reversed it.
And even Don Perdome said something.
And it's like everybody watching TV saw the freeze frame.
So they were like, what the heck?
So, you know, they reversed it.
And Matt gave me the trophy on TV.
He wasn't he wasn't having me and matter me and matter.
OK, I think you might respect me a little bit.
I respect him a lot more than I think he respects me.
But he gave me the trophy and and I I I got to be a US nationals champion.
They let him keep the money and they gave me money and I got the trophy too.
So it was very it was very, very special.
We got to they've reenacted the winner's
circle at Redding the next week and they asked Greg.
And I forgot who won funny car and top fuel.
was the 50th US nationals to wasn't it?
It was like a huge milestone victory.
That's wild.
Yeah, it was 2005 and 2008.
We won again.
But it's anyway, it's it's the most
controversial win in in the history of the in the history of the sport, I'm told.
So, you know, if you see that, if you follow Elon Werner's
bracket, Bonanza and you're a fan of our sport,
they always do these brackets where you can guess and win prizes and blah, blah,
doing the top 75.
So that's a it's a big deal.
You're plugging machine.
This guy's he mentions Greg Sprecher Bonanza getting a plug
and now in the house power or a key.
I think that's incredible.
Final technical question or topic for Steve
Johnson, and then I want to give him his opportunity to talk to the next generation
because it's something he does on a regular basis.
He actually has a charitable things that he does.
Keith.
Well, the question I'm going to have to Steve, as a fellow motorcycle rider, but not a fellow
motorcycle racer, I've always, you know, I made the comment, you know, you look at the
guys that, you know, run, you know, super bike and, you know, all these
things that they do, you guys, the top fuel bike guys.
And I said, so think about it like this, I go, here's, you know, let's look at Matt
Hartford, Matt Hartford, you know, 205 miles an hour, 208 209
but he's in the car, not on the car.
So Steve, what's it like going through the big end, 200 miles an hour, you know, do you
poke your head up and rip your helmet off?
I mean, what's that experience like for you?
Yeah, John Hall and Angie, Angie Smith, the past weekend and everybody, they, they all
go over 200 a lot.
I haven't been over 200 a lot, but it is, um, I'll tell you what, if, if what's cool is
no matter what emotion or what kind of context you may have to drag racing at the finish
line, no, no, at the shutdown, after the shutdown, and you pull over and you take off your helmet,
you know, your hands are still moving, your adrenaline's still going, it's so exciting.
Now here I'll give you some facts and this will be hard to digest, but I had a heart
rate monitor on me and it was 214 on my heart rate monitor on the starting line, you know,
getting ready to go wide open throttle at Indy one year.
So there's a lot, there's a lot going on when, when you're, you're staging, you know, that's
when they say Dale Earnhardt was at his lowest because he was so calm, but with our adrenaline
so high at the starting line, and then when you let go of the clutch and the front wheel,
the rear wheel moves a little bit and then all of a sudden the front wheel comes up and
what's interesting is when the front wheel's up, now the rear wheel, that square 10 inch
wide rear wheel is now the front wheel.
So that's driving.
And if it's driving to the left, moving the handlebars does nothing because the front end's
not on the ground.
So you have to, what do you do to steer?
Anybody?
Shift your weight.
I'm going to give that one to you, but you put, if it's going to the left, you've got to push
the peg of the opposite direction.
You push the peg, yes, you push the peg, very good, very good.
So anyway, that's how you steer a pro stock motorcycle.
And then within one second, a light comes on, you have to push the button and it revs so fast,
you can't miss it because it'll either be on the chip or it'll be too low.
And just like any other car or motorcycle in drag racing, snowmobiles, whatever it is,
we have five gears that we have to go through to get into six gear.
And when the front wheel comes down about half track, gives a little pound, but
man, your adrenaline's going because you gauge, along with a handful of other people,
have perfected racing, not like the Dave Schultz and John Meyers day, where they're
throwing their body forward when they let go of the clutch.
And some people say it makes the motorcycle think it has a longer swing arm because your
weight is being thrown forward and the motorcycle might not feel that weight because you're
throwing it forward. If you can visualize that, it might work for you.
But when all that stuff's going on and you have to push the button and then you have to
scoot in the second part of the seat and you have to aim for your target and you have to make
sure you shut it off at the finish line because it's going to go on the rev limiter and that's
what breaks parts, it's a lot. And then shut it close. Oh my God, at 200, hanging on is one of
the most important things. And in all fairness, like Keith was doing, it's part of the rule.
You have to be on the motorcycle when it crosses the finish line. So hanging on is an important
feature. Shut down, the bikes are bouncing all over. So Keith, I don't know how to even answer
the question other than that long synopsis, but it's a lot of fun when you're winning.
And it's not very much fun when you're not going fast.
You certainly answered that question and I appreciate that. It's like I said, I'm not drag
race, but I've been on some, you know, I've been a $0.75 on a bike, not on a drag.
And it's exciting. And doing what you do in that short period of time hit all those shifts within
a handful of RPM, because we know, especially the down low shifts, you miss those up top your
way off. I mean, just everything you've got going on, steering it with the retire. I mean, wow.
Here's something that I'll bet you none of your listeners know. All the famous motorcycle drag
racers, like specifically Matt Smith, Angel, I hadn't mentioned Angel at all. I get are confused
with Lynn St. James, but Matt Hines and Andrew Hines all went to George Brice's drag racing school.
And as much as I want to promote George Brice's Frank Holly drag racing school,
as much as I want to promote our sport, and it's very, very difficult financially getting in there,
being able to ride it and have the motorcycle there, all the things that have to happen.
And I will tell you that I think they're the most difficult to ride in all of drag racing.
Promod's probably pretty hard, but to ride them to do them perfectly in 900 people that went
through that drag racing school, the most respected drag racing school, they only signed 10% of them
as having licenses. Wow. Very, very difficult. Well, it seems difficult. I can relate to a
alien stuff. I'm impressed by it. I love going down to the finish line and watching you guys cross
and thinking, y'all's crazy. That's what I think. I think y'all's crazy. There's faster motorcycles,
for sure. Mitch Brown drives a top fuel motorcycle and he makes our cylinder head. And I'll tell you,
there's lots of combinations out there, but you can buy a monster cylinder head and cams and pistons
and advanced Heinz crank in most senses and stock cases or aftermarket cases. And you can race a
pro stock motorcycle. It's victory valves and springs and you can bolt all that stuff together
and it's going to be fast, but there's a big difference between a two valve and a four valve.
Those were very well disguised sponsor plugs, guys. That's my job to point those out.
In the whole, that's an engine. That's the parts. If it was a sponsor plug in all fairness,
you would pull up something like Goodson. Goodson makes all of the parts you need for your machines
to do the engine building. And I think it's good. It's Goodson, just like it says. You just go online
and look at those guys and you see everything that they make. It really is a help to have nice
equipment to build stuff. For you audio only folks, he is holding up a container of Goodson
metalworking lubricant, which is great. Okay, Steve, don't drink it. At the end of every hidden
horsepower, we ask our guests with the hopes that somewhere out there in our audience,
there's some younger person who's thinking, man, this is my passion. I'd like to get into it.
I'd like to pursue. We certainly hope to replenish the engine builders and machinists that are out
there. Certainly the racers. That's kind of the sexy part. We ask everyone to provide a little
advice to the next generation. This is what you have been doing with your Batman scholarship.
You've been speaking to young people for a long time in mass. So this is a good opportunity for
you to talk to that person, hopefully in our audience. And what do you say to that person?
What can they do to be successful and to get ahead?
First thing you do is whatever you want to do. And I get it from Tony Robbins.
It's really his suggestion is have a compelling reason to do something, get the best advice
on the planet, and then use massive action. So have a compelling reason. You want to build a fast
engine. A compelling reason in a scenario might be, your doctor says, if you don't lose weight,
you're going to get diabetes. Well, then you go figure out how to lose weight
and then use massive action. So it's not rocket science. If you want to build engines,
you've got to associate yourself with successful engine builders in that particular area.
That's what I would encourage people to do. And then you can extrapolate all that stuff.
If you're a young person, Samtech is a great place to learn to be a machinist.
But there is an organization. Keith can help me with it.
A-R-E-A, I think. And that stands for...
Yeah, A-R-A. It's Automotive Engineering Buildings Association. Steve Fock and those
guys, they're great. They're absolutely great resources, a tremendous amount of data on the
database. They're fantastic people. But like, you know, you can go chat GPD and ask the questions
and stuff, but there's just nothing like hearing it and being able to look somebody in the eyes.
You know, you get the demeanor when they want to help you. And it really is easy.
I couldn't do many classes on all these things, but I could do a class on how to just have no money
and still get resources and still, you know, rely on people to... And there's other things
you can give people besides money. There really is. It's not necessarily... That would be another
class, but I would encourage them. We have a scholarship called Batman. It's Be a Technician.
If you want to be a technician, you go online. There's six questions. And we just gave away
10 of them. Joe, there's a really neat picture. We gave away 10 in Chicago along with Wings and
Warrior. They're a big, big supporter of ours. And they're going to have an air show to raise money
for PTSD. These are so many areas to learn about what's going on. Again, you can do it on the
internet. I have somebody I communicate with all the time in Japan. He's an engineer. He loves that
stuff. But going there and seeing somebody, it really isn't rock. You could go to a cup race
and talk to engineers. Just don't dress like a knucklehead. Don't... And have two tic-tacs before
you go over and talk to them. There's just so many easy ways to learn something. And then when
you get a little nugget, you always got to thank them. If you think about it, if you get the most
famous person as an engine builder and they give you some kind of tech tip, you find out their
address and send them a UPSM Oreos or UPSM, a gift card. That's kind of weird. But something
that nobody else would do. That's what you would do. And it would shock them enough. And then you
just follow up. Hey, I'm just calling to see if Mike got those Oreos. Yes, yes, yes. And next thing
you know, they're calling you back. And you know, hey, do you want to come over and look at the shop
or something? It's so easy. You just have to have gratitude in your heart to be thankful for what
people are giving you because they do want to give it to you. You just have to ask. Wow. And
there it is. Tremendous, tremendous. Steve, really appreciate you being on the show.
Getting horsepower, Keith came up with the ideas. Like, how about Steve? That shouldn't be a hard
challenge to get Steve on the show. This has been great. I really appreciate it. And Keith?
Absolutely fantastic. Yes. And Phil has his ultrasonic LSD.
Phil has is doing really good at the IHRA. And then I just gave him, I gave him what I learned
from Larry Dixon about cutting lights and how to track that. And Phil was like, that's a perfect
example. Phil has, he runs a successful company ultrasonic. He's a racer. He's won races. But
he didn't know what I learned from Larry Dixon. And so I gave it to him. And man, his eyes were
all big. And he's just, I like that. And so it's fun to be able to do stuff. And I could, I'd be
remiss if I didn't say thank you, Keith. You shared your cell phone number with me. Oh my
gosh, probably shouldn't have done that. But anyway, it just doesn't have to be racing, y'all.
You could build your 32 Ford or a 69 Cougar or a Mustang or a Chevy or something. Just a regular
engine. There's so much satisfaction in building your own thing and turning the key and listening
to it and have it not smoke. Because you didn't, you didn't put the, the expander
over itself and then cram it in the hole. There's just a lot of fun and engine building. And I,
thank you, Keith, for helping. And I thank you guys. I thank Total Seal, Matt and everybody
at Total Seal. I love the tour. I went through a tour and I learned about how a round ring starts
off with this piece of wire that goes way down there.
No, always glad to have had you in, Steve. I mean, I enjoy our time spent together. Every
time I see the track, it's like running into a, you know, an old friend that I haven't seen in a
while. We got to catch up. It's not about racing. It's like, how are you doing? How's this? How's
that going on? It's, and one of the things you said about talking, you'll get a little secret
from like, it's a community. It really is. I mean, how many other places can you, you know,
we're here to help each other. We're here to make this better, make it faster, make it, you know,
make it easier. And, you know, it really is a community and, and it's a, it's a unique community.
And Joe, you might not notice you'll laugh though. I'll tell you, you can learn from your
competitors because they will tell you how to go faster. How's that? You just go to
Winter Circle and hang out and then they'll be talking to each other. Oh my gosh. And they'll
be telling people it's like, you know, in the second round, I took two pounds and clutch out
of the thing and I put an arm up and it's like, I learned that every time Vance and Hines won,
every time George Bryce won, he'd be talking to Greg Cope and stuff like that. I was always there.
And of course I stayed late to watch Bernstein because he was a master at, at, at, at Winter
Circle and doing the hats. But a public service announcement, always wear your safety glasses,
you guys. Gosh darn it. If you can't see, put magnifiers in there, but your eyes are the only
God gave us so much stuff, but he's not going to give you another eyeball, you know, at least
and not until Elon Musk figures it out. But no, listen, that's true. That's true. Please. Yes,
I've started doing it later in life. I've started doing it. All right, Steve Johnson,
thank you very much. Oh, Keith, go ahead. You said though, you know, my safety goggles and
ear protection, I've had to have stuff dug out of my eyes two times at the eye doctor because
of not wearing safety goggles. I have severe tinnitus or tinnitus from not wearing ear protection
around loud racing engines and loud rock concerts my whole life. So protect those ears, protect those
eyes. What? Yeah, exactly. Exactly. All right, Steve, thank you very much. Let's get back to it.
Appreciate you coming on Hidden Horsepower presented by Total Seal. Thank you, Steve.
There he goes. Steve Johnson with us here on Hidden Horsepower. How great was that?
Oh, that was awesome. That was I knew Steve would be good, but I didn't know it was going to be
that good. That was awesome. Exactly. I mean, you know, like we this is his shop, by the way,
he's got no, he's got he's got a whole big operation. Good, good things going Steve Johnson,
motivational person, really motivational. He does a great job also has a great sense of humor.
Keith, another episode in the books, what's going on at Total Seal and how can our guests or
listeners get ahold of you if they want to, you know, maybe you won't give your personal
cell phone number, but they can still call you. Well, I do give it to a lot of people,
but I do try to keep that on the download. But hey, just reach out, you know, we're busy. Again,
we're always trying to do the next thing, working with new materials, coatings. We've said that
before, but we're always striving for the next thing. But reach out to us, TotalSeal.com.
Give us a, you know, get on there. A lot of great information, a lot of great data,
videos, links to the Hidden Horsepowers of the previous day of, you know, age,
all of the, you know, all the previous shows, a lot of great data on there. But also,
my emails on there, the other guys are on there. Please use us as a resource. 62
there, excuse me, 800-874-2753. That's how to get ahold of, I almost said my cell phone number.
So, got me on that. So, but reach out to us. We're here. We're a resource. Use us.
There it is. Thank you, Keith. Great job as usual. See you on the next one.
See you, Joe. Have a great day. There he goes. Keith Jones. He's the director of technical sales
at TotalSeal Piston Rings. I'm Joe Castell, track announcer at the National Hot Rod Association,
seeing a lot of this great stuff that Steve has done over the years. If you're ever in the area of
an NHRA national, come on out and enjoy it. But we love all motorsports as well. I also do a podcast
called WFO Radio. You can find it maybe after you watch this one. But I really appreciate everybody
out there. Thanks to Steve Johnson for joining us on the show. Another edition of Hidden Horsepower
presented by TotalSeal.
About this episode
Keith Jones from Total Seal Piston Rings joins the hosts to frame the show around chasing incremental power and engine efficiency. Steve Johnson—described as “a privateer for much of that” with “40 years in NHRA drag racing”—shares how street racing led “to the drag strip,” what it’s like in Japan, and the story behind a 2004 US Nationals reversal. The conversation then pivots into ring seal, dyno testing, profilometers, ultrasonic cleaning, and why racers learn by inspecting parts and asking questions.
Steve Johnson, a 2X NHRA U.S. Nationals winner who is celebrating 40 years in Pro Stock Motorcycle racing, takes some time to reflect on Hidden Horsepower. From Dale Earnhardt to Don Prudhomme, Steve Johnson has been in the center of racing for decades. Steve will talk about how he had to reinvent himself from a marketing person to an engine builder over his career, and how he has done some wild things just to make it to the track. Hosts Keith Jones and Joe Castello pepper Steve with questions about his thoughts on engine technology and his life in drag racing. Steve's BATMAN technical scholarships program helps young people become automotive technicians and he is the perfect person to give a little advice to aspiring machinists and engine builders. This is a fun episode.
