Davies Craig and the DatZen 280Z

01/06/2018 09:00AM

The Hot Rod Power Tour is a big automotive event in the United States. This weekend, starting June 9 and going through to June 15, is the 24th running of the HRPT.

Cars are driven through a number of cities and this year’s event sees the Beech Bend Raceway Park in Bowling Green, Kentucky, right in the heart of America’s Deep South, as the starting point. Over six thousand cars and over one hundred thousand spectators will see a bewildering display of automobiles travelling through seven cities including Chatanooga in Tennessee before wrapping up in North Carolina’s Concord at the zMAX Dragway.

Last year’s event enjoyed the company of “DatZen”, a Chev V8 powered Datsun 280Z, and fitted with items from the extensive Davies Craig catalogue. An Electric Water Pump, or EWP, is at the heart of the DatZen cooling system, and being the EWP150, it’s the ideal choice to deal both with the American summer and being part of a miles long line of traffic.

Emily Williams Reeves and her husband built up the Datsun and Chev combination after driving the route for the first time in Emily’s Holden Monaro aka Pontiac GTO a decade earlier.

Emily reports that the car has been at many shows since the 2017 HRPT but of late has been used as a daily driver. Naturally that means the EWP150 has been holding its own in varying driving conditions, however the trio will be joining the Power Tour again this weekend. It’s here that Emily states, with more than a little pride, that it’s the ultimate proving ground for such items as “we literally sit for hours in miles of Hot Rods, where most are overheating and spewing water.”

Emily herself is pretty handy with a spanner, having plenty of mechanic experience. She also co-hosts a car based program with her husband, Aaron, which means that if they need to fit any other Davies Craig parts, it’ll be a pretty simple job for them.

Keep in touch with Emily and Davies Craig via social media and contact Davies Craig for any enquiries on our huge automotive cooling products range.