Todd's track car

[ToddK]

Here are a few pics of the track car I'm putting together. A buddy of mine found this car and a parts car sitting behind a high end used car lot. Since it had SCCA stickers on it, and I have a trailer, he called me to go check it out with him. The car had sat in a driveway untouched for 6 years. The story we got was that the car belonged to the dealership owner's next door neighbor. This is where the story gets cloudy. When we were looking at it we were told the guy who owned it got very sick and stopped working on it. They brought it to the lot to sell as a favor to the guys wife. I am assuming the guy is dead now, but I don't really know. There were no titles involved, just $3500.00 cash. My buddy decided to buy them, and we arranged to go pick them up a couple of days later. I showed up to pick up my buddy and he said he couldn't come up with the cash and would have to put the deal off a couple of weeks. I pounced! There was no way I was going to take a chance at letting those two cars get away. I parted out the other car and put $1500.00 back into my pocket. To be honest, I let some of those parts go way to cheaply.Here are some early pics.

[ToddK]

The first thing I did to the car was a little structural stuff. The floors and spare tire well had new sheet metal welded over the rusty floors. Done By the PO. From underneath, I cut away all of the original rusty metal, and tack welded the edges to the new metal. I made up metal panels and welded them to the underside of the floors and up against the frame rails. Now there is two layers of 18 gauge steel for the floors. I seem sealed all of the edges and painted with POR 15. After all of that welding, I had to repaint the interior floors. I went with a light grey. I removed the gas tank a remade some of the trunck floor. The shock towers were fine. Now the only rust is a few bubbles on the doors(I bought some good ones) and a small amount on the outer rockers where the fiberglass bonds to it. I was going to redo the body and paint it this Fall, but I ran out of time. It will have to wait until Spring.

[ToddK]

I still don't know what specs the motor has. I do know that it was built by Kermit Upton at Mountain Auto Sport Racing in Vt. It has a number stamped on the block and MASR 5/85. Unfortunately Kermit doesn't keep records of that stuff, so he can only speculate about the specs. He says probably around 200HP, but I doubt it. The motor has twin 40 DCOEs, and a nice header. There is an external oil cooler and a new radiator with an electric fan. It has a 245/10 CR 5 speed. That's the one from an early 323. The interior is gutted. There is a welded Kirk cage, and a Kirkey seat with simpson cam lock belts. It came with full VDO gauges, a shift light, a MSD 6AL ignition box, and drilled pedal pads. I need to install a window net, mirrors and a fire system. In the trunk, there is an electric fuel pump and filter. I will need to install a fuel cell eventually. The suspension is pretty basic. IT has Bilstiens, coil overs, camber plates, front and rear stress bars, and bigger sway bars. All new by PO. It also has the Volvo disc brake conversion. All of the rubber pieces need to be replaced with urethane. That is this Winters project. I shreaded the guibo laying a strip in my driveway, so maybe it does have 200 ponies.

[ToddK]

The body consist of fiberglass pin on hood and trunk lids, and fiberglass box flares. The bumpers have been removed.

[ToddK]

Back in September, I bought another parts car at an auction for $55.00. Sweet parts car. The motor may be even more strong than the one in the race car. It has a SERRA 300 cam, twin 45 DCOEs, and 185 PSI of compression. It has a new starter. I traded a bunch of stuff to Winston T.J. for all of the urethane pieces that my car needs. I'll send the motor to my engine builder to go thru it. After that, I'll wrap it up and put it away. I also picked up a 85 TVR Tasmin 280i at that same auction for $275.00. Someone stuffed a Corvette motor in it. I don't want to deal with the smog laws for an 85, so I'll chop this one up too. The parts are worth alot if I can find buyers. I plan on keeping the tube frame chassis, and running gear. I'm looking for a light weight body from any car that was made before 1980. I'll skin that car, put it on the TVR chassis and title it as whatever the old body is. My buddy offered up a Porche 356 tub with a title, and a fiberglass repro tilt nose. How many Porche purists do you think I'll piss off with that monster?

[ToddK]

Here are a couple of pics of my TR8 race car.

[ToddK]

And a couple of the MGB I'm building.

[bmw1602.com]

nice car !!

what a great find! congrats!

too bad you don't live around here so we could race agaist each other!

[TMK-001]

Fark you have some diverse projects! What is the motor in your TR8? I cant work it out with the two centre sparks close together...

Todd K as well.

[ToddK]

It's a 4 liter Rover V8. It pushes about 300HP and 325FP of torque. I just put it in and am changing classes in the Spring. I'm switching to ITE to run against 911's and Vettes. I got tired of all of the british ignition components letting me down. ITE will give me more free reign on changing to non stock items. I can also bring the weight down from 2430#. I'll probably end up around 2100# once the ballast and some more items are removed. I can also go to bigger brakes and wheels. If it still isn't fast enough, I can always install the 4.6 liter Rover I have. It pushes over 400HP. A similar one in my buddies car runs sub 12 second 1/4 mile times at over 120MPH on 225/50/16 street tires. I was in his car one time when he went from a dead stop to 160MPH in under 4/10's of a mile. Honestly, I think I'm afraid to put that motor in a 2100# car with racing tires.

[Guest Anonymous]

Did you build that track car or did you buy it mostly done it looks like a car that i saw a while back but some times they start to look the same are you located near MA the ca i saaw was i think in brokton, I had been Autoxing down on the cape in my 02 and this guy showed up one day and said i have a 02 all done up race ready and i went and checked it out at it looked like your car just interested ifyou did buy it some what done if you knew the old owner? if not disregard this email thanks for any info.

Jeff Anderson

japainting@comcast.net