Lizard Racing

We moved across country three years ago. When unpacking, I uncovered built models from decades ago. I thought "I can rebuild some of these!" Completed survivors can be found on other threads.

Could it be that was 50 years ago! I remember the Ford vs. Ferrari and arguing who actually won. I highly recommend the book Go Like Hell by A. J. Baime. It has good character insights into Enzo and Henry, which was the cause of the whole affair.

I've always liked Mary Steenburgen. She's a good actress and seems to be a good person. And still looks as good now as she did in Back to the Future.

The Connie is such a curvaceous, sensual design. I heard once Howard Hughes designed it.

Jimmy Jabara was a leading ace fighter pilot in the Korean War. He also grew up in Wichita, Kansas; same as me. I got a Hasegawa kit and specific decals from Warbird Decals and came up with this: The kit decals are VERY detailed, down to all the exterior markings. It took 2 days to apply all of them. As can be seen compared to a F-51, the F-86 wasn't that much bigger. Simpler days.

Good job! I recently did a '48 in two-tone green.

Great flame job on the '58!

The Daytona/Superbird were the most outrageous of the muscle cars of the '60s. And you could go buy one!

My teenage daughter came home one day and said: "the brakes are making a funny noise." A quick look showed the pads down to the backing plates! I didn't want to even drive it to the car club, so I replaced the brakes right in the apartment parking lot. All girls say is: "so fix it." I even had a special plastic container just for brake jobs. That really helped. Such adventures!

I just finished refurbishing a survivor model of the Parnelli Jones roadster of 1963. Not only did this car win the Indianapolis 500 in '63, but started on pole. In addition this car was the first to qualify at over 150 mph in 1962. It started with the AMT kit. As stated in the workbench forum, the tires are all wrong for this car. I used the front tires on the back and used passenger tires for the front. Decals are from Indycals. Some of the contours are really tricky to get the decal to conform. Scallops especially. The photos are for research purposes. The other cars are also survivors from 30+ years in storage. Center is Bobby Unser from '68 and right is Johnny Rutherford from '74. In a mere 10 years, tires got wider, wings appeared and speeds jumped 50 mph!

Are you near Bountiful? There are only a few of us from Utah.

This is why I used to do all my own car working on. At least if it's screwed up, you know what's screwed up and how it got screwed up.

The Lotus 7 is a perfect sports car: nothing on it that doesn't help it go faster. Save those survivors!

In the '50s and early '60s, efforts were made to put as much weight on the left (inside) side tires as possible. The other priority was to lower the profile of the car, to reduce drag and lower the center of gravity. One of the most radical efforts was made by Epperly and Lesovsky, locating the engine far left in the chassis, then laying it over to the left. The result was the top of the engine protruding through the left side of the car! Although a layover car won consecutive 500s ('57 & '58), the design never really caught on. Upright engines on the left side became the way to go. I was always fascinated by these radical cars. So I started with the Jones roadster and adapted it to the laydown configuration. This is as far as I got. This model is another survivor. I always liked the look of the injector stacks sticking out of the hood. I am also working on the Parnelli Jones roadster, documented in another thread. Thanks for looking.

Mind blowing!!! I have been following the thread and you put a LOT if work into this project. I need to get started on mine.

My wife watches a LOT of murder shows on Investigation Discovery, especially when one spouse kills the other. Should I be worried/wary?

I guess this movie proves that you can get too much of a good thing. If the audience wasn't familiar with the overall story, the movie wouldn't be as good. OBTW, Mad magazine just issued a special edition spoofing sci-fi and fantasy movies.

Regarding the passenger seat: the rule specified that the seats had to be positioned equally on both sides of the vehicle centerline. I call that the "Roger Penske Rule." Remember the old Zerex Special Cooper? That was a wrecked Cooper Formula 1 that RP made into a sports car. Its passenger seat was hung outside the frame on the left side. The driver seat was moved 1/2 inch to the right. Conformed to the letter, but not the spirit of the rules. First application of the "Unfair Advantage."

Sorry if I created a controversy. If you recorded the race, watch it anyway. Lots of close intense racing.

I haven't seen Hill Street Blues mentioned. Funny and sad stuff in almost every episode. Remember "Cows got no down genes"? Barney Miller was also a favorite.

Anyone seen the Solo movie yet? I went Thursday night and am interested in what "normal" people think.

Just remember that Memorial Day is to honor those vets who gave the full measure of devotion. Not to dis the current vets, but their day is November 11. Originally Armistice Day, is now Veteran's Day. Take the opportunity to honor all vets, no matter which day. They deserve it.

Please keep in mind these older cars were a product of the designer's imagination (or nightmares) and without computer aids. For the time they looked pretty cool.

Good one!! The 962 was the most successful race car of its time. All you had to do was lay down the cash and go race.

For those who don't remember the original Canadian-American Challenge Cup series, it collected the professional sports car races in the US and Canada into a (for the time) high-dollar championship. All a car had to have was two seats, four covered wheels and a windscreen. Everything else was up to the owner's discretion. The CanAm started in 1966 and the winner of the first race, and the championship, was John Surtees driving a Lola T-70 with a Chevy engine. I first built his replica from a re-issue of the IMC Lola kit over 40 years ago and it has been in storage most of the time since. Lately I've tried rebuilding some survivors. All I did to this one was glue the bits back together and apply new decals. Some are home made and others are Gofer decals. I didn't even repaint it, as the old paint is still good with a few flaws.