Vintage Baja Racer info?

[Conejoracer]

I just picked up this Baja today. It looks to be a vintage racer, does anybody recognize it?

It looks a lot like this car;

Any help identifying the car/driver would be appreciated!

[flashho]

This car was just mentioned on race dezert forums, or was that your post? If not, check there and with track photos.
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rant _ classified ads with out pics are almost worthless

[Conejoracer]

That was my post on Race Dezert, I figure that if I ask around enough somebody will remember it. Thanks for the tip on Trackside, I emailed Jim this morning. They don't have the archives online any longer, but he may be able to help. I'm looking for a trailer now so I can bring this toy home and start playing with it!

[Conejoracer]

I just got the car home today. It's definitely the 20s car pictured above. The car is a convertible and raced as a swing axle originally. It's converted to IRS, and the front pan is cut off and the front looks extended a bit. It has some strange spacers on the rear torsion housing, I'm not sure how that works. Maybe they did that back in the day before they started widening the trailing arms?
I hope to find out more of this cars history before long.

[BUGGUTZ]

THAT IS AWESOME!!! I'm totally jealous!
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66 Baja
73 standard
14 Jetta TDI
95 Escort
89 CUMMINS in whats left of a dodge body

Everyones gotta be somewhere!

[flashho]

Very cool!
I see Norra mex 1000 in your future.
Just saw a great small trailer yesterday on FB off road classifieds 6x 12 for 400 bucks, but I can`t find it now
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rant _ classified ads with out pics are almost worthless

[bajamike560]

Those are torsion extensions, had those on my old car. They allow you to run longer torsion springs.

Great luck with the car, thanks for saving it from the crusher.

Make a list of parts and put it out there to see if anyone has anything.
All my old stuff went with the car when I sold it.


Mike
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Jackpot motorsports

[dustymojave]

Some of those torsion housing extenders were made at a length which allowed using long IRS bars with swingaxle spring plate cut to fit wide IRS arms with their spring plate brackets set the same extra distance out from the center of the car.
_________________
Richard
Offroading VW based cars since 1965
Tech Inspection 1963 - 2012 SCCA/SCORE/HDRA/MORE/MDR +
Retired from building Bajas, Fiberglass Buggies and Rails in the Mojave Desert. Also Sprints & Midgets, Dry Lakes, Road Race cars. All types New and Vintage
SoCalBajas Member
Kicked Cancer's A$$...1st and 2nd round...Fight ain't over yet.

[Conejoracer]

Thank you for the replies and help, I will be slowly putting this car back together and leaving as original as I can. I've been told this may be a car that was driven by Mark Hansen in the 70's. His car was built by Bert Junker, and looks similar to Dick Lee's car, and the 20s car I have. Does anybody have info or photos of Mark Hansen's car?
Thanks

[69 (0\ ! /0)]

This looks like the car that is on the front cover of the revised Baja Bugs and Buggies.

[69 (0\ ! /0)]

This looks like the car that is on the front cover of the revised Baja Bugs and Buggies.

[69 (0\ ! /0)]

This looks like the car that is on the front cover of the revised Baja Bugs and Buggies.

[69 (0\ ! /0)]

This looks like the car that is on the front cover of the revised Baja Bugs and Buggies.

[69 (0\ ! /0)]

This looks like the car that is on the front cover of the revised Baja Bugs and Buggies.

[BUGGUTZ]

I'm sorry, what did you say?
_________________
66 Baja
73 standard
14 Jetta TDI
95 Escort
89 CUMMINS in whats left of a dodge body

Everyones gotta be somewhere!

[dustymojave]

Stuttering issues huh?

It DOES bear similarities, Mainly a yellow Baja Convertible with front and rear hoop roll cage...but has even more doubtful areas, like the roof bars which are shaped different and the beam mounts that are different...

_________________
Richard
Offroading VW based cars since 1965
Tech Inspection 1963 - 2012 SCCA/SCORE/HDRA/MORE/MDR +
Retired from building Bajas, Fiberglass Buggies and Rails in the Mojave Desert. Also Sprints & Midgets, Dry Lakes, Road Race cars. All types New and Vintage
SoCalBajas Member
Kicked Cancer's A$$...1st and 2nd round...Fight ain't over yet.

[bajamike560]

Bought that book almost 30 years ago, still have it someplace in my collection.

Mike
_________________
Jackpot motorsports

[shano63]

Ditto...bought mid 80s. Just unearthed it. It seems I had highlighted and underlined lot of stuff I thought was important..lol
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63 T1 Ragtop Gulf Blue
08 Civic 5spd
22 Wrangler 6spd
78 F250 4x4 4spd

Chris

Take it as it comes-- Morrison

[Conejoracer]

I've been in touch with Mark Hansen, he was the 1975 SCORE class 5 champion. He drove both of Bert Junker's convertible Baja Bugs, so he has an idea what they were like. We've sent some pictures back and forth and he believes my car may be one of the two cars that he drove for Junker. The evidence is not yet conclusive, but hopefully we get to that point.
On a side note, it would appear that the front end of my car was converted at some point to run a widened "parallel" front beam. The beam clamps are sized for link pin torsions, but it has ball joint beam spacing. I've read that Bugzyla makes a beam for this setup, so I know where I can pick up a front beam that will work. The rear torsion housing is difficult, the adapter/spacers that widen the housing are strange and I'm not sure it's worth keeping it that way. The spacers are are 4.5' wide per side, using stock IRS trailing arms would widen the car 9 inches! i don't even know what kind of torsion bars/spring plates this would require. I'm considering removing them and cutting off the IRS pivots and welding new pivots inboard further (stock location) as is standard these days. I can then run a 3x3 rear trailing arm and still find parts "off the shelf" that fit.

[dustymojave]

I agree that removing the torsion housing extenders and relocating the inner pivots would make some sense.

Most of the folks who used the extenders used stock spacing from inner pivot to torsion housing end.

To assemble it with the extenders in place, you would simply use long torsion bars (IRS length) with short torsion spring plates (late swingaxle, '61-'67) cut to fit the IRS arms. The IRS arms could be 0 X 3. Then use axle shafts to fit. The arms would actually be stronger than 3x3s. It was also popular at that time in buggies to use Bus torsion housings or fabricated housings to Bus width to get the added width.
_________________
Richard
Offroading VW based cars since 1965
Tech Inspection 1963 - 2012 SCCA/SCORE/HDRA/MORE/MDR +
Retired from building Bajas, Fiberglass Buggies and Rails in the Mojave Desert. Also Sprints & Midgets, Dry Lakes, Road Race cars. All types New and Vintage
SoCalBajas Member
Kicked Cancer's A$$...1st and 2nd round...Fight ain't over yet.