My favorite track car

This car belongs to a friend of mine. He's pretty sick with cancer and has 6 of the nicest kids in the world. I've mentioned him before.

Anyhow, I figured I'd show some pictures of my favorite track car. This Miata was found as a stripped-out shell. It was the result of a V8 swap that got to step 1 (take out everything that isn't a V8) and never got to step 2 (put the V8 in). It was straight if a bit rusty. Russ found out about it and we put together a cunning plan. One night after work, a bunch of the guys from Flyin' Miata and Russ' clan gathered at the FM shop, pulled the complete drivetrain and suspension out of a salvage car and stuck it under the stripped Miata. Everybody pitched in and we had a lot of fun. The family piled a bunch of missing body parts and everything they needed to make the car run into the cockpit and dragged it home.

Lots of late nights and hard work later, it's now running with our local track day and autocross group. Other than the roll bar, it's basically stock and is currently running on donated wheels and tires. Yesterday, the car was shared between three brothers aged 15, 17 and 19 years old. It spun a couple of times and got run pretty hard, but it never missed a beat and the kids got faster and smoother. Even Russ took it out a few times - that's him behind the wheel, taking one of the kids out to show him around.

It's an ugly little thing as you can see. The instrument cowl is held on with duct tape. There are at least 5 colors of paint on the body, and parts of it were sanded down for painting so they're basically bare metal. But I love seeing it howl around the track because of what it represents. I'd much rather see this car on track than just about anything else.

I wouldn't change a thing. That is berkelying cool in its own way, much like that found-in-a-dry-wash '49 chevy on the cop car chassis.

Please don't paint it. This is a rat-rod. Don't care what other people say.

Well done.

that made my day a better one....

Stone Soup Miata

Well played, FM. is there anything I can donate to the cause?

GRM Car of the Year.

Woody wrote: GRM Car of the Year.

+1

Amazing teamwork! Bravo!

Brust wrote: Please don't paint it. This is a rat-rod. Don't care what other people say.

Totally agree. Keep it as it is!

Car looks awesome. I always liked lining up with shiny/immaculate track cars when my E30 was several colors. It gave me a sense that nobody would challenge me into any given corner for fear of scraping their 40K car against my 2K POS. Great fun.

What suspension is the car running? Stance looks nice.

Excellent stuff. The multi-coloured Miata looks great, too.

ScottRA21 wrote:

Brust wrote: Please don't paint it. This is a rat-rod. Don't care what other people say.

Totally agree. Keep it as it is!

Japanese Rat Rod. I say leave it like it is.

Totally grassroots.

give each of the six kids a paintbrush and some paint, and a section of the car and let them go to town on it...then apply clear over their artwork...

Love the look- you can sort of preserve it with a mat clear coat. I think the challenge rat rod did that, too.

Although, if you are going to do that, might as well start some surface rust to make it look even cooler.

Eric

924guy wrote: give each of the six kids a paintbrush and some paint, and a section of the car and let them go to town on it...then apply clear over their artwork...

Good idea. My kid doesn't like his bikes until they're painted to suit.

Y'know, helping folks out isn't always the greatest of thrills at the time, but they're the ones that stay with you, that you can always recall and feel good about. Good job!

About the paint - I don't think the plan is to keep the car looking like a junkyard refugee. Not every teenager wants a car with this particular paint scheme I think the plans include carpet for the interior at some point too! Kids these days, I tell you...

I didn't mean to exaggerate my part in this car or that of anyone else at FM. We're all friends of Russ and his family, so we chipped in to help out when we could. Most of the work has been done by the same boys who are driving it and their dad. That's what I love to see.

I don't think the car has anything special on it for suspension. It's possible it has an old set of FM springs and AGX shocks on board, depending on what we found around the shop.