----- Original Message -----
From: Charles Christ
To: spridgets@autox.team.net
Sent: Tuesday, December 14, 1999 9:31 PM
Subject: bat rolled rear arches
posibly i couldshed a dim glow on the origins of the method? in the early
60's sports car racers were looking into interperting the rules and
remaining "legal" and still attempting to gain an advantage in performance
or handling. when a way around the stock wheel width was found and later a
maxium of 5.5" was allowed (spridgets) the next hurdle was the opressive
rear wheel arches . the rules stated that there could be no removal of the
original metal . you could not just cut out fenders and add flares or hack
and cut and add metal to increase the aerea to get the fender wider. so
first was the rolling up of the fender lip so it would not cut a tire side
wall when the axle shifted under hard cornering. no metal removed or cut,
just slightly modified but still legally in place. the next and logical
step was the "stretching" of the arches. it was not uncommon to cut a piece
or 2 of hard wood and remove a wheel, using a jack between the inner wheel
house(at strongest aerea along the trunk(boot) floor seem) and the outer
wheel house at the wheel arch where attached to the quarter panel. placing
wood under the jack and between the jack and quarter panel you could jack
out the quarter panel and actually gain well over an inch without wrinkling
the exterior skin(if you were good at it). eventually it was so well
practiced thatit gave way to actual rules governing flaring fenders wich
later evolved into the huge elephant ear flares we see today on current
competition cars competing today. the method described above was so well
practiced that the darn paint would not even crack. it was all in the
interpetation of the rules in the spirit of competiton. it was not limited
to spridgets either! also on the subject of wide fenders comes a foot note
on spridget wheels. early on minilite's were much too expensive for the
regional / weekend enthusiast to afford. creative sorts found out the the
1960 corvair had riveted together wheel rims as did the early sprite rims.
corvair rims were 13"x5" wide! ah-ha! if you drilled (not chiseled) or
ground off the heads of the rivets and drove then out you could lightly
hammer apart the centers and the outer rims. by welding the corvair valve
stem holes and reversing the rims, placing bugeye centers in the corvair
rims and centering (truing them on a home made jig) you could weld together
custom stock looking steel wheels that really needed a second look to
distinguish weither thet were correct or not! i have a set for my sprite
with dunlop racing tires for show. and if you were really interprising, you
could balance the steel wheels on a bubble balancer by welding(to add
weight ) and grinding (to remove weight) on the back side of the wheel where
no one would ever be the wiser, before you mpainted the rims and mounted the
tires. much later came the vega wheels wich i had a set for autocrossing
back inthe late 70's.
ok kids so much for racing cheating, oops i mean interpertiting the rules as
written and being competitive in the bad old days of sports car racing.
hey frank, you can sell vintage race car fender modification kits on ebay
with some of the leftover hardwood from jobs? hmmmmm? just cut to fit and
package with authentic racing duct tape wrapping. just kidding!
oh no what have i done now????????????
chuck
peering up out of my back yard fox hole to see if coast is clear?
|