AUTOWORLD Retro F/C racers

[BIG E]

Waitin' on delivery of two Mustang funnies from BUD'S HO Cars. A complete "Blue Max" car and an "L.A.Hooker" body only. More stuff to pile on the bench for the summer months, but I just couldn't resist two more vintage FORD racers. Plus, Rob's always got the good prices on the AW stuff. If you're not gettin' regular emails from him, you should check him out.
My intention is to mount them on some kind of original Aurora chassis, like most of my other HO drag stuff. I'll probably play around with the AW 4Gear chassis, too, like I'm doin' with the AA/FD car I purchased earlier this year.

We'll see what comes of these... Ernie

[HRWJim]

I saw these too and thought they were very cool. I think I will take the traction magnets out and put silicone tires on them. So they are faster than the Gasser we run but a little slower than the modern F/C we run too. My son and a couple of his buddies run 4 classes. Original Aurora chassis we run as a stock class, then Johnny Lighting we run as our Gasser class, then we run Pro Stock and F/C 4Gear class. All stock chassis except wheels and tires and lights tuning. Now we can have a 5th class, slassic F/C . Jim

[BIG E]

Yes, Jim, the first thing I did on the rail was to trash the traction magnets. Still not impressed with the performance of the 4G chassis, but silicone tire choice, wheels, motor brushes, pickup shoes/springs, guide pin, motor magnets, ect. are all things that I plan to mess around with. There's no reason why these chassis can't be made to run well. Also, those rear axle holes need to be reworked to get rid of the incredible amount of wobble in the rear axle assembly!
We'll see what happens when I'm finally able to find time to work on these cars. I'd probably be more motivated if Tony's Small Torque Motor Speedway was still up and running with that beautiful full function Max Trax drag strip! (I really miss that track!)

Maybe in the fall... Ernie

[BIG E]

Got the package from BUD'S HO CARS out of the PO box on the way to my monthly model club meeting last Thursday. All the drag guys were impressed as I showed them around. Remember, these guys are primarily 1/24-25 scale automotive plastic modelers (a few have been published in Scale Auto and Model Car magazines), not hardcore slot car racers.
When I first passed around the car in the factory package/display box, many thought is was a 1/64 diecast! The paint and tampo printing looks good, as we were able to give the loose body a hands on and up close inspection.

Looking forward to playin' around with these two. 'Til then... Ernie

[HRWJim]

Just ordered these today from BRS can't wait to get them My son and his buddies were just racing the drag cars last night. Jim

[BIG E]

Saw the real BRUTUS Mustang and Bruce Larson USA-1 Camaro Funny Cars (those two were spot-on re-creations) along with many other original vintage Rail, Funny and Gasser stuff this past weekend at Raceway Park, Englishtown, NJ. That Mustang is the same style as the AW cars. Also, Bruce Larson himself was there, saying hello and shaking hands.
The smell of "Nitro" was in the air, as chills went up and down my spine while I saw cars I hadn't seen in 40 years either racing or on display.
You can actually SEE a 200mph Funny Car as it goes down the track, unlike the 300mph modern stuff that flashes by for 1000ft.! And the different bodies are so cool, they actually LOOK similar to the cars they're supposed to be! What a great two days we had, can't wait until next year.

Hope you guys have fun with your new HO scale "retro funnies". Keep us posted... Ernie

[HRWJim]

Man I would have loved to have been there. Sound very cool. We will have fun. We will have to do a nostalgia drag and take pics some time. I have a lot of the older super stock cars ans some I have made plus our Gasser. Now with the funny cars it should be cool. Jim