High Speed Wear

How about the latest in High Speed Wear at the SPEEDWAGEN shop. Who said that mechanics don't have an eye for style. J.W is attired in his retro blue bibs, and John Deere T shirt, the rolled cuffs just say---I dare you!. King is outfitted in the more traditional grunt overalls that have authentic grease spots and are frawed for that laid back casual look. This pair of Style Setters can be found easily in the crowd due to their kick'in welder kaps from Komer Kaps. Remember what ZZ top says!

Stuff that makes it GO & WHOA !

This is the Kennedy Eng adaptor that hooks the Subaru engine to the VW trans axle. We got the part from Outback Motorsports. They are Subaru powered Buggy Guru's. Kennedy has adaptors to hook about anything to a VW transaxle except a Schwinn These are some steer and stop parts. The steering arms are from Speedway Motors, they are for cross steering for our rack steering set up. The rotor is from Buggy Works, they are the for the VW transaxle. Buggy Works is building us a gear box to supply the TOP END we need.

PANKL HOT ROD

This Hot-Rod is a titanium Pankl Rod for an Indy car Auroa Engine. We have acquired several sets of these rods, and a few sets of J&E pistons. There is also some parts for a V6 Indy Buick. These are a part of our "barter" inventory

Herbie spotting

Could it be Jaime has found the real HERBIE!

Wheels for the Hind End

Went to a Swap Meet Friday and scored another pair of narrow Center Line style wheels. They are Fenton "Look Alike" wheels. Jim had some new meaties put on them, now we need to get the temp spares off the front wheels, and get some meaties put on them;then we can start the set up of the chassis

Engine from L.A.

The "set up" engine arrived today from the importer in L.A. This is what they call a JDM engine. The engines that are put in cars that are sold to the Japanese Domestic Market, are considered to have better internals than the U.S. domestic motors. It took a little bit of a beating getting here. These engines supposedly get a compression and a leak down test, along with a power wash. The Kennedy adaptor should be in this week. We ordered it from outback motor sports, They were very easy to deal with, and they know their STUFF. subaru Outback Kennedy Engineered Products ### The Hunnert Car Pileup ###

Motor Head Art

We have an Art Studio in the Shop for doing styling renderings, and any other form of Motor Head Art. This is one of the Stained Glass works, it's a full scale Harley Pan Head Engine.

Girls like Speedwagen T-Shirts

Plans are in the works for some FAST Speedwagen Stuff. The usual do-dads, hats, t-shirts and garage accessories---How could a guy get by without a speedwagen shop rag.

Endangered Species

This is a Hand painted Champion Spark Plug sign that is not going to be around much longer. Hand painted signs have went the way of the "See Rock City" barn paint jobs. This is in the old part of Carmel Ind. There is a new building getting ready to block the old sign from view. What's this got to do with anything?---nothing, its just a cool old sign that I pass every day on the way to the shop."Today Paradise put in a parking lot."

Wide Load

This is a pair of fenders that have each been widened 4 inches. With a 6 inch drop on the top, it looks way WIDE. The Speedwagen will most likely not have fenders. We will try to tuck the wheels back inside the body as much as possible. We found another set of centerline style wheels to put on the back of our roller. The pieces are coming together. A Kennedy engine adaptor and a stock 2.0 motor should show up at the back door next week, then we can get to work on the business end of the car.

Can you I.D. This car?

This famous old dragster showed up at one of our neighboring shops, B.C. Race cars. I saw this car run at Raceway park in the Mid 60's--can you name It? You never know whats likely to show up at our neighboring shops. There are Hot Rods, Circle track cars, Jags, Model A's, Corvairs, some Harleys, and our infestation of Bugs.

Half-a-roller

We put some drag wheels on the front of the car to check clearance for the calipers. This gives us half a roller to push around like a wheel barrow . Late breaking news!--a 2.0 stock motor is on its way from L.A. Its a used ej20 motor from Japan.Its not a big H.P. motor, but will be good to use to get all the systems working. Then comes the "Monster" motor. --Scoobzilla

OOPS!

This is a junk picture of a broken part. The black part pressed into the end of the front spring. It is missing part of its outer lip. The part has a square edge on the back side of the broken lip. Square edges and plastic are invitations for a fracture. It was better to find this problem when we were on jack stands, instead of when we were standing on the gas!

SPEEDWAGEN Chop-O-MATIC

This is the latest in top chopping tools. The hand powered Chop-O-MATIC,its even Y3 k safe. If you order today from SPEEDWAGEN, you will get a free book on how to chop up all kinds of stuff. No chicken is safe once you get this space age tool. No Chop shop should be with out one.

Big Ole Rotor

Got to get-er-stopped! These are 11 in rotors that have brackets to mount GM calipers. We need to do some machine work on the calipers before we can mount them. There is a "lump" that need to be cut of the caliper casting. And a slot needs to be milled in the casting to reroute the position the brake line attaches to the caliper. The spindles are old Ford style, with an adaptor that allows Chevy wheel bearings. The bolt pattern is for Chevy wheels. We have some disk brakes for the VW rear end that are also set up for Chevy wheels. This flyer will have parts on it from everything but a J.C. Higgins.

Steer me in the right direction

This is the slick little rack steering box that does the "push & pull" on the passenger spindle. It does Ole Time cross steer, but with a rack instead of a steering box. You saw it first here on the SPEEDWAGEN!

It's a FRAME UP I tell you!

The main frame rails are mild steel tubing that will get powder coated some fast color, as soon as we get finished fabricating the rest of the appendages that need to be added. The length of the rails will work with our lengthened Volkswagen wheel base. We are thinking around 114 in .

Speedwagen & Speedway Motors

Our parts from Speedway Motors www.speedwaymotors.com have all arrived. Jim and I started the day at Steak and Shake for some Breakfast and made a game plan to start the Chassis build up. We have a set of frame rails from a Track T to start our Chassis with. The front axle is a 4 in dropped tube with the spring mounted behind the axle, so we can keep our nose on the SALT. The steering is a cool little rack that steers the passenger side. This keeps the bump steer from being a handling problem. The brakes are 11 in rotors with G.M. calipers. The radius rods are Hair Pin style, for the old rod look. We had a couple problems, but no big deals. We received the wrong steering arms for the cross steer box, and we broke one of the nylon bushings in the front leaf spring. We will have Verne machine us some new ones with a little more beef and some design mods.

Indy Hi-Winders--still do'in it!

The Indy Hi-Winders revised the club logo, and sent a decal to us to put on the Speedwagen. They are sponsors at Bonneville. This is my old car club from back in the day---these guys are still at it 40 plus years later. One thing these guys do best is HAVE FUN

Chop Top Sections

Here is a Samba pic of the start of a "chop top"showing the pieces before they are patched together. The top has to be split in the center from front to back as well. As the top gets lower, it has to be made wider and longer to fit up with the pillars. We have to figure out how to pull this off on a super beetle with the curved front windshield. The Super has the windshield laid back 15 more degrees than the standard beetle. This will help on our aerodynamic design.

Speedwagen MPG solution

The picture says it all

Old School,when it was New Thing

This a a picture of my first Hot Rod. Its a 36 Ford Truck with a passenger car dog house, and a Mopar truck bed. It had a 265 with a Borg Warner 4 speed. The little boy on top is my nephew Mike, he was my first assistant mechanic.That was around 1966. So as you can tell the Speedwagen team has been at this motor head stuff for a loooooong time. This weekend we will be putting the Speedwagen salt car front axle assembly together. Speedway Motors has had us on back order for spindles, so we have been working on getting the shop finished up, so when the parts rolled in, we can "get with it". Hope to have some car fabrication pictures soon.