wearemobile!

New Format. Text on the left, pictures on the right!

Here we see Jamie (red) and Rob (white) posing obviously for some camera time. We also note that most of the Amazon's innards have spilled out onto the roof and into the lidless boot.

Along with most of my tools.

Here's an interesting angle. The new gas fill. We decided that the original fuel tank/filler location was far too susceptible to rear impact (which, from what I hear, is relatively high on the likelihood scale in these LeMons races) so we relocated everything about 6" inboard, and will be adding additional braces in the back for protection. The new tank? From a Volvo 1800. And that lovely fuel fill? Swiped from a Nissan 200SX.

I really have no idea what this is about. I think those two white boards are actually chopsticks that one of the Rats that live in my barn are attempting to use to eat Jamie.

OK, these are SU carburetors. And there's some rolls of aluminum. Rob is constructing a cold air intake! More pictures below...

Ah yes, the exhaust. This rusty cylinder is the resonator that came with the car. My original plan was to stuff it with steel wool, drill some holes and add a larger pipe inside, and make a homemade cherry bomb. Then I got lazy and found a nearly-new muffler laying about my shop and just welded that on. Hey, at least we're under the 92 dB noise limit. And we have a cool, in-front-of-the- rear-wheels exhaust outlet.

But first, that muffler had to pass the strenuous "Suck-Blow" test. Here I am executing the rigorous "Suck" portion of the test. (Note the wrist bandages from last week's medical procedure)

...and here's the "Blow" portion.

I didn't die, I didn't inhale (much) carbon, and the muffler stayed intact. Good to go.

The old seats were a wreck. We have a nice racing seat (came with the cage we bought) but needed tubular bracing. This was something the original Volvo seats were able to donate.

The moth-eaten upholstery, on the other hand, will be going straight to the centre of the earth!

At some point, after installing a roll cage, fastening in the seat, coaxing some petrol into the SU's, fashioning a crude air box,fitting an exhaust, and swilling all the water left in SC (seriously, the drought here is BAD) we fired up the old Swedish tractor engine and I, intrepid (stupid) team captain took her for a spin around the back 40.

I think I should have sharpened those bumper reinforcements.Even if we lose LeMons, at least the Volvo will serve well as a brush hog.

As shot of the seat, steering wheel, column (held in place by exhaust clamps) and cage.

Another angle of the seating position. Its a bit low, so the overall effect is sort of akin to driving your father's pickup truck when you're 10. The seat needs to come up and the wheel, down. All relatively minor corrections.

Since we had removed the shifter previously, and since we could not now locate it, and since I had this piece of 1/2" pipe laying around...

Ah, the Cold Air Box! This will surely infuse the pushrod solid lifter iron block twin carb 1.8 Litre powerhouse with at _least_ 50 or 60 extra horsepower and lead the Tunachuckers on to Victory!

To prove that I was mortally wounded last week, and that I did not just wrap gauze around my wrist to effect sympathy (of which I received none, anyway) here's a shot of my wrist with the bandaged removed. For the strong of stomach, click the pic for a full 640x480 rendering of my war wound.