ClayBelt wrote:Had the mustang run off on me, back to searching. Hope is to build a safe one that meets tech for $1000 from a mixture of Picknpull and Craigslist
Sounds like a great goal, but at a minimum budget at least $3000 for a new build. Even if the car is free a pre-bent cage is $700 shipped to you alone. That doesn't cover welding consumables or that you know how to install a cage correctly and won't have to cut out and re-buy components. The cheapest new seat you're going to find is $300, maybe you can find a used one for a little less. Harness, fire suppression system, brakes, tires, gas, getting a free car running well, oil, trans fluid, brake fluid, plus $500 worth of things you never thought of.
We attempted to do the same thing our first race because we had no money and were thinking that less was more in Lemons. It was a mistake, our $50 Pep Boys pads were completely gone before the race ended and this was discovered as our driver was going 100+ on the front straight of NJMP and he couldn't stop. He was quick thinking enough to down shift in our automatic transmission, made the turn and got back to the paddock but he was lucky. Our $200 worth of Pep Boys cheapest tires were completely melted and chunked. We did not finish the race as we didn't have any spares and with only a couple hours left in the race it wasn't worth trying to find a set. We had the second slowest best lap time only to the 3PM Rolls, yes even the upside down Camaro had better lap times largely due to our crappy tires and brakes. We also failed tech due to the roll cage not being installed properly and had to scramble to find help and fix that.
We all have budgets and have to make choices based on them. However, be extremely careful not to skip on anything safety related. Pay for the .120 DOM cage, better brakes, and safety gear. In the unfortunate event your driver gets t-boned while disabled on the track you will be very happy you did. Lemons has been historically amazingly safe despite being some extremely severe accidents. Do not skimp on safety! Your team won't want you to skimp on reliability either as there is nothing worse than blowing a motor at 1:00 in the afternoon Saturday just after the local junkyards close because you chose cheap oil.
Team Glue Sticks
00 Firebird, 02 X-Type, 93 NX2000, 00 Mazda 626 (Sold)
2016 NJMP Heroic Fix, 2017 NJMP Near Heroic Fix except we can't drive, 2017 Thompson I Got Screwed, 2019 Pitt Heroic Fix