The Mustang Forum for Track & Racing Enthusiasts

Taking your Mustang to an open track/HPDE event for the first time? Do you race competitively? This forum is for you! Log in to remove most ads.

  • Welcome to the Ford Mustang forum built for owners of the Mustang GT350, BOSS 302, GT500, and all other S550, S197, SN95, Fox Body and older Mustangs set up for open track days, road racing, and/or autocross. Join our forum, interact with others, share your build, and help us strengthen this community!

S197 3V Fabman's build; How did we get here? Build Thread

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

Fabman

Dances with Racecars
6,518
8,154
Exp. Type
W2W Racing
Exp. Level
20+ Years
Pleasanton: 1/2 way between Sonoma and Laguna Seca
OMG this is old.
The maiden voyage for my Thunderbird.
Still bare metal, it was finished in the parking lot the day of the race.
We took it to a track I'd never been to before and set two track records right off the trailer and then won the dash and the main.

Look how low this thing was!

548240_10151017769318535_1500738479_n.jpg

 

Fabman

Dances with Racecars
6,518
8,154
Exp. Type
W2W Racing
Exp. Level
20+ Years
Pleasanton: 1/2 way between Sonoma and Laguna Seca

Fabman

Dances with Racecars
6,518
8,154
Exp. Type
W2W Racing
Exp. Level
20+ Years
Pleasanton: 1/2 way between Sonoma and Laguna Seca
Later that same year while leading at that same track....

 

Fabman

Dances with Racecars
6,518
8,154
Exp. Type
W2W Racing
Exp. Level
20+ Years
Pleasanton: 1/2 way between Sonoma and Laguna Seca
The nice thing about tube chassis is you can cut off the bent shiznit and weld on new stuff.
We were at another track the following weekend and took the checkers and the money once again.
 

JDee

Ancient Racer
1,797
2,001
Exp. Type
W2W Racing
Exp. Level
20+ Years
5 miles from Mosport
Guy in the #2 was a bit optimistic on that pass on the slower car.

Around 1989 when I first was thinking about getting into racing I was trying to decide what to run so talked to a lot of guys about pro and con stuff with different classes. A Formula Ford guy said exactly those words about fixing tube frames to me. I didn't listen, but I was lucky enough to never get anything worse than surface wounds on the car.
 

Fabman

Dances with Racecars
6,518
8,154
Exp. Type
W2W Racing
Exp. Level
20+ Years
Pleasanton: 1/2 way between Sonoma and Laguna Seca
Guy in the #2 was a bit optimistic on that pass on the slower car.

Around 1989 when I first was thinking about getting into racing I was trying to decide what to run so talked to a lot of guys about pro and con stuff with different classes. A Formula Ford guy said exactly those words about fixing tube frames to me. I didn't listen, but I was lucky enough to never get anything worse than surface wounds on the car.

Yeah, we had quite a friendly rivalry going on for a few years. Really good guys from Washington state. Right after the incident he said he wasn’t going to look at the back of my car for another 50 laps and if he was going to get by it would have to be in traffic. And so it was.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

Fabman

Dances with Racecars
6,518
8,154
Exp. Type
W2W Racing
Exp. Level
20+ Years
Pleasanton: 1/2 way between Sonoma and Laguna Seca
Uh oh...whats he up to now....?

27066934_10156079164948535_380272224852943156_n.jpg
 

Fabman

Dances with Racecars
6,518
8,154
Exp. Type
W2W Racing
Exp. Level
20+ Years
Pleasanton: 1/2 way between Sonoma and Laguna Seca

Fabman

Dances with Racecars
6,518
8,154
Exp. Type
W2W Racing
Exp. Level
20+ Years
Pleasanton: 1/2 way between Sonoma and Laguna Seca

JDee

Ancient Racer
1,797
2,001
Exp. Type
W2W Racing
Exp. Level
20+ Years
5 miles from Mosport
Interesting. One can never have too many pictures of Mustangs on their walls. Couple of glimpses of the blue Mustang from the "what's he up to now" post of a few days ago, but not enough to see what he's up to with it yet.

But the biggest question of all is, where is the most important thing for any shop? The beer fridge. As Nimitz said to Halsey, "the world wonders". ;)
 
6,360
8,180
[QUOTE="JDee, post: 193951,
But the biggest question of all is, where is the most important thing for any shop? The beer fridge. As Nimitz said to Halsey, "the world wonders". ;)[/QUOTE]

Alright!!, another history guy!!..BTW that was designed to follow up a message to mess with Japanese intel guys, it wasn't supposed to be a dig, but history didn't record it that way..sadly Halsey, after the IJN turned around and stole defeat from victory at the cost of Taffy 3, was almost in gun range of the fleeing Japanese fleet when he reversed course...It would've been a shootout between the Iowa class BBs and the Yamato and escorting BBs.
 

Fabman

Dances with Racecars
6,518
8,154
Exp. Type
W2W Racing
Exp. Level
20+ Years
Pleasanton: 1/2 way between Sonoma and Laguna Seca
Interesting. One can never have too many pictures of Mustangs on their walls. Couple of glimpses of the blue Mustang from the "what's he up to now" post of a few days ago, but not enough to see what he's up to with it yet.

But the biggest question of all is, where is the most important thing for any shop? The beer fridge. As Nimitz said to Halsey, "the world wonders". ;)
You think I'd be without...?

f.jpg
 
1,246
1,243
In the V6L
...But the biggest question of all is, where is the most important thing for any shop? The beer fridge. As Nimitz said to Halsey, "the world wonders". ;)
From the looks of it, they turned the bathroom into a storeroom, so to keep the staff from having to run out the local Chevron every hour, Sal took out the beer fridge and the coffee machine.
 

Fabman

Dances with Racecars
6,518
8,154
Exp. Type
W2W Racing
Exp. Level
20+ Years
Pleasanton: 1/2 way between Sonoma and Laguna Seca
From the looks of it, they turned the bathroom into a storeroom, so to keep the staff from having to run out the local Chevron every hour, Sal took out the beer fridge and the coffee machine.
No, we have 2 rather large bathrooms here and they remain unencumbered.
I just ran through here really quick with my phone on a whim.....it's not like I planned it.
A lot of stuff was not shown...we have 5000 feet here, it would be an even longer and more boring crappy video. Who needs that?
 

JDee

Ancient Racer
1,797
2,001
Exp. Type
W2W Racing
Exp. Level
20+ Years
5 miles from Mosport
You think I'd be without...?

View attachment 3364


You da man Sal! I figured you'd have to have a beer fridge in there somewhere, hard to imagine a shop without one tucked away somewhere!

And boring? Hell no, what car guy doesn't like looking at other car guys shops? It's the man equivalent of the real estate TV shows the ladies love so much!:D
 

JDee

Ancient Racer
1,797
2,001
Exp. Type
W2W Racing
Exp. Level
20+ Years
5 miles from Mosport
[QUOTE="JDee, post: 193951,
But the biggest question of all is, where is the most important thing for any shop? The beer fridge. As Nimitz said to Halsey, "the world wonders". ;)

Alright!!, another history guy!!..BTW that was designed to follow up a message to mess with Japanese intel guys, it wasn't supposed to be a dig, but history didn't record it that way..sadly Halsey, after the IJN turned around and stole defeat from victory at the cost of Taffy 3, was almost in gun range of the fleeing Japanese fleet when he reversed course...It would've been a shootout between the Iowa class BBs and the Yamato and escorting BBs.[/QUOTE]

Somewhat of a history guy, but especially about the Pacific war. My old man was one of the unfortunates that got sacrificed, er, sent, to Hong Kong. He was, obviously, one of the few fortunate ones to survive, though the survivors were all in seriously ill health. He was 4 years in hospital after the war but he recovered and led a full life. Passed on his love of cars and racing to me. We are our fathers' sons.

I think I've read John Toland's "The Rising Sun" 4 times and learn something new each time, an excellent history of the era.
 
Last edited:

TMO Supporting Vendors

Top