I made probably my biggest automotive mistake last year buying the same car I had in HS, a 1985 mustang GT with a T5 and T-Tops, sight unseen. It wasn't a huge outlay of money in my overall budget but it was enough to sting a little bit. Once I got it, there was a ton of issues that honestly soured me on the car.
So the good part of the car is that it is a southern car from birth so absolutely no rust. It has been repainted at some point and is a 10' car. Looks decent but not great.
So I'm debating on what to do with the car. I can cut bait and run with it and sell it at a loss just to get rid of it or I can go race car with it. If I go race car with it, part of that will be rally cross since there is a great scene here in Central TX.
So thoughts on an old fox body with a 7.5" rear in Rally Cross? I mean I know all cars can work.
Javelin
MegaDork
3/31/22 10:53 p.m.
Honestly those are worth a LOT to the right market. Pretty sure you could make money on it...
But as for rallycross, sure why not? The 7.5 should make it once. I'd be more worried about the unibody flexing and cracking.
dps214
Dork
3/31/22 11:48 p.m.
My general rule for rallycross is no t-tops, especially on cars with already flexible chassis. But people do it and it seems to generally not end up with an interior full of shattered glass. It does mean that already weak chassis is going to be even weaker and chassis wear/damage might be a concern like Javelin referenced.
One of the detroit guys has been running one (not a t-top) for a while. It's not a winner but it seems to be fast enough to consistently not be last and to keep running it. I never talked to him much but it doesn't seem to have any major reliability issues.
I think one of the PA guys spent a lot of time trying to get either a fox or sn95 to handle well in rallycross, and eventually gave up. It might be fun, but it may be very hard to make it competitive.
NickD
MegaDork
4/1/22 7:29 a.m.
I seem to recall ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ briefly had a rallycross Fox-Body GT. It wasn't great.
NickD said:
I seem to recall ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ briefly had a rallycross Fox-Body GT. It wasn't great.
It was great at kicking up gravel. Avoiding cones not so much.
I think I have a good consensus here. I think I'll probably dump it here soon.
Thanks for the input everyone.
dps214 said:
My general rule for rallycross is no t-tops, especially on cars with already flexible chassis. But people do it and it seems to generally not end up with an interior full of shattered glass. It does mean that already weak chassis is going to be even weaker and chassis wear/damage might be a concern like Javelin referenced.
One of the detroit guys has been running one (not a t-top) for a while. It's not a winner but it seems to be fast enough to consistently not be last and to keep running it. I never talked to him much but it doesn't seem to have any major reliability issues.
If you mean Scott Beute's SN95, he has a lot done to the chassis. Griggs torque arm and Panhard rod so the rear end works well, front subframe with better geometry and shifted wheelbase, etc. It is a really nice setup.
Texas? Weren't you in CS? I only remember because I lived there until a few years ago.
Foxbody prices are way up, you should be able to sell it and probably make a little profit over your purchase price.
Duke
MegaDork
4/1/22 9:44 a.m.
moxnix said:
NickD said:
I seem to recall ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ briefly had a rallycross Fox-Body GT. It wasn't great.
It was great at kicking up gravel. Avoiding cones not so much.
IIRC, he basically said it was best at scaring the crap out of corner workers, because the only way to avoid chronic understeer was to provoke it into hanging the ass out all the time.
All of my Fox body experience has been on pavement and was when they were relatively new cars. My recollection, however it that they handled best if you followed Collin Chapman's "Any suspension, no matter how poorly designed, can be made to work reasonably well if you just stop it from moving." philosophy. That seems like a poor strategy for rally cross. With the T-tops you will get some compliance through the flexing body but tuning that is challenging.
In reply to untchabl :
No I won't. It'll ease the pain but definitely not a profit. It was a bad purchase on my side from 1000 miles away.
WillG80, Austin but I did a lot of the TAM autox in the day.
moxnix said:
NickD said:
I seem to recall ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ briefly had a rallycross Fox-Body GT. It wasn't great.
It was great at kicking up gravel. Avoiding cones not so much.
As I recall, the cone count was about 50/50 between gravel spray and uncontrollable sliding. I have pits in my windshield from staging too close behind it in start. Way too much power to be usable with 2wd. The motor was definitely not stock, though.
I'd rallycross anything, but that's me. If you want to sell your '85 5.0; I really love the year and history of them. You could maybe work a trade with me for a proven rallycross car too....
In reply to AnthonyGS (Forum Supporter) :
If it has four wheels and passes tech, it's rallycross worthy 
Might not set the world on fire but it will most likely leave you grinning!
SN95. I cannot tell you if it is competitive because I am trying to figure out how to drive, but one thing is for sure....FUN and smiles ear to ear.
Long ago I had a failed (and ill-advised) Group 5 Fox body 5.0/5-speed project that I Rallycrossed...once. For me, the terrible weight distribution and lack of any rear grip kind of took all of the fun out of it. I'm sure the lack of dirt-oriented tires was a contributing factor but, if I were to do it again, I'd go with a base, v6 model on all-terrain or Rally tires for a slightly less maddening experience.
I *think* it had anti-squat brackets in the upper control arm mounts too so it *should* have had a bit more traction than stock but any throttle input at all resulted in tire spin with little to no noticeable acceleration at all.
In reply to The_Jed :
If I were to "build" a Fox body, I'd start with a four cylinder. You can make too much power with a 2.3. I'd also want to take the rear upper control arms off and throw them far, far away, replacing them with a torque arm and Panhard rod. I'd prefer a 3 link or 4 link but that looks unsimple to package in the Fox chassis without wholesale re-engineering the back of the car.
In the front, the biggest problems are that the steering rack is absolutely horrible for steering feel, the suspension geometry is bad, and the steering geometry has anti-Ackerman. There used to be things you could do with redrilling this and shifting that, nowadays I'd think about just chucking the whole front suspension out and putting a Volvo 740 crossmember in there. I am fairly sure I have a way to put a certain Ford 4x4 1/4" bolt pattern hub on the Volvo stub to get you preloaded style wheel bearings like an SN95 but without having to use five lug wheels.
rslifkin said:
Pete. (l33t FS) said:
In reply to AnthonyGS (Forum Supporter) :
If it has four wheels and passes tech, it's rallycross worthy
Might not set the world on fire but it will most likely leave you grinning!
Seconded.
I agree, but some platforms are definitely better to start with. I have a great starter rallycross car for sale if anyone is looking.
Yeah, I'm not looking at that big of a project. With the world opening up, I'll be overseas at least a third of the year. I'll be posting a for sale ad probably in May after I get back from Miami.
AnthonyGS (Forum Supporter) said:
I agree, but some platforms are definitely better to start with. I have a great starter rallycross car for sale if anyone is looking.
Absolutely. Plenty of things can be fun, but have no hope of being competitive. That was absolutely the story when I was rallycrossing the Jeep. It wasn't uncommon for me to be one of the fastest cars through a fast slalom (I had a lot more tire and power than most), but once you add in the tight bits of the course I was lucky if I finished better than mid-pack (never really got that dialed in, it was either 2wd and can't put down power or 4wd and fight to get it to rotate).
