What are the Challenge builds that you'll never be able to do?

The idea is to share that weird car design that you know you won't be able to do, but someone might.

Most recent one for me is something I call the Modular B-body, or the El-Blazermino Wagon (the name could stand some workshopping.)

Start with a mid 80s B-body, probably a sedan.  Chop, cut, and weld so that you can make it into an El Camino, a sedan, or a wagon.  At each event have it be in a different mode.  LS motor and manual trans and done.

Less pie in the sky, and more likely to happen, when I finally get in gear to build my hat-truck I plan on bringing the Crown Vic base and leave the keys in the ignition at the starting grid, letting anyone and everyone drive it.  The goal is to at one point have every seat filled and a pro driver piloting.

A 164 v6 powered X19.  Which was one of our ideas coming back from one of the Challenges we went to.

Probably would have never fit, but it was an interesting idea.  At the time, one could get two 164 or 155 Twin Spark 2.0L Nord motors from Italy for ~$1000, some of which were the entire powertrain.   That would have been a possible fit.

Mid engine v8 tube frame under something old and light.  
 

not because I can't, but I just don't want to anymore 

My idea back in the day of a four door E30 with a Ford 460 set where the front seats were. IIRC the rules then stated that the whole body had to be present so my plan was to cut the pillars and use the roof as a tonneau cover. The pillars could then be used to fill in areas as needed. I think it's still a valid idea but I don't think I could cut an E30 now.

alfadriver said:

A 164 v6 powered X19.  Which was one of our ideas coming back from one of the Challenges we went to.

Probably would have never fit, but it was an interesting idea.  At the time, one could get two 164 or 155 Twin Spark 2.0L Nord motors from Italy for ~$1000, some of which were the entire powertrain.   That would have been a possible fit.

Apparently it does fit, because someone built one for Lemons racing and it was glorious. They called it the Launcha Splatos and decorated it with squashed tomato graphics. I thought one would make an awesome summertime fun car.

My Challenge car I'll probably never get around to - partially because car values have crept up in the meantime - was a Volvo 242 with a Lexus/Toyota 1UZ v8 swap.

In reply to Stampie :

You just need a E36 M3ty enough E30

I figure that I don't have the skills to come up with a tube-frame beast, so I always wanted to either find a kids abandoned Civic project and do my best to score at the autocross and concourse, or find something with decent power but too much weight and put it on a radical diet. 

dculberson said:

alfadriver said:

A 164 v6 powered X19.  Which was one of our ideas coming back from one of the Challenges we went to.

Probably would have never fit, but it was an interesting idea.  At the time, one could get two 164 or 155 Twin Spark 2.0L Nord motors from Italy for ~$1000, some of which were the entire powertrain.   That would have been a possible fit.

Apparently it does fit, because someone built one for Lemons racing and it was glorious. They called it the Launcha Splatos and decorated it with squashed tomato graphics. I thought one would make an awesome summertime fun car.

My Challenge car I'll probably never get around to - partially because car values have crept up in the meantime - was a Volvo 242 with a Lexus/Toyota 1UZ v8 swap.

That's pretty awesome.  At the time, $500 164's were pretty common- financially, it would have been possible.

Since we had the idea well before LeMons existed, I'll give credit to my friend who suggested it.

Patrick said:

Mid engine v8 tube frame under something old and light.  
 

not because I can't, but I just don't want to anymore 

You could have helped AC develop his middie V8 Corvair back in '04.  That thing has some serious potential.

A small FWD car with the rear axle replaced by 2 wrecked sportbike rear halves. Triple engine, AWD, with IRS and torque vectoring bysomehow biasing the sportbike throttles based on steering input. 

maschinenbau said:

A small FWD car with the rear axle replaced by 2 wrecked sportbike rear halves. Triple engine, AWD, with IRS and torque vectoring bysomehow biasing the sportbike throttles based on steering input. 

I'm going to apply the term "evil genius" here, with my greatest respect and admiration. 

Bike engine spridget...  

I have this want to build one, challenge it, then probably upgrade some things and take it to trackdays.  

I wont get around to it, I have kids and an F500 I am jonesing to get out and drive more...

mid/rear engine LH body. 

Engine sits on a fully removable subframe so just need to cut as much as needed from the rear of the LH. It looks doable from my non-scientific guesstimation, move fuel tank to the front area, use a pair of civic rads, angle air into the rear doors and duct said air either down under the car (cheaper) or replace rear glass with lexan and have it vented for heat to escape (not cheap).

Finding challenge priced LH's has become near impossible. When cars are posted as 'Engine makes noise, transmission doesn't shift $3000' and has 3 blurry photos of a very ragged out body, its not worth calling to even look at because its maybe a $200 car max if that. No idea why these cars have suddenly shot up in value locally. 

I'm also 3516.6kms (2185.1miles) away from the challenge, so I'm better off doing a fly-in to join the festivities of the challenge.

edited for: spelling mistake

*checks list*
 

*waits for new rules*

3500m Chrysler drivetrain put in the rear of a 914 with prowler tcm for paddle shift and itbs for noise. Have delta regrind the cams. 

Orange and carbon fiber. 

I bought a $300 orange 914 to do it once. Ripped it in half pulling onto the trailer.....

Chevy Corsica with dual 3.1V6/TH125 drivetrains and nitrous.

maschinenbau said:

A small FWD car with the rear axle replaced by 2 wrecked sportbike rear halves. Triple engine, AWD, with IRS and torque vectoring bysomehow biasing the sportbike throttles based on steering input. 

I went down this rabbit hole at one point trying to find a bike that had a single sided swingarm that switched sides in one model run. IIRC it exists, but I don't remember which bike. You would of course need a lateral link to support the swingarm. I don't know if the axle bearing is designed for much in the way of lateral load, but I can't think of many more amusing ways to find out.

MrJoshua said:

maschinenbau said:

A small FWD car with the rear axle replaced by 2 wrecked sportbike rear halves. Triple engine, AWD, with IRS and torque vectoring bysomehow biasing the sportbike throttles based on steering input. 

I went down this rabbit hole at one point trying to find a bike that had a single sided swingarm that switched sides in one model run. IIRC it exists, but I don't remember which bike. You would of course need a lateral link to support the swingarm. I don't know if the axle bearing is designed for much in the way of lateral load, but I can't think of many more amusing ways to find out.

Got your start here:

https://www.facebook.com/commerce/listing/932522724129346/?media_id=1&ref=share_attachment

Yeah right and give away all my winning ideas? 

The BDT has a extensive text exchange where about every 3 days we get excited about a completely ludicrous challenge car idea.  Ones that make the LMP360 seem somehow sane.  

Currently we tend to focus on insane Autobianchi and Fiat X19 based builds because we have extra of those laying around.  

The one I won't do that would be cool would be putting a Fiat 500E drivetrain and battery pack in the Autobianchi.  It won't happen because I'm scared of electrons and just don't know enough about that world to make it successful.  Maybe someday but for now it's just a pie in the sky option.  

In reply to eastsideTim :

I have seen this, I don't know if it has nitrous, but it runs and drives, was at a C&C, Bethlehem PA Dual 3.4 V6, automatic trans(s).

In reply to slefain :

That's what I'm talking about!

Any chances I had of building a Challenge car probably died when my ex- and I broke up years ago.  I don't have the patience to look for deals to keep a build under budget and I have a hell of a time staying motivated to keep working on a project.  My ex- was amazing at finding deals when she wanted to and nobody could keep me working on a project like she could. Of course, we also drove each other crazy, so who knows if a Challenge project would have ended us any faster than the house renovation project did.  The trick would have been getting her actually interested in doing a Challenge car - it would have to be something she liked.  But if someone could get her interested, the natural engineer would take over and she'd be on the project like a rabid chihuahua on a pork chop... at least for about 6 months until that interest burned out. 

Otherwise, my probably with building a Challenge car has always been the singular focus most of the builds tend to be.  I would need the car to be useful for something post-Challenge. And would likely need to remain street legal.  Maybe someday when my current project load isn't over my head.

I would like to build a T-bucket or other sort of classic hotrod.

Mid-engine, rear drive Civic.  Preferably 1992-1995 coupe.  It should be fairly straight forward and inexpensive, but I cannot imagine having enough free time to do it.  By the time my kids are older and I have some time, some other idea will make more sense to me.  And I'll probably come up with an excuse for not doing it too.

A Fiero with a 3800SC motor putting maybe 350hp to the ground.

Manufacturers spent a TON of time effort and money designing their products.   My thinking is that improving their production compromises is better than reinventing their entire product.