Race and play, well that's where this all started from. Some of you may remember 1 of my posts where I stated that I wanted to race the Best In The Desert, specifically the Mint 400. After much research and conversations with Cory Sappington from UTV Racing Association, I soon realized that being able to race the entire series may be a little bit out of my reach at this time. The main issue I had was cutting up the frame and plastics on my brand new car, I just wasn't down with that. I still wanted to race so after conversations with Cory I decided I would race more of a sportsman class or at least race when there wouldn't be full size trophy on the course at the same time. By going this route I would be allowed to run a bolt on cage with opening doors. This was important to me since this was not to be a purpose built race vehicle, this is going to be a race and play car. Racing allows me to challenge myself and test my own skills, but I'm also a family man and this is why I went with the utv over building another custom sand car or race car. Utv's opened the doors to more opportunity especially with the RZR being such a multipurpose vehicle. With a RZR my family and I can dune, trail ride, rock crawl and race.
Jump ahead 6 months and I've had the cage, doors and bumpers built. The two front seats have been installed on Jimco style sliders, unfortunately I feel they could be lowered another two inches so we'll be revisiting that later. The front and rear light bars have been mounted. I had the builder install a custom spare tire mount. The mount lifts up out of the way for access to whatever is in the bed. I plan to put 2 bags with spare parts/tools and a cooler during play mode. I still have a lot of little things to do including powder coat, wiring, installing mirrors, jack, pumpers etc. The two big items left to deal with are designing a way to bolt the doors shut and something for the fuel cell in regards to a firewall of some sort.
At this point I'm turning to the community for some final details. I have to decide on what kind of tires to run. I'm leaning towards the GBC Mongrel 30x10x14 wrapped around a set of GMZ bead lock's I've already purchased. I've not made a decision on the jack, I'm looking for something lightweight and easy to use obviously. I also need a set of pumpers, a horn and some fire extinguishers. I'd like if you guys could share your experience with different product.
I'm hoping that once I build this car I will find more race classes that are willing to accept me with my bolt on cage and opening doors (maybe even get to race the Mint). I feel that I'm not the only guy out there that wants to race but doesn't want to cut up their brand new car to do so. Hopefully if we get enough people interested in this class of racing we will find more races in the future for our level of build.
I may be new to racing but I'm definitely not new to this industry, I've been riding for as long as I can remember and know the desert like my own backyard. My goal has not changed from when I first started this mission, I want to complete a race.
At this time I'm shooting for the Parker race in January which has a class I can run. Please share any info you might have on racing or race requirements and ideas on a preferred jack, tires, fire extinguisher, pumpers, horn, the fuel cell firewall and anything else I might have missed. No matter what happens I will have a much safer car for my family to ride in and if all works out I will get to fulfill a goal of mine to run in a professional race.
Jump ahead 6 months and I've had the cage, doors and bumpers built. The two front seats have been installed on Jimco style sliders, unfortunately I feel they could be lowered another two inches so we'll be revisiting that later. The front and rear light bars have been mounted. I had the builder install a custom spare tire mount. The mount lifts up out of the way for access to whatever is in the bed. I plan to put 2 bags with spare parts/tools and a cooler during play mode. I still have a lot of little things to do including powder coat, wiring, installing mirrors, jack, pumpers etc. The two big items left to deal with are designing a way to bolt the doors shut and something for the fuel cell in regards to a firewall of some sort.
At this point I'm turning to the community for some final details. I have to decide on what kind of tires to run. I'm leaning towards the GBC Mongrel 30x10x14 wrapped around a set of GMZ bead lock's I've already purchased. I've not made a decision on the jack, I'm looking for something lightweight and easy to use obviously. I also need a set of pumpers, a horn and some fire extinguishers. I'd like if you guys could share your experience with different product.
I'm hoping that once I build this car I will find more race classes that are willing to accept me with my bolt on cage and opening doors (maybe even get to race the Mint). I feel that I'm not the only guy out there that wants to race but doesn't want to cut up their brand new car to do so. Hopefully if we get enough people interested in this class of racing we will find more races in the future for our level of build.
I may be new to racing but I'm definitely not new to this industry, I've been riding for as long as I can remember and know the desert like my own backyard. My goal has not changed from when I first started this mission, I want to complete a race.
At this time I'm shooting for the Parker race in January which has a class I can run. Please share any info you might have on racing or race requirements and ideas on a preferred jack, tires, fire extinguisher, pumpers, horn, the fuel cell firewall and anything else I might have missed. No matter what happens I will have a much safer car for my family to ride in and if all works out I will get to fulfill a goal of mine to run in a professional race.
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