on November 1, 2012
Well, when it comes to motorsports there is one thing in this world that comes to mind for nearly any car enthusiast. SEMA. This is the show of all shows. It is the place where new vehicles are released, new products come to market and everyone attends. This year Project Baja was in attendance with Fingers Crossed Racing and a few other friends as well. The purpose of the trip was to meet some new people as well as say Hello to some of our old friends and that was successful. Along the way however, we saw some very cool vehicles and products as well.
Just walking into the show we stumbled on this beauty. The paint is amazing. It is a long time patina’d original paint job that was meticulously cleaned up and then cleared over. It has such an authentic look and makes it very original looking.
While we were cruising around the show, Raptors were everywhere. This would be the greatest support vehicle we could dream of, but of course a support vehicle that costs twice as much as your race car is a bit unrealistic for a low budget team. But when I stumbled on this one. Well, I couldn’t help myself to daydream of the possibilites…
We have been looking at lighting systems and when we were in the Baja Designs booth there was a Factory Five race car there. This cars owner, Yvonne, was ready to tell us all about the car. I really enjoyed chatting with her, but this little detail was kinda nice. There is a small green light, when that light turns on, you stop fueling. When you are dealing with gas cans and not an auto shutoff pump
Another vehicle that we would love to have for chase is the Local Motors Rally Fighter. I mean, seriously, look at this thing!
What else did we like finding? Well, Couplers. Man that sounds nerdy and boring, but when you are campaigning an old, air cooled vehicle with the possibility of, seriously, anything happening. You want to minimize your loss both in time and resources. So if we have to drop an engine, why not make it easy. Oil line couplers that are quick release, but also are able to stop the flow when disconnected? Yes, that sounds like a great plan! Maybe couplers for other areas of the car too that don’t require tools but make things fast and easy? Sure, why not. Companies like GoodRidge, Jiffy-tite and more had some cool solutions for this stuff.
For me, I have enjoyed good lookin’ vehicles for a long time, Many years ago I stumbled across Kirkham motorsports. They make full aluminum body Cobra Replicas and I have geeked out on the Polished alumimum version they made. This thing has brushed racing stripes and after many years I finally got to see it in real life.
So what else did we see? A ton of cool cars, road race cars, off road cars and more. Some real creativity and innovation has gone into some of the customs that were on hand from A Mach 5 mustang with a GT 40 drivetrain to a massive old school Dodge.. Check out some of the other odds and ends we came across.
And for fun, we got a good chance to watch the GRC finals just outside of the show. Premium viewing as well. It was a great show!
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