Vintage Race Car of the Week: The Chaparral 2J Sucker Car

[cjforumadmin]

http://www.bangshift.com/blog/Vintage-Race-Car-of-the-Week-The-Chaparral-2J-Sucker-Car.html

[LSX-GTO]

Re: Vintage Race Car of the Week: The Chaparral 2J Sucker Car

All the Jim Hall projects ROCK!!!!

His talent was incredible...

Ed

[TheSilverBuick]

Re: Vintage Race Car of the Week: The Chaparral 2J Sucker Car

I'm surprised he/they never figured out a way to make the snowmobile engine survive. Another great story Brian.

[JRoberts]

Re: Vintage Race Car of the Week: The Chaparral 2J Sucker Car

Brian thanks for another great piece of writing. I remember the "sucker car" and the wow factor it produced. It was even more unusual, as you point out, because it never really worked for an entire race. I can't imagine what went through the mind of the driver of the first car that particular Chaparral passed. Seeing those huge fans in the back must have been mind blowing. I wonder what kinds of speeds we would have seen if the car and the concept weren't nixed and other team/cars used a similar system.

[SpiderGearsMan]

Re: Vintage Race Car of the Week: The Chaparral 2J Sucker Car

like some of smokey's stuff .. how much of it was jim hall and how much of it was chevrolet 'not racing ' engineering ?

[BlackoutSteve]

Re: Vintage Race Car of the Week: The Chaparral 2J Sucker Car

There is also this..

http://www.bruce-mclaren.com/the-cars/canam

Also used the Reynolds Alum BBC engine.

[LSX-GTO]

Re: Vintage Race Car of the Week: The Chaparral 2J Sucker Car

[Weldangrind]

Re: Vintage Race Car of the Week: The Chaparral 2J Sucker Car

Hey Brian,

Great story! Do you happen to know if the snowmobile motors were two or four stroke? A two stroke can't starve for oil, because there isn't any (aside from the transmission side).

[TexasT]

Re: Vintage Race Car of the Week: The Chaparral 2J Sucker Car

According to the tour guide at the Petroleum Museum, the car was outlawed. Apparently the rules said one engine only and the snowblower engine was one too many.

If you're ever in the vicinity a trip to the museum is highly recommended. On the tour we took, the guide said they even get some of the cars out and 'exercise' them. I got on the list for an email for the next time they 'get them out to play'.





















Got a few more if any are interested. http://s444.photobucket.com/albums/q...20Hall%20Cars/

[tiresmoke!]

Re: Vintage Race Car of the Week: The Chaparral 2J Sucker Car

This stuff is just mind-boggling........talk about cutting-edge.

[Swede4]

Re: Vintage Race Car of the Week: The Chaparral 2J Sucker Car

Thanks Brain for the great story. I remember reading how the competitors of this Jim Hall vacuum cleaner complained about the debris being expelled by those fans ? imagine having one of these pass you on the outside of a corner?and then throw everything it found outside the groove at you! Love the story, keep it up.

[mustang13]

Re: Vintage Race Car of the Week: The Chaparral 2J Sucker Car

A friend that followed Jim Halls stuff told me that the sled ehgines were air cooled and over heated. Being a life long snowmobiler I could see how this happened, I've over heated them in the cold! One other thing bad for the other drivers on the track, anything on the track came out of the fans and in the face of who was behind it. Still, this is the kind of innovation that most classes of racing are killing with cookie cutter and spec. rules.

[ls7gto]

Re: Vintage Race Car of the Week: The Chaparral 2J Sucker Car

doesn't the "COX" decal just rock! Takes me back to a simpler time.

[SpiderGearsMan]

Re: Vintage Race Car of the Week: The Chaparral 2J Sucker Car

in road racing - innovations killed all of the fun of road racing

[Brian Lohnes]

Re: Vintage Race Car of the Week: The Chaparral 2J Sucker Car

Spidey...I'm figuring a way to buy you beers sometime. Chevy was in fact working on the same deal before Hall brought it out. It was a cobbled together design at the proving grounds, but it did happen. It was some "non-racing" race engineering.


Indeed competitors did complain about being showered with rocks and junk from the track being strewn up from the car. McLaren was the loudest and the most prominent complainer, which was completely ironic because they had dominated the series for years....figger that! ;)

Guys, thanks for reading and bringing out more finer points than possible in a "pocket" biography. Hell of an audience to be in cahoots with!

Brian