This 24 Hours of LeMons thing seems to warp the minds of once-sane car builders more deeply with each passing year. We thought it would be impossible to top the brain-boilingly great race-car creations we saw in 2012, but we were wrong! To put a bow on the eighth season of 24 Hours of LeMons action, we're going to share some of the best cars that debuted (or were revamped beyond recognition) during 2013. Here we go!
We started off the '13 season at Carolina Motorsports Park in South Carolina, and got knocked on our asses right away by the sight of Speedycop's "Spirit of LeMons" 1956 Cessna 310 road-racer. Speedycop and his Gang of Outlaws began building their amazing LeMons cars during the 2009 season, and (as we'll see shortly) they weren't done once they put their road-racing airplane on the track.
The Spirit of LeMons triggered a global media frenzy that has yet to subside, but things got even crazier when Porcubimmer Racing turned their BMW 325e into a very fast replica of The Homer. There were some rumblings of disapproval from Fox's legal department at first, but then Simpsons creator Matt Groening gave The Homer replica his stamp of approval and all was well. The Homer went on to finish fifth in a very tough 154-entry field at Buttonwillow.
Photo courtesy of David Moore Photo
With LeMons racing already staggering from a conflagration of mainstream attention thanks to the Cessna and the Homer, Speedycop and the Gang of Outlaws came right back and dumped a barrel of chlorine triflouride onto the flames with The Upside-Down Camaro. This fine racing machine is a Ford Festiva chassis with a fourth-gen Camaro body attached, and during its first few laps at any race, it causes the sort of mass confusion also seen from the Azz Backwards pickup truck.
Since the Gang of Outlaws were on a roll, they also created the Honda Accordion, which functions as a real musical instrument.
With so many cars that we want to see in a LeMons race, it never even occurred to us to ask for a Rolls-Royce. Then Pennsylvania-based Three Pedal Mafia (you may remember 3PM as the creators of the road-racing Sea Sprite boat) managed to find a 1969 Rolls-Royce Silver Shadow for just a thousand bucks. The car's interior had a somewhat scary mycotoxin problem and it wasn't quite drivable, but it was a genuine Roller and that was enough! They sold a few parts off it to get the purchase price under the LeMons-mandated $500 budget (not that we'd be too strict about the nickels and dimes with a car like this), got it running, caged it, and raced it.
We've always suffered from a shortage of Rootes Group cars in this series. There was the Team Tinworm 1959 Humber Super Snipe wagon and that was it . . . until the Flaming A-Holes dug up a 1964 Hillman Imp and drifted it around Sears Point, winning the Index of Effluency at that race.
Another British car we never expected to see in a race was the Silversleeves Racing Austin ADO17 "Landcrab" sedan, which showed up at the Pacific Northworst race with a Mazda V-6 swap and a profoundly defective Hydrolastic suspension.
It was an excellent year for Austin products in LeMons racing. Here's the Austin Powerless 1975 Austin Marina, which won the coveted Index of Effluency award at the Capitol Offense race. The Marina (badged as a Morris in Britain and an Austin in North America) is best known as the car Jeremy Clarkson proclaimed to be the worst vehicle ever built, which of course makes it ideal for LeMons.
A few months later, another Austin made a big impression on us, when the Union of American Wrenchers team found a deal on a threesome of long-forgotten Austin Americas aka BMC ADO16s, flew Austin America expert Spank out from California, and and made one raceable car out of the parts at the Gator-O-Rama race in Texas.
Speaking of long-term LeMons Legend Spank, in addition to various terrible British Leyland products, he has raced a Citroën DS, a veggie-oil-diesel-powered Corvette, and a Harley-Davidson-powered Toyota Prius. The latest Spank-built LeMons car is this 1967 Oldsmobile Toronado, which debuted at the Arse Freeze-a-Palooza.
The Toronado wasn't the only vintage (a.k.a. rusty basket-case) Detroit machine to dodge the crusher thanks to LeMons racing this year. Here's the Team Fairlylame 1964 Ford Fairlane.
The Escape Velocity Racing 1964 Dodge Dart, complete with Slant-6 engine and pushbutton shifter, debuted at the same South Carolina race as the Fairlane, then went on to take the Index of Effluency win at the Gator-O-Rama in Houston.
The Coming From Behind 1966 Dodge Dart came close to winning Class B at the Arse Freeze, thanks to its tunnel-ram-fed 318 V-8.
At the South Fall race, the legendary NSF Racing brought two ancient American cars: a terrifyingly rusty 1972 Plymouth Fury III coupe and a not-quite-as-rusty 1956 Ford Crown Victoria "roadster" (courtesy of some Sawzall work) with 272-cubic-inch Y-block V-8 and three-on-the-tree manual transmission. The Fury had difficulty passing the tech inspection and managed just 48 laps, while the '56 finished a stately 80 laps total.
It should go without saying that American Motors products are much prized by true LeMons aficionados, and so the approval rating of the 2013 team-points championship-winning Rally Baby Racing 1975 AMC "Whorenet" (which boasts a blow-through-carbureted turbocharger setup on its 256-cubic-inch straight-six engine) stands at an even 100 percent. This car managed to avoid blowing up for an entire weekend, which earned Rally Baby the Index of Effluency trophy at the There Goes the Neighborhood race.
Another AMC machine benefiting from junkyard forced induction, the Morrow's Auto AMC Gremlin received 3.8 liters of supercharged GM power (courtesy of a blown 3800 that once lived in the Morrow-built Bradley GT). Starting with their twin-turbo GMC 1-ton van back in 2009, Morrow's Auto has been building an increasingly insane string of great LeMons cars, and we look forward to seeing the additions to their fleet in 2014.
2013 was a great year for LeMons AMCs; we saw our first-ever three-AMC race at the B.F.E. GP event in Colorado, with a Marlin, a Pacer, and the first appearance of the Crapple Wapple Do Dang Gang 1970 Gremlin. Equipped with manual transmission and warmed-up 258, this Gremlin ought to be pretty quick once it gets sorted out.
Also making its first appearance in Colorado, the Rocket Surgery Racing 1978 Checker Marathon took the Index of Effluency at that race, then went on to rival the Donner Party for cross-country frozen misery in its drive from Denver to the season-ending race in California. We'll return to that story in great detail in the near future.
For the Pacific Northworst race, the King Henry the V8th team swapped their Cadillac Deville for this jailbreak-themed 1976 Chevy Nova.
RIP Racing brought another a memorable Malaise Era GM product to the Gator-O-Rama race: this 1979 GMC Caballero, done up as "Barbie's Corvette."
The oldest of the old Detroit entries this year was the Chase Race 1952 Hudson Hornet, which won the Index of Effluency at the Pacific Northworst race in Washington. This car, complete with original straight-six flathead engine, automatic transmission, and about a 55-gallon drumload of Bondo on the bodywork, was slow but beautiful on the track.
In addition to the great classic Detroit cars that graced our tracks in 2013, we saw some happy-inducing foreign steel as well. The 1971 Volvo 1800E of LOL Racing, gorgeous in spite of its gaping rust holes, took the Index of Effluency at the Vodden the Hell Are We Doing race at Thunderhill.
Rear-wheel-drive and 58 pushrod horsepower gave the AMCI Starletans and their intensely stock '82 Toyota Starlet the IOE win at the Arse Freeze.
The Team Bad Decision Mercedes-Benz W123 awed us all with its mid-mounted Chrysler 440 V-8 swap and homemade dry-sump oil system.
Keeping the factory diesel engine in your old Benz also makes us very happy, as Team Idle Clatter discovered when we gave them the IOE award for their first race in this 1979 300SD.
In fact, you really can't go wrong with a diesel engine in LeMons racing. Zero Budget Racing complemented their existing Chevette Diesel with this Isuzu I-Mark Diesel (which served as a much-loved Judgemobile last year) and doubled their enjoyment of oil-burning GM T-body racing.
On the subject of puzzling-yet-glorious engine swaps, the 1989 BMW 325 of No Business Racing continued a cherished E30 engine-swap tradition with its GM 4.3-liter V-6 torn from a Chevy Astro van. This car finished 106th out of 117, but we're sure it will dominate once the bugs have been worked out.
A great theme can also help your E30 win the hearts of the LeMons organizers. Here's the Hella Shitty BMW at Sears Point.
Likewise, the Team NYANCAR 5-series drove everyone crazy (in a good way) with its loudspeakers blasting the Nyan Cat Song. All weekend long.
Trucks are always welcome in our race, especially heavy four-wheel-drive pickups with 1960s-technology pushrod L6 engines. The TGTW Offroad Jeep Comanche did amazingly well at the North Dallas Hooptie race.
Grandpa Dave's Motorsports turned this 1991 Chevrolet S-10 into a credible fire truck for the Southern Discomfort race.
The Mater Madness S-10 was the best-executed Tow Mater theme we've seen yet.
The Pit Crew Revenge Mazda pickup-based camper, complete with dead chicken and curtains fluttering out the windows, made us wish for a camper spec-racing series.
Vans belong on race tracks! Here's the weirdly quick Volkswagen Vanagon of Team Westafari.
Image courtesy of Head-On Photos
With its Run-D.M.C. theme and place on our original Cars We'd Like To See In LeMons wish list, the Jackie Stewart's Coin Purse Racing Ford EXP was a big hit at the incredibly hard-fought Chubba Cheddar Enduro at Road America.
Does racing get any better than a showdown between three big front-wheel-drive GM sedans of the 21st century and three Volvo 850s?
The Iron Duke engine remains a LeMons favorite. Here's the bone-stock 1987 Olds Cutlass Ciera of Party Sheep Racing.
Great themes abounded. Sorry For Party Racing stay in their frighteningly accurate LMFAO costumes all race weekend, and their Firebird always contends for the lead, except when they misjudge an opening at NHMS and put their left front wheel through another car's side window.
The Syndicate of Texas converted their "Jettarossa" into a bamboo-ized rolling tiki bar.
This Dodge Shadow became The Little Engine That Could.
What's a good theme for a Wisconsin Neon? Team Udder Chaos turned their '96 Dodge into an upside-down cow, complete with milk-squirting udders.
Also in Wisconsin, the Oregon Fail "covered wagon" Honda Civic.
We've been begging for years for some team to do a really good Bosozoku style car. Finally, Team BTB 1 did this with their 1992 Nissan Sentra.
Stick Figure Racing proved to the world that a twin-engined, four-wheel-drive, automatic+manual-transmission-equipped Toyota MR2/Toyota Corolla mashup could stay in one piece on a road course, and so they came back and built this twin-engined Toyota Corolla "FX32″. Sadly, this car flipped over at Thunderhill, but we expect it to return in 2014.
Another very sensible engine-swap idea was executed by the Knoxvegas Lowballers, who stuffed a Ford Contour SVT V-6 engine in the rear of a Geo Metro. Sure, thousands of a few issues need to be sorted out before this car lives up to its potential, but 2014 promises to be a great year for Lowballer domination!
Last and most certainly least, we've got the NSF Racing 1987 Plymouth Reliant-K wagon, which roamed the country and broke the hearts of countless racers during 2013. We'll be telling the complete story of the yearlong "K-It-FWD" fiasco pretty soon, so check in later.
With so many legendary cars in the past year, I'm sure I forgot a few—apologies from LeMons correspondent Murilee Martin a.k.a. Judge Phil if your supremely qualified car didn't make this list. Be sure to check out the official LeMons wrap-up videos, add your favorite LeMons teams to your Facebook likes, and visit the Car and Driver LeMons Inexplicable Presentation page!
from Car and Driver Blog http://blog.caranddriver.com
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