Ray Brown Lakester… More details.

The HAMB History post What happened to Ray Brown’s 27 Lakes roadster? by Jimmy B had some great images of the car, including a rear 3/4 shot with the turtle deck off that I had never seen. Its pretty rare to find very many clear, in-progress construction shots for lakes or Bonneville racers in the 50s. I recently stumbled upon a shot of the Brown 27 that I have never seen: A photo of the complete Flattie drivetrain bolted into the rear trailing arms.

It was explained in the May 1950 Hot Rod as: “A tubing ‘cradle’ supports the engine and is attached to the rear axle housings. It is suspended in front with a ball-joint in the center of a cross-member, which allows the complete assembly to flex with the sprung rear end.”

From the magazine description and the other images of the 27 I had seen, it wasn’t clear to me how much of a removable unit this actually was. It looks like Ray engineered it to unbolt from the car very easily for major repairs, motor swaps, etc. You’ll also notice that its not a V8-60 in the image, but a full size 59AB. Obviously set up to run in another class.