So I've been thinking about this project for a couple of years now. I have always liked the history of dirt track racing and old time county fair type jalopy races. Particularly from the pre to immidiate post war time period. I have a pile of parts and a stock model A chassis with a decent running banger in it along with an old T coupester body and a pretty complete T coupe body that I'm thinking about using one or the other. Both are pretty rough and would lend themselves nicely to the jalopy, dirt track look. Anyways...my question is this...what modifications would have been done to your average car back in the 1930-early 1950's to set it up to race on the dirt? Welded doors, some sort of roll bars, wide 5 rims etc?? Any other suggestions photos etc???
From what I can recall of the late fiftys and early sixtys the use to run with the outside front tire tilted towards the radiator at the top. I assume they heated and bent the axle to get that effect. I was told that sometimes they used to chain or strap the suspension on the drivers side, probably to give the car a bit more tilt towards the drivers side. I did work with a guy who had raced quite a bit in the fiftys mostly on dirt tracks, and he said about all he ever did for engine mods was to have the head milled, and change cams. He was running flathead Ford sixes. Hope this helps.
The Jalopy Journal
