Oddball of Oddballs: Jensen-Healey in ITS

[Knestis]

You guys are certainly braver than I am. The father of a friend of mine in school had a J-H and we thought it was the coolest thing on the road. When it was on the road, that is.

Best wishes on the project. Maybe we can schedule an opportunity for me to come drink some stout and stand around not working on it...

K

[JeffYoung]

David, great to hear from you. HOpe to see you back on track shortly. VIR in October?

Brave and stupid are synomyns in the racing world..lol....come by any time. It is an interesting piece. I do seriously think it has more potential than my TR8, and is certainly a better canidate to get dropped back to ITA as it doesn't have the V8 stigma -- and there I think it could really be competitive.

Kirk, come on down sometime and have a look. And bring your grinder, no standing allowed....lol. Seriously, plenty to look at it in Ron's garage: the J-H project, a nearly complete GT40 replica he built himself, an M3 and a 91 Esprit Turbo. Lots of cool stuff and he does almost all his work himself,including programming chips for the Lotus.

Also, saw you guys are getting the Golf ready for the 13 hour Enduro. Myself, Mark Whight and three others are going to run a Spec Miata. Should be a fun event -- saw your webpage, and it definitely helped us think about some of the organizing/prep we need to do.

Jeff

[Ron Earp]

Kirk, come on down with Jeff sometime. I want to meet more folks in this sort of thing to get my car going, and I can give a lot of help too. Like most of folks I'm sure, I can fabricate, weld, build motors, do electrics, etc. and I don't mind helping out. I've got a fairly decent shop to work in and am always up for getting into something provided the wife and little one lets me.

------------------
Ron
http://www.gt40s.com
Lotus Turbo Esprit
BMW E36 M3
RF GT40 Replica
Jensen-Healey

[Ron Earp]

I was able to get to VIR to check out some racing yesterday and throughly enjoyed it, wish I had longer to see the IT race. Damn.

JH update - car is being assembled and from what I'm finding it is worth more as pieces than as a car. I've already sold the first batch of Ebay pulloffs from the car and netted $582.00 - not bad! JHs apparently are rare enough that stuff like sunvisors go for $114 on Ebay, if you can believe it. Anyhow, I've got two more "batches" of parts to go and with luck I might have a zero cost race car (zero as in intitial purchase price before it becomes the money pit!!!).

Tech stuff is rally hard to find. Most JH'ers are preservationists and are asking questions on their boards like "How many inches was the stock seat from the steering wheel, and what sort of standard deviation is there out there in the production lots?". So, finding out info about heads, cams, etc. is not so easy. There are some sources, but most come from my Lotus fellows on their boards.

I'll post some pictures at some point, but thanks to the various folks up at VIR yesterday that entertained my stupid questions with viable answers. Best,

Ron

------------------
Ron
http://www.gt40s.com
Lotus Turbo Esprit
BMW E36 M3
RF GT40 Replica
Jensen-Healey

[JeffYoung]

Actually, might have been good that you didn't stick around from the IT race to see me drop like a rock from my 12th place starting position due to a missed shift and a couple of stupid driver mistakes. Oh well..from the highs of a 2:22 in the morning session to struggling to stay in 17th place with crappy brakes...that's racing.

You around this evening? I'll stop by and check out the J-H if you are. Maybe do some work if you have a few minutes.

Jeff

[Super Swift]

You may want to contact Robinson Racing of Alpharetta GA as they prepared a J-H for ITS a few years back.

[Ron Earp]

I did try but came up a dead end. Fellow I spoke with said he knew the car, but not where it went or if it remained in service. Another fellow I spoke with said he remembered the car but didn't know if it was competitive or not.

------------------
Ron
http://www.gt40s.com
Lotus Turbo Esprit
BMW E36 M3
RF GT40 Replica
Jensen-Healey

[itascca]

Jeff...amazing...simply amazing! You have done a nice job with the TR-8...best with the J-H. Bring it out! We need a few more "odd" cars running out there...just to liven it up!


Ed Forrest
AMC Spirit-GT
IT-A 94

By the way...if anyone knows where there is a 4 cylinder AMC Spirit or Concord...we need a rear end! Talk about odd stuff!

[JeffYoung]

Ed! Good to hear from you.

Yes, I've got the car running pretty good at VIR. Still a few seconds in it (the driver).
Having a blast that's for sure.

On the AMC, I've got to run our local junkyard to pick up some bits for a friends Camaro sometime in the next couple of weeks. I'll see if there is any AMC stuff out there.

Do you ever make it to VIR? Come on out sometime. An IT field with a TR8, a Jensen-Healey and an AMC Spirit would be quite the sight.

[racer14itc]

Originally posted by JeffYoung:

Do you ever make it to VIR? Come on out sometime. An IT field with a TR8, a Jensen-Healey and an AMC Spirit would be quite the sight.

How about if you added an ITA Corvair to the mix? My dad actually has an ITA legal Corvair sitting in his shop in Dobson, NC. I built the car in the early 90's for auto-x and driver's school but ended up racing a VW Scirocco instead.

It probably wouldn't take much prodding to get him out on the track with it, or I might even strap in just for giggles sometime.

MC




------------------
Mark Coffin
#14 GP BSI Racing/Airborn Coatings/The Shop VW
Scirocco
Zephyr Race Coaching and Consulting
http://pages.prodigy.net/Scirocco14gp

[lateapex911]

There is NOTHING like following an old Corvair around for a few laps...man those things are the very definition of the term "slip angle"!

No reason to put numbers on the back, anybody behind the thing can read the nubers off the doors just fine in the corners!

Get that thing on the track!

------------------
Jake Gulick
CarriageHouse Motorsports
ITA 57 RX-7
New England Region
[email protected]

[Joel Topy]

Hi Jeff, You are not the only one who has been looking at a Jensen. Mine is sitting under a cover in the driveway waiting to become an IT car. It came from California and has been a street car for all of its 105,000 miles. Last year at Mid-Ohio during the runoffs I was able to talk to Joe Huffaker about their cars and his thoughts about running one in IT. My impression was that it was do-able. I have started to acquire parts for the project, mostly bushings and other suspension parts, a spare car (it broke in two when we took it off the trailer) but I still need an extra drivetrain and shocks/springs. The BIG hold up in moving the project forward is the 944 Porsche that sits between the garage and the Jensen, seems it wanted to be an ITS car before the JH showed up. Know anyone who would like a 944 for solo's or racing? If I start another project I'll be living in the motor home, anyway good luck with the project and if you bring it to Mid-Ohio you will have a couple of exta crew members (like it or not!) Joel
[email protected]

[Ron Earp]

The Jensen is progressing nicely. I'm assembling parts to rebuild the rear suspension and hope to have it back in place by next week.

I've welded metal in place for numerous rust repairs and completely stripped the interior and dash for the cage builder. Gauges are on order, trying to make some sense of the wiring harness, which has been seriously torn up over the years.

I've also located spare heads, cams, blocks, and some other parts that are in route to be used for the motor. I don't plan on doing anything to the motor for the first season other than make sure it will run relabily.

Seems the car could work well in IT but it will take a lot of development and since no others are racing, lots of footwork. My Lotus ties are helping out a lot though!

Best,
Ron

------------------
Ron
http://www.gt40s.com
Lotus Turbo Esprit
BMW E36 M3
RF GT40 Replica
Jensen-Healey: IT prep progressing!