Meet the Fleet – Sportscars: Ford J-Car

• BODY: Aurora
• WHEELS & TIRES: Vincent

We’re rapidly reaching the end of the sports cars for our MtF features; toward the bottom of the barrel we find an example of an ugly car that’s been a very hot performer. The Ford J-Car, developed as a successor to the GT-40, wasn’t much of a looker. It was, however, extremely technologically advanced, especially its lightweight bonded aluminum honeycomb construction. The seeds of greatness might have been sown with this car, but instead it became a historical footnote because it never really got to strut its stuff on the track after legendary driver Ken Miles was killed while testing one at Riverside Speedway after infamously being cheated out of his LeMans win by a botched PR stunt in 1966. To this day no one really knows how the crash that killed Miles occurred, but after that tragedy, a decision was made somewhere, by someone, to scrap the J-car project. Fortunately, many of the advances that went into it were incorporated into the Mk IV variation of G.T.-40, with which Ford went on to win LeMans 3 more years in a row. A small handful of these cars have survived and occasionally show up on the vintage racing circuit.

I honestly can’t remember now whether this car was another Cigar Box conversion or whether it was originally a slot body; what I do remember is that I wanted the blue and white version that looked like the original real car, but every time I found one for sale it kept being too expensive; I found this blue and yellow version at a next-to-nothing price and I guess I bought it because I was frustrated in looking for the one I wanted and figured it would be a “stop-gap” to satisfy me until I could find a deal on the right one, but I never got around to finishing the hunt.

I threw it onto a used Ultra-G chassis, which surprisingly required very little effort in terms of the usual grinding and material removal with the Dremel to get it to fit despite its small size. She got shoed with a set of Vincent “ATS” wheels which were a non-standard width, more narrow than usual (I also don’t recall how I even wound up with that set of wheels). Suprisingly, the result was a very fast and exceptionally good handling car! It never won a tournament but it came close more than once! I decided to dress it up a little after the fact with some sponsor adverts and a set of headlight decals from RRR which I think really improved the appearance; I believe these were actually made for the Chaparral 2F, but they fit this car perfectly.

Unfortunately, this was one of the cars that had an engine fire during the “Secret Oktober” sports car races this fall. The motor was a hot performer and it had a lot mileage on it, so maybe it had just reached the end of its lifespan, but I have not raced it since replacing the motor. My fear is that it will be slower, since the motor I had to replace it with is one of the older Playing Mantis TJ500 units which generally seem to be slower than the newer Auto World motors, however, even if it is a bit slower, I’m sure its handling capabilities are not diminished, and that’s what really made this car a winner, so we’ll see how she does during the next tournament.

Of the roughly 12 J-Car chassis built, several of them were turned into GT-40 Mk IV’s, but “Calamity” is a survivor. Owned for decades by a private collector who acquired the car directly from Ford, current owner James “Reflex” Reid acquired it from his family in 1980 and spent 2 years resealing everything and bringing it slowly and surely back to race-worthy condition before hitting the track. His list of race victories is long, and if he can recover from last fall’s engine burnout, there’s no reason why “Calamity” won’t be back on the track for the next sports car racing season, challenging the best and the brightest just like she was meant too when she was new.