Road Crew Expansion: Lucky Mach 1, Cheater Challenger

LUCKY MACH 1

Don’t you jes’ LOVE it when you’re cruising ePay for something specific and you stumble upon an incredible deal that looks almost too good to be true? Usually when something looks too good to be true, it is; but sometimes, you get lucky! Such was the case the night I happened upon a bright yellow copy of the very sought after, very valuable Road Race Replicas reproduction of the Aurora 1969 Mustang Mach 1. Made back in the days when RRR was calling themselves “Nu-Rora,” their copy of one of the best and most collectible Aurora bodies actually improved on the original, with a black louvered insert for the rear window, a rear wing, and historically correct Mach 1 striping. For all these reasons, the “Nu-Rora” repro seems to be as valuable as the original body, and getting ahold of one is always a challenge! I have managed to acquire two of these for my collection; the first one, in metallic teal, cost me a fortune; the second in orange I got a killer deal on, but not as good as this one; I came across this at a price I could not believe, and after looking carefully at the pictures to make sure I wasn’t buying cracked up and broken junk that just looked good from a particular angle, I hit that “buy it now” button with no regrets at all!

There was no question that this was the car I was going to use my last set of chrome 5-lug wheels on; I used to buy these in bulk from MEV, but since they seem to have stopped doing business, every time I’ve attempted to order more, they’ve just sent me a refund with the comment that nothing I ordered was available, so I’ve been saving one last set in reserve for a special car that deserved them, and this is it! The Road Crew hasn’t had any additions for a long time because there’s not much to add; I already have just about all the Aurora originals I want, with the exception of a couple of uber rare ones that sell at prices I’m probably never going to pay, but that doesn’t mean I’m not willing to add more if the circumstances are right!

Even so, building this car was difficult; I wanted to use the last T-Dash chassis I had in reserve for it, but I have had a lot of difficulties with running these T-Dash chassis on my low power, low speed model motoring track. I’ve gone into some detail about this in previous posts, and the chassis I mounted this car on did not want to cooperate; it would barely move until the power was turned up enough for it to shoot across the room, and I was unable to get it adjusted for predictable “model motoring” without a lot of effort. I eventually got it tuned to where it runs acceptably, and although its finicky and needs to be handled with care, that just serves to make it seem all that much more special…kind of like a real Mach 1, a car so powerful and high-strung that you wouldn’t drive it to the grocery store every day.

CHEATER CHALLENGER

Stuck @ home alone on a lonely Sunday, I could have done any number of productive things; I could have mowed my lawn or pulled some weeds, I could have worked on a couple of plumbing projects or even cleaned the house a little. Naaaah! Instead I wanted to play with my toys, so I went through boxes of junk and discards looking for a way to add another car to The Road Crew! A while ago the white Dodge Challenger added as a late addition to the Muscle Car fleet had to be removed to make room for the awesome addition of the ’85 Buick Grand National, and since this car was always an afterthought anyway, I had no problem tossing it into the “body box” for an unknown future. I decided to get an early Johnny Lightning chassis with a semi-burned out motor running again with new brushes and a good cleaning, and fit it with scrap wheels, axles, and tires from an Aurora original and remount it. For an afterthought, it came out pretty well!

Everything about this car is a cheat; its not a real Aurora original and its not even mounted on an original chassis. But hey…all the MEV bodies in the this fleet aren’t “real” either, and strictly speaking, neither are the Road Race Replicas or Dash Motorsports reproductions of the Aurora originals. And since I’m not a purist, I don’t care! This body is sized just like an original so it looks just right, and even though Aurora never made a Dodge Challenger, I have no problem saying they should have! So now I have another “muscley” member of The RC; it’s not fitted with the thicker Jel Claws 2031 tires (because I’m out of them, used the last set of those on the Mach 1 as well!) but it skates around the track just fine on a set of 50+ year original tires, and I like that I’m getting additional use out of a burned up motor too weak to return to the big track. Why, I daresay all this reuse of old parts is almost “sustainable” of me! See? I’m “saving the planet!”

I don’t know when I’ll add another car to the Road Crew-I’m not planning on it, so any other additions will probably be “happy accidents” like these, but this beautiful Mustang getting added to my collection for about a quarter of what it’s worth and adding a Challenger to keep my fleet of Chargers company made me happy indeed! Not a bad way to spend a late summer weekend!