One aspect of off-road racing, or rather motorsports in general, that I seem to enjoy more and more these days is the blending and tie-in with other types of racing. On one hand, you would think drifting and rock crawling are far from similar, but behind the scenes, these machines share more in common than one would think. Enter this year’s Holley Ford Fest, an off-the-wall celebration for anything powered by a Ford engine. For those that know Ultra4 champions Loren Healy and Vaughn Gitten Jr, you may know where I’m going with this.
Below is a “race” update from last weekend’s race, straight from Loren & Vaughn’s RTR Team. The photos are a blast, and I couldn’t help but share those here. Enjoy!
Enter Team RTR
Good morning! What a weekend of on-road and off-road fun at the annual Holley Ford Festival in Bowling Green, KY! Saturday’s action again saw Vaughn and Loren getting rowdy in the Ultra4 Ford Broncos as well as the trio of Mustang RTR Spec 5-Ds on the drift course piloted by Vaughn, Chelsea, and Adam. Not to be left out, the Mustangs were joined by Loren drifting his Ultra4 Bronco and Bigfoot providing a mobile clipping point. Not limiting themselves to just drift, Vaughn and Chelsea also saw some oval track action in the Crown Vic race early in the day Saturday.
We’ve been hard at work outfitting the coolest, most capable, military “UTV” to bless our lands. The BC Customs SXV is built ground up like no other light technical vehicle around. Complete with a Spider 9 IFS and rear Spider 9 Solid Axle, every corner of this machine is designed to take the toughest abuse. As it should, of course! The video above is a few years old now, but these vehicles are running stronger than ever.
We have recently added a new housing calculator to our list of builder tools, making life a little bit easier while you’re working in the shop. The all-new Pro Series Rear Housing Calculator takes much of the guesswork out of building your Spider 9 rear end while using Pro Series Unit Bearings & 45 Spline Axle Shafts. Much like our other Ultimate Unit Bearing calculators, if you know your desired width and pinion offset, this Excel sheet will help calculate the needed housing tube lengths and axle shaft lengths to make it all work.
One NEW feature on this spreadsheet is the numeric entry for Locker Gap and the new selection for Pinion to Locker. Here’s a quick rundown of how these two new fields work.
Locker Gap: In previous spreadsheets, we allowed for two values for this field, .500 and 1.500. Since 45 spline (and 36 spline) axle shafts are designed to nearly contact each other inside the diff, we allow for any entry in this field with recommendations of “common” locker gaps or simply the gap between the passenger and driver shafts.
Pinion to Locker: The distance from pinion center line to “axle shaft centerline” is commonly 2.125″. This is straight out of the Ford OE spec. It’s a value that has been around for ages and is what we usually see. THAT SAID, when you upgrade to 45 spline (or 36 spline) axle shafts, you’re looking for anything BUT ordinary. For design reasons, this distance has changed through the years to minimize the deflection from ring gear to axle shaft. Some locker & spool manufacturers have moved this value, so the axle shaft centerline is more in-line with the ring gear. You will have to check with your locker manufacturer on what value is best to use here, but we now allow any entry in this field to work perfectly for your build.
Kick off your Labor Day weekend with 10% off & free shipping on all Wheel Spacer Kits! Good across our entire line of wheel spacers, including our brand new Tundra and Bronco applications, as well as all Wheel Spacer Kits in our recently revamped Outlet Store. Good till the end of day Monday, September 5th, simply enter coupon code LABOR22 at checkout. Now hit the trails and make it a great weekend!
Our team took some time, out of what seems to be an impossibly busy schedule, to make navigating our Outlet Store quicker, easier, and less painful. For those new to our Outlet, this is THE PLACE to find amazing deals on cosmetically blemished products. Never second-hand, perfectly safe, and always with the same limited lifetime guarantee you have come to expect. Along with discounted prices, all Outlet Store items ship free as well.
It’s a first come, first serve shopping experience, so be sure to stop by The Outlet Store often.
