Cortez Rally Raid in a GWagen???

[burquedoka]

And....

 

[mk216v]

Whoa, almost a tube frame G!

 

[McBride]

Indeed it is! Much of the inspiration for our modifications came from our study of the Purdue Graz factory built Paris Dakar G Wagen. That G Wagen is now owned by Carlos Garcia of the Garcia Automotive Group - headquartered here in New Mexico. We were able to crawl all over and under that G. They own over 20 major dealerships including Mercedes Benz of Santa Fe. We are incredibly fortunate to have them and the guys at our local Mercedes dealership as one of our supporters for this build!

Our suspension was designed and built by Overland Motorsports out of Albuquerque. These guys have roots in The King of the Hammers, desert racing, rock crawling and European cross country rally builds. The improvements/modifications they made to our car were based on their experiences in those other motorsports and they feel confident that our car will be able to go extremely hard throughout the 4 day race in graceful style. The cool thing is that these guys are open to working with people on these non standard type projects. They love the challenge.

We have an awesome team and we are getting closer to having a solid car, now we just need to do our part....

 

[mk216v]

Indeed it is! Much of the inspiration for our modifications came from our study of the Purdue Graz factory built Paris Dakar G Wagen. That G Wagen is now owned by Carlos Garcia of the Garcia Automotive Group - headquartered here in New Mexico. We were able to crawl all over and under that G. They own over 20 major dealerships including Mercedes Benz of Santa Fe. We are incredibly fortunate to have them and the guys at our local Mercedes dealership as one of our supporters for this build!

Our suspension was designed and built by Overland Motorsports out of Albuquerque. These guys have roots in The King of the Hammers, desert racing, rock crawling and European cross country rally builds. The improvements/modifications they made to our car were based on their experiences in those other motorsports and they feel confident that our car will be able to go extremely hard throughout the 4 day race in graceful style. The cool thing is that these guys are open to working with people on these non standard type projects. They love the challenge.

We have an awesome team and we are getting closer to having a solid car, now we just need to do our part....

Well done William!!

 

[McBride]

mods

Here are some pics of some of the reinforcements/suspension mods the guys at Overland Motorsports have completed.

 

[McBride]

more pics

Some more pics.

 

[cols110]

Very nice, with the money you have spent on it now would you not have been better off initially buying an early G55 with the 354hp engine to make the most of the mods you have completed.

 

[McBride]

Very nice, with the money you have spent on it now would you not have been better off initially buying an early G55 with the 354hp engine to make the most of the mods you have completed.

Valid point but I don't think so mainly due the weight issue - our overall weight goal for this SWB 230GE is 4K lbs. With the tuned and rebuilt 4 cylinder motor it is going to be pretty zippy. Our hopes are that by keeping it lightweight we will have excellent performance in the dunes as well as minimizing stress on the vehicle as a whole.

Being an endurance race over very rough terrain our choice for this year is more for along the lines of the tortoise rather than the hare. There will certainly be some very high horsepower vehicles on the starting line. Fortunately Vehicle durability and navigation play a big part in determining the outcome of this type of event.

If we get hammered due to our minimal power/speed then next year we would do something along the lines of a small bi-turbo diesel. We soon see if our logic pays off!

William

 

[cols110]

Fair point mate, hope it works out as planned as the truck is coming together nicely.

 

[mk216v]

Whoa those are some SERIOUS Fox dampers! I honestly haven't ever seen ones like that--4.0's? Since the shock has a remote for keeping the fluid cool, what the heck are the 3 "stacks" coming off the main shock body? I can't tell from the pics. <Looking to be educated>

 

[burquedoka]

Whoa those are some SERIOUS Fox dampers! I honestly haven't ever seen ones like that--4.0's? Since the shock has a remote for keeping the fluid cool, what the heck are the 3 "stacks" coming off the main shock body? I can't tell from the pics. <Looking to be educated>

These are tripple bypass shocks. Each of the three tubes contain valving the controls exactly the amount of dampening you want at that stage of the shock cylinder stroke. Two are for compression and one is for rebound. Then there are the nitrogen bump stops, the fronts are seen inside the springs and the rears are mounted off the frame rail. These will really complete to effect of superior absorption of any washboard and or mild airtime. We have found that she is VERY nose heavy, and have been given strick instruction not to trust and sand dune crest for fear of endo-ing her off of a cornice.

 

[McBride]

Rally G Wagen Chassis

Here are a couple of pics of our modified G wagen chassis. The build is moving quickly. The engine went in today and the body will go on next week. This thing is coming out great. 30 days to the race and we have a lot to do.

 

[McBride]

more Rally G pics

23 days til the start of the Sonora Rally!

Our G chassis should be married to the freshly painted body by the end of the week. We're waiting on a few more clutch parts and then we'll be ready.

Here are a few pics.

 

[McBride]

We head to Mexico on Friday!!!!

Here are a few cell phone pics of the Rally G as of Saturday.

For tracking google Sonora Rally - they have a link at the top at the main page - Burquedoka and I are #55.

If anybody wants to show up for the adventure you will be welcomed with open arms. Fish tacos are on us following the finish in Puerto Penasco!

 

[nick disjunkt]

good luck to you!