greggkishline

Just finished paint on this restoration of a Viking Craft 1/4 midget roadster. Doug Caruthers built and sold these in the late 1950's. Body was a badly damaged original, requiring full restoration - chassis is re-created from reference photos. Lettering and upholstery are scheduled, in the works. (1960 Offyette 400E pictured is an unrestored survivor, a fiberglass monocoque chassis with full suspension, adjustable shocks, hydraulic brakes, and rack & pinion steering. The trailer is a purpose-built, scaled Burbank as used by owners of full-sized midgets, prior to cages on cars. All three appeared at this year's Miller Meet in Milwaukee, much interest.)

I bought these cars about 2011, cheap - these are the seller's photos (Beaver Dam, WI???) Restored one (the green one was finished in yellow, pictured below) - sold the other to a retired midget racer. Finally discovered they're Pacemakers, and got to know Danny Ruth via emails. Then Doug Schiller. Both great guys. I got hooked building new old cars - 1/4s and 1/2s ... and some restoring. This forum is new to me, so I'll toss in some pictures - hope they all load up. The two Kurtis 500 Supers and the Pacemaker are obviously commercial cars - I built the rest, including a Werner up-right car from plans. Well in fairness, AJ Watson built the full-size Sun City roadster ... The scratchbuilts take 8 months - 2 yrs. Restorations go quicker. The current project started as a NOS Moss 1/2 midget body - 3rd Moss for me. Rather than replicate the factory channel frame, I chose to go the Birdcage Maserati route with a space-frame and independent front susp, inboard coil-overs thru bellcranks. Buddy of mine found 50's diecast mag wheels, 8" diameter - which will really work well on the rear of the Moss. They were submerged in a pond for 15 yrs (!), but they're period-correct and savable. Engines are heavy so I display them separately. So many projects, so little time....