Field Trip!

[URTOAST]

Well after about 4 months of tracking people down, and talking to Chuck Beck, and several other people that know Shogun's I'm going to get the chance to take as many photo's I can of the real live # 002 Blue Shogun. I can’t say enough about how nice the owner of this car has been to me, he has even had his mechanic call me, and offer to pick me up from the airport. So on the 23-24 of this month I'm flying to go see the car that started it all for me about 16 years ago. I'm even renting a Chevy Aveo to get me in the mood and get me to his shop from the airport :lol: I will hopefully have all the documentation I will need to complete my car, and maybe answer some questions about these rare little devils. I'm working on a list of questions for the owner, and for the next time I call Chuck. (I think I'm going to get him a cel phone for Christmas) Every time we talk his phone is cutting out, and he has to call me back, or I call him back. So getting questions out there for answers has been hard to say the least, but he is a very nice personable guy.
I am mostly concerned with the location of the sub frame assembly that I have, Chuck said he thought the wheel base was a bit longer, but wasn’t sure? But he did make mention of where it was attached to the Festiva, so thats a starting point. So location of the sub frame will be my first question, followed by the fuel cell dimensions, just how they attached the rear panels, The tie rods are from a ?? exec... Oh and the water pump question. I'm bringing two cameras with me with a combined total space of about 3 Gig's so I hope to have a lot of documentation to share. Maybe I will bring the video Camera, just incase a ride is offered :wink:
My wife seams to think I have lost it, but oh well, Like I tell her I'm into cars, it could be worse :wink:

[Pu241]

Good luck!
Remember to bring a ruler or some easily photographed reference device so you can tell scale in your pics!
Could be helpful for location and dimension of various things.
Just a thought.

[URTOAST]

I'm planning on brining a plastic ruler, with my luck a metal tape is not taken well on a plane? The car is in a full mechanical shop with a lift, so If the ruler dosnet work I'm hoping he will have a tape Maybe I will buy one at the local Home Depot on my way from the airport.

I just reserved www.fordshogun.com and shogun007.com for a place for the documentaion of the car. I have had little in the way of luck finding a good sorce for info on these cars, so I hope to maybe have a one stop place for info, I have seen so much bad info over the last year posted on these cars. some say they had v8 SHO motors, others say 15 were built, exc..

[Unicornasaurus]

I'm planning on brining a plastic ruler, with my luck a metal tape is not taken well on a plane? The car is in a full mechanical shop with a lift, so If the ruler dosnet work I'm hoping he will have a tape Maybe I will buy one at the local Home Depot on my way from the airport.

I just reserved www.fordshogun.com and shogun007.com for a place for the documentaion of the car. I have had little in the way of luck finding a good sorce for info on these cars, so I hope to maybe have a one stop place for info, I have seen so much bad info over the last year posted on these cars. some say they had v8 SHO motors, others say 15 were built, exc..

Quoted from Wikipedia:

In 1990, Chuck Beck of Special Editions and Rick Titus took seven Festivas, gutted the interiors, and mounted Ford SHO 3.0 L V6's behind the front seats in mid-engine rear wheel drive configuration. There were substantial cosmetic and mechanical changes, including relocating the gas tank to the front of the car, structural bracing and improvements to the chassis, adding wider wheel arches to accommodate a wider stance and larger tires, and a complete redesign of the suspension. These changes resulted in a car that could travel the ¼ mile (0.4 km) in 12.9 seconds at 100.9 mph (162 km/h), and could achieve a lateral acceleration figure ranging from .95 to 1.04 g [1]. Of the seven, Jay Leno owns the silver one, which is number 003 [2].

[Damkid]

WOW i gotta say you are one lucky guy, i would love to check out a real SHOgun (test drive :lol: ) i really hope you get tons of info that you need and lots of pics and vids for all of us to see

[todd00]

good luck on your trip. where will you be flying to? i think you owe me an email, but when ever you have time is fine.

[URTOAST]

I'm planning on brining a plastic ruler, with my luck a metal tape is not taken well on a plane? The car is in a full mechanical shop with a lift, so If the ruler dosnet work I'm hoping he will have a tape Maybe I will buy one at the local Home Depot on my way from the airport.

I just reserved www.fordshogun.com and shogun007.com for a place for the documentaion of the car. I have had little in the way of luck finding a good sorce for info on these cars, so I hope to maybe have a one stop place for info, I have seen so much bad info over the last year posted on these cars. some say they had v8 SHO motors, others say 15 were built, exc..

Quoted from Wikipedia:

In 1990, Chuck Beck of Special Editions and Rick Titus took seven Festivas, gutted the interiors, and mounted Ford SHO 3.0 L V6's behind the front seats in mid-engine rear wheel drive configuration. There were substantial cosmetic and mechanical changes, including relocating the gas tank to the front of the car, structural bracing and improvements to the chassis, adding wider wheel arches to accommodate a wider stance and larger tires, and a complete redesign of the suspension. These changes resulted in a car that could travel the ¼ mile (0.4 km) in 12.9 seconds at 100.9 mph (162 km/h), and could achieve a lateral acceleration figure ranging from .95 to 1.04 g [1]. Of the seven, Jay Leno owns the silver one, which is number 003 [2].

I have looked at the info on Wikipedia before, informative, and it looks to be mistake free, but it lacks the detals of the swap, the parts used exc... I'm not saying the info's not out there, but not all in one place. I have just tried to gather as many magazine articals, books, quotes, and info from web page documentation, but there is alot of conflicting info once you start trying to piece it together. It dosent help that almost every one of the 7 are different in some way.

Example..

Jays car lacks the number ID plate in the pictures I have of the car, and it's a 89 Model, most are later versions. I'm wondering when the ID plate came to be? I'm guessing when people were paying 48K for them they sort of wanted a plate on the car!

Todd00 I will check my email and get with you.. I thought I returned it? Sorry? I'm going to MA to look at the car.

[URTOAST]

WOW i gotta say you are one lucky guy, i would love to check out a real SHOgun (test drive :lol: ) i really hope you get tons of info that you need and lots of pics and vids for all of us to see

I will try to get as much info as posable, and share it with you all. Thats the fun of this, maybe we can make it a bit easier for others to try this project? I'm not going to ask for a ride or anything, but if he offers... its on!

[GenevaDirt]

If you go for that ride...make sure the video camera is running.

[URTOAST]

Oh I will... even though its hard to get a sence of how fast something is on tape, i will just for the fun of it... remeber this is the one with the SHOshop blower on it... ~~ 400 HP so it is most likely going to be like a cannon. A ride will be cool, but not nessasary I guess.... but it would be very motivating for my project.

[GenevaDirt]

Thats awesom...I do not know know much about the Shoguns...and I definately did not know one had a blower on it...lol. Hope you at least get a ride...if not a little driver seat time yourself....have fun!

[packrat427]

That is very awesome !!

Good luck and I know you will have fun .

Has he ever visited the site ??

[URTOAST]

That is very awesome !!

Good luck and I know you will have fun .

Has he ever visited the site ??

I'm not sure? I dont think so, he dosent strike me as a computer person?? But I will ask. he probably dosent celebrate that car because it's a Festiva like most of us do, I'm sure he likes it because its rare, and fast. But his car will visit the site when I get back

[neanderpaul]

Dude, exciting times. Archive the whole experience. We are rooting for you and your project.

[25Horseplay]

How about I send you a Fordfestiva.com sticker to give him for the car! Is this the same car that was built up by the Shoshop and was on Ebay a couple years ago? You certainly have one exciting projectthere and I hope you continue to share it with us! I believe this car also participated in One lap of America or something like that.