For the love of BUGGIES

[scouthead]

how about a badass burro?

this is the first burro i ever met - my buddy's dad had a VW repair shop in bellflower ca when i was growing up. they were friends with Tiny Thompson and i got to meet him in passing a few times when he would stop by my buddy's house, or when we would be over at the shop getting under peoples feet.

His dad and his dad's best friend had purchased kits from Tiny back when he was still selling them, and they both built their own burros. their family took me to their cabin most thanksgivings and new years... we would go all over the place in buggies, or on a borrowed ATC someone would put me on. there was always one or both of the burros bouncing along on the trail. this one was my buddy's dad's - still one of the coolest and best built burros I have seen. he still has it - will probably always be in the family.

I think its got a tired 1914 in it, and still rocking an old gear reduction swing axle trans

 

[Wes Harden]

That's really cool history.

 

[scouthead]

here's another from my buggy adventures;

This one popped up on craigslist while i was hanging out with one of my enabler buddies -"oh... its only 15 miles from here, and there's nothing on your trailer today... its only 400 dollars... "
So of course it ended up in my driveway, and over a few beers I named it "Ugly Buggy".
It's really an oddball... not a burro, not a manx or an empi... appears to be a one off / home build, but it is about the size of a burro.
its also:
-built of round tubing frame (burros were mostly square tubing)
-it is mid engined!? Ive never seen anything this short that was mid engined
-it has a type 3 motor so it can lay flat and fit under the "bed"
-it has disc brakes on the back
-no brakes on the front but an intersting aluminum wide 5 hub thing that had german markings? We had our resident VW king of all things aircooled look at them... they are origional Porsche 356 aluminum brake drums that someone milled off the brake surface! -they would have been worth a fortune if they were intact!

 

[scouthead]

With a fresh battery it turned over, but It needed the cadrones rebuilt. I was already gettting a different buggy set up for myself - sold Ugly Buggy to that enabler friend of mine. He went thru the carbs and got it running, slapped some new tires on it, rebuilt some marvin shaw air shocks for the back, put on some seat covers i had laying around... and put a few miles on it. He put some new tires on the back that were a little bigger, and when I test drove it off road, i was SURE that the motor was bigger than a 1600. Yes, it is a really lightweight car, but still - that thing had too much torque for a car pushing larger than stock tires... I will probably never know motor details unless he needs to rebuild it somewhere down the road.
I didnt like the design of the frame and how thin some of the tubing was, so i helped triangulate and support the frame in a few places. We built a cage for the motor and got a skidplate under it.

 

[scouthead]

As far as i know he still has Ugly Buggy, but never drives it... just sits in the desert until the carbs get clogged with ethanol seperating out of the gas... we arent that close anymore so i dont get updates often.

 

[imiceman44]

https://reno.craigslist.org/cto/d/sun-valley-dune-buggy/7815675153.html

So I saw this one up by Reno.
Any idea what it is?

 

[Wes Harden]

Has fenders like an iEmpi Imp but it is not. Sand Puper vomes to mind but am not 100%

 

[Wes Harden]

Found a vid of my Niece driving our old hi jumper on El Mirage, My brother filmed from his 250r.
View attachment Hijumper.mp4

 

[scouthead]

https://reno.craigslist.org/cto/d/sun-valley-dune-buggy/7815675153.html

So I saw this one up by Reno.
Any idea what it is?

yeah that's an interesting one. not familiar to me. did a quick google for non manx buggies and didnt come up with any like this one

 

[scouthead]

Found a vid of my Niece driving our old hi jumper on El Mirage, My brother filmed from his 250r.
View attachment 496130

thats so damn cool! I have a soft spot for the old high jumpers... and have a bunch of pictures to share of one of mine! (later) - gonna post a bunch of nonsense buggy stuff that i cycled through before i got to hijumpers

 

[scouthead]

This was one of my next buggy dreams. I found this for sale nearby - the guy built it from scratch, had the frame and all of the body panels powder coated, and all of the edges of the panels were gasketed to prevent vibrations. I was really really impressed with the quality of work and the framework around the rear suspension - and the way the rear shocks were sort of inboard from most of the other buggies i was familiar with.
this was a vw based car, but he had been running coil overs, and a pinto motor out back. His family was growing, and he stripped this car down and built himself a really cool 4 seater.

since my previous buggy had been stolen and later recovered in pieces, i had EVERYTHING to build this car back up...

 

[scouthead]

Alas this one was never built by me. it sat for a few years while I dated a lot and ran other buggies that were complete but barely holding together. Here's a couple pics of what it looked like while complete when the previous owner had it, and a few photo shopped dreams I had of putting graphics on it... I eventually sold it when moving and downsizing on storage space

 

[scouthead]

Ok - so, since my good friends have always had a soft spot for burro's, This one of my friends had a burro that he bought cheap, but after hitting a huge burm, it basically broke in half.
So, using the broken burro as a template, he built THIS:
His own car from the ground up, and tweeked a few dimensions to accomodate 3x3s and longer shocks, wider seating space for suspension seats.. etc. I would have thought I had better photos of this buggy -its in the background a lot, but for now these are the best Ive got.

 

[scouthead]

 

[scouthead]

It's ALMOST / BASICALLY a burro. He has always driven it hard, has broken and repaired EVERYTHING. there are a lot of stories around this car. Over the years, its been a battering ram, its been flying through the air... wheels fallen off, cv joints exploding, and upside down at least once.

 

[Wes Harden]

Bigger shoes on the back feet

 

[Wes Harden]

Some buggy fun today. 100ish + miles.
Mohave Rd to Rock Springs in the Mohave National Monument.

 

[kennyw]

Saw this at the swap meet this weekend.

 

[centexk5]

MSN

www.msn.com

Just saw where Manx has partnered with a company to build a new buggy.

 

[Wes Harden]

Yeah the new ownership of Manx buggies is doing a lot of new things. not sure how i like that new one, but I guess it's aim at different market share