LIVE with Aaron Brown! Vintage NASCAR Q&A at The Garage Shop

I can't remember what all did you Let's go through it. I think there's a couple. All right, we'll just go through it. Oh, yeah. There's a lot of comments in them. So, yeah, live now. Now, we officially have to be PG PG-rated. We've never done a live with um an extra person. So, this will be interesting. Now, I have to figure out how to make this bigger again. Oh yeah, there it is. See the numbers jumping up now. People way to make the font bigger because I if somebody asks something I can't see it at all. I just did make it like that. Can you see it now? No. If you pulled up if you pulled it up on your phone and looked at it then I guess you could see it better probably. So, there's 74 people in here now. Yeah, I can approve people's comments then. Yeah, that's pretty good, huh? Yeah, 70. Good. So, so what are we doing? Go through the comments, talk about videos we did, you know, just answer some comments off here. Just kind of hang out. We printed these off. Yeah. Comments from videos. We'll do that. And uh what' you guys say in here too? You got comments about the comments that counts too. There we go. Comments about comments. Yeah. And we can even talk about some current NASCAR stuff if you want to. That's always fun. Yeah. I might have to just let you handle that if I want to keep being able to do stuff. I can't do that either. What is that noise? It's playing an ad on her phone. Okay. Well, you wanted to do this. What was on what was burning on your mind that you wanted to talk about? Well, I was I read I really appreciate, you know, everybody that watched the videos and stuff like that and there were some really good questions. Uh, and we got some printed out here and we'll kind of go through it. If you want to ask some questions there, we can do that. Uh you know my background in cup racing goes back to 1993 uh through about 2013 14 somewhere in there. Uh uh did some consultant work. I started the garage shop in uh around 2010 and we still did some consulting work uh for NASCAR. We also uh this company just you know a little bit of background on the garage shop uh we build all the fire trucks and rescue uh first responder vehicles for the F1 countries in the United States. Uh all the fire trucks at Miami and Homestead and Las Vegas are all ours. Uh we've built quite a few safety innovations for NASCAR for their training. Uh the cutaway car, I think you've seen that one before where they actually cut and remove a driver then put it all back together. They can uh basically that car is really neat. It smokes, leaks, water, all kind of stuff. Uh they can cut the entire roof off of it and remove the driver and put the roof back on it and put the window panels back in it and put driver back in in 11 minutes. Wow. So that that's pretty neat. That is a neat project. I think there's some video of that way down on our Instagram page down there. So, uh you know, so that's kind of our background, you know. So I'm not real sure that you know a lot of people understood, you know, kind of things we do. We also do high-end 3D printing. Uh we've done stuff for the military, Homeland Security, all kind of fun stuff with that. Uh we use Stratus 450s, uh big printers. We can print carbon fiber, uh Ultum, pretty much do anything you want. We do 3D scanning. We have an in-house engineering department that really works on a lot of other things besides our race car stuff, but uh you know, they have a lot of projects right now, too. And we the production shop leans on them pretty hard uh when it comes to designing roll cages, suspensions, figuring out problems, figuring out why things break and why they don't. So, but yeah, I'm ready to start going through these questions here. Uh do you know this Jason guy? He's talking about somebody named Gino. Yeah, I don't know Jason, but Gino was uh an engineer. He sadly passed away. He had a Trans Am car when we worked at DEI and he was an engineer over there and and his office was like I don't know it reminded me of like Willy Wonka's chocolate factory. There was just stuff piled everywhere and he knew where everything was. So and and Gino uh Gino was could build anything, could figure anything out. HA and I, John Clansmire, Chad Walers, um, we really enjoyed Gino and and I was really sad when he passed, but there'll never be another one like it, bro. So, um, we're So, we're going to go kind of through here. I got this printed out and we'll kind of go down through. I Sorry, I should have been a little more prepared. heard. I was on a farm this morning for a bit getting some stuff done over there. Uh but um we kind of go down through some of the comments. One of them was uh the fella that said something about the uh Justin Justin Weiss, your opinion. I'm going to read this to you on the what I thought of the adjustable upper a franch. And uh it was intriguing. And and he and you say that basically that you run them on your dirt car and they see real high load and all that stuff. I mean that that's really cool. I mean I'd be interested to see the engineering on the load numbers. I I actually have it because we did a project for Penske racing shocks on dirt late models. So it would be cool to match your data up on wheel loads with our data up that we did with Penske shocks with a dirt lake model program. And uh then we could maybe do a FEA program on these upper control arms. I'm I'm betting you're right. They'd probably be pretty good for a dirt car that doesn't see a real high wheel load. Not as high as you think. Uh uh but like places like Daytona, stuff like that with a 34 or 500 lb stock car going 200 mph leaning up on the right front one of those adjustable A-frames. That's might be good for a lap or two. I don't believe I'd race it, but you know, thanks. That was pretty cool. And uh I I you know appreciate that. Um that was one of mine here. You pick one. Well, this Josh Royce here has a question for you. Where do you think DEI would be today if Junior and Ty Norris would have stayed or would that have made a difference? You know, you know, that's a good question. Uh I mean, I think there's a lot of other people that could answer that. Uh it it was a great place to work and also very confusing at the same time. you know, postale. Um, I mean, I can understand why things kind of went they went. If that was my family and it was torn apart like that, I I don't believe I'd want much to do with that place either. So, you know, I that's kind of what how I feel about it is I feel bad for them that what happened happened. And, you know, I think it's awful pretentious for a lot of people to think, oh, they should have carried it on. Well, they didn't lose their, you know, matriarch there. you know, the leader of the deal and then expect to carry it on. I think that's harder harder than what it seems. But that's my answer. How about this guy? Uh, we get real the meat here. Say, um, Joe Hoover. Oh, yeah. Joe. I was, you know, best friend Joe Hoover. or what does he think that that that you're like being a baby for saying you can't restore that Thunderbird or something? Is that Yes. Um, you know, and Joe, I really appreciate your comment. It really it kind of it kind of made me smile. Uh, you know, it reminded me a lot of cars we get here from people that say they can do work for cheap and and you know, you could restore that thing and I was being lazy. You know, the the end of the road for that car is, is it worth restoring to a high level? I mean, is that car worth spending, you know, 50, 60 grand on to make it a competitive car, a good car? It's not. There's a lot of other cars out there with some history that would be that. Exactly what I said about that car is it needs to go to somebody that has a nice little shop at their house and with a little bit of knowledge and the fortitude to ask people for help and they can do a lot of the work themselves, which at that point that car would be a good deal. putting an LS motor in it and hacking it up and all your nonsense with the turbos and you could the brakes are fine. I mean, and I'm real familiar with your F40 project. I know the people that did it. I mean, we're pretty heavily involved out there at Land Speed. We actually set quite a few records at Bombville and Elm Mirage and uh that that I don't think I'd be bragging on that. I don't think I do that. It was a cool project, but I I don't think it really hit the speed that I think everybody thought it would. I didn't get a chance to look it up, but I I don't I remember it not being that that sporty. Uh it was cool though. Very cool. But you know, Joe, I mean, my offer to you is uh stop doing things so cheap because your ends up here at my shop and and people are upset. So, that's all. Uh you're more than welcome. I'll give you a job. You're more than welcome to come here. I like your tenacity. So, if you want to work here, come on. We'll show you. We We'll put you in the production floor and go from there. But, thanks for your input. I guess there was a couple people that noticed in that video you said, "I don't know. I don't have my glasses, but you had your glasses on your head." I looked I saw that. I think I think there was an edit there because I usually wear my glasses under my hat. And I think when I look back, I think I did put my glasses on. I don't know. I don't I could I've been known I've been known to not know I have my glasses on. I actually lost them this morning and I got these like safety glasses on. So, uh, yeah, that was interesting. So, obviously a lot of these cars were from Bring a Trailer. Yeah. You know, and again, back to that little orange car. It's worth something to somebody. I'm just not going to recommend to my customer that you go spend $100,000 on that orange car. It was bought to be a static model for a restaurant. That's it, you know, and and at that it was a it was a really good deal. Good deal for that. But, uh, I don't know if they're going to use it, so it might be for sale. And I think it could be bought for exactly what it was paid for if anybody's interested. So, if you're interested in the orange car for what it was bought for, you're more than welcome to come pick it up. I'm sure we can work that out. See, it it runs Yeah, I think uh in that video you started off not not liking that Thunderbird too much and then by the end after we went over that 12 car, you're like, you know, somebody could actually do something kind of okay with this Thunderbird because the the other one made it look so much better. I I do I have a soft spot for Thunderbirds. My first job in racing was with Rick Mast on the Skull Car. We actually sat on the pole of Indie with a real small team. I think I think there's only eight of us that worked on that whole deal. Um, but I I you know the Thunderbirds for some reason and from there I went to Kenny Bernstein and Jeff Boddines and worked on all the Thunderbirds. I don't think I worked on a Chevrolet until I got to DEI in 2001. Wow. That explains a lot about your preferences. I never thought about that. Yeah. No, I was kind of thinking about that the other day, you know, and I was like, you know, we built the first Tauruses, you know, did all that and, you know, then I went work for Ray at Dodge, you know, at the Dodge deal. But I don't think I touched a Chevrolet until about 2001. Didn't Ever run a couple races with a Taurus at the end of 2000? Yeah, with Casey Kane in the Motorola car. Yeah. It's like I never knew about that until I saw pictures pop up a couple months ago. Yeah, we should we should have known better at that point. We didn't. Did uh Jim Haynes here wants to know if you ever knew anything about Mario Rossi? I don't. Um I don't. I think his Dodge Daytona that was the guy from Greenville. Spartanber. Yeah, Spartanberg down there. I saw um his Daytona over at a friends of mine. A friend of mine shot the one with the 305 in it that they let him run in 1971, I think it was. Yeah. And he almost won the race, but he ran out of gas or something. Like he would have won the race with the little motor. Um but I saw that car, but and I think I talked to his son. Nice people. No, sorry. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know a lot. I don't know. That's my extent of what I know about that. Replicator wants to know if has that traction control ever been proven to be used in the 2000s? What do you know about traction control? That's a good question. I mean, it depends on what you would want to call traction control. Um, there was a lot of different stuff, you know, back then. And I'd have to jog my memory a little bit, look back at some notes, but I mean they were doing some funky stuff with some shock oil in the right rear uh that would, you know, heat up, you know, so it would pass the shock test when they had the shock thing. So there was some stuff back there. Um I'm sure I would say I'm sure at some point somebody probably tried to play with some traction control, like electronic traction control. Yeah, I would I I there was always rumors of this or that. I mean, I've never physically seen it, but I mean, it's just odd how some guys with no talent can go around Martinsville and sit on the pole sometimes, you know, or somebody uh you know, it's a little strange in some of the places where, you know, grip means everything and all of a sudden they're the best of the, you know, they win happy hour and win the poll and then they crash in the race. So, Joe Warble wants to know, did you go to the track much with DEI and what was your position? I did. I I did. I was a R&D fabricator. So I went uh for a lot of years I went to all the Speedway races. We drugg around a fab trailer to all the tests uh for the three teams and we carried a lot of parts uh pieces and we built stuff at racetrack. Uh and then my last year at DEI when Paul Manard drove the 15 car um I our R&D program was kind of stagnant. So I volunteered with Dan Stillman to help you know to go to the track with him and be Hoover and you know and that whole group with Paul on the 15 car when he ran those six cup races. That was a lot of fun. I I really enjoyed that. That was a great group with Bee Hoover and you know Dan Stillman. We had a good time. A lot of fun. What's Paul like to work with? Paul Manard. He's good. I mean really quiet guy. Like you don't know anything about him. He just there. He does his job. He goes home. Yeah. He, you know, he, it was really cool when we were at the before they brought the 15 cup car over to the over to where the um the bush shop was for 15 over dragster. We had the R&D thing in there and we would always try to like help Dan out if they needed help. You know, their little fab shop was beside the R&D shop. Like me and one other guy was the only guy in the R&D shop. They didn't know what to do with us anymore. We were just kind of out pasture. Like the end of R&D. Well, it was so bored that you would actually help them put crush panels in cars. really. Oh, yeah. It got pretty bad. So, that's how I got involved with going to the track with Dan. You know, it was either that or probably not have a job. I don't know. No, I don't think I don't think I did. Um I know the name, but I don't I don't I don't think I ever worked with him. So, there was one other thing in the comments that stuck out to in my mind that when we said it was a factory weld like, "So, it's not welded in a factory." Yeah. No, no kidding. A factory weld means that like somebody knew what they were doing when they welded it. Like, it was welded in a real race car shop, not somebody's barn. Stick welder. That's what that mean is, you know, it wasn't meant that it was welded by in a factory. It just meant that was the chassis shop. Yeah, it was built came that way. Yeah, it was built in a real race car shop, but you know, so just to clarify that and we used to say that a lot. So, it's kind of still habit, you know, it's like factory made, you know, factory built. So, you know, so that's that's where that goes. There's a lot of terminology that is common in this space that doesn't make sense to somebody who doesn't know what is what the what the names are, I guess. Oh, here's one. Mitchell, are you going to race your car anytime soon? How about an update on that? What is soon? Yeah. So, how about let's share an update on that. Um, well, the clip is tacked to it. It's not finished welded yet, but we're starting to make things again, like the dog house and everything. And I don't know if people in the chat here follow me on Facebook or not. That's the only place I posted that, but I haven't said anywhere that we had to put a whole clip on it, but you pretty much had us cut the car in half. Yeah, it's cut in half. I don't I don't know if that was completely necessary, but we did it. Some of it wasn't necessary, like the windows and stuff. Yeah, it's like we cut the everything behind the oil tank is gone. Cut the cut the roof at the edge of the back window. Seat posts are gone. It's like it was sitting there welded to a table like twothirds of a car. You got a lot of work today. Yeah. When are you going to get it done? After we're done with this. Oh, you're going to go work on it today? Yeah. today, tomorrow, the next day, the next day, the next day. Well, we'll do a phone call later this afternoon. Let me know how you make out. All right. Yeah, I'm good for you. Gonna make it look interesting. So, so, so yeah, Mitch is doing a really good job on that. We got a couple of guys in the shop helping him out. It was, it was hurt really bad. I mean, and it had been hurt. It had been wrecked before. So, at that point, you know, Bob Noodling here, he had some uh rear clips from back in the Red Bull days. some pretty neat mandril bent rails and we just decided I mean you just can't keep bending the rear clip and expect it to like keep doing rear clip things. So we just cut it off. I think that that's where we ended up. Yeah. Kind of goes back to what you talked about in that video or what is what gets it done versus what is right. Right. Yeah. Yeah. you know. So, and that's where we're at. And I think we're going to get once we get it all done, we'll get it back on a pull down machine out here. Get it all reset, rezeroed there, and you know, see where we're at there. See if we can help you out out there. Jay Tom says, "What did Hornady help you with?" He helped me put the seat in and a bunch of other stuff like finishing a duct work and hooking up the gear cooler and just random random things that the car I did like it ran when I brought it over there, but it wasn't done. It didn't have all the underpainting and stuff on it. Well, where you started with that car and where you got it to, that's pretty impressive. I mean, that works. It was almost done. It was like I mean that car legitimately should have been on Facebook Marketplace like four more times before it got finished. Yeah. No, that that I know exactly what you're talking about. You see, somebody buys a car and they're like, "Look, I just bought this car." And then two months later it's for sale for like $1,000 more than they paid for it with half the parts on it and then it just keeps getting passed down and further destroyed and then somebody finds a red paint chip and thinks it's a redheaded stepchild. Yeah. thinks it's a Dale thinks it's a Dale Carr. Yeah. I mean, and that's the other thing. I mean, not trying to be mean or anything, and I'm not trying to say we know everything. And because when we don't know, I'll tell you, we do because we know people that do know. Spencer, some idiot named Spencer Brown has a question for you. I got them, Spence. But they're I lost them at the farm. They're in the field somewhere, I believe. So, I got extras. We're not insulting you guys. Spencer Brown is his son, so we're allowed to call him an idiot. Yeah, that's on vacation. That should be at work. Yeah. Why did he go on…