Over 13K photos in these galleries!
Thorgeirson Galleries
Summer of 2007 at Portland International Raceway, Portland, Oregon
Updated: Dec 29, 2008 11:48am PST
![Historic : "The car was built in the early 1960s by Doug Thorgeirson, who was a welder at the Canadian shipyards on Vancouver Island. It was raced extensively from 1964 to 1968, but was unaccounted for after it was sold by the builder. It was discovered in 2004 and restored for vintage racing. It is available in Portland, Oregon for $17,500.
Thorgeirson said he borrowed a Lotus 23 from a friend, and spent all weekend studying the car and taking measurements off the lightweight chassis. He used the British-built car as the model for his home-built. The bare chassis pictured [in these galleries] weighs about 100 pounds and is made from thin wall steel tubing, which was normalized in the shipyard oven after Thorgeirson and his partner finished welding it.
When he first conceived the special, it was to be powered by a Porsche engine. But after spending a couple years and $5000 building the car, Thorgeirson didn’t have the budget for a Porsche motor. He went to a wrecking yard where he found a Fiat 600 and rebuilt that engine using parts from the European tuner Nardi. Normally, the Fiat is a rear engine car, so to accommodate placing the engine in front of the gearbox, the transmission had to be mounted upside down.
The fiberglass nose is actually the rear section of a Devin roadster, a popular kit car at the time. Thorgeirson said that in order to save money, he ordered only the one piece from Devin. He then used that piece to make a mold for the rear of his car, which he cut off short to create a Kammback effect. Thorgeirson raced the car from 1964 to about 1968. He competed on road courses, hill climbs and even on oval tracks on Vancouver Island and at Westwood and Mission Raceways near Vancouver, B.C.
He sold the car in 1968 while in a tavern and lost track of it as it went from one owner to the other. Over time, the original Nardi engine and gearbox were lost, the bodywork suffered from age and neglect and rust attacked the lower steel tubes, destroying the ones that carried water from the engine to the radiator. It was found about five years ago [~2004] – within a few kilometers of where Thorgeirson still lives on Vancouver Island — by an auto enthusiast and racer, who purchased it in hopes of finding someone who would tackle it as a restoration project and preserve a piece of racing history.
It has been thoroughly restored to better-than-new condition, with beautiful bodywork, a fresh Fiat 850 engine with rare Abarth components, fuel cell, fire system, oil accumulator, new gauges, lots of Aeroquip, new belts, coil over suspension and vintage-style Kirkey seat. I have lots of photos documenting the work done during the four years it took to restore the car. Spares include extra blocks, heads, gearboxes, rare NOS racing pistons, etc.
The car has a current SCCA Oregon Region logbook. H-Modified was a popular class in the 1950s and ’60s. It is what eventually became D/SR today. It weighs about 1,000 pounds and is race ready."
Information above is from this Bring A Trailer ad/article
http://bringatrailer.com/2009/05/31/bat-exclusive-1963-thorgeirson-h-mod-special/](http://sportsracernet.smugmug.com/H-Modified-Cars/Thorgeirson/Historic/basegi2/444958140_kWfrz-Th-1.jpg "Historic : \"The car was built in the early 1960s by Doug Thorgeirson, who was a welder at the Canadian shipyards on Vancouver Island. It was raced extensively from 1964 to 1968, but was unaccounted for after it was sold by the builder. It was discovered in 2004 and restored for vintage racing. It is available in Portland, Oregon for $17,500.
Thorgeirson said he borrowed a Lotus 23 from a friend, and spent all weekend studying the car and taking measurements off the lightweight chassis. He used the British-built car as the model for his home-built. The bare chassis pictured [in these galleries] weighs about 100 pounds and is made from thin wall steel tubing, which was normalized in the shipyard oven after Thorgeirson and his partner finished welding it.
When he first conceived the special, it was to be powered by a Porsche engine. But after spending a couple years and $5000 building the car, Thorgeirson didn’t have the budget for a Porsche motor. He went to a wrecking yard where he found a Fiat 600 and rebuilt that engine using parts from the European tuner Nardi. Normally, the Fiat is a rear engine car, so to accommodate placing the engine in front of the gearbox, the transmission had to be mounted upside down.
The fiberglass nose is actually the rear section of a Devin roadster, a popular kit car at the time. Thorgeirson said that in order to save money, he ordered only the one piece from Devin. He then used that piece to make a mold for the rear of his car, which he cut off short to create a Kammback effect. Thorgeirson raced the car from 1964 to about 1968. He competed on road courses, hill climbs and even on oval tracks on Vancouver Island and at Westwood and Mission Raceways near Vancouver, B.C.
He sold the car in 1968 while in a tavern and lost track of it as it went from one owner to the other. Over time, the original Nardi engine and gearbox were lost, the bodywork suffered from age and neglect and rust attacked the lower steel tubes, destroying the ones that carried water from the engine to the radiator. It was found about five years ago [~2004] – within a few kilometers of where Thorgeirson still lives on Vancouver Island — by an auto enthusiast and racer, who purchased it in hopes of finding someone who would tackle it as a restoration project and preserve a piece of racing history.
It has been thoroughly restored to better-than-new condition, with beautiful bodywork, a fresh Fiat 850 engine with rare Abarth components, fuel cell, fire system, oil accumulator, new gauges, lots of Aeroquip, new belts, coil over suspension and vintage-style Kirkey seat. I have lots of photos documenting the work done during the four years it took to restore the car. Spares include extra blocks, heads, gearboxes, rare NOS racing pistons, etc.
The car has a current SCCA Oregon Region logbook. H-Modified was a popular class in the 1950s and ’60s. It is what eventually became D/SR today. It weighs about 1,000 pounds and is race ready.\"
Information above is from this Bring A Trailer ad/article
http://bringatrailer.com/2009/05/31/bat-exclusive-1963-thorgeirson-h-mod-special/")
"The car was built in the early 1960s by Doug Thorgeirson, who was a welder at the Canadian shipyards on Vancouver Island. It was raced extensively from 1964 to 1968, but was unaccounted for after it was sold by the builder. It was discovered in 2004 and restored for vintage racing. It is available in Portland, Oregon for $17,500. Thorge ...
Updated: Dec 29, 2008 12:20pm PST
