MarsFab Buggy build

MarsFab

MarsFab

Will work for money
Joined
Oct 24, 2007
Location
Harrisburg, NC
About a year ago George Gazeley came to me and told me about this idea he had to build a buggy. He wanted a mid mounted 22re, stak 3 speed, 2 steering rockwells, 49" Iroks, and 130" wheelbase packed into a small little single seat buggy. I thought it sounded awesome. Plus this would be the first buggy I'd built so I was really looking forward to building something out of the ordinary to get started. So after some sketching we decided that I would be building the chassis, mounting the motor tranny and case seat and body, doing the suspension, steering, and any other welding that needed to be done on the chassis.

The chassis is all 1.5" .125wall dom fully TIG welded.
Lower links are 2.25" 3/8 wall dom
Uppers are 1.75" .125 wall dom sleeved with 1.5 .250

I've got lots of pictures. So I'll just post some of the good ones here. The rest will be on my site in the next few days so you can see more details.
All welded up. This thing took 50 hours to fully TIG weld!!
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Looks good Chris!
 
I've got pictures of all the suspension on my other computer. I'll try to get them loaded up tomorrow. For now all I've got is the chassis.
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Looks great man! Welds look killer!
 
I actually finished my part of the build a few months ago, and now George has been working hard to get everything else from the plumbing and wiring to hydraulic lines and sheet metal. Throughout the whole build He's been debating on whether or not to take parts off his other buggy to get this one finished. So since we had rides going on all last year he didnt want to take anything off it till around Christmas. So when we set up the suspension we didn't have shocks to use we just used square tubing for mock up and as stiff knees to move it around. Well when we went to cycle the suspension a few weeks ago we realized that I had put the shock tabs on the axle at the wrong angle and the mounts bound up at full flex. Brandon at Rides supplied the 18" racerunners that came in last a few weeks ago. So this morning the buggy came back into my shop to redo the shock tabs, mount the shocks and charge them up. That brings to now. the Buggy is completely finished except for the engine harness. Here's a few shots from today while we were loading it up.
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Damn! Nice job dawg.
Can i be next in line?
 
Absolutely sick, just not a fan of the 4 bangers... Though I figure with a 22r and rockwells, that buggy will never die, can't say that when you start throwing serious HP numbers at it.
 
XJfreakHO said:
Absolutely sick, just not a fan of the 4 bangers... Though I figure with a 22r and rockwells, that buggy will never die, can't say that when you start throwing serious HP numbers at it.
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George is a die hard 22re fan. He's got one in his other buggy. It's reliable and has plenty of power to go anywhere he wants. Which is usually further than anyone else. Thanks for the good words man.
 
I remember this thing in the shop while Chris was building the Kraken's suspension. It was cool then & now its just badass. George has a lot of knowledge when it comes to wheeling. Good to just sit & listen to soak up the info & Chris knows a thing or two when it comes to fabbing so I'm sure this buggy will do some amazing stuff. Great job guys.
 
it needs a bigblock hemi!


looks badass killer work chris!
 
MarsFab said:
^^^ He says it'll get an ls one of these days. I guess we'll see ^^^^
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surely not a chevy motor in one of his rigs! he needs to build a wicked dodge engine for it!

or get whatever kevin crews was running in that buggy from alabama today!:huggy:
 
Yea I missed the race today. Wish I could have come out.

I know, george and Chevy doesn't fit together. He's got a nicely built 440 sittin in his garage just waiting to go in something. I told him we shoulda used that from the get go.
 
George as usual another awesome "YOTA" powered buggy.
what is the ratio's in this drivetrain? I see you have an atlas in this rig instead of the toy reduction/dana300 . This is one is for "XJfreakHO" unless you've seen george's old buggy in action you wouldn't understand the "22R" thing . you don't need alot of HP if you have a proper set up buggy that is geared and I've seen the old buggy go places that bigger and more(800+ hp) rigs . Cnn't wait to see you at the farm .
 
jeepn-jason said:
surely not a chevy motor in one of his rigs! he needs to build a wicked dodge engine for it!
or get whatever kevin crews was running in that buggy from alabama today!:huggy:
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he had an ls2....
 
reddnekyotadude said:
what is the ratio's in this drivetrain? I see you have an atlas in this rig instead of the toy reduction/dana300.
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Thanks man. It's actually a stak 3 speed monster box. 5.44:1, 3.05:1, and 1:1. I'm not sure what the 2wd 5spd transmission has for a first gear but with 6.72's in the axles and 5.44 low/low It should have a great crawl ration even with the 49" tires.
 
A few more of the dash and interior.
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Its really tight beside the engine with the driveshaft running from the T-case all the way back to the rear of the belly to a Ford Ranger pillow block. That intermediate shaft is almost 5 feet long.

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The tranny shifter works copmpletely backwards from normal. Thats gonna take some getting used to.

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Rear steer lever.

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I think these two shots are really cool. They give you a great idea of how crooked this thing looks in person.

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good Lord, your first buggy! This looks awsome. :beer:
 
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