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And in the Beginning . . . |
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This is why the Swedes named the car 'The Jumping Doghouse'. |
Stripteaser with its final original paint job. |
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Lost in France |
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And that might have been the end of the story were it not for the enthusiasm and determination of Andrew Gibb. Several people have harboured the dream over the years of tracking down Stripteaser and returning it to the UK but, fortunately for all nostalgia fans, Andrew succeeded where all the others had failed. Some 25 years had elapsed since The Jumping Doghouse left these shores and finding it after all that time was not going to be easy. It was a leap of faith in any case because with the passage of time anything could have happened to this unique part of UK drag racing history. Andrew was well aware of this and his Plan B was to build a replica from the ground up. The breakthrough came when he posted a 'desperately seeking' ad for Stripteaser in English on 'Dragster en France', a French language website which is currently (2008) offline. To his enormous relief he got a reply almost immediately. From then on things happened very rapidly indeed. On Wednesday 24 October 2007 Andrew agreed to buy Stripteaser from Jean-Louis Peyrard who had by then acquired the car. Come Friday lunchtime and Andrew jumped into the cab of his trusty recovery truck and set off for St Etienne in the south of France not all that far from the Italian border. I looked up the route on Google Maps and found that the journey is approximately 620 miles each way. Unfortunately he could not get on a ferry at Dover until 8 pm but such is life. A mammoth drive across France then ensued with a short stop for shuteye and Andrew arrived in St Etienne at approximately 1.30 pm UK time on Saturday. Within an hour he had done the deal, loaded up the truck, and set off for another 620 mile stint back to England arriving back in Romford at 3.00 am on Sunday morning in a rather tired state to put it mildly. |
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Fester goes to Work |
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Andrew lost no time in delivering his new acquisition to Bill Felstead's Fester Race Cars workshop at about 8.00 am later that day. The plan had always been to race Stripteaser and not just to restore it as a museum piece. This meant that a new chassis would be required to meet current regulations and this entailed increasing the wheelbase by some five inches from the existing 85 inches to 90. Numerous pictures were taken of the original chassis so that the new one could be as accurate a reproduction as possible within the constraints of the modern regulations. A 125 inch wheelbase Mark Williams funny car kit was purchased to form the basis of the new chassis. Bill Felstead worked his magic on this to reduce it to the required 90 inch wheelbase. The result was a chrome moly chassis tagged to 7.50 seconds which fitted in the bodyshell like a hand in a glove. As many of the original components as possible were retained. These included all of the steering gear, the front and back axles, the seat (reputedly with upholstery by Tony Nancy), the nitrous bottle, and many of the brackets fitted to the chassis. New push plates were needed for the back axle and new replica shock absorbers from a 1970s Honda C90 'steppy' went on the front. A new set of Ford Pop kingpins and bushes completed Andrew's shopping list for the rolling chassis. |
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The new funny car style chassis under construction on the jig at Fester Race Cars. |
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Engine and Transmission |
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The engine received a thorough overhaul which included line boring the block, a re-bore with new liners and the oil ways were cleared of congealed oil and gunge. The crank was ground and the con rods were shot peened and both were fitted with new bearings all round. The head only required new cam bearings, bronze inserts, and valve seats and shims. A new Hilborn fuel pump and the fitting of new Aeroquip hoses completed the work to the engine. Stripteaser was well known for its lively handling and Bob Jarrett advised Andrew that the car was at its least unpredictable when fitted with a two-speed Lenco. The existing B&J Clutchflite was therefore removed and a three speed Lenco was obtained fitted with the gearing specified by Bob. |
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Bodywork Modifications The planned increase in wheelbase had to be achieved in such a way that the distinctive body was not distorted unduly and remained instantly recognisable as Stripteaser. The solution was to leave the overall length of the body shell completely unchanged and simply to move the rear wheels backwards by four inches and the front wheels forward by one inch. The result was so cunningly achieved that you have to look at comparative pictures of the car before and after before you even realise this has been done. The rear wheel arches were cut from the bodywork and retained while the existing arches were suitably enlarged. The left hand wheel arch was then glassed into position on the right hand side and vice versa. It was found that there was sufficient space at the front of the body to accommodate the slightly changed position of the wheels without resorting to more fibreglass work which was a real bonus. |
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The Paint Job Fortunately for Andrew the previous owner had simply sprayed his new paint scheme over the top of the original paintwork. Therefore it was possible by carefully removing the top layers of paint to take accurate dimensions and positions of the various elements which made up the original design. In the case of the Stripteaser logo this was traced onto translucent paper in order to obtain an absolutely identical copy. Following this exercise the paint was then completely stripped back to the bare fibreglass which was filled as necessary and painted with a white primer coat. The primer was then followed by a coat of blue pearl lacquer. The blue, yellow and green stripes were then added in that order. The paint was actually coloured lacquer which was laid on in coats with Andrew standing outside the spray booth telling ace spray man Dave Richards when the correct shade had been achieved. Great care was taken in the positioning of the stripes even down to replicating dimensional inaccuracies in the
original setting out. The precise colours used where Regal Blue, Aztec Gold and Sea Green for the stripes, Fire Red for the remainder of the body, and Chrysler Imperial Maroon for the chassis. Finally the vinyl transfers were made which included a replica Castrol sticker from the 1970s to reflect their sponsorship of the car. |
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The Finished Article There is nothing more to say - just feast your eyes on this little beauty, the finish is absolutely superb and a credit to everyone associated with it. There are plenty more pictures of the build and the finished car on the Gallery pages which you can access from the menu on the left. |
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And Finally . . . Andrew would like to thank the following individuals and organisations for making this restoration possible (and for their encouragement and support when he was ready to throw the towel in!) : Bill Felstead of Fester Race Cars A big thank you to my sponsors at Castrol Oil An equally big thank you to my family Sandie, Corinne, Kirsty, Annalieze and my assistant crew chief Thaliah. Finally, thanks to Eurodragster and The Acceleration Archive for their ongoing support and enthusiasm. |
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All material on this site is copyright |
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