No, I,m not Dr. Nick Riviera. I own a repair shop in Torrance. I've run across the H.A.M.B. many times while surfing the net for various things and broke out in laughter when I found out what it meant. Now I've been racing and repairing cars for many years, but I'm an old Volvo guy, pushrod power. I help prep the only Volvo to run the Monterey Historic Races. Here is a link to an article about the car. I'm kneeling next to the car on the second page, 3rd pic. The owner of the car and author of the article was literally a rocket scientist (he's now retired) and a racer since his youth. He has a side business as the "Automotive Archaeologist", and has a vast knowledge of historic racing and an archive of photos as well. http://www.vclassics.com/sebring1.htm I started my racing career on the streets of the South Bay area in So Cal. This quickly led to a gutted car with big 50mm side draft Webers and the Brotherhood Raceway on Terminal Island where I embarrassed many V8 powered machines with a 5:38 welded R&P and 9" slicks on the 1/8 mile in my little Volvo 122. I took the last timed run before they took down the lights. Then Ascot Park opened up a class called foreign stocks and it was all over. The 122's wheelbase was too long so I gutted a P1800 that I had lying around, took it to Torrance Muffler where none other than Wild Willie Borsch bent up rollbars for me, but out of legal thickness bar. Your not gonna believe this but Willie drove a 68 Volvo 145 wagon during his final days and I sold him a M41 overdrive tranny for it. Well my driver (I sucked in the mud) went on to win the championship at Ascot with that car the year before they closed. Then it was time to move on so I built a tube chassis car to go pavement racing with a group called the MSRA, Mini Stock Racing Association. Yes, its Volvo powered, B20, bored and stroked to 2280cc, 14.5:1 Volvo Competition Stage IV head then ported and polished further by one of the best in the business, steel billet roller cam w/.640 lift, Isky roller lifters (same bore as Chevy), custom rev kit, T&D custom built roller rocker assy, 55mm Webers & billet aluminum intake manifolds, dry sump oil system, 4 wheel coil-overs, Speedway Engineering mini quick change, 4 wheel JFZ disc brakes, etc, etc. Chassis dyno time was sponsored by AEM before they went into manufacturing go fast goodies for ricers. The guy I used for all my fabrication work (a former circle track racer) is now building and maintaining nostalgia dragsters and is incredible. He built the re-creation of TV Tommy Ivo's 4 engine, 4 wheel drive car. He told me there was someone looking for some Volvo parts on the H.A.M.B. so here I am to see if I can help.
The Jalopy Journal
