Old School rails? Anyone use them anymore?

4-Seaters can be hard to come by.

I've seen some pretty nice rails for sale for under $10K....expecially if it doesn't run. Heck....an acquantice has one w/a bus box in it. They are out there and guys can't sell them (wonder why?)....cuz they ride rough.
 
4-Seaters can be hard to come by.

Especially ones that were properly built.

Didn't know shit about shit and this was our first ghetto buggy... turns out it was a 2 seater that had ~3' of straight tube added to make a 4 seat which meant less-than-zero structural integrity. First ride out of the trailer each trip was to clean Gene's or Dirty Bob's for more gussets and welding. The wife drove the hell out of that thing with the boys strapped into the back seats 🤘 ...until one of the GD Super Bowl trips to cement flats... maybe 2 miles out she stopped, I roll up on my quad like WTF and hear this rattling and see her eyes big and white through her goggles. Both a-pillars, both b-pillars, and one c-pillar had come loose at the belt line and the entire top cage was rattling off the car. Got her on my quad, the boys into other cars, and that car went home for a meeting with the Sawzall.



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I've helped many guys swap from VW to Honda. Many of them actually ended up with money in their pocket after selling the VW.
My last car had a 2180, then a turbo 2332 that I kept building and adding money to. Running straight race gas and looking into meth injection when I finally decided to pull it and throw the mini van engine in it. The only thing I regret about the swap is not doing it sooner.
 
I want an old school rail so bad. Two reasons - I grew up seeing them and riding in a couple. Reason number 2 is because Im broke and can't wrap my head around $20k+ for a sand car. If I came across a good 4 seater at the right price though, I would have a hard time passing on it.

You can find a Sandcar for 20?
 
I used to have a sister car to this with a turbo 2275. Pretty, fast AF, always fixing the chassis, and keeping it shining was a full time job...
J&J? I wish mine a little turbo for some boost and whistle... still pretty fast being NA.
 
J&J? I wish mine a little turbo for some boost and whistle... still pretty fast being NA.

Yep. It was called "Shine-o-mite"...or some spelling. The decals were removed when I got it, but you could see it lightly ghosted in the panels.

Story was that a pair of brother in PHX had 3 built. They raced 2, the one I had was the toy. I was sitting at the base of Olds one weekend and an old fella walked up to me and asked if this was the shine-o-mite car. Yep. The then proceeded to tell me the story of how he owned MANY years prior. Kinda cool.
 
My first car was a Johnny's 2+2 with an 1835cc in it. I could keep up with anything, but it was a very rough ride. One thing that car teaches you to do is actually dune, momentum is the key to everything. Seems I was welding on the frame to fix cracks almost every trip, but man was that fun. I don't miss carbs, FI is a game changer.
 
yeah the ol'school buggy can and should still rock it, but...... not with a stock beam or swing axle. gotta be 6+ coilover beam and 3x3 trailing coilover for me to get at it

my 1st rail was a Prowlers SandSprite4; stock alum beam (bent it went to 10+ wider coilover), rear was swing axle with marvin shaw shocks (blew them and went to fox 8" coil over), but dang the front was nice, rear still sucked and really hurt the back
 
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