Update 3/6/20 – This cool little hot rod is still on the market after two years. The price has been dropped $2k since we featured it last. Find it here on Facebook where the seller is now asking $7,500. Are we getting closer?
From 11/2/18 – Who knows when drag racing actually began, but it is a sport that has probably been about nearly as long as motorized transport itself. Speed gains are always incremental and are measured in thousandths of seconds. However, speed gains over decades are significant. Our feature car may have been competitive in its day, but its value now lies in the ever-growing culture of historic racing machinery. You will find this 1923 Ford Altered listed for sale here on Craigslist. It is located in Kingston, New York, and comes with a clean title. The owner has set a price of $9,500 for this historic racer.
Apparently, this car competed during the 1950s and 1960s before it was retired and placed into storage. It sits largely as it would have been prepared for its next race meeting. The only thing missing would be the wider wheels and tires. It’s hard to believe, but the parachute is still packed and in the trunk. As far as body and frame restorations go, this has the potential to be one of the least complicated that you could find. It appears that the body is fiberglass and that it isn’t painted, but has been wrapped. The steel frame appears to have a coating of surface corrosion, but it seems to be solid. Reviving both the body and frame look fairly straightforward.
The interior is all about go, not show. The only upholstery present is a bit on the seat, but otherwise, it’s pretty bare. That makes it a pretty easy job. The one thing that I did notice is the scatter-shield on the floor. With the tail-shaft running back down the center of the car (and between the driver’s legs) to the rear end, a sudden tail-shaft failure is going to send shrapnel flying in all directions. That shield doesn’t look like it is going to stop much, but I guess that it was deemed appropriate at the time that this car was competing.
The business end of proceedings is the engine, and this one is a 392ci Hemi that drives via an automatic transmission. The engine runs 2 x 4-barrel carburetors and drank alcohol rather than gas. There is no word on whether this engine turns freely. However, it is quite probable that following a race meeting, the owner would have squirted some form of lubricating oil into the cylinders and intake system to protect precious components from the acids present in alcohol. Therefore, it is possible that the engine still turns freely.
The value of this car as a drag car is negligible, as it would not comply with current safety regulations, and modifying it to comply would be prohibitively expensive. The value of this car lies in its historic past, and the window it provides into the world of drag racing in the 1950s and 1960s. The owner states that the car saw duty at Niagara Falls Raceway, and the Glens Falls Dragstrip. It might be possible to trace the car’s history and to return it to the specifications and look that it sported back then. Its value lies in its historic roots.
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