Re: Old Scout Racers

[n9ads@domain.elided (Howard R Pletcher)]

On Sun, 07 Dec 1997 00:28:26 +0000 Nicholas Rayer Jr
<nrayer@domain.elided> writes:
>I was looking through a bunch of old magazines the other day. They 
>were various truck and van mags, remember the late seventies! I noticed 
>that Scouts seemed to win quite a few off-road races. Specifically
Sherman
>Balch, Jimmy Jones in SSII's and Frank Howarth of ORD performance in a
>traveler. Does anyone remember seeing any of this, or the whereabouts 
>of these rigs? I am sure that these trucks were highly modified for the 
>era they were in and would be a dinosaur today, but it would be neat to 
>see how the factory and dealers modified them to be so successful. From 
>the pictures I can tell that they ran a reverse shackle in the front. I 
>know that the Mike Ismail runs one now, but whats the history behind
IH's
>involvement?
>
As far as I am aware, Jimmy Jones was the first of the big-time Scout
racers, running a Cabtop pickup (powered by a 6-258 I believe) in the
Baja 500 and Mexican 1000 in the 73-74 time frame.  I don't think he got
any IH support at this time, although he may have been sponsored by a
dealer.  About the time the SSII was being developed, the Sales
Department learned of NASCAR's "Win on Sunday, Sell on Monday" motto and
began sponsoring some teams, particularly those mentioned above.  Jerry
Boone is another one that I think received some sponsorship  I'm not
aware of others in the big time, although there was some regional and
local support for some local efforts as well.  It was interesting to note
that Balch and Howarth were racing SSII's before they appeared in the
showrooms although that is not too significant since the SSII was largely
the addition of the fiberglass panels and removal of other trim from the
standard chassis.  I know little of what was done to prepare them for
racing as that was done by the teams in California.  I did hear rumors
that one engineer at the Indianapolis plant spent a lot of time
developing non-stock engine parts for this purpose however.  I would
expect the Scouts to be about as stock as a NASCAR stock car.  Sherman
Balch was probably the most successful of the racers, winning the SCORE
championship in his Scout in about 1978.

One of the Scout vendors, I think it was Mr. Scout, has advertised that
he is now the home of Sherman Balch's Scout.  Frank Howarth's ended up in
the possession of that engineer from the Indianapolis Plant and made an
appearance at the Scout Nationals in 1990 or 91.  I don't know if there
are others anywhere or not.  

It was an interesting time to be around.  Too bad it had to end.

Howard Pletcher
Howteron Products Scout Parts