Gambling With Frankenfire: Members’ Rides

Last week in Members’ Rides, we met Pete, with his lovely bright blue Genesis. I am a sucker for a bright color on a car you wouldn’t expect to see it, so bright blue on a luxury car is an unusual and great combination to me! This week, instead of looking at late model, low mile cars, we’re flipping to the opposite end of the spectrum and looking at a fleet of heavily customized old cars, that get used and abused in fantastic ways!

Members’ Rides is where we share the cars and stories of Autopian Members. The potential to be featured here is a perk for Autopian Members of every level, from the ultra-affordable “Cloth” tier all the way up to “Rich Corinthian Leather.” Click that link and join today!

Meet Marshall, aka Staffma. He is a mechanical engineer living in the gorgeous Finger Lakes region of New York. He’s also a Gambling addict… No not like that! He takes his awesome customized rides around to the various Gambler rallies all the time, and has collected an impressive collection of cars to do it with!

What’s currently in the garage?

• 1971 Triumph Spitfire Mk4
• 1971-1980 Triumph Spitfire “the Frankenfire”
• 1970 Buick Skylark
• 2000 Chevy shortbus
• 2010 GMC Sierra
• 2022 Kawasaki KLR 650
• 2022 Toyota Tacoma TRD Offroad

How did you get into the Gambler rallies?

A buddy of mine saw a video on Facebook in early 2017 about the Original Gambler in Oregon, and another buddy of mine and I decided to go. Ironically, my buddy who sent the video still hasn’t gone to a Gambler event after all this time.

What is the Gambler?

It’s a navigational rally with a strong side quest to collect litter and other garbage on public land. Basically, it’s a way to pack your buddies into a cheap car (ideally $500 or less), bomb around, have a good time, give back to the community, and foster good stewardship all at the same time.

How many have you run at this point?

I’ve lost count, but usually one or two events a year since the Fall of 2017, with a break for a few years due to COVID.

What Gambler was your favorite?

Hard to pick, but our first event up in the Adirondacks in 2017 was a great time. We drove the short bus, which was surprisingly capable off-road as long as it could physically fit down the trail. Had a great time at camp doing slow parade laps, doing the party bus thing.

With all these cars and builds, do you have a shop or a massive garage? What does that setup look like?

I have a two-car garage that I work out of. The garage was split originally into a garage and a woodshop. I figured out that the center wall wasn’t structural (or even attached to the ceiling) and tore it down, making one larger space. One side is taken up with machine tools (CNC mill, manual lathe, plasma table), 3D printer, air compressor, welders, etc.

The other side has a MaxJax four-foot lift, 12-ton press, 2×72 belt grinder, etc. I also have a crappy old barn that can fit 3 cars and my pile of various engines and transmissions. Still have to store some vehicles outside. Looking to thin the herd long term to get everything inside.

How did you come by the Spitfire?

My dad’s boss sold it to him for $500, who then gave it to me as my first car. It had been sitting since the late 1980s – turned out the ballast resistor went bad – and my dad and I got it going again Roadkill style, complete with epic smokescreens and a complete failure to meet our deadline of driving the car to my senior prom. Ended up having to take my 1980 rabbit diesel, which ran, but the electrical system crapped out that night, and I ended up driving home from prom with no lights.  Luckily there was decent moonlight.

What kind of condition is this one in?

Overall, poor condition. If this were any other car, I would throw it away and start again. At this point, it barely runs due to a failed distributor. The body and frame have a lot of rot, and the floors have delaminated from the rocker panels. Everything else is very rusty, and it’s a wonder something important didn’t separate and kill me.

The electrical system is particularly bad, and the car has a habit of trying to self-immolate when cables rub through. There are still burn marks on the underside of the bonnet from the throttle cable welding itself to the underside. Heat has been stuck on due to shoddy HVAC controls, brakes, and suspension are all iffy.

What are the plans for it?

I am actually in the midst of replacing or patching pretty much everything below the doors. The inner and outer sills, floor pans, rear wings, trunk floor, frame, and outriggers. Just received a large parcel of sheet metal direct from England via Rimmer Bros.

Beyond panels and frame, I am planning on rewiring the entire car, sending out the engine for rebuild, and custom machining the auxiliary mechanical overdrive gearbox I designed for the car for my senior project in college. I’m not going full restoration, just mechanically and structurally sound, so it can finally be back on the road after about 9 years off.

How did you get into Spitfires?

My Dad said, “Hey, we could get you this car, do you want it?” I did a tremendous amount of reading and researched parts availability, issues, the whole nine yards, and said yes. In hindsight, this thing is a deathtrap, and my dad should have gotten me something better. But things worked out. I went to engineering school to figure out how to improve the Spitfire, and it led me to what I do now.

What do you love about them?

The style is the first draw, penned by the great Giovanni Michelotti. My particular car is in a lovely shade of British racing green, and the swooping curvature really works out. The simplicity and easy access for work is a big plus, and the extremely raw feel of driving compared to modern vehicles. Manual brakes, steering, 4-speed manual … everything you need, nothing you don’t, roof included!

Now what is the Frankenfire?

It is the tub from a 1971 Spitfire, with a 1980 front clip, doors, and trunk lid on a shortened 1990 Chevy S10 2WD chassis. Power brakes and steering, rewired with speedway kit, fuel injected. The motor is a 4.3 Vortec that was supposedly built and came out of a 1941 Jeep Willys fully custom rock crawler. Transmission NV3500 out of a 2WD 2003 Blazer.

What powertrain is in it now?

Currently nothing. I stole the 4.3 and NV3500 to swap into the Buick when the Buick 350 choked on dielectric corrosion

What additional plans do you have for this beast?

I am actually planning on completely tearing it apart and rebuilding it. My initial frame work was good but the body mounts were made when I had COVID and they are not my best work.  Also, it turns out that I don’t have enough legroom due to the shape of the frame not letting the seat go back far enough. Lastly converting it to 4wd. This was always the plan, but If I am redoing the body mounts, I might as well do it now.

I’m planning on 3D-scanning everything and potentially custom-making the frame. My day job is engineering /3D-scanning obsolete parts, so I figure I should use my skills to make sure the body is mounted straight and centered this time.

Where did the idea for this build come from?

There is a fellow in PA who built the Trackfire – a Spitfire on a Chevy Tracker frame and powertrain – who was daily-driving it for years. I wanted to build my own version, but with more power and beefier axles. The guy sold the Trackfire a few years ago, but I sadly didn’t seeit  until afterwards.

Back in 2019 I saw an ad for a stripped shell for a Spitfire and bought it. I also had a 1990 Chevy S10 short bed that my father purchased around 2000 as a parts truck to swap my mom’s 1989 with a small-block Chevy. Many of the 4.3 parts are used for the small-block swap, and the ’89 is a 2.5 truck originally. I took the swap parts off, and was left with an extremely rotten body, a bad 4.3 motor, and a decent frame. Width is about right, length could be shortened – I figured, why not? Free parts truck!

What was the hardest part about building Frankenfire?

Building a whole car from a literal pile of parts for the first time is a steep learning curve. I had to figure out practical wiring, find combinations of parts that work, and fix issues as they came up. As previously stated, the body mounts were much harder than they had to be, which I chalk up to COVID brain fog.

What’s going on with the Skylark?

Basically, a mechanically restored, lifted, ratty muscle car that I was hoping to do summer driving and light gambling with. Fuel injection and a 5-speed, converted to disc brakes. This started as “Oh, it needs a fuel pump and tires,” and went to fixing every subsystem until the only original parts left are the body/frame, steering box, and steering column. Even the rear end is from a ’72 Cutlass because the ’70 Buick rear end uses unobtanium gears.

How did you get the idea to do this?

There is a fellow with a lifted 70ish Chevelle that inspired me. Lifted muscle cars are a big thing on the West Coast, especially in Gambler circles. When I got the Skylark, it was already actually lifted in the back, but dumped in the front on torched springs, so really, I just leveled it.

Was it hard to adapt a lift kit to fit this?

Nope! I bought donk lift spindles, 3.5’’ aluminum horseshoe spacers, an adjustable rear arm kit, and adapted 4WD 1990 s10 air shocks to fit the rear. All bolt-on, and I used s10 brake lines as well for length.

What made you decide to go with the 4.3 for this build?

I did a lot of work on the Buick 350 V8 that was in the car. This worked great, until it got up to temp for the first time, and decades worth of dielectric corrosion was freed from inside the engine and plugged up all the coolant passages. This made it so that the car would nuclear overheat once it reached a certain point.

I had the 4.3 already, so the swap was a weeklong Hail Mary so that I could take a road trip out to Oregon to the original Gambler. Didn’t even make it onto the highway before the seam of the gas tank split, and it was dumping raw fuel in addition to a bunch of other issues.

Realistically, the 4.3 is pretty much a placeholder, but I do have the car roughly ¾ LS swapped for when that inevitably happens.

With the powertrain yanked from the Spitfire, do these feel similar in any way?

Not really, the combo is a little too powerful for the Spitfire and not quite enough for the Buick.

Any additional plans?

Get the frame straightened. Thanks to some old accident damage, towing a broken F150 during the Gambler, and maybe some light jumping, it has seen better days. Then I need to get the alignment dialed back in, break in the new rear end, and eventually LS swap.

I’m hoping to get it good enough to do some rally cross events, which would be a heck of a lot of fun, slinging it around. Because the lift is mostly in the spindles, it’s not very wallowy and handles decently, even without the rear sway bar.

How was it running this in the Gambler?

We ran the Fall Gambler near Cortland, NY, in 2023. It was a good time, different terrain than the Adirondacks, where we usually go. The car did very well on powerline and logging trails. It was pretty dry, so no water crossings or major mud. We picked up a reasonable amount of trash. There is a video of me flat towing a  1980s F150 back to the camp when its hydraulic clutch line fell apart.

Now, where did the bus come from?

My buddy had this bus, and the town was giving him trouble for too many vehicles, so he gave it to me, and as a group we road tripped from Long Island to my house, closer to Rochester NY.

What do you use it for?

We took it to the Gambler, but all the spirited driving caused old brake lines to leak, so it hasn’t done much since then.

How was the Gambler in this?

Oh, great fun, we would sit in the La-Z-Boy by the rear door, which was not bolted down, and be catapulted to the stratosphere on every hard bump. We only had to sit out a couple of really tight trails as the bus was physically too wide to fit down the trailhead. We picked up hitchhikers, most of the pieces of an exhaust system, and all sorts of other trophies.

What’s the plan for the bus?

Hopefully fix it up, build a walkway on the top, and Gamble it more as well as daily driving, it’s the ultimate utility vehicle.

Now, how does the Sierra fit in?

This was my daily until a few months ago when I got the Tacoma back from my mom. I bought it to replace my 1984 K10 in about 2019, which turned out to be a significant downgrade in reliability.

You mentioned it’s got over 200,000 miles. What kind of shape is it in?

I’d say D+, normal NY rust and frame issues. Pretty much everything except the engine and trans has gone bad at one point or another. The extended warranty people kicked me off the plan once I hit 12k in repairs, got my money’s worth!

Issues I’ve had:

• In the 100,000 miles I’ve driven it the check engine light has been on for about ½ the time.
• Three sets of front wheel bearings
• The front diff exploded
• Alternator, radiator, and the AC condenser all went out; it still has constant AC leaks
• I rebuilt the entire front suspension, rear shocks
• My power steering cooler turned into a sprinkler
• The steel wheels like to bend at the slightest provocation
• I had to get the entire fuse box replaced. This is apparently so common that the shop keeps them on the shelf. Luckily, that solved the gremlins in the electrical system issue
• I have replaced the hood latch, tailgate latch
• Evap issues galore, purge valve (3x), purge solenoid, fuel pump, fuel pump driver, split fuel line (lost 10 gallons of gas in 5 miles)
• Throttle body failure (this one made me mad- the new “better” throttle body cut my mpg from 18 combined to 15.5, and it’s never recovered)
• VVT failures, it turns out this system is crap if you believe the GM oil change intervals, but full synthetic at 5k mile oil changes fixed all my issues

Any plans for it?

Currently off the road due to not being inspectable due to frame holes. Trying to decide if I want to fix it or pull the motor to put in the Skylark.

Now with all the crazy builds and trucks, what’s the role for the KLR? 

It’s my daily during summer, assuming light rain at most. Having hard bags makes it quite practical, and 45-48 mpg saves me money. I believe the bike has paid for 1/4 of its purchase price in fuel so far. On average, I put about 3,000 miles on it a year.

What led to this being added to the fleet?

I rode 80s bikes a lot during the summer in high school and college and wanted to get back into it, but only had one bike that could do everything and was safer on loose surfaces. With ABS and knobby tires, it is very surefooted. I have now run it in Gamblers four or five times, and we actually have a motorcycle Gambler event now.

Do you think you’ll have this one long time?

Yep, I really only want to store and maintain one bike, and this one should last me until retirement if I take care of it.

What led to the addition of the Tacoma?

I needed a reliable daily. The peace of mind knowing that I had a vehicle that was either going to start flawlessly or someone would fix it under warranty was a big weight off my shoulders.

How did you pick this out over everything else out there?

That’s a funny story! I might be the only person to every seriously cross-shop a new Miata, a newish Tacoma, a Factory Five ‘35 ford truck kit car, and a restored or good-condition 1980s Chevy truck for a daily driver.

The common thread here is interesting: manual transmission, reliability, and at least 15 mpg. I have at various points daily-driven a 1984 Chevy and my original ’71 Spitfire, so I know both of those would work, and I would have the 2010 GMC still for truck stuff if needed.

• The Miata is the spiritual successor to the Spitfire and would scratch that itch more reliably; the issue is, I could not find one when I was looking, even to sit in
• Tacoma: good, reliable, comes in green, manual 4×4, expensive
• Factory Five ’35 truck was about the same total cost as the Tacoma, but with a big effort to build. Sadly, I just didn’t have time
• 1980s Chevy would have worked well, but I just wasn’t finding the right one for the right money. Eventually, I’ll get another square body and build it properly.

At the end of the day, I found my Tacoma spec’d exactly how I would have done it CPO in the Toyota dealer closest to me at the max price I was comfortable with, so I just went and bought it, ending the debate.

That’s awesome. Thanks Marshall!

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