RACING THE NORRA 1000 PART 5 - REAR TIRE CARRIER

Added: 2026-06-02

[00:00:01]Hey everybody, Nick Olson, Chupacabra Offroad. I'm here with Jason Miller, AZP Concepts. He is the builder of this car, and if you've watched and you missed the first part, we talked about his ideas, the cage, the main setup. Part two of that is Jason building this rear tire carrier. Again, this car balances between a full-on race car and a really stout play car.

[00:00:22]Of course, Jason and I are always thinking about when we're adding something, could this be an accessory?

[00:00:27]Can we take what we learn from racing?

[00:00:29]Can we test the durability of our parts, but come up with a product that you guys might want to buy and bolt on to your stock Pro R. But, I tasked Jason with some challenges.

[00:00:39]I was at King of the Hammers looking at all the race cars. We're looking at what we thought looked cool.

[00:00:44]We needed a spare tire carrier. We wanted the weight down low.

[00:00:47]We needed a jack that was hidden. We wanted to also have some extra radius rods. And of course, we needed a spare axle and some storage for tools and whatnot. So, if you watched the first part of this video, I also talked about how this car is going to evolve over time. It's going to get a fuel cell. It's going to get a rear radiator. But for now, Jason put this all together. He came up with a really cool axle mount. Um and then um also ended up using a stock Polaris plastic box, which worked out perfectly for the packaging of this whole setup.

[00:01:16]>> Yeah, so like Nick said, um obviously we added this back here. I think this was actually probably the most fun, coolest part about the car. Um obviously we added the safety of the cage, you know, and and that's kind of expected.

[00:01:29]But this whole back end is something that we haven't really seen done the way we did it. Um obviously there's other people out there. The Pro cars kind of have something similar. But but like Nick said, you know, you know, he's at Hammers. He's sending me photos. Hey, I kind of like this. I kind of like that. But you know, I want this.

[00:01:46]And and really it was like, okay, we got to have side panels. I think that made it the coolest part. You know, and then you know, he'd mentioned that he'd wanted a a jack mount and the radius rod mounts.

[00:01:56]And so, got to thinking, I'm like, I think we can make this all fit inside of here. You know, like, I don't want this stuff on the exterior. I don't want a jack out on the outside. Like, I think we can make this work. So, went to work and, you know, it came down and figured out the angle he wanted, where he liked the tire. Um we did have to cut the lights out, which we knew that was planned from the start. Um we didn't care about having the tail lights in the car, but you know, like you said, there might be something coming in the works for you guys um that will work with the lights cuz we understand not everybody wants to cut apart the car and take the lights off, but um as you come in take a closer look at it, you'll see all the cool little mounts we did.

[00:02:33]Um like I said, I I think it came out really cool. It doesn't really stick behind the tires much, so, you know, you're not going to lose a a ton of room inside of a trailer or anything.

[00:02:41]Um axle mount, again, that's a welded on axle mount the way we did it, but there may be something coming in the future because it worked out amazing.

[00:02:51]>> Yeah, you know, we didn't want it sticking too far off. We wanted the weight low. We wanted it to look cool.

[00:02:55]Comment below what you guys think about the tail light scenario.

[00:02:58]We obviously went with a rear light bar, Baja Designs, of course, so that adds our our tail light function, uh brake lights, as well as amber chase light, that type of thing.

[00:03:08]I don't know if you guys are going to want to chop your There's a additional challenge the rear end comes a little bit weaker. I mean, Jason braced it up.

[00:03:16]So, there's some challenges, but we wanted to That had not allowed us to get the tire in a little bit closer, and the way the tire comes together with the stock player storage box, there's not much wasted space. I just love how the whole thing was packaged. And again, this is a little bit more racy, so we we mulled over that a hundred times. So, comment what you guys think, and I just love how how it turned out because we decided to go with getting rid of the tail lights cuz this is a race car.

[00:03:39]>> I you know, I like you said, I think that's kind of one of the biggest things. I I would like to know your comments, too, and and know, are you guys okay with cutting the tail lights out, or would you rather see something that works around the factory plastics, um you know, something that works around the factory exhaust, so you don't have to buy that. You know, let us know, but I I think this is something that we might need to push further and bring to market.

[00:04:00]>> Yeah, and speaking of bringing to market, another design goal, we didn't want it so low that you couldn't run a stock exhaust.

[00:04:05]This car had a stock exhaust until right before we were getting ready to go. We got on board with Evo Powersports and put on their gorgeous exhaust. So, we didn't want to have it so low that that would demand that because we've learned from our Can-Am X3 product, it's a great product, but an exhaust is another layer. So, we didn't want to do that.

[00:04:22]Some of the race cars they go really low, which probably helps with lower CG.

[00:04:26]Um, so, another thing, too, I'll just kind of tease it, you know, we added some stoutness to this Jason's design because this is a race car. I'm going to get bumped. Luckily at the Nora, that's not a rule and nobody bumped us, but we will inevitably have to bump someone and get bumped. So, inevitably, once we move the radiator, Jason will make a bigger, longer front end bumper for us to do that. But, we're trying to prove that a stockish car can go get hammered, that parts that go on your stock car can withstand the abuse of racing. We're really trying to balance that line, and when we do come out with a product like this, or if we do, it might have some tweaks because also comment below.

[00:05:03]You guys want a solid stout setup to hold your spares and all this, but you're probably not going to hopefully get bumped by your riding buddy.

[00:05:09]>> I I hope not. You know, and that's one of the things, you know, again, on on Nick's car, we did weld a couple mounts on it and how we disconnected it so that way it can be, you know, replaced if he does get hit. Um, but obviously, we got we got to make it to where it's a bolt-on for you guys. Um, so, I think we got something coming. We'll see.

[00:05:27]>> But, it turned out awesome. We just put some foam on the panels as well as the roof. No rattling. I love the design elements. I love how you've got some bent tube right here in the in the corner gusset that you did. Style is really good. Check out his website, AZP Concepts. He makes beautiful full turnkey sand car prerunner cars. Maybe we'll get him down here to Baja in one of those things, too, but uh love what you did to the car and we just put it through its paces, hammered, and we didn't have to worry about this at all.

[00:05:53]We had everything that we needed and um had a safe, fun race, and many more to come. So, thanks for everything you did.

[00:05:59]>> Perfect. I'd like to thank Nick, also, for getting us involved. Um this is kind of our pride and joy is is chassis stuff, chassis work. So, came out awesome. We'll see what we can do with it now.

[00:06:09]>> And uh yeah, also, you don't just do stuff on Polaris uh San Carlos stuff.

[00:06:12]You built a car for a Can-Am Maverick, too. So, right if you're watching this and you're interested in something extra custom, you you just built a Maverick?

[00:06:18]>> Yes, we we actually just finished a car for uh Terry Madden and Micah Black, and they just uh did the hammers with that car, and you know, they're going to do some more racing this year. So, like I said, we we enjoy chassis work. We enjoy all the race car stuff. So, let us know if you have any questions, we'll help you out.

[00:06:34]>> Thanks, everyone, for watching. I'll list a link to his website below. We'll see you on the next one.