Want your own race track? Yucca Proving grounds for sale

[Flatsix66]

Looks like Stellantis is taking a shit and selling their 4000 acre proving grounds over by Yucca. https://www.hagerty.com/media/news/stellantis-selling-arizona-proving-grounds/

 

[oldman]

I own 5 acres right down the road from that. I may look into it.

 

[oldman]

About three miles down the road. 5 acres of wasteland,

I thought Ford still owned it.

 

[coolchange]

No Ming sized lake, I’m out.

 

[HALLETT BOY]

I’ve always wondered about that place , I’ve noticed the well maintained chain link fence with barbed wire . Seems like a lot of security for a test track …

 

[oldman]

I’ve always wondered about that place , I’ve noticed the well maintained chain link fence with barbed wire . Seems like a lot of security for a test track …

I remember seeing photos of Ford trucks in cinder block walled off parking stalls years ago doing hot weather idle testing.

Talk about extreme weather testing

 

[lbhsbz]

I’ve always wondered about that place , I’ve noticed the well maintained chain link fence with barbed wire . Seems like a lot of security for a test track …

They don’t want people taking pictures of a bunch of broke down mopars

 

[Ziggy]

They don’t want people taking pictures of a bunch of broke down mopars

Or coming through holes in the fence to test their own shit, ya know, for the fun of it then killing themselves.

 

[Riverbottom]

Most of the buildings are subterrain, big enough to drive semi trucks underground. Pretty large facility.

 

[77charger]

I headed into the desert and came up on toyotas testing grounds place was huge.just last week rriding through desert on the bike came up on chryslers

 

[WAAZ]

Just sent the link to Cleetus……..

 

[17 10 Flat]

Went there lots of times when still working for Ford. Cool place once was an Air Force run POW camp for Germans. Ford sold it back in 2006 when they were running out of money. They now rent time at VPG in Phoenix, There are old Ford cars buried out there back in the day they didn't crunch vehicles just dug a big hole and pushed them in.
What is the lunch room was the Officer quarters, use to be an in ground pool the employees could use when off work, that was filled in and made a shaded break/eating area.

 

[Sportin' Wood]

My grandfather used to work for GM, he died a few years ago at age 97, but he used to tell us stories of the time he worked at the test facility. The safety standards for the drivers were pretty lacking back in the day. He also told us stories about working on the production line before the UAW and it sounded terrible.

I wonder if Jeep, Dodge and RAM will be for sale soon as well. It would be good if we could get them back in the hands of an American company.

 

[17 10 Flat]

My grandfather used to work for GM, he died a few years ago at age 97, but he used to tell us stories of the time he worked at the test facility. The safety standards for the drivers were pretty lacking back in the day. He also told us stories about working on the production line before the UAW and it sounded terrible.

I wonder if Jeep, Dodge and RAM will be for sale soon as well. It would be good if we could get them back in the hands of an American company.

They watched us pretty close. During the day 90-95 mph was max speed. Our section would reserve the track for an hour or so after normal hours. If you were planning on 120mph +, vehicle needed roll cage, proper tires. They would station an ambulance at one end and a tow truck at the other.

At the time Ford owned Aston Martin. They were trying to certify 200 mph. Sadly they would not trust any of us behind the wheel... New set of tires daily. Pretty pricey. Was not in the Aston program just shared space in the garage with them.

 

[Cooter01]

So are we all pitching in to buy this bastard or what?

 

[Flatsix66]

RDP winter clubhouse

 

[Paradox]

So are we all pitching in to buy this bastard or what?

Well.. if they sold it cheap (say $10M) you’d only need 200 people chipping in $50k each for a pretty awesome private facility. That said, I suspect upkeep would be a bitch.

 

[Cooter01]

Well.. if they sold it cheap (say $10M) you’d only need 200 people chipping in $50k each for a pretty awesome private facility. That said, I suspect upkeep would be a bitch.

We setup a consulting firm that specializes in grant funding projects to get grant money and use incarcerated folks to do the grounds keeping work. Use trade schools so students can get hands on learning when chit hits the fan on big stuff. Once a year we will do tours of the facilities and once a quarter we will rent the track out for events.

 

[monkeyswrench]

Put up some private hangers with condos, and let the ballers store their supercars there, and fly in and out. Concierge service to maintain cars, detail and such, maybe catering and bottle service? Like a high end yacht club.

 

[Roosky01]

Does this mean that Stellantis is just saying "fuk all this hot weather testing bullshit" and will suddenly be putting out better quality vehicles without it?

 

[17 10 Flat]

Well.. if they sold it cheap (say $10M) you’d only need 200 people chipping in $50k each for a pretty awesome private facility. That said, I suspect upkeep would be a bitch.

I think Ford sold it for 6 mil.

Mentioned about the buried cars. Part of the agreement no digging those up. Lots of old race cars, supercharged T-Birds, Galaxies 1956, 1957 style. So I was told by the old timers.

 

[Sharky]

I wonder if Jeep, Dodge and RAM will be for sale soon as well. It would be good if we could get them back in the hands of an American company.

Elon should buy Chrysler and bring back the slogan they had in 1996. 1996 was before that prick Eaton sold Chrysler to the fuking krouts. And Diamler used Chryslers money ($7 Billion in the bank) to buy the company.

I could see an electric, 1200Hp Chrysler 300, AWD

 

[aka619er]

The one in Yuma always has Nascar teams on it. I would imagine that one does as well.

 

[The Chicken]

I spent a fair amount of time at the proving grounds back in the early 2000's back when Ford owned it.
I was there doing electrical addition and maintenance work for the electrical contractor I worked for at the time.
I had a friend that worked there as well wrenching on and repairing test vehicles that had been put through the wringer.
As someone else mentioned, the place was originally a military installation (one of the original "Sites"-like Site Six, which was also originally a military base, that was scattered around the Arizona/California border area, IIRC).
Some of the old buildings had really interesting floors-the old concrete had so much reinforcing steel in them, magnets would typically stick pretty good to the floors.
I remember even way back then seeing parts of test cars that were testing hydrogen fuel cell power systems. In fact, IIRC, one of the control systems we were installing was for the fuel cell refilling system.
It was a fascinating place, full of fascinating things, and being a Ford fan, I was sad when they sold it, and seeing it sort of downgraded from a sorta secret test facility to more of a mundane test facility for Chrysler and Harley and whatever its been doing lately-seems like it lost some of it's mystique.
I hope someone buys it and does something really cool with it. It's a place that has so much cool history.

 

[Bigbore500r]

Does this mean that Stellantis is just saying "fuk all this hot weather testing bullshit" and will suddenly be putting out better quality vehicles without it?

Please see other thread, where RDP member is currently asking if it's normal for his Jeep to run 235 degrees . . .

 

[Bigbore500r]

Elon should buy Chrysler and bring back the slogan they had in 1996. 1996 was before that prick Eaton sold Chrysler to the fuking krouts. And Diamler used Chryslers money ($7 Billion in the bank) to buy the company.

View attachment 1443438

I could see an electric, 1200Hp Chrysler 300, AWD

Diamler Benz is responsible for alot of the good shit that happened to Chrysler over the past 20 years. Nice interiors, non-shitty transmissions, and they donated their E-class Benz platform to create the Challenger / charger / 300 cars. Now Fiat . . . all they did was take Diameler's work, and continue to use it with minimal updates, while running the company into the ground. And bring everyone the 3.0 Eco-bomb diesel. But what do you expect from Fiat?