Jack Ulstad's Page

Hi Stephen!

Thank you very much for the nice welcome and quick response... looks like a great group to be involved with for sure! I decided to join VRL for 2 reasons. I'm planning to start racing vintage events in the near future, but more importantly I own a business that specializes in creating vintage racing simulators and we have an immediate need for authentic-looking Lotus 49 components. We have a full size Lotus 49 simulator that we are building the back half for right now... the photo I used is a temporary one, not of our actual simulator... I'll try and switch to a photo of the actual simulator later on when I arrive home.

After several setbacks with my business, progress is being made lately and we are now gearing up to really blow some people away and create some systems that will show of the glory days off racing. As I said, at the present time we are concentrating our current efforts on putting some finishing touches on our Lotus 49 replica simulator. Perhaps you might have some advice or contacts here?

The Lotus has been used by our business and it's former owners (BRD in the UK) at many public events, and each time we usually try to incorporate several improvements to add to the "driver's" experience. And now we are hoping to make the most dramatic improvements ever, for a very special charity event that will raise money for Parkinson's Disease research. We do not have much time though, as it is the end of September that the simulator will be appearing at the Danville d'Elegance. There will be several well known race drivers there, including Phil Hill (if he is well enough), Sam Posey, and several others. My late father died of Parkinson's, so we are donating our effort completely free to the organizers (we'll be charging people to race and 100% of the money will go to the Parkinson's Institute). Obviously, it is our desire to make the experience the absolute best that we can to get so we can raise as much money for this great charity as we can.

So there are several improvements we would like to make to the piece beforehand, and perhaps you may have some ideas or advice. One most important goal is to have a realistic exhaust (on the replica DFV we already have). Also, we are searching for more authentic looking wheels/tires, rear suspension pcs. (all front suspension components are from a real Lotus 49). But we are especially keen on finding an exhaust system... or at the closest configuration available to the original Lotus 49 exhaust. Please let me know if you would have anything ideas and/or conncetions as to where some of these components could be obtained or duplicated, hopefully without spending a small fortune... You can see some of what our Lotus 49 simulator looks like right now on our website at www.trinityracingconcepts.com. Sorry for the long message, but I felt you may be able to help us on this after noticing you are involved in vintage F1.Thank you for your time Stephen!