12-2-14
Hello. MY name is Dana Moudy and I received a email from you about my Elden FF. Sorry for the delay, but I have been super busy for the last few months.
I did own a Elden FF MK10. I bought the car about 1979 or 1980. I was autocrossing with a 67 Shelby GT-350. I decided to move up to run in b-Modified with a FF. I did some research and found out the Elden had the shortest wheelbase of I believe 83”. So it was ideal for B-mod. I won the A-mod & B-mod for 1983 SCCA regional Championships with it.
I finally started racing it in 1985 at Hallett with the COMMA race series in Club FF. I started a string of races with it in which I won 18 straight races with it. I ended with a crash caused by a driver trying to go for first place and he lost control and took off my left rear corner on the car. I repaired it and while leading with 2 laps left the only part I didn’t replace broke and I spun out with a DNF.
I then sold the car to Steve Carbone who bought it for his son to race at Hallett. He owned a Machine Shop for race engines. He took the car totally apart and put it in the back of his pickup truck and on the way to the shop to be painted and chromed he stopped at a burger place to eat. When he came out the truck had been stolen. They eventually found the truck and the chassis and all the parts were still in it. This is where I lost the trail of the car and I don’t know what happened to it.
As far as I know it was never raced at Hallett because I was still racing with a Lola T440 Club Ford. I raced it and a Royale SF with a 2000 Motor and wings. I last raced in Tiga S2000 and I never saw the car back at the track. I quit racing racing at Hallett because for several years I was doing double duty by racing a dirt midget on Friday nights at one track and Saturday nights at another track, as well as the Tiga S2000 once a month at Hallett.
I gave up the road racing and drove the dirt midgets twice a week as well as another car for my son. It was pretty nice to get money at the dirt tracks and they paid nothing for road racing. I quit racing and concentrated on my sons midget. That was around 1995 or so. My memory of racing is pretty blurred with all the races and cars after 20 years. The Elden was a MK10C I think but it had the narrow nose not the wide one which kind of looked like the ones on the Tyrell’s F1 cars at the time it was built. The car came from the Chicago area and had been racing in that region with SCCA.
I have moved and the pictures have all been put away in storage buildings so I would have to dig up some pictures which I have no idea in what boxes they are in. I do have one black and white picture that I have and I could copy it and send it to you if you will send me your address to send it to. It was bright white with a blue Ford stripe and a black stripe down the bottom of the car. It is a picture of the car with the back section of the car removed so we could work an it quicker. It was good to think about that car because I won more races in that car than any others I owned. Between the Elden and the Lola I won 27 races, I 3rd and 3 DNF’s. Quite a lot of winning in that car.
If you have any other questions email me and I will try to answer you if I remember any more. Thanks for bringing up a great time in my life and remembering how all the other drivers with better cars couldn’t believe what that little car could do. Oh, I forgot to tell you I moved the radiators from behind the front tires to next to the drivers seat to get the Transient response better and lose a little weight because I could use less water and lose a little weight at the same time. Thanks for the memories. Dana P. Moudy
Dana, Good Hearing from you and your history with the Elden. I bought an Elden Chassis from a fellow in Ok City and in reviewing the log book you owned the car from Ron Eilken and previously Jay Davis, Jay actually was able to see the car last year and assured it was his as it has special fasteners from a company he represented. Oh so interesting. A couple of pictures I have found of the car and Jay has sent some others from when he owned the car. I don’t have a body for the car but plan on the front radiator position, I Think.
LCH Restorations 
Hi, I guess I should weigh in here. It was great to read Dana’s comments, and here I thought this car had a lot of history before he got it!! After many years of going up to Road America with my uncle (Dick Jacobs, one of the first ten or so Chicago Region SCCA members, I think), the last three with either my Porsche 912 (think 911 with a 356 engine) or my Lotus Europa Twin Cam, it was clear I had to race. While making a sales call on a car dealership, (Kopper-Piccone Lincoln-Mercury, Waukegan, Il)(I sold fasteners, terminals, and thousands of universal replacement parts) I found this white FF sitting over in the corner. Mike Piccone, the son of the owner, had raced it for one season, I believe, doing quite well from what I heard. Problem was, though, I found later after doing quite well myself, also in driver school and regionals, that Mike had replaced the camshaft with a stock Mercury Capri (anyone remember those?) camshaft that was not quite, well, ah, legal. You never heard an FF idle with a “blump-blump”) quite like that. Luckily by the time it was replaced with one from Jan at Wrep Industries (any Chicago area people?) I had learned to drive and didn’t miss it that much.
I raced regionals, mostly at Blackhawk Farms (S. Beloit, Il), IRP (Indianapolis Raceway Park, for you non-midwesterners–No, NOT IMS), Mid-Ohio, and of course, what we thought of as our “home track”, Road America (Elkhart Lake, Wi). I know I raced at least once with it after attaining my National License, the best of all amateur road races in all of the world, the June Sprints at RA in 1979. My goal, running a now 5 year old car with the street car equivilant of 100,000+ miles on it, was to qualify in the top third of the field, within 3% of the leader, driving the very latest stuff. It worked.
The REAL history on this car was generated by the first owner, Gary Hackbarth, of Janesville, WI. Gary was always one of the top FF drivers in CenDiv, if not the country. He put A LOT of weekends on this car!!! Although he made it to the Runoffs in FF several to many times, I’m not sure if this fine Elden ran there, even though it was with this car that he earned the invite, of that I am sure. Great car, loved that short wheelbase, could do things on tight corners that no one else could. While on a sales call to Carl Haas Automotive (Highland Park, Il–If you don’t know of this cigar-chomping icon there is no help for you if you’re a road racer) I spied a Dulon MP21 for sale, and sure that if could get a car just a few seasons old, Colin Chapman would be calling me some Monday to drive for Lotus (never happened). So I sold the car and “moved up”. Ron Eilken, a young man ready to try racing bought it. We were both at a Midwest Council of Sports Car Club event (kinda like AAA ball would be to the majors, or SCCA). After practice the first night we walked the track with beers (4 miles worth). I should have never showed a newbe that if he exited the famous RA Carosel at full song, AND KEPT his left front on the outside white line, he could go though the dastardly “Kink” without lifting. Boy, did I feel like a jerk coming out of the Carosel, ready to lap him in last as the pole sitter, there he was in the grass after hitting BOTH guardrails, taking all four corners off the car!! I’m pretty sure he never raced again.
Thanks to Larry for letting visit my old girl. Jay Davis, Spring Grove, Il