Roush JBA Saleen Mustang??

JBA is a performance shop in San Diego CA who used to specialize in Ford/Mustang stuff. They now work on other makes as well. They used to be involved with restoring vintage Mustang road race cars as well and were involved with some Shelby stuff.

Never heard of them doing a JBA version of a Mustang but they do lots of custom stuff. They started in 1985 as J Bittle American. Of interest, their engine services group appears to be co-located with ESI who were the main engine supplier to Saleen for the S7 engines.

Larry
97-0183

Metalcop said:

What the hell is a JBA Saleen Mustang. The article is from 1987 or 88, I believe. This must be some performance company who took the handling/appearance only Saleen of the day and 'breathed' on it, engine-wise?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/1988...ryZ10076QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

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I think they took a Fox Saleen and did some engine mods with this car.

JBA is most recognized for the Dominator cars
http://www.teamdominator.com/

I remember this article along with several others over the course of the late 80's through early 90's that featured this particular Saleen Mustang.

It was/is actually James "J' Bittle's personal Saleen Mustang that he purchased in 1987 & was used by the various incarnations of his aftermarket Ford performance shop, J. Bittle American (JBA), as a rolling test bed for many of their products, such as their now famous 5.0 shorty headers. If I remember correctly, J. Bittle originated the shorty header that was copied by just about every other aftermarket company & became the basis of the original Ford Motorsport/Saleen SSC headers. J. Bittle was one of the pioneers in offering 5.0 performance parts when there was simply no such parts available.

Anyway, J's personal Saleen Mustang went through as many incarnations as his company & I believe he may have sold it years ago as I haven't seen it in a long, long time.

The Dominator Mustang was a completely different Mustang that J. Bittle tried to offer as a turn-key tuner Mustang to capitalize on the burgeoning 5.0 aftermarket started by Saleen. I don't believe he ever built more than a hand full of complete vehicles (if even that many). I know of at least two here in the San Diego area that regularly appeared at the car shows hosted by JBA & the San Diego Mustang Club. JBA then attempted to offer individual components such as the body kit but they never proved to be very popular. Eventually JBA sold the molds to the now defunct company called Mustang Power House or MPH who marketed the kits for a couple of years.

The link provided by FAS8N provides a fairly good over view of the original Dominator's history. Locally, Mr. Bittle's & JBA's historical reputation isn't quite so glowing.

But that's another story.

Was J. Bittle not the parts man at Burch Ford during the early Saleen years? ( I think this is the story ) After developing the 5.0 shorty header he left Burch to start his own performance aftermarket company, which also evolved into the place that housed and shipped Saleen Autosport aftermarket parts to the consumer. Someone confirm or correct me if needed.

bigwingsaleen said:

Was J. Bittle not the parts man at Burch Ford during the early Saleen years? ( I think this is the story ) After developing the 5.0 shorty header he left Burch to start his own performance aftermarket company, which also evolved into the place that housed and shipped Saleen Autosport aftermarket parts to the consumer. Someone confirm or correct me if needed.

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I don't believe this to be the case. As far as I know, J. Bittle & JBA have always been local to San Diego. In fact, J's house is not that far from where I live as it is in the Claremont area.

Amongst my collection of Saleen automobilia is an old advertisement from the 1984/85 era that lists JBA as the exclusive distributor of Saleen Performance Parts. The address listed is JBA's original location in a retail center on Claremont Mesa Boulevard.

Of course I'm providing all this history from memory & I can't claim to be infallible like the Pope.

Here's the scoop according to the Saleen Book.

"In 1986, Steve Saleen worked out an arrangement with J.Bittle American, a San Diego based high-performance Ford and SVO parts distributer, to sell the company's body kits, Racecraft suspension components, and other pieces. Their arrangement was the foundation for Saleen Performance Parts, an operation Steve would eventually bring inhouse."

I was wrong about him working at Burch Ford....but he did sell Ford parts.

bigwingsaleen said:

Here's the scoop according to the Saleen Book.

"In 1986, Steve Saleen worked out an arrangement with J.Bittle American, a San Diego based high-performance Ford and SVO parts distributer, to sell the company's body kits, Racecraft suspension components, and other pieces. Their arrangement was the foundation for Saleen Performance Parts, an operation Steve would eventually bring inhouse."

I was wrong about him working at Burch Ford....but he did sell Ford parts.

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So I was off a year or two... it's that infallibility thing again. I could have checked the Saleen Book or my collection but I chose to "wing it" (no pun intended).

SVT Saleen said:

I chose to "wing it"

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GOOD ONE!!!!!