Indy 62 Pics

[Hemi Moose]

62 Plymouth C/SA hardtop and 63 Dodge B/SA wagon...

[oldskool]

Ain't that a thing of beauty ?

Just goes to show that lots of guys don't care, at all, how a car looks, if it'll win.

I suppose this saying can also be applied here: "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder."

To many, any car that wins for them is beautiful.

[oldskool]

The OP mentioned his parent's Pontiacs.

'62 was a big year for Pontiac racing, drag & circle track. I call the years '57-'63 Pontiac's "Glory Years".

The M/T '62 Tempest also won A/FX at the Winter Nats that year, & a '63 Tempest won it in '63.

Carol Cox had also won S/SA at the '62 Winter Nats.

I suppose the Indy '62 win was the only Pontiac powered Top dragster win ever, at Indy. No Nitro dragsters were run that year @ Indy. I've read where Don Garlits said he built a dragster that year especially to run @ Indy, using a 413 Mopar engine, as requested by Mopar. He lost the final round, to the M/T Pontiac powered dragster, driven by Jack Chrisman.

At Indy '63, Jim Wangers won the B/FX class, in an All-Pontiac final.

"...Arlen Vanke's Tin Indian and a few other..."

Bill Abraham & Arlen Vanke both ran several Pontiacs & drove some of Knafel Pontiacs "Tin Indian" cars.

Those 421SD engines did a lot of winning back in the early '60's. The 389SD engines also got their share of wins. Several '58 Pontiacs did quite good, for several years after that, getting class & event wins, setting records, & winning div points championships.

Like many other older threads on car forums, many of the pics that were posted are no longer visible. So, I'll add a few pics of Pontiacs that were @ Indy '62, plus others, back in that time period.

[oldskool]

Originally Posted by Hemi Moose

Does anyone here remember this car, it was Arlen Vanke's Tempest.

Don't know if this is the car that was mentioned, or not. It was a Bill Knafel's Anderson Pontiac '63, driven & tuned by Arlen Vanke.

" Yep.....Not a factory built car. He built it himself. Has a solid pontiac rear under it and set the record. There was some "stink" about it having a real rear end instead of those rubber bands in the factory cars."

Yeah, M/T & others made this rear end swap on the early Tempests. Don't know how much of the build Arlen did by himself.

IIRC, for '63, Pontiac rigged up at least 6 Tempest cars & 2 wagons(maybe more) with the 421SD engine, & gave 'em to top Pontiac racers. Then, some of 'em were probably raced by others.

[DeuceCoupe]

I'm putting this in here to add to Rat Patrol's nice 1962 summary at:

https://skunkwerkssuperstock.wordpre...s-experiments/

I found this while we were hunting for stuff about Antlocer being possible S/S R/U at 62 Indy as said on Boyce pg14.

But the fun part is I saw a big Chrysler 300 as S/SA R/U car.
Holy cow who would believe a big dog like that!
Well it turns out they werent THAT big.
NHRA lists shipping wt for the 62 300H at 3750.
That's lighter than a lot of Galaxies & Pontiacs & even fat 1970up "Muscle Cars".
The June 1962 Hot Rod article is here:

http://wildaboutcarsonline.com/membe...S_Auto_1-3.pdf

Off the assembly line the 1962 300H weighed 4040 with half a tank or about 4100 curb.
(Our 64 Galaxie XL curbs at 4200!!)

The car had 4.56 gears, a prototype 413/405hp-8v LRSP (Long Ram Short Partition) & they added the proper cam and then headers & some chassis work.

I'm surprised how good this big dog ran.
14.73 at 95.74 in street trim, closed exhaust & 4040 lb car.

12.88 at 108.40 in NHRA trim ready at 3880 lb ready for 62 NHRA Pomona Winternationals.
Great article.

[oldskool]

"... who would believe a big dog like that!..."

Speakin of Mopar dogs. Some of those early '60's Mopars were REALLY ugly !

BUT, what's that sayin: "Beauty is only skin deep" ?

Other than small aerodynamic differences, it didn't really make any difference what the car body looked like.

It only mattered how much it weighed, how much power it had, & how much of that power could be hooked up to the track. Because of that, there have been some really ugly cars win drag races, especially back in the old days, & especially some of the early '60's Mopars.

"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder". Therefore, people's opinion of which cars look better will vary, greatly. While lookin at pics from the old days, I've seen a few cars that don't look like race cars, at all. Besides the ugly Mopars, there are Studebakers, Hudsons, Corvairs, & even VW bugs. Since I'm a Pontiac guy, I'll say that the '62 A/FX Tempest was one of the ugliest Pontiac drags cars, IMO. I'm also not a fan of the '73-'77 A-bodies. A '77 Can-Am would be the exception.

Those are a few that come to mind. As I run across others I think are particularly ugly, or don't look like race cars, I'll try to think to edit this post & add 'em.

Car makers have sold some really ugly cars, down thru the years. But, no matter how ugly, there have always been people who bought 'em. There have always been some people who just wanted something to get them from point A to point B, & really didn't care how it looked.

Same with some drag racers. There have always been some who just wanted something that could win, regardless of how it looked, especially if it was provided for them, at no cost, or at least real cheap.

[Mark Yacavone]

These are the type of cars that caught my interest when I read the Indy coverage in Hot Rod during study hall ;-)

Today, I can't stay focused very long, watching 10 and 11 second Novas ,Camaros, Dusters and Malibus...all automatics... Not enough variety in Stock today IMO

[oldskool]

"...all automatics..."

Now there's a subject we can talk about.

IMO(which I realize not everyone agrees with), except for the same-class heads-up runs, the other runs in Stock are just a bracket race, for Stock LEGAL cars. The driver can dial any time they want, as long as it's not slower than their class index. Therefore, a really slow, low class Stocker, can win some races, with their index as their dial-in.

Anyhow, because the majority of Stock runs are basically dial-your-own bracket rules, I(and some others) feel that auto trans cars have at least a slight advantage. I suppose that's just one of the reasons most Stockers are auto.

Therefore, I'd like to see there be some sort of incentive for more guys to build stick Stockers. I don't know exactly what that would be. Maybe have an added separate Stick race, @ all div races & nat events ? Maybe get some sponsors to come up with a cash purse for winner & RU ? Maybe Stocker stick winner run SS stick winner ? OR ???

BUT, the main thing I'd like to see is some sort of special race-within-a-race for just the Stockers with carbs -- No Fuel injection, no computer controls, no turbos, no superchargers -- you know -- old school Stockers. 1-carb, 2-carbs, or 3-carbs OK, but carb cars only.

Well hey, I suppose most everybody has an idea of changes they'd like to see. I reckin we just need to hope NHRA continues to run Stock & SS, even tho not everybody likes the rules.

"...can't stay focused very long, watching 10 and 11 second Novas ,Camaros, Dusters and Malibus...Not enough variety in Stock..."

Check out the variety in the top 8 from this year's US Nats.

https://www.dragracecentral.com/DRCS...r2021#indextop

In fact, if you look down the list, there are lots of different models on the list. But, I suppose there will always be more Camaros than anything else.

[oldskool]

Here's an odd '62 Pontiac pic. I'd seen it before, but I reckin I just didn't look at it very close.

Look at the RR wheel well. Don't appear to have a tire or wheel there. Looks like maybe a small tire or wheel inboard from where the tire/wheel should be.

There also appears to be some sort object on the track, just behind the wheel well.

And look at the guy walking behind the car. Can only see one lower leg/foot. Since he appears to be just walking, we should be able to see both lower legs/feet, IMO.

I assume this pic has been edited, or has been altered in some way, whether by accident or on purpose.

Opinions ? Anybody have more info about the 1st pic ?

WOW ! I just clicked on the pic again, & now I see it. It was just an optical illusion !

What I THOUGHT was the track, was actually part of the fixture holding the staging light. What I thought was something on the track was the wire coming out of the light fixture. Can't see the guys other foot because it's behind the tire. With that in mind, the pic looks perfectly normal. I showed it to my wife. At 1st, she saw it just like I had when I 1st saw it. But after I explained it to her, then she could immediately see the difference.

[tommy d]

Originally Posted by oldskool

"... who would believe a big dog like that!..."

Speakin of Mopar dogs. Some of those early '60's Mopars were REALLY ugly !

BUT, what's that sayin: "Beauty is only skin deep" ?

Other than small aerodynamic differences, it didn't really make any difference what the car body looked like.

It only mattered how much it weighed, how much power it had, & how much of that power could be hooked up to the track. Because of that, there have been some really ugly cars win drag races, especially back in the old days, & especially some of the early '60's Mopars.

"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder". Therefore, people's opinion of which cars look better will vary, greatly. While lookin at pics from the old days, I've seen a few cars that don't look like race cars, at all. Besides the ugly Mopars, there are Studebakers, Hudsons, Corvairs, & even VW bugs. Since I'm a Pontiac guy, I'll say that the '62 A/FX Tempest was one of the ugliest Pontiac drags cars, IMO. I'm also not a fan of the '73-'77 A-bodies. A '77 Can-Am would be the exception.

Those are a few that come to mind. As I run across others I think are particularly ugly, or don't look like race cars, I'll try to think to edit this post & add 'em.

Car makers have sold some really ugly cars, down thru the years. But, no matter how ugly, there have always been people who bought 'em. There have always been some people who just wanted something to get them from point A to point B, & really didn't care how it looked.

Same with some drag racers. There have always been some who just wanted something that could win, regardless of how it looked, especially if it was provided for them, at no cost, or at least real cheap.

Going up I would see Ted's "Chicken Hawk" and Frantic Fred Robinsons Studes every Saturday at Muncie Dragway.