More Legends of Drag Racing
Mike Keener's thread regarding his meeting with Gas Rhonda got me thinking. I Love Comp class and loved Modified, but all I remember was reading about the Gassers. Would it be safe to say they were the forerunner to those? How many of you have stories about them? Who and what were those racers like? I have read much about Stone, Woods and Cook, K.S. Pittman and I have even spoke briefly with Jack Ditmars, but how about Ohio George Montgomery?
Enlighten me with some history, facts or fiction. Steve |
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While not universal in their application, the importance of the adoption of the automatic transmission during the Gasser movement was notable, I think.
Before the Gasser era, it was hard to find a purpose-built race car on a drag strip, with an automatic transmission of any kind. When the really fast Olds-powered supercharged Gasser of Pitman-Edwards started running times down in the low 11s and high 10's, B & M started selling a transmission for drag cars called a "Hydro-Stick," which was based on the Dual-Range HydraMatic that was OEM in Cadillacs, Oldsmobiles and Pontiacs (and, other applications too numerous to mention, here.) The '41 Willys of Pitman-Edwards apparently was B & M's "mule-car." Those blown Oldsmobiles had too much torque and horsepower for the Cad-Lasalle and Lincoln Zephyr 3-speed transmissions of the day, and clutch technology wasn't advanced to the point that conventional discs and pressure plates were up to the job of harnessing 600horsepower effectively, so the guys running the blown cars experimented with the automatics and found them to their liking. B & M had a weekly ad in Drag News featuring one of a group of West Coast cars, spreading the word that these "Hydro Stick" automatics were getting the job done in some REALLY powerful (for the day) cars. Other transmission builders followed suit,and soon, a large percentage of the blown Gassers were running these 4-speed automatics. The penetration of Hydro Sticks into the normally-aspirated Gassers wasn't as successful, partially because the T-10 manual 4-speed was coming into its own at that time, and was capable of handling the power from a lot of the unblown cars of the day. The gear ratios in the Hydros were nothing to write home about, and they were cast iron (heavy!) but they seemed to have the necessary torque-holding capability to handle just about anything a GMC-blown Olds or Chrysler Hemi could throw at them. Companies modifying them flourished as the top runners of the day in the supercharged Gasser classes bought and succesfully used tons of them.... I remember names like B & M, C & O Hydro, Bee Line Automatics, Hydro-Motive,and Cal Hydro... can't believe how many I've forgotten! But the Hydro's competition was making progress with the development of the high-stall torque converter, and the 3-speed automatics such as Chrysler's TorqueFlite and G.M.'s Turbo 400 loomed large on the horizon in about 1965-66. The HydraMatics had always been plagued with traction problems due to the deep (3.87:1) first gear. The "new" 3-speed automatics had a more manageable 2.45 or 2.48 first gear; now, a loose torque converter coupled with that taller first gear provided more consistent launches and better e.t.'s. Almost overnight, the aluminum T-Flites and Turbo Hydros replaced the aging cast iron HydraMatics in these blown Gassers. About the same time,altered wheelbase F/X cars caught the attention of fans and, the following transition from A/FX to Funny Car was pretty swift. Virtually all of those A/FX cars that morphed into fledgling Funny Cars used automatic transmissions. There were some exceptions, but they were minimal. But, the Gassers had paved the way with years of R & D, and that fact shouldn't be forgotten! |
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Thanks Bill for the lesson. Merry Christmas to you.
I remember reading that traction was quite an issue back then and that had been the reason for the front end lifted to transfer weight and bars that went almost to the front axle. You are correct that it was a day and age for learning. Steve |
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Merry Christmas back atcha! Thanks!
Tires (slicks) back then, were nothing like what we have nowadays, in terms of bite. So, the racers did what they could to improve the situation by utilizing weight transfer and good, static weight distribution. My personal heroes from that era (1958-1966) , Pitman-Edwards were among the very first SUCCESSFUL practitioners of the application of Dual-Range HydraMatics behind a (seriously) blown Olds in a '41 Willys coupe,and they were aware of the importance of NO WHEELSPIN with that transmission, early in the game, apparently; and as a result,they once had a Willys coupe/race-car that weighed 3,600pounds! It didn't spin... LOL!! !Those cars usually were about 2,400-pounds, race-ready. Most guys just built tall, short-wheelbase, cars that ended up squirrelly on the big end, and had a lot of frontal area.... but,they used their weight transfer to good advantage to overcome the limitations of those hard, ineffective, slicks of the day. Wheelstands were not uncommon. NHRA eventually imposed a rule limiting the distance between the ground and the centerline of the crank as some builders had placed the engine so high in the chassis to aid weight transfer. Doing so didn't do anything to enhance their handling properties at high speed, as you might imagine... LOL! A former racer/writer named "Don Montgomery" has written a book called "Supercharged Gas Coupes" that is near-comprehensive, and is filled with a huge amount of picturesof those early Gassers. If you like that sort of thing, you might think about getting a copy; I think it's still available. I got mine from Amazon.com. Also worth a look is Larry Davis's "Gasser Wars" a more recent book about the cars we love... Happy holidays!!! |
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Historically speaking, the Gasser morphed into more efficient chasses as time went by.
In the '50s, cars that showed up to race "Gasser" classes might be literally anything....and, in a way, that was kind of refreshing. Most anything that wasn't REAL heavy, might become the recipient of an engine swap,and fitted the Gas Coupe classes (A through D,depending on the weight-to-cubic-inch, ratio.) It was real simple.... A was 0-9 pounds per cube; B was 9-to11, C was 11-to 13, and D was anything over 13... Four classes; no handicap racing, and if you wanted to win the money, you built an "A"car. Like I said,REAL simple, but there was no shortage of race cars. It didn't stay that simple for long; more classes were added nearly every year, for a while. In the late 1950s, folks started getting a little more savvy about which chasses were advantageous. The fledgling California cars were things like early (1940s) Studebakers, which LOOKED large, but were actually pretty light. In about 1958, some people discovered that various models of early Willys cars made excellent race cars for the Gasser classes, and Willys coupes started coming out of the woodwork! Their wheelbase was 100-102 and a weight-conscious racer could build a "bare bones" car in the 2,100-2,400-pound range. The supercharged Gasser contingent caught onto these Wiily's, and there were 450cid+ Olds and Chrysler- powered blown race cars that weighed around 2,600 pounds and went 140+ mph. Willys coupes (and a few sedans and pickups) comprised the bulk of these blown cars throughout the '60s... English Fords called "Anglias" and "Prefects" were significantly smaller than a Willys,and NHRA began letting them run,legally, in someGasser classes. Eventually,there wereGMC supercharged big block Chevy V8 Anglia Gassers, but it took awhile to get them accepted by NHRA. The late model bodied Gassers began to show up in about 1967, or so, and for me, the magic went out of it with the advent of the Mustang Gassers and Opels.... But, progress is progress, and is pretty much unstoppable in a deal like this. AFX cars were now going faster than even the blown gassers,and Funny Cars soon made their debut, putting the last nail in the coffin of the once-charismatic GAS COUPES. |
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Nicely summarized, Bill. I believe that you really captured the essence of the evolution effectively.
A fact that is rarely mentioned is the effect that the rapidly developing Funny Car movement had on established categories such Street/Modified Eliminator and some really benchmark classes such as AA/GS. A night at the Irwindale Drag Strip in 1965-66 would have demonstrated this point very well. The AA/GS cars of S-W-C. Big John Mazmanian, Shores & Hess, Junior Thompson, Kohler Brothers, Gino Ciambella, Herrera and Sons, Chuck Finders, and more were candy-apple painted, highly polished and chromed, beautiful machines, the epitome of a highly developed, relatively sophisticated category that had built itself into a corner. On the other side of the pits were the F/C guys, hacksaws in hand, challenging for the imagination of the spectators. AA/GS couldn't evolve much farther by then without going head-to-head with the new kids on the block. The F/C movement was at the exciting stage of developing an industry in the mid-60s. Every week brought some new experiment that started with altered wheelbased Super Stockers to injectors to blowers, to nitro, to outrageous set-backs, hacked off tops, and, eventually to flip-tops. Gassers were already developed as far as they would ever go. The only things remaining to make them stand out in the crowd were paint, chrome and more polish. In the end, the nitro won out. It must have been a little bit like watching the dinosaurs die out! Glad I got to see it. c |
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Bill, you hit on the Gasser thing right on the money.
An Uncle who just recently passed away, was a major influence in my life. He ran a 50' Olds club coupe in C/Gas and C/A in the mid to late 60's.. My first lesson in automatics was rebuilding Dual range Hydros for his race car. Some of the early Hydros from military applications evedently had even lower 1st gear ratios than the passenger car version cause I remember we put one in his car and the thing just stood straight up on those old 10" slicks! .....Having a nearly 180# rear push bumper helped. The early exposure to those cars influenced my building my '40 Willys in the early '80's. That car was my passport to meeting some of the great drivers and tuners of our sport. Racers such as Don Garlets, Dale Armstrong,Eddie Hill, Fuzzy Carter,Frank Bradley,Kenny Bernstein,and even John Force actually sought out my car in the sportsman pits........Many of the Gasser greats came by to see the car and the most frequently asked question was how it handled with the front end down on the ground as opposed to sky high as their cars were. It seems that near the end of the Gasser era, as tire and suspension technology were advancing, many of them found it was no longer practical to have the nose high in the air. As strange as it seems, many of the cars ,particulary the Willys coupes experienced evil handling problems in the traps......Over the years many of the early racers told me the same thing. One racer, Bob Scheffler,who along with his brother built fiberglass Willys bodies and raced in A/G ,came by at the Keystone nats in '86or '87 and asked me how the car handled at high speed being so low. .....I told him it was a little skatey in the lights . ...He showed me a picture of a car they built around 1969 or '70. ....It was nearly as low as my car in the front! .........He told me that the car actualy flew in the lights at Pittsburg,and was destroyed, the rear end of the car actually lifted off the ground ! It turns out that the beautiful slope of the Willys roof and deck lid make a very efficent wing creating lift, not downforce when the car was at the proper angle! ......Apperantly the only thing keeping my car on the ground was the fact ,I had not yet reached the proper speed! The Gassers were probably ,in my opinion the greatest race cars to ever see the strip, un equaled even by the early years of Funny Car. |
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You added some really important perspectives to the chronology of this transformation. And yes, it was hard to watch... gave me a bad taste in my mouth for Funny Cars that persists to this day... |
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Purpose built Gassers could have a 10% engine setback.
Altereds 25% Or at least that is how I recall the rules! I could be wrong though as I did not race either of those 2 types of cars Supercharged cars ran in Super Eliminator and included anything with a blower on it if I recall right. Street eliminator was for /MP's and gas coupes and sedans and the sports classes. If you showed up at your local track with any car and had simply removed the front bumper.....you were put into a Gas class. If you had a non stock carburetor on it...you were put in /MP There was 2 distinct sections of the pits where I raced. One was for all the self starting cars and the other was for any that needed to be push started. The "Hot Pits" was at the far end of the track and they used push vehicles to push down and start up........ Gassers were required to be self starting and ran Street eliminator... Altereds could push and ran Competition eliminator.....you could run a gasser as an altered and pit anywhere you wanted. My friend and former boss ran C/A and B/G with the same car. A 301 in a Prefect. ( Looks like an Anglia) Injected with a 4 speed........Was a very wild ride back then. We had a Gasser circuit run around my area a lot and they put on a great show......... |
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I had never heard the theory about the Wiilys's deck lid aerodynamics, nose-down attitude, and rear-end "lift," but it makes all kinds of sense, when you think about it. Maybe a good thing that your car wasn't a little faster! LOL! DualRange Hydros had a 3.81 first gear in the generic transmissions,but in the last year this transmission was used in passenger cars, strangely, the '56 Pontiacs that had that transmission utilized a 1.55 front planetary instead if the time-honored 1.45, which accomplished a couple of things: Since the power flows from the crank flange, through the torus cover, into the transmission and through the front planetary unit BEFORE it goes forward to the fluid coupling, it both raises the stall speed AND produces a deeper first gear (about 7-percent) of 4.07:1. Maybe that's what that tail-dragging Gasser had???? The '56 Pontiacs also had a needle-bearing pilot bearing in the back of the crank to support the input shaft... the only such application of that, that I ever saw on a hydro. I have no experience with military hardware, but I know that the G.M.C. six-by's had a modified Dual Range Hydro with a built-in "LOW RANGE" on the bottom of the case. But, I digress... My point of all that verbiage was to point out that the whole drivetrain thing (as regards the slide into Funny Cars,) was a study in evolution, with the Gassers leading the way. Before Pitman-Edwards showed the way, you couldn't FIND an automatic on a drag strip. I'm glad that I'm not the only one who remembers that. :) |
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We built a Chevy powered Henry J in 1962, thinking it would make a good Gasser. The only thing we didn't realize was that that particular brand of car has the body shoved forward on the chassis SO FAR, that when you position the engine on the chassis with a 10% setback, the number one sparkplug is now directly below the base of the windshield, putting the entire engine behind the firewall. This necessites constructing an all-encompassing engine cover. What a hassle... Thanks for your comments,Rich! |
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Bill your a few years older than me so you have more years and changes to cover from the early days.
I went to the racetrack for the first time in about 1962 or 1963. I convinced my father and mother on a sunday drive to go down the entry road to Island Dragway. I went "crazy" when I saw the cars racing and it must have warped my brain! I had no drivers license or a car for a couple years and tried to get older friends who did to pick me up and get back there. By 1966 I was racing all the time and was fortunate to see a heck of a lot of development in the sport first hand......I tell people today.....We just never knew what we were going to see when we went racing as cars and classes were developing and the sport was rapidly changing......Easily the best era......mid 60's to early 70's...... |
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I see frrom the shoe polish on the windshield, that "PEE WEE" ran D Gas, a 13 pounds per cubic inch class (at least, early on it was.). Even a 265 Chevy motor would have had to weigh atleast 3,445 to run that class. Maybe it was a later car; one that ran after they came up with different weight breaks... That doesn't look like a 3,400+-pound car to me... but it sure is cute!!!! |
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You got in on most of the changes. Not a lot happened to the Gassers between 1955 and '62 that was significant except for the blown Gassers. They really weren't much in profusion in the really early years, but began to show up big time, in about 1961. The Super Stock movement was also born (as a concept, if not as an Eliminator) in the very early '60s with teams like the Ramchargers, the Golden Commandos, Tasca Ford, Bill Thomas and Nickey Chevrolet sporting the latest in high performance "factory" OEM hardware. That was pretty exciting, just seeing what the factories had come up with for the new model year. Yep,it was a great time to be a fan of NHRA racing!!!! |
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This is a priceless history lesson of a very innovative Class in Drag Racing. I thank all of you for your comments.
Now, were the turbos used by Mallicoat's or Montgomery an advantage? Were they just a flash in the pan? I saw that Montgomery used the Boss 429 motor for a while, did it do well? I thought it was "dead" until I saw Glidden use it in the EXP's and it seemed mediocre at best. |
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Turbos are banned in the cookie-cutter Top Fuel and Nitro Funny Car classes. Ditto for both Top Alcohol Dragster and Top Alcohol Funny Car. Makes you wonder what they're afraid of.... Comp Eliminator cars can be turbocharged, but the pounds-per-cubic-inch is closely regulated. Turbocharged Stockers and Super Stockers are a hot topic right now, for several reasons that would be subject matter for another thread, or maybe, two. I'm not knowledgable enough about Ford 385 Pro Stock motors to say anything at all... sorry. I guess that Blue Crescent motor was derived from the 385 series, wasn't it??? Glad you liked this thread, Steve; there are lots of old racers on here who, fortunately, remember a lot more than I do about this stuff. I appreciate their comments, too!!! |
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IIRC, Montgomery's advantage with the turbo in AA/GS was about three tenths of a second. Initially, Montgomery and Mallicoat were both thrown into BB/A but, in 1971 (I think!), the NHRA pushed the turbos out of AA, BB and CC/GS into the turbo-specific classes of /GS(T). After the /Gas Super classes were absorbed into AA/A, BB/A and CC/A, NHRA created similar /A(T) subdivisions, too. Obviously, we still have them today.
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Thanks, bunnyman; I was hoping you'd come through with some good information!
I think the pertinent thing here is that NHRA recognized, early-on, the significance of the built-in superiority of turbochargers in class racing. I see where that mindset continues, today, with NHRA having reduced the size of the turbos on a Pro Mod (Brad Personnet) for the 2011 season after Brad's performances, lately. And, the beat goes on... |
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Whole lot of cast iron in those babys. |
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The hydro we used in our sedan delivery was a Vitar. Was pretty heavy and I recall used a thin paper gasket and a lot of bolts on the torus cover to flywheel connection. I usually made my partner do that job. It was really his car in the first place so I could use that excuse...LOL On at least one occasion he missed with the gasket and we had a mess of ATF all over the floor. I think it was something like 11 quarts in one of those tankers.
We adjusted the pressure regulator at the race track many times. Adding or removing a shim made a big difference on the gear change. Too much pressure and the little 283 would bog down on the 1-2 shift or maybe it was the 2-3, I can't recall that detail....too little and it slid...... I used spark plug washers and a big wrench.....Was a nasty job at places like Atco in the sand......but then so was R&R' ing the driveshaft at every race....we had no towing hubs.... Work is slow....can you tell....LOL |
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TWO HUNDRED AND TWENTY CHEST-CRUSHING POUNDS. Gravity always wins.... As the Dual Range Hydros were being ushered out of popularity, I HEARD that Cal Hydro had an aluminum case for that transmission, and that SOMEBODY had fabbed a 2.20 rear planetary to replace the 2.63 that was in (as I understand it) every Hydro that was ever built.... giving ratios of 3.19:1, 2.20:1, 1.45:1 and 1:1. Not bad, for a light car with a big engine.... But, they needed some alulminum rotating parts, too, such as clutch drums for the bands to wrap around. In a parallel universe, maybe... |
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AHRA cleanup crews were not amused.... I used the spark plug washer "trick" for mainline pressure adjustment and ended up coil-binding it (un-knowingly,) and I got my first lesson in physics as regards the compressibility of fluids... they aren't. Blew the whole end off the oil delivery sleeve. Now, we had a 2-speed.... 1st and 3rd.... Live and learn.... |
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I was on Bob Rice's facebook and linked to the Kentucky Motorsports Hall of Fame and came across this pic. Wow! I love the traction bars.
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I'm pretty sure that Bill Taylor (of Coleman/Taylor Transmissions) had a lot to do with that car. |
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Not too far from the subject, I am posting pics of Jack Ditmars Lil Screamer. It was at the Hunnert Car Pile Up here in Decatur in October. The fellow doing the restoration has a web site and has been documenting his progress. My only concern was that I called Jack out of the blue and he wanted me to help him get the Screamer back, the fellow would have nothing of it unless it was very large $$$$. I contacted Jack because his Opel funny car ended up at our local track as a bracket car and he found out it went sand racing and was destroyed. What a shame.
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I saw that Ditmars car (not the Opel) run several times, and it really WAS a "screamer!" Fantastic little altered, and fabulous paint job!!!
I hope he gets it back!!!! |
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