millers and offys, oh my

[silent rick]

my story begins 5 or 6 years ago. a fellow member of this little biker fraternity i belong to stopped by my garage and was surprised to find out i was into old cars also. he started talking about the machine shop he worked at. original sprint and indy type cars, millers and offys, casting and machining parts to rebuild these engines, visiting the basement of the museum down in indy to pick up an original set of tires and other stories. he went on and on. it's not that i didn't believe him, it's just that come on, this place was just 15-20 minutes away from my house. how come i hadn't heard about it.
since then i inquired about the place. very few had heard of it, most hadn't. i was on a mission to find out all i could. then 2 years ago i met a guy at a local cruise night with an offy powered model A. some of you might remember my post. cas(spendingtheirinheritance) verified the stories. he's also good friends with the owner.
well a month ago, i finally got the opportunity to tour the place. steve, the owner is ok with me posting pics. i hope cas comes on this thread to help explain the stuff i saw. the lighting wasn't the best. in an attempt not to provide any mis-information, i'll leave most of the fact telling to cas. enjoy the pics.

some of the guys hadn't heard an offy run, so steve fired this one up for us






i love the brakes on it. steve says as far as he knows, they're off of some WWII era aircraft.



an original miller





this one was my favorite. it was steve's dad car. i think he said it was raced at jungle park. supercharged

[silent rick]

just got back in from the garage. here's some more










some other cars that were there







i didn't take any pics of the stacks of wheels around the shop. these will have to do.




it's amazing what he had stuffed in the nooks and crannies. i spotted this out of the corner of my eye




i think there was 3 or 4 of these in this stack

[silent rick]

steve then took us back and explained the inner workings of an offy, how the crank gets loaded in from the end, not dropped out of the bottom of the crankcase.




here's a crank ready to be loaded


these pieces the bolt the crank in the cases tend to break. steve is machining his own. much stronger than stock.



stock piece on the left, steve's design on the right



more parts steve casts





this is what a rod looks like. i think he said they're tubular. it felt light.


here's one on the dyno



my tach goes to 16,000, of course i need to run two 8,000 tachs in series



yet another getting machined




what's that doing in here?



that's about all i have. half way between this shop and my house is ray nichels old shop. more history there too. wasn't ray the only person to have a car on the pole at both daytona and indy in the same year?

[Buz]

Wow, thanks for sharing the pics.

[Normbc9]

I lived in Temple City and a co-worker lived in Tujunga in 1959. He had a Offy 220 powered oval racer. For tune-up runs we'd head west on Foothill to the Templin Hwy and cruise up to Castaic Junction and then park at the Fire Station to make any adjustments. You should have seen the looks we'd get from the motoring public. That was one tough engine and the blue flames from the alcohol at night looked cool.
Normbc9

[ago]

As a machinist I can see the beauty in the machine work in remaking the Offy. The original was done with a lot of lathe work, I have seen photos in old magazines with con rods machined on a lathe.




Ago

[ago]

Did anybody notice the steering box setup on the 16 valve Offy #2?



Ago

[Bib Overalls]

Originally Posted by Normbc9

I lived in Temple City and a co-worker lived in Tujunga in 1959. He had a Offy 220 powered oval racer. For tune-up runs we'd head west on Foothill to the Templin Hwy and cruise up to Castaic Junction and then park at the Fire Station to make any adjustments. You should have seen the looks we'd get from the motoring public. That was one tough engine and the blue flames from the alcohol at night looked cool.
Normbc9

Where is Broderick Crawford when you need him?

[JEM]

Originally Posted by Bib Overalls

Where is Broderick Crawford when you need him?

Now if we could just convince four million people to leave the LA basin (and take their politicians with them) we could have stuff like that again...even I, who wasn't quite yet a zygote in '59, can remember when Castaic was BFE.

[SPDJNKY]

Damn that is a thing of beauty!

Thanks for posting Rick!

[koth]

That sounds like a gold mine! Thanks for sharing the pics of the place!

[Gasr57]

Cool pics and story. There is is a place in Cincy that does the same type of work. They had a car on display at the Cavelcade a couple years ago.

[Stu D Baker]

Very cool Rick. Stu

[tub in da dirt]

did anyone else notice that that is a model a trans behind the 16 valve black car
wow

[The37Kid]

Yes, and chances are real good it has a cut down early 1928 Ford multi disk flywheel & clutch, they were the standard setup well into the early 1950's. Lots of clutch surface and more foot room for the driver. Thanks to the original poster for sharing the photos!

Originally Posted by tub in da dirt

did anyone else notice that that is a model a trans behind the 16 valve black car
wow

[big bad john]

....Thanks for sharing.......great pictures.....never seen one in person,but maybe one day......I bet it sounded nice when he started it up....

[stillrunners]

like...wow....cool they were saved....

[jandlcars]

thanks

[mctim64]

I was too lazy to read the story but the pix were cool.

[killbilly]

I was there the day the pics were taken,Steve was a great host,one of the coolest things I have seen in a long time!What a collection!