History Drag cars in motion.......picture thread.

I have seen this picture many times but never noticed the guys hand in the upper left corner. Must have been holding the car to keep it from rolling out if the beams.

 

@swade41

The Bread Truck Altered... Bruce Carman
old Friday Art
Hello,

The inspiration for the Orange “Bread Truck” drawing comes from the old Drag News weekly papers that showed drag racing competition from all over So Cal and throughout the rest of California plus the USA. The orange ties in with other Orange threads as a color that certainly attracts the eye to the hot rod or drag race vehicle.

It was a weekly thing that most avid hot rod/drag race folks did as soon as they hit the speed shop racks. The real reason was the information as to who was doing what to their hot rods and builds for drag racing. Plus, it was free.

The Forsberg Brothers from Northern California had strong ties with Vic Hubbard Speed Shop and were a record setting team in several different divisions throughout their careers. Thanks, Denny...

The speed shops that advertised, the manufacturers that advertised the racers on their own ads reaped the benefits of us and thousands of others to buy their products. For most, it did, as the benefits went along with the results. If it did not, then there is always another cam grinder promising better results.

Having an inkling for the future drag racing/daily driver hot rod, my brother and I found a Model A coupe that was in great condition, despite being left outside for months that led to almost years. The old story of an older family moving on after an event led to the covering of the Model A coupe being neglected in the backyard. As pre teen with my brother being older, we knew the old couple and the situation in that household.

Jnaki

So, the search for other builds of Model A coupes, sedans and sedan deliveries played an important part of our beginnings. We originally liked the Model A woody station wagon, but there was no way to make it safe and secure for daily driving.

The chopped, Model A Sedan Delivery, was from northern California and was slowly building a name for itself. It was not a daily driver as it was given a 25% set back on the DeSoto Motor. It was also one of the only racers at the time using a DeSoto brand motor.

From its humble beginnings with several different owners, Bruce Carmen was the third owner and first to use a DeSoto. It was a regular at Vic Hubbard’s Speed Shop along with the Forsberg Brothers and their racing machines.


Note: The chopped Model A Altered Sedan Delivery sold in 1982 and the new owners, Norris Brothers were now caretakers of a little history from Northern California.

 

Another one of Mickey Thompson's ideas.

 

Thing that catches my eye is lack of parachute on that truck with what looks like no front brakes thru the 12 spoke front wheels. It was common for dragsters, altereds and flopper FC's (like in my avatar) not to have front brakes, but most also had parachutes. That would have worried me, since I've been in couple of situations where I wasn't sure if I was going to get stopped in time even with 2 chutes open. For those that might not know with rear brakes only on large slicks at low air pressures, if you apply rear brakes to hard the slicks act like a bouncing basket ball, to point entire rear end of car starts bouncing off the ground.

 

The thing that caught my eye about the 12 spokes was the lack of lug nuts!

 

You don't use lug nuts with spindle mount wheels.

 

@DDDenny was joking.

 

I was privileged to do some welding on this car when it was restored here in Washington awhile back, what a great car! Modern photos I took at the 2019 CHRR.

 

@old flopper

Hello,

One has to take into account the time period of the photos and what class the hot rod build was running at the time. There is no comparison from those early days of drag racing to the time dragsters and funny cars took over all of the drag racing classes as portrayed like today’s “drag racing shows…”

So, speeds were not the same, the builds were not the same and modifications were done as well as possible. There were no parachutes at the time of the Bread Truck and others in the photos. When the speeds rose and the modifications changed, the addition of parachutes to slow down were an important part of drag racing. 110 MPH Altered vs 180 MPH without front brakes on the top FED record holders is quite a difference in the early 60s.

Racers took advantage of relaxing rules to push the envelope to the levels that were in place. From those early modifications with the newest style of spindle wheels to show up in the marketplace, racers used them to their advantage. There was more concern with weight on the spoked wheels at the time. Some did make early Airheart disc brakes as an addition to the modifications, whereas others went with the spindle only set up like faster FED racers.

Jnaki

In talking to my friend from the photos during that time, several owners made their own changes from the original Bread Truck. If one noticed, the Desoto motor was gone and an SBC motor is/was in place. Several owners later, the color remained the same, but those changes were their choice. The Altered Class Bread Truck had center steering and the original Desoto motor may have been one set up similar to Pete Ogden’s style of Hilborn injected motors on it.

The Bantam Altered and others in the class, did not have a parachute until several years later. By then, the speeds were up and more power forward needed more power to slow down and stop.

NOTE: But, for the Bread Truck and its early history came to a halt in a massive warehouse fire about 10 years ago. YRMV

 

Additionally, I question whether a parachute would have been effective when fixed to the back of a sedan delivery truck. The large zone of negative pressure behind that truck would have slowed the deployment and "blossoming" of the chute. Without a modern day 'chute launcher it would not have opened until way down track where its effectiveness would have been negligible.

 

mc mullen's before tom i'll bet...

 

No, that’s Tom in the car. It doesn’t look like it but the car was green metalflake here, one of the very first ‘flake jobs. Tom had 6 Stromberg 97’s on his SBC at the time.

 

thanks! all you guys here def know the history...

 

Ron and Don, maybe with Bobby up. Love the '59 sedan delivery push vehicle.