Cotton Werksmans' Ardun-powered T

please do; i've heard of this car for years but have never seen it. too bad i missed this when it was first posted.

 

Here you go.

 

Thanks John, you are the picture man!!

 

I'll second that. I miss too many good postings here thorugh my own inadequacy

 

thanx. cool car. no wonder i'd heard of it.

 

A couple more pics, just in case.

I'm guessing the second one's a Cotton clone, with just a regular flathead

 

I worked with Bob Knaack SEVERAL years ago here in Chattanooga and helped him redo his roadster that was the twin to Cottons. That thing was nice !!
never met Cotton but Bob Knaack is a great guy ! anyone know where he is or how to get in touch with Bob ??

 

I am building a track style 27 T with Cotton Werksman built Ardun engine. I've talked to him on the phone a few times earlier this year with questions. he's pushing 80 but is still as sharp as a tack.

 

This is when Cotton was an LAR member, early 70's.

 

I remember being fascinated with this build when it was being featured in a couple of the magazines, back in the day.

Unfortunately, I'm not seeing any pics of the car in this thread.
Are there any build shots of this car anywhere online?

I've been pondering another project & something with a Werksman vibe kinda perks my interest.

 

The Bob Knaack modified was at this years Autorama (2013) in the basement. There are several pic's of it in the H.A.M.B. Autorama coverage. It is the little black "T" with the yellow grill shell, and red flames on the side of the body. The new owner has started to install an Ardun in it!

Some neat pic's, if someone can find them and post them on this thread.

 

This pic is from the post by "ontario55"
Detroitautorama2013, lower level pics
part 2 of 2

 

Wow! I had always wondered about the T but never took the intitative to search for more info on it. I saved a picture of that T a long time ago and every time I come across that picture, I would look at it for a good few minutes before moving on..

 

I realize this thread started in '05 and the last bump was still close to a year ago but like the bank robber looking up at Dirty Harry's 44 magnum I GOTS TO KNOW:

Has anyone seen this car recently?

 

It was at the big indoor car show here in Denver in November. I got all excited seeing it after all these years, and I babbled to everyone I could about it, but nobody I was with remembered it or seemed to care. It still looks just like it did and it's really a study in how a cutting-edge hot rod was built back then. Great car.

 

Thanks fatkoop, but that's the car he built in or around 2005. I am curious about the original one from the late 60's early 70's that's shown in the picture above.

The key differences are the original had independent rear suspension and that cool looking top. The main visual differences are the original had a chrome roll bar and rear hairpin style radius rods. The original one no longer says "Cotton" on the grill shell either.

 

Every time I see this car I'm reminded how amazingly radical it was when it was new. The combination of an ultra-low T roadster with an Ardun, 6 carbs, IRS and massive Goodyear Stock Car Blue Streaks was completely outside the box -- just as radical as Grabowski's T, in its day, but never as well-known.

The tires are unknown today, but they were the hot setup on road courses in the mid-60s. Almost slicks -- terrifying in the wet -- but on dry pavement they were amazing. I'd guess that Cotton was into autocross, or whatever that kind of competition was called in the day.

The car really deserves to be a lot more famous than it is. So original, so baaaad.

 

He got the tires from "Reeds Race Rats" on the South Side of Chicago. They used to sell the previous years model road race tires at a discount, which is what they were. Yes, very cool.

 

So true!
But yet for all its innovation and radical-ness it didn't deviate from the classic "look".
Amazing stuff Mr Werksman.

 

Well it fooled me! I guess 40 years or so as dimmed my memory somewhat. <label for="rb_iconid_11"></label> <label for="rb_iconid_11"></label>Now I know better. Thanks.

 

There is a VERY N I C E article on him and his cars in the latest Rodder's Journal (62). I got to see the car at the Gilmore last spring, but my photos didn't come out all that red hot. Anyone got more / detail shots? Gary

 

Here is a pic of the Bob Knaack frame......correction, the 3rd tube frame T.

 

I did something similar -- bought some Cobra takeoffs from Carroll Shelby. Although they were nominally 670-15s, the tread was close to 7" wide. I put them on this:

Overkill, to be sure, but it sure was a sticky station wagon!

 

That's the frame for the "3rd" car that was built around 2005-6, not the Bob Knnack frame.

 

Wrong.....that frame was built by Cotton and Bob, around the same time as Cotton's Ardun powered "T".
^^^^^Wrong!
I stand corrected.....it is the "3rd" car frame!

 

BrokenRecord is correct, that is the 3rd frame. The easiest way to prove it is to play Lieutenant Columbo...if that was the Bob Knnack frame, how come there are pictures on the wall behind it of cars Mr. Werksman built 10-15 years AFTER the Knnack frame? Example, the mid engine car right above the picture of the blown flathead. I was in high school when he took me for a ride in that one '84/'85 timeframe.

 

I don't know which frame it is. But is it possible it is the Knnack frame being restored years after its original construction. Which would explain the the early pictures on the wall.

 

Stumbled across this pic last night. Thought I'd throw it in here.
Mart.

 

Just talked to Bob Knaack, Cottons's first tube frame T, was finished in 1968, rear engine project car, was finished in 1972, Bob's T (2nd tube frame car), was finished in 1975. But the chassis pic is from the 3rd car, because the first tube frame T, and Bob's T had side shifter transmissions, while the 3rd car has the top shift transmission. So the real clue, is the transmission!

 

Does anyone know where the 3rd T went? Bob thought it was sold to someone in maybe Washington state, or somewhere in the Pacific Northwest. Hope it wasn't parted out to get the Ardun. Worst case, maybe it will show up with a flathead, instead of the Ardun.