Features VINTAGE SPRINT CAR PIC THREAD, 1965 and older only please.

Thanks, Rootie, for all of the fantastic photos!

There's not really much in the way of "backing it in" in today's Silver Crown cars. They are mostly just steered into the turns now instead of using the long broadslides of the past. The super wide tires and modern compounds have taken care of that. The tracks get like asphalt pretty fast now so the technique is totally different today. And judging from the size of today's crowds compared to the one at DuQuoin in your photo it's a pretty good bet that the fans know the difference.

 

Exactly the case at the Hoosier Hundred this year. I prefer shorter tracks, and I suspect the drivers do too.

The August 8th USAC sprint car event at the 3/8 banked dirt track at Cedar Lake, WI, racing was as good as it gets in this modern day. Good car count, fast, great drivers, enough passing, great track (especially after they moved the cushion way up in the turns for the feature), backing them in and a bit of diamonding.

Now if the cars weren't so ugly and you could see the drivers working and if there was a more substantial crowd, it would have been perfect.

 

I totally agree with all of the above. Times change and that is a fact of life. Thankfully some pay homage to the past. Paul Martens of Fairview, OK with Brady Bacon up pretty much " back 'er in". Note the gold leaf numbers.

 

The long and short of it. There was a time when there was no max. wheelbase rule for USAC sprint cars. Hence, Henry Meyers dual purpose champ/sprint car.

 

Actually, my first job in racing. in the early 60s, was working for Henry, on this car.
The photo you have here is after the wheelbase was shortened to 88" and the chevy engine was installed.
The car was built in 1959 with a 96" wb and a 220 OFFY engine. Following the 1961 season, USAC told Henry, that he would have to decide if it was a champ car or a sprint car.
He decided on the sprint division, so he shortened the wb to 88"(still long compared to the usual
84 to 86 inch cars of the day) and installed the chev V8. Everybody thought that Henry laid the engine over(45deg) to improve left side weight, which it did, but in reality, the frame was 22" wide
for the OFFY so the chev would not fit sitting straight up.
Henry's big deal was light weight and "zero" binding in the suspension linkage and driveline.
The original car weighed 1160 lb. Henry owned an aircraft machine shop in Dayton OH that did business with Wright-Patterson air base, so he had access to magnesium and titanium materials that were not generally available back then. The car had a sheet magnesium body and titanium nuts and bolts.
The car was one of the first coil spring cars. Handling was severely limited by the Monroe and Gabriel shocks of the day. The car was either the fastest car on the track or the most dangerous depending on the driver. If we had a "stand on the gas" guy who kept the springs loaded down all the time, the car was fast but if we had a driver who sawed up and down on the throttle, the car would jump up and down like a pogo stick because, unlike today's shocks, there was no adjustable rebound resistance. With current technology shocks, the car would still be fast.
The car won five USAC features and held lap records at Dayton, Winchester and Salem Speedways
The perfectly restored #93 Iddings Auto Glass Spl. currently sits in the Garst Museum in Greenville OH.

mac miller in INDY

 

Hey Mac, do you have an idea who is driving the 93 car in the above photo?

 

Tom...a great posting on the Henry Meyer car, well done.

 

Hey Mac, do you have an idea who is driving the 93 car in the above photo?


My best guess would be either Hugh Randall or Allen Crowe.... ??
The photo appears to be 1962 Winchester ......???

mac miller in INDY

 

Iddings car, sprint car sized.

 

As stated the Iddings car has been restored. But it still has the dent in the roll bar that Bobby Marshman put in it at Trenton in 1961. Here's the video:



And Mac is absolutely right about USAC coming down on Henry Meyer after 1961 about running his car as either a Championship car or a Sprint car in 1962 . However, it took the Board of Directors until January, 1963 to get it into print. The USAC rulebook for 1963 had what was basically a "Henry Meyer Rule" stating that dual-purpose Championship/Sprint cars or Sprint/Midgets would no longer be allowed and that cars could only be registered in a single division. In the past it had been possible to register cars in more than one division so long as they met the appropriate technical requirements when they were raced.

 

Rootie, I appreciate your knowledge as well as your picture posts. Can you tell me approximately when that "unlimited wheelbase" era was and what would have been considered an exceptionally long car? I am asking this because I am 6'6" tall and trying to make my replica long enough for me to fit inside it (with a three-speed auto trans). I think I am at 110" w.b. Were any that long?

 

I don't think there was a max. w.b. for the champ cars. Even now the Silver Crown cars only have a min. w.b. of 96" but have a overall max. length of 15'. I don't think 110" would be out of the question, at all, for a 1930s/40s champ car. For example, the V-12 Mercedes type 154 had a w.b. of around 108".

 

Thank you. To balance the length I am making the rear bustle proportionately long, ala the 1925 Gallivan sprinter / Marchese Bros. Garage racer.

 

A couple Vintage sprinters that ran as part of the USAC sprint race at Cedar Lake Speedway, New Richmond, WI, August 8th. The #7 is a rail frame, the #5 a Leffler.

 

This was a IMCA Old Timers show at Cedar Lake Speedway

 

The Sid Street Motors Spl. one of the 2 Champ cars built by Bob Pankrantz.

 

Winchester action

 

Bob Veith and the Meskowski built Pete Schmidt roadster.

 

Rootie, with your permission I'd like to forward these 4 photos you've shared of the Pankratz car (the one that wound up in the PNW) to Tom Malloy et all who has been on the hunt the past 20 years for the sister car Malloy Special (that wound up a sprint car in the Mid West)
Link to photo of Malloy car last seen:
http://s1011.photobucket.com/user/carl44s/media/motorsports 1943-69/Car_.jpg.html?sort=6&o=76

 

The Schmidt Roadster was pitted next to us at Texas World -2009

 

I used to swap letters back and forth with Joe when I needed help with my Riley 4Port back in the early 1970's. Got to visit his shop around 1973-74. In my mind I'd thought is was a big machine shop, he did have two mailing addresses, home and shop. Turned out living on a corner you did live on two different streets. I often wonder how much racing history went through his doors. By the way "Bunny" Phillips had his Bugatti shop some were near by, did anyone ever have the nerve to ask him how that nickname came about? Bob

 

You bet, no problem.

 

Is the Holland Special #2 the same car Joe Mac had in the 1970's? GMC powered if my memory is correct. Wonder if those wire wheels on Joe's car were the same ones he would use on his T Bucket that was just uncovered and is posted in another HAMB thread? Bob

 

Mike Magill's Indy rookie ride 1956. Looks like he stopped off at the tire shed for some new 'Stones' but it didn't help, still a DNQ. No idea what 'Chesty' was but probably not what I'm thinking.

 

Rootie, "Chesty" was the Chesty Potato Chip Company which was a brand sold mostly in the Midwest in that time frame. They may have started in Wisconsin but were later based in Terre Haute, Indiana and absorbed by one of the big snack food companies. They were famous for selling their chips in large metal "tins".

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/131097039125152713/

Also, the guy looking down at the right front tire is Del Neal. He was the brother-in-law of Firestone Racing boss Bill McCrary. I got to know him in his later years. A great guy and a great source for behind the scenes racing info.

 

This is Sam Craft from Denver N.Y. in front of his shop some time before 1938.

My great uncle Don Weyle would travel with him.



Family Photo

 

Neat graphics on the Travelon Trailer car 1955

 

Duke Dinsmore late 40s.


Dinsmore in the Safety Auto Glass Spl. (A.K.A. the 'roadster on the roof ') 1960.

 

Actually, I think there are pretty much exactly twenty years between those two pictures! The Dukester drove this "works" Dreyer only in late 1939 (when it was #7, I believe) and early '40 (as #2). In the late forties, this particular car looked a lot more crummy (if you have "The Illustrated History of Sprint Car Racing", take a look at p255, bottom right).