History Camshaft nicknames, history, and rare parts

A thread dedicated to vintage Camshafts and there nicknames. As well as Rare and unusual Rockers and other valve train parts. Guys always had good nicknames for camshafts; Several I can think of:

The Isky 550 'Super Le gerra' AKA " the mini express"
The Crane 'Saturday night special' AKA " the king of the drive in"

Any others you can think of ?

 

Adjustable rockers for an Olds McGurk as I recall.

I don't know if this is what you were after. Crane used to sell a bumpstick called a Fireball that was pretty popular. If names is what you were after.

 

I always liked the Isky "5 Cycle".....

 

I had a Crane Zip 510, .510 lift, 310 duration. Killer cam in a 283 with 4.56 gears.

 

Comomn names,"3/4 cam",was name of one used for street n drags,later was called "Street n Strip" or just mild by some.
One that be came highly regarded was a SBC cam called Dontvof 30/30{Spell?}. "500" was fairly hot for a time,but really was just any cam with 1/2in. lift=Reground 500.

 

For later '50s and earlier '60s .500 was a lot of lift. There were roller cams with more lift than that but not normally something you would buy off the shelf. actually 310 duration is a lot of duration. I got an Engle cam for my vintage race motor that is .500 lift and 288 duration and it was advertised as a "Long duration race cam"

 

Bump Stick I said. Show me she said.

 

@dana barlow will probably remember or know if I am guessing right, I think it was Potvin that ground a 3/8 cam for flatheads. being from the era of 3/4 or full race cams the "3/8" moniker throws me off.

 

Looks like I short-changed the name of the cam, it was the Zip 510 RamSonic HP, sounds pretty racey, huh? Here is the letter from Harvey Crane when he recommended the cam, I wish I still had the cam card to show the timing events but it's long gone.

 

I wasn't suggesting the duration number was bogus just that it was or actually is a ton.

Something I seldom see advertised any more is overlap, you would think that would be important information to know these days without Sunoco 110. LOL Used to be it was something that got bantered around a lot, duration and overlap.

 

No harm, no foul. I didn't take your post that way 'beaner, I just remembered that I still had that letter from Harvey Crane and when I looked at it I saw the RamSonic name.
Realistically it was too much on the street, even with the 283, 4 spd and 4.56 gears in a Chevy II the bottom end was pretty soft but it hit hard at about 3200. For the street the '097 was a better choice and a hell of a lot cheaper. Young and foolish, that was the last time I mixed my DD with my hobby.

 

Guess I was clarifying that for the masses and not us. A friend and I actually got reported for causing drama a while back (quite a while now perhaps) and we were just discussing something.

The letter is actually pretty cool. Back in the early '70s I stuffed a ram sonic in a punched 283 that was in a '63 Biscuit. It was a lumpy SOB, but the car was always flat towed. The guy that was running the chebby said, "The parts guy said this cam will really run." He was right.

 

Chet Herbert {west}amung others like Schooler{east} did some very cool "hot regrinds" back in the 50's,there were a number of those doing it,Crane came along. I want up to old man Crane's coragated tin machin shop to get a cam ground for 1950 Henry J,Redseal inline flathead in late 50s,that was before it became a bigdeal {cost was $28 about the same as others,bring your own cam to get reground}an the kid later went big.

 

Believe it or not Uncle Sig started out doing regrinds before the Erson name became a household word. I think that regrinds were the bread n butter for a lot of the name cam grinders in the beginning.

 

Anybody remember who ground the Short Bigelow and the Long Bigelow? It was a Jimmy six cam.

 

Memory fart, I thought there was a 505 Super Le Gerra?

 

I think maybe Isky offered a "Polydyne" cam...

 

Funny I remember the names of the cams but I sure couldn't say who ground them. It must have been a commonly known grinder as you and I are from different parts of the country.

 

I think you're right!

 

I got a "purple stick" in'er

 

Howard Johanssen ground some mean ones...Isky told a funny story about a Howard's cam someone brought to his shop, for 'analyzing'... Isky started reading lobe profiles and timing, found some radically different from others! (that was about the time Isky introduced the "ISKY 5 CYCLE"...Isky said the 5th 'cycle' was the 'cooling' one!)
He surmised that Howard had an 'inside' to the variables of gradients thru the ports, or some such.
Probably right...Howard's grinds were 'progressive', not a series of 'mistakes'...
Howard's cams always worked the way he predicted.

Remember the Isky grind with the 'Least Emissions'? "For the good of the Country"... I laughed when Dick Artibee brought that one to me, 1965? He bought it at Goodies Speed Shop, San Jose.

1958: I had my flathead block (304") machined for my 'big hurrah': Guide bores fitted to the tappets that followed the ultimate. POTVIN ELIMINATOR. Whew! Scared my '32 Five window to death.
Really liked that engine, loved to say, "Cam? Potvin Eliminator..." Even the older guys got reverent when they heard that...LOL

Oh, BTW... my new cam for my flathead is NOT a Winfield SU1-A. It's an SU1-R!
That means 'Racing', right? Oooohh....... Git 'em!

 

Always laughed at the term "5 Cycle" I never knew about the "cooling cycle" ha ha

never heard of the emissions cam! what a hilarious scam!

'big hurrah' with the potvin eliminater....cool

 

The one thing I remember from back then was the Giovaninni decal with the girl riding the "bumpstick". No, I don't have an example to post; my mother confiscated the 3 I got in the mail when I was in the 11th grade!

 

The edelbroke street master was an emissions/mileage intake. What a joke those were.

Here ya go buddy its ribbed for her pleasure.LOL

 

Those sound about right for the numbers that the sprint car guys liked in the late sixties and early seventies.

I don't remember the grind number, but that sounds like an Engle the several guys in our group ran.

Edit: I think the Engle Number may have been 238. Isky 505T was another popular stick in that crowd.

 

Crower "Baja Beast".This in one of my FE engines worked well.Of course it was on its face at 4800 rpm.

 

let me venture into the dungeon and see what I can dig up.

There were a few old cam grinders that came around when I was little and most of them told me back then that cam performance was all in the ramps. Of course at my age I wasn't sure what they meant.LOL

153 and I think 2B21 are the numbers

 

In the late 50s thru the early 70s..We sold hundreds of Engle #123 for small blocks

 

I still have an Engle 95 on the shelf.
I have a Crower roller that has 90R Killer stamped on one end.