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

The bottom pic looks like Ivo's Barnburner about a half a car on the Ernie's Camera car

Ah yaa weed sweeper pipes and boil the hides, early fuelers forever !!!!!!!!

 

That would be the "Barnstormer".

 

Is that ok with you Muttley? This has pretty much been your thread and I don't want to mess it up.

 

o.k. seriously, who ever started this thread, sucks !! I have spent countless hours watching ,looking,learning, and just plain old being envious..I think I was born about 40 years too late.. wow, awesome awesome ,stuff !!

 

Yep Steve she was fun times !!!

 

never to be seen again, too. Everything today is just a costume party trying in vain to replicate the "Golden Years".
I'll be impressed again when there's 32 top fuelers, 64 funny cars, gas classes, match races, 1/4 mile strips, push starts, ribbon chutes, no burnouts, no computers.......well, you get the idea.
If you weren't there, you'll never understand.
It's like watching "Hogan's Heros" and thinking that you're an expert on World War II.
Sorry kiddies.

 

Hi Maz

I was working at a place in San Fernando in 60' and looking to see who was towing through town on the way to the Smokers meet in Bakersfeild, and see this red & cream 57' Nomad flat towing a very clean red & cream 55 Bel Air with a pair of slicks on the wagon roof rack

The 55 was Mike Maranoff's blown C/Gasser from New York city and it was show quality and a record holder too, as he was going by I was thinking boy these guys are real racers flat towing 6000 miles out here and back in the middle of winter

I kind of patterned my gasser after Mikes cool 55 for a top of the line racer & show car too like Mike built

 

Exactly 100% true.

I have gone to a few of these so-called "Nostalgia Drag Events" and I can report that there is nothing there that makes me feel the least bit nostalgic. The cars don't look the same, they don't sound the same, and they are just NOT the same. It was a different time and it's not coming back. Like Maz states, if you weren't there, it's impossible to explain to someone what it was like. It would be like going to a Rave and thinking that must be what Woodstock was like...

 

Actually Mike was from the Chicago area.

Roo

 

Then Skip got it right when he started this thread all those years ago. Even those of us who where there, back in the dark ages, learn from things posted here. I love learning what went on in places other than Southern California. This thread is golden!!

 

Not my thread, it's Royalshifters. It's fine as far as I'm concerned though, I've probably posted more stationary shots than in motion anyway.

 

I was talking to Kelly Brown about this the other day, run the restored fuelers on a 1/8 mike track , and light them up the whole way

You would fill the stands like they did at the Beach every Sat nite, those people would go nuts seeing those early cars run boiling the hides

 

Correct D.N.D.
I often wonder how much people would pay today and how far they would travel to go inside a crystal ball and attend just one average race day at Lions, Irwindale, etc.
When I look back on all the events that I was at, any one of them would be just drop-dead-bitchin'.
From the four jets racing at one time at Fontana to opening day at Irwindale, to the day when the world was introduced to the first factory-sponsored flopper funny car, to the match races with "Pure Hell", Dick Landy, Gas Ronda, John Mazmanian, Ronnie Sox and the shows that included the "Little Red Wagon", "Stage Fright" drag bike, Dragmasters twin engined car, the one event at San Gabriel that included Tommy Ivo, Don Prudhomme (GBP), "The Greek" and Don Garlits, the match race between Ivo's "Barnstormer" and the "Untouchable" jet, the day that Tom McEwen drove the Hemi-Cuda skyward in the traps at Lions ("All I could see was sky!"-McEwen), the day Danny Ongais drove his fueler through the traps at Irwindale upside-down, the pre-race spectacle of the dragsters and push cars/trucks all lined up in the staging lanes, the fire-up road and the first blast of the nitro fueled blast, to the crew-members yanking and pulling/pushing the cars into position and to the starting line, the lights dropping and the roar, smoke and virtual chaos that was "the race" and many times not even knowing who won due to all the smoke and crap blown into the air by so much violence.......then the silence as everyone would quietly listen for the announcer to tell us who won and what the numbers were. Then, after a pause the crowd would mutter some nervous laughter and chatter.......but that time would be short-lived as the next two cars would ignite their engines to just do it all over again......week in and week out.....from Lions to San Gabriel, to Fontana and then to Irwindale in 1965.......this was my playground, my little league, this was all I wanted to do. This is what I did.....cameras in tow and a couple of bucks in my pocket and this was my world between 1961 and 1967.
Whether by bicycle or coaxing my parents for a ride or hitching a ride with friends or with some of the racers that I had met and become friends with......didn't matter to me as long as I got to go.
In 1966, I was finally able to drive myself and the weekends were the same as usual.
Over the next several years GIRLS and photography school took most of my weekends and extra dough but I never quit going to the races, always trying to keep up and enjoy what I could, when I could.....
Today I occasionally go to the March Meet but it's not the 1960's and I know better than to try to "pretend".
It's good. Thankfully lots of people still go to events such as this, but it's sure as hell not the same.
As said.....thankfully there's still racing to enjoy and plenty of noise and fumes, just different packaging, in a different world and a different culture.....but it's all good.
I regret being 65 but I'm overjoyed being 65....if you know what I mean (and I know you do).
I'd rather be at the tail-end of Life and have lived in the 1950's-1960's than be young and have to endure with issues that were not known to us back in those days.
I didn't lock my house until the 1970's.........different world, kids.....different times......back when a hand-shake was a contact......
What a wonderful Life

 

So many memories...Lions in the early '60s, gas only but still cool under the lights, San Gabriel, still gas but Ivo, Lefty, Durfee Motors, Doug Cook, so many more, put on an incredible show....first pass down Pomona (scared the crap out of me!!), through the lights at San Gabriel in my Ardun, Lions at night, all you could see was the space between the blower and the header flames...Lions was a separate experience, I don't think I ever got used to it..we knew how many racers didn't make it out of there.....San Fernando, always casual, but well managed, Colton, same way, they knew how to treat the racers and spectators right....Bakersfield: 1964, qualified 64 top fuel cars, 32 in each ladder, and yet that was just more than half the field, something like 100 top fuelers alone showed up from everywhere, along with gassers (Don remembers Mike Marinoff, he was there too, just like Don remembers)...one run after another, from around 8:00 until after the sun went down, then off to Hashim's to fix what you broke...not much distinction between the big guys and the little guys like me...if they had parts, they loaned them to you, or taught you something you had no clue about....towed on a open trailer behind a sedan or a pickup......I have never gone back, I do appreciate the effort the nostalgia guys go to in either recreating or restoring these classics from those days.....but I've never gone back...

 

Reading this post almost made me feel like I was there, even though I was born in 66` I still dream about and long for the best years of drag racing. Thanks to all the guys who were there and are here to share the stories and pics. I know I`ll never be able to know what it was really like, I just have to settle for looking, reading and dreaming.

 

Ok Mazooma and DND....
Someone better save me a spot on their time machine if mine doesn't get finished first.
Oh, and make sure Willy and the Winged Express are in the program.
And the Freight Train.
And Big.
And Jenkins.
And of course Linda Vaughn.
I'll even ride in the back, ok.

 

Roo

In a drag news they said that Mike was the ' Mad Russian ' from New York cityso I never knew he was from Chi town thanks for pointing it out

 

Mike Marinoff was from Milwaukee as was his driver Bill Reeves. He was occasionally booked in to Minnesota Dragways for match races or exhibition runs. That speaks highly of the car and driver to be a '55 Chev with a blown small block and 4 speed, that it could put on a show that people were willing to pay to see.

 

To Mazooma1, DND, DDDenny, Dean, 296ardunm

I thought I would add our experiences in defying gravity at the Beach. We were not space scientists; it only took a prerequisite short wheel-based Willys, the basics listed below, and the absurdity of youth.

Geometry of Our Set-up
· Ladder bars (long) connected at the rear engine cross beam, basically ~75% of wheelbase.
· Engine was set back 10%+
· Wheel based shorted to 99 inches
· 90/10 front shocks
· No radiator
· Trunk mounted a 10 gallon water tank, electric pump to engine
· Diesel truck battery mounted in trunk, right rear position.
Energy, Transmission & Kinetics
· Engine Chevy 327, Sig Erson cam, Hilborn Injectors, Joe Hunt Vertex mag
· Mondello heads
· Launch RPM generally around 5,000
· Header extensions to maximize low-end torque
· Heavy Hayes steel bullet flywheel (~60lbs) & Hayes clutch
· Borg Warner close-ratio 4-speed, every other syncro ring milled off, shifted like cutting through butter.
· Pontiac rear end with 6.11 gears! (crazy I know)
· Summers Brothers axles
· Ran 8,600 through the traps, sounded blown at top end
Traction & Tricks
· Airheart disc brakes on the front wheels (new for the times)
· Used a cabled hand brake to stage & preload the car at start line (pre Line Loc days)
· Cragars on rears with a set of low pressure (~5-6lbs) wrinkle wall M&H's with screws in the rim
· Shifted to 2nd just before front wheels touched & generally pulled wheels in 3rd
· Rear bumper was a ubiquitous 4" chrome pipe with screw-on caps (lead optional)
· Rear wheel-well beading were lead formed
· Car was all steel with all original stainless moldings
· Car was a true 1940; the wiper spot(s) were leaded in

Enjoy, Dick M

 

Life is good!

 

Man I would love to see more pics of the Vette

 

Love the specs

 

Lyle Kennedy photo of my car at Eagle Field last May. I drew up rules for a new Street Roadster class that would shape the cars to resemble cars built in the late 60's. I would like to get a group of these cars together for some 8-9 second four speed crowd pleasing FUN!