Thanks,,,,,,,,,,,,,,we stayed away from the NHRA, because there were more AHRA tracks in the midwest...also the vette did not fit the class rules very good....the AHRA stock was more suited and believe it or not, the payouts were great with the AHRA...The Tice family became very close to our team,
Mr. Colsey, Nice stuff on the 61' Corvette (Musser Brothers then Carmine Rotunda's). Little 283/270 HP with the dual-quad. Didn't realize Carmine won the 1968 Super/Stock Magazine Nationals at New York National in F/Stock. 1965,,,C/S 1966,,,D/S 1967,,,C/S 1968,,,F/S paul 1969,,,G/S 1970,,,H/S
Torqueflites become bombs when the rear sprag has failed or "rolled over" and you have a stock front drum. The sprag is usually damaged when you break a rear end or driveshaft. Without the sprag holding, the front drum gets spun up to around 12,000 rpm and explodes. That's why you run a bolt in "super sprag" with more rollers for more holding power, use a valve body that applies the rear band in first, a billet steel or aluminum front drum and do your burnouts starting in second. Oh yah, and a ballistic blanket as well. I would imagine hitting the first button at 6000 rpm would damage the sprag, and then next time you get the bomb. Found these pics on the forabodiesonly.com website of a grenaded TF.
Ask and ye shall receive. <IFRAME height=390 src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/mNJKgJUmVV0" frameBorder=0 width=640 allowfullscreen></IFRAME> Pete
According to an interview in some Mopar magazine article (that I can barely recall) on Jack Werst sometime in the early 2000s, it was he and his SS/D RO23 Plymouth that were responsible for having neutral starts banned at NHRA events. Or perhaps, his car being "the final straw" causing NHRA to ban it. Pete
Much nicer looking with the Cragar S/S wheels! First photo I've seen with them on Carmen's Vette. Pete
I have to respectfully disagree. Everybody ran Cragars, but those Appliance slots MAKE the car!!! Maybe the change to Cragars was for weight. The Cragar S/S mag was all chrome plated steel but they also offered a "Sport" mag (identical to the S/S) but had an aluminum spoked hub, attached to a chromed steel rim. Much lighter. I ran those on 9"x15 XS-11 M&Hs on a 3960lb car with 4800rpm launches and never had a problem. ............GOOD wheels! Verne
History is the proof that most people preferred those wheels, so there's no debating that, but I just can't get "that" look of that Vette with those slots out of my mind. I just think it's perfect.
Thanks for the research, bud. I always liked the look. That's the only Stocker I ever remember with those wheels. Yes ,we had plenty of Cragars too.
Well Colsey -- I've oft told that my memory is fuzzy but i usually remember just enough to get me in trouble or to get a controversy started! I THOUGHT i remembered Zoom-O trans explosion as being in DALLAS! LOL -- But I also was thinking it was PRIOR to the NO NEUTRAL START rule! But apparently not - if the pic was from 69!! Also in you same post above you mention 67 Mopar cars running push-button torqueflites? I thought the push-buttons were gone by then and those 67 cars had column or console shifters? Not a mopar man by any stroke - so i am just "out on a limg" here? There were a number of us Div III TH400 Neutral Starters that reicved a letter or a Call from DD Bob Daniels imforming us of the rule to be in effect at the Nationals. Probably those michigan camaro boys got the word too! I just wasnt "wealthy" enough to start experimenting with hi-stall converters like HP43 talked about. I dont think Marv Ripes was doing anything at the time with the TH400 converter --- think he was still strictly PG man at the time?? Anyway Colsey, thanks for digging up those pix i talked about!! Tweed
1964 was the last year for production push button mopars although they could have been mounted in later cars. I seem to remember one car with a push button setup coming up from the floor to the drivers right at finger length away. Art Carr made something similar.
I had a street '69 383 Cuda with a stick 383 and was racing it at Dallas Georgia when the starter came up to my window and told me NEUTRAL STARTS AREN'T ALLOWED....WHEN I SHOWED HIM MY FOUR SPEED SHIFER HE SHEEPISHLY WALKED AWAY....(car had 3.23 gears and we were only running mid 13's. but was barely getting into fourth gear be the finish line)... I was flattered they thought I shifted that well!!! LOL!
I found the Jack Werst interview online: JW: The '67s were very poor cars. That's the truth. They were slow, heavy, and had a low- compression street Hemi motor instead of the good stuff. Ford brought out their 427 high-riser Fairlanes at the same time, and they were far too fast for us to run with because we were so heavy. That year, Jenkins also had sorted out his little Chevy II, so the Chrysler street Hemis in A/Stock didn't have any hope. Jere Stahl, who had won the championship in 1966, didn't even try to run in the Stock class that year. So we had some special transmissions made that year by a guy in Scranton, Pennsylvania, named Tim Richards, who later tuned Joe Amato's fuel dragster and is well known today. With those transmissions, we began doing what came to be known as Banzai starts. They even called me "Banzai" at some of the tracks I went to. The trick was to wind that Hemi up to 8,000 rpm in Neutral and then drop it into First gear. KA-baam! The car would drop a half-second under the index by doing that. It would also cause some very bad transmission explosions in the car. Parts would go everywhere. We got smart and put a blanket on it later, but that was some scary stuff. I got a lot of ink doing those kinds of starts, but now I see it as being pretty foolish. I blew windshields out of the car, dashboards out of it. I was just so frustrated with the car, I'd try anything to get it to run. Anyway, the funny thing is we go to Indy, and I was ready. I knew how fast the car would go, and I'm in the lanes and figuring I've got the class in the bag. In fact, this car was basically set up just like a stick shift, Dana rear and big rear springs. Well, I got to the staging lane, and Buster Couch and all these guys were laughing. Here was this big sign: No Neutral starts. So then we had to take the whole car apart and set it back up for the standard way of running the automatic. Read more: http://www.moparmusclemagazine.com/...0_hemi_plymouth/hemi_darts.html#ixzz1O3CKRnKM Pete
MM: What do you think of drag racing today? JW: I'm glad I raced when I did. It was a wonderful time to be a racer, and I don't know how these guys do it today. I don't know what these teams are spending today in Pro Stock, but it takes millions of dollars to run. Super Stock is almost as bad. To do well at it, you need to race full time and spend a lot of your own money. If you don't have those resources, stay home. No, I did it at the right time. I wouldn't have traded those early years of Pro Stock for anything. It was a lot of fun, and it was the best time of my life. This was the sport of the '60s. It was in its infancy, and we were all good friends. If you broke down beside the road and one of the Ford or Chevy racers saw you, they would stop and help you out. We all raced match races together, and we were all friends. Pete
I agree.....Cragars rock, but Rotunda's Corvette would not look right to me without those Appliance wheels....it's just how I always remeber seeing it. It looks like a bunch of other Junior Stock Corvettes of that period with the Cragars.
i just wanted to thank you guys for so much history, that we all endured during the greatest days of drag racing...i raced stock and super stock and had no desire to ever leave...the associations kinda ran us off..you guys are wonderful...so many of our friends are gone too!
Not sure if this will work but.. http://dragnut.smugmug.com/Magazine-Photos/Stock-Super-Stock-Photos/4293186_RmKeS#251630956_hPR5s
It's great that these guys and gals who paid their dues to be part of the big show get the recognition from this terrific website...i was visiting another site for about 6 months, and every post i made about our era, was met with" get over those days are not coming back"......i never said they were...i was just telling some stories, and was banned for making a comment about nhra(have we all done that?)
Don Spencer (right) and Ron Knape are photographed receiving their Stock Eliminator winning trophy (from a Playboy centerfold!) at the 1976 Gateway Nationals in Saint Louis.
The Jalopy Journal
