Projects NEW BUILD-OTIE'S AUTOMOTIVE B/A FIAT TOPOLINO TRIBUTE

Your wife ROCKS!! Lol. And so does that car!!! Awesome your are doing this ☺️

 

Edelbrock B10 came today, have everything to mock up the engine now. Thanks Bob, looks NOS to me, couldn't be happier.

 

Wow. That is the best b10 intake I've ever seen. All mine are welded and have heli coils some where.

 

Definitely, it was my second try. The first B10 I bought on eBay. They had it described as mint, pictures looked good. When I looked it over I found where it had been weld repaired, sent it back.

 

It's looking good Jason. I'll be watching.

 

Thanks Todd, your dragsters looking good as well. We gonna get to smell any spent fuel this year?

 

Good day, perimeters welded, ready to mount the axle and rear end housing.

 

Almost a roller, body mounting starts tomorrow.

 

Man, That engine looks huge in this pic. lol

 

looks great! Can not wait to see MORE!

 

This is going to be GOOD.

 

My first friction shocks

 

Love the workmanship, this is going to be a great tribute...

(did you ever learn anything about Al "Waldo" Hirshfield? I remember him in SoCal when I was racing in the early '60s...he ran an early Willys gasser in addition to the Fiat, ...I have a vague memory of him building hydro transmissions, but I could be way off)

 

I knew Otie's machinist at the speed shop. His name was Vick and lived in Kent Ohio just down from my Father's gas station. Vic had a NHRA "C " dragster and Otie's son Bill drove it. If I remember Vick and Bill won the U.S. Nationals in 1964. It was powered by a Chevy 301 and had a Pontiac 3 speed transmission which only 2nd and high were used. I think it ran low 10's. I spent many hrs with Vick watching him, work on the dragster. He was slow and seemed to be a perfectionist. Nice man. After I went off to school and the Army I heard he turned the garage into a gun shop.
I sure would like to know what ever happened to that dragster !

 

Thank you, it's nice to have our work appreciated. This is the first car I've ever built and I'm doing most of the machining and chassis fabricating. My friends who've built cars before are doing the sheet metal and welding.
I haven't learned anything about Waldo Hirshfield. The only new info I have is what I have learned from going through the whole year of 1961 Hot Rod mags. I don't know if Waldo built the car, but it was raced through 61 with different drivers. The car won B/A at the 61 Winter Nationals as the Hirshfield & Bucky Coupe, they lost Middle Eliminator to Mickey Thompson. It set a national B/A record at Inyokern 5-61, as Hirshfield -Beaver at 11.00. The car then won the 61 US Nationals with K.S. Pitman driving. It was sold at Indy and brought to Ohio where it sat at Arlen Vanke's shop over the winter and was purchased by Otie in the spring of 62. Bill came home from school at 16 and it was in the driveway. Otie told him it was his first race car and started taking money out of his paycheck to cover it.

 

elba, post: 11533230, member: 211709"]I knew Otie's machinist at the speed shop. His name was Vick and lived in Kent Ohio just down from my Father's gas station. Vic had a NHRA "C " dragster and Otie's son Bill drove it. If I remember Vick and Bill won the U.S. Nationals in 1964. It was powered by a Chevy 301 and had a Pontiac 3 speed transmission which only 2nd and high were used. I think it ran low 10's. I spent many hrs with Vick watching him, work on the dragster. He was slow and seemed to be a perfectionist. Nice man. After I went off to school and the Army I heard he turned the garage into a gun shop.
I sure would like to know what ever happened to that dragster ![/QUOTE]

I can't find that dragster either, according to Bill it was a Lakewood chassis. That was the first dragster Bill drove and yes, they did win C/Dragster at the 64 US Nationals. I only have 2-pictures of that car. The B&W I found on Pinterest and the color picture is from one of Bill's scrap books.

 

Thanks or the PICS Otie Auto. The last pic brings back a lot of good memories . I would buy that dragster if I could locate it. If I was still in Ohio I would be helping yubut I am a thousand miles away in Alabama.
I saw Otie run that Hemi altered many times at Quaker City and Vic and Bill at Dragway 42. I miss those days a bunch.
Vic gave me many tips on the first Chevy V8 I assembled. I was only 16 .
Memories are they only thing we take with us when we die.
I will continue to follow your work.

 

Your welcome, I wish I had more pictures of that car. Vic was the first to put Bill in a dragster and he speaks fondly of him as well. If you ever come back to visit please get in touch, I wish I could have been there to see the original's compete.

 

Nice 2 port!

 

Thanks, it's a new one. Just came this morning from Alky Digger's, it was a 6-week wait from Hilborn. They were very good to deal with and it got here pretty quick. Haven't bought the pump yet , not sure how I'm going to turn it. The original car had it on the back of the blower and I haven't found any of those parts yet. I'm not so sure I want too, it doesn't look very easy to work on back there with how far the engine is set back. I can't run it off the cam because I'm going to run a water pump with the Isky drive.
Maybe off the front of the bottom pulley if I have room between it and the radiator.

Can you run one off a v-belt?
Everything I see is a cogged belt.
My crank hub has pulley built in to the back of it.

 

Almost half mounted, ran out of gas, bummer.

 

I do not think a V belt will work to run the pump, but I could be wrong. Ask Racer X here on the HAMB, he would know for sure.

 

I wouldn't trust the v belt. You could run one of these


It will bolt to the front of the pulley. The only thing that you would have to do is remachine it for the Isky offset hole. I have an angle drive that runs the pump off the magneto and it adds a lot to the back of the motor.