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

One of the biggest downfalls of the Henry J was their own marketing strategy.
They called it the "everymans car", and just like today, there was a segment of society that felt they were above the level of the average citizen.
Now on the other hand, the Williams' Henry J was anything but average and in my opinion was one of the nicest of it's breed.

 

Nice looking FED interesting fuel line plumbing to the rear mounted barrel valve.
Can you tell me about the injector and fuel system?
Colour co-ordinated scoop with body is a nice look as well on this one

 

Yeah, them too. Especially the ones that were all steel with stock steel fenders. And if they happened to be '29 A pick-ups, even better. Of course, if they were bright red, that was like the icing on the cake.

When it came to the Gassers, there were some that just impacted me, knocked me to my knees. There are some race cars that when you saw them run, they just grabbed you around the neck and would not let go. This is one that did that to me, the first time I saw it go down the track...

Lean Gene's Oldsmobile in the 1950's...

 

When it comes to Gassers (or Street Roadsters), if it does not have original outside door handles, opening original steel doors, with glass windows that rolled up and down, I tend to lose interest real fast. It's not that I don't understand the logic of light weight components for drag cars, it's that when drag racing was off-the-wall fun for me, we never heard of the word "fiberglass" or "plexiglass", or "tube frame"...

 

Got any history on the Barracuda to share with us?

 

One Sunday nite in 59' I was setting in Bob's Big Boy in San Fernando and they were closing up the car service

And I hear the loud rump a dee - rump and a blower wine, and it is Dick Harryman and his buddy in his blown 49' Olds fastback gasser un-corked and with slicks just making a pass through Bob's

He lived just a few blocks from me so we followed them home, and that is before the Hydro's and Dick had a 3 speed floor shift trans probly a LaSalle

So at each stop sign he would light up the rears just a bit, stick it in high and cruise on home

That is one 4 mile drive I will never forget, if you did that today they would put you in the clink and throw the key away and take your gasser away too

Boy those were great days DND

 

My last word on the level gasser thing.Rules said they had to be level, not jacked up. Most of the period pics you see with high noses are under power with the weight transferring. That's why they LOOK jacked up, but weren't.
Mow back to DRAG CARS IN MOTION!
As for the Keeling & Clayton California Charger above, that's the old (1960-61) Enderle
"Barn Door" injection. (On car below)

Not state of the art for 1970!

Seemed to work just fine!

 

Parham & Doane 55 gasser. Evolved from street car to showpiece.
One of my favorites from the 60's in the NW!
Gary Parham lurks here on the HAMB, but doesn't post!

 

Gene Adams was the "Rocket Man" before the term was widely used, and an inspiration to many !

 

REAL gasser. Most 55's had stock front suspension, not tube axles!

 

Pete Dorsey's Crazy Cuda

 

Dick Harryman, a name from the past for me. Dick and my own dragster partner, Nye Frank, with Mickey Brown in the seat.

 

Gary and Steve built 3 - 55's, that last one had a lengthened 40 Willys chassis, with all mounting points copied from the Stone, Woods,Cook (Black Car). Steve told me he spent an afternoon with a tape measure, under that car at the Winternationals !

 

The funny thing is that many that did have a "tube" axle, or an early Ford straight front axle, and a pair of leaf springs, probably had more weight in the front suspension than the stock OEM independent suspension weighed.

 

Gary
When I was in high school, about 1970, there were a few drag cars invited (by the school) to put on a display in front of the school, citing CRS, so I'm not positive on all of them but IIRC one was Gary Parham with his 57 Corvette, Tom Chase and Kenney Goodell.
One or two passes (can't recall who) in front of the school left quite an impression.

 

The car is the Keeling and Clayton California Charger, one of the nicest front motor cars ever. Normally on a Don Long car with a bug catcher hat the throttle linkage came up from a bell crank on the firewall to a second bellcrank that mounted on the back of the blower and had a link going forward to the right side of the throttle shaft. In this case the injector is a "barn door" Enderle which has a longitudinal throttle shaft (and two big rectangular butterflies) so it was expedient to mount the barrel valve at the rear and run the vertical link directly to it. Getting it to work right meant that the barrel valve is mounted vertically with the outlets that would normally point back along the left side of the blower (with a regular bug catcher style hat) facing up. The vertical outlet runs forward to the distribution block for the nozzles in the injector and the angled one feeds the port lines. The return line is the small one coming out of the BV and running along the top side of the valve cover and then down to the frame rail and back to the tank.
This is the more common installation:


Roo

 

Love the old hand lettering on this dragster.
I don't know any old sign painters that does not use "One Shot Paint" for his work.

These were the day's of true sign painters.
Jimbo

 

Yep I hear you Jimbo, a few yrs back I needed a sign board and asked the guy if he could hand letter one up like in the days of old and no problem he says

So I clear coated a trick piece of fancy thin plywood, go to pick it up and it had been all stenciled using a laser printer and I was really ticked off

It looked so bad compared to the hand lettering, what a joke as things have sure changed on us

 

There are still some "real" letterers doing awesome work. Paul Romine told me earlier today that Brando is going to do the head and tail lights (and flames) on his nostalgia F/C once Tony Pedregon paints it and then after the clear is on he is going to hand letter it. And then there is Glen Designs. Either check out his Facebook page (Glen Weisgerber) or Google him. He still hand letters commercial trucks on a daily basis and is one of the best ever. Can't forget Blood either.

Roo

 

The last sign I had hand painted was done by a guy that was legally blind. He did fantastic work.

 

About what time period did Enderle make this model injector?

 

Early 60's I would say

 

There seems to be something missing from this lineup.