Dean, Thanks for the detailed explanation - very cool indeed!!!! So if I am to understand - by doing it this way you guys don't have to "bar" the motor - I think I get it! Makes total sense. Thanks for takign the time to share with us!!!!
Dean, I really would like to meet Tommy and invite him and his entire crew (includes you) to be a personal guest at our Fresno Dragway Reunion. Rocky
Rocky- Thanks so much for the invite. I'll talk to Tommy, but the man never takes time off from the car to do anything. He doesn't go to the drags with me and I haven't even been able to get him out to a baseball game and he loves baseball! He played semi pro ball in Sacramento for years- there is even a baseball diamond in the city named after him and he just can't be torn away from the garage unless it's to go to the track to try to make a run. Hopefully Adam and I will be down for the Fresno Dragway Reunion- I'll work on the guy with the 4 engine drag kart to come out, and if that happens I'll probably be there to help him out. Then in 2011, hopefully with our King Ch***is dragster! Dean
Dean-Thanks for the detailed explanation on the starting and ending procedure that you do. You explained it so even a mechanical simpleton like myself could understand it.
Rocky- I will certainly ask him. I'm not sure the car will be back together by then- and I do think with 6000 horsepower on an unprepped airport runway a run at Eagle Field it wouldn't give him the kind of data he needs to work the combo out for a regular prepped 1/4 mile dragstrip and that's what he's all about at this point. Plus since he's a retiree on a fixed income and it's so expensive to just fire the car up, he needs to be choosy about his opportunities with the car. BUT I really do think after he gets one really good run in and proves the combo works, he'll be much more open to just sharing the car/engine with everyone and perhaps trying to put on a bit of a show for the folks and doing that kind of thing. But right now he generally doesn't want to be sidetracked on the work needed to be done to move the project forward. But I will run it by him for sure and see what he says. I just don't want anyone to take it personally if he declines. He's not stand offish at all- just really focused and dialled in on the deal- plus I know that he's feeling the pressure of time. He's 73, and if he can only afford to run the car once or at most,twice a year, that really limits the number of opportunities he has left to try to make it happen. I told Tommy yesterday he's got to live to be 200 so he can build a couple of spare motors as backups. But really, if he's lucky and his health remains good enough for him to still do this into his late 70's, in real terms that means we only have 5 or 6 days at the track to make it happen, and with the car that means one shot per day. The pressure is really on. Thanks, Dean
Thanks for taking the time to check this out! It's been a steep learning curve for me to play my role on the crew. There used to be a guy that had actual nitro racing experience doing it and I was the guy doing the starter, but he and Tommy had a falling out. Because of that, I got "promoted" by default about a year ago. I'm still learning a lot every time we fire the car up, and it means a lot to me that Tommy trusts me with his car, so I work hard to try to deliver on Tommy's trust. In the pits it's not too bad, because we can kind of conference, but when we are on the track Tommy is in the car and can't see what's going on with the engine and has to concentrate on driving- so it puts the responsibility for the engine in my hands. It's kind of a heavy deal and there is some pressure. I don't want to be the guy that makes a bad choice and blows the engine up and total 45 years of Tommy's hard work. But I couldn't p*** up the opportunity because how often are you given the chance to play with a blown nitro dragster?
Dean-Not to take ANYTHING away from Tommy but has he ever thought of using a pro driver to pilot that monster? I can't imagine how bad he wants to get that one good p*** in, but for the Mother of all Nitro Cars to be your first ride,eek! The mans got way bigger balls than I do. I agree with Rocky, we gotta get you guys to Eagle Field. Even if he doesn't make a p*** it would be awesome to see (and hear) that ride. I'm sure we could all make it happen for Tommy.
Thats cool , got to love innovation . Just a shame NHRA doesnt like innovation didnt they ban most of those overhead cam multivalve engines a while back , its a shame . But that is a cool story and sounds like a cool guy . Im only 21 but am a big fan of hemi engines and have allways found the attempts at multi valve overhead cam hemis very interesting . I sure wish chrysler had gone ahead with the one they designed in the 60's . Anyway thats awesome , good luck with the project .
so whats happend with all the old castoff parts, things that didnt work, or hes updated,, ect???? if he started on the project in the 60s he should have a big pile of cool old parts, right??? if so do you got any pics????
Dean you are extremely lucky to be involved wioth such a great thinker and do-er like Tommy - I am truely jealous!!!! Tell Tommy that we're all pullin' for him!!!!! As for lettin' someone else drive - hmmmmnnn 40 years devotion to watch someone ELSE pilot the thing - I can't imagine how he could do it. There's so much to be learned & Tommy must be a true Zen Master of design and fabrication - as I said origionally - Awesome simply awesome!!!!! As far as Tommy's sucess - I think he's ALREADY won - everything else is gravy!!
Maybe I'm full of ****, but wouldn't it be cool if the average HAMB guy could become a mini-little sponsor for Tommy? Dean, maybe you can talk to Ryan about putting a "HAMB 4CAM" club/promotion together? Hell, maybe come up with tee-shirts of something for everybody that signs up . . . something like$30 - 50 to be in? I'm not rich, but I'd sure like to see him be able to make more p***es and I'd like to help pay for some of the expensive consumables that a nitro motor requires. If we could get 100 - 200 HAMBers in the gig, it might help him out. Anyway, give it a thought . . . and count me in for a few bucks if you can get something going! Dale
Thanks- I will ask Tommy about it and let you know. It just kind of depends upon where his head and wallet are at. He gives a pretty good explanation in the article/interview I posted a link to as to why he won't put someone else in the car but it's really: he doesn't want to be responsible for someone getting hurt, he feels as though he is the best one to get seat of the pants data regarding the motor by driving the car and someone else might not be able to tell him what he is looking to find out, and lastly if some hero driver marches the car to the top end, blows it up and then says "uh, sorry dude..." Tommy would pop a gizzard. He's too old to start over if someone obliterated the engine. I've thought about "Twin Cam Tommy" t-shirts to help raise funds but as I said earlier, I can do layout and design, but I'm not enough of a freehand artist to do that artwork. If someone wanted to do that and donate artwork for shirts, I could probably make it happen. I used to be in a band and we screened our own single color shirts, but if it calls for it, and I could sell the shirts at a profit to benefit Tommy, I'd have them commercially done. Regarding a garage full of old parts, nope. Sorry. Anything that was taken off and usable for an upgrade (i.e. the old Enderle injector hat was replaced by the new style carbon fiber injector) gets sold off to help defray the cost of the new-to him- parts. Stuff like that he buys used from current fuel teams. Thanks again for everyone's interest. I truly feel fortunate to not only be involved with Tommy's project, but to be able to call him my friend. Dean
Awesome stuff ! This story also reminded me of another long time Hemi project, that of the late Bill "Mad Man" Phillips. His project was a rotary valve setup. He spent many years on development and yes it ran, but never quite to it's potential. Tell Tom, we're all rooting for him, he's certainly a hero of the "little guy's" in drag racing. Here's some pics of the rotary valve hemi project, and yes, there were more than one of these engines.
I remember when the McGee quad cammer was the next big thing... http://www.mcgeecams.com/history.html Best wishes for your project.
That is very cool! How far did he get with it? Sadly, I worry that Tommy's project might suffer the same fate. We are running against time. When I first met him when I was 13 (I'm 42 now) it seemed like there was all the time in the world. But now the reality is that we've got maybe a half dozen more opportunities to get it done, ten chances, tops. As soon as he sneaks up on a baseline- at one point it was running great with one mag, a 65 GPM single stage fuel pump, a stock 6-71 and the Endlerle Bug Catcher- things get changed. In Tommy's mind, he wants to prove that the heads are the advantage, so he keeps up with the current T/F specs in order to isolate the heads performance-wise. But of course, that always introduces another set of curveballs to sort out. I'm not sure if many are aware of this, but a big part about what makes nitro so potent is that it carries its own oxygen molecule. With gasoline, it won't burn in liquid form. You have to mix it with oxygen by atomizing it in order for it to burn. Nitro is not like that. It will burn as a liquid. So in the history of drag racing the tug of war has been between creating horsepower and planting horsepower on the track. Racers early on made way more horsepower than the ch***is and tires of the day could handle. Once tires got better the new weak link was the clutch or the ch***is. Once they got that sorted out, they could make more horsepower, and the cycle begins again. But there are really two components to making nitro horsepower- how much fuel you can burn dictates how much fuel volume you can put in the motor (remember you don't need to atomize the stuff to burn it). When dual mags came in, the fuel pump volume they were using became inadequate. So they upped the fuel system to deliver more volume. Then the 44 amp mags came in, and you could deliver even more fuel because there was now the power to ignite even more of the stuff. So now on Tommy's engine there are air timers to control lean out, dual 44 amp mags, 88 GPM dual stage fuel pump, the current zooty carbon fiber injector hat (I'm not even sure who made it, but it came from Joe Amato's operation) and now that it's making even more power, we're finding new weak links that were previously plenty strong with the old setup- as witnessed by spinning the oil pump shaft clean off at the hit and wiping out the ****** yesterday. Tommy knows we can't change the car anymore- we've got to keep working with what we've got and just sort it out. Dean
Dean, As nice as silk screened shirts would be - just give Tommy a big fat sharpie and have him autograph any shirt - that'd be good enough for me!!!!!! Where do we send the money!
One of the common things ive read about previous nitro 4-valve attempts seems to be burning exhaust valves and seats . Have you guys had any similer problems .
So far, so good. Tom has to tear the heads down to deal with the oil pump situation- it's driven off the front of one of the cams, and I think he's going to check everything out, so I'll let you know if there are any issues.
Bill had many dyno pulls and a few p***es down the track, but was plagued by sealing problems along the rotary shafts. Not a huge problem but just one of those bugs he needed to work on. He was quite the innovator. Someone out there in total secrecy, hopefully has continued, the development of this concept.
Dean, Have you or Tommy seen Joe Schuebeck's (sp?) twin cam motor? I recall seeing a very small blurb on it in an article about his composite lifter endeavors. As I recall it was BIG displacement (900+ inches ???) and I think was aimed at unlimited drag boats - something like that. Anyways - I thought it might be interesting to you. I might be able to dig up the article, but am not sure if the contact info is any good as I seem to remember hearing something about the demise of his company (don't quote me on that). I guess I couldn't be any LESS precise - :-(
Hi all.... great story and he does sound like Burt Munro... I grew up with drag racing and did my time in a machine shop in the town where Burt Munro came from yea a tiny town in New Zealand. My old boss used to tell me many stories about him when i was a apprentice and we still had bits around the shop from some of his tests (that shop started in 1919) . He was a hero in my mind long before the movie made him famous. Tommy sounds just like Burt and i hope he also get the adulation's he well deserves as if it was not for these people our sports would not be half what they are.... GO TOMMY GO!!!
I just started reading about this, foind this thread on a google search. Did he make any runs in 2010? Way cool read!
Go Tommy Go!!!!! I was wondering if Tommy would set up a Pay pal account and give us the e-mail address. That way we could contribute to the funding without bothering him. Tommy would be the only one who knows the p***word and thus the only one that could take money out. Another suggestion. Go to Eagle Field and p***-the-hat. Burt was OK with that. There are thousands of us that would gladly throw 20 bucks toward a project like this. Thousands of twenties can go a long way. I know a little bit about what he is feeling. I started a project a bunch of years ago and then started going blind. I am in a race to finish. I, for one, would love to contribute without any strings. Tommy is the real deal. Here is wishing Tommy that 4 second p*** (1/4 mile, not 1000 feet). Thanks Don
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