Tooling around the hard drive this morning and found this fantastic drag roadster featuring a 4-71 blown 283. It's all pretty standard affair for a early-to-mid-1960's drag car, but the chain drive set up is what really caught my attention. From what... <BR><BR>To read the rest of this blog entry from The Jalopy Journal, click here.
I used to see a lot of these in car mags back in the day. Like you stated, the looks of that really says it all. Serious and tough.
Before Gilmer belts, it was either chain or V belts to drive a blower. V belts were a pain in the *** because they had to be matched exactly, and chains robbed power and tended to leave the building at high rpm. Howard Johansen designed his belt drive with the enclosed case so it could run in oil making it more reliable. The Potvin crank driven set ups were popular because they were gear driven, did not slip, and were completely reliable.
Would it be cool looking to cover a 2" Gilmer belt with a cover like that. It would keep fingers happy!!!. Ago
Back in '99 I was helping a friend who was helping another friend clean out an old block garage with the roof caved in. My friend was trying to get a look at an old Harley. As we were shuffling things around I came upon a 6-71 blower case sticking out from a pile of leaves and corncobs. When I pulled on it, it popped out with a drive and intake manifold. After it was cleaned off we didcovered it had a double #40 chain drive. It was set up for 6 three bolt carbs. The carbs were gone and we found out that it fit a 325 Dodge hemi. It had some kind of an idler system held in with a very strong return spring. It was an iron manifold badly rusted. The blower did roll over. I wish I would have taken pictures of it, it was really a neat piece. I was gonna keep it on the shelf for a conversation piece but some guy from New York found out about it and bought it sight unseen. He called me later thanking me for the quick delivery. This was way before I even knew about this place. Never did hear what he did with it.
they are like hens teeth to find. had to find one for a fuel altered a friend was building (history car ) that had one on it , but it wasn't enclosed like the howards are . it was a dual chain driven and exposed… bet it was a messy time in the crowd if one let go , just think about it.
When I was first drag racing my 34 fourdoor at the Antique Nationals at Irwindale (late 70's) a guy by the name of 'Fritz' shows up with this old front-engined comp-coupe/digger looking thing of some sort - with a nasty *** chain driven motor in it. The chain was running under a flimsy chain guard that wouldn't hold back a Schwin if you were peddling fast and broke a link. He fired that thing up and scared the hell out of most everybody. Rumor was that Fritz dug it out of some old wrecking yard in San Pedro, got it started and hauled it to the drags. Was a beast - I was afraid to be anywhere around it. B&S Hey - just remembered I have a magazine that covered the races - ****py photo, but here yah go. Just so happens my first 34 Ford is in the picture below - 16 years old and having some fun. Wish I had that engine out of Fritz's car today - would be fun to run it!:
I have the Weiand made Chrysler blower manifold for use with Howard's chain drive. Wish I had the rest of it !
Gary Cagle chain driven 6-71 at Lions,somewhere between March & June of '59. Notice the stream of water behind the push bar.Back of the picture says "split cylinder wall". This same car had a chain driven 4-71 at the '59 March Meet.Top speed of the meet,,180.36. troy cagle
Obrien truckers sells the front cast piece. but as a wall hanger. you could use it and adapt to it. They are pretty cool.
Comparing what's done in those old blower chain drives to cam drives in modern engine design, if you did a chain-drive with serious on-road durability testing you'd come up with a double-row chain and a couple more guides to take the slop out and the thing would last longer without adjustment than the blower. Periodically I think about the idea of a Potvinesque front-mount but using a giubo - the kind of flex-disc drive used in BMW and similar driveshafts - instead of the chain coupler, with the disc flange machined/mated into a conventional crank-damper hub so you could retain the damper.
I remember seeing one of those chains come apart at a track in Nebraska....a lesson in physics.I think I'll stick to supercharging
My buddy Eli found this old ScoT Italmeccanica set up in a bucket. He put it all back together and ran it on a Merc flathead in a roadster pickup. It worked great Posted using the Full Custom H.A.M.B. App!
Why in the world would you want to run a belt in an enclosed case and in oil ? Wouldn't the oil make the belt slip and be bad for the rubber ?
A chain drive running in oil makes sense as that is what is on a lot of newer ohc setups but I'm with you on the belt slipping in oil.
having had this type of blower ( for product offloading ) on semis and having to deal with v belts and glimers , I would hate to deal with a chain unless it was a beltlink style, if it wasn't for the blower making its buzz I hate to hear how much noise they make too . but alignment issues would be less .
I had a 32 roadster about 20 years ago with a SBC and a 471 blower with a CRAGAR triple V belt drive. Anyway, I acquired one of the HOWARDS enclosed chain drives...Super neat looking piece but I never got to install it as with the thickness of the Howards housing it was going to move the water pump out too far for fan clearance (yes, it had a mechanical fan, it was a street car). Wound up selling the HOWARDS set up to a guy in Hartford City, Indiana (I'm sure some of you Hambers know him as he is a pretty big collector of nostalgia stuff) Roadster is gone, Howards set up is gone but I'm still running a 471 (different one,chromed with a Cragar 2 inch drive) in the Willys. NO PICTURE OF THE HOWARDS HOUSING BUT HAVE A ****PY PIC OF THE ROADSTER WITH V BELT DRIVE AND LARSON VALVE COVERS (still have covers)
Here is a Howard chain drive on a flathead in the early 60s Ken Crawford photo 5 v-belt Ken Crawford photo
A number of years ago I was at my long time racing friend Clayton Harris's funeral and there was a ton of racers there telling stories. One of them was telling me of a time in the late 60's racing with him. He had a old front engine dragster with a chain drive super charger on it. Well he goes on to say they were racing at night and near the finish line the chain broke and went up and just happened to cut the power lines to the track. When it cut the wires all the lights went out and sparks were flying all over the place. He goes, "Hell I thought he was killed for sure". They get down to the end of the track and sure enough there he's standing in the dark next to the car, he asks them what the **** happened to the light?!?! JC
Nick Cirino's Durfee Automotive blown Olds with Tom Beatty belt drive. Nick first ran the car unblown. When he built the blown motor he didn't have money for a blower injector, so he adapted the Hilborn port injectors to the top of the blower. This roadster won it's share of top eliminator trophies at the original San Gabriel drag strip in the late 50's. This shot is from the 1960 March Meet.
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