History Finally Coming Home.

We left Houston MS 5:45 pm Friday. Drove all the way through to Denver Co ( Lochbuie ) and arrived at 12:45. Loaded up the Lost Boy and headed back. I was singing a Bob Seger song ( Get out of Denver). I finally decided to stop in Goodland Kansas and get a room at Comfort Inn. We were wiped out mentally.
We are up this am and getting ready to head home.

 

Looks good but I'm sure mama wasn't happy about it loaded in her daily driver.

 

Now that’s a road trip! In a super charged mid engine v8 van no less!

shots of how you strapped it down?

 

Looks as if seat belt anchors were put to use on a firm base board I presume, getting it in the cargo area would be a trip in itself.

 

V8? That's a Stovebolt Six.

 

To my loving wife: Could you take the old car to work today? On my day off today, I need to do some maintenance on your family cruiser today, since I am at home today anyway. Just hoping that she does not smell old engine oil aroma inside her family cruiser, when she goes to work the next day in her ride.

 

Well Shit you’re right! Inliner it is!

 

50 miles out of Little Rock. Would you believe she volentold me to take it. Cherry picker put it right onto the pallet I made. Less than 45 min turn around. And yes the seat anchors are wonderful. Should be back home by 11:00pm.
I’ll fill in the whole story after a day to recover. Just turned driving over to my wonderful son who volunteered. My ass is cramping.

 

Home. Walked in at 11:30pm. Going to bed. Give me a day and I’ll explain the whole deal.

 

"Hey, buddy! I gotta make this road trip to Denver, you want to ride along?" And your son says, "Sure, Dad! I'm up for it". Just doesn't get any better than that. Glad you got it done and are home safe.

 

Rollin' past the horizon is the Best. N.,S.,E.,West.

 

Ok. So here it goes. And I am going to break it into a few sections so it makes more sense I hope.
2002 comes around and Mick and I had built a new FED to replace my altered. It had a 250 built with what I had and a few parts that I had traded a core 454bbc for. It was decent but far from exotic. It ran 7.30 in the 1/8 and stacked number like clock work. I saw a video of a red 64 ish Chevy II and was blown. And I have always liked different. So I decided if they can I can.
I had several intakes. A couple of Clifford’s. an Offy .a stock one cut and welded for 4 bbl ( cast iron Offy basically) and a manifold that looked identical to the Clifford but had Batten cast in it. And instead of a Holley flange had a flange for the 4 jet Rochester ( small 4 bbl. ). So I decided to use the Batten as the sacrificial lamb.
A week later I bought a 144 sbf blower set up from Joey Donaldson after he had installed it on his mule and promptly blew it up. Manifold was sold and I kept everything else.
I bolted the intake to the head and bolted it to the mill table. I took the manifold to blower gasket and made a pattern on 1 inch aluminum plate. My mill is old school. And ten times more capable than the operator (me). Used ply wood first then transferred to the aluminum. After I milled the carb box out and opened up the area until the plate set in and lined up parallel and square.
At this time I was not very good at tig welding and (used a string I had ) and this all got slipped in an industrial welding lab one night and I begged and bartered the best welder at this lab to do the final step. ( I later learned I asked him to do a very hard thing. Welding cast to plate aluminum. ) once home I used the gasket to drill the 4 holes and tapped them. Damn it even looked like I knew what I was doing.

 

Step two. Getting the drive belts etc to line up was damn near pure luck but it worked. Both times. The first blower snout is super long because the sbf has to clear distributor and all accesories. So the first attempt was using a racing balancer redrill bottom spacer and pulleys to that. And used my mule motor from the previous naturally aspirated engine changing nothing not even the headers. I cut one idler ( spring loaded) off and got a ten ribbed deep serpentine belt from a Massey Combine by part number and put it together. Made exactly 4 passes and the bottom blower pulley and balancer went flying into the fence at Byhalia MS track just outside of Memphis on old hwy 72. I have a few photos here and I’ll explain the fix to this problem and what it also caused latter. Also notice than this blower had the ten rib belt.

 

cool

 

Wow that is quite a road trip for a short period of time 1200 or so miles each way and 18 hours at legit speeds any route you take. That Two Fiddy looks like it will be a runner though.

 

Even a tiered old grumpy Ford guy saw that…
Cool parts!

 

Ok step 3.
We have all heard the rumor /lie depending on who you talk to /and then you hear the engineers view on harmonics on a straight six.
So after asking everyone in the country that’s supposed to know a fellow from Inlinners named Blecha with a ford Tanus race car with a blown jimmy gave me insight and told me how. I was skeptical but had tried everything else so what did I have to lose.
Double key crank /buy a BDS sbc blower hub shorten 3/8 of an inch crank gear side. Install ( no balancer of any kind. ) Take Christmas felt( Red from wife's sewing stuff) and put a thin layer between flywheel and crank flange. Thread locker and torque to spec. After that it never broke anything /or hurt a bottom end again. Blecha told me the blower belt was the balancer now. I repeat it never hurt anything bottom end again. Even at 7k rpm which with 5:57 gear for 1/8 mile. I also had to ditch the bottom lower spacer so I did some checking. The blower snout for the 177 on the bbc is exactly shorter by the length of the bottom spacer I just ditched. Marion Fairchild ordered it for me and 3 days later all was fixed.
Notic that there is no balancer and the B &M spacer on bottom is gone. Also notice that unlike everyone else’s version including ( Aussie speeds version) the sbf blower put the drive almost right over the centerline. Perfect.

 

When a real purpose built blower motor was in order as always Marion Fairchild did all the machine work. Bottom end was simple. Stock crank /rods ( arp bolts) oil pump etc. The pistons were 307 forged flattops 30 over. By design Marion ordered ten for (4 spares) spares in case I ever hurt it. I still have those spares. Never hurt it. Main and head studs. SCE copper head gasket. The cam was Jack Engle’s Brain child and yes him personally. He told me he wanted to know every detail and don’t lie. He cut a specific blower cam for the set up. And it was nuts on the specs but wow it was night and day from the other. Head work was 1.94/1.6 exhaust. Six guys will know why you don’t go bigger. I used a pattern for unshrowding the chamber that Sissle used. That’s also where I got a bought lesson in cc’ing chambers and making them match. Harland sharp rockers and the springs that Jack sent me.
I had 38 or 39 hours in that head when I got through. And Marion flowed everything I did every time I made new mod or next step porting. I did not remover the divider my thought was with the weight of the blower even with the under brace it might break. We did not lump port it. I figured the blower would take care of that and for the most part it did. I also built zoomie headers. Very simple DUI ignition with recommended curve as Marion specified. Sorry I just had to have them. I cut them off when I shipped it to CO when I sold it. It is still that way and the tips are being shipped to me as are the other small pieces. ( water pump drive /tops and data folder.

 

From 04-07 it never hurt a part again. Ran consistent mid low 10s and was a winner.
Won 05 Reunion at BG. And did a runner up in 06. This was also on plain premium pump gas. With an additive or two.
About this time Micky and I had built a new FED 417 Donovan powered. Molly car with no expense spared. We were taking a leap and as much as we learned I wish in hind sight I had done some things differently. It was a monster and ate cash like air. Nothing like my other one. So I decided to sell the blown rail. I learned never however to sell turn key. That’s another story also. So the car went to Little Rock /then last I knew it was on the west coast with an off topic engine. It’s stupid fast but it is still off topic for here.
The engine as in the one I have come to call Lost Boy was sold here in the Hamb in 09 to a retired veteran in Denver CO. And I had to cut the zoomies off to pack in crate etc.
I always regretted selling it. But like most racing operations you sell off to move up to the next level. I sent all spares /and the data folder. I didn’t figure I would ever see it again.

 

The under roof shot is the last time the car was together. We had a lot of fun that day. We had actually put it over on methanol for a short period. Converted back to gas for the last two races of the season. A week later it was going to all corners of the earth.

 

I About 9 months ago I get a phone call out of no where. I don’t usually answer anything /one if I don’t recognize them. But for what ever reason I did. A man names Paul Martinez from the Denver area introduced himself started to ask if I had knowledge of a blown six. And I finally asked how he got the number. He was reading the data folder and found it.
Along with all the questions I am still kinda in shock. He tells me that the person I sold it to had passed. Never finished the project ( I think 55 with a dougnash. ) and he now owned it.
We talked a little while and I was in so much shock that I didn’t come accross as really interested. But I did thank him for contacting me and the more I thought about it the more I wished I had. A couple of months pass and I contact him. He is in the middle of moving to Idaho if I remember correct. And while doing so some piece of trash breaks into his shop and steals a ton of stuff. This engine being one of them. To add to dumb thug news the piece of SXXX puts it on markets place for sale.
I’ll say this Paul is a smarter and better person than me. He makes contact and bring in the authorities and they raid the place and he gets his stuff back. And the blower engine. He leaves it at a friends barn outside of Denver ( Lochbuie) and when I called back I asked if he would sell. And he said yes. I was like the little boy on the RATT video to the song LAY IT DOWN. You just gotta see it to understand.
The problem was neither Paul nor myself could get anyone to ship and pick up etc.
Finally I asked what If I come get it. He even lowered the price if I would. So I planned and my son and I left 5:45 pm this past Friday. Drove all night and arrived at Bobs shop ( where Paul stored it) at 12:30 Saturday. ( Lochbuie) and loaded and headed back out by 12:45 pm. Stopped back in Goodland KS ( 12 miles over state line ) and got a room at comfort inn and we crashed. Got up at 8:05 am central time( Sunday) /was 75 their time and headed back. Drove through the wind and rain and got home last night at 11:30 Sunday. My son says either corn or the wind turbine is the state tree in Kansas. Some of you have asked for photos of how we loaded and secured everything. Here you go.

 

So once again I am humbled and reminded of how the Good Lord has smiled upon me.
I will call this engine Lost Boy.
I have it home and secure. I need to check a few things. Weld the zoomie tips that I cut off in 08 back on and run it in. I have no plan to put it in anything at this time. I still have a set of aluminum rods that I never put in. Mick and Wess keep telling me it will fit in the Prefect but I already have that set up for hilborn sbc. I do however want to try and convert that small cal custom scoop ( air cleaner) to a real deal functioning fuel injection hat. Just a thought. And maybe methanol and ditch the radiator all together. I never dreamed I would ever see it again. I really didn’t want to let it go back then but such is the nature of racing /and or this hobbie when we think we need to go to the next step.
There is one question. 10 or so miles over the state line from Kansas into Colorado is a strange abandoned building on the side of I 70. A didn’t get a picture- hard to do driving 75-80 with a typical 20 mph cross wind. It has what looked like a look out tower. Was very old. I’d love to know what it was.

 

Do you remember if the lookout tower was on the north or south side of I-70 before you stopped in Goodland? I've done a satellite and street side search of both sides from Burlington, CO to the state line and on to Goodland KS at a 500-foot scale and haven't seen the tower yet.

 

It was on t he north side heading toward Denver. It was all wood or looked to be. But it was so weird. And thanks for looking. One day when I am not flying 80 plus down the I state it’s one of those things I’d like to revisit.

 

Cool engine, you must be happy to have it back.

 

It was a dirt/gravel drive way up hill about 30 yards. The yard if you call it that was fenced around also.

 

Yes I am. It was the combination that everyone said wouldn’t work. Wouldn’t live. Would be competitive. Wouldn't get finished. There were highs and lows but possibly the one engine that I am most proud of. Make no mistake. Even my own machinist ( Marion Fairchild had doubts) and told me a sbc or bbc or anything would be easier. But he Loved different and between him and Bleecha we figured it out. Again we have left the main scene for one reason or another - haven’t been back for a while. We’ve built several and yes there is intention to come back to the track with a vengeance. But make no mistake time has been our friend. Funny how as I get older Time ( which I was always afraid would run out) has been the kind preserver of many things that I love.

 

World wonder View Tower Genoa. From my angle of the hwy I would have said about an 1/8 off of the hwy /drive way and all but I am almost certain this was it. What I did notice is that several state hwys ran parallel with I 70. Pretty much the whole way in both Kansas and Colorado. Maybe a road trip in the 57 one day. Just not 2400 miles in 32 hours. Lol

 

Very cool. The pic is what it looks like from your car. Glad you found it

 

Yep. A great number of the county roads were gravel/ dirt. Grew up on a lot of those. Lol