Hot Rods How about some love for the T-Bucket?

Yup!... May he rest in peace....

 

End-of-the-HAMB-era example. Jim Grant's T from a story in Popular Hot Rodding about the Riverside Roadsters car club. Are they still around?

 

And...I only want people who don't already know the answer to try to speak up: Who can identify what's "unique" about Charles Miller's T (other than running injectors on a street roadster)?

 

I think I know! Does it have to do with ignition?

 

Could be...

 

More on the Miller T:

I have no idea how the Kaehni ignition works - I've not seen any in-depth articles about it, nor what "constant flow" means - but it made waves at the '66 Oakland show and had these brief features in all the magazines (this is from Popular Hot Rodding).

 

You know, I was working out in the driveway yesterday and heard something cool coming. I looked up just in time to get a glimpse of a dark green T bucket drive by. I've never seen that one. It had a short pickup bed, 5 spokes, short wheelbase, 1960s style-ish. I didn't see what it had for an engine, but I'd love to know if any local guys know of the one I'm talking about. Anyone?

 

Found another Miller T image on the hard drive - a horrible scan of a page torn from an old issue of Hot Rod that spent my Jr and Sr. High years stapled to my bedroom wall:

 

That one was always a head scratcher for me. Notice how the spark plugs appear to be up out of the recesses in the stock head. And note the five silver dohickeys (on the head bolts?).
Here’s a stock ‘56 322 head, note the deep recesses….

 

There was an article in Hot Rod about it, this is the only image I found. Evidently the system is constantly firing - think of a never-ending arc welder - and the plugs are placed into "pre-combustion chambers" that allow the compression to "flow" into the chamber and is then ignited by the constantly-fired plug, much like a diesel. The article says that ignition "timing" is changed by adding or subtracting spacers in the pre-combustion chamber.

 

what a score it would be to find an nos set-up. heck, even an intact used set-up. neat post, sir.

 

Since the ignition was already mentioned (didn't know about that! but did see it??) The brake and clutch master on the firewall is fairly uncommon and the molded front frame section around the radiator is darn near unique.

 

IIRC, from that article, or another from distant time past, one of the problems was rpm/power. It "came-on" w/in a fairly narrow rpm range, & as mentioned, the pre-combustion-chambers' volume had to be changed to alter the rpm "hit". Hard to do on-the-fly. Be interesting to see what could be done w/current technology. Almost worth it to spin heads, pop eyes, & see the whau-foahs mouths moving w/o sound... .
Marcus...

 

^^^^ Add to that the mechanical fuel injection and I’ll bet it never ran very well….

 

Does anybody remember this car? I'm almost certain, I saw this car at a speed shop in Yuma, Arizona about 1966-67.

 

That T is sweeeet

 

Just a basic T Bucket…but perfecto!

 

What’s not to like! Simple, Clean and I suspect fairly inexpensive to build and fun to drive.

 

Same car....maybe part of a magazine photo shoot? I've always thought it was a great example of a well-done and nicely proportioned T. I'm not much of a fan of the lantern lights or brass radiator, but I'd make room for it in my garage!

Lynn

 

while it looks fun, jumping in and out of mine is no longer an option, or at least a lot less graceful..

 

Mine has a door on the right. I am way to old to be jumping in and out.

 

Those photos were part of a photo shoot with this picture being the money shot.

I’m not good enough to find the photo with the photo bucket mark removed.

The car is parked in front of the first McDonalds located in San Bernardino.
I always thought this car looked street tough and just plain cool when I was a kid. I think the owner was in the Early Times car club.

I think Watson painted the flames.

 

It's okay Jim, it's in this thread and the bucket of ugly many times.

 

magic!