"Of course the name Watergate was quite famous back then for reasons unrelated to racing. Nice Chevelle you had there" Thanks! Yes, There were more than a few new-generation 'stock eliminator' cars that 'flew' out of the Watergate EXXON-related stable. Kenny Koonce and (I think) Leon M. both had "Debugged" scribed on their rides.
A supercharged 4-door H/T yet! Guess those blown 300/312 Fords were raced in just-about every body configuration made. I recall seeing a staging-lane(?) shot of a '57 retractable hardtop many years ago. With most of the folding steel-top mechanism located in the 'trunk,' it might have been (depending on the weight 'break') a good combo. Not an easy task campaigning those (supercharged) cars -- the ball bearings in the Paxton/McCullough blowers had a nasty habit of seizing up at high RPM, with the unfortunate result of 'wringing off' the crankshaft 'snout' right behind the multi-grooved crank pulley.
"They just might be the slowest V8-powered cars I've ever seen on the road. It would have taken more than a supercharger to make them competitive." Chuck, I certainly agree -- the 332/352 "big-block" engine was as 'lame' as its smaller 'Y' Block-series (239-to-312 cu in) 'little' brother, but the blower was only offered on the 'Y' Block (312) in '57. See *part of a lengthy Hemming piece below --> "The 1957 F-code Skyliner Ford clearly rolled the dice with the introduction of the first retractable hardtop on a mass-produced vehicle. The novel idea all but eliminated the negatives associated with a fabric top, but in the same breath, pretty well eliminated the normally vast trunk space. Surely, it would take a certain kind of buyer to purchase a Skyliner--one such customer was George Chaltin of Bellwood, Illinois. Chaltin had been present for the action at the 1957 Daytona races and left impressed by the performance of the new supercharged Fords. Before going home, he tried to score a blown fixed-roof Fairlane 500 from a Daytona-area Ford dealer, but didn't make the deal. The failed impulse buy turned out to be a good thing, however, as Chaltin subsequently attended the Chicago Auto Show, where the new retractable Ford was front and center. Watching the top go up and down all day long convinced him that the ultimate combination would be a supercharged Skyliner, which he ordered from Courtesy Motor Sales. As it turned out, Chaltin was one of just a handful of customers nationwide to order an F-code Skyliner, and was perhaps the only one to order it specifically for drag racing. On the surface, one would think the heavier Skyliner would be at a disadvantage in straight-line time trials, but the extra heft actually slid the Ford one class lower into D/Stock, where Chaltin did very well against a variety of mostly GM competition. By 1961, Chaltin was a highly competitive racer and won the D/Stock title at the 1961 NHRA Nationals at Indianapolis--an event that drew the likes of a big-name stock class racers Arnie Beswick, Hayden Profitt and Dyno Don Nicholson. Chaltin's victorious 14.54 seconds at 95.14 mph may seem slower than you'd think, but mid-14s for a 2-ton Ford with limited modifications was impressive in the day. At the time, the Skyliner sported a column-shifted three-speed manual, which Chaltin later swapped for a Ford-O-Matic when the racing days were over. The latter came from a Fairlane Chaltin owned at the same time, so the conversion is complete down to the power brake pedal, which subsequent owners left in place. Stubbs seems inclined to live with the status quo for now as, while the lazy-shifting automatic leaves much to be desired, three-on-the-tree isn't exactly the cat's meow either. Such was the state of the 1957 Fords. Even though the supercharged 312 was a one-year wonder, no doubt helped by NASCAR's April 1957 ban on fuel injection, superchargers and multiple carburetors, Ford's retractable hardtop continued through 1959. We never fail to marvel how that exotic roof operated, which can still be considered true engineering even today. The retractable includes more than 600 feet of wire, three drive motors and a plethora of switches and solenoids, all of which proved relatively reliable. While today's new retractable hardtops benefit from far more advanced technology, designing such a piece is still no easy feat. Ford's budget for the project back in 1957 was reported to be more than $2 million, though with nearly 50,000 units sold throughout the three years the car was built, we suppose the effort was deemed a reasonable success. As opposed to today's automotive offerings, when high-performance engines rarely cross over from one model to another, it was a different story for much of the '50s and '60s. Ford's 1957 supercharged 312 is a perfect example, offered throughout the company's varied lineup from Skyliner to Sunliner, Ranchero and Ranch Wagon. As we found with other cars in the Stubbs' collection, such cars often had different characters and purpose, yet find common ground in a race-inspired powerplant unlike anything of its era. While racing success was short-lived due to sanctioning body edicts, the Stubbs are helping assure that these 1957 Fords are preserved and remembered for the long haul." *Read the entire article here --> http://www.hemmings.com/mus/stories/2006/04/01/hmn_feature8.html
The Jalopy Journal
