History Ramchargers/Chrysler History

No, but I had a friend whose wife used to run in those Mobil (?) economy runs. He told me how she would use the vacuum wipers all the time to lean out the engine.

 

Nope. We almost had an early Mopar for the club car. The deal was almost finished when somebody let it slip that we were going to use it for dragracing.

 

Other engineers at Chrysler started the fifties testing of tuned induction systems. A part of their work ended in the H&M. The manifold was intended only for dyno testing, and, believe it or not, it was only soft soldered. Fortunately, this was remedied before the Nationals. Tuned manifolding has been around "forever." Unfortunately, some "tuning" occurred by accident. I remember a Peugeot engineer was asked about a "lump" in an intake manifold. All he could say was that it ran better with the lump. Consider the Hillborn stacks on the early Offies. Unfortunately for the owners, stacks long enough to catch the next harmonic would have given them some more power. For more information, see my comments on the Jaguar testing.

 

Thanks Bill for enlightening us with this history....!

 

https://www.hotrod.com/articles/hrdp-9907-ram-tuning-guide/
This is the link to the Hot Rod article written by the tech editor, Steve Magnante. Steve did an excellent job of putting my thoughts together. I had to go back and reread it to make sure my memories were correct.

 

Man! Such a huge chunk of history! It's truly humbling for you to share.

Just whose idea, and who chopped the top on "High and Mighty"?
(I used to love the "Altereds". Who could have imagined that they could parlay into Mega-Corporation profiture?
And "C" class, at that! Totally off the chain!.)



Thank you for posting, and to quote Red Skelton, "May God Bless."

 

Those megaphones are wild....

 

I'm a huge fan of your guys work. Specifically harmonic length calculations for wave tuning. I use it on a daily basis and seen how important it is during dyno testing. A few examples I'd like to share with you.....

Our Engine Masters Challenge effort from 2010-2012
Intake tract length of around 22" to catch the 1st wave


The second and more recent effort (Engine Masters Challenge 2017) of ours, this one I know you will appreciate.


Better to see it in live action. I'm catching the 2nd wave for torque and the 3rd for horsepower. Travel distance was 3-3/8" to accomplish this. Interesting thing was we kept the engine at peak torque the rest of the time once it got there.

So thank you for all of the effort figuring this stuff out years ago. Extremely important still to this day! Would love to hear anymore input on the subject or stories pertaining to wave tuning.

 

40 2BOSSMAN

WOW WOW wow wow... ... The sound of my amazement resonating

 

If you like that sound then you will like this even more. This is @Dog_Patch Tony's Quick N Dirty Southeast Gasser Hemi that I had a big part of in action. Gotta love those Injected Early Hemis!

 

A hemi connected to a four speed too, don't get any better than that.
Tony is a cool dude!

 

I want to hear all of it.

 

I'll just sit here at the back of the class, and hope I catch enough to pass the final!
Thank you very much for sharing!

Full Kustom drunk mobile posting

 

Congratulations on your efforts, which are obviously contributing to the sport. Keep in mind that you want to minimize energy losses that accompany changes in flow area. For this reason, "trumpets" or "bell mouths" should always be used. I don't know what you mean by "1st wave." Generally speaking, you'll always be concerned with that which is called the "third harmonic," which means 12 front reversals during the time when the intake valve is closed. I would consider it essential to fully understand "water hammer." Hunter Rouse, in any of his textbooks, explains water hammer thoroughly. Steve Magnante's "Hot Rod" article on "Ramming the Rat" is very good. I'm strongly considering doing a YouTube article, perhaps using Barnes Daniel's engine picture as I do a voice-over. As a bit of History, Chrysler...and much of Detroit...was pretty well confused by a book by Phillips, which tried to correlate tuned manifold effects with the occurrence of sound waves. This sort of thing even became a part of Chrysler advertising. Sound waves, by definition, have infinitesimal pressure differences, meaning they cannot begin to explain the effects of tuned manifolding.

 

Can't recall seeing that first picture before. That's Barnes Daniels next to the manifold, with Maurie Leising beside him. Haven't been able to make contact with Barnes recently, but Maurie is very active. Before I forget, that's Dwight Kanupp in front of the car. He always wore white bucks, which were popular at the time. Dwight did a lot of sports car racing, as I understand. That's Skip McCulley (Sp?) next to Maurie. He later went to work for Pontiac. He was our camshaft expert, advising us to use the C300D cam at the '59 Nationals (top class speed; not bad for a stock cam). Later, a roller was installed. In front of Skip is Pete McNichol, who had a zillion NHRA records, all with the slant six. He would have also had the C/D records, but he mistakenly installed his air cleaner backwards. He worked in the department where they put together the prototypes. He had a Thunderbird with a hemi and it certainly appeared to have been delivered that way. That's Dick Burke next to Skip. He visited me when I was in California and, through my contact with Steve Magnante, was in a Hot Rod article on tuned manifolding. He was in charge of the suspension group for the H&M. I believe that's Jack McPherson on the far right. Much of the work on the H&M was done in his garage. Surprisingly, he remained married. As I recall, he was one of the early drivers of the H&M.

 

I have a Max Wedge intake on the 426 in my coupe. As far as I know it has had the inter-connection done inside. Did this really help? And if so, where? Bottom end...top end or no end? And who in Michigan was doing it for Chrysler? Thanks, Gene.

 

I think you're referring to the long ram intake manifold where the inner runner partition has been reduced in length. George Wallace tried to convince those in engine design that the ram manifold, as produced, did nothing for performance. The runners were too long. The ram manifold car felt much stronger in normal street driving. Somebody arranged for a "drag race" at the Proving Grounds between a car with the "old fashioned" dual quads and one with the ram manifold dual quads. The "old fashioned" car won easily. This kind of "screwup" occurred because the Engine Design group had much more clout than the Performance Laboratory (George Wallace). (I think it was called the Performance Laboratory. I could be wrong.)

 

In the mid fifties, just before the large "bed" with hydraulic force actuators came into play at all the Proving Grounds, a group of Chevrolet engineers developed a means of applying d'Alembert's Principle to the suspension testing of automobiles. They tethered a car to the side of a large vehicle (a bus, as I recall) and then, at a very low speed, steered the car away from the bus. This simulated the situation when the car was cornering at high speed. It follows that, with an application at 90 degrees, the rear suspension linkage could be evaluated at a high G launch acceleration without the need of starting the engine.

 

For the '59 Nationals, we had ordered 12.5:1 pistons from Jahns. Either Jahns or the Ramcharger that ordered them got it wrong. They were more like 10:1.

 

I'm getting confused. I never really got all the production names straight. We usually talked "short ram" or "long ram" and we understood each other. Perhaps I can find some pictures, so that we can be on the same page.

 

OK, this is the original long branch manifold and, as I've inferred, it was worthless for racing. The car felt strong, but a conventional dual quad manifold car would "run away and hide," as the saying goes. This manifold gained the upper hand, however, when it was modified by removing part of the inner partition near the plenum.

 

This was an excellent performance manifold and required no modification. (The Hyperpack manifold for the slant six was also an excellent manifold and required no modification.)

 

That's it...the short ram! But mine has been modified. I think the Chrysler high performance manuals told you to. Mancini had someone doing it. However, no one there now knows who or what they did. And I am not sure why it was done. Away for a while, when I get back to where the car is, I will post a picture. Gene.

 

Yes, the factory made "short long ram" intake manifolds for the higher HP, solid-cammed 413s in '60 and '61. That definitely made it more confusing. It's pretty easy to see where the factory removed the split for high-rpm performance when compared to a standard long-ram intake.





You asked if we have any questions, so here goes!

Dodge did a lot of weird stuff with the rollout of the D-500 program in 1956. When first announced, it was a full engine, exhaust, suspension, and brake package only available on 2-dr hardtops. Then it became only an engine option, and was soon available on any Dodge model and body style. Then later that year came the '56 "Dash One" D-500-1 which was more or less the original concept with the big engine, stiff suspension, and big brakes. Can you shed any insight on why the '56 D-500 rollout was so strange?

You touched on the D-501 Dodges of 1957. Do you have any background on that project? Was there any specific reasoning for using the heavier low-deck Chrysler engine instead of a racier version of the tall-deck Dodge Hemi? I understand the '57 D-501 engines were dual quad 354 Chryslers, which on the surface seem to be the same as the '56 300B engines - but nearly all of the internal components were different (heads, cam, pistons). Were you involved in any of that engineering effort? Any input on why Chrysler dropped their factory support for Nascar, but still went ahead with building all the D-501s as street cars?

Finally, the Bendix Electrojector debacle of 1958. Did you ever work on any of that engineering effort? Did you see any of those cars around Chrysler or on the road?

Thank you for sharing all this Chrysler and Ramchargers history with us!

 

Yes, I'd like to know more about this. Never talked to Dan about it.

 

I knew about the D501 before I started at Chrysler in '57. I saw Arnie Beswick and his D501 at Cordova. (Later, Arnie drove the Passionate Ponchos.) As for the engine choice, I would assume that it was the easiest and cheapest way to gain the performance they wanted. In '57 and '58, I was working on my Masters from the Chrysler Institute of Engineering. Incidentally, I would strongly recommend that CIE program for those engineering students who have maintained a good academic record.

 

Was just reminded of another bit of trivia. This shows, once again, that I've always been about 5 years too late. I received a patent on a fuel pump while I was a student at the Chrysler Institute. The pump had an annular diaphragm with the actuating rod passing through a hollow screw at the center of the diaphragm. Good idea, but about 5 years too late. When I was working in the Advanced Development group at AC Spark Plug, a department head came storming in with "smoke coming out of his ears." Evidently, someone there had come up with the same idea, but, in their research, found that "some guy in Advanced Development" held the patent for Chrysler. Turns out the guy from the design department wasn't all that upset and he left with us joking about it.

 

I do have another question...how did the "J" converter come to be? And what plays more in selecting the correct converter...weight, engine torque, gear ratio or all the above? Guess that's two questions. Gene.

 

Man I love hearing this stuff since I retired from Chrysler and always loved the ramchargers but I was there after their run. I still remember there was a 426 hemi on an engine stand outside the VP of engineering office. One reason I have a 63 dodge is seeing the 63's run at Detroit Dragway .