A little sidetrack, here, but dang, that seat stitching is so cool. Now everything is done with cost-saving in mind. A seat cover, these days, might have some big squares or some machine-made pleated material. Not many probably noticed a detail like this because it was the norm.
I have gone through every page of this thread and did not find one photo of Jerry Gwynn's "Baby Huey" AA/A out of NHRA's Division II. I'm going to correct that "situation". (photo is mine taken at Indy, I think.)
Sorry loudbang, I guess I sure did. (Maybe my eyes became"altered" after looking for so long.) I knew you'd have some if anyone did! Thanks.
The problem is that the Fuel Altered class now is basically the same as funny cars with a different body. The days of The short cars are gone . We have great memories of Pure Hell (the original Short WB), Pure Heaven, Winged Express, Panic, Pisano/Matsubura and the excitement of the drivers has passed. No disrespect to anyone, just an opinion.
that may be true but when you see a 5 second altered go down the track it still gets you excited. at least it does me.
Pure Heaven, the Winged Express, Rat Trap, Nanook and Bradford's Fiat are still running in pretty much their original short wheelbase configuration and the current Pure Hell certainly is nowhere near what I would call long wheelbase. Sullivan's second generation version of his Fiat is a little longer but still almost a foot shorter than a funny car chassis as is Hall's Tramp. And none of these cars have a big wing hung way out front either. Roo
Just to clarify, you make a very good point. The difference I was making was modern fuel altered not older/nostalgia fuel cars. Pure Heaven ll and lll had wheelbases in the under 100 inch area . Pure Heaven V is way longer (125) and has a Camaro body also. Pure Hell is 112", certainly longer than Dale drove but not a funny car chassis. That's why I added no disrespect intended. We all know that Mike Boyd, Howard Haight can drive anything extremely well.
One issue I see with short AA/FA cars today is today's typical track prep. Sticky tracks and high CG cars are a toxic combination and a short nostalgic AA/FA with a six-foot wheelie bar hanging isn't - well - nostalgic. I once saw Don Garlits make an exhibition run on one of his old cars (Swamp Rat III ???). He staged the car 3" off the outside edge of the lane, well outside of the glued in groove, and smoked the tires nearly the length of the track, still 3" off the outside edge. That man can drive. [I know. That's no news flash.]
Randy Bradford, Dave Hough, Ron Hope, Mike Boyd, Jeremy Sullivan etc have all run on well prepared tracks (specifically Bakersfield and Bowling Green at the Reunion events) and do it without any more than period correct short wheelie bars. Both the Sullivan Fiat and Guasco's Pure Hell are capable of five second runs and Bradford has been 6.0 (at near 230 mph). Admittedly the Sullivan car is a low rider but that is how it was back in the day when Mike campaigned the original version. As for Garlits, I saw him do the same thing at a nostalgia event at KCIR. He initially attempted to make a pass in the groove but when the car bogged he stepped off and made a U turn to get back to the start line. I ended up pulling the car back when he was unable to complete the second U in the narrower space behind the start line. As in the run that you saw he staged about as close to the outer stripe as possible and blazed the tires to about 1000 feet. Roo
roo, Point taken. I guess I forgot that with slider clutches and today's converter technology you can dial in the harshness of the hit to suit. And probably eliminate all of that annoying tire smoke. Just out of curiosity do you know which of the cars you mentioned use clutches vs converters?
We ran at the Super Stock Reunion races in VA in the mid to late 90's. Garlits ran his exhibition passes on the 1 lane return road/service road between the racing surface and the grandstands. Very smoky and entertaining. Now back to the altereds...
It ran in 1958....with a little engine set back....the orginal 195AH.....Don Argee - driver - Lawrence Brocchini -builder
A is a big engine, H is for "Hot Roadster" Which was a fuel roadster. Gas burning roadsters would have been A/R
The Jalopy Journal
