That's a beautiful racecar. I think you're right, the trajectory of innovation in USAC would have been different, but then again maybe not? Remember the NOVI, or the STP Turbine car? Innovative but not very successful. Hard to tell what coulda been.
Ryan, I think that if Vuky had won in '55 with the Epperly car, fenders would have been banned before the 1956 race. Typically, when an advance threatens to make the rest of the field obsolete, the threatened teams push to get that advance banned. Even though the turbine never won the 500, the teams lobbied for smaller inlet sizes more than once, effectively killing it as an option. In F1, look at the machinations behind the Brabham 'fan car' or the Lotus 'twin-ch***is' 88. The same is true for any number of innovations in MotoGP as well. As far as fender cars at Indy, given the handling issues other closed-wheel cars faced, they could have made safety the excuse for the ban.
All I know is that it was beautiful in person. Innovation? Effective? When you're standing by it getting down and seeing it from different angles who gives a ****. I place this in the never-get-tired-of-it catagory, right up there with GT40 and the like.
I forgot about the Merc airbrakes! Working with Tom Burkland and Robert Steele I have something similar in mind for the Salt car.
I was lucky to see that SUMAR recreation built over on gasoline alley by Denny Jamison. I guess that car ran without the body and finished 8th.
Holy Thread Resurrection Batman! Notice how much craftsmanship went into those old cars. If they were built today people would just use fibergl***. I love the panel work and other details seen in old construction techniques.
That's so crazy....Just imagine how the design of Indy cars could have advanced, if that car would have run, and dominated the field. CanAm cars come to mind. Open ****pit, wheels covered, cars.
Another absolutely beautiful car with that style body was the LeMans- oriented Jaguar Type D, gorgeous car with monocoque frame, disc brakes etc. The Daytona Coupe (the first one) did a stint on the 10-mile oval at Bonneville- I would have to dig deep in my old magazines for that article. IIRC it was for 24 hrs? IIRC it was also the one used in "Red Line 7000", and put in the ditch. That car was for sale in Sports Car Graphic for $10K for quite a while. I still have my Cox Chaparral 2E slot car with the wing that works, the little motor rotates and moves the wing up and down. Too bad I don't have the original box for that one. There were several test sessions at Indy with the USRRC and Can-Am Chaparrals over the years, including the outrageous (but ugly) 2J, with moving ground-effects skirts and vacuum with fans powered by a JLO snowmobile engine. I was lucky to see the 2J run for the first time in person, at the Watkins Glen Can-Am, in July 1970. It wet like stink as long as the ground effects were working- it was plagued by grenading engines, both the ZL1 main and the JLO on the fans
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