Indholdsfortegnelse for December 1973 i Hot Rod

“That’s not the way to start a race, but it sure is the way to finish," said Buddy Baker. “I was in the middle of everything. If somebody had told me halfway through that I was gonna win by four laps I would have almost had to bet against myself." Baker had just driven the K&K Insurance Dodge, prepared by outspoken Harry Hyde, to a seemingly uncontested $5250 win in the Nashville (Tennessee) 420 at Fairground Speedway. “Might not be the Daytona 500 but I’ll take it," said Baker, the six-foot-five, 225-pound Charlotte, North Carolina, driver whose only other victory of the year came in his hometown’s World 600 in May. “I’ll have to admit that I wasn’t overly confident when we qualified seventh fastest … but things just kept…

Letters for publication should be sent to Post Entry, Hot Rod Magazine, 8490 Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles, California 90069. Letters are subject to editing. ’NOTHER TRUCKER After reading your August issue on trucks and vans, I got all excited and went looking for a panel truck. After checking for a Chevy, Ford and Dodge in decent shape. I came across a 1960 International panel in real nice shape for $75. Now I realize what a big mistake it was. The huge International V8 (displacement unknown) isn’t what you’d call a hot rodder’s dream. I plan to make a neat but practical street machine, and since there is no such thing as speed equipment for this engine, what popular engine, trans and rear will tit easily? Is there a company selling…

You’ve no doubt heard rumblings of Chevy’s messing about with a rotary-powered Corvette for future production. Well, here before your eyes are two different Wankel rotary-powered Corvettes that GM Styling built. They are living, breathing, running automobiles, not plywood mock-ups covered with stylist’s clay. One has a twin-rotor “Vega-type” Wankel (similar to the limited-production Vega rotary slated for 1975 release), while the other has two twin-rotor engines coupled together. Chevrolet refers to them as experimental vehicles, and spokesmen are adamant that these cars do not necessarily represent any future production vehicles. Of course you will recall that past Corvette show cars have mysteriously appeared on the old production lines in recent years, but then Chevrolet wouldn’t go and do that to us again, would they? While other magazines would have…

Don Garlits’ long-dormant streamliner finally emerged from his Seffner, Florida, hideaway to make its first public appearance. The occasion was AHRA’s Grand American race at its newly acquired facility, Orange County International Raceway in Southern California. It was their first big effort at the prestigious track. Neither debut was impressive. The streamliner had been completed in Florida and shipped to California—without testing—and the odds that it would run hard were slim. Flowever, it was heartening to advocates of streamlining, the car’s builder “Jocko" Johnson among them, that Garlits had finally finished the car. It had been sitting on sawhorses for more than a year and it had seemed that Garlits had lost interest. Further speculation had it that his interest had been renewed by the drubbing that the “Old Man"…

On the cover of our October issue, we blurbed a van interior for under $200. And in that issue, we completed half of it (the floor and paneling) for $102.32. This month, we’ll show how to complete the job by using the remaining $97.68 for carpeting. Actually, the cost is going to vary, depending on the quality and availability of the carpet you choose. In the case of our GMC project van. depicted here, we purchased a brand-new 9x 12-foot piece of multicolored shag carpeting and padding for $76.50. But if you shop around and do a little bargaining, you can pick up a closed-out pattern or remnant for considerably less. By the way. shag carpeting is recommended because its deep pile does a great job of hiding the seams…

The racing colors in NASCAR’s Late Model Sportsman division are brown and gray. This isn’t by custom as, for instance, England’s racing green is. It is by the nature of the competition, for brown and gray are the colors of primer. When a fender is ripped off, it is replaced by a brown one or a gray one, and in the Sportsman division fenders are ripped off as frequently as tape decks are ripped off in city parking lots. The meticulous sheetmetal artist of winter has surrendered to the burdened competition of summer. Preparation time between races is short. It is devoted to engines and chassis, not paint jobs. At Birmingham (Alabama) International Raceway on this particular late summer night, gray left-front and right-rear fenders on Red Farmer’s once-immaculate white-and-gold…

Letters selected for Shop Talk will be answered in this monthly column only. Do not send stamped, self-addressed envelopes with your question; it is impossible to send out personal replies to your questions. NO PLACE LIKE OHM I am just learning about cars and what makes them work. One of the things that I have a problem understanding is what electricity is all about. Is there some simple explanation of electricity that a beginner can understand? Robert PurdyOakland. California Try imagining that the insulation surrounding a length of copper wire is a section of water pipe. Let’s also assume that the copper wire inside this insulation (water pipe) is water instead of copper. You can compare a wet-cell storage battery to a water pump which provides force in moving the…

A trio of rides worth babbling about. Last month’s editorial wound down with the project rod in Tulsa and me grumbling in typical poor loser fashion. The 750-mile sprint from Tulsa to Hammond. Indiana, was accomplished on Sunday under escort of Jersey rodders Don Biglow and Pete Van Iderstine (they couldn’t believe the little Vega four could cruise at 80 mph with ease on the Will Rogers Turnpike). The rod was then parked in Indiana while I flew back to L.A. to watch the store before DC-l0ing it back to the Tulsa drags. After playing the role at the U.S. Nationals at Indy and towing a busted Don Nicholson down the return road, filled with a sense of deja vu (those of you demented enough to read this column will…

A fen months back we showed you a cutaway of a Volvo Pro Stocker (NON-factory, Volvo took great pains to tell us) and noted that drag racing was quite popular in Europe. When editor Terry Cook was there last summer, he got some more pictures of iron from Over There. These beauties are from Sweden, and considering the short time the Swedes have been involved in the sport, they’re pretty nice. The Andersson-Hammerman Opel Manta, blown-hemi-powered, runs in the sevens. The Walkyrian AA/FD is a privately owned effort built and maintained by local hot rodders. Best time for the rail is 7.70 seconds on 50 percent nitro. If the times for the Opel seem slow, he informed that their FC rules are more like our Pro Stocks … makes it…

If you think of Volvos at all, chances are you class them with anvils, doorstops or similar mundane objects. They do what they’re designed to. they look a little clunky, and if you ever reach the point where function is supremely important to you, you may buy one. That’s exactly what Volvo wants you to think. In this country, at least, the canny Swedes are selling reliability, and it’s paid off handsomely for them. Volvo is the eighth largest selling import in the U.S.. with sales expected to reach 55.000 in 1973. It wasn’t always thus. Volvo once supported rally teams in real rallies, not the pale imitations you see here in America—until 1968, when a series of accidents turned public opinion against rallies and they pulled out. A European…

Darlington Raceway, nestled on the western fringe of a small South Carolina farming community, doesn’t seem to change much. It just ages while it sits there, much like it did in 1950 when the gates first opened, waiting to relive the birth of major-league stock car racing every Labor Day. It’s old and it’s cranky and it has been criticized more than the proverbial weather. And like the weather, “everybody talks about it but nobody seems to do anything” about Darlington. Oh, Darlington has undergone a token number of superficial changes over the years. But it hasn’t really changed and it won’t change. It can’t. When the man cries “gentlemen, start your engines” and the Southern 500 roars to life every precious ounce of Southern pride and stock car racing…

If you’d like to have your car appear on “Readers’ Page,” send description, plus black and white photos with a clean background, to Readers’ Page, Hot Rod Magazine, 8490 Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles, California 90069. Photos cannot be returned. SUPER COUPE Bill Robinson of Riverside, California, is the proud owner of this beautiful metallic gray ’33 Ford coupe. It’s powered by a balanced and blueprinted Boss 302 with an Isky cam, twin 600-cfm Holleys atop an Edelbrock Street Tunnel Ram and Mallory ignition. A B&M C-6 Cruisomatic handles the shifting chores, while an Olds rearend with 3.90:1 Zoom gears puts the power to the ground. So far, the little gem has recorded a best of 13.10 at the drags. VINTAGE VETTE Over two years were spent in the restoration of…

A few years back, when the practicality of the Wankel rotary engine was being demonstrated in its first applications in the NSU car and as a small utility engine, one of the pioneer Wankel licensees, Fichtel & Sachs, gave its motorcycle division, Hercules, the job of trying out the rotary on the bike market. Using a readily available industrial engine produced by the Sachs engine division, together with a BMW motorcycle gearbox and driveshaft, the first attempt was a dud. It was overweight, and it didn’t perform. The press panned it, and a dubious public didn’t show much enthusiasm. Hercules pulled in their horns and seemingly let it die right there. In the meantime, the Japanese, who aren’t letting anything pass by these days, eased the Mazda into the limelight…

Organizations are invited to send us their event schedules for inclusion in this coming events listing. We can’t promise that we’ll get everything in, but we’ll do our best. Please allow three months lead time. We are not responsible for any events which are canceled or rescheduled. JANUARY CAR SHOWS 4-6-ICAS, New Orleans, La. 4-6—ICAS, Dallas. Tex. 4-6—ICAS, Dayton, Ohio 4-6—ICAS, Lancaster, Pa. 4-6—ICAS, Albuquerque, N.M. 4-6—ICAS, Phoenix, Ariz. 9-13—ICAS. Hampton, Va. 10-12—ICAS. Tipton, Ind. 11-13—Autorama, Boston, Mass. 11-13—ICAS, Grand Rapids, Mich. 11-13—ICAS. Lansing, Mich. 11-13—ICAS, San Jose, Calif. 18-20—ICAS, Detroit, Mich. 18-20—ICAS, Erie, Pa. 18-20—ICAS, Wichita, Kan. 19-20—CSH, San Bernardino, Ca. 25-27—ICAS, Flint, Mich. 25-27—ICAS, Milwaukee, Wise. 25-27—ICAS, Toronto, Ont. 25-27—ICAS, Sioux City, Iowa 25-27—ICAS, Greensboro, N.C. 29-31—ICAS, Harrisburg, Pa. KEY: ICAS—International Championship Auto Show STATEMENT OF OWNERSHIP. MANAGEMENT…

VANNERS, CHECK THIS ONE Made of dark-shaded, high-intensity plastic, Van World’s new Super Scoop serves as an inexpensive sunroof. A flap in front unlatches to open up and let the air in. For more information on the Super Scoop and other van accessories, send $1 to Van World, Dept. HR, 2899 West Pioneer Parkway, Arlington, Texas 76013. DEAR SANTA … One of six new Stanley tool kits available for Christmas giving is the automotive tool kit pictured above in its distinctively styled box. Included are 4- and 6-inch standard-tip screwdrivers and a Phillips driver, Screwstart for holding and starting screws, pliers and a window scraper. Priced at $9.97. Query Stanley Tool Division, Dept. HR, 195 Lake St. New Britain, Conn. 06050. ONE FOR ALL Summers Brothers has announced a new…

If you live in the Ohio or Western Pennsylvania areas and you race a MoPar. you won’t have to send all the way down South for exotic “replacement" parts any more. City Auto Chrysler-Plymouth in Pineville. West Virginia, will probably have just what you need in stock. If they don’t, they promise to get it within 48 hours. They’re already dealing heavily in new. late-model dual-plug hemi heads, dual distributor drives, 396-cubic-inch destroker rods. Summers axles. 35-spline spools. Apollo titanium parts, and even some Sox & Martin stuff. Winters’ Transmission Service is into two new projects that will benefit drag racers and circle racers, but not simultaneously. Fuel and Competition cars will be on the receiving end of a two-speed transmission featuring force-fed lubrication. Hydraulic pressure will facilitate gear shifting,…

Richard Petty, miffed because he isn’t having what he calls a “championship" season, scored a face-saving, late-summer victory in the Capitol City 500 as NASCAR’s Winston Cup tour crunched its way toward the end of the season. The Randleman. North Carolina, super driver, and four-time Grand National champ, measures his successes in dollars, and the $5275 he picked up for walking away with the 500-lapper at Richmond (Virginia) Fairgrounds’ .542-mile paved oval pushed his winnings for the season to $ 121,000—a paltry amount for the STP campaigner, who hasn’t been that low since 1969. “I could win the rest of the races this season.” Petty said, “and I still wouldn’t classify it as a good year. You’ve got to win $300,000 to have a good year. I haven’t had a…

You may recall the article “The Pennsylvania Crisis” featured in the May 1972 issue of Hot Rod Magazine. To quote briefly from the story, it began, “People, with a few rare exceptions, fail to concern themselves with problems not immediately affecting them until it is too late to do anything about it. Such is the case with the Pennsylvania Crisis. “Pennsylvania has always had a reputation for strict motor vehicle codes. It is a state with several densely populated areas and a large number of vehicles. The legislators in that state endeavored to provide just laws that would leave the streets free from unsafe or objectionable vehicles, in accordance with our cherished values of providing for the general welfare. Unfortunately, the elders of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania were a little…

Have you ever tried telling something to a friend who flatly refused to believe what you were saying, even though you knew you were right and he was not’.’ One could liken it to being told for the first time that there was no Santa Claus. But what would you do if someone told you the pistons in your racer are not all they could be. even if they’re the latest, lightest, trickest numbers available? Or if it was casually announced that a piston design for street engines had the capacity for higher compression, negligible blow-by and an increase in gasoline mileage? To make truth possible for both these rather bold statements. Dick DeBiasse of Automotive Engineering Research (AER) in Madison. New Jersey, has devoted large portions of his time…

We’re sitting there at the Bob’s Big Boy on La Cienega, and Gene Winfield is reminiscing about the old days. Like that old day shortly after World War II when he was cruising through Modesto in his customized ’30 Ford roadster and spotted a customized ’36 Ford convertible cruising down the road in the opposite direction. In those days there just weren’t all that many customized cars, and naturally Winfield had to hang a U-turn and chase the other guy down to find out what his story was. As it turned out, the other guy was George Barris, who was headed south from Sacramento to join his brother in Los Angeles, where the two of them had recently opened a custom shop. Winfield and Barris exchanged pleasantries, checked out each…

For the fifth straight year, hundreds of NHRA-legal Gassers. Modifieds and Super Stockers assembled at Rockford Dragway in Byron. Illinois, to compete for nearly $9000 in cash, plus contingencies. Unlike NHRA national competition, though, the three categories are handicapped against each other in one big 64-car field. In the few short years of its existence, the event has consistently attracted some of the nation’s quickest and fastest gas-burning cars. Billed as “the largest gasser event and awards program in the sport’s history." the Rockford Gasser Meet has been able to boast past entry lists numbering close to 600. This year, however, the threat of rain hampered its attendance. In spite of the unusual weather, the final day of qualifying and eliminations featured over 300 eager competitors and a near-capacity crowd…

In this inflationary world of spiraling car costs, we wondered if it were still possible to build a decent performance car on a budget. Thus while our normal choice of project vehicle subjects centers around the annual crop of new cars from the domestic and import manufacturers, we felt that a worthwhile project might be a ten-year-old car. preferably something representative of our bucks-down readers. Our choice was an early Chevy II because of that marque’s popularity with our readership. but much of the information contained herein could be applied to any car. regardless of make. Actually, working with a car of this vintage does present other advantages than just low cost, as about the only emissions equipment a ten-year-old car is required to have is a PCV (positive crankcase…

Well, what can we say? You can see it’s an orange car, or an orangecar, or something. It was built in England for the Outspan Company by Brian Waite, whom we understand is a sort of British Barris. All the parts that make it go are from an 850cc Mini, so it won’t run very fast. But it does run and has been licensed for the street. The back opens up to let you into the leather interior, from which you look at the world through orange-colored glass. The whole thing rides on a 48-inch wheelbase (track is the same) with Minilite mags and Goodyear Rally tires. And it does, attract attention, which was the purpose of the whole exercise. The cost? Three thousand. Pounds, not Phase Whatever lightweight bucks.…

One of the most unique aspects in the sport of drag racing is the diversity of machinery used by its participants. From the $20,000 Funny of the pro driver to the use of daddy’s car for a Saturday night bracket bash, everyone does his own thing. Unique indeed is Studependous, a ’59 Studebaker Lark owned and aptly named by Mike Sala-munovich. Mike, a 23-year-old student from North Hollywood, California, has combined the clean lines and light weight of the Lark body with the unlikely power capabilities of a Studebaker engine to come up with a most competitive bracket car. While most people would agree that anyone using a Studebaker motor isn’t playing with a full deck, Mike has managed to wrangle enough power from the antiquated mill to push the…

Wally Laub is a dedicated dirt bike rider. He’s never happier than when he’s racing down the back roads and across the lonely mesas of nature’s spectacular wonderland in Southeastern Utah. But he has had his troubles. And he learned the hard way that trained motorcycle mechanics are a scarce commodity in that. Strangely enough, though, things weren’t too different back in the teeming Los Angeles/Orange County megalopolis Wally calls home. There were motorcycle mechanics, to be sure but fewer than you would expect in one of the country’s major urban areas. It turned out the story was about the same almost everywhere in the nation. There are more than 3.000.000 motorcycles registered in the U.S. today, plus an estimated 3.000.000 more dirt bikes. But there are fewer than 10.000…

Hot Rod Mart Requirements: 25-word limit per ad. not including name and address. We reserve the right to edit copy or refuse ads. While not responsible for accuracy of description, we will reject misleading statements. No ads from commercial firms will be accepted. Only one car may be listed in any one ad, but this limitation does not apply to parts or equipment listings. Please state preference for street or competition classification. $10 per ad must accompany each insertion. When photo is included, the rate is increased to $15 per insertion. Due to normal publication schedule, allow at least two months from time ad is received until it is printed. STREET MACHINES SELL—1969 Hurst Olds, p.s., power discs, pos tract., factory air, new Holley, 4000 mi. on factory overhaul New…