Interesting pictures from Tom M...

[HolmanMoodyStroppeGang]

  The FRANKENSTEIN MAG's

This is a rare and powerful Frankenstein magneto that only the fastest teams used to win.

They sparked so hard, guys joked that they might be able to get old Frankenstein himself up and running ! Funny, to me.

In the late 70s, 10 years after their debut by Cirello, that is great, a Frankenstein was still worth a solid 500 bucks.  about the cost of a block

To do a period correct digger or flopper, like one of the Don Long or Woddy Gilmore Fuel SOHC cars, this is the Mag that won.

The smaller mags were good, but the added amps and the internal coil here, provided a safe ignition system that would not drop cylinders.

Blown, dropping a hole or two lifted a lot of blowers.  Lose the spark, load the holes, spark. returns, BOOM,,,,we saw many rotors blast up up and away when a magneto lost it's mojo.

On a blown SOHC, there is no hole for the distributor

You mount the mag on the horizontal plane. It gets driven one of 3 ways.

Off the front cover driven by the stub cam,  these you see centered down low.  Or, Driven off the fixed idler, up high, in front of the left head and cylinder 5

The great, gosh we love his work, OHIO George made a dual drive. We made a small run too. Mallory helped.  These are trick.  The dual drive mounts to the fixed idler, again, high up, by the left front head, by 5, and the fuel pump and distributor spin. He ran a real nice MALLORY Mag, vertically, and the fuel pump was horizontal.   a 2 in one

Now also guys,  The Super Snake, had the Mag in the center, off the stub cam, and fuel pump off the fixed idler

Some of our thinking was, better timing accuracy with the shorter dual roller chain to the mag, and let the longer chain span, drive the pump

Today, a Frankenstein is supposed fetch around 3,000. Yikes.  And a dual drive, rare as a hen's tooth, again, 3-4,000 they say.    We may do a short run again.

Tommy Grove won more than anybody with a special Mallory Mag.  We still win with them so I hope you trust and run these stout guys too.

Back then, a VERTEX was OK at about 4 amps

Old Frankenstein could get pumped up(magnets, charged, etc) to around 6-7

Today a stock looking Mallory can do 14 amps easy using rare earth magnets and tricks.

Wanted you older cats to check this old mag out. The fastest guys had that big black MAG. I am sure some of you remember them.

I have the special magneto mounts if you guys are interested. Hilborn made several and so did we, and guys from then. You have a scale on this mag to bump the back up or down by degrees, between rounds for example.


I would add, the legendary Tommy Grove was dominant with cammers and ran a Mallory Magneto with great success.  These have the large diameter cap and he had great luck with his Mag on the front of the cover over the fixed idler, by cylinder 5, up high.

Grove match raced up to 4 times a week, ran water in the block and iron heads. He drained all the water after a run. This was common then, you just dumped the hot water, waited as you serviced the car, changed the oil, then after 30 minutes or so, added cool water back.

Grove ran a special one of a kind Fuel Pump, from the stub cam location, down low, centered on the front cover, and spinning on the horizontal axis parallel

I can show you nice guys the Mag mounts soon.

It is like a vacation to just talk tech in a congenial and gentleman like manner, as FORD guys.

It is far more productive and much more thought provoking

Thank you kindly

[ScotiaFE]

Interesting to see that 100 psi oil pressure.
I like it meself.

It would be interesting to see some more of those old tests just to see what those guys were running for numbers.

[HolmanMoodyStroppeGang]

I will add that I've met and talked to Tom in person and he was nice enough to introduce me to Stroppe Jr. We've talked and emailed on several occasions and he's always been very helpful.

Thumbs up FORD man.  This new friends DAD was a dedicated FE man from back when, and this cool cat is around some brutal fast SOHC's.  Also, he is a good man and fine Father

Best to Dad and the family pal.

I may have some rare 406 HP stuff for you guys some day

Stored 50 years

[HolmanMoodyStroppeGang]

Here is more data for the guys. Please let me explain soon, thanks very much.

On the blown FE girdle, here is some data to ponder.

FORD needed a solution to the max effort blocks cracking the main webs on the blown stuff.    Noel Timney is in the Garlits Hall of fame in the very first round. He was the first Drag Racer to build a 150 MPH car at the first Drag race, and Nationals, in Great Bend , Kansas,   Scotty Drove the Bustlle Bomb. Politics denied them the win. They were a rowdy hard fighting gang. Funny story for friends some day

He invented the girdle as one of FORD's and Stroppe's best race car machinists. As a young gear head, many legends told me this and he deserves the credit.   I sure was glad to build with him for a long time.

He was my Boss, he trained me in the HMS way to prototype and try to help engines live.

He hired me, and we had a race car shop after FORD ended the FE that was mostly fast FE stuff too.

He did the girdles for many winning rare race engines in the 50s-60's. We were lucky to have a very big and well tooled machine shop inside the center of this big race shop.

This is his design, with all of our input, for FORD, and the very fast guys who needed more bottom end strength.

Deal was, they cost about 2,000 with all the steps, so only a few could get one then. Plus, by then, too many guys were switching back to Dodge due to the DONOVAN and FE parts drying up.

This girdle also helped some very fast SOHC Top Fuel Race Boats.  Hydros, etc..  We raced them out here plenty too.

I made several with him.  I mounted others, rare stuff. I have the prototype, plans, etc.

Plate chromoly. You pattern it then flame cut the blank on a pantograph.  I cut maybe 5?   Remember a Pantograph guys? Very trick deal then.  A table, and a tracer, and an oxy acetylene cutting torch pointed down.   You followed the pattern and cut the rough part out. Many many 60s speed parts started ths way. Thousands of header flanges for example,many race parts.

Then, you rough it out to fit a SOHC block perfectly.  These are entirely hand made.     Now, these max effort FE's had studs. See the clearance for studs? We made studs because no ARP or SPS was around, no jegs, we made a lot of special race related stud kits

Next, you mount the front cover and center it on a crank. Then, you dowel it, so it stays were it was fit

Then, the block and cover goes on the overhead chain fall, up, and in to a Mill.   A horizonatl mill with gang cutters on an arbor.

The girdle is finely finished in a surface grinder too, dead flat.

You mill the rails and cover perfectly flat too

Then, the main caps on 2,3,4 go on the magnetic table of a surface grinder.  a nice wide fine finished flat is added to all 3 at the exact same height.  This flat is as wide as the tabs you see with the counter sunk allen cap screws. 2 per spacer

Then the caps go on, sidebolts, torqued, then the girdle sets on, with a special paper thin gasket.   Note the 6 bolts per side with the larger bore?   They allow a hardened nut, to get torqued down, on a stud that is coarse into the block, fine into the girdle. The pan mounts through studs, with nuts

So the 3 spacers get fit now, by surface grinding to a nice preoad.  The girdle is interference fit.  The girdle, presses firm on the caps and can no longer elongate or cycle enough to crack and fail.

The bottom becomes very strong. It becomes a Y block with longer stronger side skirts.

You add a nice crush, then line hone it all assembled.  The mains are now rock solid.

The pan sets on a normal gasket, that sets on the girdle. You also have the sump lower thus less drag and windage

I have the rights and plans to this, and it is very rare

From the mind of Noel and the gang, for and with FORD


Hope you like it, very few have seen these.

[Autoholic]

Tom, I remember talking with you a little when I first visited 54. Now days I enjoy this lot and what they dive into. Is anyone working on a SOHC book? Time isn't slowing down and the original guys who played with this engine aren't getting any younger. It would be nice to have a written history from behind the scenes of how the engine was made / designed and then what racers did to improve the SOHC platform. If anyone has read the book Racing in the Rain by John Horsman, it's amazing to read about his life and career with JW Automotive / Gulf Racing. A book like that becomes an invaluable resource to anyone interested in classic race cars. There has to be a decent number of SOHC secrets that only the guys who lived in the golden age would know about. With the resurrection of this engine, the how-to's, don'ts and tricks are important to new people who don't want to find things out the hard way with a $40-50k engine.

Thanks

On a fact finding note, did any racers run H in a SOHC? Hydrazine is some pretty nasty stuff.

[HolmanMoodyStroppeGang]

Hello Sir

I get a lot of email and have a bunch of friends into this idea. A bool about the 90 day wonder better known as the HEMI Killer to some of us.  I have liked this idea a long time too.

What I have done is begin to compile more data since the FE guys are a real nice gang.

In the last 2 years, here and elsewhere, I have tried to share some things for the new guys to recall or think about as best me and my pals can.   

Today, I am sharing some of the parts and have more to let the gang ponder.

I would buy a SOHC book, sure !

My friends an I like books done by racers, for racers and books that dig deep, and find reliable sources.  This can take years, travel and money

I respond when asked, the people who could be the huge resources so far seem fine with this idea

If this gets done, I have a iist of the guys I respect most

The order is off the top of my head but the names would be, Tommy Grove, he is a SOHC genius who won 215 rounds in a row,   Ohio George Montgomery, who was dominant and a fiece A gas legend. He  beat everybody too. Amos Saterlee, he is fine and tuned the Mickey Thompson Mustang that Danny Ongais won and won with. You would need the FORD engineers, so the great John Vermeersch is mandatory.  He said he would contribute to the new Holman Moody Stroppe book a while back so that is so nice of him.  John is legend to the SOHC world and a smart FORD man all the way. He was there with a spare and crewed for Dyno Don too.

Ed Pink was unbeatable for that period, Kieth Black's son would be great, his Dad won and won. McEwen is a must, he had fast SOHC Dragsters, Don Long and Woody Gilmore would be mandatory because they supplied those fast SOHC Dragsters,  Stroppe, sure. Lee Holman of course, he is just great. 

Dyno Dan, he built for Dyno Don and is a close friend. We shared the Maverick SOHC tricks with you guys a little for example.

Then the new vendors, and don't shoot me please, but a certain head maker might offer a few words about his 11 wins and helping Dyno a little.   

Connie Kalitta would be central, he was so fast and so dominant, he rules the field a long time.

Bruce from HMS is a close friend, and he crewed for the awesome Conrad on his SOHC cars.

I'd definitely interview the greatest, Big Daddy.  He could add a huge perspective and is such a treasure to so many.

Robert Pond is key, he has invested so much to help so many

Doug at pump builder deserves  his page, to show respect t him for helping provide so many cool new SOHC parts. Fast old Paul Munroe for making heads and intakes, chains and more.

Of course the awesome Champ JAY BROWN,,, This genius and forward thinker is widely admired for pushing the old SOHC into the 21st Century with such passion and ability. We all owe him a lot.


Of course Barry and Blair who build cammers and who are so good. Such awesome FE guru's and they have such fascinating minds. 

I am going to reveal this.  I did a series of essays about a group of us combining to force feed a SOHC on fuel soon.  Barry has twice expressed interest and would be a huge resource to any Drag Team.   

and the fine Southern gentleman Blair, gosh he is fast, he was a huge help on this SOHC on Fuel deal.    I was sure a team would gel, and the Boss told me to find and buy a famous SOHC dragster since we raced a few...So I get 3 blocks and a lot of stuff. Well, the economy was tight, and people didn't step up, so Blair was awesome to buy all 3 blocks from me.  It was good for both of us because I just bought a bunch more SOHC stuff.  Thanks.

Think Brent has done some nice ones and he is a skilled engineer and rising star.

William Conley for his smart analysis, real smart cookie. He should be asked. 

Cammer Butch has a wealth of knowledge and has a ton of cool SOHC stuff. Nice man, and his helper Ben is cool.

Ed ISKY, we talk cammers at times, he did OHIO George's cams. Ed remembers that fast FORD well.

Clay Smith cams, old Striegal is a genius, and it was him, who brought the Hydrozine out of the oil field and in to the sport.  We talked about that a lot recently, on the starting line at Bakersfield. It is virtually undetectable by the tech guys because it bubbles off and disappears so fast.

Lean Gene Adams,boy he tuned a bunch at HILBORN

Rowland Leong would have to be interviewed. He was like a son to Black. awesome man.

Steve Gibbs, Dave McClelland, great guys and just fine.

The Bach and Gould team, for sure. They are legend.

Danny Ongais for sure, he is fine and a great guy. Still building too, local. Man could he drive that Mustang for Mickey Thompson.

SHELBy of course, helped my favorite Top Fuel Cammer in many ways, ARIAs of course, many would be important

I'll make ya a girdle,,,LOL

Thanks now

I'd love it

PS   I am tired, I know I forgot 20 people and we can add them

You guys tell us who should be in there please.....Old FORD guys for sure

OH  Larry Knapp,,,,he was close to the great Earl Wade and has his last Pro stock engine in a Stroppe car, Larry, for sure.  He has 3 cammer cars and has been a cammer guy for 50 plus years. He is re doing the Les Ritchey Mustang

I'd add Randy Ritchey and  many more, Sherm Gunn of course, built Dyno's Maverick, Bobby Spears, many good people could help

I'll make the Lasagna....LOL   and get ya down the road a bit...

Ha ha ha   

thanks

very nice to hear from you pal

Email any time, just give me time please

Fast Frank Bowers of course could add wise facts. Nice man.

Hope it happens. Gosh, it is so nice to just share and not have to see a fight when you say cammer...!

[Autoholic]

Wow, that is a lot of names to pull together for a book. Would take a decent amount of time and lot of skill to piece it all together. I hope I see it happen one day.

Did I read correctly, that a guy named Striegal was the first to play around with hydrazine? Did it ever run in a SOHC? I've read a lot of old racer stories about how dangerous it is.

[Nightmist66]

Hydrazine, What's the worst that could happen?
His expression is like, wait a minute! I shouldn't be seeing my rotating assembly right now!

[Autoholic]

I've read some stories where guys would keep it chilled in their race trailers and what not. Put a few drops in at the line and then dump their tank after returning from a run. The scariest thing about H is the level of protective gear you need. I was talking to a guy who had to procure the safety equipment for his crew, I think he was in the Air Force. He said they treated it like instant cancer if it got on you, which isn't too far from reality. These days you have to wear a hazmat suit designed for toxic gases that are corrosive. Hydrazine is still used to this day for spacecraft as well as emergency generators on some jets. Take a look at this fairly recent photo showing the level of protection you have to wear to deal with H.

[Nightmist66]

If sources are reliable, it is said when hydrazine was mixed with nitromethane it could make an unstable form of nitroglycerin! The oxygen scavenging abilities were so great that it only required 10cc's of it per gallon of nitro. It can also burst into flame if spilled on rusty metal. Also highly carcinogenic. "If it's burning green, it's hydrazine!"



I think this was actually a copper head gasket burning, but you get the point.

[Autoholic]

I've read the same thing. I watched a video that interviewed an old racer. He said anything over like 2% in your fuel mixture could send people to the hospital from the exhaust fumes. I'm not positive about the percentage but I can believe the bit about toxic exhaust gases. Nothing was safe from this stuff. An engine could blow up simply from having any remnants of hydrazine left in it after a run. The problem is due to nitro acting like a catalyst to hydrazine, as H will consume oxygen and react. This will then serve as a catalyst for the nitro, in turn. The result is a large bang.

On a related note, often the most dangerous fuel tanks are the ones close to empty. Whatever fuel you're running, once the fuel tank level is at the point that stoichiometric combustion is nearly perfect for that fuel, it can turn into the largest bang. This is why a gas can with just a little bit of pump gas can be very dangerous.

I worked for a company when I was in college that specializes in blowing stuff up. I worked on one project where I got to know some of the ins and outs of a rather dangerous test. The goal was to see what would happen if you took a tanker, blew it up to disperse the fuel and then ignited the fuel with a secondary explosion. We blew up 2400 gallons of a regular, everyday fuel and it vaporized a tanker you would normally see spraying water at a construction site. We never found the cab, and one part of the tank itself was found at least 200 yards away and it weighed a minimum of 100 lbs. There are some rather tricky details to making this explosion happen, but when we got it right, we shook the entire town and blew the doors open of a tool store roughly 4 miles away from the test site, with a mountain in between. One of the biggest bangs the company made during my 5 years of college. Imagine a sonic boom at ground level up close and personal, and you'll get the idea. That's somewhat how powerful the shock wave was from the energy released from everyday fuel. I wish I had been outside at the time of the blast, you would have seen it. I have seen the way a shaped charge's shock wave bounces off and then back towards a wall in a zig zag pattern on high speed cameras. That is crazy stuff.

[Qikbbstang]

Love seeing the old "girdle" knowing it was from before CNC's when folks designed and machined w/o computer. I picked up out of the trash a early 70s Raleigh "International" 10spd bicycle. (about $1000)While the frame was made in and bike assembled in Carlton England all the machined components were Campagnolo I pictured a fine Italian machinist working a week on just the crankset.

[HolmanMoodyStroppeGang]

Interesting to see that 100 psi oil pressure.
I like it meself.

It would be interesting to see some more of those old tests just to see what those guys were running for numbers.

Hi Mr Scotia FE

The 100 PSI is with Valvoline 40W Racing and is not multi visc oil.  We were sponsored by these great guys, and others. Pennzoil was in the AFX SOHCs for Dyno for some time for example.

Bardahl was a sponsor, so were others

We blueprinted every oil pump and I have done them our way a long time.  The 2 Cobra Jet tests are to compare the FORD Drag Team 7 QT pan versus a Drag Pan with 9 Quarts from MILODON who has been close by a long time and who would make parts with FORD's guys input and them we would test the stuff.

So you see a long static 2000 RPM break in and there is data not on the sheet. We have to fill in the blanks

On these 68s, geting prepped for the Winternationals, or first Super Stock race in 69, all the Drag Team cars were coming and going from the 'Hill'. So trying to get any edge and stay NHRA legal was one thing

Another was, these engine continued to get built by many of us, to be just like the Drag Team cars, for decades afterward. A customer would come in and say, I would like an engine like ,,,,name the team driver, had, in his Mustang in    say   1969.

So, all the guys would talk, even at their later shops, and share these little tricks.

What I would add is.  I see these books that claim every CJ car had this list of parts.  Sure,as ordered I guess. However, these cras were owned by FORD then leased or sold with conditions, to the Team guys, and then FORD paid us and others, to add tweaks to help win

Tese Drag Team cars were very carefull assembled, the engines were thoroughly blueprinted, tenth tolerance usually, and the target was,,,,,at least 40 PSI hot idling, and about 80 psi under load wide open

If it broke in, got tested, and cycled, heat cycling, that is important, if it had less than 40 psi when done, it came off and apart.  This never happened because you basically do them all the same, well here, clearance wise,,

I am not sure if we have met but O/T, I am told that Nova Scotia is just beautiful and would love to explore it some day.  You are a lucky man to live in a wonderful land.

Kind regards sir

Thanks now

[HolmanMoodyStroppeGang]

Wonder how long the sweeps were on that 428 dyno?  I've never seen an engine pickup 20 degrees of oil temp unless it was hurt....

I'll bet they were static pulls, Brent.  Remember, this was 1969, and most dynos were not computer controlled, and the data was not collected in an automated fashion.  This was explained to me once by somebody, can't remember who, but they would run the engine up to the RPM of interest, get the brake set, read the scale (!), hand record the other data they were interested in, and then move the engine to the next RPM point.  Or, maybe shut off, look at the data, and then start again and go to the next RPM point.  If they were operating like that, it is entirely possible that the oil temperature would go up significantly as they gathered the data.

Hello Mr Jay

Thanks again for all that you do.  You have a nice team here.

OK, you are correct as usual and here are some facts.

FORD had the best DYNO money could buy then and we had 2 cells.    These legends would come test for a fee at Ford racing for example.

It was really something else, to have the older guys say, FORD funded the 3 most precise dyno cells this side of the Mississippi. This was told to us because we had side by side Heinan Freund dynos on the East end of this mammoth engine room

Bruce CROWER obtained one of them for his private skunk works after we moved because they were very special

The key is, a huge water brake.  and a very precise way to load it up and down

The control panel had the highest quality instruments, and part of this was so that our tests, could go back to Detroit in some cases, or down to HM South, and be calibrated for comparison

And yes, running the pulls required 2 men, and a skilled operator with these tasks

You have a level on the console, right hand controls the throttle, like today

Left hand stays on the rotary switch that loads or unloads the torque brake.

In front,, a window to the test cell, and two large calibrated gauges, a big tach, and a big pound scale to measure torque to the tenth of a pound.

So this requires skill because a very good dyno guy, if having a bad day, or distracted, could let the engine 'get away' from him, wing it and bang it.

A legendary FORD engine man had a crowd watching, and was kind of showing off or talking too much, they distracted him in his defense, and the tricky paart is manually mashing the gas, or WOT,,wide open throttle, then clicking in the load, loading the engine, and if it has a lot of juice, it may over come the torque brake and get away from ya, and if you reacted just a bit slow, failed to lift, or close the throttle fast, it might over rev and   BOOM !!

He is the only guys we recall who boomed one

427 tunnel port, 14/5 to one,and and

The Foreman usually did the data gathering,  Somehow I ended up or was so so soooo lucky to do some of that later, usually 2nd shift and on the weekends or during a thrash to get many cars to the races.

So you read gages, filled in the boxes, and went in and out of the Dyno cells

What was cool was who came up to Dyno too. The first Total Seal rings, Kendig Carbs, the original NOS systems from NOS down the street, the legendary, man we have stories here, Gale Bank did his twin blown Rats there, he has an entire wing of awesome accomplishments in his own wing at the NHRA Hot Rod museum.   W would do cam changes, durabilty, max boost tests.
and he an I smelled so much Av Gas on weekend, we were fainting,,,,LOL  And he taught me and a few guys helping, to go into a separate room, grab an oxy acetylene torch, open the O2 side, set the tip in your mouth like a cig, then breath in oxygen to clear your head.

He could pull well over 1,100 ft pounds ina super durable build, with ease.

Ak Miller tested there, huge legend and we loved him, Gus Davis, Unser, Gurney over on the Autolite side, he banged a few Offys and just did 2 more to win

OK   war stories, gotta work

Static yes, trick, yes, next deal was, how weel she ran on a track. The Dyno was a basis, to them get the real data, a time slip or lap time

Thanks

AUTOLITE DYNO......top secret,,,,,and had IBM stuff, to simulate laps at INDY for example.

Thanks men

[Nightmist66]

AUTOLITE DYNO......top secret,,,,,and had IBM stuff, to simulate laps at INDY for example.

I'm guessing it was like this dyno. Way cool for the time!

https://youtu.be/4OlvafnYrOo