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Sat Oct 15, 2011 4:57 pm

36hplandspeedracer wrote:

VW's have been part of Bonneville and Vintage Speed since the early sixties. You can see both and early bug and bus in this photo from 1962 taken with my 1913 expandable pocket Kodak camera. Also visible are a 59 El Camino and 59 Ranchero.

Burly

Burly,

What is the structure? Timing tower? Start line?

Thanks!

Scot

Sat Oct 15, 2011 5:25 pm

Scot, that was the timing tower used in the late fifties, early sixties, and was moved onto the salt for Speedweek each year. The early bug and bus and early El Camino and Ranchero help date the photo I took around 1963.

Today the pits are located across from the timing tower at around the three mile mark. Back in the day the pits were by the start line and this tower sat all by it's lonesome at the three mile. Spectator participation was almost non-existant back then, unlike today where two or three thousand spectators line the course during Augusts SCTA/BNI Speedweek.

Burly

Sat Mar 03, 2012 8:48 am

Tuscarora HC in PA

Sat Mar 03, 2012 9:25 am

Stonefish, that is a really great shot! As a road racer at heart, the picture resonates with me and has just become my desktop image. Thanx for sharing!

Burly

Fri Mar 09, 2012 7:03 pm

I need to post more here....got a ton. Glad you like them!

Sat Jul 21, 2012 5:51 am

Just saw this vid from already 2 years back and I think it kinda belongs here. Unique 1961 footage from Dick Beith's original record run in his blower oval complete with an interview with him prior to the 101.69 mph record run:

Sat Jul 21, 2012 6:25 am

Beetspeed wrote: Just saw this vid from already 2 years back and I think it kinda belongs here. Unique 1961 footage from Dick Beith's original record run in his blower oval complete with an interview with him prior to the 101.69 mph record run:

Well yes but as it was Bonneville specific it was put in this topic: http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?p=4465520&highlight=bonneville#4465520

Sun Nov 11, 2012 2:41 pm

Has anyone ever heard of a Scarigo Spitfire exhaust for a 36 horse engine? It looks to be Itialian made with the flag colors as a background for the logo. It has four tail pipes. I will try to get a picture and post it.

Fri Mar 01, 2013 11:31 am

From the 1962 Weber Catalog.

Fri Mar 01, 2013 12:08 pm

BTW The Edmondson Judson Ghia (printed in reverse) in the picture above belongs to a Sambanista: http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=113641

Fri Mar 01, 2013 9:23 pm

I may have a photo of this car ( I think) that was found at a swapmeet. I cant see the rear deck and the gentleman is standing in the way but I do see something up on the dash. He is in a jump suit and on of those old fashioned hard hats. It is all framed up but maybe I can take a picture of the picture.

Tue Jun 11, 2013 9:29 am

I'm sorry I don't have any photos, but my VW experience started early in the 60's when a friend THRASHED my A-H Sprite with his '61 40 horse VW. This led me to acquire a new '66 1300 a few years later and I raced this car in the Green Valley 1967 AHRA Nationals, winning the Stock Bug class just before going to Boot Camp for the Navy. When I got out, in 1971, I returned in a pristine 1962 23 window Microbus I bought in Norfolk, Virginia from a California surfer dude for $250! Boy, do I wish I had that one back! I traded it for a nice 1964 Standard Beetle, which I gutted and built a 1500cc engine for, using a Holley 500 CFM 2-barrel carb to run NHRA A/MC class, which was limited to a single 2-barrel carb in 1971. The car ran high 13's on 13" recap slicks with a stock gearbox, stock 1500 pistons, reground cam, flycut heads ported with a 1/4" drill and handmade intake and exhaust manifolds. However, I married in 1972 and didn't have a chance to race again until the late 80's. Now, I want to recapture the fun of the old days, building all of our own parts and grinding, milling, filing and massaging stock parts until they work well together. Cubic Dollars never get respect from real innovaters, but a handmade dual carb setup on a 40 horse engine should. Let's Play !!!

Tue Dec 03, 2013 5:13 am

This is an interesting display set-up. The first picture is of the front cover of an original Shorrock Supercharger brochure...not sure of the date...probably late '50s early '60s. It shows a cutaway display model of the C75b supercharger.

Last month a friend found the same display model on an antique collectables website and it was for sale. I had no place for it but I know someone who would jump at the chance of owning it...so I emailed him and sure enough he bought it.

He had it delivered to me as it was located in the UK and he was coming over from Belgium to a swapmeet in the UK the following week.

I took the opportunity to take a few pictures of it...

As you can see it's nicely detailed...the internal mechanism has been chromed and mounted on a solid Mahogany plinth. The item obviously formed part of the official Shorrock Trade Stand with the double pulley removed and replaced with a nice little Mahogany button to spin the supercharger rotor.

You'll now find in as part of Alejandro Martin's supercharger display if you attend Vintage VW shows in Europe.

Sat Oct 22, 2016 3:00 am

Robert Bosch Gold Cup Super Vee series. I am looking for decals from that series when the A/C cars were run (70s). Place to purchase them or even clear photos to have reproductions made.

Mon Jan 27, 2020 9:16 am

Braukuche wrote: Not sure if this is what you are looking for, but I did some research on the vintage components of my own engine that I built for my '58 standard bus.
About two years ago or so, I answered an ad in the local Craiglist about an estate sale featuring a horde of Corvair parts and "some" VW stuff. Since it as near the house I went to check it out and discovered a treasure of old speed stuff.
The owner was dead, and had been into VWs back in the early '50s switching to Corvair I guess in the early '60s so all the stuff he had was bastard 40 down. He was big into buses as he had a clothing business and used them to haul stuff. I found a bunch of barndoor stuff for example, but the best find was a pile of 36hp engines under the house.
Right away I found a dual carb kit mounted on a set of heads along with the linkage. Turned out to be a Rethwish kit.
Rethwish was an English outfit that predated Okrasa. In fact EMPI sold the Rethwish kits here in the US before switching over to Okrasa in the early '50s. The Rethwish kit used dual stock 28 PCIS on aluminum manifiolds with a balancing tube mounted on stock heads. The kit included linkage which was an aluminum bar with clamps on them to actuate the carbs. It used the standard return spring and appears to have a provision for using the manual choke but I haven't figured that out. I found no air cleaners (unfortunately) and still do not know what they came with. For now, I am using the WolfsburgWest early Knecht knock-offs.
Anyway, digging further I pulled out like 10 cases. Looking closely at one case that had a Porsche Pre-A large crank "OT" pulley I noticed the crank was eight dowled. I thought right away it must be a Okrasa crank! Cool! But found out it was something even cooler.
After cracking the case I found a stroked 69.5 cranks stamped with "EMPI" on it. Upon doing some research I discovered that back in the day the owner of EMPI wanted to produce a stroker crank to meet demand here in the US. This was pre-Okrasa era. Anyway, he went to Porsche and asked who was making their cranks and went to the same foundry and had some made to specs to fit in a VW case. Once Okrasa came out with their cranks EMPI stopped selling these.
I assembled my engine using all these components found a couple miles from my house running in a bus that sold locally and has never been out of the county.

Great story

Mon May 25, 2020 10:10 pm

Beetspeed wrote: Just saw this vid from already 2 years back and I think it kinda belongs here. Unique 1961 footage from Dick Beith's original record run in his blower oval complete with an interview with him prior to the 101.69 mph record run:

Thanks for the link!

Sat Sep 05, 2020 1:18 pm

An old thread, but thought I'd add my bit. Sometime around 1961/62 Mike Griffin and Roy Vaughan started Cartune VW in the U.K.

They started out selling Mag Superchargers and Maico disc brake conversions. By the end of the decade they had a premises in London in which they could undertake engine performance conversions (including SPG Roller cranks) and also had a Full VW / Porsche / NSU dealership in the Northeast of England. They also manufactured their own range of performance parts which included shifters, camber compensators, anti roll bars etc.

I have a vested interest because I restarted the company in 2017, but here are a couple of pictures of them racing Ovals at Goodwood in 1958. Excuse the watermarks on the photos. I paid for the rights to use these and have already had them used elsewhere without my consent.

Wed Feb 15, 2023 9:58 am

Stonefish wrote: Car built
originally by Gary Davis, Don Dietrich, and Tom Davenhall, last ran in
Pa. by Denny Frick and Harvey Davenhall. Paint design by Milton
Bailey in Atlanta, {kids called it the puzzle car). 0-60 was probably
in 3,s, 60 was roughly top of 2nd gear. Will have some more pics when
figure out how.

Do you have any more pictures of the “Puzzle Car”? It looks great!