Monthly Calendar Report for June, 2010
Righteous!
—For once my own calendar is eclipsed.
That's because the June entry of my own calendar is the weakest.
Yet the June, 2010 entry of my Oxman Hot-Rod Calendar is incredibly strong, the best entry in the entire calendar.
It's the hot-rod I'd wish for myself, a chopped 1931 Model A coupe lowered so much ya wonder how ya sit in it.
The motor is '50 Cadillac, and looks gorgeous sitting out in the open.
Everything is done right, particularly the sectioned '32 Ford radiator shell.
Every hot-rod should have the '32 Ford radiator shell, and the Model A looked righteous too.
That was the influence of Edsel Ford, Old Henry's son.
Model A proportions are taken from the fabulous Lincolns, as were their lines.
Compare the competitors. Fords always looked best.
It was fortunate they were cheap and available, and could thereby be the basis of post WWII hot-rods.
Many rodders even used the Ford Flat-Head V8, souped up of course.
A racing camshaft could make it breathe better, as did multiple carburetors.
But often the Flat-Head was replaced by a more modern V8, e.g. the new overhead-valve Cadillac and Oldsmobile V8s introduced in the 1949 model-year.
Later was the Small-Block introduced in the 1955 model-year by Chevrolet — the V8 that retired the Flat-Head, primarily because it too was cheap and available, and responded so well to hot-rodding.
This car reminds me of two cars:
-1) Is the fabulous Model A roadster my friend Art Dana (“DAY-nuh”) was building.
Dana is the retired transit bus-driver with fairly severe Parkinson's disease.
For 16&1/2 years (1977-1993) I drove transit bus for Regional Transit Service, the public transit-bus operator in Rochester, NY. My stroke October 26, 1993 ended that.
Art's wife is gone, so he lives with his sister in nearby Pittsford, NY. Pittsford is a suburb southeast of Rochester.
He's 69.
We share similar interests, trains and hot-rods.
Dana had done everything right, despite the car being on a much-modified '46 Ford chassis.
The frame had to be reconfigured (narrowed) to fit a Model A body.
That was the owner before Dana.
The car had a '56 Pontiac V8; a hairball.
Hard to get parts for.
Art is a mechanic. He had built hot-rods before.
He managed to get that Pontiac V8 to work, despite antifreeze leaks, etc.
But not with the triple two-barrel carburetors he desired.
With that it backfired up through the carburetors.
He had to go down to a single four-barrel.
He started it for me once in his garage, and it was clearly a hot-rod.
Rumpeta, rumpeta, rumpeta, rumpeta!
The car had a long sky-high floor-shift lever, probably the Ford three-speed tranny.
The shift-lever extended above the windshield.
But no top; it was an open roadster.
It also had the '32 Ford radiator shell.
And everything was painted flat-gray.
But it wasn't primer; it just looked it.
Many hot-rods from the '50s were only flat-gray primer.
And the tires were Coker (“COKE-rrrr”) bias-plies.
Coker is a classic-car reproduction of tires used in earlier times.
Modern tires on a '50s hot-rod look ridiculous.
Art had done everything right.
But sadly he had to give up on his hot-rod.
It was due for inspection, and the wiring was wonky.
I always felt bad I probably coulda wired it for him, but didn't think of that until after it was gone.
All it was was ancillaries; taillights, horn, etc. It ran.
Part of the problem was the motor being 12 volts, yet the ancillaries were 6-volt.
I rewired an old Chevy pickup truck once. Converted everything to 12-volt, since the battery and generator were 12-volt.
-2) The second car is a two-door sedan hot-rod that passes our house.
Total height is maybe 40-to-50 inches; which is extremely low, so low the driver probably sits in the rear seat.
You can hear it coming — open unmuffled exhausts, just two open megaphones on each side, with four exhaust-headers plumbed into each.
Not too bad though — better than the unmuffled Harley-Davidson motorcycles that bark at you, loudly serenading all-and-sundry.
Passing our house in the sedan is cruising; part-throttle.
It's not accelerating wide-open-throttle.
I've yet to see it long enough to figure out what it is, but it appears to be a Ford, and clearly a hot-rod.
Perhaps a Model A, but chopped and lowered so much, it's hardly stock.
I also have never deduced its motor; perhaps a Chevy Small-Block.
But it sounds, and looks, fabulous.
A few years ago Dana and I attended a classic car-show, and to me the best car there was a humble '60 Chevy Biscayne two-door sedan, with a souped up 283 Small-Block.
They guy had it unmuffled — lakes-pipes open.
I was smitten — hadn't heard anything like that since the middle '60s at a drag-strip.
89 bazilyun hot-rods arrived; many similar to the car pictured.
And most were flat-gray primer.
Both Art and I were in Heaven.
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| Photo by BobbaLew. |
I guess he's gonna have to give up on it too.
It's steering was sloppy, so it was converted to a Volvo steering-box, but even then it ain't power steering.
Art has been weakened by the Parkinson's, and no longer drives.
I've tested it in his garage, and it ain't too bad. Just bad enough for Art.
It has a classic Flat-Head Ford V8 motor; apparently it was never wrenched out.
And it has the classic aluminum Offenhauser cylinder-head castings.
A Flat-Head with Offy heads is extremely rare.
“Have a safe trip.” (Photo by BobbaLew.)
—The June 2010 entry of my own calendar is eastbound train 14G about to restart after a crew-change at Rose, north of Altoona (“al-TUNE-uh”), PA.
14G is a regularly scheduled daily train of mixed freight and bulk commodities from Pittsburg to Morrisville, PA.
Morrisville is a yard across from Trenton, NJ where the old Pennsy Philadelphia bypass began.
Who knows if the old bypass is still in use — it used to be electrified. Norfolk Southern (and previously Conrail) now uses other lines from Harrisburg to the New York area.
The old Pennsy line is now Amtrak's Northeast Corridor.
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| Photo by BobbaLew. |
The helpers also add dynamic braking as the train descends.
Their traction-motors are turned into generators, which generate current that heats giant toaster-grids atop the locomotive.
Doing so generates braking action.
The train may also have helpers on the rear; I can't recall.
The helper-sets are now two SD40Es, downrated and modified EMD SD50s.
(The SDs are six axle.)
For a long time they were SD40-2s, but they are finally being retired.
The helper-sets add climbing and braking power, and are added to heavy trains.
The climb over Allegheny summit for a long time required helpers, but now if a train is light enough it can master the summit without help.
Road power is getting strong and flexible enough to master the summit unassisted.
It's only 1.8 percent; 1.8 feet up for every 100 feet forward.
The helper-sets are based in Cresson, just west of the summit.
A two-unit helper-set was added at Cresson for the final climb to the summit, then stayed attached to add braking as the heavy train descended the mountain.
Into Altoona, where the helpers were taken off, and the train's crew was changed at Rose. (They probably came all the way from Pittsburg — giant Conway Yard, west of Pittsburg.)
The photograph was taken at the crew-change location; you can see the small platforms.
Crew changed, the train is about to resume.
4-4-2. (Photo by David Newhardt.)
—The June 2010 entry of my Motorbooks Musclecars calendar is one of the best musclecars, in fact the BEST.
It's a 1971 Oldsmobile 4-4-2, and also a great picture.
The Pontiac G-T-O, first of the musclecars, was brutal, as was the 4-4-2, but brutal with class.
The 4-4-2 was introduced about the same time as the G-T-O (1964 model-year), but had better handling (or so it claimed).
“4-4-2” stood for four-speed four-barrel with dual exhausts.
Later 4-4-2s came with the W30 option — no indication this car is a W30.
W30 was Oldsmobile's attempt to keep up with the 454 SS Chevelle, “Judge” G-T-O Pontiacs, and GTX Buicks, all at 455 cubic inches.
W30s also had 455 cubic inches, rated as high as 470 horsepower in the 1970 model-year.
(Ratings were much more conservative in the 1971 model-year, but just the ratings, not the engine-tune; 260 horsepower net.)
But you have to remember such cars were the GM intermediate, heavy and big with unsophisticated suspension — just humongous hot-rodded engines.
Still, both Oldsmobile and Buick tried to make their musclecars handle, less likely to spin off the pavement.
You're tying a gigantic heavy motor casting to a rudimentary rear axle.
The front plowed, and the rear broke loose if floored.
Thanks be to Mr. Emmons. (Photo by O. Winston Link.)
The photos of my three train calendars are all equally moribund.
—The June 2010 entry of my O. Winston Link "Steam and Steel" calendar is Norfolk & Western #104, a 4-8-2 Mountain, being watered in Bristol, VA.
Link persuaded nighttime roundhouse foreman W.D. (“Bill”) Emmons to reposition locomotives so Link could take pictures.
104 is in a slew of other photographs. Here it has been backed to a water-tower so it can take on water in its tender.
That water is boiled into steam, which gets thrown out the stack after working the drive-pistons.
It isn't condensed back into water.
Some foreign users of steam locomotives did that, but not here in America. —Water was generally available.
104 is being driven by a “hostler” (adapted from English horse-keepers).
It isn't the road-crew. Hostlers are moving the locomotives around for servicing.
Bristol was apparently a terminal, where locomotives would pull in for servicing.
This included light repairs.
Steam locomotives required constant maintenance.
Ashes had to be dumped from the fire-grate, and the fire cleaned (unburnable clinkers removed).
Often the inside of the boiler had to be washed to keep it a good steamer, and leaks repaired — usually welded.
Plus there was greasing mechanicals, and fueling and watering.
All to get it back into road service.
Fairbanks-Morse. (Photo by Alan Waterbury.)
—The June 2010 entry of my All-Pennsy color calendar is a Fairbanks-Morse H-20-44 switcher, 2,000 horsepower.
Fairbanks-Morse tried to enter the railroad diesel-locomotive market following WWII, an application of its submarine diesel-engine, which was the right size, but not really a railroad diesel.
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As such, the engine was very tall, taking the unit roof highish.
A submarine diesel was poorly suited for railroad operation.
A railroad diesel was getting slammed around and vibrated every-which-way.
In a submarine the engine was in a stable environment. It wasn't getting slammed around like on a railroad.
Plus with the opposed-piston layout, you had two crankshafts that could break.
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| Train Master (Erie-Lackawanna). |
But eventually its effort at building railroad locomotives folded.
Most interesting to me is that tankcar two cars behind the engine.
The tank is on an actual frame.
Nowadays the tank is the frame, and of course the tanks are much larger.
“Monocoque” construction, I guess; revolutionary when first applied to racecars in the '60s.
The car's frame was actually its body, which also was a gas-tank.
A place was hollowed out inside wherein the driver sat, but it better not leak, or you were sitting in gasoline.
This happened to race-driver Jackie Stewart long ago.
Recent tankcar construction is the same way; the tank is the frame.
But that's not how it was at first; the tank was on a separate frame, as in this picture.
Sadly, the railroad is gone, replaced by a walking-trail.
That railroad it's crossing still exists, but it's METRA; the picture is near Chicago.
A Pennsy Q-2 (4-4-6-4). (Photo by Bob Lorenz©.)—The June 2010 entry of my Audio-Visual Designs black and white All-Pennsy Calendar is a depiction of Pennsy's attempt to develop a modern steam-locomotive .
Pennsy didn't develop modern steam power in the '30s; investment was going into electrification.
So come WWII they were stuck with old and tired steam locomotives.
In fact, during WWII they had to go outside; the J-1 2-10-4, a Lima SuperPower design for Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad, the only Pennsy engine without the trademark Belpaire firebox.
Pennsy had traditionally developed its own locomotives, but the War Production Board wouldn't allow them to develop.
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First was the Q-1 (at left), but 4-6-4-4, with the rear driver-set running via pistons behind — i.e. in reverse. Only one was built.
Later was the Q-2, 4-4-6-4, all pistons working the same way, but also like the Q-1 a duplex, not an articulated.
i.e. All drivers were on a common single frame; they couldn't accommodate extreme curvature.
Pennsy could do this — long driver wheelbases — because it was relatively straight and open.
The T-1 passenger locomotive was also a duplex, 4-4-4-4. —But really a 4-8-4 with four drive pistons.
Apparently the Q-2 was quite successful; but they didn't last long.
Diesels were coming.
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| #6110, the first T-1, at Baldwin Locomotive Works for delivery. (Later T-1s looked quite a bit like this, but different [not as much shrouding, etc].) |
Chrysler introduced that body in the 1941 model-year, and used it clear through the 1948 model-year.
Automobile development was on hold during WWII; in fact, there was no auto production.
The car appears to be pre-war, probably 1941.
It's followed by a late '30s model, perhaps a 1936 Chevrolet.
This train is on the storied Fort Wayne division out of Chicago, eastbound from Fort Wayne to Crestline, OH.
In 1902 a speed-record was set on these same tracks, 127.1 mph by the “Pennsylvania Limited,” precursor to the “Broadway Limited.”
Ugly donkey! (Photo by Philip Makanna©.)
—The June 2010 entry of my Ghosts WWII warbirds calendar is an airplane I'm not familiar with, a Polikarpov I-16 “Ishak” (“little donkey”).
Probably because it was not American, e.g. the Lockheed P-38 Lightning, The Bell P-39 AiraCobra, the Curtiss P-40 WarHawk, and the North-American P-51 Mustang.
I had to access my Warbirds site.
The airplane is Russian, but has Chinese markings.
All I can think of when I see this is how radial aircraft engines weren't very aerodynamic.
A big bluff motor is presented face-on to the airstream.
Air flows through it to air-cool the cylinders.
It's not as streamlined as the Allison V12s and later Packard-Merlins.
But they are water-cooled. Radiators have to be incorporated, piping and water.
All things that add weight.
Air-cooled engines don't have that.
Sometimes the air-cooled engine might be a flat-four or six.
The front two cylinders were presented to the airstream, followed by the remaining rows of cylinders.
Apparently enough air was flowing around to cool all rows.
But I bet the rear rows ran hotter; much like the air-cooled V-twin Harley-Davidson motorcycle engine.
The rear cylinder runs hotter, because it's blocked by the front cylinder.
Arrange five or seven or nine cylinders radially around the crankshaft, and you get a massive assemblage presented to the airstream.
Nevertheless most WWII engine development went into extracting extraordinary horsepower out of radials.
It was largely the Navy.
They decided to maximize radial-engine development for carrier-based airplanes.
Radials went to multiple rows; two rows of nine cylinders each, 18 total.
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| CornCob |
So much horsepower was extracted out of radial engines, even the Army Air Corps went with it for fighter-planes, the Republic P-47 Thunderbolt.
The I-16 was the first low-wing monoplane with fully retractible landing-gear, but was quickly outdated.
I-16s were used in the Spanish Civil War, and by the Russians against the Germans.
Also against the Japanese in Manchuria.
But much more advanced fighter-planes came into use by the Luftwaffe.
They ran circles around the I-16.
The I-16s were also hard to fly, and unstable.
Their only advantage is that they could take heavy damage and keep flying.
That was partly their construction; all wood except metal wings.
Such construction also made maintenance and repair easy.
One also wonders if this plane's motor is original.
Restorers have a habit of hanging a Wright Cyclone radial on the front.
More are around, so they are easier to maintain.
Tehachapis. (Photo by Philip Makanna©.)
—I fly the May 2010 entry of my Ghosts WWII warbirds calendar again because it looks like it was shot over the Tehachapi (“tuh-HATCH-uh-PEE”) mountains in California.
It's just the Ryan “Recruit” trainer, almost forgettable.
The Tehachapis are at the southern end of the mighty San Joaquin valley down the spine of central California.
The Tehachapis are a barrier to getting up into the Mojave (”moe-HAH-vee,” as in “ah”) desert, and also Los Angeles to the south.
For years the railroad only ran south in the San Joaquin and stopped at the Tehachapis.
Scuttlebutt was that no railroad would ever conquer the Tehachapis, up to Tehachapi Pass to the Mojave.
But then about 1875 William Hood rammed the railroad up the Tehachapis, zagging every which way to keep the climb no more than 2.5 percent — that's 2.5 feet up for every 100 feet forward; quite steep, but not impossible.
To do it, he had to even incorporate a loop, the famed Tehachapi Loop. Wherein the tracks climb over themselves.
Tehachapi Loop is probably the most famous railfan pilgrimage stop on the planet, and I've seen it.
I'm a railfan, and have been since age-2 — I'm currently 66.
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| The train is probably crossing itself — the Loop was built by Southern Pacific, but Santa Fe has trackage-rights. |
We did see a train during a visit in the '80s.
The Loop is extraordinary, but more extraordinary is the trackage itself.
It twists and turns tightly all over the place to keep the climb manageable.
It also included a slew of tunnels.
Two were destroyed in an earthquake — the Tehachapis are right on the San Andreas Fault.
Down in the San Joaquin you're faced with a wall of mountains.
The climb seems inconceivable.
The Tehachapis are semi-desert; they seem to more gravel than rock.
The grass dries yellow as it did in this picture.
All that remains green are the scrubby trees, also visible.
Fire breaks are carved parallel to the road to keep brush-fires from leaping onto the roadway.
I pored all over this picture looking for the railroad, but I don't see it.
I see one track, but it appears to be a road.
California has since built an expressway down the Tehachapis, Highway 58.
The old road is twisting and torturous, good for maybe 25 mph max.
I've driven it. Seems that's the road most parallel to the railroad.
The Tehachapis are massive.
Not seeing the railroad in this picture was almost expected.
But it sure looks like the Tehachapis.
Labels: Monthly Calendar Report
posted by BobbaLew at 12:41 PM
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