Rex White's Mk II and others

models916

Well Known Member
Supporting Member 7
strange to see

The last photo at the site is of a car model with decals I produced years ago. I could not get permission from Rathmann Chevrolet so I used McMann. I think I still have some of the decals if anybody is into car models.
 

SS425HP

Well Known Member
Supporting Member 3
Old time NASCAR

Yeah, Tommy and Richard. Love those old stories. Whish I had been around with you guys back then. We hardly ever saw NASCAR up here. It's your memories that help us.

Thanks again.
 

real61ss

Well Known Member
Supporting Member 8
Fred,
Richard and I email back and forth right much cause we don't want to bore everyone with our converstaions about past stuff. He suggested this (I hope he doesn't mind me reprinting it) Of course, we can't do it but it would be interesting to see what would happen. We were discussing the fact that the new guys are driving cars that are engineered to suck themselves to the ground, all they have to do is have nerve enough to hold the pedal down and with the amount of money that's being dangled in front of them, that ain't hard to do. They get on national TV and whine cause the crew chief put 1 pound of air in the left rear tire and it made the car push!!!! In the "good old days", they used the Steering wheel, gas pedal and brake pedal all at the same time and made the damn thing handle.

"Comparing the old NASCAR drivers and cars to todays.--- Wouldn't it be fun if we
could send Kasey Kahne ( who won the race at Charlotte this last week-end) back in time to 1956 and put Curtis Turner and Kasey in two equally prepared 1956 Fords on the old Darlington track. How many laps before Kasey would be in the "cheap seats"?
 

SS425HP

Well Known Member
Supporting Member 3
Then and now

1 lap, maybe?????????? Now they whine when the power steering goes out. Nowadays, when they feel they were wronged by another driver, they glare at them or throw something. The good old days, they threw things. Punches, fists, knees. Cale Yarborough and Allison ( I think ) were two who didn't mince words. Eiher fight, or put the other over the wall. Today, cookie cutter cars and cookie cutter drivers.

I know there is nothing I can add to your discussions, but I do like to read them. Very interesting to me.
 

dq409

Well Known Member
Supporting Member 3
Freds right!! NASCRAP is just one more sport that I don`t watch any more due to that the money and whining have taken over the sport.

As far as doing the time machine thing,,, I`D PAY FOR FRONT ROW SEATS !!!!!!:brow dq
 
M

MK IISS

Guest
Mrs. Petty

One of my favorite NASCAR storys deals with the Petty family. During a race Lee Petty (Richard's father) was put into the wall and wrecked by another driver. After the race Richard's mother went up to the offending driver and told him what she thought about him wrecking her husband. The driver said something back to Mrs. Petty she didn't appreciate so she hit in the head with her purse....it knocked him out..cold. A reporter asked Richard how his little mother could have knocked out a full grown man with just her purse. Richard replied: "I think it was probably the .38 she always carried in her purse that did it."
 

dq409

Well Known Member
Supporting Member 3
One more angle on the current NASCRAP racing,,,

In the old days, Say ten years or so ago maybe a bit more, the speeds were not as fast and I believe the drivers still did more of the racing then.

Now with all the crews running faster then they should and with the addition of the restrictor plates it has turned into a follow the leader roundy round unless something breaks or you have a wreak.:yawn:

There just isn`t that fun of watching the Petty types as mentioned ( or any number of others) doing daring passes like drafting slingshot passes , passing where no one thinks you can, and plan ol` being out raced !!!

The days of chasing the fastest driver because his crew knew how to build a better, faster engine, set the car up better and a bad a** driver have been long gone and with that went the fun.

Occasionally you still might catch a good race today on the smaller tracks. There you really see who has the balls and mentality to really race !!

Do away with the super speedways and NASCRAP could be NASCAR once again !!

I would also like to see more NASCAR road course racing.
We have a Historical Auto Race here in Portland and seeing the old cars and reproductions of the Petty era car race on a road course is a blast !!:brow

Can you imagine if racing went back to production cars ???:D :eek:
The car makers would have to give us great two door rear wheel powered cars again !!
Too bad it will never happen,,,,dq
 

SS425HP

Well Known Member
Supporting Member 3
Stock??????????????

Yeah. Stock cars!!!!!!!!!! Try to buy a rear wheel drive, carburated car today. Same with Pro Stock in NHRA. Stock??????????? What part???????? Cookie Cutter Car racing. And, next year it gets worse with the car of tomorrow. Same car, just different decals.
 

oil4kids

Well Known Member
Hey Richard Martin

in 1963 Smoky race prepared two “427” Z06 Corvettes campaigned by Mickey Thompson for the American Challenge Cup race on February 17, 1963. Those 427 engines had five intake manifolds released for “prototype” purposes only. The most popular was the NASCAR intake part number 0-321366.
Were they 90 degree 409 blocks under those motors?
 
M

MK IISS

Guest
"Were they 90 degrees 409 blocks?

No, I would have to believe they were Mk II blocks/engines because they were reported to be Mk II 427s.... the same Mk II engines released for the Daytona 500. Mk II intakes would not work with a 90 degree deck Mk I block with Mk II heads because the seals at the end of the intake would not match up with the block. More proof the Mk II block was a new casting. Why would Chevrolet fool around with a modified 409/Mk I block for the Corvettes when they had already designed a new block for the Mk II ?

Mark: I'm not sure where this story about the Mk I and Mk II engines having the same block casting except the angle of the cyl. bank decks originally came from. Chevrolet engineers who designed the Mk II engine said it had a new block casting. I'm aware Fran Preve claims the Mk II casting was a 409 block with 90 degree cyl. bank decks. Mr. Preve also claims the Mk II was a 427 cubic inch engine from the get-go...it wasn't. All the Chevy engineers said the Mk II was originally a 409 cubic inch engine. We also know Chevrolet did not know about the 7 liter rule until October 1962, long after Chevrolet had the Mk II running on the dyno. So Mr. Preve has been proven incorrect on this. A W engine water pump will not mount on a Mk II block. The front of the Mk I/W engine and Mk II block castings are different. In my opinion this alone indicates a new casting, although there are some similarities between the two engines and also with the Mk IV.

It's just a matter of who and what you want to believe. I'll go with Chevrolet engineers and historical facts. I've seen the two engines side by side at Floyd Garrett's. I don't consider myself an expert by any means and I'm not the brightest bulb in the knife drawer. However, even I could see differences in the block castings.
 

SS425HP

Well Known Member
Supporting Member 3
Back on line?

Richard, are you back on line? Or at the library?

You have to be right on the blocks. The 409 water pump and the BBC pump are completely different. Don't remember the pump on the mystery motor at Floyd Garrett's place. I think I took pictures, but have no idea where they are.
 
M

MK IISS

Guest
Fred: I'm at the library....again. I bought a new cpu. When I started to unhook my old one I remembered my photo album. I may have lost all my photos except the ones I printed. I should have put them on a cd. Anyway I took the old cpu to a repair shop to see if anything can be done. I'd rather take the new one down to my other residence in largo.

It's too bad Garrett doesn't have the Mk II on display any longer. Anyone could look at the MkI and Mk II sitting side by side and form their own opinion. I'm guessing, but I bet it went into the cloned Junior Johnson '63 Impala Garrett had built.
 
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