Printable View
Havasu - 1971 ( continued ).....
Three laps behind Sirois was Reggie Fountain, driving a 21' Glastron Molinari for Glastron ( he was not a Merc factory driver yet ) and finishing 3rd was the "Iceman", Harold Eis in his Eis Super Cat that he won with in 1964 and 1965!
Havasu - 1971 ( continued )......
Hiram Mueck finished 8th in a 21' Glastron Molinari/Mercs and Ron Brown came in 9th in his Schulze/Mercs giving the twins five of the top ten places on their last run at Havasu. Here's Brown's Schulze......
I have read all your fascinating information about the "Good Old Days" of racing and all the wonderful information about the Mercury operations. Now you can help me with something. I remember back in the early 1970's, there were Merc engines that looked like a Twister 1, except that the exhaust exited the bottom of the exhaust chamber through something that looked like a cow bell rather than through the mid section. I only saw this configuration for about a year or so and have never run across one since. Was that something that Merc was experimenting with or was it being done by individuals. I remember that they had a sweet sound, not as loud as a stacker, but louder than a Twister 1. Any thoughts on those? Please keep all your wonderful information coming. I always look forward to your posts. After all, those were the wonder years...Bob Van Bomel / Clearwater, FL.
Bob, these were nicknamed "Cow Bell" Twisters and were factory team race motors for part of a year around 1970.
We are still looking for good pictures or surviving motors of this type
Bill:
How much would six 1250/1350 powerheads and four 15"BP Mids be worth today?$?$
My recollection of the multi OB offshore 'throttleman" was a short piece of bungee cord and 'red dot' rev limiters.
Hi Gene, really glad to see that you have decided to join us, this ought to be fun :) . Easy to tell from your "throttleman " comment that you've " been there, done that ". For those of you that might not know Gene, he's the man pictured below......he raced Wings and played with offshore boats for years, so now you have a direct source for Wing and Race questions " From the Golden Era " :cool:Quote:
Originally Posted by GENE LANHAM
Cowbells....an attempt to recall their brief history
Going into 1970, Merc's big engine was the 1350 water injected stacker. However, everyone knew it's days were numbered because do-gooders were on a noise pollution campaign. Engineers at Plt.6 in Oshkosh were working on a quiet, tuned exhaust system that could replace the stacks, but not lose performance. We ran a pair of specially ported stackers at Parker that year and a couple of months later Plt. 6 sent over an engine with this log or silo exhaust system for testing. After several different tests and a couple of backyard races, final specs for this engine ( the Twister ) were approved. It was also decided to build a hundred of these for sale to the racing public the next year, so they were locked into a design. Later that summer, the Plt.6 engineers brought over an open exhaust version of this manifold ( the cowbell ) and testing showed that it outperformed the silo. I guess their thinking was that the team boats would run the cowbell where permitted and the silo at the remaining events. However, during this time frame, the engineers in Fond du lac were working on the C6. It first showed at Berlin in 1970 and was on four team boats by July of 1971. It was obviously a more powerful engine, so all engineering efforts were directed to it. Money for silo tooling had already been spent, so it was decided to keep it and the cowbell just sort of fell by the wayside. It was only around for about a year and a guess would be that about a dozen were built.
Hi Gene
Are you trying to peddle the powerheads from the "Let's cross the Atlantic" venture? Glad to see you can finally work a computer..Regards to you and Bob..Welcome aboard..
Butch
This forum keeps getting better. With Gene on board there should be more good stories and info.
As a pilot of a wing, perhaps you can help me clear up a memory from long ago. Back it the very early 70s, there were races in the bay here in Clearwater, Florida. I remember two wings that used to do battle. One was El Lobo, that at that time, was running a pair of Chrysler 135 stackers. I guess the El Lobo used to run Mercs, but at this race, it had a set of the blue cowl Chrysler stackers. The other wing that El Lobo was doing battle with was named Firebird. It ran a pair of 1250/1350 stackers. Do you have any recollection of that one? No members seem to remember Firebird and now I am questioning my own memory. I can still see Firebird written on the sides of the boat back by the engines. I remember it being black with yellow and red trim. Any thoughts?
Thank you both for your reply on the Merc cow bell engines. I remember seeing them back in the early 1970's and then, just as fast, they fell off the face of the earth. Now I know why...Thank you both...
Back in the early 1970's there was a driver that lived here in Clearwater, Florida that had a boat name "Muck..Muck." I am in hopes that someone remembers his name. The boat was a green Cobia Holiday that had been cut down and re decked with plywood. It ran twin 1250 BPs. Any thoughts???
Your'e not thinking of Bo Bo Mears are you?
Butch
Could he spin a yarn better than uncle rhemus and call everybody "hoss?":)Quote:
Originally Posted by Bob V
Butch:
It was the grandkids that finally taught me to use the computer.
We used up a lot good stuff back then, didn't we????
Gene