Lunchbox 305 cubes and Weslake W1, Garlits Crower C-500, D200 too

[aerolith]

Still love this story and the fact that if Brooks had won the 71-Daytona race, he would have been BARRED from Nascar...

Good old 'Big Bill', changing the rules on a daily basis...

What did he have against the 'lowly 305' LA-T/A engine...


Thanx Greg, can I post some pics please of the 'Rossi in sunglasses' pictures, fitting the 'LUNCHBOX 305' for us wannabee's lol...

'Snow-plough' front spoiler was a hindrance I bet?

[aerolith]

Saw on another thread that it was ''just a rollcage'' in someone's garage...

I think after reading ''305 found'' all is good in the World!

Wonderful picture of the HEMI and the LUNCHBOX lol...

[aerolith]

How did Dick finish after this HIT!

[aerolith]

For an Engineer like myself, I am looking for Engine info, on the 305ci please?

Plenty of stuff on Motortrend/Hotrod which is mostly 'blocked' for UK folks!

[Aero426]

Finished 7th, a lap down.

Keith Black provided the engines as they had done development on the 5 liter Trans-Am and the P-69 Indy engines based on the LA block.   The first time the engine was in the car was at Daytona.   There was no test program.    

The 305 would have worked at places like Daytona and Talladega where you are WOT all the time.    Probably would not have worked elsewhere where you needed torque off the corners.   It was a gimmick, and it almost worked.

[Aero426]

What did he have against the 'lowly 305' LA-T/A engine...

It wasn't the engine.   NASCAR did not want ANY of the special bodies on the track in 1971.   Period.

[aerolith]

Thanx Aero426,

The reason I ask is this...

A UK company called 'Weslake Engineering' was given a pile of engines from Mother Mopar for Nascar development in the late 60's.
Mainly hemi D5 and other hem related items plus the infamous and complete W1 engine that I have in the UK.
The carb was a 1969 'sandcast' Holley that now resides on Greg's wonderful 200mph car...

Some were returned to the USA when they went bust and a few remained behind for us Limey's to play with lol.
The smallblock T/A stuff, I lost track of in the 80's, but still own the 'W1 426 Weslake' as I call it...

[aerolith]

I was hoping to piece together a 305ci motor to join my W1 426 Nascar engine.

Unfortunately the paperwork from Weslake was lost, which described the reason for building the non hemi-headed 426 for Nascar.
This was going to replace the hemi engines after the unfortunate banning of the infamous hemi 426...

As you can see from the pictures above it was going to be an 'ovalport passenger car head', a replacement for the 906 casting.
But just as the W2 head was never placed on a street car engine, neither was the W1 (as I call it) lol...

Open Chamber design with the extra water passages for heat dispersion.

Obviously a 'pass head' as it has the heat cross-over unlike the Max-Wedge heads...

[aerolith]

It was going to run the 'highly modified' STR intake with a sandcast dominator.

Looks huge next to the MI intake...

[aerolith]

The only Weslake smallblock parts I have is the J head cutaway pieces.

These are NOT T/A parts, but 70 stock J's...

[Aero426]

Interesting that Weslake was working on some big block applications.   This is the P-69 Indy car head for the small block.

[aerolith]

Nice picture Aero426,

Sir Harry Weslake lived a wonderful life, 'by all accounts'...

I have never read his book, ''Lucky all my life'', maybe I should get a copy and see what's in there?
He re-designed many heads for many folks over his long career.

It was so cool that he got to work on Mopar engines, but his philosophy of 'smaller, well shaped ports' fell short with hemi's and such like!

Hemi's famous 'square-ports' converted to Weslake's 'round ports' in the D5, a 'bridge too far' maybe?

[aerolith]

I like the fact that the wonderful Keith Black was called Reverend!

His father was a 'man of the cloth' and this was instilled into Keith.
No cussing or drinking, just a good all round kinda guy...

Seems God needed Mr. Black and Mr. Donovan for duties elsewhere?
So sad they died so young...

[TiMopar]

Thanx Aero426,

The reason I ask is this...

A UK company called 'Weslake Engineering' was given a pile of engines from Mother Mopar for Nascar development in the late 60's.
Mainly hemi D5 and other hem related items plus the infamous and complete W1 engine that I have in the UK.
The carb was a 1969 'sandcast' Holley that now resides on Greg's wonderful 200mph car...

Some were returned to the USA when they went bust and a few remained behind for us Limey's to play with lol.
The smallblock T/A stuff, I lost track of in the 80's, but still own the 'W1 426 Weslake' as I call it...

These are the heads and intake I had 100 years ago? I remember having valves made for them. They also came with porting plates for the intake, which also featured some interesting internal modification.

[KurtfromLaQuinta]

Interesting history and pictures.
Thanks guys.

[aerolith]

That's right Tim!

The stock length valves you had made were a 'TAD short' for these heads.
They are still in the heads when I took those pictures, with small-block DC valve springs...
This restricted the cam to a 0.509 purple-shaft old DC grind, OK for street but not for big HP!

I ran them in the infamous 76 Dodge Aspen at the Pod, but with little Joy, (last century).
So a few months ago I got some longer valves made up from Ford/Chev blanks.

2.250 intakes and 1.80 exhausts.
I can now run a decent sized camshaft somewhere around 0.650 lift 'roller' probably.
Got some very trick Arias 13 to 1 pistons and some nice 'h-beam' rods too.
Hard to find the 'old school' parts now for 60's Mopar 'open chamber' race engines...

Hope to make around 600hp like they were projected to make, 'back in the day'...

These pics show the valves you had made, back in the 80's I guess?
As you can see they have been run at the 'POD' but not anywhere near their full potential YET!

I assume the extra 'water passages' were developed on these castings in the late 60's?
Only ever seen some very late '440 Motorhome' heads with this type of arrangement...

One might even go as far to say ''Smog heads'' from 68 onwards...

[aerolith]

You will have to educate 'me/us' on the Weslake short motor though.

I believe it had some very high compression 'pop-up' pistons when built?
You gave me some damaged ones with the purchase of the engine back in the 80's.

Then somewhere along the way some forged Sixpack pistons were fitted onto the shortened 'hemi rods'?
Basically a hemi 'bottom end' but in a 440 kinda set-up...

In the foreground is a 'full-length' hemi rod at 6.860.
Attached to the SP piston is a shortened 6.760 'hemi rod for the Weslake engine...

I bought a set of Grand National 7.061 hemi rods, but never got around to having the pistons made...
Just gonna run with the Arias pistons and later H beams, much cheaper set-up lol...

Why was the engine painted 'bright yellow', how gross lol

[aerolith]

Oh yes, for Folks who want to know why this unique engine is still in the UK?

Well back in the 80's Dick Landy got in touch with Tim and wanted to buy it.
But you then sold it to me, as I thought it should stay 'here in Kent' the home of Weslake Eng.!

Then in 1990 I was looking into buying a Daytona from Galen G. and thought the, the engine should go to over to Landy. (financial reasons)
But Galen then changed his mind and said ''no Limey is getting one of my Daytona's''...

But I still felt that the engine should return anyways, but Landy had a fire at his workshop and the Landy clan said I was ''taking advantage'' of the situation?
So all in all a 'bad day at the races', for all concerned...

Ten years plus roll past and I decided to 'fly over' and see the great man in person, Dick Landy himself, in the flesh.
I had arranged to meet him and discuss the sale, but again I got cold feet and didn't meet him.
I spoke to his son Robert on many occasions (over the years) but we never got a deal done.

Roll on another ten years and Don Garlits now wants the engine and my Charger 500 too!
He thinks its his old 'Crower Car' and wants to get them into his museum.

But (unfortunately for me) he wants them as a gift (on permanent loan) kinda deal...

So you guessed it, they are staying here in Limeyland, for the foreseeable future.

Money talks and long term loans, err walk lol...

[aerolith]

Did I tell you the story of when I loaned my 69 Charger R/T (LFN 7) to a Moparmate?

Well, lets just say this, IT ENDED VERY BADLY, for all concerned.

I lost my Charger and he lost his business...

But what I miss most of all, is his, FRIENDSHIP...Lost forever...

Great story on this site, the Wendall Charger, loaned for a race day!

[TiMopar]

There was a reason that block was yellow, but I won't bore everyone by relating it here. I asked Larry Sheppard about the Weslake heads during his 'seminar' at the 84 Nats in Indy and he refused to speak about them... To add, there are pictures of some closed chamber version Weslake heads in an ancient 'High Performance Mopar Engines' book. I'll see if I can find it.

[KurtfromLaQuinta]

Oh yes, for Folks who want to know why this unique engine is still in the UK?

Well back in the 80's Dick Landy got in touch with Tim and wanted to buy it.
But you then sold it to me, as I thought it should stay 'here in Kent' the home of Weslake Eng.!

Then in 1990 I was looking into buying a Daytona from Galen G. and thought the, the engine should go to over to Landy. (financial reasons)
But Galen then changed his mind and said ''no Limey is getting one of my Daytona's''...

But I still felt that the engine should return anyways, but Landy had a fire at his workshop and the Landy clan said I was ''taking advantage'' of the situation?
So all in all a 'bad day at the races', for all concerned...

Ten years plus roll past and I decided to 'fly over' and see the great man in person, Dick Landy himself, in the flesh.
I had arranged to meet him and discuss the sale, but again I got cold feet and didn't meet him.
I spoke to his son Robert on many occasions (over the years) but we never got a deal done.

Roll on another ten years and Don Garlits now wants the engine and my Charger 500 too!
He thinks its his old 'Crower Car' and wants to get them into his museum.

But (unfortunately for me) he wants them as a gift (on permanent loan) kinda deal...

So you guessed it, they are staying here in Limeyland, for the foreseeable future.

Money talks and long term loans, err walk lol...

I've met Dick Landy on a few different occasions.
The first time was '91 when I took my 440 up to his shop to have it built. He walked in the "waiting room" of his shop. He did a double take look back at my Power Wagon sitting out in front and asked me "Is that yours?" We had a short talk. And then, from that point on, I had to deal with his son Robert and his brother Mike. Robert was an arrogant A Hole. Mike yelled at me, when after sitting in the "waiting room" for almost 45 minutes, I wandered around the back of the shop to find out what was going on. He said "You don't belong back here. Go back inside!" Thanks guys. I'll never deal with that kind of engine builder again.
I ran into Dick Landy at a couple of different Spring Flings in Van Nuys, California before he passed away. He was always friendly to me. And would make the comment "I saw your Power Wagon today."

[aerolith]

Very sad story Kurt,

I saw many famous faces at the Van Nuys 'Spring Fling' too lol...
It was the highlight of my year, all during the 2000's, escaping British rain and walking through 'fields of Mopars' in the Spring Valley sun!
My biggest fascination was the 'swapmeet', so many wonderful trinkets of Mopar magic and only so much 'you can carry'...

I saw 'lots of Wingcars' but No Charger 500's ever...

I suppose guys like Landy had 'huge reputations' and ordinary folks were, 'not on his radar'!

Robert was some kind of 'Gateman and Engineer' for his dad and brother.
Having spoke to him and only him, Robert was my 'only gauge' on the Landy family, (difficult at best).

But on my last trip to the Spring Fling, Robert had resolved many family issues after his fathers death!

It must of been hard for him to 'live in such a huge shadow'...

He had piles of stuff from the workshop and some pretty scary prices for 'run of the mill' items!
They lived under the 'Flag of Mopar' for many years, basking in its glory!
By the end of the Century, Mother Mopar was waning and all the Stars were 'getting dim'...

But for some of us, the 'memories live on' in true wonder of their acheivements...

It was all 'black and white' back then...

[aerolith]

I met some guys out in Vegas, they had taken over the Landy Shop.

They wanted to know if there were any Mopars in the UK?
Their aim was to promote themselves 'all over Europe'...

I told them ''we all drive Japanese electric cars and don't eat meat''...

To which they replied, ''Wow we didn't know it was that bad over there''...

All joking aside, they offered me a contract to sell merchandise for them in the UK.


They also tempted me with a 68 hemi engine (out of one the actual race cars) for my Charger 500...(30,0000, cheap I thought)?

But I had already bought one from my good friend Julius at a special price...

[aerolith]

Way off track now, so back to Nascar and the little engine that ROARED!

10,000rpm and 305 cubes, can it be real?

I can build an engine, but building a Daytona is a tall order indeed?
Had a few chances to buy a 'done car' but money was always tight for me...

I got enough saved for a puzzle at $22...

Saving up for the Carrera model next...

[KurtfromLaQuinta]

Way off track now, so back to Nascar and the little engine that ROARED!

10,000rpm and 305 cubes, can it be real?

I can build an engine, but building a Daytona is a tall order indeed?
Had a few chances to buy a 'done car' but money was always tight for me...

I got enough saved for a puzzle at $22...

Saving up for the Carrera model next...

Cool. They made a display out of that car!