Harmon and Collins

[all american boy]

Thanks Pete. i just had to get the MEL thing out.


'> Not necessarily. I have run them on the street several times.
Kept redline at 6500 on those.'


Did you ever lighten valves or lighten rocker arms?


How about boring for big pistons? Stroker crankshaft? Milling heads?


We got serious in the 80's and that stuff was not very popular.

[Pete]

...

[all american boy]

'No rocker arms in a flathead'


No OHV V8 Ford (Y Block)? Interesting engines.


Flatheads with factory OHV conversion.


'shaft type aluminum rockers'


Had a set in the 70's.Stuck with factory racing parts in the 80's.


Hot Rod books bad mouthed the aluminum rockers of that era.


'Milling heads on an OHV engine is usually just to true them up'


Yep.That was the word in the 80's.


Thanks.

[40 Deluxe]

Originally Posted by all american boy

'They have a 2 inch single plane radius on the face and a slot in the side to mate with a guide key inserted in the lifter bore.'


Sounds like something for the 'tear down engine' crowd.


Guess that includes us now.


If we are going to have easy access to engine in tube frame I guess we will



have to 'walk the walk'.


Ran across another possible idea


Drill small hole straight down the middle through through the lifter.


It lets the lifter and cam lobes get more oil.


Sounds good so far.

Lifters with an oil hole in the face have been on the market for years!

[all american boy]

'Lifters with an oil hole in the face have been on the market for years!'


Well.That option is 'off the table' now.


Pete just said it is better to improve oiling through the camshaft itself.


He certainly sounds like he knows what he is talking about.


About this Harmon & Collins.


Guess the one guy knew cams and the other one ignitions.Maybe.


Coming up with that dual point/dual coil sure was sharp.


That is what MSD is based on.


They made a whole business out of it.


That is like the dry lakes guy who came up with the fuel injection and patented it.


When the patent expired GM came out with the '57 fuel injection based on his work.


That's the kind of hot rodding that rings our bell.


Think about what is going on and innovate or at least try it.

[Pete]

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...

[all american boy]

'Ford tried it on the model A engine but soon gave it up'


Well.This Vizard guy recommends doing it.


https://www.enginebuildermag.com/200...ifter-failure/


It's down near the end of article.He does keep talking about Chevies.


Maybe it works with them.


I think it's a 'You're results may vary.' situation.

[40 Deluxe]

Originally Posted by 40 Deluxe

Lifters with an oil hole in the face have been on the market for years!

These are made by Comp Cams, part #800-16. They have a .012" hole in the base. Comp says "the added oil capacity creates a boundary layer that protects both lifter face and cam lobe from excessive wear."

[badassfrombadaxe]

I made a digital model of a Packard/Rolls-Royce camshaft for a Merlin V-12 from a drawing supplied by John Fall Of Quinn, Ireland for him the members of GrabCAD. I made it in SolidWorks and then 3Dprinted it to check on any place that was too thin or detailed for i.materialise in the scale I needed to cutback to fit their maximum dimension. It has figure eight lobes or concave it you will. I think it is ordinary for it's era but Vincent did design a roller camshaft for experimental purposes. Now then in automotive I ordered a Iskenderian 555 Polydyne 5-cycle gear driven for a 1962 Chevrolet short block with Rev-Kit. Yup! the lobes on that one were concave in 1964. 410 Edsel? It's alka-selzering and I hate to tell the kid he probably needs a new head gasket, maybe a head?, or even with block erosion something better than PlasticSteel. Try not to treat your V-8 like a diesel and leave it idling after a high speed run.

[all american boy]

'It's alka-selzering and I hate to tell the kid he probably needs a new head gasket, maybe a head?, or even with block erosion something better than PlasticSteel. Try not to treat your V-8 like a diesel and leave it idling after a high speed run.'


That is what I always heard.Alky fuel eats up combustion chamber.


Sounds like fun at first.Change jets and add alky and nitro and Voila!


The car goes faster and makes more power.


We will STILL keep away from it.

[40 Deluxe]

Originally Posted by all american boy

'It's alka-selzering and I hate to tell the kid he probably needs a new head gasket, maybe a head?, or even with block erosion something better than PlasticSteel. Try not to treat your V-8 like a diesel and leave it idling after a high speed run.'


That is what I always heard.Alky fuel eats up combustion chamber.


Sounds like fun at first.Change jets and add alky and nitro and Voila!


The car goes faster and makes more power.


We will STILL keep away from it.

I took 'alka-selzering' to mean it was foaming in the radiator from the blown gasket.

[all american boy]

'I took 'alka-selzering' to mean it was foaming in the radiator from the blown gasket'


Probably.His talk about dragster got me thinking alky alcohol fuel.


Thought alka-seltering was piston top foaming and dissolving from fuel.


Harmon and Collins.


They knew their stuff that is for sure!


Engineers gone racing! Distributors and cams.Yep.They make a big



difference.


Think we will pay a little more attention when we're building engines and everything else in the future.

[blucar]

Stumbled upon this thread because of the Harmon-Collins heading. Interesting reading.
I have a '36 Ford coupe that I have owned since 1952, it has a well built 59AB engine with all of the good stuff from the early '50's including a H.C. dual coil/point ignition which has never given me any problems.
Paul Schiefferer was a personal friend, his wife Pati was my late wives best friend. After Paul passed away in the early '70's from cancer the '56 T-Bird which he raced for many years fell on hard times. The car was actually his wife's having been bought for her 21'st birthday.
I ended up buying the car from Pati in the early '80's, it had sat in her garage for many years. I still own the '56.

[all american boy]

Those are 'good pieces ' as we used to say.


You did good leaving the '36 'hopped up' or 'souped up'.


Not tossing the old old hot rod parts and restoring it.


You would be amazed at what some people do it in 'Hot Rod world'.


If you want a fast car today, built a tube frame car and leave whatever old



car you find the way it is!

[all american boy]

You are spelling that Paul Schiefferer.


Is that the Schiefer clutch guy or somebody else?


What all has been done to the '56 T bird?


I saw a T bird like that with a 429 stuffed in it once for drag racing.


Might have been some kind of 428 or 460.It's been awhile.

[blucar]

Paul Schieffer (not sure about the spelling) was the clutch etc. guy. Schiefer (sp) had his hand in a lot of speed equipment, cams, clutches, etc.
The 56 T-bird was dead stock, being his wife, Patti, daily car for many years until it had 113k on it and was getting very tired. Paul re-powered it with 302 and a C-4 tran's that he got from Ford's racing team.. Paul put a Paxton blower on the engine, it ran like a rocket ship.
The exterior was modified, removing the spare tire, putting a front bumper on the rear, Hurst made up special mag wheels for the car and it was painted burgundy. Paul raced it in that form until he got sick, the Paxton was removed and the car was repainted colonial white. Patti got here tennis car back.
After Paul passed away one of his sons got hold of the car, he repainted it British Racing Green, put the Paxton back on it and returned to racing the car.
Sometime in the mid 70's the car was again de-tuned and re-painted colonial white.
When I got hold of the car it was in pretty sad shape, most of the repairs were of poor quality, Patti asked me if I would repair the car for her so she could drive it again.
I corrected all of the issues the car had using NOS Ford parts, however, I could not bring myself to remove the power-train, the car ran so much better that a Y block. I also did not put the external spare back on the car, the lines being much cleaner.

When I had the car all fixed, Patti decided she could live without the Bird, she gave it to me. As a favor to her I left her name on the title, adding mine. I eventually had an original interior put in the car and repainted it the original red, which was the color it was before Patti took delivery of the car in 1956.

[blucar]

The correct spelling of Paul Schiefer (Schieffer) name was bugging me so I dug into my old files on the '56 Bird.. The name on the title is/was Patti Schiefer.

I forgot to mention in my earlier posting that the car has a very unusual re-enforced frame, 5/8" steel bar the entire length of the frame, and HD suspension. When I had the car inspected for insurance purposes I was told the car had an export chassis, which was offered in '55 but not '56.. Reputedly Ford used up the '55 export chassis by randomly feeding them into production on the '56 cars.

[all american boy]

That makes me think of Schroeder of Schroeder torsion bars.


Had one good talk with him on phone and then 'poof'.


Next couple of calls no Schroeder.


Would have done torsion bars with him in our corner but we pulled the plug on the whole thing.


You get spoiled in Southern California being able to stop by or call on the phone and get pretty darn good info.


Have fun with the '36 and T bird!

[dmsfrr]

Originally Posted by blucar

... I forgot to mention in my earlier posting that the car (56 T-bird) has a very unusual re-enforced frame, 5/8" steel bar the entire length of the frame, and HD suspension. ...

Did the frame reinforcing look anything like these photos?

With the addition of the Continental style spare tire on the back bumper of '56 T-Birds Ford reinforced the existing frames with these add-on pieces for a first part of the model year.
Sometime in mid model year '56 a redesigned beefier frame was used.

For racing purposes most anything else could have been done by the previous owners.