[Bill Eveland]

Jack, interesting that a hill climber was prepared by John Zink. I knew he did nascar in 57 as well but never knew about the hill climber deal. I wonder if he used a similar engine set up to the nascar cars?

Here's was some info on the John Zink specials

http://starchief57.tripod.com/articles.htm#zin



.

Originally Posted by pontiac jack

Just read coverage of the 1958 Pikes Peak Hill Climb (36th annual running!). The picture is of Bob Korf taking second place in stock class with his '57 Pontiac. Stock class was won by Nick Sanborn Jr. in his '58 Pontiac. They beat out all three of the 348-powered cars entered by Chevrolet!

The caption under a "champ" car picture: "Potent Pontiac V8 powered the John Zink entry driven by Louie Unser. Car was hard to control but flew down the straighaways." Louie did have the quickest qualifying time, but finished fourth in the race.

[Scott M]

Dale Pulde, who teamed up with M/T much later as a driver, told me that Mickey was a businessman, pure and simple. He had no allegiance to Pontiac or anything else but the almighty dollar.

If some other car company had offered Mickey more money in the late 50s-early 60s, he'd have taken their deal in a heartbeat. Just so happens Pontiac had the bigger checkbook at the time.

At least that's how I heard it.

[Jack Gifford]

Originally Posted by Scott M

... If some other car company had offered Mickey more money in the late 50s-early 60s, he'd have taken their deal in a heartbeat...

I believe that's quite a crass over-simplification. No argument about Mickey being a businessman; but that simple statement ignores the fact that he was the "ultimate hotrodder", an impressive innovator, and truly loved motorsports [example: a magazine photo from about 1961 shows a spectator (Mickey Thompson) ripping his T-shirt off and tossing it to a driver to use to dry his distributor cap after drowning the engine in an off-road event water crossing!]. Another thing you're ignoring (since you weren't into hotrodding back then, I assume?) is that no engine was more desirable than the Pontiac V8 in those years. Mickey used the potential of that great engine design to good advantage- by 1964 he held 146 national/international speed records (if I counted right), all but a couple of them with Pontiac power.

[Jack Gifford]

Just a little bit more info from the Pikes Peak article:

Dennie Moore buiilt that Pontiac-powered champ car, and he and John Zink built the engine. It was 360 c.i. (limit was 366 c.i. for modified production engines) and was dyno'd at 380 HP on alcohol.

The stock-class winning '58 Pontiac used a single 4-bbl.

The Unsers were out in force- brothers Louie, Jerry, and Bobby were all driving, and Jerry Sr. (their father) was wrenching on some cars.

Total purse was $22,500- in 1958 dollars- wow!

[Keith Seymore]

From the Chevy Truck site:

[6T5 Cat]

Originally Posted by Keith Seymore

From the Chevy Truck site:

Nashville, TN . 1960s. Nashville speedway.

Jimmy Griggs 709, Herb Lewis 707, and Crash Bond 42. Great racing back in the day. Mostly Hilborn fuel injected, roller crammed 327 Chevy small blocks the in light bodies, absolute rockets.

[Scott M]

Originally Posted by pontiac jack

I believe that's quite a crass over-simplification. No argument about Mickey being a businessman; but that simple statement ignores the fact that he was the "ultimate hotrodder", an impressive innovator, and truly loved motorsports [example: a magazine photo from about 1961 shows a spectator (Mickey Thompson) ripping his T-shirt off and tossing it to a driver to use to dry his distributor cap after drowning the engine in an off-road event water crossing!]. Another thing you're ignoring (since you weren't into hotrodding back then, I assume?) is that no engine was more desirable than the Pontiac V8 in those years. Mickey used the potential of that great engine design to good advantage- by 1964 he held 146 national/international speed records (if I counted right), all but a couple of them with Pontiac power.

Jack:

Crass or not, please don't shoot the messenger. I'm only telling you what Pulde told me. Of course, this may be Dale's take on things as he knew M/T in the late 60s, early 70s versus the time frame of which you speak.

And to be candid, I believe the term Dale used was "a money whore."

[Jack Gifford]

1958 Photos. Do you suppose:

1) That this is Ohio George?

2) That Ed Garlits is related to Don Garlits? This event was in Sebring, Florida. Don was one of the first to copy (I think in '58) the very recently developed "slingshot" chassis of the west coast.

[1971WARBIRD]

Originally Posted by pontiac jack

1958 Photos. Do you suppose:

1) That this is Ohio George?

more than likely.a few years back we were changing out the gear in my 73 TA.when we went to pick them up from Super Shops we were informed they messed up and didn't have what they said.since my friend was driving over 100 miles to set up the gears the search began.found a little speed shop that said sure i got a set.as i was paying for the gears i looked down a hall into the back of the shop and wow
"is that what i think it is?"
"what do you think it is"
"a 429 super cobra jet"
after that we talked for an hour or so.told me how Ford dropped off a semi of parts at his place when they got out of racing,how he now builds V6's for one of the Nascar series.great guy to talk to,could have spent days just listening to the stories.it was in the late 90's but he still had a shop in Huber Heights just northwest of Dayton Ohio.

[GonicGM]

Originally Posted by pontiac jack

1958 Photos. Do you suppose:

1) That this is Ohio George?

2) That Ed Garlits is related to Don Garlits? This event was in Sebring, Florida. Don was one of the first to copy (I think in '58) the very recently developed "slingshot" chassis of the west coast.

2) It's hard to tell from resolution but he certainly bears resemblance to Don, even the smile.

[Jack Gifford]

Originally Posted by Bill Eveland

... I wonder if he used a similar engine set up to the nascar cars?...

The article I quoted didn't have any more details about the Zink "champ" car or engine.

Thanks for the link- interesting stuff. I wish I could read the casting number of the head of that "late '56 Tri-Power" engine.