71 Harrell F/C anyone know of its whereabouts

[sYc]

Interesting!! When and where was this? And, do you know if the cars were ever built/sold?

[menmyfcs]

We were in West Palm Beach Fl. at the AHRA Grand American.
Early 71. I am pretty sure it was kit that Don Hardy made.
Dave Libby or Harry Kalwei may know. I will see them all soon and find out if they know. I saw a article on them a while back and will have to look for it.

[68l30]

Night and day difference...WOW thats a ton of HP..Thanks!

Steve

[68l30]

Is this a Harrell Vega? Dave, I know I showed you this pic before...July of 1971,Note the stripe and the Strippers,ET-1 class with a 12.70 dial interesting car...Thoughts???

Steve

[sYc]

Thanks Dale. Now we know where to look for DH vegas, Palm Beach.

I would say you are right about Hardy being involved. Not only was Don Dick's chassis builder, but during the '70s, Don was very big into V-8 Vega kits. Everything from headers to 5 lug spindles to motor mounts, whatever.

[Chevy454]

Dale:

I'm guessing there was a pretty big learning curve when the switch to Hemi power was made, in both the tuning and the driving departments. Was there a different driving technique required with the elephant, other than a little more "pucker" in the seat area? About what horsepower range were the top hemi nitro cars in back in the early days?? If I'm not mistaken, aren't they in the 8,000hp range today???

[menmyfcs]

I am not sure what they figure the power to be now. I think if enough people made aftermarket parts for the Chevy then as they do now it would have been around much longer. KB and Rodeck blocks dart heads etc. At the time we made the switch the clutch just as today was a problem to deal with.
There were things learned that the Chevy wanted like to put the rotors in the blower backwards to help the front cylinders from being lean that also became a help for the Hemi.At the time the Hemi made more power by mistake than you had from the Chevy when it was right on.The thing Pat Foster and I both noticed is the Donovans and Chevys would just kind of get quiet and slow down at a 1000'the 426 was just getting up to where it kept on pulling. Then again you look at the normally asperated engines and the Hemi wasnt that great unless it had nitro or a blower. Until it crashed about 2 years ago one of the baddest nostalgia top fuel cars was a small block Chevy. Modern technology.DP

[68TopStock]

Dave and Dale,

Have you seen the "Agent 1320" report that is in the December 1970 Super Stock and Drag Illustrated? It reports Dick was teasing the press by announcing plans to bring a "new" chevy hemi powered car to the Rockingham AHRA meet. They were "shocked" when he showed up with a Ramchargers hemi! Would this first (public) hemi installation have been in the 1970 car or the new 1971 mini? That year, Rockingham was the 3rd event (out of 10). Maybe this was a later race, at Rockingham. I'll try and post this notice monday.

[68TopStock]

Here is the "agent 1320" report from the December 1970 SuperStock & Drag Illustrated I mentioned above. Any comments?

[benesesso]

"The Clyde Morgan car had a Fletcher chassis. It was stolen and never seen again."

I can add something here (my first post, too!) Back in 1971 I was the co-owner of a 1971 Camaro AA/FC. How I got involved is a long story but I'll try to keep it short. I was working at a facility that rebuilt the hot section (turbine blades) of jet engines. We used plasma spray to protect certain areas, and I had the tops of the pistons sprayed--way back in early 1971. Those were 427 BBC slugs, and AA/FC and TF engines were going thru a lean/meltdown problem with the pistons-which could easily make all that nitro-laden 70 wt. Kendall turn into a napalm bomb.

Anyway, I somehow hooked up with a guy who apparently was a cousin of DH's crew chief or at least a crewmember (I don't know which). We ended up buying a complete AA/FC from DH for $5k-a real bargain back then. My two partners knew what I didn't--that the car was Clyde Morgans!

The story I finally got, after I found CM's name etched on either the alum. fuel tank or water tank and some other place, was that CM had been racing under DH's "group", with DH apparently footing some big $$$ bills. I was told that CM wasn't doing a good job of maintaining the car, and after CM took it to his home in CA DH sent his crew out there in the Quaker State semi to get it-apparently to settle up on the $$$ issues. The crew waited nearly all weekend for CM to leave his house, which he did late on Sunday nite (IIRC). The crew broke into his garage and had the car inside the semi in about 2 minutes, and then headed back to the midwest.

DH had his crew deliver the car to us in northern NJ. While dumb me wanted to check it over and go racing and license-getting, my partners had other ideas. We took that car completely apart and sandblasted the beautiful candy-apple red frame down to bare metal, then painted it orange. I couldn't get a straight answer on why all this was necessary.



Here are some photos-To be continued!