55 replies to this topic

[Jhope]

well, i read a little bit about it, now discuss! (sorry for the command)

[Don Capps]

For starters, if it wasn't the first turbocharged (or as it was done in those days "turbo-supercharged") engine in racing it was certainly among the first and certainly the first to gain some attention - which gaining the pole at Indy tends to do. The turbo actually was the reason for the retirement if I recall. They didn't have many ideas of how to get the best from the turbo under racing conditions and some debris got sucked into the turbo because of the inlet location and it was "See 'ya..." That it was also in a new Roadster didn't hurt.

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Yr fthfl & hmbl srvnt,

Don Capps

Semper Gumbi: If this was easy, we’d have the solution already…

[buddyt]

There was more than one Cummins diesel indy racer. We all know about the one in 1952 that Fred Agabashian drove (It's a new track record, as PA anouncer would say). There was also one in the 1931 Indy 500 for Dave Evans that finished 13th by completing the 500 miles with out a stop, at an average of 86 mph. The car also lapped Brooklands in the summer of 1932.

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"Speed cost money, how fast do you want to go?"

[Don Capps]

Good going, Buddy! I couldn't remember the year, but remember reading about Evans driving the race nonstop. It is interesting to behold what made the grids back then on either side of the Atlantic...

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Yr fthfl & hmbl srvnt,

Don Capps

Semper Gumbi: If this was easy, we’d have the solution already…

[Jhope]

It retired from the 52 indy 500 because debri and and tire marbles would stick to the turbo charger. After the 52 500, there were rules set that were there to diminish the performance of turbo deisel cars. This was the last time the a deisel car raced at Indy because they would be virtualy un-competitive.

[Huw Jenjin]

Are diesels eligible for any of the current top formulae that require fuel stops?
I am just trying to pre empt Ross Brawns next strategy..........

[Marco94]

Huw,

Take a look at http://www.fia.com/h...election-a.html and go down to article 19. You will see Ross Brawn will not have any fuel tricks up his sleve.

Marco.

[Marco94]

Don't you just love web-sites with frames. Follow the link to Sporting & Technical regulations and then the tech reg of F1.

Marco.

[ghinzani]

I recall a great article on the cars around 25 years ago, in of all places Truck magazine, THE best lorry magazine there ever was. Wonder how a big cam 290 cummins from the 70's would go at Indy....

[ZOOOM]

Cummins commissioned a one off rear drive Kurtis chassis for 1952 and put in one of their stock block truck engines. The engine was allowed through a loophole in the rules. The engine was turbocharged when used in the city busses that it was designed for and it was a very heavy engine. The car was georgious!
The team never ran a full top speed lap during practise and the car was a sleeper during qualies. Freddie was finally allowed to put four laps together during qualification and shocked the racing community.
There was a video around for some time that showed the actual run back in '52 with Freddie up. The car was so heavy that he smoked the right front tire through every corner. When he was through with the four laps and pulled in, the mechanics were afraid to approach the car because the right front tire was almost on fire.

The car took a long time to get up to racing speed (because the rev range was so narrow and it didn't develope horsepower until fully wound up) and it immediately fell back at the start. It retired fairly soon and was put out because they had positioned the air intake too close to the bottom of the car where it picked up debris. The engine was probably the very first "laydown" engine at Indy. It was installed on it's side.

There have been persistant rumors that the actual cause of the retirement was abroken crankshaft, backed up because the car was never run again after the race. Cummins of course denied this.

It was the first race car I ever fell in love with. Back in the day you could buy bubble gum that had cardboard pictures of race cars. The first one I ever got was the Cummins Diesel....
Man I wish I had kept it!

ZOOOM

[fines]

Originally posted by ZOOOM
The engine was allowed through a loophole in the rules.

What was the loophole?

[HDonaldCapps]

Originally posted by fines
What was the loophole?

I believe he is referring to the changes that the Contest Board made in the technical specifications which would allow the Diesel to participate.

[ZOOOM]

IIRC the engine formula (for '51) was for 366 CU. In. engines as stock blocks. Cummins lobbied Shaw to allow something bigger as they needed 401 to qualify the new diesel. Shaw agreed and put it through not really realizing what it would do. When Cummins showed up with the car for inspection in '52 the contest board wouldn't allow it. Shaw had to interviene and allow it. The rule got changed back for 1953.

Geez, I hope I remenbered it right!
ZOOOM

[Doug Nye]

A wonderful full-colour movie shot at the time tells the Freddie Agabashian Cummins Diesel Indycar story on one of the Volumes of 'Motorfilms Quarterly'. Check through them on <www.motorfilms.com>. All Volumes are available.

DCN

[Catalina Park]

And the Cummins movie is one of the best things in the whole Motorfilms series! Fantastic work Doug, thanks for bringing us that gem.

[Henri Greuter]

Originally posted by HDonaldCapps


I believe he is referring to the changes that the Contest Board made in the technical specifications which would allow the Diesel to participate.

Don,

In an earlier post within this thread you mentioned that the Cummins wasn't the first turbocharged race car.
I also believe that somewhere on a local dirttrack or anywhere else someone may have tried his luck with a turbocharger already.

Hae you heard of any pre 1952 turbo car?


Other than that, I have used the quote on other occasions. But in 1988 I had the pleasure to meet Freddie Agabashian. He told me about the turbo lag on the car and how he knew that at the start he was a sitting duck. He then kind of joked to me and said: "I knew that Jack McGrath on the outside of the front row would be faster, Andy Linden in that supercharged Offy would be faster too and since my car was so low, Duke Nalon in that develish Novi right behind me would probably drive right over me!"

Another funny anecdote on the car: it was involved in one of the funniest mess-ups ever in advertising within the Indy500 programs.
The 1953 program features an advertisement of Champion spark plugs. But the car in the ad in the 1952 Cummins: the only car entered that year which didn't have a single spark plug to begin with!!!

Henri

[Dutchy]

In 1925 Major Frank Halford experimented with an exhaust driven turbocharger on his Halford Special

[fines]

Good call on the Halford, a largely overlooked "curiosity"!

My question about the "loophole" was an honest one: while I can understand that people think that Mercedes-Benz discovered a loophole in 1994 in designing a sophisticated racing engine for a low-buck stock block formula, there was nothing "left-handed" about building a Diesel engine for a Diesel formula!

Originally posted by ZOOOM
IIRC the engine formula (for '51) was for 366 CU. In. engines as stock blocks. Cummins lobbied Shaw to allow something bigger as they needed 401 to qualify the new diesel. Shaw agreed and put it through not really realizing what it would do. When Cummins showed up with the car for inspection in '52 the contest board wouldn't allow it. Shaw had to interviene and allow it. The rule got changed back for 1953.

Geez, I hope I remenbered it right!
ZOOOM

For starters, there was no engine formula for stock blocks in the fifties, not at 366 cu. in. nor any other capacity. The Diesel formula, however, had existed for years already, and needed no lobbying on Cummins's part. And there was certainly and absolutely no controversy at all about the car taking part, in fact a very similar car with an almost identical engine had participated in the Indy 500 only two years previously. Also, Shaw didn't have the power to intervene in Contest Board decisions, he wasn't even a member, iirc. The Diesel engine specifications weren't changed "back" at all, and anyway not in 1953, but a year later; also the capacity limit wasn't just lowered, but in effect simplified: before, there were two limits, one for two-stroke and one for four-stroke engines, the former was raised by about 60 cu. in., the latter reduced by a similar amount.

Else, you remembered it right!;)

[ZOOOM]

Well.... let me see.... I got one out of three right.... that's .333 batting average.
Should qualify me for a bonus, don't you think?

Thanks for straghtening me out Mike!

I found a magazine article from "Diesel Age" or something like that, from that time period. In it they say that Cummins had created all the publicity they thought they could handle with the '52 car. Management deceided that they had probably pi$$ed off enough of the "establishment" at Indy and didn't wish to enter the car again. They were afraid that the capacity of the engines would be reduced if they tried to enter again, so they just stopped...

ZOOOM

[McGuire]

Originally posted by ZOOOM

The car took a long time to get up to racing speed (because the rev range was so narrow and it didn't develope horsepower until fully wound up) and it immediately fell back at the start. It retired fairly soon and was put out because they had positioned the air intake too close to the bottom of the car where it picked up debris. The engine was probably the very first "laydown" engine at Indy. It was installed on it's side.

There have been persistant rumors that the actual cause of the retirement was abroken crankshaft, backed up because the car was never run again after the race. Cummins of course denied this.

It was the first race car I ever fell in love with. Back in the day you could buy bubble gum that had cardboard pictures of race cars. The first one I ever got was the Cummins Diesel....
Man I wish I had kept it!

ZOOOM

Never heard that one but one tale the old timers tell... the clogged intake was a cover story for the actual problem, which that the diesel roadster was simply too heavy (3150 lbs) and thus too hard on the tires. By all reports the tires barely held up through four qualifying laps. So on race day they ran it long and hard enough to put up a respectable showing and then parked it rather than risk Cummins' PR and Agabashian's neck any further. Or so the story goes.

Though it comes from reliable sources, I have no idea if the story is true. It does make sense from this angle: it would be a simple matter to redesign the air intake and come back next year to back up the incredible qualifying performance. But there is no fix for the weight problem.

EDIT: It is a part of Cummins lore that company founder Clessie Cummins served on Ray Harroun's pit crew in the 1911 Indy 500.

[fines]

Originally posted by ZOOOM
The engine was probably the very first "laydown" engine at Indy. It was installed on it's side.

The engine of the 1938 rear-engined Miller was a laydown - the first?

[ZOOOM]

I saw the movies of the qualifing run and they wern't pretty. Freddie smoked the right front on every turn.
When he got back to the pits the tire was a shambles.

The original and oft repeated story for the failure was the old turbocharger intake problem.
I remember reading somewhere that the actual reason was that the crankshaft broke.
The car came into the pits trailing smoke for the last lap. How a blocked intake could cause that (maybe running rich on the diesel fuel????) I do not know.

The diesel age story quoted management in saying that they did not come back because they fealt that the rules would be changed to lower the engine capacity and returning with a smaller engine in the car, that they fealt would not qualify as well, would hurt the reputation of Cummins.

ZOOOM

[McGuire]

Originally posted by fines

The engine of the 1938 rear-engined Miller was a laydown - the first?

I would have to think so; nothing earlier comes to mind. However, the Miller was a 45-degree layover while the Cummins was laid right on its side, like a pancake bus engine.

[ZOOOM]

Originally posted by McGuire

like a pancake bus engine.

Which it was...
ZOOOM

[McGuire]

Originally posted by ZOOOM


Which it was...
ZOOOM

Sure. In those days many truck engines, gas and diesel, were offered in both vertical and laydown aka pancake versions, the latter for bus, package car, and marine applications. Probably the most common was the horizontal version of the Detroit 6-71 (6N-71) which powered a zillion buses.

[Tony Matthews]

Originally posted by fines
Good call on the Halford, a largely overlooked "curiosity"!

My question about the "loophole" was an honest one: while I can understand that people think that Mercedes-Benz discovered a loophole in 1994 in designing a sophisticated racing engine for a low-buck stock block formula, there was nothing "left-handed" about building a Diesel engine for a Diesel formula!

For starters, there was no engine formula for stock blocks in the fifties, not at 366 cu. in. nor any other capacity. The Diesel formula, however, had existed for years already, and needed no lobbying on Cummins's part. And there was certainly and absolutely no controversy at all about the car taking part, in fact a very similar car with an almost identical engine had participated in the Indy 500 only two years previously. Also, Shaw didn't have the power to intervene in Contest Board decisions, he wasn't even a member, iirc. The Diesel engine specifications weren't changed "back" at all, and anyway not in 1953, but a year later; also the capacity limit wasn't just lowered, but in effect simplified: before, there were two limits, one for two-stroke and one for four-stroke engines, the former was raised by about 60 cu. in., the latter reduced by a similar amount.

Else, you remembered it right!;)

If I may butt in here gentlemen, it was not Mercedes-Benz that saw the loop-hole but Mario Illien, who noticed that the regs for '94 allowed engines of a previously 'stock' formula to use purpose-built blocks. The engine was designed and built in great secrecy, all the while in the hope that no-one else had cottened on. It was even designated 265E rather than 340A, and drawings for valves were titled 'Penske South' i.e NASCAR
as the exeptional size was a give-away. Only later were MB persuaded to put their name to the project. Back to diesels....

[Henri Greuter]

Originally posted by Dutchy
In 1925 Major Frank Halford experimented with an exhaust driven turbocharger on his Halford Special

I admit: new to me.

Henri

[Catalina Park]

Originally posted by ZOOOM
I saw the movies of the qualifing run and they wern't pretty. Freddie smoked the right front on every turn.
When he got back to the pits the tire was a shambles.

The original and oft repeated story for the failure was the old turbocharger intake problem.
I remember reading somewhere that the actual reason was that the crankshaft broke.
The car came into the pits trailing smoke for the last lap. How a blocked intake could cause that (maybe running rich on the diesel fuel????) I do not know.

The diesel age story quoted management in saying that they did not come back because they fealt that the rules would be changed to lower the engine capacity and returning with a smaller engine in the car, that they fealt would not qualify as well, would hurt the reputation of Cummins.

ZOOOM

When a turbocharged diesel has to run without boost it will blow a lot of smoke. It will still get the full amount of fuel but only a small part of the air that it normally uses.

I once had a hose blow off a turbo on a truck motor, it ran like a dog and blew a heap of smoke but it got me home. Re-fitted the hose and it was as good as new!

[McGuire]

Originally posted by Tony Matthews


If I may butt in here gentlemen, it was not Mercedes-Benz that saw the loop-hole but Mario Illien, who noticed that the regs for '94 allowed engines of a previously 'stock' formula to use purpose-built blocks. The engine was designed and built in great secrecy, all the while in the hope that no-one else had cottened on. It was even designated 265E rather than 340A, and drawings for valves were titled 'Penske South' i.e NASCAR
as the exeptional size was a give-away. Only later were MB persuaded to put their name to the project. Back to diesels....

Ilmor pitched the pushrod engine to Chevrolet as early as 1989 but it made no sense from the GM perspective. Note that as soon as Ilmor and Chevrolet went their separate ways for 1994, Ilmor went ahead with the program.

[vashlin]

Just wanted to say I am enjoying this thread. Cummins Engine Co. has been paying many of the bills in the Carlson household for 30 years now. Cummins is not the first engine manufacturer that springs to mind when most people think of racing engines. Nice to read about some of the history which I know Mr. C. is more aware of than I am. He is a CQA (Customer Quality Assurance) rep, BTW. Will have to show him this when he gets home from guess where?

LinC

[Russ Snyder]

A little more on the 1931 entry and 1931 race

Qualified at the lowest speed 96.87 and started 17th finishing 13th. 4 cyl with a displacement of 361! The largest displacement of all entries. Dave Evans was indeed the first driver to do 500 miles non stop.

Many accidents held the winner, Lou Schnieder, to 96.62 mph.

Wilbur Shaw, driving relief of for Phil Pardee, went over the NE wall and Feddy Winnai went over a feet further on the north chute avoiding Wilbur. Both they and their mechanics were ok. A rarity in the day when going over the wall meant bad injuries or death. Shaw even came back for relief later on. Billy Arnold had the race in his pocket till he crashed on lap 167 with a broken axle (common breakdown during those times)

[Russ Snyder]

Dave Evans returned with the diesel at the 1934 Indy qualifying at 102.414. Started 22 finished 19th out at 81 laps due to transmission.

[Catalina Park]

Originally posted by vashlin
Just wanted to say I am enjoying this thread. Cummins Engine Co. has been paying many of the bills in the Carlson household for 30 years now. Cummins is not the first engine manufacturer that springs to mind when most people think of racing engines. Nice to read about some of the history which I know Mr. C. is more aware of than I am. He is a CQA (Customer Quality Assurance) rep, BTW. Will have to show him this when he gets home from guess where?

LinC

You have got to see the Cummins movie on the 'Motorfilms Quarterly' DVD. It is fantastic.

[vashlin]

Would love to purchase this as a surprise Christmas present. Can't seem to locate it on the site.

Can anyone tell me what DVD title is?

Thanks.

LinC

[Catalina Park]

Originally posted by vashlin
Would love to purchase this as a surprise Christmas present. Can't seem to locate it on the site.

Can anyone tell me what DVD title is?

Thanks.

LinC

It is volume 11.
http://www.motorfilm...deos.php?id=104

[kris-kincaid]

The Wikipedia has a photo of the '50 Indy ride. Pretty cool how the valve cover fits right into the hood scoop
(edited the year)

[fines]

This is the 1950 car, not the '52 one!;)

[kris-kincaid]

Thanks fines, I edited it.

Here's more info on the Cummins Indy effort along with photos, including the '52 model ;) http://www.dieselpow...ce_c/index.html

[vashlin]

Originally posted by Catalina Park
It is volume 11.
http://www.motorfilm...deos.php?id=104

Thank you for the link! Just ordered it this morning.

Gary claims the 1952 car was on display at JEP, Jamestown, (NY) engine plant, a few years ago though I have no memory of seeing it. Would have taken pictures if I had.

LinC

[ZOOOM]

Kris... That picture looks perfect except for the tires. The car is as I remember it. Those tires tho!
We know the beast nearly shreaded the tires on the qualifing attempt, but I don't see how it could have uaed THOSE tires. And IIRC the Diesel used disc wheels for the race....
Those must have been something they had around during construction to get her off the floor!
ZOOOM

[B Squared]

photos: B2 Design

While in search of other materials, I came across these shots of the 1952 Kurtis Cummins Diesel. Thought they may be of interest. These were taken 7-8 years ago.

Brian

[B Squared]

photo: B2 Design

Another angle, alot of fuel tank.

Brian

[ZOOOM]

That tank is interesting. Most tanks of that era were aluminum. Some of the prettiest were done by Wayne (fat boy ) Ewing. That doesn't look like aluminum. It looks like fibreglass. I didn't think fibreglass was used in '52.
Could the original tank have been replaced?
ZOOOM

[B Squared]

ZOOOM - That is a good question about the tank. At the time I was looking at so many new & different elements, that I didn't pay too much attention to the tank. I find it hard to believe that with all the outstanding fabricators in the Indianapolis area to this day, that the tank would be fibreglass. Possibly aluminum with black paint or a coating? Only speculating myself. Next time at the Speedway, I can nose around regarding this so it can be answered accurately.

[ZOOOM]

B........
What do you mean, the next time I get back there...
Where was the car? The Museum?
The pictures are not from the main floor!
Do you have access to the BASEMENT?
Can we all go with you?

ZOOOM

[B Squared]

ZOOOM - I have been in the basement three times, the last being about ten years ago. So I don't have alot of pull for a group tour--- these were taken in the shop area adjacent & north of the Goodyear building just west of the overpass on 16th St.. I love going to that track!

Brian

[McGuire]

I believe the fuel tank is sheet metal. The top photo shows a wrinkle at a 90 degree interior corner, and fiberglass doesn't wrinkle in that manner, of course.

[fines]

Ten years ago? Then Barney Wimmer must've been still alive - have you met him there, Brian?

[B Squared]

Michael, yes; Mr. Wimmer was still with us then. He & Mr. Spoerle have been good people to us for a number of years. Ask the right questions, sit back, listen, & learn.

McGuire - good eye on the wrinkle, I am in agreement.

Brian

[fines]

You can count yourself lucky, "Barney" was a legend! Did you know he was the great Jimmie Wilburn's chief mechanic, back in the forties? He and Bill Spoerle had the job most of us would probably kill for!