Rare parts in unexpected places

[MJN]

Our local area car club was founded in the late 50's and started off with a small group of guys and a hopped up '53 Studebaker they took drag racing. The car is still part of the club and gets brought out for a few shows each year. Now the story goes that in 1959 they dropped a bored out 370 Pontiac into the Studebaker. A few years later they purchased a rare experimental Pontiac dual quad intake manifold from another racer, Arnie Beswick. The car was setup with two 4-barrels and raced until 1973 when it was parked in a barn. Then in 2009 the car was brought back out and trailered around to shows. In 2011 the club was contacted by an engineer from Detroit who had found out about the intake manifold on this car. Apparently only between three and six manifolds were produced and in between the two 4-barrel carbs there was supposed to be a 1-barrel carburetor. The 1-barrel was to be used for idling which allowed the two 4-barrels to be tuned for racing. This is supposedly the only working example of this intake left.
Its kind of amazing that in our little town of 6,000 people something this rare has been hiding out.

[OLDROCK&ROLLER]

Wow what a setup. Are those carter afb carburetors?

[Sheepdip]

That should eventually find it's way to the Pontiac-Oakland Museum.

[MJN]

Originally Posted by Sheepdip

That should eventually find it's way to the Pontiac-Oakland Museum.

The car was displayed there in early 2021

[MJN]

Found more pictures and the full story here https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/...-ever.1041715/
Funny thing is I've never bothered to take a picture of the engine or the car during any of our local shows either.

[Getter-Done]

In The shop that my Daddy rented, there was a 3 Deuce intake on a Shelf.

I don't know what ever happened to it.

Wow , That is amazing that, That intake is that rare.

[Dieselwrencher]

I know one of the men that has been heavily involved with that car. He's such an awesome fellow. I met him through another friend that met him at a gas station in Nebraska. Richard was hauling a 426 Hemi in the back of his mini van and saw Troy's load of cars heading to MCACN last November. It can be seen here at the 2:50 mark.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ekpIag7fY2A

Here is a nice video that shows Richard and his friends and he shows Troy some local cars, describes the intake and how it came to be, and actually showed them the car. At the 25 minute mark you can watch that. At about 29:55 he talks about the car club he was in and how that intake came about. If you like barn finds and rare muscle cars, check out their channel. He's dropping a video today of a 70 Challenger TA they found in Louisiana that was torn apart and setting outside.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NGkVUr5t7o

We were able to go check out the Kelderman collection a few weeks ago and Richard came up and met us up there. He has some stories and is a wealth of knowledge. We're going to go to his place some time and try and do a podcast with him. He could tell you stories for weeks.

[special-K]

I love this stuff. This is the era in Drag racing I will always be most interested in

[57taskforce]

Very cool find!
Ryan: it should be against the law to have that much fun. Sounds like a really great time. Those kinds of old stories always seem to fascinate me the most. The guy who used to do machine work for the engines we build at work, worked for an engine company that supplied Don Garlitz, and several other hero’s/pioneers with engines back in the day. He knew all of them on a first name basis. I could listen for days to the stories he would tell.


Now if I could just find that one original 4 bolt main 327 lol

[prairewolf]

Pontiac was cool All day back then. And that Studebaker looks as cool as it gets too. thanks for sharing.