RE: [Chrysler300] 300C fans & Need parts for 1957 Chrysler 300C

[christopher beilby <thelastbestgenius@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

WARNING BIT OF A LONG POST - only read on after part (a) if interested

 

1) 300C fans as fitted to 300Cs

Just went out into shed and checked my supercharged new 300C, and whereas near all the front crank pulley and water pump driven pulley were custom built, the car has what looks like stock 6 blade 300 fan - it was in 1st run/batch of cars built, Dec 28 1956.

 

And my 'newest' 300C - April 18 1957 - has same 6 blade - it sat unused from early 70s until I bought it in 90s, and my guess it the original - I even took shots of very small (metal stamp/die) stamping into one blade that I thought would be date related, in case one day someone really tries to know all re what correct on 300Cs, other 300s.

( Near everything on them in way of major item/component has some code or date method on what I have noted re different numbers/sequencing on my April 16 and April 18 stock 300Cs.)

Anyhow looks like to me that 6 blade fan was standard 'non A/C 300C use', at least until mid April 1957 ?!

 

2) (a) Someone has already built a twin McCulloch blown 392 - I have a few pics I saved off i/net maybe about a year ago - it was not a letter car I think though.

(b) the usual McCulloch blower fitted back in 300C - F days, was a VS 57.

But as the owners/builders of my 300C maybe found at Daytona Beach Flying Mile Time Trials, if heavily loaded - as happened in 1957 when loose sand had not yet blown off the Beach as was usual each year by time Time Trials held - the stock VS57 McCulloch struggled to keep a high revving blown 392 rich enough - and my car's motor locked at just on 150mph on it's 2nd required run as it entered Timed Mile - they took it there knowing it not fully sorted in the few weeks since it built/collected, but took it anyway, seemingly for the fun of it.

Briggs Cunningham - of Le Mans Fame etc - fixed that after Daytona - the car has an "RO" prefix in the blower serial number, and the 2nd McC Warranty Card that was with old papers with the car - issued with their/McC's new address (which suggests/confirms it after '57 Daytona) still has the unsent in Warranty Record Stub indicating there is no warranty. And a well regarded McC guru, says 'RO' designation only known/seen by him on one other blower, and he thought it meant it for race applications.

 

So when it came to 1960 and building the 300F that earlier posts talk of, maybe rather than relying on an already modified/boosted VS57, they just fitted two/2.

Cunningham had an early dyno, but still seemingly only estimated the horsepower of the original 300C motor he returned after setting it all up - it is recorded he said he believed it to be about 550bhp.

I do not remember what hp the later twin blown 300F was supposed to be, but outright champion for Daytona Flying Mile 'stock car' with not too modified stock motor of not too major car/body modification, has to maybe be Ford's special built semi streamilined but stock '57 Thunderbird fitted with modified 368 Mercury/Lincoln motor. Like my 300C, it only managed 1 run - but speed was stated to be 200mph - this on loose sand!!!

Near all 1956 and 1958 times read about 10 mph higher respectively than all  '57 times, so imagine what either my car, or that Ford '57 (Lincoln)Bird might have done if sand was hard as usual like in '56 and '58, when they ran in 1957?!.

As far as I know from what written in the day, only Wally Parkes (US Hotrod Mag sponsored), got permission to do 2nd runs/attempts at end of Meet, when sand finally normal/hard, and ran an injected 392 hemi, faired in, '57 Plymouth Coupe at about 150mph - he later went onto fame re NHRA leadership.

Why the '57 LincolnBird never did 2nd run then or later, is as far as I know not really documented - maybe they could find on one brave/stupid enough to drive it !? It was listed as an engine problem - they used blown and injected 312s for rest of Daytona, and one of them gave Carrol Shelby grief driving the most big cube bad asse sports race car V12 Ferrari in the Daytona Sportscar circuit race - anyone want to guess where Shelby later got his now famous idea that a good modified American V8 in a sports car (Shelby's '62-67 AC Cobra) could maybe beat V!2 Ferraris in Sports Car World Championship ?!!

The 312 Bird survives, was sold recently, but the '368 Lincoln one is not mentioned nowadays as known re surviving. The twin blown 300F survives of course, and I seem to remember reading a goodly 7 figure sum being refused by original owner/builder a few years back. It may be worth more, or less, now?!

And why Chrysler never fixed and re-ran it's injected '392 hemi 300Cs at Daytona in 1957 is I think way more to do with just how poor/bad the Beach was - that loose 1957 sand just destroyed every car's top end potentials - if they had run later like Wally Parkes did, they may not have needed doing well documented post Daytona Factory Top Speed #))C Tests. But whatever the Factory did post Daytona, 1957 300C Daytona Times still stand out as a somewhat lowspot/glitch in 300s annual steady march to better/faster times, until they later became just a Sales boosting nametag/logo at the end

 

Daytona moved off the Beach when they late 50s completed the banked oval - and so speeds of 200mph on the sand by 1957, plus crowds estimated in hundred thousand that just stood atop adjoining dunes, also ended. Bonneville became the straighline speed mecca after that.

My car never went back, but apparently ran undefeated for maybe a decade in non NHRA meets at various local and out of State strips around WI area where it lived. Supercharging the hemi 392 with the 2nd uprated blower seemingly worked well re acceleration, as it must have highly bumped torque lower down than normal for 392, plus obvious horsepower benefits - 550bhp in a street registered daily driver car even into the mid 60s would I think be very rare - someone of a 'known 300C person' no longer in the Club, told me he even knew who had  Trophies it had won.

Obviously (I guess) it never ran against dragsters/rails and blown altered 34 Coupe types, just more 'kind on kind/equals' ?!

(In 1957, the NHRA effecitively by new Rules banned running of street/stock cars of twin carb hemi engine configuration - by just moving them into same class as altered/blown competition hotrods, so to my knowledge no 300C/Ds etc, ever ran/campaigned in NHRA Drag Events/Meets. Nitro was also banned, with the odd/great side-effect of near overnight began the new idea of supercharging hemis instead - and the rest is history as they say - and 56 years on, a Mopar hemi design blown V8 still is the one to beat !! )

 

>From what I know of the history of my car, I do not think the original motor was ever removed from the car after Briggs Cunningham reinstalled after Daytona in 1957 until I lifted it out to sandblast frame etc a few years ago,, but then speedo still only showed less than 60k miles, and that the car still had four March '56 dated original shock absorbers, etc,  then shown miles are likely near correct?

 

 

So much for blown 300s, things of 'days then no more'  - Leave it to others to add/rebutt/comment,

 

Christopher in Australia 

 


 



To: d.verity@xxxxxxx; gnelson@xxxxxxxxxxxx; retromobilia@xxxxxxxxxxx
CC: robkern@xxxxxxxxxxxxx; rfmelton@xxxxxxx; chrysler300@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
From: henry.schleimer@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Wed, 10 Jul 2013 18:26:21 +1000
Subject: RE: [Chrysler300] Need parts for 1957 Chrysler 300C

  



Don

My car was built 2 days before yours - without air conditioning. It has the six blade fan like yours but with a silent drive. It makes sense that your air conditioned car would have a direct drive to increase air flow at idle.

A five blade fan with varying blade spacings reduces the chance of resonating fan belts and may have been a later innovation. The blade pitch or size may be greater to keep the air flow the same.

Regards

Henry Schleimer

From: Chrysler300@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:Chrysler300@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Don Verity
Sent: Wednesday, 10 July 2013 2:52 AM
To: Gary Nelson; retromobilia@xxxxxxxxxxx
Cc: Rob Kern; Ray Melton; chrysler300@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: [Chrysler300] Need parts for 1957 Chrysler 300C

Mine has a build date of 6/4/57. That would seem to follow the ?whatever they had? theory.
Don

From: retromobilia@xxxxxxxxxxx <mailto:retromobilia%40comcast.net> 
Sent: Tuesday, July 09, 2013 11:38 AM
To: Gary Nelson 
Cc: Don Verity ; Rob Kern ; Ray Melton ; chrysler300@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx <mailto:chrysler300%40yahoogroups.com> 
Subject: Re: [Chrysler300] Need parts for 1957 Chrysler 300C

Perhaps, changes were made (or upgrades as they became available) during the production year. It may be important when siting these examples, on various cars, to include the production number and /or date of manufacture. Seems to me this would clear up a lot of guesswork. 
Comments!? 
John 

----- Original Message -----
From: "Gary Nelson" <mailto:gnelson%40glnelson.com> 
To: "Don Verity" <mailto:d.verity%40cox.net>, "Rob Kern" <mailto:robkern%40sbcglobal.net>, "Ray Melton" <mailto:rfmelton%40msn.com>, mailto:chrysler300%40yahoogroups.com, "Gary Nelson" <mailto:gnelson%40glnelson.com> 
Sent: Tuesday, July 9, 2013 8:11:50 AM 
Subject: RE: [Chrysler300] Need parts for 1957 Chrysler 300C 

This confirms when a 300 came down the production line, if the correct part was not at hand, it received what was at hand. 

Gary 

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