1930 Pierce Arrow Land Speed Record Car from American Picker's TV Show Unearthed! Pretty cool to see it out of the ground! Looks like an interesting story.
Do you guys think it is real, and not an amature thing made way after the 1930's using an old Pierce Arrow? Looks too amaturish to me ... Pete
I've just been contacted by the organizer of the St. Petersburg Festivals of Speed event to help research this car. I recall seeing it on "American Pickers" and thinking at the time it was a project from hell. Is there an organization or sanctioning body historian who'd know more about this car and any "LSR" runs it may have run on Ormond Beach? BHW
was ormond beach still functioning as a lsr site in 1930? it seems to be a gray area between the early speed festivals of the pre-teens and the nascar conversion.....just wondering.
Someone must still be around who'd remember... Another article from Hemmings: http://blog.hemmings.com/index.php/2012/11/29/lost-and-found-redux-thunderbowl-comet/ BHW
Here is the car with an aluminum foil body put in place to help identify it...... Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
Sorry folks... Wrong car.. the car from the movie "Speed" with James Stuart is currently in a garage in North Scottsdale....
I still don't think this car is a genuine period land speed record car. I think it is either a movie prop or somebody was trying to make or replicate something and picked on an old Pierce Arrow for the components. A period land speed record car would not have had a roof IMO (roofed race cars did not come about until after the Alfa Romeo 8c aero coupe lead Le Mans in the late 30's) and also why only one engine in such a long bonnet area. If Pierce Arrow really wanted to go as fast as the gauges they needed considerably more power. Pete
There were many thirties cars both race and land speed that had roofs, more towards the late thirties like the 1936 Adler streamliner raced at Lemans, the first closed car and streamliner to race at Lemans. The problem with it being an all out land speed car is the lack of serious horsepower to achieve what would have been 250mph plus at that time. The 1929 Pierce Arrow straight 8 was the highest horsepower production engine in America at the time, but still not fast enough to break 250mph no matter what the gearing. The problem with the movie prop idea is that there were extensive modifications to the Pierce Arrow engine, frame and suspension to make it low and fast. Plus, there is a ton of high quality engineering that went into this car, something they would not have done just for a movie prop. That's what makes this car such a mystery. It seems that every streamline car of the era was fairly well noted, even the more obscure cars like the Thunderbowl Comet, the Thorne Special (later the ***eol Super Sonic) or the Timbs Buick based streamliner. There has to be somebody somewhere with some information on this car.
anybody know the history of tube bending? That front piece seems somewhat complicated to make. Could that be an old airplane part?
I have a lot of experience working on LSR cars, old and new and I have yet to see one that was purpose built with a speedometer. The driver has enough to do without looking at a speedometer. I don't doubt we can find a real LSR car with one but it would certainly be unusual. Somewhere in one of the links it was said to be a P40 speedometer. The Curtiss P40 didn't fly until 1938. Also in the links the only real info given about engine modifications was that the sparkplugs were welded in. That makes no sense at all for any reason. A real LSR car in that catagory would have the wheels faired in. Those have hoops built into the support structure for wheel wells. Doing that with the intention of building further pieces to cover the wheels just increases the difficulty of construction so I have to conclude wheel access was important and and wheel fairing was not. Putting barn doors on the side for wheel and mechanical access would have been easier and more practical if indeed it was an LSR car. Nice wheel arches are just not a priority on an LSR car. The big side windows don't work for me either. On an LSR car you only need to see in one direction. Sometimes a small porthole is used but not large picture windows. Coupled with the tall draggy roof it looks like a street car with a very long nose, kind of like a vintage 612. The air inlet in front is huge. Way to draggy. LSR car would not want or need that. A P51 with a 2000 HP motor doesn't have a radiator inlet that big. There are historical exceptions to many of these points but all in one car? Doesn't make sense. Barring any info to the contrary, to me it looks more like a movie prop or someone was building a custom street car. The only way that car was going to go very fast was under tow. I hope you find out what it is but I suspect limiting your search to LSR possibilities will not bear fruit.
The engine has not been disassembled to inspect the internal parts, so there is not yet any information there. The car originally had a huge copper radiator that was stolen a long time ago. The most obvious modification was the 4 carb individual intakes with the custom fabricated mechanical to cable 4 throttle cables for each carb. The engine being so low in the frame is another example. There are also custom modifications to make the multiple aircraft intruments functional such as a completely fabricated tach and speedo drive working off of the rear of the water pump. These are just a few of the unusual aspects of this car. I am only interested in finding the truth about the car, whatever that may be. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
This is the 1929 LSR holder: 1929: Irving Special driven by Sir Henry Segrave Considerably more sophisticated and powerful than this car. I think we can safely conclude that it was not built as an attempt at any peek land speed records. Note the Irving Special had 930hp from nearly 24 litres, but of course there are many different classes. I'm still thinking a special built using a vintage car as a basis for who knows what purpose. Surely the person who it was bought from knows something? Pete
The land speed record (set at Daytona Beach) was well over 200 mph by this time (1929) - On 11th March 1929, Major Henry Seagrave drove the Napier-Railton Golden Arrow to 231.44 mph and took the record (and was knighted on his return to England). The car is an enormous and radical aerodynamic special with a 23.9 litre 900 hp Napier aero engine. Perhaps this thing (if it is historically accurate) was intended for an engine-size limited class, but I really doubt that this was ever a serious contender (or is historical).
Yes - we posted at almost the same time. I agree - this thing is nowhere sophisticated enough to be a contender in that era.
Several of the intruments have been identified as having been used in a P-40, but these same intruments were also used in multiple other aircraft including the P-36 that flew in 1935. The one Kollsman altimeter has a patent date on it from 1933. I have not removed any of the instruments from the dash, but there are other tags on the back of the other instruments that can not be read while they are still in the car. I will pull them and date them eventually. It would not suprise me if this car was also a Harlan Fenglar creation similar to the Thunderbowl Comet, because there are similarities in shape and construction, but of course I have no information to support that. Harlan Fengler was also pursuing multiple speed records and was actually the person that drive the Thunderbowl Comet in the 1936 movie "Speed". Another interesting note is the 1941 Popular Mechanics article posted at the link provided above by revkev6 ... http://www.gregwapling.com/hotrod/la...owl-comet.html The article talks about the Comet, then called the "Golden Eagle" preparing for a land speed run with three seperate engines in order to attempt three classifications of records including one attempt with a straight 8 engine for the then 152mph record set by Harry Hartz and Fred Frame on Murdoc dry lake. The article also talks about the 7 inches of ground clearance on the Golden Eagle. So while this Pierce Arrow car may not have been attempting the all out speed record, there were land speed records within its grasp even as late as 1941 when this article was written.
Other than the engine, is there anything else that links this car to Pierce Arrow? Maybe it has been re-engined? Pete
Another question arises: what on earth would a land speed record car need an altimeter for? And those wire wheels and heavy treaded tires? (ok - maybe they were not what it was intended to run on...) This really looks to me like someones mad but glorious homegrown attempt...
Vertually everything mechanical on the car is 1931 Pierce Arrow inclduing the drivetrain, frame, suspension and wheels.
Perhaps it is.... but very few people had this type of vision back in the late thirties or even well into the 40's or 50's. Either way.... I want to know.
If so such a dated motor with very limited power producing capability would not have been used in my opinion. Rules have changed over the years but for different classes, displacement, fuel type and blown or not are pretty consistant for determining them. For a modified or unlimited catagory a car of this size for such a physically small motor would have been very counterproductive. An Allison would probably fit in it. And aerodynamic drag was well and widely understood so the cabin and radiator opening are really out of place unless meant to be street driven.