Hudson VS Olds 88
I was channel surfing last night and landed on American Muscle Car on the Speed Channel. They were highlighting the Olds 88 as one of the forerunners of the 60's muscle cars - V-8 with a light body.
They showed a clip with the Olds V-8 in 1949 and stating how it was superior to the existing flat head iron. Then they showed pictures of an old overhead valve 6, a Hudson 8 and I believe a Hudson 6.
They went on telling the story how the Olds 88 became a winner on the stock car racing circuit, ending the two year reign of the Hudson Hornet with its 260 CI engine. Then they listed its victories in 1950, 1951, and 1952.
There were a lot of Hudsons in the old race track footage that was shown. Both on the track and as passenger cars in the Pits. There were a lot of 52 and 53 Hudson in the pictures and what I really found interesting was that everytime they show the Olds out on the track there was a Hudson in front of it.
Now I suppose it is possible that the Hudson was running last and the Olds was about to lap the Hudson, But I prefer to believe that the only footage they could find of an Olds on a dirt track it was running second or third to a Hudson.
I imagine there are some on this forum who could tell the truth on how Olds faired against the Hudson.
They showed a clip with the Olds V-8 in 1949 and stating how it was superior to the existing flat head iron. Then they showed pictures of an old overhead valve 6, a Hudson 8 and I believe a Hudson 6.
They went on telling the story how the Olds 88 became a winner on the stock car racing circuit, ending the two year reign of the Hudson Hornet with its 260 CI engine. Then they listed its victories in 1950, 1951, and 1952.
There were a lot of Hudsons in the old race track footage that was shown. Both on the track and as passenger cars in the Pits. There were a lot of 52 and 53 Hudson in the pictures and what I really found interesting was that everytime they show the Olds out on the track there was a Hudson in front of it.
Now I suppose it is possible that the Hudson was running last and the Olds was about to lap the Hudson, But I prefer to believe that the only footage they could find of an Olds on a dirt track it was running second or third to a Hudson.
I imagine there are some on this forum who could tell the truth on how Olds faired against the Hudson.
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Comments
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yup, seems like they got their facts a bit skewed. Someone ought to send them a letter...not that it would do any good, of course!0
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In 1951, 1952 and 1953 Olds, along with everybody else, did very little against the Hornets. The secret of the Hornets was, mainly, the fact that it's center of gravity was much lower than other cars of the period. In fact, it was the Hudsons that made reinforced wheels a must - the Hornets tore the centers out of stock wheels in the turns.
Another factor was Hudsons cooling system - as Humpy Wheeler, an old timer who has been around the track a few times, said "With the cooling system the Hudsons had they could run at speed all day long and never over heat".
I remember a story in, as I recall, an old Special Interest Auto's, I beleive it was, magazine. The story was "When Olds Went Racing". There was a picture on the title page that told the whole story - a picture of a Hornet passing an Olds that was going over the fence into the boon-docks.
It is a known fact that a 6 cylinder engine can out drag a V-8 - at least for a couple hundred feet. Horsepower plays some part, but it's the torque that an engine produces that gives it it's power. And Hornets, being long stroke engines had more torque at lower speeds. In the long run, on a straight, yes, a V-8 will eventually outrun a six.
I raced against Hornets - not in NASCAR, but on those little 1/3rd and 1/4 red clay tracks down south, back in the late 50's. Saturday shoot-outs. Even running a 241 Dodge small block hemi in late 30's Dodge and Plymouth coupes it was hard to beat a Hornet - along with some of the 48-54 Hudsons that were being run. Tho, for some reason, the 54's didn't do all that well on the smaller tracks. As I recall, from so long ago, the short wheelbase Wasps did fairly well - as did some of the 1940-1947 Hudson coupes, which ran the 3x5, tho some did run the larger 262's and 308's.
Hudsonly,
Alex B0 -
Pretty hard for them to backup that Olds story when you just have to look at the stats for 51-53 now if they were talking about a Hudson decline in 54 they would be right. By 54 Hudson was in trouble and the racing support from the factory was waning and the competition was running bigger V8's.
Still the Hudsons had an amazing 3 year run.0 -
I was going to say the same- one can't argue with the Hudson dominating racing stats. Hudsons were the fastest cars of their day, period.0
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I knew Smokey Yunick pretty well, and arranged for him to speak at the 2000 National in frigid Nashville. Supporting what Alex says above, Smokey described the 308 as a "torque monster." With the low center of gravity and great handling, guys like Thomas and Flock took 'em into the corners hard and the torque pulled them out of the turn even harder. Several drivers, including Herb Thomas driving Smokey's car, came from the back of the pack in many races (they got back there because of an infraction or a spin-out). They passed high in the turns and were 2 car lengths ahead of the non-Hudson as they came on to the straightaway. Look deep at the stats and you'll see that from '51-'54, Hudson drivers lapped more than half the field in almost every race, finishing two or three laps ahead of several cars in each race. Also, everybody forgets that in this era there were damn few cars that would do an honest 100 mph right off the dealer's lot. A brand-new Chevy would be lucky to do 85 downhill in a tailwind. There's a lot of evidence to suggest that if they were both set up just right, at 100 mph on the highway, a '53 or '54 Hornet would be pulling away from the same year Olds. Pulling away slowly, maybe a couple of mph faster than the olds. Of course, in the same contest, a '55 Chrysler 300 Hemi would be leaving both of them behind.0
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Sam, how 'bout you sending this message to those fella's at Speed Channel, maybe they'll get their facts straight next time they try tell a story about the pioneer's of auto racin' ! !
'47HUD0 -
haha... I wonder how Hudsondad would feel about this one...
we started out in Oldsmobiles from 49-56. He still has a few, but I think that the Olds of the day, were king of the straight line performance, and while the Hudsons could outdrive them, Hudson would have faired better with a V8. (and no Jet, and no Nash merger) Nobody could touch Hudson in 1952, and with the lower center of gravity, and styling, the Hudson was a better looking car during the same period, well, maybe in 55 and 56, the Olds has the styling edge on the Hudson.
One thing we notice, and should make everyone proud, is that when taking either make apart, Hudsons come apart so much better, and cleaner, without the need for a torch, whereas the Olds, well let's just say save the WD40, and make sure the Oxygen tank is full... Most times you can use the bolts and fasteners over, due to the high quality on the Hudsons.
Hudson was a quality car, and a bargain for the dollar value of what you got. High quality parts, and fasteners, better build quality, better ride quality, what else is there?
Olds made a good car, a performance machine, and if anyone else was going to challenge the Mighty Hudson Hornet's dominance in the early 50's the Oldsmobile definitely gave Hudson a run for the money... but the fact be as they may, tell the whole story.
What would be cool is to see a Hudson versus Olds matchup. Maybe a club sponsored event?0 -
Speed Channel shills for B-J Auctions and NASCAR money - Hudson isn't around to defend itself anymore, and Olds, though a defunct nameplate, Is part of GM and therefore immune to any real analysis by Speed or any of the other NASCAR-friendly media and their talking heads.0
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I also saw the show in question. it's been around for a while. It was an "Oldsmobile" Special. Not supposed to be a history of Stock Car racing. It's no wonder the show was one sided. BUT..I'm old enough to have lived in North Carolina during the Hay Day of Hudsons. I don't recall ever seeing a Oldsmobile win over a Hudson on either dirt or asphalt. I was a race fan and If my dad didn't take me to the races, I would sell programs, seat cushions, peanuts...anything to get in to watch. The Hornet that Smokey "built" for Herb was a match for the Chrysler 300 at Darlington! Carl Keifafer (Chrysler 300, Mercury Outboard owner) threatened to quit racing if Bill France didn't find out what Smokey was doing to his Hudsons and do something about it.. Smokey wasn't cheating. To use his words. " I am using creative interpretation of the rules". No matter how you cut it. Hudson was superior. So far as Chevrolet and Ford ? It was a joke to see any of them attempt to race against Hudson. Oh how times have changed.0
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SuperDave wrote:I also saw the show in question. it's been around for a while. It was an "Oldsmobile" Special. Not supposed to be a history of Stock Car racing. It's no wonder the show was one sided. BUT..I'm old enough to have lived in North Carolina during the Hay Day of Hudsons. I don't recall ever seeing a Oldsmobile win over a Hudson on either dirt or asphalt. I was a race fan and If my dad didn't take me to the races, I would sell programs, seat cushions, peanuts...anything to get in to watch. The Hornet that Smokey "built" for Herb was a match for the Chrysler 300 at Darlington! Carl Keifafer (Chrysler 300, Mercury Outboard owner) threatened to quit racing if Bill France didn't find out what Smokey was doing to his Hudsons and do something about it.. Smokey wasn't cheating. To use his words. " I am using creative interpretation of the rules". No matter how you cut it. Hudson was superior. So far as Chevrolet and Ford ? It was a joke to see any of them attempt to race against Hudson. Oh how times have changed.
There was a WTN article a while back of a comparison between the Hudson and the Olds 88 in a little driving test he ran between em. Hudson remains the underdog in the history books I guess.0 -
SuperDave wrote:I also saw the show in question. it's been around for a while. It was an "Oldsmobile" Special. Not supposed to be a history of Stock Car racing. It's no wonder the show was one sided. BUT..I'm old enough to have lived in North Carolina during the Hay Day of Hudsons. I don't recall ever seeing a Oldsmobile win over a Hudson on either dirt or asphalt. I was a race fan and If my dad didn't take me to the races, I would sell programs, seat cushions, peanuts...anything to get in to watch. The Hornet that Smokey "built" for Herb was a match for the Chrysler 300 at Darlington! Carl Keifafer (Chrysler 300, Mercury Outboard owner) threatened to quit racing if Bill France didn't find out what Smokey was doing to his Hudsons and do something about it.. Smokey wasn't cheating. To use his words. " I am using creative interpretation of the rules". No matter how you cut it. Hudson was superior. So far as Chevrolet and Ford ? It was a joke to see any of them attempt to race against Hudson. Oh how times have changed.
Actually it's spelled "Kiekhaefer" - but that's ok, nobody else could (or can) spell it - or pronounce it - either. LOL
In any event Carl was among the first one to figure out you could win anything if you could toss enough money at it. About the closest thing to Kiekhaefer today, on the NASCAR circuit, is Jack Roush.
Hudsonly,
Alex B0 -
Super Dave,
Sadly, Smokeys innovative interpretation would be cheating today. Used to be that if the rule book didn't say it was illegal, then it was legal.(at least until NASCAR could change the rulebook) Now it is illegal unles the rulebook states that it IS legal.
NASCAR is slowly legislating itself to death. The Bakers, Allisons, Earnhardts,of yester year would soon be cast out of todays NASCAR because they were not PC.... IMHO....That and $5 will get you a cup of coffee.........
Bob0 -
Carl Keifafer (Chrysler 300, Mercury Outboard owner) threatened to quit racing if Bill France didn't find out what Smokey was doing to his Hudsons and do something about it.. Smokey wasn't cheating. To use his words. " I am using creative interpretation of the rules".
--Actually it's KIEKHAEFER, but then I'm an Antique Outboard Motor Club member living near Fond du Lac, so I should know that. There's an excellent book out there on Kiekhaefer's life called Iron Fist: The Lives of Carl Kiekhaefer by Jeffrey L. Rodengen and it has two very detailed chapters on Carl's stock car racing exploits. Smokey Yunick is quoted at length in the chapter, referring to an article in November 1988's Circle Track where he simply says that he'd read the rule book to find out what it didn't say, like how big your fuel line could be (he'd build an anaconda-sized line that would hold an extra five gallons); or that you couldn't improve weight distribution by moving the engine back, but nothing prohibited him from moving the body forward (he used to move it 3 inches).
And Bill France was no friend of Carl Kiekhaefer, by any stretch of the imagination. Bill France was trying to squeeze Carl and his Chryslers out of stock car racing by changing the rules and making it easier for GM and Ford to participate with their corporate billions. Carl brought professionalism, organization and innovation to a redneck sport which grew out of Dixieland rumrunning and that is why he kept winning. And he was hated for it--THAT'S why he quit racing after 1956, to avoid further bad publicity for himself and Mercury outboards. In one of his own letters to Bill France himself, Carl wrote "I am not complaining about anything in particular, except the presence of out-and-out factory teams backed by a two-billion-dollar corporation which, from all indications, intends to dominate [AAA] as well as NASCAR. If you have never felt the full pressure of Ford public relations in retaliation of some displeasure you may have caused them, you have something to experience."
It is a tribute to the Hudson, though, that the step-downs were able to give Carl Kiekhaefer's Chrysler 300s a run for his money well into 1955!0 -
hudsontech wrote:Actually it's spelled "Kiekhaefer" - but that's ok, nobody else could (or can) spell it - or pronounce it - either. LOL
In any event Carl was among the first one to figure out you could win anything if you could toss enough money at it. About the closest thing to Kiekhaefer today, on the NASCAR circuit, is Jack Roush.
Hudsonly,
Alex B
Alex, it's pronounced "KEY-kay-fer" and don't knock it until you've tried driving a Mark 20H conversion on the back of an 8' picklefork hydro, flying 70 MPH on the water with basically a boat-shaped piece of plywood on your @$$... now that's a white-knuckle ride!! Beats any POS OMC ever put out!!!
Check out http://www.aomci.org especially the link pages to some of the Merc sites.
Also read Iron Fist which I mentioned earlier; your local library should have it. Yeah, Carl did toss a lot of money at it, but he brought a lot of professionalism and organization to the sport which we still have today. And it's not like the factories weren't trying to do their damnedest to muscle Carl out of it with THEIR billions; they had Bill France bought and paid for...
Sorry, you hit a nerve. We here in Fond du Lac County bleed Phantom Black and we're proud of it. To me, the only Mercs worth talking about do not have wheels, but propellers and say "KIEKHAEFER" on the side!0 -
Smokey and others told a lot of stories about what he did to those racing Hudsons...some of them may even be true. Compared to today's NASCAR (or even the '60's, when Smokey was racing Pontiacs) it was nothing. Its worth noting that with all the hype surrounding "The Best Damn Garage in Town," 1. Herb Thomas was a GREAT driver. (Yunick described him as the best natural driver he ever saw), 2. Marshall Teauge and Tim Flock won big without Yunick, and 3. They were still STOCK cars. Flock listened to the radio in his Hornet during races. Yunick was a GMC dealer. If he could have won with Olds, he would have. In '55 he switched to Chevy, and Thomas kept winning, (until a bad wreck shortened his career). Flock went with Keifafer and won big with the Chrysler, until they had a falling out and Flock walked away from the program rather than race for ol' Carl. Can you imagine Jeff Gordon telling his owner to take a hike? They were interesting times...0
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Forget the radio, Flock raced with a freakin' MONKEY! Let's see Jeff Gordon pull that off.0
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Hudsons did run against Kiekhaefer in 1955, but not Smokey's. He switched to Chevrolet at the beginning of the season. An unsung hero of factory-sponsored racing is Vince Piggins. Vince was in charge of Hudson's racing program and was responsible for the direct factory support...everything from cars to "special" parts, the so-called "export" parts. After the merger, Vince went to Chevrolet, where he did the same and more for them. He's a legend in factory racing circles. Factories have always supported racing in a kind of "skunk works" setup, whether they were officially in racing or not. (GM pulled out of NASCAR for many years.) Piggins was kind of like a corporal or sargent who runs a military base...he dosen't have the official power, but he could make things happen. Jerry Green, who recently retired from Ford's racing program, was another one. Officially nobody, but he Bill Ford (and Henry II before him) always took his calls directly.0
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I read somewhere that Desoto started racing the Hemi, and in one race, lapped half the field by the time it crossed the finish line...22 laps down from the winning Hornet.0
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SuperDave wrote:I also saw the show in question. it's been around for a while. It was an "Oldsmobile" Special. Not supposed to be a history of Stock Car racing. It's no wonder the show was one sided. BUT..I'm old enough to have lived in North Carolina during the Hay Day of Hudsons. I don't recall ever seeing a Oldsmobile win over a Hudson on either dirt or asphalt. I was a race fan and If my dad didn't take me to the races, I would sell programs, seat cushions, peanuts...anything to get in to watch. The Hornet that Smokey "built" for Herb was a match for the Chrysler 300 at Darlington! Carl Keifafer (Chrysler 300, Mercury Outboard owner) threatened to quit racing if Bill France didn't find out what Smokey was doing to his Hudsons and do something about it.. Smokey wasn't cheating. To use his words. " I am using creative interpretation of the rules". No matter how you cut it. Hudson was superior. So far as Chevrolet and Ford ? It was a joke to see any of them attempt to race against Hudson. Oh how times have changed.
Hmm... are you sure about Darlington?
my facts show that this is who won during these years of the Southern 500....
1951- Herb Thomas - Hudson
1952- Fonty Flock - Oldsmobile
1953- Buck Baker - Oldsmobile
1954- Herb Thomas - Hudson
and at Daytona, the story is this....
1951- Marshall Teague - Hudson
1952- Marshall Teague - Hudson
1953- Bill Blair - Oldsmobile
1954 - Lee Petty - Chrysler
and perhaps Charlotte....
1951- Curtis Turner - 51 Nash
1951- Herb Thomas - 51 Hudson
1952- Herb Thomas - 52 Hudson
1953- Dick Passwater - 53 Olds
1954- Buck Baker - 53 Olds
Well, maybe someone wants to verify these, but I got to say I am sure they are accurate. It is easy to remember things differently, then what they really are. The truth is that Hudson flat out dominated Stock Car racing in 1952, no argument. Oldsmobile had a significant role in racing just the same, but was not the dominant force Hudson was in 1951, and 1952, but was able to start putting pressure on Hudson by 1953. Keep in mind, Hudson did flat out dominate some of these races, finishing 1-2-3 and even more of the top spots in a lot of these events, but in even some of the bigger events, they didn't always come out on top.
For what it is worth, Oldsmobile was a worthy opponent during the first couple of years of NASCAR, and that is what needs to be recognized. Probably the same as what happened in NASCAR in 1991/1992, when FORD dominated the scene, for a bit, but percentagewise, even the mighty wingcars of 1969-1970 could not equal the dominance of 1952....0 -
I wasn't "sure" that Herb won Darlington in 54. I don't know how many Chryslers were entered either. But your statistics show that Herb did win...I was pretty sure that Smokey told me that one time, but memories do get distorted over the years. Smokey did have a way of embelishing the story... Just ask Mitsi (sp?) Teague.. LOL. I did try to nail him down to some details on the reverse rotation engine, but he said his memory had slipped a bit also.. he he he.. The same Oldsmobile show was on Speed this morning. Good for a chuckle..0
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I'm confused. I thought we were talking about 1955, when Carl Kiekhaefer first started racing NASCAR with Tim & Fonty Flock driving '55 Chryslers. Herb Thomas won Darlington in '55 driving a Smokey Yunick-built '55 Chevrolet. Tim Flock was third in the Chrysler. At the end of the season, Tim Flock was Grand National Champion by 1,500 points. The '55 season is also notable because it was Junior Johnson's first full year and he placed 6th driving a '55 Olds. Lee Petty was 3rd in what else? a Dodge. Thomas was 5th in the Chevrolet. He did drive a Hudson in the first couple of '55 Grand National races. The '56 season was really interesting. Flock walked away from Kiekhaefer's team. Herb Thomas and Buck Baker joined it with Baker finishing as GN Champion and Herb Thomas runner up. This was the season the NASCAR really got going, with drivers like Parnelli Jones, Fireball Roberts, Paul Goldsmith and Junior Johnson in the hunt. Does anybody care about this stuff any more?0
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