Just a little history here.
Back in the '40's, while stationed at March Field in Calif., my Dad worked with Marvin Drake. They developed the Drake racing engine from a Ford 4cyl, model "A" engine. Later, after the War, Drake was joined by Offenhauser, and the Drake/Offy was developed. Later, Offy bought out Drake, and the Offy was the new king of the Indy 500.
A lot of the early racing engine tech came from the "tricks" learned during the development of the WWII war birds. They were getting outragous HP through the use of turbos, blowers, and cam configurations, which helped in high altitude, thin air conditions. If you get the chance, listen to one of these old warriors at idle, you can hear the lope of the cam. When they rev up, you can feel the ground shake from the power. If one flies by, especialy the radials and the V12 Allisons, it's like having your head inside the tailpipe of a big block 454.[sm=icon_rock.gif] 1200+ HP!!!
We stayed in contact with the Drake familly for many years, but since the passing of Marvin and my Dad, we have lost contact with the Drakes.[&o]

 

Cool Man! interesting "factoid". Got any of them old engines in the storage unit? that would be cool.

 

I wish I did, all the inventory went to Offy when they bought out Drake.

 

Man, our buddies used to run Offy intake setups at our local track, back in the day... those puppies could lay it DOWN! I did not know about the Drake connection before, so this thread was very interesting to me! Thanks for postin', bro!