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Offenhauser
The Offenhauser Racing Engine, or Offy, is a racing engine design that dominated American open wheel racing for more than 50 years and is still popular among vintage sprint and midget car racers. History The Offenhauser engine, familiarly known as the "Offy", was an overhead cam monoblock 4-stroke internal combustion engine developed by Fred Offenhauser and Harry Arminius Miller. Originally, it was sold as a marine engine. In 1930 a four-cylinder Miller engine installed in a race car set a new international land speed record of . Miller developed this engine into a twin overhead cam, four-cylinder, four-valve-per-cylinder racing engine. Variations of this design were used in midgets and sprints into the 1960s, with a choice of carburetion or Hilborn fuel injection. When both Miller and the company to whom he had sold much of the equipment and rights went bankrupt in 1933, Offenhauser opened a shop a block away and bought rights to engines, special tooling and drawings ...
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Fred Offenhauser
Fred H. Offenhauser, Jr. (November 11, 1888 – August 17, 1973), was a machinist and self taught automotive engineer who developed the Offenhauser racing engine, nicknamed the "Offy", which dominated competition in the Indianapolis 500 race for decades. He also built the Novi engine, which was designed by Bud Winfield and Leo Goossen. Biography Frederick Offenhauser, Jr., was born November 11, 1888 in Los Angeles, California, the oldest child of Martha and Frederick Offenhauser. Both his parents were natives of Germany who had emigrated as young adults. His father worked as a barber. Offenhauser, Jr. married Ethel C. Lowery. In 1913, when he was 25, Offenhauser began working in the shop of Harry Arminius Miller, having learned his trade as a machinist working for a railroad. That year a Peugeot Grand Prix car won the Indianapolis 500. It was equipped with a state-of-the-art double overhead cam, four valve per cylinder engine. Miller named Offenhauser as the head of his engine d ...
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Leo Goossen
Leo William Goossen (7 June 1892 – 4 December 1974) was a draftsman, mechanical engineer and automobile designer. He is known for his work with Harry Miller and his long involvement in the design and ongoing development of the four-cylinder Offenhauser ("Offy") racing engine. Goossen is considered to have been the preeminent American designer of racing engines over a fifty-year period that began in the early 1920s. Early years Goossen's parents, Izaac and Kate, immigrated to the US from the Netherlands. They settled in Kalamazoo, Michigan, where Goossen was born. The family later moved to Flint, Michigan. In 1908 Goossen left school at 16 to work as a blueprint machine operator in the engineering department of the Buick division of the nascent General Motors. He continued his education by taking classes in mathematics and engineering at night. Goossen's work caught the attention of two of Buick's principals at the time: Chief Engineer Enos Anson (E.A.) de Waters and Engine D ...
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Indianapolis 500
The Indianapolis 500, formally known as the Indianapolis 500-Mile Race, and commonly called the Indy 500, is an annual automobile race held at Indianapolis Motor Speedway (IMS) in Speedway, Indiana, United States, an enclave suburb of Indianapolis. The event is traditionally held over Memorial Day weekend, usually the last weekend of May. It is contested as part of the IndyCar Series, the top level of American open-wheel car racing, a formula colloquially known as "Indy car racing". The track itself is nicknamed the "Brickyard", as the racing surface was paved in brick in the fall of 1909. One yard of brick remains exposed at the start/finish line. The event, billed as ''The Greatest Spectacle in Racing'', is considered part of the Triple Crown of Motorsport along with the 24 Hours of Le Mans and the Monaco Grand Prix, with which it typically shares a date. The official attendance is not disclosed by Speedway management, but the permanent seating capacity is upwards ...
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Harry Arminius Miller
Harold Arminius Miller (December 9, 1875 – May 3, 1943), commonly called Harry, was an American race car designer and builder who was most active in the 1920s and 1930s. Griffith Borgeson called him "the greatest creative figure in the history of the American racing car". Cars built by Miller won the Indianapolis 500 nine times, and other cars using his engines won three more. Millers accounted for 83% of the Indy 500 fields between 1923 and 1928. Biography Miller was born on December 9, 1875, in Menomonie, Wisconsin, to Jacob Miller (1833–1900) and Martha Ann (Tuttle) Miller (c1835–1922). Miller's first work in the automotive business was with the short-lived Yale Automobile Company. From Yale he moved to Lansing, Michigan, to work for motoring pioneer Ransom E. Olds at Oldsmobile, where he was employed as a race mechanic during the early Vanderbilt cup races. After a poor 1906 race season, Miller left for Los Angeles, California, to open a small machine shop specia ...
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Louis Meyer
Louis Meyer (July 21, 1904 – October 7, 1995) was an American Hall of Fame race car driver who was the first three-time winner of the Indianapolis 500. Biography Born in lower Manhattan, New York on July 21, 1904, he was the son of French immigrants, Meyer was raised in Los Angeles, where he began automobile racing at various California tracks. Early in his career, he helped prepare the Miller driven by Frank Elliott in 1926, destroking the engine to bring it within the displacement limit permitted by the rules.Wise, p.1330. Meyer went with the car when it was sold in 1927 to Fred Holliday (of Holliday Steel Company) as the ''Jynx Special'' (a morbidly ironic name, since Jimmy Murphy had been killed in it in 1924). He would be mechanic for Wilbur Shaw in the Indianapolis 500 that year. Meyer also served as co-driver, taking the car from seventh place up to sixth. In 1928, Phil Shafer's intended Miller entry went up for sale, and Alden Sampson bought the car for Meyer. ...
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DOHC
An overhead camshaft (OHC) engine is a piston engine where the camshaft is located in the cylinder head above the combustion chamber. This contrasts with earlier overhead valve engines (OHV), where the camshaft is located below the combustion chamber in the engine block. ''Single overhead camshaft'' (SOHC) engines have one camshaft per bank of cylinders. ''Dual overhead camshaft'' (DOHC, also known as "twin-cam".) engines have two camshafts per bank. The first production car to use a DOHC engine was built in 1910. Use of DOHC engines slowly increased from the 1940s, leading to many automobiles by the early 2000s using DOHC engines. Design In an OHC engine, the camshaft is located at the top of the engine, above the combustion chamber. This contrasts the earlier overhead valve engine (OHV) and flathead engine configurations, where the camshaft is located down in the engine block. The valves in both OHC and OHV engines are located above the combustion chamber; however an OHV ...
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National Midget Auto Racing Hall Of Fame
The National Midget Auto Racing Hall of Fame is an American Hall of Fame and museum for midget cars. The Hall of Fame is located at Angell Park Speedway Angell Park Speedway has a 1/3 mile () dirt racetrack located in Sun Prairie, Wisconsin. The track has been run by the city's fire department since 1903. Racing occurs every Sunday approximately Memorial Day until Labor Day. Special racing ... in Sun Prairie, Wisconsin, and can be accessed during weekly Sunday races during the summer. Inductees are often honored with their award in January at the Chili Bowl at Tulsa. List of inductees There were 254 inductees after the 2021 induction ceremony. References {{authority control Midget car racing Auto racing museums and halls of fame Automobile museums in Wisconsin Sports museums in Wisconsin Midget Auto Museums in Dane County, Wisconsin ...
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Monobloc Head
A ''monobloc'' or ''en bloc'' engine is an internal-combustion piston engine some of whose major components (such as cylinder head, cylinder block, or crankcase) are formed, usually by casting, as a single integral unit, rather than being assembled later. This has the advantages of improving mechanical stiffness, and improving the reliability of the sealing between them. ''Monobloc'' techniques date back to the beginnings of the internal combustion engine. Use of the term has changed over time, usually to address the most pressing mechanical problem affecting the engines of its day. There have been three distinct uses of the technique: * Cylinder head and cylinder * Cylinder block * Cylinder block and crankcase In most cases, any use of the term describes single-unit construction that is opposed to the more common contemporary practice. Where the monobloc technique has later become the norm, the specific term fell from favour. It is now usual practice to use monobloc cylinders and c ...
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Monobloc Engine
A ''monobloc'' or ''en bloc'' engine is an internal-combustion piston engine some of whose major components (such as cylinder head, cylinder block, or crankcase) are formed, usually by casting, as a single integral unit, rather than being assembled later. This has the advantages of improving mechanical stiffness, and improving the reliability of the sealing between them. ''Monobloc'' techniques date back to the beginnings of the internal combustion engine. Use of the term has changed over time, usually to address the most pressing mechanical problem affecting the engines of its day. There have been three distinct uses of the technique: * Cylinder head and cylinder * Cylinder block * Cylinder block and crankcase In most cases, any use of the term describes single-unit construction that is opposed to the more common contemporary practice. Where the monobloc technique has later become the norm, the specific term fell from favour. It is now usual practice to use monobloc cylinders and ...
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Overhead Cam
An overhead camshaft (OHC) engine is a piston engine where the camshaft is located in the cylinder head above the combustion chamber. This contrasts with earlier overhead valve engines (OHV), where the camshaft is located below the combustion chamber in the engine block. ''Single overhead camshaft'' (SOHC) engines have one camshaft per bank of cylinders. ''Dual overhead camshaft'' (DOHC, also known as "twin-cam".) engines have two camshafts per bank. The first production car to use a DOHC engine was built in 1910. Use of DOHC engines slowly increased from the 1940s, leading to many automobiles by the early 2000s using DOHC engines. Design In an OHC engine, the camshaft is located at the top of the engine, above the combustion chamber. This contrasts the earlier overhead valve engine (OHV) and flathead engine configurations, where the camshaft is located down in the engine block. The valves in both OHC and OHV engines are located above the combustion chamber; however an OHV en ...
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Midget Car Racing
Midget cars, also speedcars in Australia, is a class of racing cars. The cars are very small with a very high power-to-weight ratio and typically use four cylinder engines. They originated in the United States in the 1930s and are raced on most continents. There is a worldwide tour and national midget tours in the United States, Australia, and New Zealand. Cars Typically, these four cylinder engine cars have to and weigh . The high power and small size of the cars combine to make midget racing quite dangerous; for this reason, modern midget cars are fully equipped with roll cages and other safety features. Some early major midget car manufacturers include Kurtis Kraft (1930s to 1950s) and Solar (1944–46). Midgets are intended to be driven for races of relatively short distances, usually 2.5 to 25 miles (4 to 40 km). Some events are staged inside arenas, like the Chili Bowl held in early January at the Tulsa Expo Center in Tulsa, Oklahoma. There are midget races in ...
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Head Gasket
In an internal combustion engine, a head gasket provides the seal between the engine block and cylinder head(s). Its purpose is to seal the combustion gases within the cylinders and to avoid coolant or engine oil leaking into the cylinders. Leaks in the head gasket can cause poor engine running and/or overheating. Purpose Within a water-cooled internal combustion engine, there are three fluids which travel between the engine block and the cylinder head: # Combustion gases (unburned air/fuel mixture and exhaust gases) in each cylinder # Water-based coolant in the coolant passages # Lubricating oil in the oil galleries Correct operation of the engine requires that each of these circuits do not leak or lose pressure at the junction of the engine block and the cylinder head. The head gasket is the seal that prevents these leaks and pressure losses. Types * Multi-Layer Steel (MLS): Most modern engines are produced with MLS gaskets. These consist of two to five (typically three) th ...
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