Hi Juniatha! It was the Lincoln Zephyr V-12 car I saw at the show. Quite an impressive "tank" it was, too. There's nothing really unusual about a V-12 engine, especially at the time the car was built, although it WAS unusual to find one in a car. American PT boats of World War Two fame (think John F. Kennedys PT-109) were powered by V-12 engines.
Radio talk show host G. Gordon Liddy tells a tale of when he was in college in the years after the war he had a friend who had a Zephyr V-12. They were going out, Liddy got in the car and asked his buddy "Aren't you going to start it so we can get going?" "It IS started!" his friend replied. Liddy said it was the smoothest running engine he had ever experienced, couldn't tell it was running at idle at all.
Hi Firelock
>> Got to see one at a "boat-and-car" show about 6 years ago <<
You mean a 39 Lincoln Zephyr or a V12 motor ?
To go V12 *would* have been what I *would* have suggested to Chrysler when they decided to stop making their 392 Hemi on account of extra production costs .
"and what about extra costs for a V12 engine ?" you might ask .
Sure - yet instead of hemisperical heads you would have had that exclusive number of cylinders which has a technical 'raison d'être' since it combines full self-equilibration of a six-in-line with easing of the reciprocating / rotating mass balancing problem ( calibrating balancing in counterweights on crank shaft ) in a V-type block . Hence twelve cylinders in 60 or - preferably - 120° V are about perfect - a V16 can't do better , V10 isn't good enough although providing an interesting sound , somewhat in between - small wonder at first glance yet somewhat surprising on second thought - a V8 and a V12 . I just like the idea had Chrysler offered a V12 - concept providing both performance and smoothness - they would have placed their cars above those of the other companies . A top class model had an image promoting effect on more decent models , too , this is well established sales policy today .
Maybe I take too much of an engineering point of view , yet something deep down in me likes to clings to the idea of creating true , honest value in engineering . believing that quality will in the end serve best and in the case of Chrysler should have established a convinced clientele for the make - on which to build in doubl sense in varying times . There is a lot of talk in high class car design today about 'creating emotion' , meaning to build not just what does the job but what has a distinctive character of its own : an automobile that is as much an engineering and styling asset as it is a practical and long-lasting personal transportation vehicle .
Maybe it's just that I cherish the idea Chrysler today could be the American car manufacturer in the ranks of Bentley and Mercedes ...
Regards
Juniatha
I don't know folks, but my dream car has been a 1939 Lincoln Zephyr V-12 ever since I saw the ad on the back cover of a 1939 "National Geographic" one of the neighbors was throwing out around 1968 or so. Twelve cylanders! WOW! Got to see one at a "boat-and-car" show about 6 years ago, just as cool as I thought it would be! No, it wasn't for sale. couldn't have afforded it anyway.
DeSoto were something of their own , they were the only one to offer 'gold effect anodized wheel covers , not too far out once you have accepted white off-set color on exactly those parts of the lower sides that get dirty first and most - this division of the Chrysler Corporation like Imperial was later closed down in an effort to concentrate on a few major names like Plymouth and Dodge , both late became active in muscle car 'sculpturing' of the early 1970s - an era which in a curious way meant to classic American Muscle Cars what the early 1940s had been to Super Power steam some 30 years before .
= J =
what if I had been born in 1950 ?
I guess - hope - dad would have bought a big Chrysler , like this-here 1958 NewYorker 392 hardtop
( from a vintage Chrysler ad - graphics of child and car modified by = J = )
edit: replace q++++ with curious
....We'll watch for it. As you can see, we visit this thread often.
Quentin
I've always admired the '58 model Desoto......nicely designed automobile.
Sorry about the other pic........I'll try to fix that in a day or so......
.....That is certainly a nice rendition of the '58 Desoto convertible Murray....White walls & wires...
Could not pull the previous post's photo up.
And a really nice '58 Desoto Convertible:
http://www.madwhips.com/1958-desoto-firesweep-convertible/image/1958-desoto-firesweep-convertible-2.html
Here's a nice picture for you Quentin:
.....And it's a 2-track east / west CSX main. Formally Conrail and NYC, that passes under that bridge in conversation.
= J =, the political part is probably less important to know than the engineering side. Anyway, we're glad to see it being renewed.
When steel bars are exposed at their ends then it's high time to start rebuilding . I feel like it was taking chances to let it go on for three more years , after all it would have been no fun if a span would have collapsed onto that four lane state road and railroad line ..
Sad to see things deteriorating back home while our means are bound with missions impossible to accomplish the way one unassuming son in chair had believed . A match is easily lit - a fire hard to put out . Billions have been spent to keep from tumbling down what didn't go forwards , billions have been spent on trying to build up abroad what wasn't asked to be built up and will be destroyed as the last of trucks just vanish in the distance on their way home . Billions have been spent on hi-tech development , unmanned birds of prey - leaving a broken one to scrutinizing examination . Billions didn't help our reputation in some parts of the world , I wished some important figures could have noted , picked up , related to and applied some very simple truth from Billy Wilder's 'one - two - three' . I wished some leading figures would have lived up to demand - as JFK once coined it : "Ask not what America can do for you - ask what you can do for America!" This should have applied to some at stick & rudder who have embarked on 90° banking turns . I still believe we might have won people's hearts hands down just practicing what we preach - some people today trying to emulate , not reject our commitment to freedom .
You see , I'm really engineer , not politician , I lack understanding ...
Bridge construction: Currently, a prestressed concrete beamed bridge is being replaced here in Muncie.
I actually took photos of the ends of the prestressed beams several years ago, and sent the results to the County Engineer's office. {And really got a response}, saying it was to be renovated next year...
Well here it is about 3 years later, and the bridge is being replaced.
I'm estimating this bridge to be about 25 years of age at the most....
It is a 4-lane bridge over a 4-lane state road and railroad here.
The ends of the prestressed beams were deteriorated to the point the concrete was flaked off enough exposing the re-bar on the ends. Beams sat on the support about 10". Seems salt from the above roadway came down on these beams and deteriorated the ends.
They renovated the bridge supports at both ends and in the center and set new prestressed beams and roadway surface. Doing two lanes at a time with traffic over on the other lanes. First section is complete, and second part now being replaced.
Have photos, but not able to put them on here...Too frustrating.
The geometrics of steel girder bridges are fewer. Has prestressed concrete made structural sterility reality?
Hi = J =
Enjoyed your piece on some european railroading....Especially the Polish "saving on rails".....Liked that humor.
Sounds like you had some neat rail traveling overseas with your Father.
It really makes one wonder about costs of building things like infrastructure, especially when this country built many, many bridges and different kinds of structures during the Great Depression. Many of them still in service.
But now....Oh...not possible with today's costs. I wonder how so many structures will be replaced when they start to crumble and can't be used any further.
Hi Quentin
>> Our country doesn't seem to want to enter .. <<
Yes , I read about lingering ideas of having rail high speed trains or rather not when it comes to calculating costs . It's like a big city evaluating to investigate on a subway system to start from scratch - or go on without . Seems , some of our infrastructure if it hadn't been built up over the last half of a century would just turn out beyond financing today . What makes me wonder : how come ? how could they do before what seems impossible to pay today even with all that help by modern design and construction methods , devices and machinery ?
Never mind , DBAG has a lot of issues maintaining their network - or not sufficiently maintaining it . Today there are speed restrictions springing up faster than they deal with it – not to say they couldn't if DBAG was prepared to spend on it .
As a matter of fact , accompanying my father on some short business trips I recall some rides in IC trains during the last years of former West-German DB state railway in the early 1990s when running 200 km/h (125 mph) behind 103 class Co-Co electrics : the ride usually was so smooth you saw the country side pass by the window like in a movie , there was a continuous subdued '.. shshshshsh ..' from the wheels only broken by an occasional isolated 'rdam-dram' with the coach's bogies hitting a high speed switch straight on at the entry of a wayside little station and again as side-tracks re-joined the main - that was all , there was hardly a sway or dip the suspension had to deal with . This appeared remarkable to me when from my first ventures to wild derelict DR yards with some active lines passing through in West-Berlin as a child and to East-Berlin after 1990 opening of the wall I was more used to Berlin's then mostly quite old and battered trackwork especially as DR gave a minimum of attention to lines in the western part of the city . Seeing some DB coach's bogies slamming alarmingly hard over an conspicuously down-bending rail joint with loose clamps ( "outch-aargh -- outch-awh" ) on a switch in Ostbahnhof , in stark contrast with DR coaches in the same train passing easily almost dancing over the joint ( "bha-leng -- bha-leng" ) I exclaimed to a friend next to me "See , they always send DB coaches over DR tracks from time to time for practicing some suspension gymnastics - gee !" He replied : "That's nothing , you should see Polish tracks , they say the Polish save on rail miles by expanding each of the joints to the max , some say in worst case PKP could even do without rails at all ." That was slightly exaggerated as I learned when I traveled PKP later on : “Waram-dadam … waram-dadam … waram-dadam … waram-dadam …” and so on with the coach gently nodding to the rhythm of the rails under a sooty plume of steam across the open plains and through light birch woods on sandy soil in Poland .
Edit . replace wrong 'auspiciously' with correct 'conspicuously'
Several other countries have dipped into HSR and hence designs that help them to handle such speeds.
Our country does not seem to {politically}, want to enter {yet}, into such transportation system. It just seems it's going to take some more time for such projects to get any priority here.
If we could finally remove ourselves from "protecting everything around the free world", then maybe we might {someday}, consider such. Guess one can hope....
I would supose so - what else ...
Yet , you may call me hopelessly optimistic or dreaming or a mind up in the air - I still maintain a better physical look could be realized - if those concerned would care . Yet , maybe it's just that old RR attitude to looks :
Builder : "Now do you want the sleek nose or the bullish body ..? we could also .."
RR : "Never mind about nose or body - when can you have it ready to take up loads ?"
In Europe it was largely the Swedish and the Swiss industry ( and probably their railways ) who cared to produce a clean finish with welded side sheets as plane as glass plates and with rounded edges and at east an idea of giving a look and character to their locomotives .
Swiss electrics tend to look unassuming until they make an energetic get-away with twelve coaches going into a steep ramp like mountain goats rendering road traffic next to ridiculous as they take their trains blasting past lines of cars that creep along to get to the next highway ...
That is - until France woke up from entering the doldrums after the Concorde was in regular traffic . (they seem to have a cycle of making an exceptional technological leap forward , enjoying 'France en avantgarde' for some time and then drowse away for about a dozend years until someone shouts "Alarme , La France is left behind !" and then the cycle starts again - *g*)
That's when they came up with the TGV - train grande vitesse - which prompted German rail industries to start pressing on reluctant DB for a similar high speed train - if somewhat trimmed down from spectacular to more cost concious , inevitably .
Both resulted in a new generation of express trains of - well - looks that .. uhm -- ehm .. sometimes defy definition ...
.....Hi = J = :
I suppose my thoughts of appearance design of railroad locomotives, would be thinking in terms of comparison back to models like the F's & E's and other similar configurations by a few other companies.
They now just seem to create a box like structure, with mabe a slopping front with little effort to design a pleasing looking unit. And I'm just thinking it's most likely that money dictates that.
Thanks , Creepycrank , but I will leave it to someone else to expose themselves , I do have some designs from years before when I had time to do such things , mainly as an offspring of my effort at one high pressure / condensing steam turbine electric loco . Yet you may allow to spare me checking files , selecting a drawing , scanning it , writing a description to it , 'translate' the units for posting one of the drawings here .
However , for a decently stylish electric - and a most powerful , too - see the Austrian 'Taurus' 1016 / 1116 family of mulit-purpose 6.4 MW ( 8620 hp ) / 230 km/h ( 142 mph ) Bo-Bo . I recently rode a Railjet express behind a 1016 and it took the train up to 200 km/h faster than you have finished reading this and did so without a sigh or slip - it was amazing , or rather : it wasn't even that , it was done effortlessly like it was nothing ...
Windows to peer into the heart of the beast are missing. Many years ago as a boy, I was taken to the station. Sometimes to meet relatives coming and going. Sometimes just to go to the station in the evening.
The earlier EMD passenger cab units had sizable square windows. These were larger than the port holes on EMD's newer locomotives. Hoisted on my father's shoulders, I could see through the screen of oil streams on the inside of the window. Illuminated by light bulbs was a fascinating forest of tightly cramped machinery painted green and top coated with oil.
When departing, the air horn blast was followed a low roar and brief view of a vibrating mechanical mass. Too quickly the windows slipped by and were gone.
EMD, GE, MPI and now Brookville all have accounts at Vergara Studios to do the exterior design of their passenger locomotives at least. If you can do better here's your chance.
Well , sure ... So they say . Yet I think something better could be built without too much extra costs . Mind material costs are low as compared to machining and labor and machining costs with punching out windows of pleasing proportions and shape costs the same and takes the same time as to punch out other shapes of windows .
An example of the humbler type is this 186 class synchronous motors electric I photographed on the way last November . Again , it's a matter of shapes and colors - more than ever - fitting and harmonizing , giving the electric a character ... Or not .
Rail Pool enterprise # 186 281 ; photo Nov 2011 by = J =
.....Hi = J = ....Welcome back. Believe the money must be spent on pure mechanical & electronic design now, and not much attention to aesthetics.
Quentin ,
you're right with steam , diesel and contemporay electrics alike !
......Well, first the locomotive design folks will have to put some design back in the locomotive designs to have something to "copy"
1950's automobiles imitated aviation. It was the speed and thrill of the sky made available to motorists by industrial design.
When will imitation of a locomotive cab be used to sell thrills to automobile buyers?
I moved from Oxnard CA to Millbrook NY in March of 1968. I bought an English Ford, Cortina, that had a 10 gallon tank if that much. Gas hovered around 30 to 33 cents per gallon. I could easily filler-up, before running out, for less than 3 bucks.
Thought the gas was a bit high. Had been paying around 20 to 25 cents in New Mexico in 1966 prior to moving to California.
....With the input of several here....it seems 34.9 would be a figure very close for accuracy.
J. I am doing this from a very dim memory of long ago.
The Mobil on Ralph Av & Av U in Brooklyn was 34.9 a gal. The Finast(I think) on Flatbush Av was 33.9 @ gal and if you filled your tank you got a free steak knife.
I also remember the Amoco in Lake Placid, NY being 35.9 a gal for gas. I remember the Amoco as it was the only place to get lead free gas. We used it it a gasoline stove when we went camping.
As I remember it gas was cheaper in New Jersey. My mom would buy there on trips that went that way.(I don't remember prices).
Rgds IGN
.....My family opened a brand new Esso Station in 1938, and there was a sign posted advertising....6 gal. / $1.00....!! Of course, not corrected for inflation. And.....taxes were at a minimum on it then.
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