MG Midget

[egon]

Bird, the Chrysler 300 I had was not from the original line of letter cars. They had been discontinued by 1964?? I think. It was just an ordinary four door hardtop with a 383 with a four barrel on it. The 69 was a Newport with a two barreled 383.

The one you drove probably had the ram manifold on it where the carbs sat beside the valve covers rather than between.

[Bird]

Egon, there's probably not many people old enough to remember that Chrysler ram manifold. There was a Dodge D500 with that 2 carb arrangement, and I may be wrong, but I don't think the '57 Chrysler 300 had that.

Back then, the little town of Plano, TX, just had a town marshall and a night watchman instead of a police department, so they only had one police vehicle. And the town marshall was also the worst hot rodder in town. When we moved there in 1956, the police car was a 1955 Olds, so after he tore the automatic transmission out of it 5 times, they bought a new 1957 Ford sedan with a manual transmission. He blew the engine in the Ford. I understand some rods went down through the oil pan. So then they bought a new 1958 genuine police special; a Plymouth with the push button automatic and two 4-bbl carbs. [img]/forums/images/icons/laugh.gif[/img] That car was tough enough he couldn't tear it up until one night he decided to see how fast it could go and he scraped a bridge bannister a long way out of town on the highway and tore off the right front fender and most of the grill.

That was when the city fathers decided it was time to create a police department and hired someone from out of town as the Chief and made the town marshall a patrolman and a very short time later fired him. [img]/forums/images/icons/laugh.gif[/img]

[egon]

</font><blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr />
there's probably not many people old enough to remember that Chrysler ram manifold.

[/ QUOTE ]

Sucks, that was only yesterday wasn't it? [img]/forums/images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

The ram manifold may have come about in 1960. For sure the 57's did not have it.

Egon [img]/forums/images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

[CJDave]

[img]/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img] All this talk of Mopars is making me nutzo. The VERY FIRST TIME I laid eyes on a double-rocker Chrysler I was IN LOVE! I put those early Chrysler hemi engines in everything you can imagine. My daily driver was a '58 New Yorker 2-Door hardtop with the 392 in it. In the later fifties, Chrysler was real good at playing the mix-n-match game and made several versions of hemi V-8 engines, some as small as 241 CID. The '57 Chrysler 300 had two four barrels as did the '56. The '56 was a 354 CID. 1957 and later was 392. In '59 they came out with the "B" engine family, the 361-383 wedge engines. Then came the 413, and then by combining the 383 bore and the 413 crank came the 426. The 383 made it's reputation as a highway patrol car engine. Not much could outrun a '59 Dodge with torsion bar suspension and a "pursuit grade" 383. YES, there WAS a difference between your Dad's 383 and the one in the cop car that was pulling him over. [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

[Pat]

Dave, I just loved MOPARs for the same reason I loved XKE and many others. I loved the look on the driver's faces when I totally blew them away with my '66 Sunbeam Tiger.

Pat

[Bird]

Dave, my wife still says her favorite of the cars we've owned was our 1968 Plymouth Roadrunner. It had plenty of power and it handled very well, but 12-13 miles per gallon would not be good now, and if I let it go long without driving it on the highway, the plugs would start to foul after about 3,000 miles.

[CJDave]

[img]/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img] One of the guys who shared an apartment with me had a SB Tiger. To get to the RR spark plug you removed a little access plate inside the car. His SB Tiger was red and was a real speeding ticket magnet. [img]/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img] In 1966 I wanted to buy an XKE. I changed my mind when I saw how much oil a '64 XKE that a buddy bought used could leak in just a few minutes of idling. [img]/forums/images/icons/frown.gif[/img]

[Pat]

Dave, That "plate" was a large rubber grommet thingy located sort of under the accelerator pedal and partly on the tranny tunnel. That was the easiest spark plug to get to. The rest were tough. In stock configuration the original (not last of the dieing breed) came with a 260 V-8 with standard cast iron intake and exhaust manifolds and a 2 barrel carb. Spark plugs were hard to get to in that configuration (except the left rear one with the grommet.)

There were dealer performance options shipped from "the factory" to the dealer to be installed only after a minimum 1000 mile break-in period. Among these were: a high performance Mustang racing cam with solid lifters, a Vic Edelbrock designed aluminum high rise manifold that fitted a Holly competition 4 barrel carb without needing a bubble or scoop on the hood, and an equal length set of welded tubular headers tuned for a broad boost range of 4000-7000 RPM (with collector boxes and dumps to open if you wanted a tad more performance with a terrific increase in exhaust noise. All this performance gear came in cardboard boxes labeled SUNBEAM.

Of course the same basic block started life as a 220 Cu In V-8 in Falcons etc and then became the 260, 289, and 302, all of which (except the 220) saw service in Tigers. Some of the last of the Tigers came with the 289. Chrysler bought a big chunk of Routes Group (sort of the General Motors of the U.K.) the parent of Sunbeam Talbot. The last of the Tigers came with gold five pointed Chrysler stars next to the front wheel wells. Prior to Chrysler buying in there had been a significant support of the Tiger in racing circles but Chrysler cut off the racing support which is no surprise since why would they want to promote/support a Ford racing engine.

According to the official factory brochures the top speed with the standard trim engine was rated 125 and with the dealer options it was 125 cruise and 165 top speed. At top speed the tire expansion gave 10% speedometer error such that RPM for 150 MPH was actually a road speed of 165 while the speedo was indicating 150. I never ran mine up to an indicated 150 but a couple times I saw the needle pass through 147 and still accelerating when I got off the accelerator. Of the 5 offered rear end ratios I selected 2.88:1 as I was not seriously interested in dragging the car. Drag racers went for the 4.56:1 and added the Willys J series posi-lock (direct bolt in limited slip.) With cheater slicks, posi-lock, and dealer performance options these little bombs would turn 108 in 13 flat. (J stock NHRA if I recall)

With its virtually perfect 50-50 weight distribution it was much better handling than the MG-A it replaced. You didn't drive it like a VW bug. With a VW bug there is really just two useful throttle positions, on and off. The MG was nearly that way but with the Tiger you needed to "MANAGE" your application of throttle to the extant conditions. The Tiger needed traction masters. I got a little wheel tramp in 2nd or 3rd and before I could get off the throttle I had pulled one of the shocks and its mount right out of the car. REINFORCE AND REPLACE.

With the performance options the idle speed was 1000 RPM and with the Ford HEH box 4 speed tranny that was not a good stop and go commute driver so I put the hydraulic cam and lifters back in and kept the rest of the performance goodies on it when my wife used it for her daily driver to work and back. Then when its usage permitted I would pop in the racing cam and mechanical lifters. I got pretty good at switching back and forth. It was a really fun car and to me worth the $5000 it cost in '66. I wish I had it now!!!!!!!!!!!!!

XKE were smooth and pretty and fun to run off from. One summer while in college on GI bill I got a job at the Kearfott Division of General Precision in San Marcos, CA. (F-111 swing wing aircraft computer hardware.) I commuted from San Diego, through Escondido, to San Marcos. Several times I passed the same guy (apparently on his morning commute) in his XKE. It was some fun to note his facial expression as I cruised up, dropped into 3rd and ran off from him despite his vain attempts to keep up. I didn't really need to down shift to do it but it added dramatic effect when I got significant rubber and just shot off.

A guy stationed at Minot with me had a Morris Mini Cooper that would jump out about 5 car lengths ahead of me at the light (5 Mini Minor lengths or 2-3 regular car lengths) but got blown away once the Tiger got rolling (recall the 2.88:1 rear end) I made it through a Minot, North Dakota winter in the Tiger with all the ice and snow and never had a mishap but it did require some finesse with clutch, throttle, brakes and steering to stay on the road.

Pat

[egon]

But Pat; did you ever have to change direction??? [img]/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img] [img]/forums/images/icons/laugh.gif[/img]

Or stop? [img]/forums/images/icons/shocked.gif[/img]

He he

E [img]/forums/images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

[Pat]

Egon, the Tiger handled pretty well with its 50-50 weight distribution as regards cornering/turning. It suffered a bit as many high performance cars did with marginal braking as related to repetitive high speed braking events. If you accelerate quickly just after a hard braking and hit the brakes again (lather rinse repeat) you will heat the brakes and experience some fade. Corvettes were really bad at that back then (don't know about now.)

The Tiger's handling could have been improved by reduction of the barbell effect but then that is how they got the 50/50. The Alpine (same body/frame with 1725 CC 4 banger) had the starting battery under the bonnet (hood) up front and the spare tire standing upright at the forward part of the boot (trunk.) To get 50/50 weight distribution the V-8 engine was pushed way back toward the passenger compartment making for a sizable "tranny hump" between the two occupants and although there was sufficient depth of foot room width was a bit restricted for BIG FOLKS. The larger starting battery to service the V-8 was placed in the trunk and the spare tire was placed horizontally at the rear of the trunk next to the bumper. There were two cross connected fuel tanks (same as Alpine) one inside each rear fender.

Change direction... ever have to change direction... Gee Egon, you could change direction without even intending too with a little ill timed excess throttle. You could, with practice, steer in corners with the throttle and hands just poised above the steering wheel for just in case.

I used to take my cars to the shopping center at Minot, North Dakota, my MG-A, VW Variant, and Tiger. The shopping center closed at 5PM on weekends and the large parking lot covered in a glaze of ice made a terrific skid pan for practicing various maneuvers. I got pretty good at dong 180 and 360 turns and various other acrobatics while staying in my lane starting up in forward or reverse (vastly different techniques.)

I do recall one particular change of direction... I had a college friend as passenger (he drove a 24 Ounce Datsun aka 240 Z) and heading down a hill near my house toward the freeway accelerating pretty smartly as we crossed an overpass near the turn to San Diego State University. Well the overpass was quite glazed with "black ice" and the Tiger tried to go sideways but I counter steered and feathered the throttle and straightened it right up, albeit in the other lane. My chum was both frightened and impressed with the maneuver, I was just glad I didn't hit the rails.

Pat