World's Fastest Model T Powered Streamliner

I met Joel Young about a year ago when he came to look at an old race car I had placed in storage, under lots of tarps and plastic, in my condo development’s RV parking lot, while waiting for my ship to come. My plan was to use the 1991 Wildcat Indy Lights car as the foundation for an all-new, affordable, revolutionary, never-been-tried, dirt-or-pavement/oval-or-road course race car.

No, I was never going to build it myself, not with my own two hands. (Back in my youthful motorcycle days a friend's father, a mechanic by trade, once said I handled tools like a whore handles a baby.) My folly was to fund the project, perhaps via a winning PowerBall ticket, and handsomely pay master fabricator Tom Brawner, cousin of the late and great Clint Brawner and a friend I have known for years, to turn my dream into a reality.

Then one day Tom called and asked if I was interested in selling the car. The Wildcat had been sitting for almost five years by then, my luck with both the economy and the Arizona Lottery had not changed one iota and the thought of immediate cash was more than attractive.

So my answer was an emphatic yes. Tom brought his friend Joel out to Tempe so he could "kick the tires" and I noticed he was mainly interested in the Hewland gearbox .

I then learned that Mr. Young wanted to build a Bonneville race car, powered by a full-race, turbocharged Ford flathead that started life in a Model T. His plan was to be ready for the August, 2009 edition of Bonneville Speed Week with a car that would set a record in a class for vehicles powered by stock block, American –made flatheads.

Joel Young obviously had a dream, too – and unlike me, he possessed the ability, expertise and cash to make it a reality. I accepted his check and then helped he and Tom load the Wildcat onto their trailer.

Fast forward to a couple of months ago and, while talking to Tom on the phone one day I asked how Joel and the Wildcat were doing. Was the plan for Bonneville still on track? Tom said the project was definitely moving forward, but without the Wildcat and without the Hewland gearbox. Their best laid plans had gone awry as the Hewland's ring and pinion were simply unsuitable, ratio -wise. Beside, the very wide Indy Lights car just wasn’t great for high straight line speeds so they had come up with an alternative solution, one they were feeling better and better about.

And what, pray tell, was the solution?

Tom answered by asking if I had ever seen or heard of an old streamliner called the Thermo King Special.

Oh, yes. Almost everyone who followed land speed record chasing in the seventies remembers the beautiful, red-white-and-blue Thermo King car.

Built back in 1971 by a group of engineering students from the College of the Redwoods in Northern California, under the direction of Bob Haveman, the Thermo King Special was a ‘Corsair’ streamliner powered by a blown diesel engine originally used to power transport refrigeration units. There were a couple of Corsairs built, but this particular one, the one Joel had acquired, set its last record (199.019 mph for F/DS cars) in 1979 at Bonneville. Then it was retired, supposedly forever.

“The car was in museums for awhile,” said Young, “and then bought and sold a couple of times over the years. It was destined for the scrap heap until it was saved and then shown at the old Automotive Motorsports Foundation’s exhibit at the Arizona Historical Society Museum in Tempe. When the exhibit closed and after we found out the Wildcat wasn’t a good option we decided it might be fun to give the Corsair one more chance at glory, so we tracked it down and bought it and started the renovation process. It’s been an adventure, that’s for sure.”

As a result of almost three decades of total neglect the Corsair had to be completely rebuilt. Young, Brawner and fellow team members Brad Taylor and Dennis Cling spent hours resuscitating the streamliner with maximum performance potential as their goal – although safety was really their foremost concern.

“We had to make a roll cage and replace a lot of pieces that were rusted out, or just worn out and broken,” said Brawner, “while keeping as much of the original car as possible. It really was a well thought out design, but adapting it to run with the turbo flathead and meet the safety specs of today was like building a ship in a bottle.”

The heart of the ‘new’ race car, the engine, was both the responsibility and passion of Young. The semi-retired owner of Matrix Machine in Phoenix, which specializes in hi-tech, military-spec machining and fabrication, has always been a fan of Henry Ford and his visions and capabilities despite "the father of mass automobile production's" humble background and beginnings.

Like Ford, Young is a self-taught mechanic/tinkerer/engineer who never graduated from college. Also like Ford, when he opened his own business he recognized the benefits of paying his employees higher wages, with better working conditions and the best benefits possible to attract and retain the best people. Today that business is one of his legacies, now operated by his daughter and son-in-law – although neither are named Edsel – and still doing business according to the best practices and examples Henry Ford set for America and the world.

Perhaps that's why Young is simply obsessed with the Ford Model T. He owns and drives various versions, both on the street and in competition, and he’s always thinking of ways to improve upon a basic engine design that’s now over a century old. Hence the Model T streamliner project featuring an engine that was modified and developed without any cutting edge CAD systems, design programs or virtual engineering methods.

“One thing you have to remember,” said Young, “is that the Model T engine originally put out about 20 horsepower. It had three main bearings and the crankshaft was referred to as a bent wire because it flexed so much. To go fast on the salt and to set a record we wanted over 150 horsepower. So we went to work and came up with an engine that should do just fine.”

Fine is a relative term, but Young’s fabrication and machining skills and engine building expertise should not be discounted. Starting with a block from a 1927 tin lizzy he added two more main bearings in the girdles, a custom crankshaft and installed a Garret T04 turbocharger that came right off the old record-setting Thermo King diesel engine. The custom-built head features titanium valves and with a high lift cam, Haltech engine management system and a healthy dose of methanol in the tank the bored and stroked 194 c.i.d. engine showed almost 180 horespower on the chassis dyno in June.

Toward the end of July the team got to make a brief test run on an abandoned runway at Coolidge Municipal Airport, just outside of Phoenix. They only had about a third of a mile to accelerate but they got up to 85 mph, fast enough to make sure nothing leaked and everything worked, including the original front suspension, spindles and brakes from an old VW microbus and the Chevy Corvair steering box!

The car was then painted using the same design scheme as it boasted back in the seventies, with Matrix Machine on the side along with a large Ford logo on both sides of the engine cowl. Then they packed up and headed to Bonneville.

On Saturday, August 8th the Matrix Machine team presented the car for technical inspection, hoping there would be no problems but prepared for anything and everything. There was absolutely no cause for worry as the car went through without incident other than a lot of comments about how well the car was prepared.

Sunday morning saw Young climb into the cockpit for his initial run only to discover he could not shift into third gear. Like much of the mechanicals the gearbox was the same unit originally installed in the old Thermo King diesel car, an English –built, 60's era Jack Knight two speed with overdrive. He turned out early but the team decided to get back in line and make another run, even if the car was stuck in second.

Again, the tranny wouldn’t cooperate but at least they had a run in the books. The Matrix Machine Special ran 122.079 mph, breaking the old 4-cylnder flathead Ford record of 99.448 mph, so they opted to put the car in impound for the night and make a backup run, still using second gear only, on Monday.

That attempt produced a speed of 131.959 mph for an average speed of 127.049 mph, a new record. But there weren’t a lot of high fives going around as the team knew they had a lot more speed to show, if only they could get third and fourth gear to engage.

The car was moved back to tech so the SCTA folks could seal the engine and they could continue to run; otherwise they would have had to pull the head to check the engine displacement to make the record official. They went back to the pits to adjust the shifter, put the car back in line and prepared to make one more run Monday afternoon with all systems go – including the transmission.

That run resulted in a speed of 166.264 mph. After another night in impound the Matrix Machine Special made its final run on Tuesday morning, running 153.968 mph due to slick salt and a less than perfect start. Nevertheless, Joel Young put his name in the record books for V4F Blown Fuel Streamliners with an average speed of 160.116 mph.

Young was elated over the record, the effort and especially how they really had no major problems at Bonneville. “This year is the 100th Anniversary of the Ford Model T and just like the original," said Young, "this car performed like a champ.”

But Young is already looking forward to next year. "We're looking at what we'll have to do to make a ring and pinion for that Hewland five-speed because we think we can get over 200," he said. "And wouldn't it be a kick to join the 200 MPH club using a Model T engine?"