"Let Fly" to Hot Rod; Jim Pepper in Post #62

[BobPalma]

RE: The Studebaker V8 versus the April 2012 Hot Rod magazine domestic V8 article.

Below sent to Editor David Freiburger this evening:

http://racingstudebakers.com/foo/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=2496

Update: Some people had trouble with the link, so the whole letter is below in Post #13. BP

[Roscomacaw]

You're gonna have them checking their backsides for boot prints. LOL!

[Da Tinman]

Well put Dude, much better the f-bomb loaded reply I would have given anyway.

[SN-60]

Bob 'F Lee Bailey' Palma!!

[BobPalma]

You're gonna have them checking their backsides for boot prints. LOL!

I hope so, Bob, 'cause they're gonna find some big ones! <GGG> BP

[silverhawk]

Well said Mr.Palma! I sure hope to see more coverage from them in the future, with a reply like that, I can't see why not!

[Chris Pile]

Well said, Bob - but I think the problem is that Studebaker hasn't bought any advertising in Hot Rod for a long, long, time!

[candbstudebakers]

Thanks Bob, I don't spend money on these rags they call magazines, they quit printing any thing worth reading long ago.

[Studeboro]

thanks Bob, aside from reading your responce, and learning alot, I love knowing of a good but whooping, and I'm real glad your on our side.

[davepink53]

Gee Bob, I would love to know what was written, but I have been denied reading the post??

[Son O Lark]

Gee Bob, I would love to know what was written, but I have been denied reading the post??

Same here, something about me being a spammer?

[JRoberts]

Very well put, Bob. Thanks for carrying the Studebaker banner so proudly. I just got my latest issue of Hot Rod yesterday and was very disappointed. It seems like every possilbe form of GM V8 was in their Top 20. All this said, sadly I really was not surprised at the results.

[BobPalma]

Thanks, Guys.

Davepink and Barry (Son-o-Lark): PM sent with the entire letter. (Barry: 'Good to see your Dad, Dale "Lark Parker" McPhearson, doing so well of late. Great News! BP)

Oh, phooey; so no one else has trouble with the link, I'll just go ahead and paste the whole thing here:


OK, David Freiburger,

You guys have got my dander up this time! I enjoy Hot Rod and everything you've done with it the last several years, but there's no excuse for completely ignoring the bullet-proof Studebaker V8 engine in your April 2012 domestic V8 engine history and survey.

Do I understand that the survey was conducted on Facebook? What's up with that...and with only 2,000 people responding? That's got to be an infinitesimally-small percentage of your readership. What about people who aren't on Facebook; the ones who just read the magazine when it comes in the mail or buy it on the newsstand? How were they to express their opinion?

If the survey was confined to Facebook participants, I can appreciate their probably youthful ignorance of, and subsequent disregard for, the 1951-1964 Studebaker V8 engine. That accounts for them.

But your editors, your internal "staff survey" reported on Page 65? Give me a break! If they are real car guys, they should at least be aware of the Studebaker V8 and mention it somewhere, for Pete's sake. Have any of them seen a Studebaker V8 lately? Worked on one? Considered its uniqueness and many strengths?

Let me outline a few features of this unique, remarkable, and underappreciated engine. You decide in which category each belongs:

1. Sturdy? Every Studebaker V8 of every displacement (224 / 232 / 259 / 289 / 304.5) has a forged crankshaft and forged connecting rods, standard.

2. Sturdy? The original 1951 Studebaker V8 of 232 cubic inches has more combined main and rod bearing area than either the 1949 Oldsmobile or 1949 Cadillac V8, despite those engines having 303 and 331 cubic inches, respectively. The Studebaker V8's lower end is so overbuilt that bottom end problems on Studebaker V8s are 'way below the industry average.

3. Sturdy? Each cylinder head on a Studebaker V8 is secured with 18 bolts, effectively placing six bolts around each cylinder. Head gasket failure is all but unheard of, even on the many factory supercharged (and warranted, mind you) engines built in model years 1957, 1958, 1963, and 1964.

4. Sturdy? Every Studebaker V8 has full rocker arm shafts noted for long life; no flimsy stamped, individual rocker arms and pressed-in rocker arm studs to pull out no matter how cute and avant-garde (and cheap) the engineering.

5. Easy to work on? The Studebaker V8 water pump is small enough to hold in the palm of your hand and held to the water pump manifold with 4 small bolts. It's got to be the easiest one in the industry to replace; you don't even remove either end of either radiator hose.

6. Easy to work on? There is no need to open the cooling system to replace the intake manifold on a Studebaker V8; there are no cooling system passages within any intake manifold of a Studebaker V8 engine.

7. Easy to work on? The spark plugs in the most crowded 1957/1958 supercharged Golden Hawk engine with power steering and air conditioning, while no picnic with all those options, are still easier to access than the nearly-invisible, finger-searing 'plugs below the hot exhaust manifolds on most configurations of small-block Chevy V8s and Y-block Fords.

8. Longevity due to simplicity? Every Studebaker V8 has solid valve lifters, easily adjustable with self-locking adjustment screws on the inner ends of the rocker arms. No need to fool around with separate lock nuts once the valves are adjusted, and no need to worry about problems associated with hydraulic lifter pump-up or clatter.

9. Low-Maintenance Longevity? No need to worry about timing chain stretch and sprocket wear or ease / frequency of replacement in a Studebaker V8; every Studebaker V8 engine has a gear-driven camshaft.

10. Powerful in Original Form? Only the Chrysler hemi-head V8 had more power per cubic inch in model year 1951, the year Studebaker's V8 was introduced. Even with each of them having had two years' development as production engines, neither the Cadillac nor Oldsmobile V8 could muster one-half horsepower per cubic inch by 1951. The Studebaker V8 jumped out of the box with .517 in base configuration, second only to the original Chrysler Hemi's .543 among all 1951 domestic V8s.

11. Powerful in Final Form? A portable dynamometer was on location at The Summer 2004 Pure Stock Muscle Car Drag Race in Stanton MI. A legally-stock Studebaker R3 engine in a 1964 Studebaker Challenger 2-door sedan recorded 365 HP @ 5,895 RPM measured at the rear wheels with full, street-legal exhaust, stock air cleaner, and all engine accessories in place and operating...from its bone-stock 304.5 cubic inch displacement! That's almost 1.20 HP/CI as installed in the chassis, street-legal. How many other domestic 1964 V8s from any manufacturer could make that claim?

Putting the power to the ground and down the drag strip proved that the 365 HP figure was no fluke, either: At the 2011 Pure Stock Muscle Car Drag Race, that same car turned a quarter-mile elapsed time of 12.664 seconds at over 114 mph in the same configuration...on street-legal, DOT-approved G70X15 tires.

12. Appearance? Who on your staff has recently eyeballed a genuine, factory-supercharged Studebaker V8 and marveled at how mechanical and muscular it looks? While this is a matter of personal opinion, go to a car show where someone has a factory-supercharged Lark or Hawk with the hood open. Note how many people stop for a long look and leave with their eyebrows raised, a smile on their face, and new-found respect for a factory-supercharged muscle car that was available and being sold a full model year before Pontiac's 1964 GTO-packaged LeMans. 'Nuff said.

Yet, despite "all the above," the word Studebaker never appears in Hot Rod's April 2012 "coverage" of Great American V8 engines.

I suppose that's why the word ridiculous is in the dictionary.

Sincerely,

Bob Palma
Technical Editor
The Studebaker Drivers Club
Turning Wheels monthly magazine.

[Starlight]

RE: The Studebaker V8 versus the April 2012 Hot Rod magazine domestic V8 article.

Below sent to Editor David Freiburger this evening:

http://racingstudebakers.com/foo/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=2496

Loved your letter to them, Bob,I too was doing a slow burn over that article in Hot Rod.....Glad you blistered them, now, what will the reply/response from them be.....We shall see.....Keep on Studebakering

[Bud]

I 'll see the guys from Hot Rod magazine today as they are setting up an exhibit at the Automobile Driving Museum and they come over for lunch every Friday for a meeting. I'll tell them firsthand about not including the Studebaker V8 in their 20 best engines list and how we feel about the exclusion. Bud