Grey Motor info

[fe350chev]

I have proof that the fx is not an fe typo. Do you wanna see it.

[detective]

....yeah please  ..  bring it all on!...

[fe350chev]

This only proves that it's a humpy and not a typo. http://forums.autosport.com/topic/147044-cartoons-by-rod-waller/page-7

Repco 22 explains

[fe350chev]

But I really don't care about this topic too much, was much more interested in the Canadian grey. When I read about cars of the 40's and 50's there's often reference on the queens fleet being upgraded by Canadians or produced in Canada so I have wondered if it was just cos Canada was being seen as socially progressive that added to the tall poppy thing.

[fe350chev]

...the Reg Smith advert is real and Trove is not very helpful with providing those ads from back in the day it seems...

.....all up though, i'm pretty chuffed ATM that this snippet has come out of WA racing car history....


I have no doubt about used car places using the term, but I very much doubt they didn't get it from someone else, like their workshop bloke talking to a parts supplier etc and then borrowing the term.

[detective]

.... sorry for being off topic for so long....my apologies...still great info all the same...

...BTW  ..  i couldn't get that cartoon link to work?....

[fe350chev]

http://forums.autosport.com/topic/147044-cartoons-by-rod-waller/page-7

[fe350chev]

What's an 'FX'?

When I worked in radio, 'FX' was the abbreviation for 'effects'. Is that it?
Ray, my gag has backfired bigtime. I can't believe I have to tell you the FX was the first Holden, the "humpy" 48/215 FX. The one before the FJ. You're supposed to have known that since you were in short pants. So, take two-- You're supposed to come in armed with that knowledge and in EH S4 vein, ask; "What's an ET?" Then I cleverly reply;
"Ex taxi!" Oh well, back to the drawing board! 
Dave Sullivan's winning FX really was an ex taxi and had been around the clock or around the world or something, a couple of times before he acquired it and breathed on it. It came to an unfortunate end when he hit a tree during a hillclimb, breaking the car in two.

[fe350chev]

Quoting the forum answer to a question.

[detective]

...thanks fe350chev  ..  i've got the link now and googling Dave Sullivan shows up a pic of his FX in the 6 hour at Caversham (race car 40) in the images section....cheers

[fe350chev]

Ok, so this doesn't prove it was coined as an fx Holden so I'm enquiring how the source data is recorded by contacting the author.

[fe350chev]

Did some more looking and the driver was a farmer and farm supplies bloke as he had adverts in the paper. See how we go. It's too hot to do much else lol.

[detective]

...i think the write up by Terry Walker will be quite correct because there are actual quotes from those two automotive journals for the six hour race at Caversham and elsewhere in that 1959 review...

...it also appears that both Dave Sullivan and Jack Ayres ran FE's earlier in the year then swung over to the FX's for the later race....hence i can see the logic in the differentiation between the two styles of Holden.....

[fe350chev]

Cos it's written and types up later though, doesn't mean fx was used that year unless he has original docs. U get what I mean.

[detective]

Hi All  ..  hope everyone is having a lovely festive season and wish you all well for 2015.

...I've been like a dog with a bloody bone lately and just HAD to find out as much as i could about the "Canadian Block" issue and the lesser topic of the term "FX"...

...I conducted a fairly major search of "The Age" newspapers via Google News and seem to have come up with a somewhat definitive first date of Saturday August 8 1959 for a "Holden '53 FX model...495 pounds" being sold by Mentone Motors....this is a full 6 months before Don Lofflers discovery in the "Herald"  dated Feb 12 1960...(Don and I have had a chuckle about all this....where will it all end?)

....also I'm almost certainly sure that the "CWC" castings lived on (till that 37,000 odd engine number change) with only their numerals and letters removed and replaced by our own...but still using the original casting boxes initially made for the prototypes...possibly with some minor mods incorporated along the way. I could be totally wrong, but these assumptions seems reasonable to me....still no Canadian Blocks though  LOL

....We received all of the neccessary items, patterns and jigs for our own manufacture via ship in late 1946 which gave us time to set up the foundry and other assorted manufacturing facilities for the late 1948 introduction, so i could really see no need for us to have to invoke any Canadian connection to get us on our way......cheers fellas

[GreyFC]

Nice info.  I posed this question to my club and basically said there is no proof of the Canadian block but one guys says he has one.  I am going g there next week to have a look.  He says its at 3 1/4 so I'll take a vernia aswell

[fe350chev]

It doesn't really matter I don't think cos even if a block was cast better, most performance gains are in the heads, cam, valves and fuel systems I would have thought, so id rate a crossflow head way above a Canadian block. I'm sure it's ppl getting mixed up with McKinnon chev engines. I have been thinking outside the square a bit lately. Wouldn't it be good to start a "go fund me" grey engine fund and use the donations to reproduce an early crossflow head and all of the syndicate people who donate agree on a price so that the heads can be made as historic replicas. I still want to see the original parts book reference. I thought it was posted at some stage?

[mcl1959]

I like the the way you have presented this scenario. This sounds totally feasible that the CWC casting boxes should be used at Holdens, albeit with the mod that the GMH logo is transferred in to replace the CWC.
It reinforces the original argument about a changed block but adds a slightly different twist with your investigation.    Well done!
Also congrats on the FX find in 1959.
Ken

[GreyFC]

There is a guy that has access to the foundry to re cast xflow heads, side plate and tappet cover but needs 5 people to go in as it cost a lot.

I would be in on go fund me

[detective]

Hi All  ..  Me again!! ....here is a wonderful snippet of info out of an article describing a visit by a journalist to Fisherman's Bend barely two weeks after the release of the Holden and written in "The Pastoral Review",  dated December 16 1948 with the heading  "The New Australian Car" ...

...out of a lengthy article comes this paragraph and I quote....

   "I purposely spent a lot of time in the foundry, which by the way is the most modern in the Southern Hemisphere and which was laid down at a cost of about 340,000 pound.  I made this thorough inspection because I had heard that IMPORTED CYLINDER BLOCKS WERE BEING USED.  Well, I witnessed the casting of cylinder blocks, from the pouring stage to the opening of the core box, and not only did I see cylinder blocks, but almost every other casting used on the car, in fact in a short space of time I saw fifty or sixty items leave the foundry for the various "finishing" departments and followed them along to the stage where anyone would have been pleased to have had them on the home mantelpiece, mounted on a nice piece of Blackwood.  They were a delight to the eye that appreciates a "high finish" in metal.

...end quote..

...as can be seen the Canadian Block rumours go right back to the very start!!....no wonder they have persisted for so long....cheers fellas