Skip to content Skip to sidebar Skip to footer

What Did the 1941 Willies Wounded Warrior Art Work Sell for?

HOTROD Brand

| Features

1940 Willys Coupe - Wounded Warrior

Reborn. At the 1966 Bakersfield March Meet, a loftier-school buddy told Dan Semchuk about a former A/Gas Supercharged coupe for auction almost his farming hometown of Corcoran, California. Semifamous amidst Central Valley elevate fans since the early '60s, the 1940 Willys was built and raced locally by the Avila brothers, who sold to the Rogers brothers around 1963. "All of them were just farm boys trying to go racing," Dan explains. "I've been told that this was the start diddled Willys in our area, originally with concatenation drive." Information technology had been parked since a disastrous clutch explosion—on the street, during a scary test drive by a previous prospective buyer.

"We'd heard at the time that one or both guys in the car got nicked [past shrapnel], but survived," he recalls. "The engine expanse took the brunt of it. The top flanges of the framerails were aptitude and the crossmember was gone. Both front end fenders were grenaded, destroyed. The inside of the passenger-side door had a 2-inch-long gash. The headliner had a couple of cuts. The dash and cowl were patched up. Whatever pedals had been in the car must've been hit, too, because what was in in that location was a inexpensive, weak assembly that looked like a new JC Whitney deal."

In a 16-twelvemonth-old'south daydreams, this was the view the competition would exist getting. Dan still kicks himself for sending the original, cut-out rear fenders to the junkyard, merely their plastic replacements wait great to the states. Currie narrowed the '64 Chrysler posi rearend associates, and then adjusted Ford axles and housing ends. A pair of quarter-elliptic leaf springs copied the Airoso brothers' proven suspension setup.

All that was left of the car's long-running small-scale-block/four-speed powertrain was a stock-width Chevy rearend. The flimsy rear fenders had been cut and recut and so drastically for tire clearance that barely anything remained. The drilled deck lid contained more lightening holes than metal. Johnny Avila had Swiss-cheesed the front backing plates to the point where the brakes barely worked in dry weather condition, and not at all in the rain. The rear wheels had already been sold, but a pair of magnesium Halibrands was all the same fastened to the Willys front beam. The kid eagerly ponied upwards all the money he had in the earth: $450.

"They also had a stock 1942 Willys sedan. I was told that I could have anything I wanted, but I'd have to bustle, 'cause that parts car was going to the dump. I took the front end axle, spindles, brakes, front fenders, and leaf springs. Those parts were all crimson when I went to pick upwardly the race machine in Tipton, merely on my manner home, both fenders flew out of the pickup bed, scuffing them upward pretty good.

Dan Semchuk'southward continuous quest for operation and efficiency is illustrated by his 780-way ProForm carburetor, mounted atop an Edelbrock EPS manifold made pretty by Caps Pulverisation Coating (Fresno). Our photographer caught Dan in the midst of ongoing experimentation with carb tuning, explaining the dissimilar metering blocks. Dan was thrilled to win this 350ci GM crate motor at a rod run ten years ago—until he tried bolting on aftermarket parts pulled from the previous minor-cake and learned that his Mexican-made block and cylinder heads were less-than-precision castings. Much grinding was necessary to install a rollerized timing chain, among other "bolt-on" accessories. Nor would these heads have respectable camshaft lift, restricting him to a conservative, 264-degree COMP bumpstick. Note the missing material between frazzle ports, which Dan removed to forestall the flanges from flexing, leaking, and loosening their fasteners. The exhaust arrangement "is my own mess," Dan says, chuckling.

"I bought this to be my street/strip car," Dan adds, "so I decided to build everything to be legal for the gas classes. That'south what my young mind was thinking at the time. I was 16 years old. That was my dream. I didn't have any more coin, so information technology just sat outside for a few months. All I did was pull the front wheels off and put 'em in my cupboard. I had a feeling they'd disappear at night subsequently someone asked if they were for sale." In 1967, he rolled the wreck from his parents' house to the little garage where he worked after school. "The boss said I could work on information technology later hours, but come Mon morning, it had to be out of the fashion, and no messes. He didn't have all the tools in the globe, but his torch and grinder were more than than I could wish for. I signed upwardly for some metal classes in junior college, just waiting for the draft, really."

Sure enough, the massive Vietnam-era call-upward caught upward with him in June 1969, deferring the dream until Dan returned from Vietnam in March 1971. Doing nearly everything himself, learning and paying as he went, the apprentice plumber wouldn't take his commencement examination ride for a full decade—past which time competitive gassers had morphed into much smaller, lighter, lower, quicker, high-dollar, mostly belatedly-model shapes bearing no resemblance whatsoever to their 1960s' ancestors. Dan resigned himself to a quieter, simpler 2d life for this rehabilitated strip warrior as street transportation.

Skipping ahead to this yr, sitting in the same wooden bleachers where he'd first heard this machine was for sale, Dan Semchuk's face and words reveal traces of regret that he never made it to the other side of the fence. Reminded that the vast bulk of old gas coupes and sedans that did soldier on as race cars for multiple owners are null more distant memories today, Dan silently digests the idea for several seconds, sighs, shrugs, and nods his head slowly, if not convincingly. He apparently has some doubts, still, simply he's the just i who does. The folks who invariably flock to his hot rod all seem pleased and relieved that such a archetype gas coupe not merely survived the Gasser Wars, but continues to entertain and educate enthusiasts nearly half a century later on.

beckerfroughts.blogspot.com

Source: https://www.motortrend.com/features/1940-willys-coupe/

Post a Comment for "What Did the 1941 Willies Wounded Warrior Art Work Sell for?"